I searched the articles for clues as to what was going on in his life. All I learned was that he was publishing a book about totalitarianism. It was both a relief and a disappointment to find that the articles contained no mention of me.
I read his articles every day. It was wrong and it was doing me no good but I didn’t know how to stop.
After our trip to the cove, John adopted a formal politeness towards me. If he needed to walk past me in the studio he left a generous distance between our bodies. We discussed work but he no longer asked me questions about my life.
Today he sat at a desk doing paperwork while I polished glass bottles for a sculpture. The silence allowed me to submerge myself in unwanted thoughts and I was overcome by the beginning of tears. Angry, I wiped my eyes with the polishing cloth. I didn’t even know what I was crying about – was it the letters or everything else?
‘Hey.’ John got up from his desk and sat next to me on the floor. He raised an arm, as though to put it around me, and then retracted it. After a moment he said, ‘Sorry Ania, I shouldn’t have done it. It’s just, it was so good to have someone to talk to. About art and stuff. I lost my head but it’s screwed back on now, see?’ He clamped his hands on his face and twisted it to one side, then the other.
Despite myself, I laughed. ‘I miss home.’ I dabbed the polishing cloth to my nostrils.
John dug into the pocket of his shorts and surprised me by pulling out a neatly pressed handkerchief. I blew my nose on it.
‘My parents were like that,’ he said. ‘Even after living here all these years, they still kept referring to Greece as home. Everything was better over there – the food, the weather, everything. When they finally went back for a visit, you know what happened? They couldn’t stand the place! Still, it didn’t stop them from missing it when they got back.’
My laughter gave way to tears at the thought that maybe I would end up like that. I told John about the letters.
‘Why don’t we give them a proper burial?’ he said.
I nodded and wiped my nose with the handkerchief before giving it back. He held it reluctantly between his fingers and then tucked it in his pocket.
We finished work early and rode over to my bungalow. John sat on the kitchen bench, swinging his legs back and forth, looking around the sparse room. ‘Why didn’t you say you don’t have any furniture?’
‘I don’t need.’ Though I’d cleaned the bungalow on arrival, I’d done nothing to make it feel like a home.
‘Still,’ John said, ‘seems a bit extravagant of me, using chairs for a sculpture when you don’t have any to sit on.’ He hopped down from the bench and swung open the cupboard doors, revealing neatly stacked tins. ‘At least you have food.’ He made a show of counting. ‘Eight cans of peaches. Eleven – no, twelve tins of ham.’
I shot him a dark look and he closed the cupboard.
Looking repentant, he zipped open his backpack. ‘I wanted to give you this. For the letters. You don’t have to use it if you don’t want to.’ He handed me a small wooden box. The lid was painted with an intricate picture of a tree, its roots reaching deep into the earth. ‘I made it a while back.’
This was the first time I’d seen an object that John had made with his own hands. I lifted the lid, testing the hinges. The box was well made. It smelt like talcum powder and spice. I thanked him. ‘This is just right.’
Outside, the falling sun cast an orange glow on the horizon, making the hills look like they were on fire. We walked between symmetrical rows of trees that were specked with small oranges, making our way to the far end of the grove where a steel fence kept the rainforest at bay. Here was a tree that was different from the others: it grew knobbly green fists of fruit. The farmer had told me that the fruit were called Custard apples. I wondered if he was having a joke with me. If he was, I didn’t care. I was enchanted with the idea of apples that grew their own custard.
John crouched by the tree and dug at the earth with a small spade. I placed the box of letters inside and packed the dirt back over. We stood and I crossed myself and murmured a prayer. When I glanced at John, his hands were also clasped together.
As the light departed from the sky, we walked back to the bungalow.
‘See you tomorrow, then,’ John said. He hopped on his rusty bike and rode away. If it wasn’t for what happened at the cove I might have asked him to stay. I needed the company. The ritual with the letters was supposed to make me feel better but instead I was emptied out, as though I’d buried Father all over again.
The evening before I left for London, I went down to the beach for one last swim.
At this hour the water took on the dark sheen of a crow. I discarded my clothes and walked into the sea. Something bumped into my leg – a fish, perhaps. I dipped my hands in, trying to find it.
I waded further out. When the water came up to my stomach, I closed my eyes and plunged under. My ears filled with the gurgling sound of my exhale. I gasped to the surface, the taste of salt in my mouth.
Lying on my belly, I pulled my hands through the water. Bright specks of phosphorescence trailed through my fingers, tiny stars that had fallen to the sea.
11
England, September 1983
‘Rumour has it there’s a Basquiat going for a steal.’ John rolled up the catalogue and pointed it in the direction of the stall. As we hurried through the art fair, he nodded to other passers-by before turning to me and hissing, ‘A Basquiat! Can you believe it?’
The white-domed ceiling glistened with fluorescent lights. Its high, curved structure reminded me of the train station in Wrocław. We were on the ground floor of the art fair, in an enormous rectangular room that was subdivided into stalls. On the level above us, people leaned over balcony railings, clutching glasses of champagne. On the ground floor, at the back of the room, was a video installation: a middle-aged woman wrapped a length of white bandage around her body, mummifying herself. I watched as she wrapped the bandage around and around and around.
Exhaustion rolled over me. Unlike John, I was still suffering from jetlag. Breaking my gaze away from the video, I plucked a couple of glasses of champagne from the tray of a waiter. He gave me an indulgent smile and then whisked the tray towards a thin man who was examining a painting through a monocle.
I took a sip of the liquid. Bubbles dissolved sour on my tongue. ‘This champagne is like lemons,’ I said to John.
‘Oh yeah?’ He was inspecting a painting of a naked woman kneeling by a bucket. To my disappointment, there were few sculptures at the fair and none of the paintings struck me as being particularly inspiring. Perhaps I was simply tired. Taking in all this art demanded more energy than I had.
‘Wait here.’ John beelined for a nearby coffee table and returned with a small packet of sugar. Grinning, he sprinkled the white crystals into my champagne. The liquid fizzed and bubbled over. ‘That’ll perk you up.’
I brought my lips to the glass, sucking the excess. Particles of sugar dissolved on my tongue.
‘Better?’ He straightened his jacket and then directed us to the stall he wanted to see. A couple of people had to exit before there was space for us to go in.
Finally, here was a painting that excited me. It was of a bulky male figure, a white skeleton superimposed on his black skin. The man gritted his teeth as he pulled a fish from the water by its tail. The tangled brushstrokes had an energy, wild and direct. It was as though the artist had removed his paintbrush from the canvas the very moment before it was hung on the wall.
‘This one is alive,’ I said.
John consulted his catalogue. ‘Damn … Not what I’m after. I thought it would have a crown on it. That’s what he’s known for.’
‘A crown?’ I gave a laugh. ‘You can add one yourself,’ I pointed my champagne glass to the top of the painting.
The stallholder, who had been talking to a woman with a small dog in her handbag, cleared his throat. I backed away.
‘Can’t win them all,’
John said.
His exhibition, White Water, was opening tomorrow night. When we visited the gallery earlier today, one of the sculptures was still in a wooden crate plastered with stickers that read, ‘This Way Up.’ I had told John that I wanted to help the gallery staff prepare for opening night. ‘Impossible,’ he’d said. ‘I need you with me.’ During our four days in London, I’d accompanied him to interviews with journalists in hotel dining rooms, to the apartment of an underfed woman who collected art, and now here.
‘If this painting is no good,’ I gestured to the black figure, ‘we can go back to the gallery. See it’s okay.’
‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘They’ve got things under control.’ He pushed back his sleeve and consulted his watch. ‘It’d be great if you’d do me a favour and pick up my suit from the dry cleaners. I’ll need it for the opening.’ He lips made a sucking sound. ‘Speaking of which, what are you going to wear?’
‘I have not thought of this,’ I said.
‘Look.’ He dug his hand into his pocket. ‘You can say no if you want to, but how would you like to buy yourself a dress?’ He handed me a plastic card with his full name on it: John Bautista Papageorgiou.
I handed it straight back.
‘It’s a business expense. Take it,’ he pressed the card on me. ‘You’ll be meeting a lot of important people tomorrow and we’re not in Kansas anymore.’
‘What?’
‘Just an expression. It doesn’t matter.’
Outside, the cold gnawed at my cheeks. My jetlag ebbed away and I felt alert. I considered going to the gallery to check that the sculptures were properly installed, but decided against it. John had made it clear that we would get in the way of the staff. Besides, it was exhilarating to be on my own in a foreign city. The last few days had been spent indoors and now I finally had the chance to take in London, with its rush of black-clad figures, its enormous red buses and pale oyster sky.
An ambulance sped past. Its siren blared but no one else looked its way. The noise receded and then there was punk music as a young man with coiffed hair strode towards me, cradling a tape deck on his shoulder. With a cigarette in his mouth, he mumbled something indecipherable.
I walked on, staring up at the red brick buildings before colliding with a sign on the footpath. I stopped to fix it, my hands grasping a cartoon woman in a tight orange dress. Painted across her middle was the beguiling instruction, “Try Our Macs ‘n’ Mash.” As I rearranged the sign, a tall lady with dark skin walked past, a beautiful purple and gold material fluttering around her. Nearby was a boarded-up shop. On the planks nailed across the windows, someone had spray-painted music notes, together with the words, “Don’t Cry For Me Maggie Thatcher.”
After the languid pace of North Queensland, the city made my fingertips tingle. Dazed by the noise and the traffic and the people, I lost my bearings. I looked around for a shop where I might buy a map, the moan in my stomach reminding me that I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. I passed a few clothes shops, then a cinema, and then, as if by magic, I saw a sign that announced: Polski Sklep.
The shop was cosy and smelt of rose-jam doughnuts. A man with a fuzz of grey hair stood behind the counter, wearing a red and white apron. As I walked in he smiled broadly and said, ‘Dzień dobry.’
‘Good day,’ I greeted him in Polish. The shop was decorated with pictures of the Tatra Mountains, Wawel Castle and the Pope. The shelves were lined with jars of pickles, sauerkraut and herring, and the deli counter was packed with cold meats and cheese – far more food than we’d ever see in a grocery store in Poland. I bought a doughnut. Its warm jam filled my mouth as the shopkeeper asked me questions about Poland. He nodded as I told him about the curfews and the protests, the censors listening to our telephone calls. To my relief he didn’t ask why I’d left.
When I finished eating, he said, ‘Pani must have another.’ Using a pair of tongs, he extracted a doughnut from the display cabinet and put it on a ceramic plate. He set it on the counter by a photocopied flier for the London Solidarność movement. Next to this was a Polish newspaper and also a religious magazine. Then I spotted the journal that Dominik wrote for, Świat Kultury. My hand rested on the matte cover and without intending to, I bought it. As an afterthought I remembered to buy a map.
I sat at a plastic table in the corner of the shop. My fingers left spots of oil on the pages as I flicked through the journal, searching for Dominik’s face. I found him on page ten. He had, incredibly, got an interview with Miłosz, who was one of his heroes. Miłosz was quoted as saying that anyone could fall in love, but being able to act with love towards another person was an entirely different matter. It was this acting with love that was so dangerous in politically repressed societies. To this, Dominik’s response was, “You’re right. Love humanises us. It offers a radical force for change. That’s why they’re so scared of it.”
My heart quickened. In the opposite mirror, I could see I was flushed. How could Dominik write so eloquently about these things and yet know nothing about them?
The next page contained details about the book that Dominik had published, together with information about a speaking tour he was doing to promote it. There were events taking place every couple of days; at universities, in bookshops, and at Polish associations across the country. Casting a glance at the shopkeeper, who was now occupied with a woman buying bread, I used a pen to mark Dominik’s speaking engagements on my map, plotting out his movements for the next couple of weeks. I imagined turning up, startling him, armed with everything I wanted to say. Which was what? That I was angry? That I missed him every day.
‘Dziękuję,’ I thanked the shopkeeper on my way out.
He beckoned me over and slipped me something. It was a sweet wrapped in pink and silver foil.
Back on the street, a group of school children passed me as I consulted my map. Turning it this way and that, I navigated my way to a nearby shopping district.
Glass doors opened to a room that rustled with taffeta and tulle. I checked the price tag on a simple black dress and pulled away, astonished. As I was walking out, I noticed a rack that read ‘Half Price.’ The clothes had various faults such as missing buttons and torn hems. I was drawn to a soft, fibrous material. This turned out to be a long-sleeved evening dress made of velvet. There appeared to be nothing wrong the dress, and it was a beautiful colour, the same green as the hills at home. But that couldn’t be right. The hills in Poland were dewy green, not emerald like this. Then it dawned on me. When I’d thought of ‘the hills at home’, I had meant the ones in Australia.
12
My plans to get to the exhibition early were thwarted by John. He insisted that we go together, and one hour after I had knocked on his hotel door, he still hadn’t found anything to wear. The dry-cleaned suit was lying on the bed, sheathed in plastic. John had decided that it was ‘all wrong’ for the opening. My temples pricked with irritation. His room, though bigger than mine, felt too small for the both of us. He sat on the bed sorting through his clothes while I stood at the other end of the room by the window. On the street below, a police car sped past, its lights flashing on the wet street. John wandered over to the mirror. He held a striped shirt to his chest and then a plain one. On the bedside table, the digital clock flipped its digits to 19:00.
I paced the room, kicking a couple of balled-up socks out of my way. ‘I think you are scared for your exhibition,’ I told him. ‘That’s why you are … What’s the word? Wasting of time.’
John scraped his fingers through his hair and looked around. He snatched a dark green shirt from the floor. ‘I’ll wear this one.’
I waited on the bed while he got dressed in the bathroom. When he came out I clapped my hands. He looked distinguished in his formal trousers and shirt – in Australia I was used to seeing him in just a pair of shorts. ‘We go now,’ I said.
He lassoed a tie in my direction. ‘Give us a hand with this?’
I flicked the tie back to him and stood up. Making h
is sculptures was one thing, I wasn’t going to dress him as well. ‘You must do yourself. And hurry. We are late.’
John looped the tie around his neck, struggled with the knot and then cast it aside.
As I’d predicted, the gallery was crowded by the time we arrived. I stood on my tiptoes and caught sight of the waterfall of chairs flowing from the gallery ceiling. ‘No,’ I said to John. ‘It doesn’t belong like that. It needs to be more curved.’ Curved? That didn’t seem to be the right word.
John said, ‘Ania. Things have been so crazy I haven’t had a chance to thank you properly. And I’ve got a surprise for you. Truth is, I’m a bit nervous about it.’ He paused in his tracks and then massaged the deep lines on either side of his mouth. ‘The thing is … Actually you’ll find this flattering –’
The gallery director approached us. Her evening dress made the swooshing sound of a plastic bag. She enveloped John in her long arms and then pulled him away to meet someone. He turned back to me, indicating I should follow.
‘Go,’ I mouthed. I wanted to see the sculptures by myself. Even though they weren’t my pieces, I had still made them.
Standing under the waterfall of chairs, I looked up at the fretwork of white wood, the black-painted walls showing through the gaps. The sculpture wasn’t arranged quite the way I wanted. I would speak to the staff about adjusting its position. I continued through the gallery, coming to the cube of clear plastic with a triangle fitted inside. There wasn’t much to the piece and I had discouraged John from exhibiting it. Yet as I regarded it, an older man stage-whispered to the younger man at his side: ‘I love it. I have to have it.’
Behind the plastic cube was a piece that I quite liked for its audacity as much as anything. It consisted of a row of glass milk bottles, mounted to the wall, each filled with clear liquid. Holy water from the churches that John had visited in various countries: Greece, Yugoslavia, America, England and Australia. In the process of being transported here, the water from the Yugoslavian church had leaked into the packing crate. Together, John and I had come up with the idea of replacing it with tap water. He gave the piece a new title, Spot the Fake. A woman in a polka dot skirt stood in front of it, consulting the exhibition catalogue. ‘How much?’ the man by her side wanted to know. She showed him the catalogue and he snorted. ‘If you want a bottle of water, I’ll buy you one at Tesco.’
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