by Les Zig
Wednesday, she’s back in jeans and a peach blouse. My heart booms and echoes my pledge from yesterday. A flightiness erupts in my stomach, and I want to run to the toilet, but instead I hurry towards the counter. An older woman with her hair in a bun approaches, and I skip several steps to beat her to the queue, so that I’m right behind the girl with the hummingbird tattoo. That’s what it is. The faerie is stupid.
The older woman scowls and I turn away in embarrassment, but then I guess she must be in her seventies and feeling the aches in her joints, a sharp pain in her hip from having to be in line—and here I am, making her wait longer!
The girl with the hummingbird tattoo is a good height—her cheek would rest against my shoulder. Her hair is tied back, and she wears a fine chain around her slender neck, although I can’t see what hangs from it. Her perfume is sweet—richer than I anticipated. I don’t know what the scent is, but it’s pleasant.
‘What can I get you?’ the barista asks her.
‘Ah, let’s see,’ she says, voice clear, hands on the edge of the counter as she bounces on her toes. ‘Could I get a ham and cheese croissant and a banana muffin?’
‘Coming right up.’
The barista moves away to fill the order, and I sway there, blocked of every approach. Even clichés desert me. Maybe I should reach across her, as if I’m getting a straw from the dispenser on the counter, and bump into her. Then I could apologise and that could be the conversation trigger.
Only it’s a horrible premise—I don’t know how she’ll react to being bumped. She might think I’ve done it to paw at her. Or her defences might go up. Or she might realise once I try to start talking to her that bumping into her was a pretence. I need help. Divine inspiration.
She turns and I turn, too intimidated to make eye contact. The old woman behind me continues to scowl. I don’t think she’s changed from her initial scowl. This is the same scowl. I hear the barista return with the girl with the hummingbird tattoo’s order, hear the exchange of money.
I spin back as she sidles off.
‘What can I get you?’ the barista asks.
‘I’ll have, um … I’ll have …’ I scan the menu. ‘I’ll be back.’
I scurry away, retreat to the toilets, splash cold water on my face and cringe at the mirror. This has become hard because I’ve built it up in my head. If I see her again, I’m going to be straightforward. Straightforward is best.
I leave the toilets and pick up my notebook as I pass my booth. Old Scowly and the barista trap me in their glares, but I don’t meet their eyes, shooting right down the promenade and out the door.
That night, I stomp around my laptop shouting nonsensical lines in the hope that I find some way to continue my book, to achieve something meaningful, to make me somebody, then maybe I won’t be so anonymous, so diffident.
I don’t sleep much, obsessing over whether I should’ve done something, and vowing that I will the next day. You always say that, is the response that rings through my head. But I vow that I will.
It’s difficult to focus on work throughout the morning, and I fluff the script through several calls. I tell myself there’s an idiocy in working myself up over something so innocuous, but it’s no longer about the girl with the hummingbird (and now that seems stupid, too) tattoo, but about my ability to take control of a situation.
Come lunchtime, I charge from the cubicles and push my way through the crowd waiting to use the lift, making sure I get in the first one down. Insane possibilities leap into my head—that the lift’s old and it might break down, that I might get trapped, that given the speed of the lifts it would’ve been quicker if I’d sprinted down the stairs, even if it is ten flights and I can’t remember the last time I sprinted.
When the lift opens, I burst out and walk quickly enough that I almost jog to Charisma’s. Somebody’s taken my usual booth. I take the one opposite then discover that the counter’s partly obscured, so I move to a table in the promenade.
The waitress—Nicole again—shows up within moments. ‘What can I get you?’ she says.
A menu sits on the table, but I check the board above the kitchen window. ‘A ham and cheese focaccia and a bottle of water,’ I say.
Nicole begins to scribble on her notepad. ‘A ham and cheese focaccia—’
‘Hang on,’ I say.
Nicole stops scribbling.
‘I’m expecting somebody, so …’
Nicole drums her pencil on her pad. I had a plan to wait for the girl with the unicorn tattoo to arrive, and then go up behind her in the queue again. Nicole’s jaw clenches and her hand tightens around her pencil.
‘Sorry, no, it’s okay,’ I say.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Yeah. Sorry.’
‘I don’t want to pressure you.’
‘It’s fine.’
Nicole leaves and I move to pick up my pen to rest it across my notebook, but in my rush, I’ve brought neither. Maybe it’s just as well, unless I have the greatest idea of all time to continue my book, and now have nowhere to record it. Ideas always come when least expected.
I focus on the door. The girl with the sunset tattoo usually comes in about 12.15. Wherever she’s coming from, she must break for lunch at 12.00 and walk down. But the only things that arrive at 12.15 are my focaccia, which Nicole unceremoniously plonks on the table, and my bottle of water. I smile, about to thank her, but she’s gone before I can say a thing.
Time ticks by. I go through the motions of eating. The food is tasteless and sticks in my throat. I eat to be done with it, wash it down with water, but the focaccia is endless. By 12.50, I’m finishing it off, and while others have come and gone, there’s no sign of the girl with the tattoo. That’s who she is: a girl with a tattoo. Just a tattoo. A dreamcatcher tattoo.
I ask Nicole for my bill and she brings it in a little leather wallet. I stick money in for the meal and a five-dollar tip. Nicole fetches the wallet wordlessly and I lean back, trying to make the water last. Charisma’s fills up with the lunchtime crowd, and it’ll be only a matter of time before they ask me to vacate the table so they can use it for customers who actually need to eat.
It’s 1.08pm now and I resign myself to the reality that the girl with the dreamcatcher tattoo won’t be showing up, when a blonde woman walks in. It’s her. I spring to my feet but the woman approaching the counter isn’t her—other than her hair colour, there’s no similarity at all.
She’s not coming. For whatever reason, Thursday’s not a day she comes in—if she’s going to come in again at all. Maybe she had a reason to be in the city on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and now she’s done. That’s it. A chance encounter that provided a limited window of opportunity, and now that window is closed forever, because that’s what windows do.
They close.
Or shatter.
I plod from Charisma’s, head back to work, and curse myself for my inaction. I should’ve said something. Anything. I approached Lisa, charmed her with some stupid lines. Of course, I’d had a few beers. And I was younger. Things are simpler when you’re younger. And stupider.
The afternoon drones on. Maybe the girl with the dreamcatcher tattoo went to Charisma’s later. That’s my insecurity. She’s living her life now, doing whatever it is she does. I try to imagine what she could be doing at this very moment, but there’s nothing. Lisa I can see. She’s taken Bobby on a play date—most likely with Joanne. Lisa and Joanne are having coffee, comparing accomplishments, laughing, possibly making fun of their better halves. Bobby and Pel—Joanne’s three-year-old son—are playing in the rumpus room. Bobby doesn’t think about me, unless he falls. Then there’s an instant in which he expects me to pick him up—an instant that grows progressively shorter with each occurrence.
I ride the train home, blinking incessantly, and offer my seat to a plump older woman. She smiles her gratitude and I weave through the packed train to brood in the doorway. Faces are stoic around me, most of them concentrated on their phones
. These people go home to their lives, and—in all likelihood—don’t spare a second thought to people they randomly encounter through the day.
Outside my block of flats, the garbage has been collected and the small television is gone. Now, all that’s there is emptiness. Here one day, gone the next, probably smashed on some heap, having left no trace on the world. It doesn’t seem fair that it was abandoned like that.
Inside, I go through my routine, but now as I prowl around my laptop, I recognise these attempts as nothing but a facade. There’ll be no words tonight, just as there haven’t been since Lisa. I should ditch this story, start something new—if I should pursue writing at all. Maybe writing is a stupid fancy and I’ve taken it as far as I can.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I take it out. ‘Hey, Gen.’
‘Hey. What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong.’ I clench my right fist. My scar peeks out from beneath my sleeve, like a jagged, mocking smile.
‘You don’t sound good,’ Gen says.
‘I’m okay, okay?’
Gen lets the silence grow, smother me, until I need to fight my way out.
‘Sometimes …’ I say. ‘Sometimes, things are what they are, y’know, and it gets to me.’
‘Life’s a collection of moments, August. You just need to get from one to the next, and put some energy into taking the right course.’
‘How do you know what’s the right course? People get married, they think it’s forever, and then it’s over; they wake up, think it’s going to be a great day, and get hit by a car—’
‘You deal with that when it happens, not if.’
Again, the silence. But this time I’m not breaking it. I close my laptop, look at the cards scattered across my coffee table, at the picture of Bobby, and start to tease open the dog-ear. No. I close it, flip the photo, get up, and grab a beer out of the fridge. I need more. I’ve mowed through them this week.
‘Hey,’ Gen says. ‘Still there?’
‘Yep.’
‘Oscar and I are coming into the city tomorrow. Catch up for lunch?’
‘Sure.’
‘Where—’
‘Charisma’s.’
‘Just after twelve?’
‘Sure.’
‘Okay. You going to be all right?’
‘I’m fine, Gen. Really.’
‘Okay. We’ll talk tomorrow, but you call me if you need me, okay?’
‘Okay.’
Again, the silence. She doesn’t want to let go. I don’t blame her. I shouldn’t scare her like this, especially given the cause is so stupid—although the girl with the dreamcatcher tattoo isn’t the actual cause. She’s just a reflection of the problem—me. My ineptitude.
‘Gen, really, I’m okay.’ I force a chuckle. ‘We’ll talk tomorrow. I’ll see you then.’
‘See you.’
I hang up, drink my beer, and watch my muted TV in silence.
5
‘You listening?’ Gen asks.
We’re in my usual booth at Charisma’s. Although we’re twins, Gen and I look nothing alike: she’s buxom but graceful—courtesy of all the years she played netball, volleyball, and hockey as a teen—and she moves with deliberation, as if everything she does is measured. About the only sign she is ruffled is her dark hair, which is a wire brush, and eyes that have grown so dark it’s like she’s over-applied mascara. Still, I can feel her underlying happiness that was mostly filled by Pat, and is now satisfied by motherhood. She rocks Oscar, napping, in her arms.
‘You were asking if I was taking care of myself,’ I say.
Gen whirls the index finger of her free hand: Go on.
I smile guiltily.
‘Are you eating?’
‘I’m eating.’
‘Properly?’
‘As well as ever.’
‘You look thin.’
‘I’m fine.’
‘You need a haircut.’
‘I like it long.’
Gen leans back in the booth. ‘Pat and I were around the other day—your cupboards and fridge were bare, so we did some shopping again—’
‘You’ve got to stop that. I mean, I appreciate it, but you and Pat can’t keep taking care of me.’
‘August, please.’
‘Same with my washing—you’re doing my washing too, aren’t you?’
‘Maybe.’
‘There’s a laundromat down the road. I can take care of myself, okay?’
‘We’re just trying to help … after everything.’
I take a deep breath, unable to meet Gen’s gaze. ‘I’ll get there.’
‘I know you will.’
Gen smiles. I shift in my seat. Oscar stirs and his eyes blink open. He’s got it easy—eat, sleep, dirty his nappy and have everybody fuss over how cute he is. If only he could stay a baby forever. I jiggle the little teddy bear at him that I bought on the way over. He closes his eyes again.
‘How’s the book?’ Gen says.
I shrug one shoulder.
‘What’s that mean?’
‘Whatever convinced me I could write a book?’
‘Because you’re creative? You used to write a lot of short stories. I hated how all that fell away when you were with That Fucking Cunt Lisa.’
‘Gen, you know I don’t like that.’
‘Sorry. That Cunt Lisa.’
I roll my eyes in the direction of the entrance.
‘You mightn’t like it but you should accept it. You’re the only one who could come out of that relationship feeling indebted to her.’
‘I wonder, okay.’
‘Wonder what?’
‘Maybe I wasn’t enough.’
‘You’re an idiot.’
‘Thanks for the sisterly support.’
‘You are. Your partner should accept you for who you are. I’m not saying you don’t have to work at it, or make concessions, but you still need to be you. Like with your writing, I’m so happy you’re trying to take it up again.’
‘I’ve been stuck for a year.’
‘Are you expecting somebody?’
‘What?’
‘You keep checking the door.’
‘Nervous habit.’ I pick up my pen, drum it on my notebook.
Oscar stirs again and whimpers. Gen pulls open her blouse. Oscar blinks at the offering.
And then, of course it happens while my sister’s sitting here trying to get Oscar to attach, the girl with the dreamcatcher tattoo walks in. But the tattoo’s not a dreamcatcher now, it’s a stallion—she’s come to rescue me. She’s wearing jeans and a cropped pink top that exposes the tattoo. Her hair’s loose for the first time; it’s not as long as I thought it would be, and flat-straight, like it’s been ironed.
‘I hoped writing would be therapeutic,’ Gen goes on. ‘But maybe …’
The girl with the stallion tattoo goes up to the counter. She’s also a creature of routine: she plants her hands on the counter, bounces on her toes, and reads the menu. The good-looking European barista behind the coffee machine runs his hands down his shirt before he approaches.
‘Maybe what?’ I ask. Damn, Gen’s got me with the silence again.
‘Maybe you need to talk to somebody.’
‘Did that. Done. Okay?’
The girl with the stallion tattoo folds her arms across her small breasts, her large eyes narrowing until her face is a study of concentration. The barista smiles, says something that must be a joke because he laughs. Or maybe he’s flirting. It seems so easy for him. He’s shaved his hair back to disguise he’s balding, and he has big, round shoulders, so he must work out. While I’ve seen him before, I’ve never registered him. Not really. But now he’s a predator—a threat.
‘I’ve got another idea,’ Gen says. She grabs my right wrist, folds her palm over my scar.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘Go get her number.’
‘What?’
‘The girl at the counter, go get her number.’
‘What’re you talking about?’
‘Last night, you tell me to meet you here before I can even ask, you’ve been constantly watching the door, and you’ve been distracted since she came in. I’m happy. Mostly. If you’re looking at other women, that means we can start to put That Cunt Lisa behind us.’
‘You think a woman like that’s going to be available?’ I ask, I recite, on autopilot.
‘The world’s made up of strange and amazing stuff.’
‘So are fairytales.’
‘Humour me.’ Gen’s voice is flat. ‘I want to see you do it.’
‘You want to see me do it?’
‘I want to see you go up and talk to her.’
‘You want to see—’
‘Stop stalling and go. Even if she shoots you down, prove to yourself there’s a world out there outside of That Cunt Lisa. You might surprise yourself.’
All my vacillating through the week, all my vows, working myself up to do this, but now Gen’s here, it’s impossible. If I’d failed before, I could’ve ditched Charisma’s, and picked any other cafe in the city to eat at. But with Gen here, it’s real.
‘Go.’
‘Go,’ I mimic.
‘What’re you afraid of? That she’ll decline?’
If I managed to ask for her number and she said no, there’d be disappointment, but also relief. That relief is the key. Lisa flashes through my mind. Arguments. Titus, Lisa’s father, waggling his finger at me. The loss of security. Bobby, standing between Lisa and me, staring, back and forth.
‘That she might say yes.’
‘Isn’t that the objective?’
‘Where do I go from there? What if I don’t meet her expectations? Maybe I won’t know how to respond in a conversation, or how to do things, or enjoy things, or just be a relationship person, or any sort of partner, and next thing you know, I’m boring her and she’s checking out other guys—’
‘Try. Okay? Get up and try. Don’t make me drag you out of this booth.’
‘Right.’
‘Right. I’ve got a better idea.’
Gen starts to scramble out of the booth. Oscar snivels as her breast bounces in front of his face. Gen nudges Oscar’s pram out of her path with her knee.