Chasing Chris Campbell

by Genevieve Gannon

  We had to remove our shoes. Our feet glided on the marble surface that was like ice. We stood below the entrance and looked up.

  ‘Come around the back with me.’ Harry took off his jacket and bundled it into a ball, placed it on the marble and lay down. I did the same. He pulled the camera to his face and looked through the view finder.

  ‘It’s hard to imagine it was all done by hand,’ he said. ‘No angle grinders in the seventeenth century.’

  He twisted the lens to get a closer look at the carvings then handed it to me so I could see.

  ‘Imagine how much he must have loved her, to build all this just to house her corpse.’

  Michael drifted into my thoughts. He had wanted to build something with me. Not a shrine perhaps, but a home. A place to keep and protect each other and our imagined children. I bit my lip.

  Harry propped himself up on his arm and looked at me. ‘What is it?’

  ‘What’s what?’

  ‘You seem upset.’

  ‘It’s nothing. I was just thinking about Michael.’

  ‘That guy in Varanasi?’

  ‘No, no, Michael’s my … ex. It feels strange to call him that, like he’s no longer a current player in my life. He’s been shifted to a past realm.’

  ‘That is what happens when you break up with someone.’

  ‘We only just broke up. Around Christmas.’

  Harry didn’t say anything.

  ‘Do you have a girlfriend?’

  ‘Nah. Not for a long time. Come on.’ He hopped up and started walking towards the entrance to the main building where we joined a tour group.

  We wandered around for about half an hour and learned about the history of the Taj. The Mughal had planned to build a black Taj exactly the same as the one that stood now. We lingered for hours, discovering hidden corners and trying to catch the light with our cameras.

  To the left of the complex was a mosque we weren’t allowed into, but we could climb to its entrance. It stood at the apex of stairs that rose as sharply as a cliff face.

  I pulled my phone out to find a message from Cass, in reply to the picture I just sent.

  I’m glad to see you’re getting out.

  ‘Look,’ I said to Harry, pointing up. The roof was covered in wasps’ nests.

  ‘Great shot.’ He aimed his camera and snapped. ‘I’ve got a treat for dinner,’ he said.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘You’ll just have to wait and see.’ He grinned.

  Following instructions he had written on a piece of paper, Harry led me to a doorway in a busy street not far from our hotel. Upstairs was a place dressed up like an American fast food joint. There were waitresses in pink smocks and boys behind the counter in pointed, white pillbox caps. Chrome stools faced the counter-tops where burgers and fries were served. The rest of the customers sat at red polished banquettes. There were smorgasbord-style serving stations and an all-you-can-eat dessert bar.

  ‘I still wouldn’t recommend the salads,’ Harry said. ‘But look.’ He held up a menu illustrated with pencilled sketches. ‘Milkshakes. Real milk.’

  ‘Contraband!’ I grinned. I ordered vanilla and he ordered strawberry.

  ‘How did you find out about this place?’ I asked as we slurped.

  ‘The tour guide at the Taj told me. He said people were always asking him where to go to get western food.’

  ‘Oh, that’s kind of sad,’ I said.

  ‘Says the girl whose wildest desire is a forkful of lettuce.’

  ‘You never finished telling me about your love life,’ I said, relishing the foamy milk.

  Harry screwed up his face. ‘There was a girl, Leanne. She was a vet, an animal nut.’

  ‘Vegetarian?’

  ‘No. More of your kitten loving type of animal nut than moralistic crusader like you.’

  ‘Do you think I’m moralistic?’

  ‘Not in a bad, preachy way. In a thoughtful way.’

  That satisfied me. ‘So what happened with Leanne?’

  Harry shrugged. ‘We grew apart. She had a big heart. She was … kind.’ He went quiet.

  We sat and looked out the window at life-threateningly frayed wires while sucking from straws like teens in an American soda ad. We ordered another round. Harry’s attention was focused on a couple chatting under a streetlight. His parenthetic dimples had melted into his skin, which still had its soft, freshly shaved look from this morning.

  ‘She was very beautiful,’ he said after a moment.

  Suddenly I didn’t want to hear any more about Leanne and her perfect bone structure. ‘What else would you like to do in Agra before our train leaves tomorrow night?’

  After ordering a plate of donut holes, Harry said he wanted to ride elephants.

  ‘Be careful,’ I said. ‘Some of them are treated very badly.’

  We’d already seen the famous ‘dancing’ bears in chains along the roadside as the bus had driven towards Agra that morning. The bears’ owners, traditionally from nomadic groups known as the Kalandars, poach the bear cubs when they’re young and use hot irons to pierce their nose or palate. The wound never heals properly and the owners use it as a means to controlling the beasts, leading them around by a rope that is threaded through the raw piercing.

  The waitress delivered a plate of donut balls rolled in cinnamon sugar. I put one in my mouth. They weren’t as good as the galab juman we’d been eating most days but they were warm.

  ‘How do you know about the elephants?’ Harry asked.

  ‘Animal cruelty sort of became a hobby of mine. Reading about it. Not doing it. I used to work with lab rats. Animal testing is absolutely necessary for the development of medicine, but I did the best I could for them. When I felt bad I’d go to the library or search online to find case studies of people who would be helped by the drugs. Whenever I come across animal cruelty I get really mad.’

  ‘Hence the vegetarianism,’ Harry said.

  I nodded.

  ‘I see,’ he said.

  Then he snatched the last donut hole from the plate. ‘I’m saving you. It was cooked in animal fats.’

  He bit it in half and passed the rest to me.

  After dinner we walked through the friendly street racket admiring shopfronts.

  ‘And they say New York is the city that never sleeps.’

  ‘I love the way nothing ever closes,’ I said as we passed store after store full of people chatting and laughing.

  The area we had stumbled into was filled mostly with jewellery stores. There were two types – one that sold fake-looking yellow gold jewellery, and one that sold tarnished silver and chunky, coloured stones.

  ‘You should get yourself a souvenir,’ Harry said, bending over a window display.

  ‘What is that doing here?’ I pointed at a silver Swastika on a chain.

  ‘It’s an ancient Hindu symbol,’ he explained. ‘It’s a lucky charm. Or at least, it used to be.’

  I selected a piece of coral on a chain instead. Harry hooked it around my neck. His fingers tickled the nape as he closed the clasp.

  ‘It suits you,’ he said. I blushed with pleasure and checked it in a handheld mirror.

  ‘I look awful,’ I said. My eyes were tired and my skin was pale.

  ‘Let me see.’ Harry took the mirror and peered into it. ‘I don’t see anything awful in here.’

  I snatched it from him and gave him a shove. I retrieved a brown eye pencil from the pocket of my daypack and started to draw in some colour around my lashes.

  ‘You don’t need it,’ Harry plucked the pencil from my fingers.

  We wandered back to the hotel in silence. In my room I lay on the bed, touching the silver links of the chain where it rested on my skin. It was a nice compliment, to say I didn’t need makeup. I thought about another time someone had said that. It was the end of school muck-up party and the boys had roared down the main road in a car, pelting us with eggs and water balloons. A water bomb had hit me in the face causing
my first attempt at eye makeup to run down my cheek. I leaned down to the side mirror of the nearest parked car and tried to re-draw the cat-eye like Cass had shown me. After a minute or two of creating wobbly, blobby wings on my lash line I realised Chris Campbell as watching me. He dropped his water bomb in the dirt and came towards me. I lowered the eyeliner.

  ‘You don’t need it,’ he’d said, cupping my face.

  I leapt up and ran downstairs to check my email. Still nothing. I bit my thumb and pulled my phone out to text Cass.

  Taj was amazing. Have just had dinner and strolled streets. How’s everything? Any news? Say hi to Mum and Zachman.

  I sat holding my phone. But there was no reply. She was probably studying, or in class.

  When Cass had travelled overseas she had written long, detailed emails once every few weeks. I’d seized on each message like a hungry dog. Her being away had unsettled me. I’d felt disconnected, so I had turned to Michael to fill the void. Now I had no Cass and no Michael.

  Harry and I took a bus to the Agra Fort, climbing a winding path to reach the top on foot, and passing several tour operators giving visitors rides on elephants. The red sandstone fortress looked particularly magnificent against the spotless blue sky. Inside its 2.5 kilometre perimeter was the Mughal rulers’ imperial city. I snapped a photo and sent it to Cass. She wrote back immediately.

  Who’s that?

  I looked at the picture I’d sent. The back of Harry’s head and shoulder were in the frame.

  Harry. He’s travelling too.

  Seconds later my pocket vibrated. He looks cute. Take a proper photo! Show me!

  ‘Harry,’ I called. ‘Hold still.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘My sister wants to see what you look like.’

  ‘Have you been talking about me?’

  ‘Only so she can file an accurate police report.’

  He laughed. ‘The lady doth protest too much.’

  ‘She just wants to make sure you’re not an axe murderer.’ He held still while I captured his face on my screen. ‘We’re twins. She believes in twin telepathy, so she has a vested interest in making sure I’m not hacked to death.’

  ‘Twin telepathy, really?’

  I shrugged and told him the story Mum used to tell us to stop us fighting when we were little. She said we had a special bond and had to look out for each other.

  ‘It happened not long after we were born. Mum had put us down for a nap but after only half an hour Cass started to fuss. I was sound asleep and Mum didn’t want me to be disturbed so she picked up Cass and took her into the lounge room. She fed, burped, and changed her, and content, Cass fell asleep again. Moments later she jerked awake and burst into an intense, urgent cry.

  ‘She’d been burped so she wasn’t gassy. She was clean and fed and her temperature was normal. Still, she wouldn’t stop screaming.

  ‘As Mum walked her back and forth jiggling her and rubbing her back a thought struck her. She hurried to our room. She felt certain it was me that was in trouble and scooped me out of the crib. She was right, I was having a seizure. My face was blue and I was convulsing. Mum called an ambulance, and I was rushed to hospital.

  ‘To this day she swears she never would have gone into the room if it hadn’t been for Cass. I hadn’t made a sound and I could have died in my crib. Another unexplained cot death.’

  ‘That’s some story,’ said Harry.

  ‘Yeah. The idea buried itself in Cass’s brain and she’s been obsessed with it ever since. She’s always looking for other examples of twin telepathy.’

  ‘But you don’t believe it?’

  I screwed up my nose. When we were kids I wanted to believe it. I’d test it by poking Cass after she’d gone to sleep. I’d stick her with my finger to see if I felt the jab. I’d pull her hair and drop water on her forehead from a cup to see if a cool sensation would spread over me. I once even stuck her arm with a sewing needle to see if it would draw blood from mine.

  ‘I can see why she wouldn’t want you getting hacked up.’

  ‘Exactly,’ I said, sending the photo.

  Cass replied a few minutes later. Oh my God. He is HOT!!

  I wrote back. What? No he’s not.

  Um. Yes. He. IS. My eyeballs just ovulated.

  I laughed.

  ‘She likes you,’ I told Harry. ‘See. More evidence that flies in the face of twin telepathy.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  What I want to say about the Agra train station is that it was crowded. But then all of India is crowded. If you ever hear a story about India, incorporate a detail the teller might not bother to relay: three thousand people haggling, begging, laughing or just squatting on the sidelines watching. When you picture Agra train station, multiply this number by five.

  We had arrived an hour early for our train to Varanasi.

  ‘Indian timetables are more like a rough guide than an actual timetable,’ Harry said. ‘Nothing here is an exact science.’

  We had dinner in a cafe inside the station, sharing a table with an older American couple, who ate with their packs on their pudgy laps. The husband was tallying up the cost of what they were ordering, and the woman was speaking in a patronising tone to the waiter, berating him for not having Minute Maid – which was a fruit drink, from what I could gather.

  ‘That’s eighty for the poppadums, a hundred and twenty rupees for the curry,’ the man said to the waiter who was nodding patiently.

  ‘And we want fresh bottled water, but no gas,’ his wife told the waiter. ‘No gas. You got it?’

  He nodded and departed. When he came back he was bearing carbonated drinks. The woman stared at them and stuck her bottom lip out.

  ‘I said no gas,’ she whined to her husband.

  When the waiter returned with their food the woman reprimanded him. ‘What are you, deaf or something?’

  At 7 pm Harry looked at his watch and announced we had to go. I put a few extra samosas in a paper bag and stashed them in my daypack. On the way out I dropped a large tip into the jar by the register, hoping to compensate for the boorish couple. I was in a good mood. That morning I’d had an email from Chris and I was feeling light and hopeful.

  Vy!!

  How are you liking India? The Ganges was a trip! Unbelievable. Can’t wait for you to see it. Catcha soon! x

  He had already been to the river. We had to hurry.

  ‘The train probably won’t be on time,’ said Harry. ‘Unless we’re late. In which case it will definitely be on time.’

  The train wasn’t on time. It wasn’t even in sight. We dropped our packs and sat on the platform. It was scheduled to arrive at 7:15 pm. But at quarter to nine we were still perched on our luggage, waiting. Harry went to buy a large pack of masala-flavoured chips and some cans of beer. At 10:05 the ancient engine, splattered with red paan stains, which never failed to remind me of blood, eased into the platform at a relaxed pace.

  There were no rooms or private carriages, just bunks lining the walls. The eastern wall had beds running along it. The western wall was divided by shorter walls that stuck out from it horizontally and had bunks built into them.

  ‘Aren’t there any doors?’ I asked.

  ‘Nope,’ Harry said, lowering his backpack. I watched the other men and women claiming their beds with the swing of a suitcase or the dropping of a bag. There were bright blue curtains that provided a scintilla of privacy.

  I found number 15 and was startled to find a man in a neat brown suit with a briefcase seated on the end of the bed. I checked my ticket again. Number 15.

  ‘Are you sure we’re in the right carriage?’ I asked Harry.

  ‘Definitely,’ he said.

  ‘Um, excuse me,’ I said to the businessman. ‘You’re on my bed’

  ‘So sorry,’ he said and wiggled a few inches towards the end. He patted the space to his right where he had created more room for me.

  ‘No, I don’t think you understand,’ I said.

  ‘I ju
st wait for the conductor,’ he said.

  ‘But –’

  He patted the spot next to him again. I sat timidly. A young Indian man with a backpack flung his bag onto the top bunk opposite.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘A lot of people hang around hoping someone won’t turn up and they’ll be able to get a ticket. He won’t be here long.’

  He said something in Hindi to my bed mate. The man nodded and replied.

  ‘Yeah. He’s just waiting to see if there’s a spare bed.’

  ‘Oh. Okay.’ I didn’t want to cause a fuss. I pulled my book from my daypack and pretended to read. Really I was watching the businessman at the end of my bed. He sat perfectly upright with his eyes forward. His hands were folded neatly in his lap and his briefcase sat by his side like a faithful dog. Guilt squirmed inside me. He was perfectly harmless. But I still wanted him to get off my bed.

  Finally the train rocked into life. I cleared my throat. The conductor came by and punched a hole in our tickets. He nodded and chatted to the businessman on my bed as he cross-checked my bunk number.

  He was about to move on when I interrupted.

  ‘Excuse me, are there any spare bunks?’

  The conductor shook his head. ‘Spare bunks? No madam.’

  He took the ticket from the person above me in bunk 16 then moved to Harry. The conductor wasn’t worried by the spare passenger. Neither was anybody else. I folded my arms and pouted. I asked myself what Cass would do in this situation.

  I could hear her saying, This is what travel is about. Make new friends. Have an adventure!

  She would have given up her bed to the businessman, and moved to another part of a train where she would have stumbled across people who were having a party, and then spent the night singing and sharing recipes for pekora. But I wasn’t Cass.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I addressed the conductor. I said it loud enough for the man on my bed to hear. I felt rude but I needed sleep. I was tired from sitting upright on my pack for two hours waiting for the train. I couldn’t share with him all night.

  The businessman didn’t move.

  The conductor said something to the businessman. He ignored him. The conductor repeated it more sternly. The businessman replied in an irritated tone, collected his briefcase and left. Feeling slightly mean, I pulled off my shoes and stretched out on my bunk. I picked up my book and re-read everything I had just pretended to read.