I get back to serving and mingling, but always at a distance from him, even though I can feel him pulling me like a magnet. No matter who I’m serving, what I’m inanely chatting about, I’m aware of him. The weird, annoying thing is that if I do actually sneak a look, I catch him looking at me. He grins each time. And each time this happens, I turn away as quickly as I can. But there’s a heat along my spine that his eyes and smile are stoking.
At one stage, I’m at the kitchen sink pouring drinks, wondering how much longer it’ll take before I settle down, when I hear Ralph next to me. ‘Can my mum have a glass of water? She went to the beach today and I reckon she got sunstroke.’ I can’t say anything. It’s taking all my concentration to keep that wine bottle steady, pouring into the glasses and not onto the tray. I’m too stressed to look up at him so I don’t even know if he’s looking at me or the tray of glasses.
‘The sunscreen and sunhat idea never quite caught on with their generation, hey? I think Mum spent the seventies frying herself in the sun to try and make herself look darker so she’d be sexier to Dad.’
By this point, I’ve managed to put the wine bottle down and reach up to the cupboard for another glass. Now, it almost slips out of my hand. His hand springs forward to catch it, but thankfully I’ve rescued it by – oh my God, how loserish – hugging it to my chest so my breasts are squeezed up a little over the edge of my dress. And that’s just where his hand accidentally lands to rescue the glass before he hastily pulls back. I don’t want to be watched and touched like this any more, like a wriggling insect dissected by guys who can make me totally frustrated and flustered.
And how dare he slag off his mum like that! Yeah, some women will do anything to please a guy. I did. I could’ve been left with a baby or some disease out of that wish-it-was-forgettable experience. A baby that this idiot smirking about his mum wouldn’t want anything to do with. I’m never going to go through all that again, and that means I’m not interested in this sexist moron’s opinions on how women try to be sexy to please men.
I put on a scornful face and hand him the glass with such a sharp ‘there’s iced water in the fridge’ that it wipes his smile away. I grab the tray, gripping it till my fingers hurt, and I shove past him. After I get the wine glasses out to some guests, I don’t stay and chat. I head further outside to the cooling dusk air, find a side of the patio where I can be alone and slow my breathing. My cheeks are burning and I want to cry. I fan my face with my hand, and wait for the memories to settle back.
But there’s something else I’m not ready to experience. That tanned hand on my breast. The way that momentary touch instantly made me melt between my thighs, sent the heat spreading inside me. I look up into the darkening sky, hoping for some cooling dew to fall onto my face. I don’t want to get interested in another guy at all for a long, long time. I don’t like feeling that attraction, that tingling in my crotch and up my spine, because now I know where it takes you.
‘Hey.’ His voice makes me jump. I’m angry, embarrassed, speechless – and melting. He sits down next to me on the edge of the patio. My head’s lowered and I can see his thighs and knees contour those jeans, his tanned arms resting gently on those thighs. What gives him the right to do this to me? ‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine,’ I snap, sounding so not fine. Don’t start in with the I’m a real sensitive guy right up till I have sex with you routine, I want to add.
He sits there quietly for a while, checking out the velvety darkening sky, the flowers, the backs of his (yes, sexy, sculpted) hands. I force myself to stare out to the sky to avoid staring at those hands and thighs. ‘Don said you’re up from Adelaide. Quite different for you here, I’d imagine.’
‘Look, Adelaide’s not exactly in the wilds. We’re quite civilised, you know. We don’t spear kangaroos or live in bark huts.’
He starts laughing. Laughing, would you believe! ‘Well, some of us don’t think that kind of life would be uncivilised actually.’ He turns to me now, his knee just gently against my thigh. ‘Have I said or done something to upset you? I feel like I’ve somehow …’
I can’t reply. My eyes inadvertently look down to our touching bodies. His gaze follows. He shifts away a little, then shrugs. ‘Do I bother you?’ He’s actually managing to sound worried. ‘Is who I am a problem for you?’ I don’t understand that tinge of anxiety in his voice. What an actor.
‘Yeah, you do bother me.’ Now that he’s not touching me, I find my voice. I even manage to look at him, into a face that’s put on a furrowed troubled look, while I blurt out, ‘I’m just sick of guys who think they own the world and get their kicks making you feel like you’re dumb or hopeless. I know I’m out of place here. But your macho attitude, “look at me, I’m so cool, I got the power” is so not cool.’
Ralph’s nodding slowly, like he’s trying to piece something together. ‘Sorry, Pina.’ No, don’t say my name in that mellow voice. ‘I didn’t realise I was coming across like that. Believe me, I don’t own the world.’ His hands are clasped between his knees. He shakes his head with a weird kind of weary smile. ‘And I know about feeling out of place.’
I can’t help it. I’m a mushy marshmallow and that’s what gets me into this kind of trouble. But we’re on this patio and it’s safe and this is where it’ll stop. I’ll never see him again after this. Why does that thought not sit so well?
‘It’s okay. Just the way you spoke about your mum. So what if she liked your dad and wanted to look good for him! Does that give you the right to stir her? Just so typically sexist. I hope your dad appreciated her more than you would. Are your parents still together or did he dump her ’cos she tried too hard?’
‘No, he’d never dump her. He adores her. He’s on nightshift so he couldn’t make it here today. They fought so hard to be together – I think they must really love each other. Her parents, my nonni, made it hell. You know what old Italians can be like?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Your parents still together?’
‘Yeah … I guess so.’
‘Still in love?’
‘Yeah … I guess they are.’
‘That’s seen as real rare these days, hey?’
‘Well, mine aren’t so typical.’
‘Neither are mine.’
Ralph’s gone back to checking out the sky. His teeth shine through that easy confident grin of his. How could anyone who looks like this, carries himself like this and charms you so easily, ever feel out of place? Anyway, I tell myself, I’m at my uncle’s party and the last thing I want going around is that I was rude to one of his guests. So I’ll be nice, then say goodbye in a few minutes and that’ll be that. Make small talk, be sassy, show him he doesn’t unsettle me any more.
‘So which part of Italy are your parents from?’
‘My mother’s Calabrian, but she was born here. So was my dad.’
‘So you’re third generation too.’
‘On my mother’s side but who knows how many on Dad’s side. All been a bit lost, or killed off.’ He can tell he’s lost me. ‘You know, my dad being a Murri and all that.’
A Murri? Just for one pathetic second I find myself thinking, now what part of Italy are Murris from? And then it hits me. His dad is Aboriginal.
‘No, I didn’t know.’ I’m such a dumb-ass loser!
‘You mean, it isn’t obvious from my skin?’
‘You look like a dark wog.’
‘Well, yeah, I am, sort of.’ He brushes my arm with his as he leans in with a snigger. ‘I thought Don might’ve told you a little about me.’
I shake my head and smirk. ‘Why would he tell me about you?’
‘Now don’t get snarky again. It’s just that he told my mum how good-looking you are and that I’d like you, and Mum told me. I was hoping he might’ve said something nice about me to you.’
I’m getting hot again with embarrassment.
‘You know, how good-looking I am. That I got the best of Italian Romeo and Indigenous w
arrior in me.’ He leans in, nudges me again, and gives me the most divine self-deprecating smile.
‘Please, Ralph, don’t flatter yourself,’ I sneer, but a girly giggle escapes.
‘Well, now it makes sense!’ Ralph exclaims, slapping his thigh with his palm. ‘When I said in the kitchen about Mum tanning, I wasn’t being sexist. I was joking about Mum wanting to look Indigenous so she’d fit in with Dad’s mob.’
I look down, blush, and feel this relieved smile growing. He pokes at my arm again with his elbow. ‘And I thought you were having a go at me with that spearing kangaroos and bark huts stuff. That you didn’t like me ’cos –’
Now I feel really stupid. ‘No, I wasn’t being racist.’
‘Whoa. Assumptions. Can be killers, hey? I guess I could pass as a full wog but I’m not. That’s what I meant, you know, sort of out of place everywhere.’
His words take me back to So-Not-Miss-Havisham. She would’ve loved to have a son like him. ‘What was it like growing up Italian and Aboriginal?’ Okay, so I like him and he can probably tell. Might as well say something intelligent to him, finally.
‘There were actually lots of similarities. I got a double dose of the importance of family, but a triple dose of prejudice ’cos my parents broke everyone’s rules.’ He counts them off his long sexy fingers: ‘Rules from Brit-Australians for Italians, from Brit-Australians for Aboriginals, from Italians for Aboriginals, and from Aboriginals for Brit-Australians, within which they lump all whitey migrants like the Italians. I feel like I’m Italian, I can speak Italian and my Italian grandparents are okay with me. First-born grandson and all that. But my mum went through hell as you can imagine. My grandmother on my dad’s side taught me some Murri and all about the Dreaming. So I’ve got two stories, the Bible and the Dreaming, and live with both of them in a mixed, nice kinda way.’
I nod and sit silently for a while, wondering where So-Not-Miss-Havisham is tonight, thinking about Ralph’s life, and mine. ‘Does it ever feel too much sometimes? Like you know too much, and you wish your life was simpler?’
‘When I was younger. At school. Which gang do you join? The wog-boys? The blackfellas? What about when they’re out to get each other? Only time I was allowed was when they ganged up against the skips!’ He shakes his head with a grim smile. ‘Yet, it was all okay in me. It’s what everyone else out there does to it all. I was supposed to choose whether I wanted to pass as a dark-skinned wog or a light-skinned black. But I’m both and sort of neither, I always said.’ He pauses for a while and looks at his hands, turning them over and over.
In the last dwindling light, I notice what I hadn’t noticed before in the dusk, even though I’d been sneaking photographic memory snapshots of his sexy hands: his palms are much paler than the backs of his hands.
‘I’m glad school’s over, Pina. You sit in a class on Aboriginal history and you wonder where you are in it. Or you hear about Italian migrants and wonder, what about someone like me?’
We chat on until his mum comes out holding her head. ‘Ralphie, I gotta go. Sorry Pina. My head’s really dizzy. Sorry, Ralphie love, you need to get me home.’
He looks both amused and annoyed, yeah, like he really doesn’t want to go. ‘Mum, for a woman who’s supposed to have been a smart radical, I don’t get how just putting on a sunhat is beyond you! When you get skin cancer, don’t come to me for sympathy.’
I laugh. She groans and looks at me for support instead, whispering, ‘Oh, I wish he’d stop nagging. He’s so responsible! Pina, please stand up, love, so I can kiss your cheek. I can’t get down there.’ I stand and she kisses my cheek. ‘It was sweet meeting you. Hug your parents for me. I hope we see you again. Don’t take too long, Raffaele.’ And with a cheeky smile, she makes her way back in to say her goodbyes, still holding her head.
I’m giggling. ‘Ralphie, Raffaele. That’s so cute.’
He hides his face in one hand for a while. ‘That’s how she gets me back when I take away her mummy-power. I sometimes think her brain freeze-framed me when I was ten years old.’ Then he shoves me gently. ‘Anyway, don’t you laugh at me, Giuseppina! Giuza!’
I groan and push him away. He looks at my hand, hesitates, then takes it in his deliciously warm but not clammy ones. ‘Hey Giuzy,’ we do this shaking hands thing. ‘Can I say now that I think your uncle was right about you?’
I pull my hand away a little even as his words soak so easily, so welcomely, into my parched heart. ‘Well, some days I can actually think I’m passable.’
He gives my hand a gentle slap. ‘I would’ve liked to have shown you round Melbourne, but we’re all heading off to Shepparton tomorrow to spend Christmas with Dad’s side.’
‘That’s cool.’
‘No it isn’t, ’cos I’d really like to see you again. But I should say – I’ve got a girlfriend, or at least I think she’s still my girlfriend, up there in Shepparton. Although Sara’s last few calls while I was here doing my uni exams haven’t been so good. She might’ve been hinting she’s moved on.’
‘I understand,’ I say. ‘It’s okay. Good luck with Sara.’ Although deep down I cross invisible fingers that she has ‘moved on’.
He reaches over, a kiss on my cheek for Christmas, his soft hair brushing my lips and the pulse-point on my throat under my ear. A final smile, and he’s gone.
I stay seated on that patio, still feeling that marshmallow squishiness where his hair has brushed me, where his lips left an imprint, I’m sure, on my cheek.
Maybe not all guys are selfish idiots or psychos. Maybe if a guy really loves me, he won’t care about my parents but just respect them.
The air’s getting that Melbourne summer evening chill so I wander and weave through people’s voices and laughter, commiserations and embraces, and realise most of them have had to make decisions about who they are and how to defy or navigate the rules of family and society.
I watch my Zi Don and Wei Lee; their laughter, concern and joy with one another and others in the tapestry of lives and loves around them. Will they be cardboard cut-outs of themselves at Nonna’s?
My mother is forced to be a cut-out copy of herself.
This thought arrives and stays until the doorbell rings again. I open the door and I know that heady aftershave, the shiny clothes, sculpted face and sticky gelled hair. I hesitate. He looks at me wryly. ‘Yes, it’s me again. I am invited. I apologise to you for my nastiness at the door last time.’
Wei Lee comes over, kisses that smooth waxy cheek, and leads him in, announcing, ‘Hey everyone, some of you may not know Ray, Don’s ex.’
‘Don’s friend now, thanks,’ Ray says, his voice deep and gravelly, but there’s a nervous flick of the shoulder.
Zi Don comes over and kisses him. I’ve been okay with my uncle kissing other guys in greeting over the last few days, but this one bothers me. I’m immediately imagining the two of them in bed doing more than just kissing, and I feel all these revulsions: at them, at the fact that it was with this slimy shiny character, and with myself that I can still be so friggin’ squeamish about sex between guys. I’ve got a long way to go in all this.
‘Hi Ray, where’s your partner?’ Zi Don asks.
Ray’s eyes are scanning everyone. ‘He’s at a family Chrissie function to which I’m not invited because I do not yet exist. Anyway, they’re still getting over his break-up with his fiancée months ago.’ He drinks some champagne, a hasty swig from a frosty glass clutched in the poised fingers of both hands. ‘At least he’s not confused, Donny. He’s definitely gay, thank goodness.’ He takes another long drink and peers through the glass to Zi Don and Wei Lee, and the other Narnians.
People smile kindly, but Ray’s brought in some of the outside world, some of the wardrobe. Unsettling, confusing, wintry. To too many people out there, what’s here would be a chilling confusion. Yet being here, I realise life has never seemed clearer and simpler.
Ray doesn’t stay long. He doesn’t really want to be here but he’s not welc
ome where he wants to be. And I feel for him and his lack of place. There are some exchanges with friends he’d known through Don. There’s another apology for me, sincere and thoughtful. There’s a warm embrace with Wei Lee and a warmer one with Zi Don, who wishes him well with his new partner. They remind him he’s welcome over any time. He smiles, letting fragility soften his eyes and manner.
The evening continues, the music gets softer, the voices slower, and a relaxing clean-up by the last few guests is part of the party.
I find I sink into bed, my legs tired from a lot of standing and serving, but my mind feels awake and un-wardrobed, my heart feels lusciously large and deliciously full of Narnian conversations wanting to be retold and filed as living memory.
I fall asleep with fantasies of Ralph.
15
Other worlds around the corner
IT’S LATE IN THE MORNING when I finally wake up. There’s a surreal moment where I feel like I’m both at home in Adelaide and here in Melbourne as the familiar espresso coffee aroma lures me away from my bed.
I wander into the kitchen to find Zi Don packing baskets of leftover party food. ‘We do this every year, Principessa. Christmas visits to those who couldn’t make it to our party.’
So later that day we make our way into inner-city Melbourne. By now the tram stops and hook turns are comfortably familiar. We stop at a unit in a narrow street of terrace houses in Prahran. Their friends John and Mick live here. In the car, Wei Lee and Zi Don have filled me in a little but it’s enough to make me frustratingly nervous.
The unit’s small and neat, the little front garden trimmed and sparse. Mick lets us in; a tall, blond, worried man. His smile is welcoming even as the lines around his eyes seem to be stretched out with weariness and sadness. He lets us in to the lounge room where John’s seated. Well, what I really want to say is: where John is crumpled into a lounge chair, wrapped in a fluffy blanket, his head resting against a silk cushion and his hands tightly clasped in an effort to control their trembling.
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