Life in Outer Space

by Melissa Keil

  ‘Um, hi, Henry. Camilla told me to –’

  ‘Yeah, hey, Sam. Hold on.’

  He disappears into the house. I shuffle from side to side in the doorway, my hands buried in my pockets. It’s freezing and the sky is dark and low. Part of me wants to be back home in bed, but I am also kind of curious to know what Camilla is up to.

  Her dad reappears, lugging a square black box that almost comes up to his chest. He thrusts it at me. ‘She ordered me to give this to you. Hope you know what she’s handing over. This is a genuine Fender. It’s not supposed to wear L-plates.’

  It takes me a second to realise that the box is a guitar case. ‘Um. Thanks?’

  ‘Yeah. You’ll need this too.’ He hands me a scrap of paper with an address scrawled across it. ‘See ya, Sam. When you speak to my kid, tell her to call her dad for more than just two minutes, if it isn’t too much trouble.’ He lingers in the doorway like he’s not entirely sure what to do with himself next. I resist the somewhat smug urge to remind him that she’s been gone less than twenty-four hours.

  ‘Sure. Bye, Henry.’

  I walk down her driveway with the heavy case in one hand and the scrap of paper in the other. It’s an address for some place in Fitzroy. I have only a vague idea where it is; I never head out that way. Under the address in a barely legible scribble is this:

  Look for the blue door. Give the package in the case to Jasper.

  Jesus. Maybe I should have just stayed in bed. Living in my pyjamas for the next two weeks was shaping up to be an acceptable plan.

  I swing the case over my shoulder and step onto the curb. The street is pooling with puddles and leaves, and everything looks washed out in hues of grey. I hover uncertainly on the side of the road.

  I look over my shoulder at Camilla’s house. From my place on the street I can see her bedroom window with its small balcony. Even from this distance, her room seems silent and empty.

  I glance at the address on the paper again. And then I heave the guitar case over my other shoulder and head towards the station.

  •

  A train and a tram ride later, and I’m standing on a drizzly street corner, squinting at the map on my phone and trying desperately to pinpoint where I am. I’ve triple-checked the address, but all I can see is a narrow bluestone laneway across the road. The laneway is guarded by graffiti of a rat with what I’m sure is unhealthily disproportionate genitalia. There is no street sign that I can see. I look at the map on my phone again. It is telling me that rodent-penis alley is where I need to be going.

  I dodge the traffic and bolt across the road, the guitar case bouncing across my back.

  The damp lane is wider than it appeared from across the street, although it still looks like the sort of place that should be adorned with flapping police tape. I hover for another twelve seconds. And then Camilla’s voice echoes in my head.

  How big a wuss are you, Samuel Kinnison?

  ‘Guess there’s only one way to find out,’ I murmur. I slip the phone into my pocket and step out into the laneway.

  •

  I see the blue door straight away, mostly because it is set in the biggest wall in the lane. White paint flakes off the bricks under balding red ivy. I can just about make out a faded sign on what is probably the third storey. The sign reads: The Blue Delilah.

  I realise I’m standing at the back end of an old pub. A moment later, the blue door is abruptly flung wide. A guy with pastel-yellow hair is attempting to wheel a bike through the doorway. He glances at me and his eyes narrow suspiciously. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Um … I’m looking for Jasper?’

  His face changes as if someone has flicked a lever under his skin. ‘Oh right. You’re Henry’s kid’s mate. I’m Ethan. Go in. He’s expecting you.’

  Yellow-haired Ethan squeezes the bike past me and peddles off with a wave. I stick my head in the doorway.

  ‘Are you coming in? You’re letting my heat out.’

  Inside is what I assume was once a bar, but is now a very large, very messy living room/dining room/refuge for a pool table and a heap of giant speakers and random music equipment. Half a dozen guys are lounging on orange velour armchairs that are scattered around the far end of the room. The air smells like coffee and old beer and stale cigarettes. I close the door behind me.

  The people on the couches are staring vacantly at a TV that’s balanced on some milk crates. They appear to be watching Rage. A couple of them peer at me; most look wholly uninterested. A twenty-something guy with a head full of chaotic curls stands.

  ‘Lemme guess. Sam?’ he says, stretching his arms languidly over his head. His T-shirt is ripped, revealing some sort of twisted tattoo across his stomach.

  There is much shaggy facial hair and faded band T-shirts and flannel on the other guys in the room. I suddenly wish I had worn something other than my pale-blue hoodie and Oscar the Grouch T-shirt. I have an inexplicable flashback to the first day of high school: loading my Ninja Turtles stationery into my locker as Justin Zigoni made out with Brooke Piper against the locker next to mine.

  ‘Um, yeah. I’m Sam. Jasper?’

  ‘One and the same.’ Jasper crosses the room and shakes my hand with a lopsided grin. He has a thick English accent that’s nothing at all like Camilla’s. Even though I’m looking down on him, I feel like he towers over me.

  ‘So, I think you have something for me?’

  ‘Ah, I think, yeah.’ I scramble to undo the clasps on the guitar case. Sitting on top of Camilla’s acoustic guitar is a flat brown-paper sleeve.

  Jasper grabs at it eagerly. ‘Original press Burrito Brothers record.’ He gives me that half-smarmy grin again. ‘Thought I would have to pry this from her cold dead fingers.’

  The guys on the couch seem to have lost interest in us. They’re talking about some gig they were at last night. I notice a couple of framed black-and-white posters propped up against the pool table. Jasper’s face stares down the camera in front of a bunch of guys wearing expressions of pain and gloom. The swirling text beneath their faces reads The Annabel Lees.

  Jasper clutches the record to his chest. ‘Righto. You ready? Let’s go upstairs.’

  It seems pointless to argue. I follow him behind the old bar, which seems to have been converted into a combined storage space for food, shoes and general junk. A wooden staircase leads upwards. Jasper takes the stairs two at a time.

  The level above branches into a wide corridor with chipped blue doors leading off it. I’m guessing it’s the old hotel part of the building. I peek into bedrooms of various levels of disorder. If I wasn’t having a minor freak-out about what I’m doing here, I might actually be able to contemplate what a cool place this would be to live, in spite of the filth.

  Jasper leads me into a room at the far end. There is nothing in here but some mattresses propped up against the walls and a few cracked stools. He sits down heavily on one stool and gestures for me to take the one opposite. He places the record carefully on the floor beside him. ‘So. Camilla told me you’re a virgin,’ he says.

  ‘She did what?’ I stammer. ‘She’s not … why would she … it’s not like she would know –’

  Jasper laughs, loudly. ‘Relax, kid. I meant, she told me you’ve never played before. But thanks for sharing, yeah? Unfortunately, this is all I can help you with today.’

  He’s still chuckling as he reaches behind him for a battered guitar that’s resting against one of the mattresses. I must have missed it in all the mortal fear.

  Apparently, I am having a guitar lesson. I sit down on shaky legs and wipe my palms on my thighs.

  ‘Right, well, since this is your first time – I’ll be gentle and all that.’ He laughs again. I am glad he’s amusing someone. He starts to tune his guitar, his fingers plucking lightly at the strings.

  I hoist Camilla’s guitar awkwardly onto my lap. I’m not even sure I know how to hold the stupid thing. I feel like a massive knob.

  ‘So … how do you know Camilla?’ I m
umble. It seems like a reasonable thing to ask at this point.

  ‘London. Her dad was big on the scene when we lived there. I used to give little Cammie lessons, back in the day.’

  I make a mental note to rib her about the ‘Cammie’ later. ‘You were her guitar teacher?’

  He grimaces as he sets his guitar aside and takes mine from my hands. ‘Do I look like I’m wearing spectacles and a pocket protector? I’m not a teacher. I’m a musician. But yeah, I did a few lessons here and there. Select clientele, you understand?’ He fiddles with the tuning-things on Camilla’s guitar. ‘I mean, I wouldn’t be doing this for just anyone, right? But Cammie asked. I’m doing her a favour.’

  I get it, Jasper. It’s an honour to be studying at your feet. ‘Well, thanks,’ I say.

  He hands the guitar back to me. ‘Yeah. Tell her she owes me a visit, virgin-boy.’

  ‘Can we just stick with Sam?’ I say. I hope it doesn’t sound too pleading.

  Jasper grins. ‘Whatever. Righto. Let’s start with some basic chords.’

  •

  ‘So? How was it?’

  I made it back home just as the rain started again, and I’ve spent the last four hours alternating between staring at the drops on my window, staring at an empty page in my red notebook, and staring at my computer screen. When Camilla finally pings me on Skype, I have to turn the volume right up on my laptop just so I can hear her over the noise of the rain on my roof.

  She’s stretched out on her bed with her laptop perched on her pillow and a mug of what I’m guessing is that strong English tea she likes balanced beside her. Her hair is scooped up behind her neck. It looks wavier than normal today.

  Her mum has dragged her out shopping for most of the day; I know Camilla can spend hours combing through vintage stores, but malls are some of her least favourite places. She hates the fluoro lights, and the sameness makes her sad. Gabriella should know that. Camilla looks tired.

  ‘It was actually okay. Jasper’s a good teacher. I almost have three chords nailed. Sort of. Are my fingers supposed to feel like they’re bleeding?’

  She grins. ‘Yup. Keep practising. You’ll be surprised how quickly they’ll toughen up. And three chords is ace, cos you can play a whole heap of stuff with three chords. Hang on, I’ll send you links for some good guitar tab sites.’

  ‘You think I’ll be capable of playing actual songs?’

  ‘By the time I get back, you’ll be rivalling Jimmy Page.’

  I have no idea who that is. I move from the desk to my bed, settling the laptop onto my pillow. ‘Well, you’d know,’ I say casually. ‘Jasper tells me that the twelve-year-old you was some sort of musical genius.’

  Camilla’s cheeks turn red. She takes a long, slow sip of her tea. ‘He would say that,’ she says eventually. ‘I think he might be talking up his own teaching skills.’

  I peer at her face. She’s looking somewhere just left of the webcam, her fingers plucking at her bedspread. I’ve been busting to ask her a billion questions all day – number one being why I haven’t ever heard her play anything if she’s so good, and why she gets that weird expression whenever I mention it. But she looks awkward and embarrassed, and I’m suddenly not at all willing to make her any more uneasy. I shelve my interrogation, for now.

  ‘Anyway, Jasper’s place is very cool. I think there’s about eighteen people living there.’

  ‘Yeah, I love it too. Though it does smell a bit too much like boy for me. I’ll take you to see Jasper’s band play one day. They might look like rejects from the 70s, but The Annabel Lees have a really great sound. I think you’ll like them.’

  I sit up a little straighter. ‘Camilla, that record you gave him … was it worth a lot? I mean, I’ll pay you back, but –’

  ‘Don’t worry about that. It’s not important. But Sam …?’ She leans closer to the camera. Even in the crappy laptop light, her eyes are twinkling.

  I find myself leaning towards her as well. ‘Yes …?’

  Her eyes narrow mischievously. ‘Are you ready for your next task?’

  •

  She sends me to the National Gallery on a mission to photograph the top five weirdest nudes I can find. I text her the truly outstanding examples, and she texts back her rating while she’s confined to her mum’s office. The gallery has no windows, which makes me feel like I’m in a space-time warp, where my only connection to the outside world is Camilla on the other end of my phone. A bunch of scenes for my screenplay swirl through my head as I wander the gallery halls, but I don’t bother writing any down. I’m not sure my story really works with my Killer Cat people trapped on opposite sides of a dimensional rift.

  Camilla is so enthusiastic about the top five nudes project that she sends me into the city again to gather the top five examples of a whole heap of pointless things – the top five stupidest restaurant names, the top five street signs that could double as porn words, and the top five greatest moustaches on city waiters. The top five moustaches prove to be perilous to photograph with my phone, though I do manage to get a photo of me with a bartender at a Mexican restaurant who looks exactly like Lando Calrissian from Star Wars. I explain my mission to Mexican Lando, who is more than happy to pose with me, so long as we can both wear a sombrero. Camilla tells me that she loves the sombrero pic so much she has set it as her laptop wallpaper.

  She makes me watch a movie called Trust by this guy called Hal Hartley. I watch it twice and then I download everything else that he has ever written. I can’t sleep, but it almost doesn’t matter that I’m blurry-eyed with exhaustion. The movies are awesome. I find myself filling half a red notebook with bits of dialogue while I wait by my laptop for her to Skype. Camilla gets stuck at some fashion launch thing with her mum and so ends up only texting, but I think she’s a bit excited that I like him. She reminds me that I’d promised to watch one of his movies the very first time she came to my house. It seems like a lifetime ago now.

  On Friday, Camilla makes me trek out to this vintage store on Smith Street, with the goal of finding the most ridiculous thing I can buy for under twenty dollars. It takes me about three hours to comb through the cavernous shop, but I eventually emerge with an electric-blue velour top hat that has a giant peacock feather embedded in the side. When Camilla finally pings me on Skype, it is almost 2 a.m. and I’m staring blankly at the screen in my pyjamas and the hat. She laughs so hard she actually has tears running down her cheeks. She tells me it is the best hat she has ever seen, and that she’ll be borrowing it when she comes home. My stomach does this unnerving bouncing thing when she says that. I may have eaten too many tacos for dinner.

  I know she’s making this stuff up as she goes along. But I find that the only way I’m able to get out of bed every day is by doing exactly what she tells me to do. This is probably slightly pathetic. But everything feels out of sync and messed up and confused, and I’m so tired that I’m barely managing to function, and my house is way too quiet, and KCftTMoJ has hit a big fat dead end, and every time I try to write I just end up covering pages with half-arsed sketches and rows of tiny music notes.

  Mum spends most of her time with Aunt Jenny. She updates her résumé and starts smoking full-time again. She is in tears at unpredictable moments, like whenever that ad for the Family Feast KFC box comes on TV. We circle around each other without talking about anything.

  It rains for the entire second week of the holidays. Camilla and her mum go on a spa retreat in Malaysia for a few days, so we don’t get to Skype for ages, but on her instruction I hang out at Schwartzman’s on the evenings that Allison is working. I take my homework and notebooks and try to work on my screenplay, but it seems to have morphed into this weird experimental Sundance thing where my Killer Cat people do nothing but sit around licking themselves while yowling longingly at the moon.

  I end up mostly just talking to Allison. I suspect she has spoken to Camilla and Mike, cos she doesn’t ask me anything about my family, but she does give me sympathetic head tilts
and doesn’t make me pay for coffee. I learn that she is planning to apply for an Asian Studies course at uni and that her dream job is working as a translator for the UN. I feel a bit bad that I’ve never asked her before what she wants to do with her life. She wears a blue uniform and a matching ribbon in her ponytail while she works. Without her hair clinging to her face, Allison looks older. She actually looks pretty. It is an odd revelation.

  I have three more lessons with Jasper, who turns out to be really cool and not nearly as big a knob as I first thought. I spend a whole afternoon with him and his housemates, listening to music and playing pool. I become almost proficient at a dodgy three-chord Ruby Tuesday, the song that Henry once mentioned inspired Camilla’s middle name. My fingertips start to feel tough and hard.

  I have coffee with my dad like we’re old friends or something. He still looks hopeless, like he’s not entirely sure which planet he’s beamed down onto. He has no explanation for what’s happening with Mum, other than mumbling some stuff about ‘finding himself’. I’m tempted to say that he should know where he is by now, but instead I just stop listening. The only silver lining of this whole situation is that I no longer need to deal with my father and his dumb-arsery.

  I find myself writing a long email to Camilla at three in the morning, which is mostly about the screenplay of Amateur, but also, in passing, about my dad. She emails back to say that I’m allowed to be mad with Dad, just not for forever. She doesn’t say anything more.

  When she manages to jump online in between her mum’s frenzied scheduling, I help her Warcraft dwarf level up another two times. Mostly, when she finds the time to Skype, we talk about movies, and Battlestar Galactica, and the places she has lived since she was a kid, and the stupid stories from Reddit, and how awesome Hal Hartley is, and how crap I am on guitar even though I’m loving it, and how we both might want to live in a converted pub one day. We talk about everything other than our parents, which suits me just fine.