Apartment 255

by Bunty Avieson

Sarah had been wondering when Tom would bring up his father again. It had been a couple of weeks since he had phoned Tom, out of the blue. Tom hadn’t mentioned him for more than a week but Sarah knew he had been thinking about him. He had been sleeping badly, tossing and turning and calling out in the night.

  ‘Do you want me to come?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘No, but thank you for the offer. We’re meeting at a pub in North Sydney.’

  Sarah looked at him anxiously. ‘Are you okay about that? Do you want to see him?’

  ‘Yes and no. But ultimately, yes.’

  Tom took the dinner plates into the kitchen, effectively ending the conversation. Sarah followed him. ‘I must say you seem awfully calm about this.’

  Tom kept his back to her and continued rinsing the plates. ‘Do I?’ he said.

  ‘Well, yes,’ said Sarah.

  Tom shrugged.

  After dinner they cuddled up together in front of the TV with a video and coffee.

  It was a thriller and both paid little attention to the plot, each consumed with their troubled thoughts. Tom was straining to recall his father’s features. He remembered his father’s woody aroma, a mixture of tobacco, eucalyptus oil and automotive grease. And he could remember the feel of his father’s brushed cotton shirts against his cheek. But he couldn’t picture his father’s face and it disturbed him deeply. He had no photographs of his father and his mother had certainly hidden away, or more likely destroyed, any she might have had.

  Tom thought about his father’s hands. They were huge and wide with scars and bumps. His nails were chipped and dirty. They were workman’s hands. He looked at his own hands. His fingers were big and wide. The only bump he had was a writing bump on his middle finger. He remembered his dad in his workshop, hunched over the bench, always fixing something. But when he tried to picture his father’s face it was blurry and indistinct. It hovered in Tom’s memory but he couldn’t quite grasp it.

  Sarah was restless and fidgety. In her mind she went over her argument with the researcher, touching it up here and there to make herself feel better. Tomorrow she would admit she had overreacted but right now she was still smarting. She felt heavy and bloated. She disentangled herself from Tom and went into the bathroom. She slumped her shoulders, lifted her shirt and looked with disgust at the profile of the tiny mound of her belly. The tension of the day, all her old feelings of inadequacy, not being able to measure up to the impossible ideal she held for herself, welled up inside her. She felt angry and out of sorts.

  She turned to the porcelain bowl and lifted the seat. She steadied herself then, placing two fingers in her mouth, she pushed them until they tickled the back of her throat. She felt a moment of discomfort then her throat started to convulse. The spasm started in her throat and worked its way down her oesophagus. She started to dry retch and then working her throat muscles brought up a sludge of undigested dinner and red wine into the bowl.

  Beads of sweat formed on her forehead and at the back of her neck. She felt the gastric juices burn the lining of her throat. She tried not to breathe through her nose. She looked at the dark brown sludge in the bowl. Her throat muscles worked involuntarily, trying to keep the rest of the contents of her stomach down. Sarah shoved her fingers back down her throat and felt her stomach heave again.

  When the final spasm passed she wiped the sweat from her face and the back of her neck with toilet paper, tossed it into the toilet and pressed the button. She unlocked the bathroom door and caught her reflection in the mirror. Her face, framed by a mass of corkscrew curls, was as white as the tiles.

  She was filled with self-loathing. It had been so long since she had felt the need to do that. She was in control of her life now. Or she thought she was. She felt edgy now, had for the past few days. It was building inside her and the urge to purge had returned, too strong to ignore. She felt disgust at her own emotions. She wasn’t going back to that again. She was better now. Just this time. But never again.

  Tom watched her as she walked back into the room. She sat at the other end of the couch, staring intently at the TV.

  ‘What did I miss?’

  ‘Sarah, what have you been doing?’ he asked suspiciously.

  ‘Nothing. I went to the toilet. Is that all right?’ Sarah replied, not meeting Tom’s eyes.

  ‘Sarah, you said you wouldn’t do that any more. Why do you do that?’

  ‘I didn’t do anything,’ she snapped. ‘I just went to the toilet. Give me a break.’

  Tom shook his head wearily. ‘I don’t understand you.’

  ‘There is nothing to understand. I went to the toilet. End of story.’ Sarah’s tone was icy and final.

  Tom felt inadequate. ‘I love you, Sarah,’ he said quietly.

  ‘And I love you too. Now can we finish the movie?’

  Both slept badly that night. Sarah was cold and kept waking with a draft down her back. She followed Tom across the bed, seeking his warmth, but he kept pushing her away. He was hot and kept throwing off the blankets.

  Sarah was up early and cycled around the park. She had energy to burn. She brought Tom croissants and the morning papers in bed. She opened the curtains to a beautiful sunny day. They lay in bed watching the sun-speckled boats on the harbour, their spinnakers billowing in a stiff breeze. They read the papers, then they loved each other, lazily and with much tenderness, rolling over the newspapers so that Sarah ended up with newsprint on her buttocks.

  *

  Tom admired the row of gleaming Harley Davidson motorcycles as he parked outside the hotel. He stopped to look at them, taking a moment to quieten his agitation. He was reluctant to go inside, apprehensive about what he might find in there. He felt as if he were about to have a mirror held up to some facet of himself and he wasn’t sure that it was a part that he would like. In his working life he liked to be completely prepared. He always knew as much about his subject as was possible before he walked into a room. But he was uncomfortably aware that there was no preparation he could do for this meeting.

  He stopped and looked at a beautifully maintained Fat Boy, wide and low to the ground, its chrome handlebars reflecting the sunlight. Tom superimposed over the bike a vision from his childhood. It was fifth grade and Mr Barkley was telling him to hold out his hand. Mr Barkley administered six hard stinging slaps with the leather strap. Tom had stood and watched angry red welts rise on his palm. He remembered the searing pain and how badly he wanted to cry but he had held fast, drawing on reserves he didn’t know he had. He had pushed all his emotion down and looked up unflinchingly at Mr Barkley. It was the most sobering moment of his young life. Tom drew on that memory whenever he needed courage. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders and strode confidently into the main bar.

  The hotel was old and unrenovated, one of the few inner-city hotels still to be gentrified. It was busy but subdued inside. A few old-timers at the bar, drinking solemnly. A group of bikers in leather vests and jeans played pool. A TV screen showed the day’s races from around the country. Tom took a seat and ordered a beer from the barmaid. He looked around him, wondering if the grey-haired bloke staring intently at the TV screen could be Hal. No, too old.

  The bar door opened and a man came in. His tall, imposing frame was silhouetted against the bright sunshine outside. He nodded to the men playing pool and they nodded back. He walked over and stood at the bar next to Tom.

  ‘Gidday,’ he said stiffly.

  ‘Gidday,’ replied Tom.

  They sized each other up awkwardly.

  Tom saw a fit, wiry-looking man in faded black jeans with a denim shirt and black leather vest. His face was lined with deep crevices on each side of a full sensuous mouth. He had a shock of white hair, neatly trimmed. His eyes were deep blue, the colour of Tom’s. He was a stranger and yet he looked familiar. Tom felt a sneaking sense of relief.

  Hal looked Tom over, taking in his vivid blue eyes, blond curly hair and lopsided grin. There was no mistaking whose son he was. Hal smiled shyly. T
om slid off the bar stool and stood in front of his father. Their eyes were level. Hal held out his hand to Tom. It was warm, dry and leathery.

  Tom felt his own hand grasped in a firm handshake.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about this for such a long time and now that you are here I don’t know what to say.’

  Hal’s voice was deep and gravelly. It echoed along the walls of Tom’s memory.

  ‘I don’t know what to say either. I know I’m pleased to see you, Dad,’ replied Tom. It sounded awkward and the word hung in the air between them.

  ‘Call me Hal, mate. Everyone does.’

  Hal wanted to know all about Tom’s life and he listened patiently as Tom stumbled through it, not knowing what to say or where to start. He talked of his job on the newspaper.

  ‘Sounds like you’ve done pretty well for yourself. What else? Are you married?’

  Tom explained about Sarah, how they had met at university.

  Hal watched his face soften as he spoke of her. ‘She sounds like a nice lady,’ he said.

  ‘I’d love you to meet her,’ said Tom. ‘She wanted to come today but I thought it was better if she didn’t.’

  ‘That’s right. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.’

  The barmaid kept the beers coming as Tom and Hal skirted around each other. Their conversation was peppered with awkward silences. Tom’s mind was full of questions that he didn’t know how to articulate. He desperately wanted this man’s approval.

  Tom needn’t have worried. Hal liked him before he walked in the door. He remembered him as a feisty eight-year-old boy, full of mischief. Hal had loved that eight-year-old boy, and carried the memory with him wherever he had travelled in the past twenty-two years. Whoever Tom had become, Hal had no doubt he would love him too. But Hal was equally anxious that Tom might not approve of him. He didn’t know what to expect. Perhaps Tom was an angry young man, bitter that his father had walked out on him and his mother. And so they skirted around each other, self-conscious and wary, yet wanting to open up.

  Hal talked about his Harley Davidson dealership and the bike chapter he ran in North Sydney.

  ‘I remember your motorbikes, Hal,’ said Tom, drawing on his memory’s deepest recesses. ‘I remember you used to lift me up onto the petrol tank and wheel me up the driveway.’

  Hal was chuffed. ‘You remember that? I would have taken you on the road but your mother would never let me.’

  It was the first time Tom’s mother had come into the conversation and Tom was attentive for what would follow. He waited for Hal to ask about her, but he didn’t. Hal swiftly moved the conversation back to motorbikes.

  The opening was gone and Tom, who made his living from manoeuvring conversations where he wanted them to go, was at a loss as to how to get it back there. They talked about football, politics and which Sydney petrol station sold the cheapest petrol. They compared hands, holding their palms against each other and both were delighted when they were a perfect match. Hal’s hands were covered in the scars and bumps that Tom remembered but his nails were neat and clean. Tom pulled up his shirtsleeves and showed Hal a scar on his elbow. He had fallen over playing footy, not long before Hal left, and he remembered Hal gently cleaning the wound and telling him he could cry if he wanted to.

  The tears filled Hal’s eyes as Tom spoke. He made no effort to brush them away. ‘I don’t remember that,’ he said softly. ‘But thank you for giving me back that memory.’

  As the afternoon wore on they ate meat pies, played pool with the bikers and ended up half slumped over each other at the bar. The evening trade started to pour through the doors and they said their farewells, slapping each other on the back like old war buddies. Hal embraced Tom in a smothering bear hug and then he was gone.

  By the time Tom stumbled into the flat Sarah was hysterical. Her hands shook from all the caffeine she had drunk while she stared out the window imagining him wrapped around an electricity pole or stabbed in a bar room brawl.

  ‘You could have telephoned,’ she sobbed into his chest.

  Tom smoothed her hair, crooning softly how he loved his Sare Bear. His eyes were bleary and his words came out thickly.

  Sarah led him to the couch. She removed his boots, then went to make him a coffee.

  When she came back Tom was snoring, his mouth gaping open and spittle running down his chin.

  *

  Sarah and Ginny met at 10 am at the beauty salon in Oxford Street for their monthly appointment. Sarah wanted a deluxe facial which included half an hour of massage. Ginny told Sarah she was having her legs waxed. It was partly true. Ginny had a problem with excess body hair. Dark curly hair, the texture of steel wool, stretched down beyond her bikini line to the top of her thighs. It was a source of great embarrassment to her and one of the reasons she was too shy to go swimming. Every month she had electrolysis to kill the roots.

  Venetia, the beautician, was an attractive, petite blonde of about twenty, who probably never had a stray hair in her life. Venetia assured Ginny yet again that her stray hairs would be all gone in another six months, never to return. She led Ginny through to the booth next to Sarah. Ginny could hear Sarah chatting through the thin plasterboard that separated them.

  Ginny stripped down to her briefs and lay on the vinyl bed. Venetia attached the electrodes to the needle and inserted it in a hair follicle on Ginny’s thigh. On the other side of the partition Sarah was chatting about the lovely weekend she and Tom had spent at the Blue Mountains. Her lilting voice carried over the thin wall as Ginny lay helpless on the bed.

  ‘So it’s still hot and lusty?’ asked Sarah’s beautician.

  ‘I am desperate for him,’ replied Sarah. ‘He is the sexiest man alive, I swear. He asked me to marry him.’

  The other woman congratulated Sarah and cooed over the engagement ring.

  ‘We bought it in a beautiful little antique shop in Leura. It’s rose gold. The woman said she knew the owner and she had been happily married for sixty-two years. Can you believe that?’

  ‘Well that should bring you luck,’ said the other woman.

  They chatted happily about wedding plans.

  ‘We haven’t set a date but probably around September when the weather is nice but not too hot.’

  Venetia pressed the foot pedal, sending a stinging current down the probe into Ginny’s hair follicle. Ginny flinched and clenched her teeth.

  ‘How long have you been together?’

  ‘Since uni,’ sighed Sarah. ‘We have just moved into a new apartment in Elizabeth Bay. It’s beautiful. Lots of Sundays in bed admiring the harbour view.’

  The two women laughed heartily.

  Venetia moved the needle to a new follicle and pressed the pedal. Ginny’s face contorted with pain. Venetia noticed and adjusted the dial, reducing the current.

  ‘Sorry. You’re not so good today?’ she asked Ginny. ‘Are you tired? PMT?’

  Ginny nodded weakly.

  Sarah made little moaning noises of contentment as her beautician worked on her neck muscles.

  ‘I just had a birthday and Tom gave me the most gorgeous negligee and wrap. It is like something out of a thirties Hollywood movie.’

  ‘Lucky you. The last present my boyfriend gave me was a sandwich maker because he likes toasted sandwiches when he watches the footy.’

  Ginny listened to the women laugh and giggle and prattle on. She envied their easy camaraderie. Sarah could talk to anyone about anything. It infuriated Ginny.

  ‘Why can’t anyone see how spoiled she is, how vain and self-centred she is?’ thought Ginny angrily, as Venetia silently pressed the pedal again.

  When they both were finally finished they walked together down Oxford Street, Ginny’s face a mask. Sarah walked fast, as if she were in a hurry to get somewhere, but Ginny knew they had hours to browse and stop for coffee. It was their monthly ritual. They strode up Oxford Street until Sarah spotted an orange shirt she liked in a shop window. She pulled Ginny inside where it was
cool and empty, with only a few dozen designer items displayed on rods on the walls. It all looked horribly intimidating to Ginny, and difficult. Skirts with uneven hems, jumpers with large slashes across the chest – Ginny would never even look at such things. She wouldn’t know how to wear them. The shop assistant pointedly ignored them as she applied bright yellow nail polish behind the counter. Sarah stood in front of her.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said for the second time, her voice rising slightly.

  The shop assistant looked up, boredom radiating from every pore. She arched one eyebrow.

  ‘If it’s not too much trouble, may I see the orange shirt in the window, please,’ said Sarah with exaggerated patience.

  The girl set aside her nail polish with obvious irritation, put both hands carefully on the counter, fingers splayed to keep them apart and looked at Sarah.

  ‘What orange shirt?’ she asked.

  Sarah turned and pointed to the sole item in the window. It was vivid orange with a high mandarin collar and slashed sleeves.

  ‘That orange shirt,’ she replied.

  The sales assistant glanced in the direction Sarah was pointing. ‘Oh that,’ she replied, turning back to Sarah. ‘That’s not orange. It’s goldfish.’

  Sarah was too stunned to speak.

  The girl resumed applying her nail polish. Her message was clear. You have been dismissed. You are not worth talking to. Ginny was agog at her rudeness and desperate to get out of there. But Sarah was having none of it.

  ‘Oh, it’s goldfish, is it?’ she asked, her tone icy.

  The girl ignored her.

  ‘Well aren’t you the rude little madam,’ said Sarah angrily. ‘What’s your name?’

  The girl looked confused. She hadn’t expected this.

  ‘Your name,’ repeated Sarah ominously.

  ‘What’s it to you?’ the girl asked. She still looked sullen and disdainful but there was a new wariness in her expression.

  ‘I want to know the name of the rude little tart with the tacky yellow nail polish so I can tell Jom why I didn’t buy his orange shirt,’ said Sarah.