Sex, Lies and Bonsai

by Lisa Walker

  I almost bump into Professor Brownlow’s wife on the way out.

  ‘Hello, Edie.’ Today she is wearing lycra bicycle shorts and holding a helmet. Her cheeks are a healthy shade of pink. She has obviously been cycling hard.

  I blush hotly and resolve to stop fantasising about Professor Brownlow at once. Or at least as soon as possible. ‘Hello.’

  She runs her hand through her thick blonde hair and studies my face. ‘You look like you’ve had a bit of sun.’

  Considering the weather, I am unsure how to take this remark. ‘Mmm, went to the beach yesterday,’ I mumble.

  She smiles and continues into the lab.

  Usually I sit under a tree and read a book while I eat my sandwich but today it is raining, so I couldn’t do this, even if I was allowed to. In search of something spontaneous and fun I trudge through the rain towards the refectory, holding my backpack over my head. I can hear music as I get nearer. This is good. I will see a band. It will be spontaneous! And fun! I am a diligent student, Sally will be proud of me.

  Swinging my dripping backpack, I push through the heavy doors. The student refectory is a huge expanse of plastic tables and chairs. Only about a quarter of the tables are filled with students eating salad rolls and drinking Coke. The room has terrible acoustics. The chatter of the students and the pounding rain almost drown out the music.

  At the front of the room is a low stage covered in grey carpet. A lone figure stands on this carpet with an electric guitar. He is dressed in black and is more Nick Cave than Nick Cave, more Chris Martin than Chris Martin. He is, of course, Jay.

  I slink into a chair near the back of the room as he finishes his song. I don’t want him to see me — he might think I’m stalking him.

  ‘This song is one I wrote myself.’ The microphone squeals and Jay bends to adjust a knob. ‘It’s called “Tangled Web”.’

  And then he sings the song I’d heard on the radio.

  You left me here

  Thinking I was part of you,

  Thinking we were two halves of the whole.

  You looked at me

  As if I was the answer

  Though you didn’t know the question.

  But now he said, she said, they said,

  You’re moving on

  And I was just a rest stop

  Not a destination.

  He said, she said, they said,

  You’re a spider in a web

  A tangled web.

  The way he sings it is so beautiful it almost makes me cry, but when I look around I realise I am the only one watching. Everyone else is chatting, texting, eating hot chips and laughing at stupid jokes.

  And it is almost unbearable to me. That he should expose his heart like that and no one cares.

  I get to my feet and leave before he sees me.

  On my way out I almost fall over a black cat that is sitting in the doorway watching Jay intently. It gives me a supercilious look before turning back to Jay. I feel uncouth — rather as if my phone had gone off during a chamber music recital.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mutter and push open the door.

  Dad is mending the stairs when I come home. Our house has a lot of wooden stairs and Dad has been mending them my entire life. I can’t remember a time when I could come up to our house without having to skip at least one stair.

  Dad pauses in his hammering as I step past him. ‘Nice little waves today,’ he says.

  Why does he always say this sort of thing to me? It is like he thinks I am someone else. How can my father and I have spent the best part of twenty-three years in each other’s company without him realising that I am not that surf-crazy kid he has in his head.

  Darling Head is full of sun-bleached, wiry bundles of energy who live for nothing but the next take-off. The streets are packed with them, my classrooms were packed with them, but I am not one of them.

  I wonder if Donald Bradman was as persistent as my father. Sorry, Dad, I’m just not that into balls, I can imagine John saying.

  At what age did Mary Magdalene realise that young Sarah wasn’t a chip off the old block? Here’s a glass of water, Sarah. No, don’t drink it, have a go at turning it into wine.

  At what stage does the parent of the child failure face up to reality? If my father is to be taken as the example — never. One would think the fact I haven’t been in the water since I was twelve would be a clue, but no, there is a part of his brain that seems unable to believe that I might not enjoy surfing.

  ‘Good waves, huh? Great.’ I smile at Dad and continue up the stairs.

  Chapter Twelve

  The paranoid is never entirely mistaken.

  SIGMUND FREUD

  Saturday: 49 days

  Pain level: 7.8

  Location: Shifting between chest and upper intestine

  Tips for self-improvement: Start running tomorrow

  Sally comes over on Saturday morning. I haven’t started my Murakami running program yet as I slept in. I will start tomorrow. We sit on the hammock and swing together, hips and shoulders touching. It is child-like, fun.

  ‘So what spontaneous thing did you do yesterday?’ she asks on the down-swing.

  I don’t want to tell her about Jay. It would feel like a betrayal. ‘Look, there’s a whale.’ I point to the horizon.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘There.’

  ‘I can’t see it.’

  ‘Look harder.’

  By the time Sally has given up looking for the whale, I have my answer. ‘I started a Facebook group for people who are into crustaceans.’

  ‘Is that, like, a sexual thing?’ asks Sally as we swing up.

  I hadn’t got that far, but now I decide it’s definitely the way to go. ‘Yeah, it’s a type of fetish. Quite rare. In fact, no one else has joined yet. I’m sure they’re out there, though. Crustaceans are terribly sexy. Did you know if human sperm was proportional to a shrimp’s it would be the size of a semi-trailer?’

  Sally screws up her nose. ‘How does that work?’

  I flap my hand. ‘Where there’s a will there’s a way.’

  We swing to and fro again. As I lean back, I catch a glimpse of a small tattoo on Sally’s lower back above her cut-off jeans. This is an old one, a deer with spreading antlers. ‘Remember that holiday we had in New Zealand after we finished school?’

  Sally and I had planned to walk the Milford Track. I’d imagined us strolling across alpine meadows as rainbows danced across the valleys. We hadn’t realised you needed to book the track about nine months in advance.

  ‘What was the name of that place we ended up in?’ asks Sal.

  ‘Glenorchy.’

  ‘Rains a lot there, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘How was that cabin?’

  ‘You mean the dog kennel. I felt like I was in Guantanamo Bay.’

  ‘No wonder we spent so much time in the pub.’

  ‘That guy you hooked up with…’ I eye her tattoo.

  ‘Travis.’

  ‘That’s right. Travis the deer hunter.’

  ‘He hunted possums too,’ says Sal.

  ‘Do you think he was really a deer hunter?’

  ‘Oh yeah. When I went to his room he showed me his gun and his camo gear.’ She gives me a suggestive look. ‘Why?’

  ‘He seemed a bit pseudo to me.’

  ‘You’ve never said that before.’

  ‘No, but I thought it. His hands were too soft. I reckon he was an accountant,’ I tease. ‘From Auckland. Or Wellington.’

  ‘No way.’ Sally screws up her face. ‘No way would I shag an accountant from Auckland.’

  ‘Exactly. That’s why he was pretending to be a Fiordland deer hunter. Much sexier.’ I lean back to get a better look at her tattoo. ‘You could get a calculator tattooed over the top of it if you wanted.’

  Sally squeals and pushes me.

  I fall backwards off the hammock and land on the deck with a thump. ‘Ow, that was reckless, Sally; you could have�
��’

  ‘Don’t you ever say that again, Edie McElroy. Travis was a he-man. He hunted deer from helicopters. He wore big lace-up boots. He was macho and sweaty and strong and… You think I don’t know the difference between an accountant and a deer hunter? He was totally essence of Heathcliff.’

  ‘Edgar Linton.’ I say this as if I am sneezing, but Sally gets it.

  She leaps off the hammock and pins me to the ground. ‘He was not Edgar Linton. Travis was more Heathcliff than Heathcliff. He was sexy as. You remember that scene in Wuthering Heights where he undoes his buttons really slowly.’

  ‘I don’t think that happened, Sal.’

  ‘Yes, it did and that’s what Travis was like. Do you want me to tickle you?’

  ‘Okay, he was Heathcliff.’ I start to laugh. ‘I give up. Don’t tickle me.’

  Sally smiles and gets off me. ‘That’s what I thought.’

  Sometimes Sally and I seem more like competitive siblings than best friends. I guess that’s what happens when you’ve known someone most of your life.

  We get back in the hammock again and push off.

  ‘You can hold your meetings in the Big Prawn.’ Sal changes topics with breathtaking speed.

  ‘Huh?’ The Big Prawn is a ghastly monstrosity that decorates the highway not far from Darling Head, but I haven’t got a clue what she is talking about.

  ‘Your crab fetish meetings.’

  ‘Yeah. If we ever have a get-together that would totally be the place to do it.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ says Sal. ‘Imagine the size of the sperm the Big Prawn would produce.’

  ‘Sally, there are some things in life you’re better off not thinking about.’

  We swing back and forth in silence for a few minutes. I, at least, lose the fight not to think about giant sperm.

  ‘I think Professor Brownlow might be interested in my Facebook group if I introduce it to him in the right way,’ I say.

  ‘Ralph Brownlow? Is he your boss?’

  ‘Yeah, do you know him?’

  ‘He’s a client.’

  ‘Get outta here.’ I push off the wall. ‘No way.’

  ‘Yes way, babe. My first paying client. He called me yesterday. Guess I’ve got you to thank for that.’

  ‘So…’ I raise my eyebrows. ‘Which of the eight steps is he interested in?’

  ‘Can’t say. Client confidentiality.’

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘No, really.’

  Sally sounds serious, so I back off. ‘Have you met him?’

  ‘We’re meeting downtown this afternoon. Anything I should know?’

  ‘Yes, but I can’t say. Workplace confidentiality.’

  Sally tickles me. ‘Come on, tell me. Is he gay?’ She looks at me. ‘Not gay, then, sleazy?’

  I squirm away from her probing fingers. ‘No, he’s…hot.’ This comes out a lot louder than I meant it to as I am laughing at the time.

  Jay steps out on the verandah as I say this. He takes in Sally and I on the hammock. ‘Who’s hot?’

  I blush. Does he think I was talking about him? ‘No one.’

  ‘Hey.’ Sally cleverly steers the conversation away from hotness. ‘It’s fancy-dress night down the surf club tonight. Why don’t we all go?’

  ‘No way,’ I say.

  ‘Okay,’ says Jay at the same time.

  Sally gives me a meaningful look and rustles one of her flyers in her hands. She is reminding me I am her star client.

  ‘I hate fancy dress,’ I say.

  Jay collapses on the couch in the sun and closes his eyes. As usual, he is dressed in black: a tattered long-sleeved shirt and skinny jeans. ‘Fancy dress is so much fun,’ he says.

  I suspect he is being ironic, but I can’t be sure.

  ‘What will you go as, Jay?’ asks Sally.

  ‘I’m tossing up between a fairy and a dolphin.’ His eyes are still shut. ‘Maybe a fairy dolphin.’

  I giggle, but he doesn’t smile. I bite my lip.

  Sally raises her eyebrows at me. ‘I knew you were a hippy at heart,’ she says to Jay.

  ‘Yeah.’ Jay opens one eye, squinting into the sun. ‘I’d go as a hippy if I had longer hair.’ He opens his other eye and fixes his gaze on me. ‘You should go as a hippy.’

  As always with Jay, it is hard to know if there is a hidden meaning to his comment.

  Sally, however, latches on to this as if it is the greatest suggestion ever. ‘That would be perfect for you, Edie.’

  I can’t see how being a dope-smoking remnant of the sixties is perfect for me, but I can’t resist the combined tide of Sally and Jay’s will. ‘Okay. I’ll go as a hippy.’ I feel sick already.

  Sally climbs out of the hammock. ‘Let’s print out a few more of my flyers and stick them in some letterboxes, Edie. I’m on a roll now, I can feel it. Do you want to help, Jay?’

  ‘Love to, but I’m flat out.’ Jay closes his eyes again.

  We go upstairs and I print out about one hundred flyers on my computer and fold them into neat packages. Sally does the odd one, but mainly she is occupied taking a phone call. She wanders over to the window and coos, clucks and chirps. It is obviously a man.

  She rolls her eyes as she slides the phone in her pocket. ‘Francisco calling from Rio. Wants to come out here. I managed to fob him off, I think.’

  Francisco doesn’t realise that once Sally has the tat, the relationship is dead meat.

  ‘All done, Ed?’ She picks up the bundle of flyers.

  We spend the morning posting them all around Darling Head. As it turns out, I do most of the posting too as Sally is waylaid in conversations with passers-by every five minutes or so. When she is not chatting she is sending and receiving texts.

  ‘Who are you texting?’ I ask her at one point.

  She winks at me. ‘Not texting, sexting.’

  ‘You didn’t tell me you had a new guy.’

  ‘Nah, I don’t really — just playing. You should get into this, Ed; it’s so much fun.’

  ‘Who am I going to sext with? Where do you meet these people?’

  ‘All over the place. Fifty per cent of the population is male, you know. I met this guy at the supermarket yesterday. He’s really hot. You remember how Heathcliff used to tell Cathy that he was burning up for her?’

  ‘I don’t remember that part.’

  ‘You need to re-read it, Ed. That’s what this guy’s like.’

  Sexting a guy I met at the shop yesterday seems about as achievable to me as flying to Jupiter on my own steam. Sally and I are definitely living in parallel universes.

  ‘I’m working up a new coaching module,’ says Sal. ‘Opportunistic flirting.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ Why am I getting an uneasy feeling that this is not good news? ‘You’re the woman for the job, Sal. I’m sure you’ll be good at it.’

  ‘My theory is that most people go through life totally blind to the flirting prospects that arise every day.’

  ‘You’re probably—’

  ‘I’m talking about people like you.’

  I knew it. She’s lining something up for me. How can I head her off at the pass? ‘I flirt all the time. Why only yesterday…’ And now I wish that Sally would interrupt me as I have no idea where I am going with this.

  Sally cocks her head to one side. She is wearing her mock-alert look, as if she can’t wait to hear what I say next.

  ‘Only yesterday…’ I rack my brain, trying to think of a man I have interacted with. ‘There was this guy, standing outside a building as I drove past and…’ What would Sooty do? ‘I winked at him.’

  ‘Winked?’ Sally smiles like a trashy investigative journalist who knows her subject is lying. ‘Like this?’ She gives me a slow, cheeky, adorable wink. Sally’s wink could double as a résumé. Sally’s wink tells me that she is a fun-loving girl with a lively intelligence and a positive attitude towards casual sex. ‘Show me how you winked.’

  She has backed me into a blind alley and she knows it. I am
unable to wink without scrunching up half my face like a Benny Hill impersonator. My wink could also double as a résumé, but it is one best kept in the bottom drawer. My wink says I am a strange, sad person who should be avoided if possible.

  ‘Who was this man you winked at?’ Sally pushes her advantage.

  I can see no more point in pretending. ‘A priest.’

  Sally bursts out laughing. Tears run down her face. Eventually she brings herself under control. ‘You’re the sweetest person I know, Ed, but you desperately need taking in hand.’ She gives me a one-armed hug. ‘Stick with me, babe. I’ll find you someone better than a priest.’

  At twelve o’clock Sally leaves for her meeting with Professor Brownlow. ‘I’ll come and get you at seven,’ she calls as we wave goodbye across the street. ‘I’m expecting groovy things, man.’

  My route home takes me past the beachside café strip. I am pondering my hippy outfit when someone calls my name.

  ‘Edie?’

  I swivel. A woman with glossy, asymmetrical black hair and enormous black sunglasses is sitting in the café. She has an iPad in front of her and is wearing one of those earpieces people use to talk on mobile phones without getting irradiated. Colourful drawings are spread out on the table in front of her coffee cup.

  ‘Djennifer?’

  The woman slides her sunglasses up to the top of her head and stands up. Soon I am enveloped in a soft, warm hug. Djennifer is wearing a floaty black top over black tights. Each of her plump, white arms support about twenty chunky bracelets, and rings adorn her black-nail-polished pedicured toes. Among the suntanned surf-label-wearing denizens of Darling Head, she stands out like a penguin in a desert.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ I ask.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I live here.’

  ‘You live here? HERE?’ Djennifer squeals. ‘This is paradise.’

  I look around. It has never occurred to me to think of Darling Head as paradise. It is just the place I grew up in. The place I couldn’t wait to leave. ‘It’s okay. So what are you doing here?’

  ‘Holiday, darling. What else? I’m staying at the Sands Resort in Lighthouse Bay.’ Djennifer waves her hand vaguely northwards. ‘I’m working on a new range.’ She sighs and gestures at the table. ‘I needed some creative space.’