by Neil Rowland
“You can’t go around blaming yourself, Noah. I know you’re not going to feel sorry for yourself or blame others. I’ve known other guys in your position, after having a heart attack, who blame themselves. But you can’t escape by changing the factors, such as diet, or exercise, or transformation of lifestyle.”
“I don’t know, because luck’s not giving me any living space,” I say.
“Not all the factors for any disease are within the individual’s grasp,” he argues. He was getting close to a genetic explanation for my heart problems.
“I didn’t always keep an eye on my case,” I admit.
“You have to focus your powers of healing,” he advises. “You shouldn’t put your system under any more pressure or interference.”
“Can you tell me how to avoid it?” I reply. “Did we succeed in solving all the world’s problems? Was I looking the other way?”
“You say you’re out of luck, old friend, but I’m sure that things will look up. I know you well enough by now, Noah, and you never give in. Don’t try to turn that into a witticism. At some point you’re going to pull around,” he decides. “We need you around, Noah.”
He puts a hand on my shoulder and gives it a squeeze. I find myself moved at his show of solidarity. “Thanks Bob. Great to get some encouragement.”
Despite this Bob’s anxiety about the party soon returns. He has the haunted look of Dylan Thomas locked in a chapel during opening time.
“Leave me to take care of the booze situation,” he instructs. “You go back upstairs with our others guests...and enjoy yourself.”
Chapter 14
At my ascent I spot the terrible couple. Melanie and Damion were friends of ours before Liz and I became estranged. Now they wouldn’t touch me socially with a toasted tofu fork. At least not with an unheated one, while Lizzie was watching. I shimmy around a wall in an effort to avoid their spying on me. He’s a freelance journalist on social policy and community relations issues; or as far as I understand. She writes such self-righteous books on capital punishment (against) and liquid castration (in favour) that even an ageing liberal like me would happily see her strung up on moral grounds. I’d let the category one prisoners do the job for me, before they returned to their cells to watch more television.
She also commandeers a crèche, for radical fem parents; a laboratory of infant psychology and behaviour, that makes that Summerhill place look like a boot camp. As a couple Melanie and Damion are the Kray Twins of rainbow politics. They are still close to Liz and the dinosaur. They share all the latest dope on me, by that route. Gossip runs around these parts like a paper boat in the gutter, believe me. It’s as much as I can do to keep my back turned to them.
In the decade after university they invited Liz and me to join their commune. They had this ambition to establish that big shared household. It really happened too, as they bought some farm buildings from her father, concealed in the countryside outside Bristol. Lizzie thought it was an exciting concept. She would have had our kids running about in the buff with these flabby free love hippies. Speaking for myself I didn’t even want to shower with those guys. Did that make me a fascist? Then they had Melanie’s timetable of daily chores around the free love farm, ranging from cooking our collective potatoes to shovelling the pig pen and hosing out the communal latrine. Man, individually speaking, I preferred our pokey flat. Lizzie couldn’t understand my mind set.
I’d rather that Melanie throttled me in the straps of her dungarees, with one of her boots on my throat, than agree to endless evenings debating with them. If Liz had insisted on going to their commune, I couldn’t have separated from her. But I knew that I might be heading off into the woods alone.
“Noah. Is that you?” Damion declares.
“Who else?” I offer.
“You’re still peaky,” Melanie says. She scrunches her face as if changing a messy nappy.
“Neither did I!”
“No, he doesn’t look so great,” Damion remarks.
“I couldn’t agree more,” I say.
Damion runs me through a complete body scan. He takes a few seconds to bring himself up to date. Certainly the results are fascinating and alarming. “We haven’t noticed you knocking about for months,” he comments.
“Who’s counting?” I say.
“So where you been hiding out recently. Keeping yourself out of view?”
“I had other appointments,” I explain.
“Oh?” he returns, studying me.
“You don’t look as if you’re exactly thriving,” Melanie observes.
“Thanks for that.”
They notice that I’m on the emotional and physical ropes. They’re moving in for the killer punch. No point trying to dodge away. It’s like a scene from Raging Bull, except in this version he’s being pounded on the ropes by bitter sister Melanie, not Sugar Ray Leonard.
“We understood that you were supposed to be feeling better,” Damion says.
“So why aren’t you keeping Mr and Mrs Noggins company this evening? Aren’t they feeling a bit lost without you?”
“Do you think she could be relaxed? Knowing that you are at the party?” Melanie accuses.
“Liz and Frank thought it would be sensible to avoid you this evening,” explains her partner.
“Right? Why’s that?” I wonder.
“Ask a stupid question!”
“As a new couple they don’t know if enough time has gone by. For you to be accepting of the new situation,” he suggests, nodding.
“That’s bloody thoughtful of them,” I reply. It’s hard to mask the hurt of Lizzie avoiding me out of embarrassment, or fearing the consequences. Maybe the concrete cupid really got to her.
“Liz knows how close you are to Bob and Sue who, apparently, are sympathetic to your attitude,” Damion says.
“What did you say to them?” Melanie wants to know.
“I can understand if the newly marrieds are ashamed to show their faces tonight.”
“They’re very happy together,” Damion coolly assures me.
“They have no earthly reason to feel any shame, whatsoever, in regard to you. How do you compare yourself to Liz? She has nothing to criticise herself for. Certainly next to you - some ageing menopausal man, absolutely lacking in any self-awareness over your behaviour and ethics, assuming you had any personal ethics in the beginning.”
“There’s no need to stick your neck out,” I observe.
“It must have been a rather bitter pill for you, Noah, to lose a woman like that.”
“It’s amazing what a guy can get used to,” I argue. The guy should understand that I’m the expert on taking bitter pills.
Melanie checks out my fresh complexion. “We noticed you lurking around here, all by yourself,” she gloats. “Enjoying the consequences of your behaviour.”
“You’re the girl to feel a man’s pain,” I remark.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she retorts, colouring.
“So how are you coping with your life, all on your own?” Damion wonders.
“Fantastic.”
“You can’t fool us, since Elizabeth told us everything. She confided in us,” Melanie tells me.
“Don’t believe everything you hear,” I advise.
“You’re lucky she didn’t punch you on the nose,” she returns. She has a girlish face, with apple cheeks and even plaits or pigtails. There’s a warrior queen waiting to split my skull, if I bumped into her by mistake. I find her as grim as the rope she affects to revile, to be straight with you.
“You telling us you enjoy your life as a single guy?” Damion comments.
“Did you notice any talent at this party?” I ask.
“What’s he saying?” Melanie says. “There’s something creepy about him.”
Damion takes a sociable sip from his glass and waves the glass significantly around my face. Under a halo of fine blonde curls he looks like a cross between Martin Luther and Art Garfunkel.
“Make no mistake about whose side we’re taking. It wouldn’t be to give any solace to a man like you,” she states.
“How devastated must you feel now, to have lost your soul mate in this life?”
“I never take any trouble to analyse my feelings. So where are the good looking women at this party?” I wonder. “No disrespect, Melanie.”
“He didn’t lose his soul mate, Damion,” says the crèche commander. “Liz finally got wise and outgrew him in an instant. As Liz readily admits, she should have recognised him for what he is and left him years ago.”
“She’s lucky to have a girlfriend like you,” I tell her.
“You have to admit you’re in a miserable place right now,” Damion adds.
“Not in the least, mate, ‘cause I’ve never been happier. Sorry to disappoint you, but I’ve been given a new lease on life.”
“Don’t listen to him,” she says disgustedly. “You know how he treated Liz.”
“I couldn’t survive without my soul partner. Goodness, no. In my life situation I’m lucky to cohabit with my perfect counterpart. A masculine element to interchange with the feminine... social and economic construct though it may be.”
“Talking for myself, man, I’m well shot of her.”
Damion’s scrubbed yet stubbly pink cheeks stir; though not with anger or resentment, oh no. “Your reaction comes from a defensive masculine attitude. Excuse me, but the truth about your marriage, and your relationship with Liz, is merely offending your crude macho defences,” he argues. “So you put up a sturdy defensive barrier to repel any sensitive or accurate explanation.”
“Do you have any more ideas from the top of your head?” I ask. He makes my love life sound like the Paris Commune.
“Leave the brute to his misery,” Melanie suggests.
“Noah is just upset because he’s lost what’s most important to him. He’s lost the feminine, both of his own personality and literally... so he compensates by emphasising the more unpleasant male traits.”
“What was it you read at university?”
Damion considers me dispassionately. “Noah, I believe you know very well what I took at uni.”
“Urban architecture?”
“No, it was not...”
“Damion, don’t bother to even listen, or to take his arrogance seriously. He’s too arrogant and unreconstructed to take in a word of your advice. And the truth of what you say strikes him directly to the heart.”
“Wouldn’t you be furious with Melanie, Damion, if she ran off with another guy?” I ask.
“Melanie? Run off?” he retorts.
“Wouldn’t you be annoyed with the little lady, if she went and absconded with some... some body building type, say?”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” The blood has coagulated in her cheeks. Fine strands of fair hair are flying away from her scalp, with the build-up of static.
Damion attempts to consider my flippant idea seriously. After all you never know what life is going to throw at you next. “No, I hope that I would respect her decision,” he tells me.
He succeeds in provoking me, though not deliberately. “Would you hell,” I tell him.
“How do you know that?” he protests.
“Don’t take the slightest bit of notice of him,” she insists.
“Don’t get personal,” I warn.
She twists her neck to scoff at my dress sense. “There’s something louche and revolting about him, Damion.”
“Noah, I would ask myself a few searching questions, if Melanie ever informed me that she wished to leave. The female has always represented the life instinct for me. I must respect her movements. She turns towards the creative, away from the destructive,” he argues.
“You don’t have to be a woman to be a feminist,” Melanie proclaims, triumphantly. Not for the first time.
“So you don’t care if she runs away with a body builder?” I facetiously pursue.
“I would not run away with a body builder,” she maintains, bunching her fists.
“But let’s just consider, for the sake of interest, that you did,” I reply.
“Why should I be interested in any other guy?” Teeth grind, eyes glint, cheeks burn; weight on the front of her feet, ready for the killer punch.
“Melanie and I are very happy,” he assures me.
“Can’t you accept the idea of an open minded man and a passionate woman being in a happy and equal relationship?”
“Are you for real?” I tell her.
“Are you suggesting that we are not?” she returns, scrolling up her bottom lip.
“I have no hesitation in declaring myself her feminist soul mate,” Damion tells me.
His wife drills him with an awesome tenderness.
“Still a good idea to keep your body in shape,” I suggest.
“You seedy old lecher,” she snarls. She rolls up the sleeves of her rainbow coloured goats’ hair sweater.
“Oh yes, she is, Noah.” He raises his dulcet voice a notch, as well as a thick finger. “They cope better than we do. We’re still grunting cave men in that area. We indulge in these chest thumping displays of anger and inadequacy,” he argues calmly.
“You’re wasting your breathe on him,” Melanie argues.
“Why bring up gender, to avoid the consequences of our actions?” I challenge.
“Take Liz for example.”
“What about her?”
“She took a hard look at her life situation and decided to change. Didn’t you always admire women who decided on change?”
“You have to admire her strength of mind,” Melanie adds.
“I got an idea about that,” I admit.
“You had to be more aware of her frustrations,” he suggests.
“I completely share them,” I tell him.
“You’re still bitter and twisted.”
“I hope that I never get to that place, when Melanie has to leave me. We’re both in touch with her emotions and we’re not going to lose that.”
“I don’t give a shit about Melanie’s emotions, honestly,” I say.
Damion narrows his eyes at me. “Both parties in a relationship should know when it is going wrong. It’s not very credible to deny the obvious,” he argues.
“It’s never been obvious to me,” I say.
“Your sexual politics are the most segregated I have ever come across,” Melanie tells me.
“Then you haven’t lived,” I repost.
“You’re completely off the map,” she insists.
“You may find some humour in your situation, but you’re asking for neuroses.”
“Oh, what neuroses can you offer me?”
“You weak man.”
“Even now when it’s too late for your relationship, you refuse to listen to your wife. That is your former wife.” His baby blue eyes twinkle submissive empathy and irony.
“Is there any better time?” I wonder.
“When are you ever going to understand Liz’s problems with the marriage?”
“Listen, Damion, let’s just have a few sociable drinks together, shall we? Let’s relax at this party and forget about our problems for a little while. What’s the use of all this fussing and fighting my friends?” I ask, in a lyrical mood.
“What’s he blithering about now?” Melanie wants to know, screwing up her girlish features.
“Why don’t you loosen up a bit, Mel?” I suggest.
“You’re over compensating again, Noah.”
“He never deserved such a clever and loving girl as Liz.”
“We’re lucky enough to stay in contact with her,” Damion admits. So he allows me to overhear and confirm my parnaoia.
“So I understand.”
“She’s made a remarkable transformation in her fortunes,” he argues.
“Is that the case?”
“You could learn something from her.”
“She could end up in one of her own cup cakes.”
“You’re revolting,” Melanie declares.
“From the chains,” I comment.
Damion tests a patient smile, concluding that, after all, I must be jesting on the subject, to some extent. “That’s a depressing confession, Noah. Yes, because your psyche is obviously vulnerable.”
“Perhaps my mother was to blame.”
“You’re only talking in that offensive way because you miss Liz.”
“I don’t miss her. I wish she would emigrate.”
“You should think about attending my men’s group,” he says.
“I’m too busy trying to pull,” I assure him.
“I would go through some soul searching, if I was in your position.”
“You’d tell Liz all my secrets,” I conclude.
“Not that my wife is ever going to leave me. As I already explained, I don’t ignore her essential needs or disregard the psychic messages she gives off.”
“My husband’s a remarkable man,” Melanie informs me.
“There’s no question,” I say. Then as she kisses his forehead, I take the chance to get away.
For all those harsh and pompous words, I can’t help thinking they scored a few direct hits. She didn’t knock me out, but she won on points. Didn’t Elizabeth’s choice expose my failure to understand? I certainly failed to anticipate. I squandered a megaton of emotional and legal fuel in the process. It’s hard not to speculate about female sides, emotional competence and, even, psychic intuitions.
Chapter 15
I resolve to limit my topics of conversation at this party; to restrict myself to discussing my garden, recent political scandals and the weather. It’s safer to chat about kites and balloons, with no mention of hearts and marriages.