The Occult Persuasion and the Anarchist's Solution

by Lisa de Nikolits

  “If you go to Costco, it will be cheaper,” a helpful individual piped up.

  “Kmart are pretty good too,” another offered, and Jason, clearly getting weary, signalled with a throat-cutting gesture. The room fell silent.

  “I think we can all figure out where to buy bog rolls,” he said. “But can anyone do the maths on the banner? I don’t want to get that wrong.”

  “I can,” a fellow in his mid-thirties with porn-star sideburns offered. “I’m a mechanical engineer and an architect. We can chat after, and I’ll call you from a burner phone to confirm the specs.”

  “Great. Thanks. Okay then, so that’s that? Any other questions? I’m getting tired here. Come on, people, it’s not rocket science. It’s a protest. Plus, all info will all be on the website.”

  “What if I want to bring a friend?” A skinny young man asked nervously. His railway-track braces made it hard for him to speak.

  “Friends are fine as long as they follow the rules: silence, black T-shirt with an anarchy sign, listen to the signals, bog rolls, don’t run, don’t talk about it, before or afterwards. Friends who follow the rules are welcome, but we’re serious, and they need to be too. Anything else?”

  There was silence. Then one hand was raised, stretching upwards in the slowest of slow motion gestures. I clenched my teeth.

  “What if we get arrested?” the voice whispered tremulously. The man looked like Muhammad Ali in his prime, but he was shaking and quivering like a bowl of jello.

  Jason let out a belly laugh. “Don’t be such ninnies. Where’s your sense of adventure? You’re anarchists for God’s sake, not conservative democrats or republicans. Grow a pair, will you? All of you, women included, grow a pair, and do it fast or don’t show up. If any of you in this room don’t have the balls to do this, then unsubscribe when you get home. That way I’ll have a true count of the numbers. If you stay subscribed, then you’re in. Are we clear? No shame in backing out. Well, I will consider you all to be a bunch of tossers, but hey, if you don’t have the balls, you don’t, it’s as simple as that. All right, we’re done here. Meeting adjourned. Thanks Robby, for the snacks, they were great as always.”

  At this, the anarchists broke into the most enthusiastic applause I’d heard all day.

  “Lots left,” Robby shouted out. “Come and get it on your way out.” There was a stampede to the table. I saw Jason talking to the mechanical engineer who was also an architect, while a large group had gathered around Mark, the bridge man.

  I was behind the now-empty table, with Robby, Martha, and Sean. Robby reached under the table and brought out a thermos. “Coffee,” he said, producing cups as if by magic, and we each took one, gratefully.

  Sean opened up a closet I hadn’t noticed and wheeled out a stack of folding chairs. He set them in a circle at the far end of the room. We all, mostly me, sank down into the civilized comfort with relief.

  “That went well,” Jason said, joining us. “What do you think?”

  We nodded various forms of approval, and Robby handed Jason a plate of goods he’d kept aside.

  Jason bit deeply into a vanilla cupcake with pink and white icing, and he shook his head. “Who knows if we’ll pull it off,” he said, and he sounded tired. He looked tired too. I was annoyed that the nervous nellies had tired him out with their questions.

  “We will,” Martha told him. She leaned forward and squeezed his hand. “Don’t give it another thought. We’re going to rock the world.”

  After the meeting ended, we all went our separate ways. I hadn’t known that was going to happen, and I was a little disconcerted to see everyone scatter. Jason was vague about his plans, and I assumed they had something to do with a doctor. Sean just waved and said he’d see us later back at the hotel. I hoped he wouldn’t be arrested in the Royal Botanic Gardens for sexual misconduct with a plant. Martha left with Robby, and I wasn’t sure if she was coming back to Apollo Bay with us or not. I stood alone on King Street, watching the traffic and the people coming and going. I decided I might as well drop into the pub I saw, the Newtown Hotel.

  I found a booth, just as I had imagined myself doing, and I admired the artwork on the walls while I waited for my beer. The interior was upscale, old-world colonial spiced with New York graffiti. One of the walls would have, at one point, been considered hard porn: it had pictures of sexy girls with their legs spread and large women holding their breasts. I supposed that anything could be called “art” these days, and if it was art, it was allowed, even right in the open and in your face while you drank a beer. I sat there, musing, thinking that in all likelihood, I was an old-fashioned prude. But I liked looking at the images, and my cock stirred, startling me. And there was me, thinking the thing was quite dead.

  My beer arrived, and I drank it in two swallows and ordered another one. The afternoon was hot and drowsy, and I was worn out, but I felt fired up too, and I wished the march was happening sooner. I finished my second beer and ordered a third. I wondered what the others were doing. I felt lonely and alone, left out. I wondered what Margaux was up to and if she would recognize me if she walked into the bar. I doubted it—my entire demeanour was different, not just my appearance.

  “You were at the meeting,” a voice said to me, and I turned and tried to focus on the speaker. It was the tiny girl, the one who looked about twelve, the one who asked what would happen to the toilet paper.

  “Should we be talking about it?” I replied, trying to keep my words crisp.

  She smiled. “That was all I was going to say about it,” she said, and she slid into the booth next to me. Right next to me. My cock sprang to full attention.

  “You’re like what, twelve?” I asked. She laughed a deep and sultry laugh, and my cock strained even further. I shifted in my seat, trying to ease the pressure of my trousers. She was doe-eyed and it felt like I was hitting on a Disney princess. I wanted to put a stop to my seemingly perverted inclinations, but I couldn’t put the brakes on.

  “I’m twenty-four,” she said, pouting her perfect little heart-shaped mouth. That upper lip. Oh my God. Those teeth. “I’m studying physics at the University of Sydney. I’ve nearly got my Masters. What do you do?”

  “I am retired,” I said. “In other words, I am very old. Ancient. Old enough to be your granddad or even your great-granddad.”

  “You’re making my pussy very wet,” she replied, her face pure innocence, and she reached out and rubbed my rock-hard cock. “You don’t feel like my granddad.”

  I squirmed. This was torture. “How would you know? You feel him up too?”

  “You should come back to my apartment and explore my garden of carnal delights.”

  “As a matter of fact, I really, really shouldn’t,” I told her. “But, you know what? I will.”

  She tongue-kissed me, and I was transported back to another time, a time of my youth, when girls’ tongues were a source of infinite and astounding pleasure.

  “Let’s go then,” she said when she came up for air. I threw enough money on the table to cover my bill and a generous tip. I managed to follow her outside into the brilliant sunlight where I was sure she’d see how horribly old I was and run screaming. But she took my hand and we walked a block south. Then, we were at her apartment and I was lying on her bed. She was going down on me and I couldn’t help myself, I came much too soon. She wiped it all over her face and grinned at me. Such perfect tiny white teeth.

  “Sorry,” I said, chagrined and deflated, my cock shrivelled and damp. There I was, in a Moroccan-styled boudoir with a sex angel, and I was done.

  “Don’t worry, Daddio,” she said. “We’ll get you going in no time. Ever tried Viagra?”

  “Of course not! I’ve never needed to.”

  “And you most likely don’t need to now, but let’s err on the side of hours of erotic pleasure.”

  She dug in her bedside table and put a
blue tablet on her tongue. She fed it to me and I swallowed gratefully, anything for that tongue, that tongue that tasted like strawberries and sunshine.

  I was concerned I’d fall asleep before the Viagra kicked in. I wasn’t used to that many beers, particularly not in the mid-afternoon of a hot summer’s day.

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  She smiled. “Polly.” We both laughed. “You haven’t seen me naked,” she said, standing up. “I’ll put some music on.”

  She dropped the needle onto a vinyl copy of “Sea of Love” by The Honeydrippers, and removed her clothing, swaying, her eyes dreamy, watching me. Soon, I was solid and powerful, and so I pulled her down, rolled over, and took her, missionary style, pounding with fury until we came together. We lay there, replete. I rolled off her and closed my eyes. I was buzzing from the beer, the Viagra, and the whole day.

  “You can go now,” she said sharply.

  I raised myself up on one elbow. “What?”

  “You can go now. Thanks and all that, but off you go.” She swatted at me with my underpants and widened those enormous blue eyes and I realized, with great sadness, that I was never going to taste that strawberry and sunshine-flavoured tongue again.

  I gathered my clothes, uncomfortable and taken aback. Had I failed her? Did she regret what we’d done? I was shaking—the exertion of it all had caught up with me. I didn’t want her to see me old and tired, so I tried to dress with cavalier nonchalance.

  “Eight,” she said.

  “What?”

  “You’re an eight out of ten.”

  “What’s the average?”

  She thought about that for a moment. “Six point five.”

  That made me feel better.

  When I left, she was still naked, and she was still on the bed, only she was painting her toenails sky blue. She didn’t look up when I opened the door and I closed it quietly behind me and walked down the flight of stairs. Outside, the day had spun into dusk.

  I had no idea what to do with myself and decided to go back to the hotel. I was about to hail a cab when I spotted a woman who looked familiar. Margaux! It was her. I was sure of it. I shrank into the doorway of a storefront and watched her walk decisively to the subway. It was definitely her. And behind her, I saw a man watching her leave, and he looked like he could be the incarnation of evil, only he most likely wasn’t. Margaux disappeared into the subway and the pale, floury man, and yes, he was incredibly pale, walked quickly away. I tried to follow him, but he had already vanished.

  33. MARGAUX

  I CHECKED MY FACE In the mirror. Pillow creases lined my cheeks and my eyes were swollen with sleep that had not wished to be disturbed. I put on some makeup and was once again painfully aware of the crevices in my face where once, not so long ago, it had been smooth. I told myself to put my vanity aside but still, I wanted to look good. I wanted to be desired. I did not want to be put out to pasture to graze the green grass and have the days of flirting and fun far behind in the rear-view mirror.

  Did I want to flirt with Jason the ex-punk rocker? Yes. I did, I knew that from our email exchanges. And, with schoolgirl pride, my feelings would be hurt if he simply saw me as someone’s granny. Not that I was someone’s granny, just yet, I reminded myself.

  I was nervous in the cab ride and unattractively sweaty. My hands were shaking when I paid the driver.

  Along the path, in the shadow of the enormous cruise ship in the harbour, I walked to the edge of the museum, worried that I wouldn’t find Jason in the milling crowd of ice-cream eaters.

  But he was a hard man to miss. He was leaning against the wall, tall and lean, like a piece of solid steel. His head was covered in a cap of tattoos and he had full sleeves of Celtic and Maori designs.

  I had no such distinguishing features. I walked towards him hesitantly, preparing my introduction but he bounced off the wall and beamed at me. “Margaux, I presume?”

  He had a bad boy gangster accent, deliciously cockney, and I found it incredibly sexy. I found him incredibly sexy.

  “Hello,” I said, nervously, stupidly, and he laughed.

  “Yes, hello. Look, there’s a nice little pub we can go to, to talk, away from all these shopaholic cruise nuts. Come with me.”

  He took my hand and my belly melted with warmth. I was sixteen, in love with this boy I’d just met. I’d be happy to never reach a destination; we could just walk around holding hands forever.

  But we arrived at a pub that adjoined a hotel, and I ordered a glass of red wine and Jason got a pint. We sat in a curved booth and it was with the greatest of difficulty that I refrained from sitting on his lap.

  “Your detective found us,” he said. “He’s not exactly the most unobtrusive figure in the world, wouldn’t you agree?” He smiled and the granite harshness of his features softened.

  I laughed. “Yep, Tim isn’t unobtrusive.”

  “And now that you know where Lyndon is, what do you plan to do about it?”

  “Nothing. I’ve got a few things on my plate that I need to sort out first.”

  “With regard to your lost soul?”

  “Yes. That.” And for second time that day, I recounted the entire story and I dug out a few pictures of Nancy that I had brought to show him.

  “The facts I found about Chelmsford and the use of deep sleep therapy are unbelievable,” I told Jason. “There were apparently at least two dozen known deaths. False death certificates were signed by the Chelmsford doctors to cover things up. Consent forms were forged; the patients had never seen them. And other patients committed suicide a year after leaving the hospital.

  “One fellow, an actor, went in because he was suffering from anxiety because his plastic surgery had gone wrong—his facelift had made his eyes look weird and he was freaked out by it. They gave him a pill telling him it was a mild sedative to help him calm down. Next thing, he was unconscious and given the sleep therapy treatment, which was, in fact, a potentially fatal dosage of barbiturates combined with other drugs. And on top of that, he was given electric shock treatment for two weeks and fed through a stomach tube.”

  “Your nurse was involved in all of this?”

  “Yes. Graham, this other friend of mine, found evidence that she worked there. We think she was in love with Dr. Bailey. But she was born cruel, the sort who tortured puppies.”

  I was finding it hard to concentrate. I was talking about the worst cases of abuse and cruelty by man to man, but all I could think about was how much I wanted Jason to kiss me. Me, practically in my sixties, wanting to be kissed like never before!

  Jason’s arm ran the length of the booth, and somehow I ended up closer to him than I was before. I didn’t know if I could manage to conduct myself with any kind of decorum for the rest of the afternoon. And my feelings must have been obvious, because the next thing I knew, I turned to him and Jason leaned down to kiss me. I put my hand on his neck, his rough neck, and we French kissed like high-school kids.

  “I am thinking maybe we should get a room?” he said and I agreed.

  We went to the front desk of the hotel and Jason got us a room. The whole thing took much too long, and I waited for him to change his mind. I wanted to apologize for the fact that my body wasn’t young and tell him that I hoped he knew what he is in for, but from the way he kissed me when we got into the elevator, I knew that everything would be fine.

  It was far from fine. It was every kind of superlative in the book, and afterwards I lay curled up next to him, with my face buried in his shoulder. “So, we finally meet,” Jason said, smiling. “Does this feel odd to you?”

  “Not in the least. Do you mean because you’re Lyndon’s buddy?”

  “Exactly.” He grinned. “His buddy. Look.” He showed me a recent tattoo of a tree on his leg. “Lyndon’s work.”

  “He’s a tattoo artist now? That’s really good.”<
br />
  “Yes. Well, he’s learning to be. He has to keep practicing. We go back tomorrow, you know, to Apollo Bay.”

  The thought of him leaving me ripped me in two and I sat up. “Oh,” I said, stupidly, clutching the sheets to me.

  “Margaux, there’s something I need to tell you. A few things, actually. I don’t want any secrets or lies between us.”

  I had a sense of foreboding. By the time he finished his story, I knew that he was dying and that a huge toilet paper protest was being planned for the near future.

  “I want to help,” I told him, and I couldn’t stop crying. This man built of muscle and steel, this man who I was in love with after five minutes, was dying. What was wrong with life? I felt my anger rise, so I got up and pulled on my clothes, yanking and tugging with fury, still crying.

  “Ah Margaux. I’m sorry, this was a mistake, coming here today,” he said.

  I stopped buttoning my shirt and shouted at him. “This wasn’t a mistake. Not for me, anyway. This was one of the best days of my life. I’m just sad, that’s all. We haven’t even gotten to know each other and now it’s over.”

  “It’s not over yet. And, at least we met each other. I’m very glad we did,” he offered. “I really wanted to meet you. You are right. This was no mistake. I’m sorry I said that.”

  I managed to stop crying. “Are you going to tell Lyndon you saw me?”

  He shook his head. “No. That’s between the two of you.”

  “If we ever even talk to each other again.”

  “You will.” Jason was confident.

  “Oh God.” I looked at the time. It was nearly seven p.m. “I have to go.”

  “Yeah, me too.” Jason got out of bed and I watched him dress, admiring the grace of his movements and the beautiful lines of his body. I couldn’t believe I wouldn’t see him again or that we wouldn’t have this moment again.

  “Listen,” he said, and he took me in his arms. “We will be planning the protest for the next two weeks. But I’ll find a way to come to Sydney and be with you for a day, if you’d like that?”