Absence Makes

by Bruce Menzies

  In Mosman Park, she sat on her front porch. The wine glass felt cool in her hand. Across the street, she could see kids kicking a football around the park. They were yelling at each other. She thought she recognised the boys who lived next door, Susie’s boys. Maybe Susie’s fixing dinner. Maybe she could tempt her with a cold drop. She twirled her glass, then thought better of it. Brad would be home soon. He needs his dinner at six sharp. Can’t interrupt Susie when Brad’s around.

  Simone contemplated her day. There’d been three interviews. Tomorrow she’d write up her notes. Baxter was the pick of the bunch. He’d provoked her, pushed her beyond her professional boundaries. No, that’s not fair, she thought. I chose to open up to him. He just acted his part, and acted it well. And the old bugger has got to me, somehow.

  She was tempted to knock on Susie’s door. A cigarette would go down a treat. So would a bit of a chat. Nothing specific. Just a general chat about work and life, and men, of course. Susie was good for a chat. They laughed together, especially on the days when Brad was out of town. She would be helpful right now, would Susie. Not to talk in depth about the interviews, though she’d have a good giggle when Simone told her about the old blokes, no names mentioned.

  No, there was more to worry about than Baxter and the project. She had received a request. It was, she thought, a strange request, and she struggled to see how she could be of any use. It had come from a former workmate with whom she’d become friendly. His brother’s marriage was in trouble. Big trouble. His wife had left. ‘Just like that,’ said Jeff, her friend. ‘She’s flown the coop. He’s seriously miserable. We’re worried about him.’

  ‘What can I do? I’m a social worker not a shrink.’ She couldn’t see the point. But her friend was insistent. ‘We don’t reckon he’d go to a shrink. He just sits around aimlessly.’ Jeff had given her an imploring look. ‘I’ll think about it,’ she said. ‘Anyway, if he won’t go to a shrink, what makes you think he’ll let me talk to him?’

  Jeff had thrown his hands in the air. ‘I just hope he doesn’t do anything silly.’

  She’d listened and asked a lot of questions. Why would he do anything silly? Marriages bust up all the time. But Jeff wasn’t deterred. He couldn’t stop talking. ‘You must love your brother a lot,’ she said.

  He gave her a quizzical look. ‘We aren’t that close. But I promised my parents I’d come up with something. You’re my best hope.’

  They’d left it there. But that was a week ago. She needed to make up her mind. Yes or no.

  She thought about what Jeff had told her. His brother’s name was Ross. He’s been married a couple of years to June, a girl he’d met at high school. They’d bought a house in Graylands. Ross was still there, but who knows for how long, what with a mortgage to keep up and interest rates going through the roof.

  Her glass was empty and she wandered inside for a refill. The bottle was on the table, along with the beans and the spuds and the chicken, still in its bag.

  Returning to the porch, she thought about the young couple, under the pump for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which were interest rates and mortgage payments. Her friends were also complaining. The bane of our lives, they said. That’s why I still rent, Simone reminded herself. High interest rates, and a lousy salary. Was it all about politics? In the eyes of Jeff and his cronies, everything that went wrong was the fault of ‘that useless Labor government’.

  She moved with a different crowd. A crowd clamouring for change. They had welcomed the new regime. So much had happened in the past year. Gough hovered in his Ascendancy. Like the emperors of old, he was busy remaking the country in his own image. They were all excited at first. Well, some of them less so, it has to be said. Simone recalled the frenetic political pace - a veritable steamroller lurching out of Canberra. It gave her goose bumps to think back on it. Most of her student friends were not switched on politically but she was a good bit older. Mature age, they call it. Well, at twenty-eight, she couldn’t say maturity was a word she could easily relate to. But, away from the campus, she mixed with a crowd that took politics seriously. They wanted to change the system. Under every stone, they saw inequities. A world of haves and have-nots. The haves made sure the have-nots stayed at arm’s length. The haves controlled the shots. They were clever, those conservatives, holding on to power for more than two decades. Like everyone, they could talk about a fair go and the Australian way. A lot of talk but mostly hot air.

  After a slow start, Simone’s eyes began to open. Energised, she threw herself into the fray. The change of government carried the promise of another Renaissance. They were convinced of that, more so when tertiary education was suddenly FREE. ‘Yes,’ she said aloud, quoting the balding poet who was apt to recite verse when they congregated at the pub: ‘An oyster landed in our nightmare.’

  The Whitlam oyster aside, what would she make of Ross and June, married, she was told, on Gough’s Day, 1972? The honeymoon must have been short. Not unusual. In her observation, honeymoons were always short, once the lovebirds realised they had each other to deal with, day in and day out. Small itches appeared. Scratched, they became gaping wounds. Band-Aids – in the form of compromises - were often applied but did little to stem the growing resentments. Couples became angry and anxious. What had happened to their golden glow? How come they were happy one moment and now – now, every tiny thing seemed to balloon into a problem?

  Ross and June - they were kids, after all. Twenty-three, Jeff said, when she’d asked. Simone smiled to herself. At twenty-three, some of us think we’ve got things figured. We‘ve observed our parents and decided there has to be a better way. We might even believe we’ve hit upon the answers and have nothing more to learn. We’ve flown the family coop. The world’s at our feet. We study and hit upon a career. We save a bit, we travel and suddenly, as a bonus, we’re in love. We shack up together. We get married and everyone is happy as Larry as we forget ourselves for a few hours and bask in reflected joy. Conflict? That’s what happens over there in Asia or the Middle East or some unpronounceable place in Africa. We’ve left home haven’t we? Nobody left to fight with. If only. If only.

  Well, she wasn’t much older than the young couple in question and already saw herself as a living example of how to fail Relationships 101. She could write a book about her miserable failures. Maybe she would, one day.

  Relationships 101. Pass or fail? When she and her girlfriends joked together, they usually gave themselves a C minus. One cocky bitch plumped for a distinction but was left with egg on her face when her husband teamed up with one of his undergraduates. The gang had laughed about that but she felt sorry for her fallen friend. She knew you couldn’t take men for granted, not even a wonderful, caring lover who seemed in the beginning to promise the Earth. You set yourself up if you did that. In her experience, it was a grand lottery in which she was completely at sea, falling into innumerable bear pits and rabbit holes, and all the while trying to make sense of this ludicrous human search for intimate connection - a driving need that so often disintegrates into an embittered dis-connection. From the time she left home at seventeen, already giddily in love, her romantic world was a mess. It felt as if she was pre-programmed, as she extricated herself from the ruins and existed in the gap - the gap between one man and the next.

  On the other hand, she was a great watcher, especially attentive to the couplings and uncouplings of friends and relations. Everyone loved to dramatise the bust-ups and the recriminations. She was as guilty as most. It was much harder to pull back and check out what was really going on. Much easier to blame and repeat the dose with your next partner. Whatever you call it, she thought, whenever the honeymoon ends, the world spins and you hang on for dear life. Or you fall off. And unless some masochistic tendency arises, you don’t relish the experience. It’s stressful.

  Simone wondered about the stressors – a word that cropped up in her lectures. What was out there that made things even tougher? She formed a theory there were four m
ajor stressors that repeatedly reared their heads. The Big Four: Sex, Power, Money…and Meaning. Everything else, she thought, was derivative. Think about it, she said to a couple of her colleagues. Don’t take my word for it.

  The boys had stopped playing football. The two from next door did not see her sitting there, as they hurdled the fence and raced inside. She gazed out across the oval, pondering the situation that had been explained to her. Money was clearly an issue. Though they received plenty of early help from carefully-generous parents, Ross and June were obliged to stand on their own financial feet. Meeting mortgage payments was their first challenge. Interest rates shot up to ten percent within twelve months of them buying their cherished house. That took the wind out of their sails and made a mess of their bottom line. At the macro level, the projects coming out of Canberra, bold as they were, cost big dollars. The country collectively groaned as inflation – and prices – headed skywards. Household budgets were murdered. Ross, the manager of expenditure and the purveyor of most of the income, grew increasingly tense. Jeff, who had some of the same problems, told her this.

  But that was only part of the story. There was also a stir-fry of meaning and power. Ross began to hate his job. He was bored to death, spending dreary days at his desk, checking and rechecking applications and writing memos to the two colleagues who sat beneath him in the office pecking order. He felt suffocated and constrained in what he could say and do. To compound his woe, he was now ruled by a bear of a manager, not an aggressive bear but a faintly contemptuous one, without an inch of initiative and a reverence for conformity. Simone laughed about that. Sounds familiar? Haven’t most of us lucked upon one of those in our time on the treadmill?

  Then there was June. ‘I know my brother’s a bit of a waster,’ Jeff told her. ‘But his wife’s one tough chick. And her head’s full of this feminist crap, just like yours.’ She did not rise to the bait. June would have a very different perspective, of that she was certain.

  If – and it was only an if – she decided to go along with Jeff’s request, it was best she keep an open mind. Simone sighed. She had enough on her plate. On the other hand, it was an opportunity to help out a friend. Perhaps she might learn something.

  A group of schoolgirls walked past, talking loudly. They wore blue uniforms and carried large satchels. Simone drank the rest of her wine and wandered inside to put on the potatoes.

  His brother suggested they meet over the weekend at a café in West Perth. Who’s this woman you’ve lined up for me to see? A social worker. What do I need with a bleeding social worker? She’s a friend of mine and she might be able to help you make sense of things. Give it a shot, Ross. We’re all concerned about you.

  He’d mumbled something non-committal before deciding he may as well go along with it. Nothing better to do, anyway.

  When he entered the café they were sitting together, the woman and Jeffrey. The woman put out her hand.

  ‘Hi Ross, I’m Simone.’

  He shook hands quickly and nodded to his brother, noting the fancy waistcoat over a striped shirt. Jeffrey was not wearing a tie.

  ‘A coffee, or something to eat?’

  ‘No, water’s fine.’

  ‘I have to nip into the office,’ said his brother. ‘Maybe you can give me a ring tonight and let me know how you two hit it off.’

  Typical Jeffrey, he grizzled. It’s bloody Saturday and he’s too busy to hang around. Plus, he’s landed me with a complete stranger. Suddenly, he felt like leaving.

  ‘I need another coffee, Jeff,’ said Simone. ‘Can you order it on your way out?’

  Nobody calls my brother Jeff, he thought.

  She turned towards him. ‘I’ve heard you’re going through a rough patch.’

  ‘What did my brother tell you?’

  ‘You and your wife have separated.’

  ‘She pissed off.’

  ‘Why do you think she did that?’

  ‘I don’t really have a clue.’

  ‘I really don’t have a clue.’ She thought about his words after they took leave of each other. The coffee had stretched into lunch. After his initial reluctance, Ross had plenty to say. When he arrived, she almost pulled the plug. What could she offer? He was only a few years her junior. And she wasn’t a proper counsellor, though she’s read plenty of books. She was interested, no question of that. On her social work placement, she met a therapist who worked with couples and families. At that agency, she wangled her way into team meetings where they discussed their cases. She found it fascinating – much more so than her regular course work. But now, face-to-face in the café, what could she say to Ross? He wasn’t looking at her, probably thinking the same thing. Thinking also that she was a friend of his brother. Jeff said they didn’t get on that well.

  He really looked miserable. No wonder his family was worried. She decided to give it a shot.

  ‘You don’t really have a clue?’ She fed his words back at him, suppressing a smile. She knew about men like Ross. She had even met some, men whose wives had left them. Their stories were depressingly similar, as if they spoke from the same script. ‘What happened?’ She left. ‘Why do you think she left?’ I haven’t a clue. These responses baffled her. You can’t be serious, she would think to herself. You must have seen it coming. Something must have registered. After a while, she realised how wrong she was. These guys, the majority of them, didn’t see it coming. They couldn’t fathom what happened. They thought everything was hunky-dory – well, most of the time. And they were left shaking their heads and in shock when she finally walked out the door.

  What else did Ross tell her? June made mountains out of molehills. She always wanted to dissect every piddling thing that came up. She had to pull every comment apart and get you to explain what you meant. What a waste of time and effort. A bloke had better things to do. They had arguments. Of course. Doesn’t everyone? But you don’t have to run out the door. It’s never that bad. Well, not in our case.

  A fair point, she thought. We all have our troubles. In relationship. Out of relationship. You deal with them. Simple as that. Or ignore them and, after a while, who knows, the sun will shine. It always does. You don’t go ultra-American, do you? Running off to a shrink at the drop of a hat. Yapping on about who changed your nappies and whether you were breastfed or had the bottle thrust in your mouth before your poor mother left hospital. Suffering every kind of psychological test to see if you could distinguish one ink blot from another. Abruptly, she thought about one of Baxter’s pithy comments: ‘You want to psycho-bloody-analyse me, is that it?’ No doubt Ross would say much the same thing.

  She’d read some Freud. He might call this ‘resistance’. It’s a bit of a dirty word, not a state you should aspire to. Quite negative, in fact. She didn’t see it that way. In a confessing mood, she’d say she wore her resistance like a badge of honour. Perhaps that’s why she’d never been psycho-bloody-analysed. Someone - some lecturer - suggested she should learn to accept feedback. She took umbrage at that. How could they judge? She was a social worker, after all. Not one of those rats and stats psychs, hiding behind their statistical studies and their psychometric tests and their diagnostic manuals. Someone should try her out. See if she was open to the Big ‘F’ – feedback, that is. She grinned. What wicked thoughts she was having. It doesn’t help to dump on those poor psychs. They merely do what they’re trained to do. And get paid three times what she could ever earn. It’s green, her envy – not red, that’s jealousy. Courtesy of some smart-arse, she’d learnt to tell the difference.

  Ross loomed large in her thoughts in the days after they met. Their conversation, she decided, had gone pretty well. He assured her he wouldn’t do anything silly, and she believed him. There was something in his self-deprecating misery that made both of them laugh. She felt relief when he laughed. He’d mostly buried his mirth and he was hurting but, when his humour did come out, it was infectious. These Aussie blokes, she reflected, they don’t know their arse from their elbow wh
en it comes to expressing their feelings but they have a certain style, a loopy way of putting things and they can send themselves up, even in their deepest pain. She liked that. It gave her something to work with.

  He agreed to chat with his brother, and she suggested a visit to his parents might reassure them too. This, he would not promise. ‘I might give them a quick call. I can’t face them right now.’

  As for June, Simone enquired if they were still talking. Ross indicated it was happening but only sporadically. June had chucked in uni and picked up some sort of job. As far as he knew, she was still at Claire’s.

  Before he sauntered off to find his car, he said he was glad they’d met. In a week or two, they would catch up again. Meanwhile, Simone had her project, and Baxter to think about.

  9

  She did delve. Baxter’s revelation intrigued her but she blithely omitted it from the interview report. Her research had forked into the sanctioned and the subversive. The latter occupied most of her time, and she did wonder when her supervisor would cotton on. While the ice held firm, she resolved to pry discreetly into Baxter’s past and see where that led.

  It led first to the Registrar-General’s Department. A gaunt fellow behind the counter gave her the once-over, and she could hear the wheels turning as he digested her recital. ‘I’m trying to track down some old friends of my parents – the Moncurs. Do you have any records that might help?’

  After making it clear his department was not a family reunion agency, the man went away and came back with a bundle of index books. As it happened, Moncur was an uncommon name. It was easy to identify the births of Peggy, Alex and Ken - the three children Baxter mentioned. But that was about it. Only one or two deaths were notified, and three marriages, none of which identified Alice.