An Isolated Incident (9 page)

‘Oi.' The tall man said it softly, but the young blokes flinched as if he'd bellowed and exchanged a look, like kindergarteners busted painting their faces instead of the paper. ‘Have a bit of fucking respect.' His head jerked backwards towards the bar. ‘What if Chris'd heard that?'

‘Shit. Didn't think, hey.'

‘She's not even here, you soft cunt,' the old man said.

‘Maybe she's out the back. Maybe she's walking in any minute. Maybe that bird listening to every word we say is her friend, gonna run off and tell it all.' Fast, he looked up, met May's eyes. ‘Or maybe she's a cop. Sussing out who's saying what. That it, love?'

May held his gaze for as long as she could bear – two seconds, three – then raised an eyebrow, shrugged and picked up her phone. She scrolled through her emails, picked one at random, began to read it word by word.

‘Oi. Asked you a question.'

She didn't look up. ‘You did? I'm sorry. What was it again?'

Several beats and then a sinewy, blond-furred forearm on her table, right by her hand. ‘You a copper?'

May clicked her phone screen off, smiled up into the tall man's sun-burnt face. ‘No.'

‘You know Chris?'

‘Never met her.'

He narrowed his eyes. ‘You work for a paper?'

‘Sort of.'

The man tapped his fingers on the table. ‘What's that mean? “Sort of”?'

‘I'm a reporter for
AustraliaToday
, it's a digital news site. That's –'

‘I know what it is. What d'ya want with Chris?'

‘I didn't say I wanted anything with her.'

‘Yeah, well, I'm not an idiot and you stick out like dog's balls, you know that?'

She tried another smile. ‘Are you always this aggressive with strangers?'

‘Yes.' His face didn't crack.

‘Wow. Um, okay. Best not be a stranger then.' May pushed her hair behind her shoulder, held out her hand. ‘I'm May Norman and I'd love to buy you a drink.'

He stiffened, snatched a look back over his shoulder where his mates were smirking into their beers. ‘Nice name, that,' he said, taking her hand, squeezing for a second, releasing. ‘I'm Chas.' He smiled, bright and kind. ‘And I'm buying.'

He turned on his heel and stalked towards the bar, stopping to murmur into the air between his mates on the way. The redhead cackled loudly and the old bloke slapped him on the back. May fiddled with her phone, reminding herself she was good at this and in control and that getting the story was more important than feminist principles – or no, not even that, it was that feminist principles demanded she tell the truth about this heinous act of violence against a woman and the blokey, misogynist community in which it happened, and if that required flirting with one or more of said blokey, misogynist community members then that was for the greater good.

I woke just after nine. Early for me. Straight away I knew Bella was dead and that I had drunk too much and that Nate had gone. I knew everything right away. I lay in bed and lived with it as long as I could and then I got up and went out to the kitchen. My legs and back ached and when I held the kettle under the tap to fill it, I noticed my hands trembling.
I felt weak and empty and shaky, but the thought of food made my stomach clench. I had done damage to myself in the night – the drinking and weeping and passing out on the floor – but this was something else. I felt like something had been ripped out of me. Something important. A lung or kidney. Maybe a few ribs. Not my heart. That kept bloody pounding.

I imagined Bella coming in and fussing over me, feeling my forehead, insisting I go back to bed. Instantly, I saw that I had become one of them, the people she cared for, hunched over the table, my hair lank, my dressing gown pilled and faded, my body racked with mysterious pains, my mind not yet gone enough that I didn't understand I was losing it. This is what it's like to be old, I thought.

The kettle clicked off and I shuffled over to the bench to make some coffee. A movement caught my eye and I looked through the window and there she was in her nursing home uniform, looking right at me, hair scraped back so I could see every bit of her unmarked face. Unmarked except for the vertical line between her brows. She was frowning something wicked, must've known I'd been boozing up and carrying on like a kid.

My body understood before my mind. I was still thinking what to say to her to make her stop being angry when my legs went out from under me. I grabbed at the edge of the sink and slowed my fall but my ankle turned as I hit the ground and I wasted seconds rubbing it. When I pulled myself up, she was gone.

I actually believed for a few seconds that she must be coming around to the front door. I watched the space, waiting for her to fill it and then it wasn't like anything changed, I just knew that she wasn't and wouldn't and hadn't been.

‘I'm in shock,' I said out loud, and it must've been true because I heard her voice then, saying,
You're
shocking,
that's for sure.

I was making the coffee when my phone rang. Unknown number, but I answered it anyway. I'd never do that now, but this was early days. I didn't get that a bunch of strangers saw themselves as lead characters in a thrilling story which began with the discovery of a pretty dead girl, who happened to have been played by my sister.

Feel free to take that personally, by the way.

Anyway, that morning I answered the phone and a woman said, ‘Chris? It's Monica Gordon,' in a tone that made me think I knew her.

‘Oh. Hello,' I said, my brain scrambling to place her.

‘Oh, Chris, I'm so very sorry for your loss. It's the most terrible thing. I've been beside myself since I heard. How're you holding up?'

‘Oh, you know,' I said. I was stumped. She sounded young, but like someone used to being listened to. Someone from the nursing home head office? One of Bella's school friends who'd moved to Sydney for uni?

‘I can't imagine. I just can't.' She sighed. ‘Look, I hope you don't mind me calling you directly like this, but the police liaison wanted me to go through this whole rigmarole and when I realised you were listed in the phone book I decided it was better if I just looked you up and –'

‘Wait, sorry. I'm a bit dazed at the moment. I've lost the thread here. Who are you?'

‘Monica Gordon. I'm with Femolition. We're a feminist activist coalition. I'm sure you've seen the interventions we've been making into the public discourse around Bella's death and –'

‘The public . . .?'

‘Yes. I mean, in the papers and on talkback radio and such?' She sounded less sure now, and younger still. ‘You know, there's been all this victim-blaming rhetoric and it's been very important to us at Femolition
that we counteract that message. So we've been, you know, stating that case.'

‘I'm sorry. I actually have no idea what you're talking about. I haven't been reading the papers or listening to radio. This is the first I've – What do you mean “victim blaming”? Are you with the police?'

A long pause, then her voice back in control. ‘Chris, wow, I'm so sorry. It didn't occur to me you wouldn't have been keeping up with public discussion, but of course it should have. I've gone about this the wrong way. I should've said at the outset: I'm on your side, on Bella's side.' A sigh. ‘The thing is, some people have been talking about the ways in which Bella may have invited, or contributed to, what happened and we think that's, that's, you know, it's bullshit.' She spat out the word like she meant it. Like I would've said it. ‘What we'd like to do, Chris, is honour Bella's memory by holding a march against victim-blaming and violence against women. We want it to be a public demonstration that despite the loudmouths questioning what Bella might have done to put herself in danger, there are many, many more of us who believe all the blame lies with the perpetrators.'

I don't know if I said anything then. I was reeling. I might have said
hmmm
.

‘So, we've got it tentatively scheduled for next Wednesday evening – to be confirmed once we hear back about the council permits for the road closures etcetera. And, of course, pending your availability. We were thinking from Belmore Park to Town Hall, ending with some speeches and a candlelight vigil. Of course we'd be honoured if you'd march in the front line, maybe holding a banner or a favourite photograph of Bella, and, if you feel able, to say a few words when we reach Town Hall?'

‘Town Hall? Like in Sydney?'

Another pause. ‘Perhaps I could come and see you to talk this over? It might be easier in person. I could be there in, I don't know, how long's the drive? Four hours? Five?'

‘No, thank you.'

‘Um, okay. So, is Wednesday . . .?'

‘No. No to all of –' My vision blurred and I had to steady myself with a hand on the sink. ‘Just please stop this. It's not . . . Just, please. No.' I hung up. The phone rang almost immediately and I answered and told her to leave me alone and then I turned the damn thing off.

Around 3 pm I was in bed staring at the wall when there was a violent thumping on the front door. The thumping stopped and was replaced by Nate hollering my name, so I pulled my bones together and went to let him in.

He stomped in, knocking the front door with one shoulder and me with the other, and then slammed his phone onto the table. ‘What kind of a fucking message was that?'

‘I'm sorry. I got pissed.'

‘Yeah, no shit.'

‘I'm sorry.'

He glanced at me, then up over my head, then back at my face. ‘Did you sleep at all?'

‘Not much.'

He sat down, mumbled something I was glad not to understand. I sat across from him and we were silent like that for a while.

‘Listen, I had a big talk with Renee and she –'

‘Spare me.'

‘Please, babe, listen.' He had my hands again. ‘Listen, she understands. She knows I need to be here with you for now. She's so cut up about what happened. She
wants
me to be here for you.'

‘Saint, isn't she?'

‘But listen, she's not comfortable about me staying here. And I think she's right, you know. It's too easy for us – for you and me – to slide back into living like husband and wife. We're both real vulnerable at the moment. It'd be easy to fall into old ways.'

‘Are those her words or yours?'

He was cringing inside, I knew, but his face stayed calm. ‘Hers, yeah, but I agree.'

‘Right.'

‘Chris, I love her. You know? And she trusts me. I don't wanna fuck it up.'

‘You're a saint too, now.' I pulled away and went to the sink, rinsed his heat from my hands, then scooped cold water from the tap to my mouth, which was like the bottom of cocky's cage. I splashed my face, dried it on a tea towel that smelt like old eggs.

‘I'm trying to do the right thing,' he said when I was facing him again.

‘Can I remind you I never asked you to come in the first place? And I never asked you to stay over when you did. I never asked you to come back today. So don't look at me like I'm some whiny little homewrecker. I didn't ask you for anything.'

‘You didn't have to, babe. You know I –'

‘Stay, don't stay, I don't care, but don't tell me about you and Renee and don't act like I owe you anything and don't – please, Jesus, please – don't fucking fight with me. Okay?'

He came to me and wrapped me up and that was fine. It was always fine when he did that.

At five o'clock Nate dropped me at work on his way to his mate Melvin's place, where he usually stayed when in town with a tour group. He offered to pick me up when I finished but I told him I'd get a lift.

‘Don't you walk,' he said.

‘I said I'd get a lift.' I went to open the door but he'd child-locked it. I glared, waited.

‘Who you getting a lift with?'

‘Someone who cleans their car once in a while,' I said, picking a chip packet out of the garbage pile beneath my feet and tossing it in his lap. He brushed it off without looking, shrugged. I tossed the chip packet back on to his lap, added an empty Coke can and a crumpled McDonald's bag.

‘All you're doing is making me hungry. So tell me how you're getting home and I'll let you out and go get myself a feed.'

‘I'll get a lift with Suze or Grey. Okay?'

‘I can come and get you. No trouble.' His hand hovered over the lock on his door.

‘Appreciate that, but it's not necessary. You get an early night.'

‘Alright. But you call me if you need.' The lock clicked up. I opened the door and I climbed out. ‘I'm serious,' he called as I walked away. ‘Don't you walk home.'

I waved without looking back. Bella used to rouse on me for walking home, too. But it was ten minutes, fifteen tops. Best way in the world to wind down after a shift. I'd never been threatened, never frightened.

But Nate was right. Those things hadn't just happened to Bella; someone had done them. Someones. Someones who were still walking, driving around free and easy as could be.

But they'd been driving around free and easy every other night I'd walked home. Tonight was no different except now I knew they existed, had seen with my own poor eyes what they could do.

It was a good night behind the bar. We had a busload of footy players from interstate and not a one of them had any idea who I was or what had happened. I still had the odd regular giving me the
poor old thing but what's the goss
look, but mostly I got to talk and laugh and bend for tips like nothing in the world could be wrong.

The busload left for their hotel around midnight leaving only a pack of local boys around the telly up the back and a few long-distance truckies and coach drivers holding up the bar. One of them, Tyler, was a semi-regular sleepover friend of mine. He was one of the younger fellas I'd taken home, only twenty-eight, but with a good decade of life on the road under his belt. Not married, no girlfriend last I knew. Lived with his mum in the outer suburbs of Melbourne. Shy in the bedroom. Shy and grateful. Now that the crowds of footy players were gone I saw he was watching me from his perch near the smoke machine.