Me Without You (8 page)

‘I have lost count of how many women I’ve slept with,’ I said, when I’d formed the right sentence in my mind. ‘I’m not proud of that; I guess in some ways I’m ashamed of it. I used to be the one who did the walk of shame, who gave the false name, who didn’t call when I said I would. I don’t think I believe in marriage or monogamy. And I’m not saying all of that to be anything other than honest, because I appreciate that’s exactly what you’re doing here too.’

Even behind the dark glasses, I could feel her eyes on mine. It boggled my mind that we could share such an intimate discussion after only a few nights together and that I would feel not even a hint of embarrassment.

‘I don’t know where this is headed, Lilah. But can’t we just share whatever path it takes while it lasts?’ I was impressed with how casual I sounded. The truth was I felt so nervous I had put my coffee down so that she wouldn’t see me shaking. If she asked me to leave, and not to contact her again, I wasn’t sure how I’d handle it.

It was her turn to sit silently for a painfully long moment. This time the ocean didn’t fill the silence at all, and I felt exposed and in danger. When she finally reached across and took my hand, I could have done a cartwheel over the balcony.

‘Okay,’ she said slowly. ‘We’ll take it day by day.’

S
unday 30 August

So. Apparently I have something like a lover for the first time in five years. And, also possibly new for me, I no longer have anything like a spine.

Callum has just left, after spending two days and nights with me.
Two nights
. I distinctly remember promising myself Friday night that I would not sleep with him again, that we would keep it to dinner, and then I would immediately resume my new commute via car and never speak to him ever again.

This time I can’t blame it on being caught off guard. Yes, maybe I went overboard on the wines at dinner, but it wouldn’t have made much difference if I’d stuck to water.

There are no awkward silences with Callum. When the conversation fades, I can sit with him and be at ease. These last few years I have felt like there is always something to prove, another fight shuffling to the top of the queue demanding my full attention—as if I owe the world something just for being here. It is busy in my mind, too busy even to journal until now, but when he is with me I am fully in the moment. The rush of thoughts slows, and I forget all of the good reasons why we can’t have a future, because the present is just potent enough to distract me from them.

We talked Saturday morning and I tried to explain to him that I just couldn’t see him anymore. I didn’t try very hard, because when push came to shove, I didn’t want to convince him at all. So we agreed to take it moment by moment, and I made another promise to myself. After lunch, I’d send him home, and I’d do some work.

But then we decided to go for a walk along the Corso. We were any young-ish professional couple walking hand in hand, just going for a casual stroll with our takeaway coffees, making the most of the weekend. We walked through the farmer’s market and while I bought some vegetables, Callum snuck into a takeaway shop and emerged with greasy hot chips and fish cocktails for morning tea then laughed at my disgust. And then I tried on hats and jokingly posed for him. He watched through the store window then he pantomimed a fashion photographer. It was so silly, ridiculous actually, but we laughed so loud that other people glanced our way and I saw one older lady flash me a knowing smile. She thought we were in love, and I wondered if she was thinking of a long-lost love of her own. This is what people do, isn’t it? They meet someone who makes them laugh, and they laugh together, and the years melt away.

And all of these deliciously ordinary things these last few days have been so much fun. I own so many hats that it's ridiculous and I can’t remember buying a single one of the others, they are just an instrument I use to try to avoid the freckles that I know I
can’t
avoid. The black felt bucket hat I bought today will be different. This one holds a memory.

He went home then just to get some spare clothes, and later we decided to go for a run along the beach together. I was confused when he put his runners on. Apparently he wears shoes, even when he runs on sand, which quite frankly seems insane to me. It’s a pretty well-established fact that the human foot has evolved to run bare. When I said as much, Callum clutched his expensive running shoes to his chest in mock-horror and pointed out that he hadn’t mentioned my bare feet
all day
so the least I could do was let him wear his shoes.

And so we did the length of the beach, me at my top speed, him barely jogging, allowing me to keep up. We talked as we ran, and he told me about how he’d long been thinking about training for a marathon, and how he’d once loved to do long distances on the weekends, but he’d really let that go when he started his new job. I could hear the frustration in his voice, even as he jogged. He’s a man with a dream or two or ten, and the barriers between him and those dreams are all in his own mind. Callum thinks his job defines him, and anything outside of that is not important enough to be prioritised. I reckon if he could make one single step towards one single goal, he’d suddenly know that he’s so much more than that, and the chains would fall right off him.

It was a nice idea, to run together, but Callum being so much taller than me, not really all that practical. After one length we separated and he ran ahead to do his second lap. I watched him run away from me, extending his stride to eat up the metres. I ran on the hard wet sand close to the water like I always do. He ran further up the beach, right at the edge of the dry sand. As he powered away from me I let my toes get wet and focused on the splash of cool ocean water up my calves. Even though I’ve lived right on the water for most of my adult life, I am still always aware of the scent of sea salt. In the same way that the scent of baking bread takes me back to Grandma and the scent of gaudy perfume reminds me of Mum, briny air takes me home.

The beach is so busy on the weekend afternoons, which is why I love to run at this time of the week—so many families together, splashing in summer or building sand castles in winter. People are happier in groups. I’ve always known this to be true even through these recent years when I’ve been alone by choice. But yesterday, I chose to be in a pack again and it felt amazing. Even when Callum was hundreds of metres ahead of me, he was there
for
me, and I loved it.

It was good. Far too good, and far too easy, which is why when afternoon became evening it seemed only natural for us to go get some dinner. He told me he was dying for a steak and so we walked to one of the restaurants just down from my place and sat out on the street as dusk fell.

It’s been five years since I ate meat, and the truth is that I very rarely miss it. And then there are times where the sight and scent of it claws at me and I feel like just sitting my environmental objections down under the table for a few minutes and digging in with gusto. If I’d asked for a bite, Callum would have offered me one—in fact he would have loved to share it with me and I’d have heard about it all night.

But of course, I didn’t share the steak and I can’t share a steak, because that’s not the life I’ve chosen. I wish I could understand why I can resist
that
temptation but Callum himself seems a whole other story.

We were finishing our meals when a musical duo started to play. It was just an acoustic band, a sole guitarist and a woman perched on a stool, singing soft ballads to the assembled diners. The woman’s voice was beautiful—liquid silk and raw honey, deeper than Mum’s voice but the same sort of acrobatic tones. Callum was trying to flag a waiter down to ask if we could move to an inside table, but instead I pulled his arms around me and we started to dance.

He told me later that he doesn’t dance, but he could have fooled me, there on our improvised dance floor. Maybe he hesitated a little at first, and I expected him to, given that we were at the front of the room by then standing right before the singer, and everyone else in the restaurant was sitting down eating. There wasn’t even much room between the musicians and the tables, but we made it work. The guitar and the voice and the lyrics spoke of longing and the sounds weaved their way around us just like the moonlight did last night, and all we had to do was shuffle gaze to gaze. I always wondered if relationships could really be like that, where if a moment lined up just right, you could stand in a crowded room with them and feel only their presence.

We raced home after that, tearing at each other’s clothing like teenagers as soon as my front door shut behind us. In these last few nights together, it hadn’t been like that—sex with Callum the first few times was very mature lovemaking, us showing off our skills and mastery of the art, both of us restrained as we learnt each other’s rhythms and tastes. But this was different; it was primal and hasty and one hundred per cent instinct. There was no playful giggling and no mid-coital comments or instructions. Our impromptu dance session had become a kind of tantalising foreplay, and I suppose feeling just a little safer in each other’s company, the undercurrent of sexual tension between us was finally unleashed.

I only realised this morning how the days had bled into each other, how
one last dinner
Friday night had already turned into Sunday morning. I promised myself I’d fix this, before it got any worse, and I dragged myself away from him and out of my bed to be fully alert and awake for when he woke. I decided I’d make him a cup of coffee, be politely aloof, and then remind him that I had been saying all weekend that I needed to do some work and the time had come.

But then he slept, and he slept, and he slept, and noon was fast approaching. And then I started banging around the kitchen to wake him up. But when he finally stepped out of the bedroom, he was oblivious to how rude I’d been and hadn’t even noticed the noise, and he grabbed me by the waist and kissed me until I was breathless. Then of course I forgot that the plan had been to shoo him out the door, and he asked me to go see a movie with him, which apparently was enough to convince me I should. While I was simultaneously getting dressed and cursing myself for my hopeless inability to nip this thing in the bud, Callum did a horrible job of julienning some carrot sticks for me so I’d have a snack at the theatre, noting that he’d realised that I wouldn’t eat buttered popcorn. In spite of his terrible knifemanship, the gesture was so sweet it nearly floored me.

When the evening began to descend and it really was time for Callum to go home, when I could no longer put off the work I needed to do for tomorrow and when he too became distracted by the preparation he needed to do for the week, I walked him down to the lobby and we kissed goodbye.

I wanted to ask him to stay. All I had to do was ask. I could see how much he wanted me to, and he’d have said yes in a heartbeat. At least I had the willpower to resist
one
impulse this weekend.

He told me he’d call me tomorrow and I forced myself to tell him I had a busy week ahead of me but that I’d call him instead when I had some time.

Now here I am, less than an hour later, and I’m feeling something that’s an awful lot like
missing
. I’ve tried to busy myself: I watered the pot plants and even did my dishes, but there was no way I could focus on work. So I’m sitting on the balcony with the ocean breeze in my face and this journal on the table before me.

And next to the journal is my mobile phone, and my hands
really
want to call him and tell him to come back...

I
lay awake
for much of the night after I left Lilah, wishing that I’d had the balls to ask her to sleep over with me again and reliving the days we’d spent together in my mind. It seemed obscene to make it to nearly forty years old without ever feeling as alive as I had in one single weekend with her, and unfair that the weekend had passed so quickly.

I looked for her on the ferry in the morning, and was disappointed that she didn’t happen to be there. She’d given me her mobile number as we parted, but I was determined not to use it too quickly—besides which she’d
asked
me to wait for
her
call. I didn’t want to scare her off.

Karl was waiting at the pot plant at nine. As I stepped out of my office, he scanned my face, and then grinned.

‘So, it went well then?’

I tried to play it cool.

‘Yeah, we spent some time together over the weekend.’

‘And?’

‘And what?’

‘Is she really as amazing as your first impression?’

I laughed.

‘Even more so.’

‘Well, colour me surprised.’ He stepped into the stairwell and I followed him. ‘I honestly thought you’d be a bit mopey today.’

‘Mopey?’

‘Sorry, bad choice of words. You were already mopey. I thought you’d be cast free from the mopey-ness, into a whole new level of mopey-ness.’

‘Why do you say that?’ I was amused, and maybe just a little offended too.

‘This whole Lilah business reminds me a lot of that psychology training we did last year, on branding and first impressions. I seem to recall you inflicted it upon us, actually. Do you remember it?’

‘Vaguely.’ I did. I didn’t like where he was going with the conversation though.

‘Consumers form a strong opinion of a brand in the first ten seconds of exposure to a design. So if the design is great, they’ll love the product, even if the product isn’t a good fit for them, and it takes repeated exposure to the negative aspects of the product to show them otherwise.’

‘Ouch, Karl.’

‘I also wondered if half of the appeal of Lilah was that she was unreachable because she disappeared on you. The thrill of the chase and all that.’

‘If you’re going to verbally beat me to death, you’d better be buying the coffees today.’

Karl laughed. ‘No, seriously Callum, I’m glad it’s working out for you. It won’t hurt you to settle down a bit and have something to go home to.’

‘She’s pretty determined this isn’t going to be a long-term thing but I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.’

Karl fell silent. He was walking a few steps in front of me, but as he rounded a corner he glanced back up at me, and then grinned. ‘You are pretty bloody smitten, aren’t you?’

‘You’ll understand if she sticks around long enough for me to introduce you.’

I
made
it all the way to bed Monday night without contacting her. It was a feat of endurance given how many times I’d picked up my phone during the day. Just as I shut my eyes, one last impulse overtook me. I picked up the phone from my bedside table and drafted a text message.

I know you’ve got a big week on, I just wanted to say the weekend we shared was amazing and I’m thinking of you.

My finger hovered over the abandon button, and then I sighed and hit send anyway. It was late, and I didn’t expect her to respond, which made the ding of the phone a few seconds later even more gratifying.

Thank you, Callum. Want to share a ferry in the morning?

Manly Wharf is behind a small, upmarket shopping centre. The bargain supermarket is nestled between overpriced boutiques and cafes, as if it was striving for balance somehow—pay too much for your chocolate and coffee, and we will reward you with cut-price flour and sugar. I found Lilah waiting in line at a coffee bar at its entrance. We were both carrying black umbrellas due to the heavy cloud cover above but Lilah also had a small suitcase on wheels.

‘Are you going away?’

For a moment she seemed confused, then she followed my gaze to her suitcase and laughed.

‘That’s just documents I was reading last night for a case. Way too much text to try to get through digitally. Have you ever read so much on a screen that when you look away you see the electronic glare like a curtain over the real world?’ I laughed and nodded before she grimaced, ‘I had an injunction granted last week and I have a feeling the bastards are about to try to get it overturned.’

‘Go get ’em, tiger,’ I said, and she reached up and planted a kiss right on my mouth. I was surprised and delighted, and we shared a grin. Over our heads, thunder rolled, but somehow it seemed that the plaza was bright with the warmest sunshine.

‘Sao-Iris?’ The barista said hesitantly. The coffee shop had you write your own name on the cup when you ordered, and I was surprised Lilah had opted for the name they’d never pronounce correctly.

‘It’s Seer-sha,’ I corrected the barista, then gave her a wink when she blushed. ‘One of those wacky Gaelic names.’

‘I ordered you a coffee,’ Lilah informed me. She took the two cups from the barista and gave her an icy smile, which contradicted her polite, ‘Thank you very much.’

She passed me a cup and as I read the description scrawled beneath her name, I was relieved to find she’d ordered me full-cream cow’s milk instead of almond. I took the handle of the suitcase from her and we joined the swell of commuters heading through to the wharf.

‘Why not write
Lilah
on the cup?’

‘Because last time I was there that barista was a total bitch to an old lady in front of me and I wanted to see her make an idiot of herself.’ Lilah giggled like a schoolgirl and I couldn’t help but smile at her delight. ‘You had to spoil the fun and give her sympathy.’

‘Note to self: beware—Lilah is vengeful.’

‘Oh, absolutely. You should see what I’m going to do to this bloody mining company if they mess with my endangered species again.’

‘Do you work on one case at a time?’

‘
One
case?’ she snorted. ‘I have dozens going at any one time. I have a brilliant legal secretary and two paralegals or I wouldn’t know what day it was. I couldn’t even tell you how many cases I have open at the moment—the staff and my computer juggle it for me.’

‘And why do you think this particular evil mining company is about to take another shot at you?’

‘I don’t know,’ she shrugged. ‘It’s a half-billion-dollar development and I doubt they’d let a few frogs and insects in the next paddock slow it down, let alone stop it altogether. We could only find one ecological guy to testify against the development at the hearing, but it was embarrassingly obvious how clear-cut the science was. Our usual experts were either bought off or scared, which tells me this might get ugly. I need to be ready.’

‘Morning, Lilah.’ One of the ferry attendants called across the deck as we boarded and Lilah flashed a smile and a bright greeting.

‘That’s Rupert,’ she told me. ‘Do you know him? He works the morning ferry.’ I shook my head. ‘He’s a great guy; his wife is expecting their third baby in a few weeks.’

I’m not sure I’d ever noticed any of the staff on the ferries, let alone learned their names or personal circumstances. We took seats side by side, nestled against a window which would take us past the northern side of the harbour. I wanted to say something to spark the conversation again, but there was a sudden heaviness in my gut and it took me a moment to identify it.

Disappointment.

For the very first time, it occurred to me how different Lilah and I really were. Oh, sure, the novelty of our differences had amused and perhaps intrigued me, but as I sat on the ferry and thought about the morning so far, I wondered if those differences might just be too extreme. What was I really looking for here anyway?

‘Hey, are you okay?’ Lilah asked suddenly. ‘Did I upset you?’

I glanced back at her, and swept my gaze over those bright blue eyes, the soft freckles sprinkled over her nose, the high cheekbones, the glossy lips. The uncomfortable twist in my gut untwisted and retwisted in a much more pleasant way. Who said we had to be the same, anyway? Maybe we were somehow a perfect complement.

‘Nope. I’m just fine,’ I said softly, and took her hand in mine. ‘Tell me about these frogs.’

A
pattern was emerging
. Who knew the ferry could become so central to my happiness? Lilah told me she was just about overwhelmed with work, but we managed to at least share the ferry rides for the next few days.

For the trip home, she convinced me to take the slow ferry with her.

‘Yes, I know it makes no sense; yes, I know you need to buy an extra ticket even though you already have a commuter pass; and, yes, I know it takes
forever
,’ she said, as she linked her arm through mine and dragged me to the ticket stand. ‘But if we take the fast ferry, we’re back in Manly in fifteen minutes and then I’m obliged to get back to work. Besides which, you
told
me you loved the slow ferries.’

I didn’t resist very hard. We sat at the bar as the ferry chugged its way across the harbour and we debriefed the day passed. Lilah told me all about her case, in extraordinary detail, although I could barely understand a word of the terminology and I didn’t even know where the national park in question was until she told me. I became familiar with the people in her life at work and even the tone she’d use when she spoke of them. Alan was the managing partner, and she seemed to revere him as a father figure. Bridget was her legal secretary, and whenever Lilah said her name her whole demeanour would brighten—I could see the affection and respect she had for her.

And then there were the paralegals, Anita and Liam, who were much more of a mystery to me, given that although they comprised half of her team, Lilah usually was cursing them when she spoke of them.

‘They just don’t get it,’ she told me one evening, when frustration bubbled over. ‘We
know
the Hemway guys are going to appeal our injunction, and Bridget and I are working like maniacs, day and night, trying to be ready. And Anita and Liam can just get up from a task midmorning and go for a walk to find a chocolate muffin? It’s just a
job
to them. They drive me crazy.’

I loved her venting to me. I loved the furious narrowing of her eyes and the wild hand gestures, and the way her hair was inevitably down around her waist by the time we caught up after work and the fiery halo it gave her when she was ranting. The passion and energy she had for her job was astounding.

We didn’t just chat about work, of course. Sometimes during those early days we’d swap silly tales about our youth as we passed time crossing the harbour. I was learning her by degrees, every anecdote and giggle revealing more of her to me, and giving me a sketchy timeline of her history. I learned that she’d been to a uni not far from mine, and that she’d lived in the CBD for a long time too, and that she’d been to every continent at least once, including Antarctica, which she travelled to for her thirtieth birthday. And then there were the hints of a busy romantic life, given that many of her anecdotes featured boyfriends.

‘He was built like a semi-trailer,’ she told me. ‘A two-metre wall of muscle and abs and gorgeous Greek charm.’

‘Well,’ I snorted, ‘by the sounds of things it’s a wonder he scored himself a girlfriend at all.’

‘Ah, but looks and charm are definitely not everything. I was doing a sociology subject at the time and over beers one night I asked him if he thought gender was innate or cultural. And he looked at me just like this,’ she squared her face up against mine to force uncomfortable eye contact, ‘and he said,
are you telling me you’re a dude
?
’

‘I can top that.’ I was triumphant. ‘A long time ago I took a woman I met through work to the theatre to see a political satire production. And then on the way out she told me she hadn’t realised the prime minister was a comedian.’

So, maybe there were some half-truths in my anecdote, like the
lovely young lady
was actually a twenty-four year old beauty therapist I knew because I regularly went to her salon, and maybe it had been the previous year, rather than years earlier as I’d implied. But after Lilah’s description of Nicko-the-Greek-God, I didn’t want to admit that my tastes in women were apparently only recently maturing.

Those trips across the harbour were the highlight each day, and the moment when we separated to go to work or to our respective homes the lowlight. I wanted to stay with her, and when we parted, my thoughts did. She was occupying my mind, squatting in my consciousness, and even if I’d wanted to evict her I wouldn’t have had a clue where to start. I was nervous about that, because every now and again, Lilah would let slip with a sudden burst of insecurity.

‘We’re spending too much time together,’ she would say from time-to-time as we crossed the harbour, and the words always burst from her lips like she’d suddenly remembered in a panic. I tried to counter her panic with humour, often with a dismissive exaggeration.

‘Yes, Lilah, I realise sharing this ferry ride is a commitment akin to buying a house together, but I promise that if things break down before we finish, I will only want weekend custody of the tickets.’

Or I’d mock her unbalanced attitude to intimacy, which always made her grin.

‘So you’re saying that all of this chit-chat is moving too fast, but what we did last weekend was fine? Noted and appreciated.’

But although our fragile relationship was staggering forward, its roots little by little cementing in our lives each time we saw each other, I was nervous about her continued hesitancy. Her enthusiasm for the shared commute and her affection while we were together just didn’t match up to those words, and I was increasingly nervous that at some point she might pull the pin altogether.

O
n Friday
, I was walking down the stairs to coffee with Karl when my phone sounded. I glanced at the screen and stopped.

‘Lilah wants to have lunch with me.’ There was a sudden sinking dread in my stomach.