New Australian Stories 2 (3 page)

Robert was staring directly at me.

In the dim light of the cabin it was, at first, difficult to tell if there was panic in his eyes. But when the captain announced that the plane would need to return to Canberra, his anxiety was unmistakable.

‘I'm terrified of flying.' He grimaced in an attempt to smile.

‘Ladies and gentlemen' — the flight attendant's voice was calm — ‘the captain informs me that there is a minor technical fault, which unfortunately means we need to land at the closest airport. As we will be flying into some weather we ask that you all remain seated until the plane has safely landed. We do apologise for any inconvenience.'

‘It will be all right,' I told him.

But he wasn't listening. His pupils were glassy and his voice tight. He said he'd had a bad feeling from the moment he got on the plane. ‘Did you hear that?'

I hadn't.

‘The strain in the engine.'

I tried to ignore the panic that surged as we dropped altitude once more. Was this the end? It was impossible. In the back a woman's scream was followed by a man's nervous laughter.

The captain spoke now. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I do want to assure you that there's no reason for anxiety. As Damien mentioned to you earlier, we are simply experiencing some bad weather. Unfortunately, we're having to fly directly into it in order to return to Canberra to rectify what is really a very minor fault with the backup navigation system. It has no impact on our safety but it is something we are obliged to fix under aircraft laws and regulations. If I could just urge you all to stay seated and calm, we should have you landed within the next twenty minutes.'

‘It's worth trying to believe him.' I kept my voice level in an attempt to convince both myself and Robert. ‘Doubting won't help any of us.' My hand gripped the armrest, and I could taste the acid fear at the back of my mouth.

Robert was white, and his pupils had flooded, black, into the darkness of his eyes.

I asked him if he lived in Canberra or Sydney, and he told me neither.

‘Melbourne,' he eventually said, voice soft.

Behind us, in the dim glow of the cabin, I could hear other passengers talking. We were all trying to convince each other there was no need for alarm.

‘Were you working in Canberra?'

Robert nodded. He was a lobbyist, for the music industry. He was there often.

‘I usually drive,' he confessed, trying to smile at his own panic.

‘And Sydney?' I asked.

It was where most of his clients were based. ‘And my son. He lives there with my first wife.'

The plane lurched again and whatever calm had begun to still him dissipated. ‘Are we going to be okay?' he asked, clutching the armrest between us.

‘Of course we are.' I spoke quickly, not wanting to let my own fear in, but it was there, searing and raw as I laid my hand on top of his and held it tight.

Robert's apartment was like a cheap hotel room. He opened the front door and stepped back to let me in.

‘Drink?'

I shook my head.

The plastic vertical blinds were drawn across the only window, but I could just make out a small two-seater couch, a glass coffee table, and in the corner a large television. To our left was a galley kitchen and on our right, a closed door that led, I presumed, to Robert's bedroom.

‘I can't do this,' I suddenly said.

In the distance I could hear the faint rumble of traffic and, from somewhere along the corridor outside, the thud of a door as it closed.

‘Of course you can.' Robert stepped close, the smell of his aftershave sweet as he kissed me, his lips soft on mine.

Of course I could, I told myself.

As he began to undress me, the thickness of his fingers fumbling with my bra strap, I said I needed to go to the bathroom first.

Under the brightness of the fluorescent light, I undressed myself, avoiding my reflection in the mirror. I gathered my clothes in a small pile and then walked to where he waited in the bedroom. He pulled back the cover, and I got into the bed with him, the sheets cold beneath me.

‘Wait,' I told him as he moved towards me.

Unbuckling my watchstrap I took that off as well, leaving it not on top of my pile of clothes, but on the small bedside table next to me.

Later, when I realised I had left it behind, I wondered why I had taken it off in the first place. I had no intention of spending the night there, and could have just kept it on my wrist. Habit, I suppose.

‘You're not leaving?' Robert reached for me as I sat up only moments after we had sex. My legs were cold, and I almost relented.

‘Tell me more about yourself,' he asked.

‘There's not much to tell,' I replied.

‘Your family?'

‘They are very religious.'

‘And you are the black sheep?'

It wasn't that simple. I didn't follow their faith, but I was not an outcast.

I pulled my top on and tied my hair back as I told him I was going to head home.

‘At least let me drive you,' he offered, but I declined.

‘You know' — and he touched my arm — ‘if you relaxed with me you might get to like me.'

In the darkness, it was hard to read his expression, but there was a momentary plea in his eyes.

‘Can I call you?'

I explained I'd rather he didn't.

‘I don't understand.'

I was surprised, thinking he must have been aware I had no desire or attraction for him. I was with him because I needed to take myself right to the hard centre of the loneliness, and I had used him for that purpose only. Surely he could see that? And having seen it, why would he want to know me?

Outside in the cold, he waited with me for a taxi. As I shivered, he tried to rub my arms. Stop, I wanted to tell him. This is not how it is between us. There is no affection. But I let him try to keep me warm; I even let him kiss me goodbye as I got into the taxi, sinking back into the seat, the sickly smell of sweat, vinyl and alcohol a welcome relief from the sweetness of his skin.

The next evening, when he rang to tell me he had my watch, I had already decided to let it go.

‘You can pick it up at the bar,' he suggested. ‘Or I could meet you somewhere.'

I was standing in the hallway, aware that Loene and Cate were both in the lounge room, drinking cheap champagne, and able to hear every word.

‘Can you post it to me?' I asked him.

‘You really don't want to see me that much?'

Looking down at the carpet, I said I was sorry. ‘It's just the way it is.'

He was silent for the first time.

I gave him my address.

Loene was laughing. She was drunk already. Cate was trying to decide which skirt suited her better. They turned the music up another notch and I heard the pop of the cork as they opened the second bottle.

‘I'll post it,' he told me.

I thanked him.

‘Well. I hope you have a nice life.'

Wincing slightly at the anger in his tone, I said I hoped he did, too, and hung up, relieved to have come to an end in our dealings with each other.

Two days later, the watch turned up in the mail, wrapped in tissue, with no note or return address on the envelope.

When the captain told us we were ready to land, I finally let go of Robert's hand. I hadn't really been aware I was still holding it, until I felt the tension in his fingers ease a little, my own hand relaxing on his.

For the last fifteen minutes we had talked. Rather, I had asked him questions, and he had answered. He had told me his son was ten years old. His marriage had come to an end because of differences that could not be repaired, and then, when he explained to me that he lived with someone now, in a marriage of sorts, ‘although we can't get married', I began to wonder whether he was gay.

When I told him my name, he showed no recognition. I kept talking. I said I was a journalist and I mentioned where I worked. I gave him no details of my personal life. I didn't think he really took in anything I said: his whole being was attuned to the immediate danger of our predicament. My own anxiety was only just under control.

In fact, I had suppressed my panic to such an extent that it wasn't until much later, as I lay on top of the quilted bedspread in the room in the hotel near the airport, that I began to really breathe again, slowly, deeply. I closed the brocade curtains on the cold darkness of the Canberra night, and I switched off the main light, leaving only the small bedside lamp on.

The room was old-fashioned, ordinary, decorated in a deep plum and cream, with a soft carpet beneath my feet. It was a twin share, and I had taken the bed closer to the door.

I had a bath and poured myself a straight scotch, wanting that burning warmth, before I picked up the telephone.

Jason was still at our house. I had guessed he might be, waiting for my return so that he could say goodbye.

I was all right, I assured him, because he had seen the news. From first reports, it appeared we had been in greater danger than the pilot or flight attendants had admitted, although it was still unclear as to what the problem had been.

I told him I had sat next to a man I thought I knew from years ago. ‘He was terrified, and so I just talked to him, the whole way back. I kept wanting to ask whether it was him, but I never did.'

On the other end of the phone, Jason was silent.

‘You know,' I said, ‘there was a moment when I prayed. Just quietly, to myself. It was the prayer they used to say in our church when I was young. It was running through my head as I kept asking him inane questions about his life. I could still remember it, word for word.'

And then, in the quiet of the hotel room, I began to cry.

‘I'm okay,' I assured him. ‘It's just a delayed reaction. I distracted myself, the whole time, talking to that man, but I guess I was scared as well.'

He tried to comfort me, cutting in over the rapid flow of my words as I kept insisting I was fine, never giving him the space to say what I knew he wanted to say. He would miss me. I would miss him also, but this would lessen. The facts were such that we had no choice.

His wife's degeneration had been rapid. Soon she would be incapable of caring for herself, let alone the children. He was going back to her because he was a good man, and I was relinquishing, trying to cut loose all the small threads that had linked and tied us for the past two years, because I, too, wanted to be decent. Older now, we had realised the importance of trying to behave like adults, even when we wanted nothing more than to cry out like a child.

The Cats of Unspeakable Kindness

SONJA DECHIAN

Most likely the number of cats on my street is not above average. It feels like it though. They do the normal things cats do: emerge from behind a gate, slip gently between fence posts with their tails curled or pointed — affectionate or vigilant. I don't mind so much that they talk to me. It's just that they have so many expectations. That's a tough thing to deal with each day.

They're lively in the early morning and I keep my eyes straight ahead and march to the train station without acknowledging any of them. It makes no difference; they shout back and forth. Insults and questions.

‘Matty's had a hairy!'

That's what they said this morning. There's a shabby black cat about three houses along, and she started up the chant in her husky smoker's voice.

‘Well, look at this then? Matty's had a hairy!'

The Persian in the next yard joined in. Her collar bell tinkled as she trotted out onto the street behind me.

‘Hairy! Hairy! Hairy! Hairy!'

I slipped in late last night. I've learned to do it around dinnertime when the cats are being fed or lapping up owners' attentions. No one noticed my haircut then. I had suspicions it was too short and I stood in front of my bathroom mirror, weighing up the overall look. The front was a little high above my eyebrows. Maybe my ears stuck out a bit. My hairdresser thought it suited me. Emphasised my jaw, giving me a more rugged look. Her smile was generous so I had no reason not to believe her and every reason to hope that she really did find me rugged.

‘Your girlfriend will hardly recognise you!' she'd exclaimed. Which was pretty much how I'd been feeling for weeks. Unrecognisable, or just unrecognised.

The last cat to confront me this morning was the scabby-faced tabby. His nose is pink and laden with skin cancers. Over the past six months I've watched the cancer eat away at his nostrils so he breathes with some difficulty and a snotty wheeze. You'd feel sorry for him if it wasn't exactly what he deserved.

‘You look stupid,' he said to me this morning.

I kept walking.

‘What the hell were you thinking?' he went on. ‘Did someone tell you that looks good? Because that does not look good. Goddamn it, Matty, that haircut makes you look retarded.'