Opportunity (26 page)

I carried the supplies. I offered her a pie. She shook her
head. She'd gone silent. Back in the dark street that led to the
main gate she wanted to rest on a wall. I opened a beer.

'Feel anything yet?'

'I'm not sure.'

There was something in her tone. I gathered up the bags.
'We'd better go back.'

I finished the beer in the foyer. As soon as we got out of the
lift the woman in pink sprang out. 'Where have you been?'
She sniffed. 'The
pub
?'

Frances said, 'Something's happening.'

'Already?' The woman bent over her, with a scandalised
look at me.

'Feel how hard it is.' Frances put her hands on her stomach.
Her face crumpled.

'Right. Let's get you back in the room.
You
,' she pointed at
me, 'get in there and behave. And no drinking!'

I sat on the end of the bed. The midwife came in wheeling
a contraption — a gas canister on wheels. There was a tube,
and a mask connected to it.

'You're having strong contractions. Breathe into this,' she
told Frances. Frances breathed in and out. Her eyes glazed
over. She shook her head and pulled the mask off. 'No, it's
terrible, it makes everything go blurred.' She ducked her head,
clenched her teeth and made a grinding, growling sound. She
opened her eyes. 'Oh, hell,' she said.

'Time to get the doctor,' the midwife said. She went out.

Frances was swearing softly. I sat near her. I had a strange
sensation, as if alarm, fear even, were near me, wanting to get
into my head.

'I get you anything?' I whispered. 'Pie? Beer?'

She laughed, wild-eyed, then she said in a high voice, 'Oh,
it's coming again.' She clutched my hand, ducked her head,
gritted her teeth and made the growling sound, digging her
fingernails into my palm. She banged her forehead against my
arm, swearing. After a time she looked up at me and said,
'This is unbelievable. You're not going to leave, are you?'

'No,' I said. I sat there while she cried and swore and
mangled my hand. I don't know how long we sat there. Hours,
maybe. My hand was raw.

The doctor arrived. 'Come on a bit sooner than we thought,
eh?' There was a crease down the side of his face and his hair
was rumpled. His eyes were swollen. He snapped on some
gloves, then he and the midwife waited, casting looks at each
other, while Frances went into another contraction, moaning
and clenching her fists. When she came out of it he had a brisk
look between her legs.

'Mmm, hmm.' He and the midwife conferred.

I sat looking out at the city, Mt Eden on the skyline. I felt so
dazed, so incredulous, suddenly so
put upon
. I considered
getting up and walking out of the room, out of the building. I
resolved to do it. In half an hour I would be at home, hiding
my face in the pillow. There was no point in explaining. I
would just go.

Frances cried out. The doctor stepped back, a small
instrument in his hand, like a crochet hook.

I started up. 'What are you doing?'

'I've broken the waters. Didn't you hear me saying?' He and
the midwife looked at me doubtfully. They exchanged a
glance. 'We're just helping Frances along.'

Frances was making small whimpering sounds and rocking
back and forth.

'Are you all right?' I asked her.

The midwife snapped, 'Honestly. She's having a baby, for
heaven's sake. Can't you make yourself useful?'

'Go to hell,' I muttered.

'I
beg
your pardon?'

'Now, let's concentrate on Frances,' the doctor said.

'Oh, God,' Frances moaned.

'Right,' the doctor said. 'I'll be back.'

'You're not leaving. Look at her!'

'It's perfectly normal; she's doing well. I have another
patient to look in on.' There was a pause. 'Excuse me,' he said.
I stepped out of his way. He looked at the midwife. She rolled
her eyes.

Frances was making strange noises. Her eyes were bulging;
tendons stood out on her neck. 'Good, good,' the midwife
said. 'You're doing fine.'

I said, 'It's not good. She looks terrible. Can't you do
something? She's in agony.'

The midwife whispered savagely, '
Will
you please settle
down. You're supposed to encourage her.'

'I can't stand it,' I said.

'Then perhaps you'd better go outside.' Icy, she pointed at
the door.

'Fine!'

I picked up my shopping bag and lurched out, crashing my
shoulder against the door. Behind me Frances wailed
something, imploring.

'Don't worry . . . do him good,' I heard the midwife say.

I walked down the stairs and out through the foyer. The
rain was whirling around the streetlights. I opened a can and
drank. The sky was just perceptibly lighter, the black turning
to dark grey, and I could make out flying tatters of clouds. The
wind had got up, roaring in the trees on the edge of One Tree
Hill. I stood out there in the warm, dark, howling dawn,
dipping my head to my drink, and I couldn't make out, in the
deeps of my mind, what to do. I began to walk away. I reached
the main road. I stood under the streetlight. Two possibilities:
to cross to the petrol station and call a taxi, or turn and go
back along the dark road. I couldn't remember now, drunk as
I was, what she'd told me about free will. Was it that everything
had been decided already, by my brain? That free will was an
illusion? If that was the case, I could only wait to see what I
would do.

The answer came to me, and relief with it: I would get in a
taxi, I would go home and in the morning the dream would
splinter and fade . . . The rain surprised me, sweeping up the
road like a silver curtain; I stopped on the kerb, the spiky,
sudden drops drumming on my head. Paper blew along the
street, tumbling over and over; cold rain streamed down my
neck. A dartboard, spilled vodka, rain falling on a winter sea;
the wind blew the door against the veranda wall;
if you go
home now you'll drown
. . .

In the foyer I chucked away the empty can, took a breath
and swung up the stairs two at a time. I opened the door; the
doctor and midwife looked up. Frances turned her white,
sweat-streaked face to me, her mouth open in a soundless
howl. The doctor stood up; I thought he was going to bar me
from coming close. I was ready to push him, to stand my
ground: I can hold my own in a fight! Instead he put his hand
on my arm.

'The head,' he said, pulling me towards the bed.

I advanced, quivering. I looked between Frances's legs. I
saw a rubbery circle; within it, a round, grey ball. And then
the midwife said something sharp and the doctor pushed me
out of the way and angled in with both hands. Frances let out
a stream of sobbing swear words, straining with all her might.
For a long stalled moment the doctor seemed to wrestle,
almost to wrench, then suddenly he stepped back and he was
holding the blue-grey, blood-streaked rubbery doll, its arms
lolling free. I wanted to cry out, 'Why is it blue? Oh, it's dead,
isn't it?' and Frances held up her head to look and let it drop,
as if she, too, saw that the worst had happened. I closed my
eyes. And then I heard the small cries, and the midwife
announcing, 'There you are, madam. A healthy boy,' as she
placed the hot, slippery, flailing soul on his mother's chest.

'Congratulations,' the doctor said. 'Time of birth, 5 a.m.'

The baby panted up at me, his eyes swollen and his face
streaked with blood. His skin was changing from that terrible
blue-grey, turning pale. His eyes were slate, the colour of a
kingfisher's wing. He had small strings of hair, wrinkled hands
that were too large for him, a watchful look. He regarded me.
What did he see? What first impression was I printing on his
brain? The midwife picked him up. She inspected him,
weighed him, wiped him and wrapped him in a cloth. The
parcelled child was returned to Frances, who had propped
herself up on pillows. She sat there, holding the oblong bundle.
We all three looked at one another: Frances, I, and the
strangely calm child.

'Shouldn't he be crying?'

The doctor murmured, writing on a form, 'They're often
nice and quiet after an easy birth.'

Easy?
Easy
? A bloodbath!

The midwife snapped, 'If
you
want to hold him you'd better
sit down.'

I looked at her. I sat down. She put him in my arms. 'You've
got quite a responsibility now,' she said. 'Haven't you.'

I looked down at the child's face.

'Less of the drinking . . .'

'Oh, shut up, you dragon.'

'
What
did you say?'

'Get out of my face,' I said. 'Bugger off.' But I spoke quietly,
looking at the baby.

'Right. That's it. I'm calling security!' She took the baby,
gave him to Frances and marched out. The doctor kept on
filling in his form. He looked at his watch. There was a
silence.

Frances said dreamily from the bed, 'Is she really calling
security?' She had her head close to the baby's; now she looked
up, a glazed, blissful expression on her face.

'I'd say so,' the doctor said. He came close and touched the
baby's head.

'Isn't he lovely?' Frances said.

'He is. He's very nice,' he said.

'Thank you,' I said.

'You're welcome.' He smiled.

'Will you get me some things from home?' Frances asked
me. 'Some stuff I forgot to bring?'

There was the crackle of a radio. A uniformed security
guard stood at the door. He made me come out into the
corridor. He listed my crimes. Drunkenness. Abusiveness.
Foul language. Strict alcohol ban . . .

I steadied myself against the wall. 'I had to get through it,'
I said.

I heard Frances say, 'They can't throw him out now.'

'Any more trouble and you're out of here,' the guard finished.
He confiscated my last cans of beer.

'Yes, yes,' I said.

I walked back into the room. Out the window the sky was
a jumble of black cloud, thin beams of early morning light
shining on the slopes of the hill. The baby was making sounds.
Frances leaned down, whispering to him.

'What do you want me to get for you?' I said.

She told me, while the midwife and doctor looked on.

I went close to her. 'See you soon.' I touched the baby's
head. I went out. Halfway along the corridor I stopped. I ran
back.

'But what's your address?' I said.

She laughed. 'Oh, I forgot . . .' She told me. She said, 'The
key's under the orange pot on the deck.'

The midwife stood by, hands on hips, shaking her head. I
thanked Dr Lampton and left.

It was all misty outside, sun breaking through the wisps
and ribbons of cloud, the wet trees and grass glittering with
silver drops. When I looked up at the dawn sky I had the
strangest feeling, a great welling pressure in my chest — for a
moment I thought I would fall over . . .

Then I walked across the car park, looking for a taxi. What
address to give the driver, Frances's or mine? She would know
that I simply waited for my brain to decide, and so, have no
regrets.

When I was twenty-two and working for a newspaper, my
boss, a married man of thirty-four, was the hero of the piece
of fiction I worked on obsessively, day and night. This fiction
never made it onto paper: it was my life.

I fell in love with him when I saw him spying on me with
binoculars from the building in which we worked. I lived on
the top floor of the flat across the street. In the early mornings
I would go out onto the roof terrace to drink a cup of coffee.
One day the sun penetrated the mirror glass of his office and
there he was, staring out, holding the binoculars to his face. I
had no doubt he was looking at me. My 'novel', at least the
novel about him, began that day. I was already a fantasist —
my life was one long, continuous fiction. That day a new
project began, page one opened, and my hapless boss was
trapped within it. From then on, nothing he did would be free
of significance. Every move he made was scrutinised, analysed
and noted by the obsessive junior down the hall. Was he aware
that he had become the hero of that common phenomenon,
the autobiographical first work? He might have noticed that
the atmosphere had changed, changed utterly. He might have
begun to suspect that his previously ordinary junior had gone
completely mad.

Why did he become the 'hero' so suddenly that day? I
hadn't paid much attention to him before. It was the binoculars.
They were an irresistible fictional hook. There he was, taking
a secret interest. At the very least wondering why I was
lounging on that dingy roof terrace, instead of hurrying in to
work. With a single expression of curiosity he had made the
leap and entered the fiction. And this was no detached, third-person
narrative I was cooking up. The
other
central character,
the heroine, of course, was me.

I worked in a small internal office. I laboured over my
assignments. I never wrote a word of fiction. Rather, I lived it.
Every element of my life, every conversation and event, played
its part in my fantasy. I couldn't go into my boss's office without
being keyed up to the highest pitch of anticipation. What
would happen today? What turn would the story take? I
believed there would be a happy ending. But there were
setbacks and difficulties along the way. The fact that he wanted
to get work done was a constant problem. What baffled,
impatient looks he gave me! And the fact that he
would
get in
his car every evening and drive home to his wife. I got
discouraged sometimes, when my plotlines didn't produce
the expected effect, when dialogue faltered and scenes fell flat.
I sat in the office or the lunchroom, stewing over my secret
drama, editing and re-editing the day's projected scenes, while
around me people worked and chatted and lived their ordinary
lives. I made complex calculations: if I make this happen, then
his reaction will be this. If I contrive x, then y will be the
result. Friday night drinks were always interesting, because
when tipsy I am prone to be inventive . . .

As I got deeper into the work I became more intense and
solitary, more engaged in the fictional world. How did it end?
Well, I can say this now quite coolly: I failed in art and love.
The project spun away from me. I couldn't control my hero.
I failed to win my man.

Was I mad?

There are descriptions for my behaviour: unrequited love,
erotomania. But my madness was quite particular, and one
thing was required for me to lose it. I needed to begin to write
novels. When I started to write fiction, I stopped living it, and
I became entirely sane. All my fantasies poured onto the page;
all my scheming went into getting my characters from one
place to another. I met my husband and had a baby, and from
that point on my feelings became secondary to the child's. I
ceased to take notice of myself. I lost myself.
I did not want
myself back
.

I became a writer. I had some successes. I lived as much of
a literary life as you could in this small city. I worked hard.

I'm a widow now. I'm an old woman. When I look at my daughters
I recall my young self. I was glad to leave her behind. But how intense her
life was. Bright colours, black miseries. Rage and joy. She was crazy, all
right. She was insane.

***

I'm old, but it's only in the last few years that I've begun to
feel it. A year ago I had a health scare. I began to have trouble
breathing. Doctors told me it was heart failure. I had an
operation, during which my faulty heart valve was replaced
with a pig's valve. I was weak for a long time afterwards. The
very thought of my heart frightened me. It made me worry
about what would happen next. But I worked hard on getting
fit and made good progress. I got pretty much back to normal,
and tried my best to forget the whole episode.

I've always had a routine. In the summer it's dependent on
the tides. At high tide I go down for a swim at the waterfront.
If the tide's out in the morning, I go for a walk instead — I've
always needed to get exercise before settling down to work.
There's a marker in the harbour that I used to swim to before
I had my heart trouble. It's a long way out, and I always used
to feel triumphant when I got back after reaching it. I've
missed the feeling of accomplishment that swimming out
there gave me. But it's such a long way . . .

This summer my neighbours have been annoying me,
playing loud music, fixing cars in their driveway. I stopped in
at the local real estate office and told the agent, Mr Lye, that I
was thinking of selling my house. Yesterday he rang and told
me he had some clients who would like to look around. I
agreed to be out the following morning.

At nine o'clock I walked up and dropped off a set of keys for
Mr Lye. Since I couldn't work I decided to do some errands. I
caught the bus down to the shopping centre and went into a
big department store, intending to buy a new kettle. A couple
of other things caught my eye. I browsed for a while.

On the way out I went to find the ladies'. In the cubicle
there was no hook, so I put my handbag on the floor. I heard
someone come in. A toilet flushed. A tap ran, and the hand-dryer
roared. And then footsteps, and a hand snaked under
the partition. Like a live thing in itself, an animal, lightning
quick, it felt around, grabbed my bag and pulled it into the
next cubicle. I snatched at the bag, nearly caught it — there
was a tug as it was wrenched under — and it was gone.
Footsteps running away. I cried out and stood up, pulling at
my clothes. I flung open the door. There was no one, just the
empty white room, and my own astonished face in the
mirror.

I clutched my hands to my heart. I listened to the beats
thudding in my chest. Before my operation I would have burst
out of the lavatory and given chase. But now . . . my heart
throbbed so. My own expression in the mirror frightened
me.

I straightened my clothes. I walked out into the mall, and
into a shop.

'I've been robbed,' I said.

A teenage girl regarded me, stopped in the act of folding a
pair of jeans.

I felt a tremor go through me. This wouldn't do. I was
embarrassed.

'Are you okay?' she asked. Her tone grated; it was
insulting.

'Is there a . . . security person?' Oh, this was intolerable. I
sat down heavily on a bench on which there were piled many
pairs of trousers. The girl came out from behind her counter.
She was wearing tight shorts and high heels. There was a
diamond stud in her nose.

'Are you okay?' she said again. In her voice an equal measure
of syrup and derision, as if she couldn't decide whether I was
a deserving case or a drunk. She made significant eyes at
another girl, who came down from a ladder carrying a pile of
clothes.

'I need to make a complaint. For insurance purposes,' I said
in an absurd, haughty voice. My eyes burned. If only the girl
would stop staring at me, I could pull myself together. I looked
away. I said, more normally, 'I was in the ladies' and someone
snatched my bag. I need to complain to someone. I'm just not
sure to whom.' There. I was myself again.

The girl who'd come down the ladder did a little shriek.
'Not again! Taylor, ring the police.' To me, 'It happened last
week outside the supermarket.' She put her hand on my
shoulder, gesturing at the other girl. 'Taylor, get security too.'

The girl called Taylor clomped away. The other bent over
me, keeping up a stream of talk. 'It's unbelievable. I was just
saying to Taylor the other day . . .'

I began to think about what I'd lost. My wallet, all my cards.
Keys. Fifty dollars cash. Two letters I'd been meaning to post.
In the zip compartment, floppy disks with my latest stories.
I'd printed some of them out. Most were stored on my
computer, but were they all? There were other things on the
disks too. Letters . . . I pressed my fingers against my
temples.

'It's not the end of the world,' I said.

A security guard came. Then a policeman. He said, 'Can
you describe the person?'

'It was a hand.'

'A hand?' He glanced at the two girls.

'It was brown. A woman's, of course. It couldn't be a man's,
could it?'

There was a silence. They were all looking at me.

'I was in the lavatory. The hand came under the partition.
By the time I'd got out there was no one there.'

'Ah . . .' The policeman wrote in his notebook. The security
guard said he was going off to look at 'footage.'

'Footage?'

'They'll be on the camera. Name, date of birth?'

I supplied details.

The policeman said, 'I'll give you a lift home.'

'No.' I rose. 'I'm perfectly all right. I'll get the bus.'

'How're you going to pay for it?' Taylor said, smartly.

I blushed. 'Oh. No handbag, no money.' I felt ridiculous.
I needed to get away. 'I'll go to the bank and sort it out first.'

I managed to extricate myself. Their concern was humiliating.
I couldn't bear little Taylor's mocking smiles.

I went to the ASB in the mall and explained the situation.
They cancelled my old cards. They asked a series of questions,
security passwords and so on. They promised me that new
cards would be on their way.

The policeman was waiting for me. He led me to his car.
Odd to travel without one's handbag. I kept reaching for it. I
had him drop me on the main road, so I could pick up my
keys.

I walked along the street. It had been a week of those hard,
bright days at the end of summer, when the light has altered
and autumn is in the air, the gardens shining in the clear light
and everything very beautiful. But now the weather had
changed again. There were black clouds, sudden showers,
gusts of wind roaring in the trees. Leaves were falling onto the
pavement.

I got the keys from the estate agent and hurried home. Mr
Lye's card was on the dining room table. The house was bright
and warm, the light falling in stripes along the hall. I didn't
really want to sell it.

I rang the insurance company. I made myself a snack and
turned on my computer, intending to get some work done.

At two o'clock the phone rang.

'Mrs Myers?' A male voice: soft, breathy, full of warm
concern. 'This is Trent from Armadale Security? Just ringing
about your bag that wuz stolen?'

'Yes?'

'Just to inform you, ma'am, that we have found your bag in
the car park area.'

'Oh, good!'

'There's good news and bad news, Mrs Myers. The wallet
and cards are there but I'm very sorry the cash is gone.'

'Oh, never mind the cash. What about the disks?'

'I'm not sure, ma'am. But would you like to collect it? Just
come to Information at the mall, the booth on the ground
floor near the main entrance.'

'Yes, I'll come.'

'Are you able to come today? Only the booth shuts at four.'

I told him I'd come in an hour.

I took the car, using the key on the set I'd lent Mr Lye. I had
my mind on the floppy disks in the bag. I wasn't efficient with
storing work and I was sure there was material on them that I
should keep. I wondered whether I'd become less organised
since my heart operation. The thought made me anxious.

I parked and found the information booth.

I smiled at the woman. 'I'm Celia Myers. I've come to
collect my bag.'

She looked blank. She fluttered her eyes. 'A bag?'

'My handbag was stolen here this morning. It's been found.
A Trent from security told me to pick it up.'

She looked under the counter. 'We don't have bag here.'

I leaned on the desk while she picked up the phone and
made a tentative explanation. 'She say her bag was stolen
here? She got call, come here? No? No call?'

She put down the phone, shaking her head.

'I've come all the way down here. Can you ask someone
who knows what's going on.'

'Sorry.'

'Sorry. Sorry. The bag has disks in it. Important work stuff.
Understand? Where is Trent?'

'I don't know . . . Trent?'

'Get me a security guard.'

I waited, agitated. He came out, slouching, eating a
sandwich, a different man from the one that morning. I
explained.

'I know there was an incident,' he said. 'I'll have to check.'

'This is so inefficient!' I could feel my heart banging in my
chest. I saw myself reflected in a shop window. An elderly
woman, angry, fists pressed against her collarbone. I
straightened up.

'Probably just some wires crossed, Mrs . . . ?'

'Myers. Mrs
Myers
.'

He spoke into his radio. Then to me. 'There's nothing about
a bag.'

'You've got my number. Ring me when you've got your . . .
act together!'

I hurried away. I stood by my car. I had the strangest feeling.
My eyes filled with tears.

Why do I feel so raw? Is it the way people speak to me, their
patronising tone? Is it because I feel my heart, because I'm
suddenly aware that it beats?