Reunion (35 page)

She opened the first email, glimpsed a long message – a good sign – lit a cigarette, read the warm greetings, an offer of friendship, an outline of the sender's interests and significant life events. He offered her a 1960 Parker 21 forest green with lustraloy cap as evidence of his good intentions, and, if all went well, marriage was an option, even children should she want them. He was a Pisces and open to all other star signs except Aries. His name was Steve, Steve Webb, and he lived in Nevada – although he was willing to relocate.

She was about to delete the message when she found herself caught by his circumstances, poor sad creature he was. She hit reply and wrote: I'm an Aries, sorry, and sent it off.

The second email was very short: It's not me. Have never been to Australia. Hope you find him. She deleted it and clicked on the last email. It was laid out like a proper letter. There were four short paragraphs, each indented. The letter finished with ‘Toujours – S'. The very first words, ‘Dearest Girl', she recognised immediately.

She had found Stephen, she had found her Stephen Webb.

 

Harry was fond of saying that email was as secure as a door sealed with sticky tape and about as private as a peep show. Ava used email only to establish that Stephen was in good health, long divorced, no partner, lived an hour south of London in Kent, was retired and travelled widely.

Two days after the initial contact during another of Helen's cancelled visits, Ava slipped cigarettes and mobile phone into
her pocket and left the house. Once in the park she went straight to a seat out of sight of the main path and laid out cigarettes, phone and the piece of paper on which she had written Stephen's telephone number. She settled herself down and dialled. She had hardly begun when she lost her way in the string of digits. She cursed herself for not having stored the number, started again, was nearly finished when a breeze lifted the paper and blew it across the grass. Bloody bloody thing, she said as she grabbed it, bloody bloody everything. She didn't want to make this phone call, she didn't want to manage the practicalities, she didn't want to be Ava Bryant with dementia, she didn't want to die, she didn't want to live.

And that was the nub of it.

She calmed herself through the duration of a cigarette and then used the pack to hold down the paper. She picked up the phone and said each digit aloud as she pressed the tiny keys. When she was finished she stored the number, then waited a moment before selecting it. She heard the play of the numbers, then a long pause, followed by a ringing tone. Silently she counted the rings. Four, five, six and then an answering machine. His name, his voice, that still-familiar voice. She hadn't planned on a machine. No words came, not even her own name, and suddenly a click, someone picking up, a voice, his voice, ‘Hold on while I turn off the machine,' and she immediately disconnected.

It took another fifteen minutes and a circuit of the oval to collect herself. She created an opening sentence and rehearsed it as she walked. She returned to the seat, waited a couple more minutes, then she called again. There was no answering machine this time. As soon as he said hello she spoke her opening line – rather too quickly, but it would have to do.

In the pause that followed she heard the scrape of a chair, a fiddling with the receiver.

‘You sound exactly the same,' he said at last.

‘If only.'

And suddenly her nerves settled. With nothing to lose and no reason to delay she told him she was sick, that she was dying of an old person's disease.

‘I have a rare form of dementia,' she said.

There was a long silence, more fumbling with the phone, then a rush of questions: Was she sure? Did she have the best specialists? Could nothing be done? She answered his questions, he sounded so distressed, the girl he remembered was now dying of dementia.

She found herself calming him: There, there, she said, don't worry. I've a good husband, the best doctors. I'm all right, she heard herself say. It's not so bad. But she wasn't all right and it couldn't be any worse, and she tossed aside her niceties and told him exactly what she wanted.

‘Nembutal,' she said. ‘From an online pharmacy or anywhere you can get it and send it to me.'

Too blunt, too direct, more demand than request but desperation surely brokers some licence. He said he needed to think, he needed to do some research, he would call back in a couple of days.

It was safer, she said, that she ring him, and asked for his mobile number. He laughed, the only time during the call. He did not use a mobile, one stationary phone was more than sufficient for him. They arranged a time for her to ring him again.

On their second phone call he agreed to do as she wished.

‘But I won't send the drug,' he said. ‘I'll bring it myself.'

3.

Time slid by. Late in the afternoons while Harry was still at the office, Ava would go to the park and telephone Stephen. They spoke every day, sometimes two or three times. They were making plans together. Stephen would fly from London to New York then to San Diego, the best stepping-off point for Mexico where Nembutal was readily available. Ava bought him a mobile phone, prepaid and anonymous, and mailed it to him for his use in Australia. She told him to throw it away when it was all over. She told him he would need to change his home phone number.

‘Don't worry,' he said. ‘I've already thought of that.'

Don't worry, he said. And she allowed him to take over more and more of the planning.

Despite her public life, she thought it unlikely he had upgraded his memories of her. What would have been the point? And she was aware of feeling sorry for him, that seeing her as she was now would be as profound a death of his long-ago love than her actual death would be.

She felt sorry for him but she needed him. Illness seizes far more than health and ability. Purloins far more.
Purloins
, the word fell into her mouth. She riffled her desk mess for an unused Post-it note, tried writing the word but couldn't decide on the second letter.
Purloins
. Already the word was losing recognition.
Purloins
. Already losing sense. No time to yourself when you are sick. No solitary time. No privacy. Not that it mattered any more. Stephen was on his way, soon everything would be all right.

The following morning when Jack arrived, Ava greeted him more warmly than usual, or so Jack thought when he looked back on those last days.

‘If only more people were like you,' she said, as they walked down the hall together. ‘You know the difference between care and company.'

He put his arm around her and felt her lean into him. At last he was giving her what she wanted.

He had brought chocolate éclairs for their morning tea, and the two of them settled in the lounge room with the cakes and coffee. Jack began with the latest news about Connie. He was nervous but optimistic about the second pilot, he was still drinking too much, and while paradise with Sara seemed a chaotic and treacherous place from Jack's perspective, Connie was still insisting he was happy. By the time the éclairs had been reduced to a streak of cream, they had both agreed that Connie would be far better off if he returned to America and Linda – ‘If she would have him,' Ava added. They then moved on to the Australian Wheat Board scandal and the Howard government's denial of knowledge of three hundred million dollars worth of kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's regime. ‘Clearly the government has decided that gross financial incompetence is more acceptable to the electorate than illegal and unethical trade practices,' Jack said.

Ava nestled into the corner of the couch and lit a cigarette. Jack was about to launch into a diatribe over the government's slaughter of the Australian heart, when she asked him to play for her.

‘The blues,' she said. ‘Play me the blues.'

Jack made no attempt to hide his pleasure; he had always loved playing for her. He began with ‘Cross Road Blues', a rugged melancholic number, then moved on to T-Bone Walker's ‘Mean old World Blues', followed by Blind Willie Johnson's ‘Dark was the Night'.

‘This selection goes back a long way,' Ava said with a smile. ‘Almost as long as we do.'

Her memory for recent events was frail, and there were numerous holes in her long-term storage, yet she could remember that night, the first of many, when she listened to him play the blues. It was the night their love affair began and, if Jack was to be honest, when it should have ended.

‘You forgave me, didn't you?' Her voice was low, the words came slowly.

She had never before asked; in fact, she never referred to their brief time together. He walked over to her and knelt down by the couch.

‘Of course I forgave you,' he said, taking her hand. And wanting to give her something in return added, ‘We found a different intimacy in our letters.'

She looked hard at him, she was so close, and laid her other hand lightly against his cheek. ‘You've always been special to me,' she said, with a vague smile and was about to continue when a voice sounded from the passage.

‘Oh dear. Bad time. Sorry. Should have knocked.'

A tall woman dressed entirely in red stepped into the room carrying a baking dish. Her face was a gesture of helplessness. ‘The front door was open,' she said.

A large dog pushed past her and headed straight to Ava. The animal nudged Jack aside, plopped down next to the couch and nuzzled Ava's lap.

‘This is Bertha,' Ava said, patting the dog.

The woman put the dish down and stepped forward, hand outstretched. ‘And I'm Minnie.' Nodding at the guitar on the couch, ‘You must be Jack.'

Minnie was a good deal taller than Jack. Later she would tell
him she was named after her very short grandmother who died just before she was born – one of those failures of attribution that families commonly make.

Ava looked up at Minnie and smiled. ‘Did you think you were interrupting a …' she hesitated a moment, ‘a secret assignation?'

Jack kept his face steady. Poor Ava. Often she was reduced to simple words or hackneyed sayings, other times she would alight on an absurdity like ‘secret assignation'. Not wanting to embarrass her he tried not to react. But she did.

‘Wasn't that awful?' she said laughing. ‘I mean the secret assignation bit.' Her laughter was not convincing.

Minnie laughed too. ‘Half your luck,' she said. ‘Not even a whiff of an assignation in my life.' She put the casserole in the fridge together with written instructions for heating it up and returned to the living room. ‘Won't stay now,' she said to Ava, bending down to kiss her on the cheek. And to Jack, ‘Good to meet you at last.'

Minnie lived next door with her two school-aged children. Jack was surprised he had never met her before. ‘In fact, I don't think you've even mentioned her.'

Ava shrugged, whether she had mentioned her neighbour or not didn't seem important to her. ‘I see a lot of her. She works from home, a graphic artist. Designs art and craft materials for children. Stickers and glittery things.' And as if it had suddenly occurred to her: ‘She's Jewish. Like you.'

‘Husband?' Jack asked.

Ava shook her head. ‘Apparently he was overwhelmed by the responsibility of children and headed north some years ago with a twenty-year-old. When his new love started to make noises about having children, he swapped her for another twenty-year-old.'

‘He and Connie would have a lot to talk about.'

Jack chatted on about Connie while he put his guitar away, and was about to join Ava on the couch when she stood up.

‘I want to give you something.'

He followed her across the courtyard and up to her study.

‘This,' she said pointing to a sealed carton. ‘I'd be grateful if you'd store it at your place.' And just in case she had not made herself clear, ‘I'd like you to look after it.'

He asked what it contained.

‘Your letters. A few old papers.' And as an afterthought she added, ‘Harry, of course, is my executor, but I want you to have your letters back.'

Jack had preserved every single one of her communications, every single letter, every single note, even her emails. And while he had always wanted to believe she had kept his letters, he had thought it best to assume otherwise. So moved, so very satisfied was he, he didn't think to ask why she had decided to return his letters now.

The box was heavy. He carried it down the stairs, through the house and out to the car. He was about to settle again in the living room when she said she was tired. In the doorway she put her arms around him.

‘I've always loved you,' she said. And with a nod to Dowson's ‘Anatomy of a Poet', one of their favourite poems, she added, ‘“In my fashion.”'

He was at the front gate when she called out to him. ‘Tomorrow,' she said, ‘don't come tomorrow.' She told him she had a medical appointment.

‘I'll see you Monday then,' he said.

But already Ava had turned back into the house.

4.

While Jack was driving home with Ava's box of papers, Connie was in his bedroom preparing for the second pilot, which, being second, was even more important than the first. He had been told there would be hairdressing and make-up at the studio but he wanted to arrive looking his best. He played through a scene in which he would be greeted by the make-up person with a warm smile and a ‘not much to do here' sort of comment. It helped calm his nerves.

Connie possessed the confidence of a man who had always been attractive alongside an exaggerated fear of ageing and decrepitude. The fear might not have plagued so vigorously if not for the TV series, a circumstance he would admit to, or his preference for girlfriends more than half his age, which he insisted was irrelevant. Then there were the facts of this second pilot. A new production team had been brought in, ‘young, hip and funky', a team whose stated purpose was to open up the public broadcaster to a more youthful audience. This team had viewed the first pilot and insisted on a whole new approach. And no, they did not want Connie's friends as extras. Connie would have to do this one alone.