Dessi's Romance (9 page)

‘Please don’t
swear, Em,’ he says with a pained expression. ‘You don’t know what it’s been
like… Your mother did everything in her power to keep me away…’

Thankfully Laura
comes in with a tray. I spring to my feet and pretend to examine the shelves
filled with pigs.

Not the only
pigs around here!

‘Coffee? How do
you take yours, Emma…’ Laura trails off. ‘Is anything…wrong?’

He shakes his
head from side to side.

‘Rob? Emma? What’s
the matter?’

‘She doesn’t
want to be here. That’s pretty damned obvious. I may as well drive her back…’
his voice cracks.

Laura tries to
pacify us. ‘Don’t be so harsh, Rob. Give the girl a chance. This must all be
terribly sudden. Why don’t you both sit down and have a coffee, cool off.
There. That’s better.’

I find myself
doing what Laura suggests. But with one proviso. ‘Could I possibly have a beer
instead of coffee?’

Laura nods
briskly. ‘Good idea.’ She picks up the tray and smiles ruefully. ‘Stuff this.
What we need is a decent drink.’

To my amazement,
I realise I’m smiling back. Maybe Laura isn’t so bad? For the first time I feel
myself relax.

More relaxed, I’d like this ride to go
on forever. But somewhere deep down I can’t help wondering why Abdul is
interested in me. Isn’t it unusual for someone three years older not to have a
permanent woman? I ask, ‘Where are your folks from?’

‘North Lebanon. Batroun.
They came here when Ahmed was four and I was two.’

‘You’ve got
a brother?’

‘Sure have.
Ahmed’s bright. Got into medicine and topped all his exams. Right now, he’s
doing his internship.’

‘How come
you’re not doing medicine? Didn’t you get in?’

‘Didn’t
try. Doctors don’t have a life.’

Again that
appraising glance as if he’s trying to figure something out. Is it whether I
will or won’t? Is it all about sex? That wouldn’t surprise me as sex, or rather
differing attitudes to sex, is what comes between me and Emma. Basically, I’m a
romantic and I guess that’s Graham’s influence. He’s very old fashioned when it
comes to his family. He was forty when I was born, Hannah twenty-nine. Though I
find it hard to view my parents as lovers, I hear certain sounds from their
bedroom that tell me they are. Rather, I used to hear those sounds. Lately,
they can barely manage a civil word to each other.      

What if
they split? Emma and Julie had such an awful time after Robert moved to
Queensland. Julie’s had a few guys since then, but they never hung around for
more than a few months. ‘That’s because she always picks hopeless men,’ says
Emma. But then… what about Sam? What about Danny? Weren’t they equally
hopeless? Isn’t Emma following in her mother’s footsteps? Sometimes she makes
it so hard for me to keep on loving her when I’m sure that whatever she’s up to
isn’t doing her any good.

I glance at
Abdul. Is he going to be as hopeless as Danny or Sam? Even if he isn’t, what
am I doing here with him? What if he’s using me to get to Emma? Suddenly I
break into an ice-cold sweat.

I shiver.

He notices.
‘You cold?’

I manage a
half smile. ‘Someone just ran over my grave.’

Traffic
lights turn amber then red. He says, ‘What do you do in your spare time?’

‘What spare
time?’ I yelp. ‘I’ve just finished Year 12.’

He laughs.
I join in. ‘Read lots,’ I say. ‘Listen to music. Check out clubs. Then I
casually add, ‘
Emma
drags
me to lots of galleries.’

He ignores
this. ‘What makes you mad?’

I mentally
shrug and go along with what he’s prepared to talk about. ‘Oh, the usual stuff
- racism, sexism, homophobia, climate change, wrecking the environment.’ These
are such clichés, we burst into laughter. When we reach the next shopping centre
he parks in the shade and returns with two more Cokes. I say, ‘Tell me about
Uni.’

‘What do
you want to know?’

‘Just about
everything. What was it like when you first got there?’

‘Pretty
confusing. It’s up to you to get your work in on time.’

‘How about
lectures?’

‘Sometimes
there can be three hundred people in one hall. Half the time you can’t hear
what the lecturer’s saying.’

I start to
panic. ‘How do you know what to do?’

‘You muddle
along. They give out handouts and sometime put a lecture up on the internet.
But it’s not easy. No spoon-feeding. How about you?’

I frown
slightly. ‘What do you mean?’

He cocks an
eyebrow. ‘How come you weren’t at a private school?’

‘Oh that.’
I grin. ‘Mum booked me into Wesley. Only Julie couldn’t afford the fees.
Emma
and me, we’re so close we refused to
be separated. So they sent us to the local high.’

Still not picking this up,
he says, ‘Do you think you might’ve done better elsewhere?’

‘Dunno.
This way, we got to meet a range of people.’

‘You mean,
Lebos…’ a sharp edge to his voice, ‘Bomb-chuckers, terrorists like me?’

‘Exactly.
What’s it like to grow up here, yet look totally Middle-Eastern, to have one
foot in each camp?’ I recall a recent newspaper article that talked of never
quite feeling at home in either.

He guesses
my thoughts. ‘You mean, what’s it like being Lebo since 9/11, Iraq,
Afghanistan, Children Overboard, and unwanted refugees?’

I redden
slightly. ‘Suppose so.’

‘Trouble
is, you Aussies think all Muslims are jihadists, suicide bombers wanting total
Sharia law so we can take over the world.’

Though I’m
not sure
some
of
this isn’t right, I say quickly, ‘But that’s not true, is it.’

‘If you mean,
do I want to go out and blow up people because my religion says I should, I
don’t think so. Basically, all we want is to be accepted as Aussies, only
keeping our Lebanese culture and religion.’

I bite my
lip. ‘Do you think that’s possible?’

He shakes his
head. ‘Not if the media keep up their anti-Muslim attitudes. If an Aussie rapes
a girl, there’s no headline saying ‘
Aussie
youth rapes girl. But if it’s someone from a Middle
Eastern background, it reads ‘Lebanese youth rapes girl...’

His anger
is so profound, I can only blink. ‘Do you think we’re racist?’

‘Some of
you surely are.’

‘How can we
stop this?’

He shrugs.
‘Just have to learn to accept us as we are. I mean, none of us are indigenous.
Everyone was once new. Every group had a rough time when they turned up. Wasn’t
most of Oz once split into Aborigines, Protestants and Catholics?’

I nod. He
scowls at a car trying to overtake, picks up speed, and asks, ‘Isn’t your
father a teacher?’

‘Ex. Right
now he’s into renovating. He says he doesn’t miss teaching. Hey,’ I pretend to
growl. ‘Stop changing the subject. Tell me more about yourself.’

He turns
and smiles. ‘What do you want to know?’

‘How about
your folks? How do they feel about us Aussies?’

‘They just
want you to accept us for who we are. Only…’ he frowns, ‘they really insist
that we marry in and bring the next generation up as Lebanese Aussies.’

‘Do you
agree with that?’

Instead of
answering, he laughs. His laugh is so deep and sexy, my heart turns over. I do
my best to stay half-sane by changing the subject. ‘Get to any garage sales
this morning?’

‘Sure did…’
He stops. Just ahead is a T-junction. On one side of the road is a small white
sedan, wheels in the air like an upturned beetle. On the opposite side, still
breathing steam, stands a larger sedan, its bonnet squashed as if by a giant
thumb. As they slowly skirt the wreckage, an ambulance swishes past flashing
blue and red lights.

Head
swimming, I close my eyes. Abdul swerves towards the verge and pulls up. He
orders, ‘Put your head on your knees.’

I do. What
if I’m too scared to get into a car again? Determined to hide my panic… am I
now phobic about cars? I murmur, ‘Ah…Sorry about that.’

‘My fault.
Should never have talked you into this.’

I say
through dry lips. ‘Can’t stay home forever.’

‘No, you
can’t. Not that I think this’ll happen again.’

‘Hmmm...?’
I manage as that sick feeling starts to subside.

‘You won’t
stay scared.’ His voice is firm. ‘You got into this car, didn’t you?’

I give
another nod.

‘Like
climbing back on the horse. You saw another accident. You survived. Now you’ll
have a life.’

I smile and
move closer. Thank heavens I’m with Abdul. Hannah and Graham would’ve been
over solicitous. So would Emma. Anyone else might have told me to stop being an
idiot. Thank god I’m with Abdul. As the road dips up and down, I consider the
thousands of times I will have to climb into a car. Abdul says, ‘Sometimes when
an awful thing happens, it’s best to talk about it.’

‘What’s
there to talk about?’ I don’t hide my anger. ‘Those first two days, I hardly
remember a thing. The cops had to tell me what happened. Jon’s a lousy driver
and he shot through a stop sign.’

‘Is he
okay?’

‘Course
he’s fine. Two weeks later he was walking around like nothing happened.’

‘Arsehole!’

‘You better
believe it. Last year two of his close mates got killed. You’d think he’d learn
something from that, wouldn’t you?’

Stopped by
the next set of traffic lights, he says, ‘How long were you in hospital?’

‘Almost a
week. They had to pin my ankle in four places.’

‘Get lots
of visitors?’

‘Mum and
Dad were with me most of the time. Kaz, Sacha and Jodie turned up just about
every day.
Emma
almost slept there. When the pain was worst she knew she was always there, she
knew to help me get through it. ’ This time I won’t let him ignore this
.
‘Right now, like being here with you
when she’s done so much for me... it makes me feel... well, totally disloyal.’

He stares
ahead. ‘You heard her ask me to contact you. I kept trying to tell her I just
wanted us to be friends. She kept pretending not to hear. That’s why I didn’t
drive her to the airport.’ His voice rises, ‘You do believe me, don’t you?

I shrug.
That’s okay for Abdul. But when Emma finds out, she’ll want to boil me in oil.

Traffic-lights
change to green. The car picks up speed. Abdul says casually, ‘How about
tomorrow. You got anything special on?’

‘Not
really, why not give me a call?’ I hear myself say, though my hands won’t stop
trembling.

My hands finally stop
trembling. Because of the three year gap since I last saw Robert, I’m able to
view him and Laura through clearer eyes. They say enough about themselves to
make me realise their attitude is ‘You got it, you flaunt it.’ In some ways I
can’t blame them for being proud of their newfound prosperity. But then isn’t
Laura that bit too quick to point out that local aborigines are responsible for
a recent outbreak of crime?

By the time we
finish talking, it’s so late I sleep over. Waking in this fabulous room, I feel
like all my dreams have come true. In this vast bed I can admire the shadows
dappling my windows, and the swimming pool sparkling outside. There’s a notebook
and biro in one of the dresser drawers. Before diving into the shower I try to
capture with only a few lines Laura and Robert eating dinner by their pool.

It’s hard
catching Dad’s distinctive smile, but I get that lock of grey hair falling over
his high forehead, the same forehead, short nose and wide lips I’ve inherited.
My sketch of Laura comes out better. But even if these drawings aren’t all
that accurate, Dessi will get an idea of what they look like. Sketching also
helps sort out some of my emotions. I’m still confused as to how I feel…really
feel about my dad. Do I still love him? Can I ever forgive him for walking out
of my life and then hardly ever contacting me?

Memories flood
in: of being carried on his shoulders; Sunday mornings in our local park and
being pushed on the swing, the wind blowing hair into my face. Others are less
pleasant; holding my hands over my ears to block out their angry voices; him
leaving home and Julie falling in a heap; and since then Julie’s constant:
‘What a shit your father is’ and ‘No man can be trusted.’

It reminds me of
the way Dessi and I argue about our current male interest. The major reason I
didn’t have sex with Abdul is probably due to Dessi. Though I openly scoff at
her puritanical attitude, I know she uses it to maintain her self respect. But
whether you go half or the whole way with a guy… does it make any difference to
what that guy feels about you? Would Danny have treated me better if I’d
refused to have sex with him? Frankly, I doubt it. Besides, I’m secretly
convinced that the only reason Dessi hangs onto her virginity is so she can
boast about it. Is pashing on with a guy to the very, very edge all that
different from going the whole way?