Elsewhere in Success (9 page)

Harry imagines Carole soaking in a bubble bath, her breasts bouncing like playthings just above the water line, cushioned in the bubbles. Jazz is playing in the background, her eyes are closed and her lips are slightly parted. Her hair is falling down, wet on the ends, pointing like a sign to her nether regions. He walks in fully clothed. He is wearing his khakis from when he was in Nashos, slouch hat, flowers stuck in the end of his rifle. He is feeling fit and strong. He has his sixpack back. He towers above her. She opens her eyes and smiles at him.

‘Get in, soldier boy,' she says. Her voice is husky. He says nothing, being the strong, silent type.

He leans his rifle against the wall and starts to unlace his boots, but she becomes impatient.

‘Don't make me wait,' she begs him, but he takes his time. She is moving around under the water. Her eyes are closed again. Her mouth is open. The water slips against her skin. Harry sits on the edge of the bath and removes his boots. She rises out of the bath, and puts her arms around him from behind, unbuttoning his shirt, and loosening his pants.

‘Big strong soldier man,' she says. ‘Give it to me.'

He stands and his dungarees fall to his ankles. She places
her wet hands on his hips and slips them under his smalls, slowly sliding around to the front. His body is as hard as iron. She is rubbing hers wetly against him, kissing him gently all over his back. He turns to embrace her. Her mouth is open, wanting him.

A car door slams and Buster barks a warning. A few minutes later Louisa edges through the passage carrying half a dozen plastic bags or more.

‘Bloody hell, Louisa,' says Harry. ‘You haven't gone and bought more clothes, have you?'

‘Oh,' says Louisa. ‘There's a sale on.'

‘It really beats me how you can buy so much in such a short period of time.'

‘It's just one of my many talents,' says Louisa. ‘Not so long ago you were encouraging me to go out shopping. Don't you remember?'

‘Whatever makes you happy.'

‘Fine, then.'

She is going through an extended shopping phase. Spring has arrived and Louisa needs new clothes.

‘I'm trying to reinvent myself,' she says to Harry. It isn't working. When she stands in front of the full-length mirror, she is the same.

‘I've lost my spark,' she says. ‘I used to have a spark.' Harry fails to contradict her, so she buys more clothes in an attempt to get it back. Clothes spill from the wardrobe and from the top of her bedside cupboard. The dirty-clothes basket is full, the clean-clothes basket, the dryer and the clothesline are full. In the walk-in robe her clothes are squeezing Harry's out of existence. Though he has holes in his underpants he refuses to purchase anything for himself. She has noticed that the more she shops, the less he does. She is currently testing this theory.

Harry doesn't seem to get the point. He tells her he has considered becoming a cross-dresser to use up some of her
excess. But her maxi would be his mini, and he tells her he would not want to look ridiculous in drag. She tells him it sounds as if he has thought about cross-dressing quite a bit. So he does the manly thing to prove that he hasn't. He throws her new clothes into the washing machine and turns it on the hot cycle, ruining them. He would apparently prefer she spent their money on alcohol. He says that at least alcohol does not take up space for long, and makes both of them feel better before it makes them feel worse. He says bugger it, it doesn't do any harm. They have no one to worry about but themselves.

She hasn't given up on the challenge of trying to appear attractive. She reveals the truth gradually, like someone doing a presentation, shaves her legs and emerges in her new clothes as if she has had them for ages. Harry tells her that he does not find her any more attractive in her new clothes, just neater. ‘That's a rotten thing to say,' she says and walks out. ‘Men like women to look nice but it's supposed to happen magically and without any visible effort,' she calls out from the kitchen. She could walk around with nothing on. That would show him. Bits everywhere.

Later Harry apologises in his way. He puts the kettle on and makes her a cup of tea. ‘The blue is nice,' he says. ‘Blue looks good on you.' He is not so insensitive that he doesn't see when she's feeling hurt.

It's different for him when he ventures out. He goes for a reason. She's at work and he's home cooking up a stew. Halfway through the process he discovers that they've run out of his favourite sauce. More importantly, it's his special ingredient. He turns off the gas and ducks down to the local shop, but they've run out, so he ventures further afield to the Gateway Shopping Centre. The school holidays have started and there are kids everywhere. He soon finds himself distracted, disoriented and wandering. On the second circuit of the complex he finds himself drawn towards a display of fitness
equipment attended by a salesman. He makes eye contact and realises it is the young bloke who occasionally parks out the front of their house. The man introduces himself and gives Harry his card. Harry reads it aloud.

‘Mason Humble,' he reads. ‘Manager, Fitness Fundamentals. Mason Humble. That name sounds vaguely familiar.'

‘I was named after my father. The footballer. That could be where you've heard the name.'

‘I guess so.'

‘Do you have any equipment yourself?' Humble asks.

Harry has allowed his gaze to stop on a set of weights.

‘I'm not really in a position to buy anything at the moment,' he says. ‘But I'd like to get a decent set of weights at some stage. Good for keeping the bones strong. You need to think about these things as you get older.' Harry laughs loudly to cue him to the appropriate response.

‘You've got a way to go yet,' he says.

‘I try to keep fit.'

‘Yes, that's good,' says Humble. ‘And you are lucky today because this set of weights is the last one I have in this line, and it's been discontinued, so it's heavily discounted. There's nothing at all wrong with them but people these days seem to want something a bit more modern looking, so I'll tell you what. You're a decent sort of man, I can see that. Make me an offer.'

‘Twenty bucks,' says Harry, being ridiculous.

‘Done. They're worth a lot more, but since you've been so nice about me parking under your tree.' He is smirking as he packages up the gear.

‘Oh that's you?' says Harry. ‘Well no worries.'

‘I like to take a drive at lunchtime but there's nowhere to park around here. I tell you, mate, it gets so you start to hate the sight of shopping centres after a while. I actually trained as a fitness instructor before I got stuck with this crap.'

‘Fair enough.'

‘You don't know of anything going do you?'

‘No, sorry, mate.'

‘No worries. I ask around. You never know, I might start up my own business.'

‘Yeah, fair enough.'

Later, at home, Harry unpacks the weights and takes them outside to give himself room and fresh air. As he raises and lowers them he imagines he can feel himself getting stronger. He is standing by the bath, fully clothed, pumping iron. Carole rises out of the water like a nymph. The soapy water shines on her naked body.

‘Oh, you are my big strong man,' she says. ‘Big strong cave man.'

‘Oh yes,' he says as he watches his biceps bulge and flatten. ‘Oh yes, you can.'

He is smiling as he turns to find Louisa has arrived home and is standing at the back door watching him. She is holding yet another two shopping bags.

‘You've bought yourself some weights,' she says, stating the obvious, in a blatant attempt to legitimise her own purchases.

‘Twenty bucks,' he says.

‘Well, just make sure you don't go hurting yourself,' she says. ‘I don't want to have to try and get you out from under those things.'

Harry's laugh plays around in the back room. He is on the phone to someone he likes. He hangs up, emerges from the room and puts the kettle on.

‘Want a coffee?' he asks.

‘Okay.'

‘Guess who that was?'

‘Who?'

‘Gordon. They want to catch up for lunch now that it's warming up.'

‘Oh, I didn't realise he was back. Why didn't Carole ring?' she says.

‘You women,' he says. ‘You're never satisfied.'

It is a nice day. They take advantage of the sun, move outside, and sit side by side on the garden swing with their coffees. A crow has landed in the big tree in the backyard and is calling out. A willie wagtail chases him off but he comes back before flying off. Under Buddha's watchful presence, small lizards move across the stone wall and disappear into crevices. Louisa feels a sudden surge of desire for Harry. Life pulses through her somewhat erratically. Her spark comes and goes.

They are both in a good mood today. Last night they
celebrated as the country voted in a new government. Louisa reflects on humans as primates, not quite as noble as gorillas. A younger silverback has ousted the older one. There is new blood and a sense of renewed hope and optimism in the troupe.

Buddha's face is gentle and his smile is genuine. Things will change. Things will stay the same.

The middle of another week already. Every time the bell sounds at the local primary school, it reminds Harry of the air-raid sirens from the movies he has seen of the London bombings during World War Two.

The school sirens are more predictable – he'd set his watch, if he could find it. They signal the status of the oval that adjoins the school and mark his day into helpful segments, providing structure and external motivation.

The siren whines and, shortly afterwards, silence replaces the clamour of high-pitched voices. This promised reprieve from curious eyes through the playground fence is a signal for Harry to put on his ancient sneakers and head down to the reserve. It was marked out for football practice during winter, but more recently the lines for athletics have been refreshed, with measured lanes for running circling the oval.

Since the promise of a secret meeting with Carole has become more probable, Harry has decided to step up his exercise regime. When he was in Nashos he was so fit that he felt as if he could run forever. The laps were a meditation, and he fell into a rhythm that felt like gliding, the strength of his muscles rendering him almost weightless, his feet barely touching the surface of the ground. He could see how people could get addicted, marathon runners and so forth, running to the point of becoming skeletal, their eyes and cheeks sunken like famine victims, unable to quit until their bodies did. He has never been like that as far as he recalls, but he used to be fit and strong, and he liked the way he felt, as if he could have conquered the world and all the gorgeous women in it.

Now he starts off slowly, shuffling more than running, his knees and his ankles hurting, and his muscles tense and unyielding. This is temporary. He knows that once his body warms up he will be able to move more freely. Buster is with him, sniffing the goal posts and lifting his leg to leave his messages. He runs ahead and back, and across Harry's path, grinning and threatening to trip him up.

‘Get out of the way, Buster!' Harry yells at him.

It takes unnecessary effort to scold him and Harry feels mildly put out, but he soon falls into the old rhythm and begins to enjoy the cool of the early south-westerly against his face. He visualises his calf and thigh muscles contracting and strengthening with every step, his arms pumping him forwards as he laps the oval for the first time. Not too bad for an old codger. He slows to a shuffle again and then a walk, holding his side where a stitch has started to develop. Buster circles back and slows to a trot by his side.

Harry finds himself thinking about the child at Carole and Gordon's place. What was Carole playing at, asking them around while she had the kid there? He shouldn't read too much into it, but he has a sneaking suspicion that Louisa has been talking to Carole about his history, and that Carole is trying her own brand of therapy on him. Women love to talk endlessly about their relationships. Apparently.

Mind you, Louisa hasn't talked to him much about Tom since the day he died, or what happened with her ex – not that he's invited it. He knows some of the old guys that came back from Vietnam and he knows that sometimes it's best to let it be. You don't know what you're playing with when you stir things up. People will talk to you when they're good and ready and anything else you try to get out of them is just morbid curiosity.

He is thinking too much. He starts to jog again and then to speed up, squeezing the thoughts out through his screwed-up eyes, out the sides of his head, leaving them behind. He begins
to sprint, willing his body to work its hardest, until it is his body and nothing else that consumes him. He runs like that, pushing himself until he stumbles to ground. He kneels there panting and attending to the rhythm of his heartbeat until the siren sounds again to send him home.

They have arranged to meet Carole and Gordon for lunch at a winery in the Swan Valley. Harry chooses the venue and instructs Louisa, who describes it to Carole over the phone. Consequently Carole and Gordon have gone to one section of the winery and Louisa and Harry to the other. They have all been sitting there waiting for the others for some time when Carole takes the initiative to call Louisa on her mobile phone.

‘Where are you?' she says.

‘Where are you?'

‘We're sitting outside where the hotel part is, near the bar. Where are you?'

‘At the cafe.'

‘Come over. It's nice here.'

‘Hang on.'

Louisa puts her hand over the phone and relays the situation, but Harry has already signalled that he wants to stay where he is. Gordon is probably saying the same thing.

‘It's lovely here,' says Louisa. ‘We're outside too.'

‘We're just having a beer,' says Carole.

‘We're having a wine. The food looks good.'

‘Just so long as there's alcohol.'

‘It's a winery.'

‘Do they have beer there?' asks Carole. ‘Gordon's got a taste for it now.'

‘Yes,' says Louisa, mouthing the question to Harry and taking a punt while he checks the menu.

Carole gives way and soon they are all sitting together.

The day sparkles. Light sunshine filters through shade created by a loose layer of vine leaves over and through the
treated-pine pergola. The small wooden table rocks on uneven red-brick paving. Louisa finds an old electricity bill in her bag and folds it for Harry to place under the shortest leg. He ignores her outstretched hand.

‘Why don't you do it?' he says.

‘I'll do it,' says Gordon.

‘We could move,' says Carole.

They stay.

Harry has already moved himself and Louisa to the table with the moulded plastic seats rather than one of those with the more aesthetically pleasing wooden chairs that Louisa chose while he was in the toilet. She has given up trying to predict what he will choose as optimal seating, because he always changes position two or three times. This happens even when he initially chooses the seating himself.

There is a backyard feel to the place, with some spider webs scattered around and no tablecloths on the slatted tables. Pretty soon everyone feels able to relax over a house red, and talk as freely as they would at home. A loud party is going on at the table next to them, comprised of what appears to be three or four generations of a large family. It is in the process of winding up. The restaurant manager carries out the birthday cake as Gordon and Carole arrive.

‘Now that takes the cake!' says Gordon. They all laugh. Emboldened by Gordon and their age past caring, they join in the birthday song and applause, but skip the speeches. Apart from the party, there is only one other couple, who are halfway through their meal. They eat in silence and leave quickly.

Harry, Louisa, Carole and Gordon relax into the comfort and familiarity of the weathered plastic chairs and prepare for a long lunch.

‘It's great about Labor getting in,' says Louisa.

‘Grape?' says Harry, pointing upwards to the vine coming through the pergola and winking at Carole. Louisa rolls
her eyes for Carole's benefit. ‘Ha, ha,' she says, but Carole strangely abandons their old sisterhood solidarity and humours Harry.

‘Don't mind if I do,' she says, smiling into his eyes.

‘That's a grape shame. I can't seem to reach them,' says Harry, winking again, and Carole laughs and takes a swig of wine.

‘They're not ripe anyway,' says Louisa.

‘Oh that's just sour grapes,' says Carole and they both laugh again.

Louisa and Gordon exchange a look.

‘I don't think–' says Louisa, as Gordon cuts across her.

‘It looks like the prime minister is going to lose his seat. I don't think that's happened before to a prime minister, has it?'

Nobody knows for sure.

‘Incredible, isn't it?' says Carole.

‘Another drink,' says Harry, pouring himself another.

‘I guess they usually get themselves into safer seats,' says Louisa. ‘But it's hard to tell what a safe seat is these days. Amazing all right.'

‘I think it's gr...' says Carole, choking on her wine, and she and Harry get the giggles.

‘I'm a bit worried about the guy who's running for my mother's electorate,' says Louisa. ‘What's his name again? Anyway, looks like he might just dip out. The Libs seem to have loaded that seat with retirement villages for decades. Nobody gives out how-to-vote cards for any of the other parties it seems. That's according to my mother. They take them down to vote and give them the cards they want them to have. But my mother still has her wits about her. She noticed and protested. They said, what do you want to vote for them for? Sort of implying that she doesn't know her own mind. I mean, she's not stupid. She's just old.'

‘Is that right?' says Gordon.

‘I don't know for sure,' says Louisa. ‘Don't quote me.'

Gordon and Louisa talk about the election while the others sit quietly, but soon there's nothing more to say about it, so the conversation moves on.

Carole and Gordon have recently returned from Scotland where Gordon was born and where Carole has discovered the graves of some of her own forebears. Everybody talks about ancestors while Louisa drinks wine from the carafe and also from a bottle that Carole has ordered. Gordon and Harry soon discover some uncomfortable ancient history. They work out that it's possible that Harry's ancestors slaughtered Gordon's. Or perhaps it is the other way around. Louisa has had two or three glasses of wine by this time so her syntax is fuzzy, and everybody else is talking fast and over the top of one another. The warm feeling, in any case, is not spoiled by this new knowledge. Everyone seems to be floating along in a pleasant alcoholic haze.

Carole says, ‘I've got a good idea. Why don't we all go to Scotland together? We could check out all the ancestors. We might even find out that we're related.' She directs all of this at Harry, and then adds, somewhat suggestively. ‘I've always thought there was something familiar about you.'

‘Yes, that would be um,
grape,'
says Louisa.

It's as if she hasn't spoken.

‘I've always thought there was something overly familiar about you,' Harry says to Carole.

‘Overly?' says Carole, coyly. ‘Not overly, surely?'

‘Stop that flirting, you two. Another drink?' says Gordon to Louisa, pouring one as he asks.

‘So who actually killed who?' asks Louisa, but nobody responds. ‘I mean the ancestors,' she says. She has been wondering vaguely why people thought or think that you can put one atrocity right by causing another. ‘I don't have any ancestors that I know about,' she says. No one is interested in this, but she blunders on anyway. ‘So I feel particularly
virtuous. Nobody that I know of has been killed.'

Carole, Gordon and Harry all look uncomfortable.

‘Oh,' she says, ‘I'm a bit drunk I think.'

‘Never mind,' says Harry, and he places his hand protectively over the top of her hand. Carole drapes her hand over Gordon's forearm.

‘I've saved just enough room for sweets,' Carole says. ‘Anyone else?'

‘Me too,' says Louisa.

‘I'll go and get the dessert menu,' says Harry. ‘I need a stretch anyway.'

‘I need the loo,' says Carole, and she goes too, leaving Louisa and Gordon sitting there. They talk about something or other and Gordon attempts to refill the glasses.

‘Oops, we've run out,' he says.

‘Coffee time,' says Carole as she returns to the table.

Over coffee they begin to sober up and the conversation winds down to a point of reflective silence. Harry and Carole seem to have lost interest in one another.

They all go for a walk to look at arts and crafts in an old-fashioned gingham-curtained and overstocked craft shop on the site of the winery. Louisa lingers over a golf-playing frog but doesn't want Carole to think that she is attracted to it, so makes a comical expression that she hides from the shop lady. Carole draws her attention to a Buddha water feature with an inbuilt light. Louisa shows Carole a picture of her own Buddha under the rosebush; it is the wallpaper on her mobile phone.

Carole and Gordon haven't been to Harry and Louisa's place for some time so Carole hasn't seen Louisa's Buddha. She generously appears to be impressed by the statue, and they talk of their dreams of owning B&Bs, becoming artists and planting trees to ultimately save the earth from global warming. The men stand awkwardly, trying not to listen to what they describe as Louisa and Carole's ‘secret women's
business'. Harry is starting to sober up. He talks to Gordon generally about politics and football.