Perfect Skin (10 page)

Well, that's the kind of thing I'm thinking it probably is.

George just looks at me. We both know she said none of that. We both know that his next question should deal with that, put it in its place, raise the date spectre once again. But we also know I've had enough.

It'll be fine, I tell him. Here's what I think, right? She's a coffee friend, and coffee friends can invite people round to dinner parties. And there's none of your highly structured signalling business going on. This is all casual. I'm probably just there to make up the numbers. You can do that with a coffee friend.

I'm glad to hear it. I'm glad to hear that in the
absence of socially responsible signalling, there's still a sophisticated conceptual framework underlying this.

Sure. Always. And why not? What's wrong with the coffee-friend concept? That stuff can work, you know. I've got a running buddy now too.

A running buddy?

Yeah. Someone else who does laps of uni, so we go together in the mornings now. You know how that is. It's like you and Nigel and the swimming.

Yeah. Is it? Who's your running buddy?

She lives near uni. Right where I park my car.

Good,
he says.
Convenient.
He stirs the sugar in my coffee, taps the spoon twice on the side and hands me the cup.

She happens to like to run at the same kind of time as I do. And she likes to run in groups.

So there's a group of you?

Well, there's just the two of us at the moment, but there could be other people some time. It's a good time of day to run.

A running buddy and a coffee friend. It's sounding very compartmentalised, this life of yours.

Which isn't a problem, is it?

No.
He drinks a mouthful of coffee.
Did I tell you I've downloaded some new software that could be good for work? For the records side of things?

No.

I've got the demo going. It's pretty good. Do you want to see it?

Okay. Yeah.

We go into his study, and his tropical fish screen saver is bubbling away calmly on his computer.

Synchronicity,
he says.
Weren't we talking about Jung's fish references earlier?

He flips around from one page of the new records software to another, but I'm not paying much attention. I shouldn't have mentioned Ash. I should have known he wouldn't get it, but it seemed like a good chance to bring her up. And I couldn't have said I think she's lonely, or anything like that. So we're running together. And having lunch on Saturday. It's definitely good I didn't say that.

He's showing me how the software recommends dosages, raises possible drug interactions.

Here,
he says,
Try it. Prescribe something. Give John Doe a really stupid dose of Amoxil.

He steps aside so I can get to the keyboard. I fumble around trying to find the right tools on the toolbar.

No, no, it's that one,
he says.
Like I showed you before.
And he goes on trying to be helpful, but using software words.

You're teching me out here, George, I tell him.

What do you mean?

You're losing me. Any time you're about to use a word that has a capital letter in the middle or ends in a little R in a circle, replace it with something bland and old-fashioned. Luddite-friendly.

You are so behind, aren't you? I'd like to call it retro, but it's just behind.

George loves technology. Not long after we started uni, he noticed that I was the only person in our social medicine tute group whose assignments were done on a word processor. Soon enough he was over at our place pretty regularly, talking hardware and software with my father
and then angling for a turn at the keyboard in the study downstairs. Word processing, experimenting, taking the kind of interest I never could. He tried programming, in a very basic way, and designed a totally non-visual golf game that relied on advice from a wise-cracking invisible caddie, a random number generator and blind luck. George had never been on a golf course in his life and the game obviously sucked, but my father got quite excited. Particularly when he shot a course record fifty-eight on only his third or fourth go.

It was that kind of thing that made me feel as though I was letting the side down. Letting two sides down. Being an inadequate friend, unable to muster enthusiasm for the world's most unappealing computer game, and an inadequate son, finding myself unable to care much about computers in general (and the record round in particular).

In fourth year uni, my father got George a cheap, second-hand computer through work, and George got excited about its very limited graphics potential. He repaid us by doing up a particularly eye-catching A4 flyer that read, ‘[
] YES!!! I want good head from a friendly person with no serious diseases' and about twenty tabs at the bottom with my name and phone number.

There were several calls. Enough, in fact, that I had to explain it to my parents. I came home from uni one day to find my mother on the phone, calmly telling someone that this was a bit of a mistake, that she wasn't sure I was looking for that sort of thing, really,
But thank you for your interest.

So we had to have a talk. Not that it was her business what I was looking for, of course – and she was pretty
clear that she didn't want to know – but was there anything I wanted to tell her? Was I lonely? Was I looking for what these men were offering? And if I wanted their numbers, they were on the pad next to the phone.

When I explained, my father said,
The lad just likes his new computer. Got a bit excited, obviously. Nothing wrong with that.

The next morning, I ignore the weasel completely. I have the cursor hovering over the part of the screen where the LATER box will be, and I stare straight at it to make sure the weasel doesn't catch my eye. I click as soon as I see the outline.

I check all my emails from Katie to see if there's a hint from her one way or the other. I'm sure there's nothing going on. Then when I go on-line there's a new one, but it's only confirming the time for Saturday and telling me to bring nothing, or wine if I really want to. Not even George could find a signal in that. Damn it, why has he got me thinking this way?

When I go past on the way to the water cooler, Wendy's door is open, and she's going through some reports.

Are you going to be at Katie's on Saturday? I ask her, and I think I make the question sound strictly social.

For dinner? No. I don't think so,
she says, and gives a small laugh.
She doesn't need me to hold her hand.

She said she's had her kitchen redone, I say, as though that might deflect any emerging sibling issues (as though it's all right not to invite Wendy and Steve if there's a kitchen being launched).

Yes, I've seen it. They've done a good job. But you'll see it for yourself on Saturday, won't you? Anyway,
I saw Lily was first at childcare again this morning. You're really into this running now, aren't you?

It's become part of my routine, I guess. There's a group of us who run now. Well, the beginnings of a group. It makes it easier to stick with it.

Okay, it wasn't such a smart way of putting it. Depending on how George handles the conversation of the night before.

Not that I assume people are talking about me behind my back, but it's the kind of thing George mightn't keep to himself. But if I'm not ready for it to be public – even if it's only running – I shouldn't have told him. I've known him long enough to know that.

Then Wendy turned at a right angle in the middle of the conversation about Katie's kitchen, and childcare arrival times suddenly seemed competitive and my running public knowledge. And out the explanation came again, or a version of it. The downplaying, covering-up, group-running version. I think I actually am assuming people are talking about me behind my back. And is it too paranoid of me that, without much effort, I can imagine every word of it?

By Saturday I've run with Ash twice more since the conversation with George. We're going further now, and that was my idea. It is better, running with someone. You do push yourself.

On Saturday morning we don't run. I aim for a sleep-in, but I'm not sure why. Lily doesn't yet observe
weekends, so I'm up when I usually am and feeding her, and getting more time than I need with the paper. She and Elvis and I go out for a walk before the day gets too hot. I take the mobile with me, since I'm half-expecting Ash to cancel lunch.

She doesn't cancel lunch. She turns up when I've killed more time, got to the cafe early, found a shady table, bought coffee and read half of another newspaper.

Hey,
she says, and makes me look up. She smiles and pushes her sunglasses back on her head.
I thought I'd go all out with the regular clothes. I even wore a dress.

And there's a second when I'm acutely aware of how much time has passed since I was in pursuit of women this age, and how many fashion cycles have come and gone. No, it's not a generation, I have to tell myself. More like half a generation. And it's just clothes, and she's a friend I run with. There'll be no crushing embarrassment here.

Ash isn't having this lurch. She's already moved around beside me and she's lifting Lily out of her stroller, saying,
Let me take a look at you.
Lifting her up onto her hip and making close eye contact with the baffled Bean, who I'm willing not to cry.
Aren't you nice?
Ash says to her.
I'm Ashley. Can you say that? Ash-lee.

Probably not yet, I tell her. Words are probably still quite a few months away. But I'm sure she appreciates the introduction. She's Lily, by the way. If I haven't told you.

Then things get stranger than the fashion problem. I watch the Bean adjust, Ash lift her and plonk her feet onto the stone table, play around with her. I wasn't
ready for that. Ash in her regular clothes, doing this regular thing, playing with a baby. I was ready for her to call and cancel, but I wasn't ready for this. Or the awkward surge of something like loneliness that comes with it.

Shall we get something to eat?

Yeah. Good idea.

We join the queue, Ash still holding Lily, now on her hip again. Lily, not wary the way I thought she might be, kicking her blue-booted leg against Ash's front, pointing at things and babbling, giving them new monosyllabic names.

She talks,
Ash says to me, and then turns back to Lily.
What did you say that was again?

And Lily waves her arm, gives Ash a thump in the right breast and grabs for her dress strap.

You've got to watch her, I warn her. There's lots of discovery starting to go on, and she's not too aware of the boundaries.

When we sit down again, I buckle Lily back into her stroller and I give her a rusk.

This is a relatively new part of her diet, I tell Ash. She got her first tooth last week, so she's into gnawing at the moment. She seems pretty keen on the dog's Bonios, which might be okay, but I don't think it'd look good.

So who does she take after? Who does she look like?

Not like anyone. I don't think. Just like herself. Hey, Bean? And I think that's fine. It's good if she gets to do her own thing.

Yeah. I hadn't thought of it that way.

So, what are you doing at uni exactly? What is it that you had to come down here for?

You re not allowed to laugh.

You can't actually say that. Particularly if you're about to tell me a thesis topic. They're all either incomprehensible or funny or both. It's a rule.

Okay. I'm looking at retail. The psychology and sociology of retail. I transferred here to be with a particular supervisor. I'd read some things she'd written on cycle times in calendar-driven retail.

Calendar-driven retail?

Sure. There are a lot of different ways it's described, but the idea is that, spread out across the year, there are specific sale points, on top of general commerce. Some of them are demographically focused, some aren't. My supervisor has an interest in Fathers' Day. Me? I went right for the big one. Christmas.

So, what about Christmas exactly?

Exactly?
She stops, smiles.
Okay, I've got a working title of ‘Christmas retail cycle times seen from the perspective of the rise and fall of Tickle-Me-Elmo'.

You can't tell me this is the bit where I'm not allowed to laugh.

But I do get to explain. You have to let me explain.

Don't worry. I'd like to hear you explain. Any time anyone travels a thousand miles to study Tickle-Me-Elmo, I do like to know why.

Are you still going to run with me after this?

I'm still going to run with you. With this thesis topic I'd only want to run with you more. But explain. Surprise me.