Caitlin paused in her circling of Colby’s chest.
‘What would I do in New York?’ she asked. ‘From what you’ve said, all you ever do is work.’
‘Not true,’ he protested, although that was mostly true.
‘And anyway, you’ve probably got plenty of girls to keep you company.’
‘Not true,’ Colby said again, although that was absolutely true.
The conversation had started as most of them did, with Colby saying, ‘Hey, babe, it’s me. Tell me what you’re wearing.’
Caitlin answered the way she always did: ‘I’ve got my daggy undies on. Why do you want to know?’
They were no longer in each other’s company but at opposite ends of the earth, and on opposite ends of the phone, with Caitlin still in Townsville and Colby back in New York. He hadn’t missed the flight back to Manhattan (dodging the fireworks with Robert was one thing; missing a day’s work was quite another). Colby hadn’t been bothered about missing the fireworks. He hadn’t expected to miss Caitlin upon returning to Manhattan either, but he’d found himself thinking about her quite a bit. He’d imagine her in her denim cut-offs, with her feet dangling over the edge of the pier, sunning herself in Queensland, while he was trudging through snow to the office, or sticking chopsticks
into a takeaway carton, and, nine times out of ten, he’d call her up just to say hi.
The first time one of his calls had come through, Caitlin had been startled – she missed Colby, too, but she was pretty sure that his idea of a holiday romance was exactly that. Before long, though, she started looking forward to his calls, and felt wretched when the phone didn’t ring. She wasn’t sure where their relationship was going – was it even a relationship? – and she could sense Colby trying to keep his tone jokey, and yet there was no denying it: as the months went by, he kept calling.
‘I was hoping you’d be in bed.’ Colby was sprawled on his sofa once again eating takeaway, having worked a full eighteen-hour shift.
Caitlin propped herself up on her pillow. ‘And the reason you’re calling me at this hour is?’ she asked.
‘Why do you think? Because I miss you, obviously. Now, tell me honestly, what are you wearing?’
‘You know that big T-shirt, the one we saw at the market that day – the one with the comedy body on it, that’s supposed to make you look like you’ve got big boobs in a pink bikini? – I bought one of those. I’m wearing that.’
‘You are not. You’re naked.’
‘Fair enough. I’m naked.’ Caitlin was in fact naked.
‘Well, you better stay that way. Because I’m coming to see you.’
‘Sure you are.’ Caitlin was curled up under a sheet, the aluminium blinds on the window behind her bed drawn against the daylight.
‘No. I really am,’ said Colby. ‘I’m not kidding. One of our clients here is an Olympic sponsor. He’s offered me a ticket to your opening ceremony. Why? Do you think I should say no?’
Caitlin sat bolt upright. ‘Really? Can you come?’
‘Of course I can come.’ Colby was enjoying Caitlin’s reaction.
‘And can I come down and stay with you?’
Colby hadn’t expected that. He put his takeaway box to the side. ‘I’ve only got one ticket,’ he said, which was true, but he also didn’t think having Caitlin holed up in whatever five-star hotel room they were likely to give him in Sydney was a good idea. There would be other traders in Sydney – not Robert this time, but others from Carnegie – and they’d want to party, and he’d probably want to party, too. Caitlin would have to wait until after the games.
‘But I can’t wait,’ she wailed. She did, however, and Colby was happy to see that she had not changed when she met him at the airport. She was in the same torn shorts, and she took him straight to her little flat so he could throw her down on the squeaky brass bed, with fairy lights wrapped up and down the bedposts.
‘I missed you,’ she said afterwards.
Colby was lying on his back, exhausted. ‘Not as much as I missed you,’ he said, and from that moment they were back into old habits: awake all night, asleep all morning, waking around noon so Caitlin could make smoothies and cut fruit for lunch, in her cheap and cheerful laminated kitchen. Then
they’d head out, usually to the beach, or for ice-cream, or to throw more chips at the pelicans on the pier.
‘I’d forgotten how much fun you are,’ Colby said. He liked the way she teased him about what she called his dorky clothes; how she’d taken a jar of Vegemite from the pantry and said, ‘See this, it’s made from the scrapings inside old beer kegs.’ She took the lid off the jar and waved it under his nose.
‘It is not,’ he said, feigning disbelief, though he’d had the bet-you-can’t-believe-we-eat-it Vegemite story from at least four Australians on his last visit.
‘It is!’ Caitlin said.
‘And you eat it?’
‘It’s good for you … you spread it on toast.’
‘I’ll have you on toast,’ he said.
He liked how they didn’t have to be doing much to be having fun. And in quiet moments, after sex, how they could just stay twisted up in her sheets and talk. Caitlin filled him in about her mum: Ruby had moved off Magnetic Island into what they called ‘assisted living’ in Townsville.
‘She can’t open a jar anymore, not without a special tool,’ she said.
Colby lay back, listening and stroking Caitlin’s hair. ‘What kind of place is assisted living?’
‘It’s basically a home for people who haven’t quite carked it. There’s a nurse on call, meals delivered, smells like Dettol.’
‘Dettol?’
‘Dettol. Antiseptic. Grandmas use it to clean the bathroom. It’s an old person’s smell.’
‘And what’s the prognosis?’ asked Colby.
‘Come again?’
‘What do they say about the illness?’
‘Only that it gets worse. I don’t really understand it.’
Colby understood it. He’d taken the time to look it up on Ask Jeeves before he’d flown out. He had read that MS is like scabs forming down the spinal cord. Messages can’t get from the brain through to the limbs. It’s degenerative, and although it can take some time to kill a person, it’s usually also fatal. He wondered how far down that path Ruby already was.
‘So, she doesn’t really walk anymore?’ he asked.
‘No. She’s got a wheelchair. She hates it, of course, but she bought a little dog. He sits on her lap. The people who run the place, they take them to Bingo. So, it’s not terrible, but it’s not really her scene.’
‘What is her scene?’
‘Oh, you know, that hippy kind of life on Magnetic – jugglers and fire twirlers and being all organic. And you can’t really compare what she’s got now with that life. All the people where she is now are old.’
‘I’d like to see Magnetic Island.’ Colby had got out of bed to stand – stark naked – by the barbecue on Caitlin’s tiny verandah, to sear T-bone steaks the size of baseball mitts.
‘Well, there’s a ferry.’
‘So then, should we go?’
‘It’s your holiday. I suppose it’s up to you,’ said Caitlin.
‘Let’s do it,’ said Colby. ‘Tomorrow. I want to see where you grew up.’ So the next day they paid the fare and made the journey, with Caitlin in a little singlet, and Colby in tailored shorts, newer and brighter and sharper across the creases than those he’d worn the year before.
They were not four steps along the timber pier when the ferry captain called out, ‘Hey, scamp, coming to visit Jack, are you?’
Caitlin stiffened. ‘No.’
‘Who’s Jack?’ asked Colby.
Caitlin started walking faster. Colby had to stride to keep up with her.
‘Hey,’ he said, ‘wait up. Who’s Jack?’
‘My father.’
‘Your father still lives here?’
‘I guess he must. I don’t really make a point of keeping up with what he’s doing.’
Of course they ran straight into him, because that’s what happens, isn’t it? People travel all the way to Europe and meet somebody who lives across the street. Caitlin had tried to avoid it, by quickly designing an itinerary that would take them past her old school at Horseshoe Bay, by her childhood home, over to the rock wallabies and back to the pier. She rented a Moke with a pop-out windshield from the man who owned Rent-a-Moke at the end of the pier, so they could get that all done, and Caitlin had just pulled up in the leaf litter outside a pink cottage when Jack stepped out onto the
porch, wearing loose yellow underpants and nothing else. He looked to Colby to be about sixty. He was in fact fifty but in bad shape: his legs were tanned like an old leather couch; his knees were shot and his beard was overgrown and grey, except for the yellow nicotine stains around his mouth.
Caitlin got out of the Moke and stood in the leaf litter, swatting flies. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I could ask you the same question.’ Jack was so freshly out of the house that the long strips of coloured vinyl that hung in the doorway were still resting on his shoulders. He cupped his hands around a match, and lit a cigarette.
‘You better not be stealing Mum’s things,’ Caitlin said, striding towards him.
‘What would I steal? It’s all junk.’
Colby was still seated in the Moke, unsure what to do. Caitlin hadn’t said, ‘Come on, let’s meet Dad,’ or anything like that. He put his hands up on the roll bar, lifted himself out of the vinyl seat and walked up to the timber porch.
‘Hello,’ he said, extending a hand to Jack. ‘I’m Lachlan Colbert – Colby – I’m a friend of Caitlin. She’s showing me around.’
Jack did not take Colby’s hand. He looked at him and said, ‘You’re a Yank.’
‘Ha! Right! From New York City, yes!’ said Colby.
‘Don’t tell me you’re one of those Septics that Trevor took out on the boat last year?’
‘Ah, I’m not sure. We went out on a tour with Trevor Nesbit, yes.’
‘Well, he saw you coming, didn’t he? He’s been dining out on that story for a year.’
‘Right,’ said Colby. ‘Well, we think we got good value.’
Jack turned to Caitlin. ‘Hear that, love? He thinks you’re good value.’
‘Shut up,’ said Caitlin.
‘Why are you here, anyway?’ Jack asked. ‘I thought you hated this place. Never coming back. That’s what you said.’
‘I’m showing my friend around. The actual question is, what are you doing here? This isn’t your house.’
‘It is now.’
‘What are you talking about?’ asked Caitlin, her voice rising. ‘This is Department of Housing. They’re going to do this up and find new people for it. You can’t just take it over. What’s wrong with your own place?’
‘Council condemned it.’
‘Did you ever think to cut the grass? Get rid of some of that junk you collect?’
‘It wasn’t junk.’
‘So, you just think you can move in here? On Mum’s lease?’
‘It’s not her lease. She’s given it up. And it’s not your business, anyway,’ said Jack. He’d been smoking, but now licked his fingers, snuffed the end of the cigarette and pocketed what remained. He went back through the vinyl strips into the kitchen and Caitlin followed.
Colby hesitated, and then he followed too.
‘I came here to show Colby. I thought the place was empty.’
‘Well, it’s not. But since you’re here, there’s a stack of mail for your mother on the kitchen bench. And if you’re planning on making your boyfriend a cup of tea, you can make one for me as well.’
There would be no tea. There was no milk in the fridge, and the only saucepan was already burnt black on the stove. Colby looked around, amazed: three cats sat on the benchtop, their tails swishing.
‘When was the last time you cleaned in here?’ Caitlin lifted and sniffed a tin of Carnation milk. Someone had hammered a hole through the lid.
‘I don’t clean, and there’s your mother’s mail.’ Jack gestured to the stack of envelopes on the bench. He pushed open the fly-screen door, and went down the wooden steps into the overgrown backyard.
‘Ignore him,’ Caitlin said.
‘I’d only be returning the favour,’ said Colby.
‘Jesus, this place is a mess.’ Caitlin ran a finger along a window sill, inspected the dirt, and walked down the hall to the room she’d occupied as a child. ‘It’s the same as when I lived here.’
‘You’re joking?’ said Colby. There was no carpet or linoleum or anything on the floor, and no plasterboard on the walls. The beams doubled as shelves.
‘This was my favourite toy when I was a kid.’ Caitlin reached for an old coconut, carved to look like the laughing head of a chimpanzee.
‘It’s not exactly cuddly, is it?’ Colby took it from her,
and rolled it through his own hands. ‘Why didn’t you take it with you, when you cleared out? In fact, why not take it now? Put it by your bed. It’ll scare off any other men who might try to stay over.’
‘Don’t be stupid.’
Colby put the coconut back on its exposed beam, and took Caitlin into his arms, so her sandy head rested on his chest.
‘You had one wild childhood,’ he said.
‘I know,’ she said, sighing. ‘Look, I’m sorry. Can we go?’
It was the first time since they had become lovers that Colby had seen her less than happy.
‘Sure,’ he said.
Caitlin led the way back down the hall to the kitchen. She picked up her mum’s mail, and left the house through the strip-vinyl door. Colby hesitated, thinking, ‘Are we supposed to say goodbye?’ He could see Caitlin’s father standing in a cloud of smoke on the back porch, grinning at Colby.
‘I’d watch her if I were you,’ Jack said, ‘she’s not the full quid.’
‘Excuse me?’ said Colby.
‘
Will you piss off!
’
Colby turned in time to see Caitlin coming back into the house, at speed. ‘Heh-ho!’ he said, reaching for her waist. ‘It’s okay, babe.’
‘There you go,’ said Jack, grinning. ‘Screw loose.’
‘I’m going to kill you,’ said Caitlin, but Colby had her by the waist and would not let her go. She turned on her ankle
so fiercely that it twisted, and she had to limp her way back to the Moke.
‘You show very little respect for your daughter,’ Colby said, and maybe he’d have said more, but the Moke had started up. Caitlin was leaving. ‘Wait up,’ he said, striding over the dried leaves, gumnut shells and ibis poo, towards where she was revving the engine.
‘Get in,’ said Caitlin, ‘before I do something stupid.’
Colby slammed the car door. ‘I’m in.’ It wasn’t a clean exit. Caitlin tried to accelerate, but she wasn’t properly in gear. They skidded on leaves, and stalled. Caitlin swore, but finally they were away.
For the first few minutes, neither said anything.
Colby broke the ice. ‘Your dad’s a jerk.’
‘Tell me about it.’ Her tone was sharp.
‘Right,’ said Colby. ‘So. Do you want to talk about this?’