‘Oh, right. Well, you have done a great job at one of those things. The other, not so much.’
‘I know. Liquid courage, I suppose. Or maybe liquid weakness.’
The wine has made Fran vulnerable, and he will hate himself for it tomorrow. But, as he sits in the dirt with me, it is bliss to be next to him, under the best tree, fractionally closer to the stars. Alcohol has its uses, as I have been saying.
‘Mrs Kingston has some moves,’ I say, pointing across the party.
The oldies are trying to get a dancefloor happening, but the music is coming out of a tinny speaker under the house, inadequate and of poor quality. Somebody has put on Jimmy Barnes, and the party hostess is directing the crowd to stand back, as though her basic two-step and exaggerated off-beat clicking has the potential to take out an eye.
‘Is that not an exorcism? I saw Father Jason earlier, so I just assumed,’ Fran replies.
‘What do you think would get him moving? A techno version of “Here I Am, Lord” could slap.’
‘Club remix, from his Boiler Room set,’ he says with a smile.
I genuinely cackle at the mental image. The warmth of the night and the glow of the string lights and the comfort of my wine start to collaborate in bringing me back to myself. I do not want to spook me, so I scan the garden a little more. Olivia is still talking to Jamie, her smile tight. She looks tired; Jamie looks as though he is having a transcendent experience. On the other side of the lawn, Luke is clutching a beer, standing next to Dad and the other dads and I assume talking about footy, or the property market, or people with victim mentalities. They are all wearing shades of blue, laughing in unison, taking sips from their bottles in unison, and mirroring each other in a million other ways. When people say ‘thank goodness for the younger generation’, they hardly consider how many are in training with the old guard. It is a lot to put on one generation, the saving of a broken world. And I feel guilt at the lack of world-saving I have done thus far, especially knowing there are people with far bigger struggles than mine who have done a lot more. I could be better, and I want to be better. I also feel like a baby who just needs her mother. I do not know where Mum is, but I assume inside helping with the washing-up. She likes to busy herself at parties and then complain she did not get a chance to catch up with anyone at all.
Fran lays his head on my shoulder, his weight sinking into me. My eyes close and I try to pause this moment for another second or two, not sure if I will have a chance to touch him again. It is more than okayness, more than some dull rock. What a terrible metaphor; no wonder Dr Montague is the professional and I am the person who pays two hundred dollars an hour for her expertise. It is a glimmer if ever I felt one.
‘It’s weird seeing you here, like going back in time,’ he says.
‘Yeah, I know. It’s weird being home. And I can’t even complain about the annoying parts without sounding like a total brat, because at the end of the day, my mum is doing my laundry, you know.’
‘That does sound annoying. I bet she’s ironing things you’ve never once ironed in your life,’ he replies.
‘Of course she is.’
‘What a tyrant.’
‘She’s also incredible at getting stains out,’ I sigh. ‘Like magic.’
We sit in silence for a while.
‘I thought you were gone for good,’ he eventually says, his voice soft.
‘So did I.’
All intention to avoid trying to find the right words disappears. Saying the right words, or trying to, suddenly feels like the very least I could do.
‘Being back in the house, back in my room, I feel like I’m twelve again. And yes, some of that is weird and bad, immaculate washing notwithstanding, but I am starting to sort through things slowly, in my head. And doing that is a good thing, I think. I’m making –’
‘You don’t have to –’ he cuts me off.
‘I know I don’t have to, but I want to. I tried to put it all in that email but maybe it was the wrong time, or too much for you to take in at once, too intense or whatever. Writing helps me figure out how I am feeling, but I know talking is the better way to handle things for most people. So, I just want you to know, I get it now, why I have been like this, how I fucked you up; it’s all making a lot more –’
‘Nora, stop. It’s fine, you don’t have to. It’s all good. I’m actually seeing someone.’
My mind has chosen the wrong moment to freeze. I will it to unfreeze, to be simple, comfortable, to be emotionally adept and agile, to be the safe kind of interesting or even the endearing kind of awkward. To be anything other than nothing.
‘Oh, right. Well, that’s cool,’ I finally reply, as though I have just now learned the word ‘cool’ and am desperate to try it out for the first time in a sentence. I pronounce it wrong – a feat – clumsy, panicked, too much ‘oo’, bookended by consonants that die before they have properly formed in my throat.
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have blurted it out like that. I’m drunk, that was weird. I just wanted to reassure you I’m fine – you didn’t fuck me up.’
I am aware that now is the time I should be responding to Fran, reassuring him everything is fine and okay and not at all weird, and that I am glad of his lack of fucked-up-ness. And I am glad, but I am out of words. Mouth literally agape, I am motionless, an old photograph, stored in a box or at the back of some drawer. I almost laugh out loud at the absurdity of my grandiose thinking, that I somehow held enough power to damage him beyond repair. I was a splinter in the ball of his hand; he is glad I am out. My reckless, thoughtless, increasingly bizarre behaviour has had a catastrophic impact on my own sense of self, really putting the ‘mental’ in mental breakdown, but to him, in the scheme of things, it is nothing more than a mild disturbance. Shoo fly, don’t bother me. And this feels both better and worse than my previously assumed path of destruction. No, it is better, I think. Better me than him who acquires the career-ending injury. He will live to play another day. I am all too aware of the lack of words I have spoken, and the length of time I have been nodding my head.
Maeve breaks the silence with a cry from her cocoon. When I jump to check on her, she is still asleep. It must be a scary dream. Maybe if I redirect our conversation, it could be as though I did not hear the horrific, wonderful thing Fran told me, as though it was never spoken at all.
‘What kind of nightmares do little kids have, do you think, if they haven’t seen or experienced anything traumatic?’ I ask.
