The Friday night Traffic was shockingly bad. A tram had collided with a truck somewhere out of the way. Or maybe it was a fallen telephone pole. Maybe it was a fire. Who knew? The announcers on the radio acted like they had a hunch, but they were just reading off a screen.
A detailed report would be on the news later that night for sure. It was something big. Everything on that side of the city got diverted. Diverted through a bunch of back-roads, through suburbs that showed Henry that his pathetic dwelling was clearly not up to the standards of what a proper house in a proper suburb could be.
Traffic was like that.
The starling was not there when he arrived. The fence was empty. Even the wattle-birds had gotten bored and went back to their nests to rest. It was far too late for all of that. Birds can only wait around for so long.
“I'm home,” he announced, dragging his foot across the threshold.
“I'm home,” he said again, shambling into the kitchen.
“Dinner's cold,” Loretta said, storming past him, “It was hot an hour ago.”
He appealed, “I sent you a text! I told you I'd be late!”
“I'd already started cooking. It's over there, help yourself,” she said, taking her phone out and flicking through it, “I'm sick of this.”
“Sick of what?”
“Gary Thompson is never late.”
“I'm not Gary.”
“He and his wife always have dinner together.”
“I'm still not Gary.”
“I know. If you were, you would've been here. We could have had dinner together like a regular family.”
“You think I don't want that?”
“What do you want, Henry?” she asked pointedly, “What the Hell do you want?”
“Silence,” he replied honestly, “Just a moment of pure, damn, sodding silence.”
“Whatever.”
Henry scooped up some brown goop from a pot and slopped it onto the plate.
“Braised steak and onions?”
“Yeah.”
“From a can?”
“You got a problem with that?”
He did. He really did. He really, truly did. But he did not wish to cause an argument. He wanted that even less. Arguments were not conducive to silence.
He relented, “No. No problem.”
Food was food, after all. And, with an English muffin, it made a decent enough meal, even if it was a bit military. Justine Thompson, he thought, would have made it from scratch, with fresh ingredients. She would have adjusted the recipe to use a little less salt, a few more vegetables. She would have ensured it was piping hot, with rice and maybe a salad.
And she would never have used a can.
He decided not to voice his thoughts and, instead, tucked hungrily into his meal. Cold or from a can, it did not matter in the end. It was food and he was hungry. Very soon he was sopping up the remnants with the last bit of muffin.
The empty plate looked up at him. He looked down at it. His eyebrows furrowed. Surely he had just eaten a meal. He was no longer hungry, which made sense. So why couldn't he remember even eating it?
He sat, staring through the plate, through the table, down through the tiles, past the floorboards and away underneath the earth. It was cold and dark down there. Cold and dark, and silent.
Loretta looked up from her phone, “So how's the merger coming, Hon?”
Henry dropped his fork and held his aching eye, “I don't want to talk about it.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I don't want to talk about it.”
“Why not?”
Well, that was a tough question, and it would involve more thought than Henry could muster. He tried to evade it.
“It's complicated.”
That reply had never worked, no matter how he applied it. Still, it was all he had in his arsenal.
Loretta countered with another toughy, “Have you fluffed it?”
Henry looked longingly at the plate, hoping that he could have had another mouthful to ruminate on. The few crumbs that remained wouldn't have made a nibble.
“No. I haven't fluffed it.”
“Good, because we need the money. The credit card is due soon. And there's school fees on top of that.”
“Uh-huh.”
And that was the end of it. Henry went to the fridge, got a can of beer out and sat back down. Loretta moved the can away.
“What? Loretta -”
She asked, “So why don't you want to talk about it?”
So, that wasn't the end of it.
“Like I said, it's complicated.”
“So I'm an idiot? I can't possibly understand?”
“No, it's...”
“What, Henry?”
His eye flipped upward, rolling about to show the red-webbed sclera, “Roger has been put on.”
She hit the table, “So you've fluffed it! Geez, Henry!”
“I haven't fluffed it! Roger's just been put on to help out, is all.”
She squinted at him, “What does that mean? Is he going to take the commission?”
“It'll be split.”
“Split? How long has he been on it?”
“He just got put on today, alright,” Henry moaned, trying to work his eye back around with his finger, “Look, can I just drink a beer in silence?”
“So how much will he get? It won't be fifty-fifty, surely! You've been on that forever.”
“I know, I know.”
“So what'll he get?”
“I don't know. It's not up to me. It all depends on what that dumb-arse Miro says.”
“Why? What's he got to do with it.”
“He's my boss. He loves Roger. And he hates me. So he'll probably do what he can to screw me over on this one,” Henry lamented.
“Well he can't! You shouldn't let him!”
“What can I do?”
Loretta scowled, “You can be a bloody man, Henry. You can tell him what's what! You can tell him that you're not going to let that Roger guy take all the credit.”
His shoulders slumped. No, she didn't understand.
“Yeah. That's what I should do. Can I have my beer now?”
“No!” she said, putting it back in the fridge, “You drink too much as it is! That's why you haven't got the merger through yet.”
“Oh, is that why?” he mumbled.
“Yes, that's why! You need to stop being such a lazy bum, and start working!”
He appealed, “I am working. I work every day. I've never stopped working!”
“Then what are you doing now?”
“I was about to have a bloody beer and a sit down for five minutes!”
He pushed his jaw forward, hearing an audible click as it threatened to dislocate. He gently pushed it back into place. For a second there was a moment of golden silence. Outside his cricket began to chirrup merrily. Loretta went back to her phone.
He wiggled the finger of his left hand to see it there was any life in it yet. He inspected it closely. It felt soft, too soft, and it looked dull and grey.
No beer. Fine. He was going to have a sit down anyway, but he needed a beverage of some sort to do that. He boiled the kettle, made a coffee and sat back down.
A dazzling flash of hair, sequins and glitter that was Paula, Henry's daughter, whizzed past the table and stopped at the fridge. Her elevated heels tocked on the tiles in her haste. She was dolled up, hair puffy, make-up slathered on.
“And where are you off to tonight?” Henry asked.
She looked up from the fridge door, “Jackie's.”
“Studying hard, I hope?”
“Ha ha.”
“No, really.”
“Ha ha.”
Henry's eyebrows dropped, “That's not an answer. Are you studying?”
There was a microscopic pause before she answered. She used that time to brush some of the hair from her face and feign a smile.
“Of course. What else would we be doing?”
“I don't know. That's why I'm asking.”
She replied curtly, “Well it's none of your business.”
“It is my business. I'm your dad.”
“It stopped being your business when I turned sixteen.”
“Ah, right. The whole age thing. Look, Pea, time has got no bearing on whether or not I'm your dad.”
“I never said you weren't. I said it's not your business.”
“Right. None of my business.”
“That's right.”
Loretta looked up from her phone, “Henry! Shut up!”
“What? All I want is to know what's up with our daughter.”
“She's fine, Henry. Leave her alone and shut up.”
“Don't you want to know what she gets up to at Jackies?” he asked.
“None of your business,” Paula interjected.
Loretta added, “She's old enough to take care of herself.”
Paula huffed from the room, taking a drink with her. Loretta was staring at him.
“Alright. Fine. Sue me for giving a shit.”
“Shut up. And fix your eye up, already. It's giving me the creeps.”
“Stupid thing keeps rolling about,” he explained, pushing it back so that it pointed forward, “I don't know how to fix it. Gosh, this coffee tastes like crap.”
“Then make a pod.”
“We haven't got any. There are no pods left.”
“Then why didn't you get some at the supermarket?” Loretta grouched.
Henry looked down at the brown liquid. It was tasteless. The jar was pretty fresh, he was sure, and he had put sugar in it, but it was as if he was drinking a cup of hot water.
“What coffee is this?”
“Moccona. The same you had yesterday.”
“Tastes like crap.”
“It's the same you had yesterday. Did it taste like crap yesterday?”
He sighed, “I don't know. I can't even remember yesterday.”
Loretta blew sharply over her bottom lip and went back to looking at her phone. Henry got back to his coffee. Tasteless, odourless, it was all he had, so he drank it, grimacing with each mouthful. He had a chance for a sit down and, by golly, bad coffee and no beer wasn't going to stop him!
“Oh, for Pete's sake, Henry. I can see you, you know. If you don't like the coffee just throw it out!” Loretta said.
“It's almost finished, anyway,” he said, swirling the bottom and looking at the little brown flecks that got lifted, “May as well see it to the end.”
Paula called back from the front door, announcing, “I'm going now!”
Henry snorted, “Great.”
“I need a lift!”
“Great.”
Loretta whacked his arm, “Hey! You're always on about not spending quality time with your daughter.”
“Huh?”
“Give her a lift!”
“Only a few minutes ago, she didn't want to even tell me how she was doing.”
“That's because you were prying!”
“I was not! I was asking – Oh, screw it,” he grouched, leaving the grubby remains of the coffee and grabbing his keys, “I know how this is going to end.”
“Shut up, Henry.”
He got into the car, grumbling all the while.
“What's gotten into you?” Paula asked, “You're always pissed off these days.”
“Nothing!” he snapped, “Absolutely nothing!”
He started the car, checked his seat belt and reversed to the road.
“Right. I'm driving, see? Everyone's happy?”
“Whatever,” Paula replied.
“Where are we going?”
“I'm going to Jackie's. You can go wherever you like.”
“Where's that?”
“Brunswick.”
He cried, “Brunswick? Oh, come on! That's twenty minutes away.”
“That's why I need a lift.”
“So that's another hour out of my life, then?”
“It's twenty minutes.”
“Up. Then twenty back, then add in an extra bit for the drop off and that's if this heap of junk doesn't conk out on the way.”
“Let's get going, Dad.”
Henry asked, “So I'm a bloody taxi service now?”
“Do you want me to take a taxi? It'll cost, like, fifty bucks.”
“Suits me fine, so long as you're paying. Couldn't you take a train?”
“At this hour? Come on, let's go. I'm supposed to be there in twenty minutes.”
And that was the end of the discourse. Henry tried to talk about various things on the way, about the weather, about school, about his work. Each attempt was met with silence or a grunt or a non-committal response.
At the Nicholson Street lights, Henry looked over at his daughter. It might have been only last week when she was a bopping, bouncing little girl, keen on getting into this and that, stumbling to take her first steps, fumbling over her first words.
Now her chubby little arms had been replaced with ultra-tanned sticks. Her dazzling eyes were hidden under layers of make-up. Even her cheeky smile had been transformed to a smarmy snarl, coloured a fake, ruby Maybelline red.
The world, Henry realised, was changing her. The world consumes everyone, one nibble at a time.
“Do you remember, Paula, a bit ago, I used to push you around in the wheelbarrow in the backyard? We'd go around and around, and over bumps and under the clothes-line until I got tired,” he asked, “You never got tired. I did all the pushing, you'd do all the laughing.”
“Huh?”
A little smile crept to his face, “You'd hop in, whether there was dirt or dust or sand in there or whatever, you didn't care. You'd get in and brace yourself so you didn't fall.”
He laughed a little.
“And then, if I didn't start pushing, you'd look back, all impatient like, and would be like, 'come on'!”
He let the smile linger on his face for a couple of seconds. The lights turned green.
He prompted, “Remember that?”
“No,” she said, “Why?”
The smile reluctantly melted away from Henry's face and slithered down to hide under the driver's seat. He swallowed the memory. Somehow it tasted a little bitter.
“Nothing. I guess I was just...”
“Ew! Gross!”
He started, “What? What's up”
“That's just gross,” she said, holding up a white and red item in her hand, “Is that a – a tooth? Is that a tooth? Oh, there's another one! Ew!”
“Ah, sweet. I was looking for those – crap! Aw, geez, no!”
Paula had wound down the window and flung the teeth out into the night, wiping her hands on the car seat. Henry pulled over carefully.
“Damn it, I needed those, Pea!”
“What were they doing here? That's gross. I had to touch them!”
“Am I that repulsive?” Henry asked.
“Just keep going! I'm going to be late!” she stormed.
“Can you please go and get them back?”
“Ew! No! I'm not picking them up again. And they're on the road, now.”
“Pea...”
“Just go!”
Henry engaged the gear and pulled back onto the road, making a mental note of the houses.
“I needed those, Pea!” he grouched.
“Turn into that street there. Just pull up over here!”
“Where's the house?”
“Just pull up.”
“Which number?”
She insisted, “Just pull up.”
“Oh. You don't want to be seen with your old man, is that it?”
The perceptible pause was enough for confirmation, “Just pull up.”
He sighed, indicated, pulled over and let her out.
“What time am I picking you up?” he asked dutifully.
“You're not.”
“What?”
“I'm sleeping over.”
“Hell you are!”
“I've already told Mum. She said it was fine.”
“You didn't tell me.”
“Good night, Dad!” she called, hitching her backpack on her back.
“Come back here – Aw, shit!”
Henry slumped back into his seat. He could go after her. He could make a scene and pull her back to the car, kicking and screaming.
He watched as she walked briskly up the street. She was confident. Independent. Society and the Law said that she was old enough to make decisions for herself. They said she was a grown woman who was capable of making rational choices.
On the topic of his role as a guide, a mentor, as her dad, they were curiously silent.
Still, maybe he could compromise and bring her home at, like, eleven.
Or, he thought, he could go back home and not worry about it. If Loretta said it was okay, then she must know something he didn't. Maybe that Jackie girl was the responsible type. Maybe they were just studying.
His illusions were shattered when she turned into a house with the porch light on, and was greeted at the door by an unmistakably male figure. They kissed.
“Son of a bitch!” he growled, revving the car engine.
Paula looked back, frowned, gave a cheeky little wave and went inside.
His stomach boiled. His kidneys squirted juices. His eye rolled sideways and his abdomen tore open, spilling the hot acids and adrenaline over the car seat and all over his pants.
“Aw, damn it! Damn it! Son of a bitch!” he yelled as his stomach and liver nosed underneath his ribs and pushed their way through the rift.
He poked the escaping bits here and there to keep them inside, but his abdomen was crumbling to pieces. His seatbelt was the only thing holding it all together. If he unbuckled, he feared, he would lose it all. There was nothing for it but to go home and try to get the mess sorted out.