John Davis - Talk to Me Tenderly, Tell Me Lies

Ben was crouched at her bedside table, under Clyde’s photograph, rigging the cable along the skirting board. He indicated the picture. ‘Is that Clyde?’

‘Yes.’

‘May I?’ He picked it up. Clyde smiled self-consciously at him, a burly, nice-looking, no-nonsense balding man, uncomfortable in a suit and tie for the occasion. ‘Looks a nice guy.’

‘He is. Very.’

‘Wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of him, though.’

‘No. But he’s a softie, really.’

Ben replaced the frame on the table and resumed work. ‘I took a degree in English Literature,’ he said.

She blinked. ‘I thought you did whatchacallit – gemology?’

‘I did. But a few years later I decided to do English Lit on the side. University of New York, night classes.’

Helen sighed. ‘Oh, wow. Good on yer. Wish I could do that. Did you think you wanted to teach English?’

Ben tapped a tack into position. ‘No, just for interest. Had a vague idea I’d try writing one day, or try to get into publishing. But, bought a motorbike instead.’

‘But a degree like that’s never wasted! Oh Ben, why do you say you’re not a success? I so envy you your life.’

Ben worked with the wires. ‘Yes, I suppose I’m a success in that I’m doing what most people fail to do, namely savour the world. Or I’m trying to. And I’m learning , the while.’

‘Becoming wise ,’ she said with glowing solemnity. ‘That’s what I’d love to do – become wise. … And I’ve got all the time in the world to try to achieve it, by reading. And I do read. But there’s a hell of a lot more to wisdom than book-learning.’

‘Indeed.’

She waved an expansive hand. ‘It’s out there. Beyond the blue horizon. Where you’re going back to. Or forward to. Always forward, that’s the trick!’ She sighed, staring across the room. ‘That’s why I thought I might be a lawyer. The daily human drama of the courtroom, seeing human nature at work. Arguing a case.’ She frowned tipsily. ‘The beauty of words. Of persuasion. Of logic. By the time a lawyer’s my age he must have seen it all.’ She sighed again. ‘I used to spend hours in the gallery of the Brisbane courts.’

‘And why did you consider being a teacher?’

‘Again, the words. The beauty of the English language, and the satisfaction of using it to guide the young.’

He began work on the switch. He said: ‘Have you tried writing? With all this time on your hands?’

‘Have you ever tried?’

He said: ‘No, but I’ll write a book one day. Even if it’s never published, I’ll have done it.’ He smiled. ‘But I wrote a poem once.’ He sat back on his haunches, put one hand on his heart and pointed his screwdriver at the ceiling.

‘The moon shines up there like a cuspidor,

Doris, oh Doris, what are we waiting for …?’

There was a pause, then Helen threw back her head and burst into laughter. ‘That’s hilarious!’

Ben grinned, and resumed work. ‘That’s what Doris thought. She couldn’t get over the cuspidor, didn’t think it romantic at all. She was a dancer – the longest legs you ever saw, and I was bursting to get her into bed. That’s pretty optimistic when you’re five-foot-five. Still, I gave her a good laugh.’

Helen giggled. ‘If I’d been Doris I’d have fallen for that one!’

Ben felt a flicker of hope. ‘Better be careful, I might think my luck’s changed and re-write it.’

Helen tried to stop giggling. ‘But have you seriously tried to write, Ben?’

The flicker faltered. Nothing like a hasty change of a subject like this to falter flickers.

‘I’ve made lots of notes every day. One day I’ll get my arse to an anchor for a few months and start it.’

‘And what will it be about?’

He was screwing the override switch into the wall. ‘Hemingway said you should only write about what you know. So my book will be about this little New York Jewish jeweller, oversexed and underloved, who chucks it all up in disgust and goes off to savour life as best he can.’

She grinned. ‘Oh, Ben …’ She was about to query the underloved playfully, but thought better of it. ‘Will it include this visit to the Outback?’

‘Oh yes.’ He paused and took a sip of wine. ‘You’ll be in it.’

She fluttered her eyelids tizzily. ‘ Really? Dull old me?’ Then she narrowed her eyes theatrically. ‘What will it say about me, Smart-ass?’

Ben twisted his screwdriver, considering.

‘I assure you, Helen, that you’re not dull. You’re a very interesting woman.’

‘“Interesting”? You make me sound like a “case”! What kind of case of most interesting woman am I? A case of rather interesting bushwhacked mindlessness ?’

He grinned at the wall. ‘You’re highly intelligent, Helen. And … appealing.’ He was going to say desirable, but changed it in his mouth.

‘Intelligent? I ain’t said anything intelligent yet. But I’m a humdinger when I get going. Ask Oscar, bless his soul …’ She sighed, then added glumly: ‘I haven’t done anything intelligent for twenty years.’

He had wasted the opening. ‘You’ve raised a lovely family.’

‘Any dumb blonde can do that. I mean intelligent .’ She banged her brow. ‘Something that requires the ability to grasp new concepts and apply them. De velop them. Create with them …’

He tightened the last screw, and stood up.

‘There. We’ll test it later.’ He turned to her. And this was the moment to make his pass at her: they were in the bedroom, and about to leave it. He felt just bold enough, with all the booze inside him. He was about to sit down on the bed beside her – and he lost his nerve. He said instead:

‘You’re right, of course, we could all do so much more with our brains. Have you ever thought of writing?’

‘What’s there for me to write about?’

The moment was definitely past, and he felt a kind of relief that he hadn’t made a premature blunder.

‘Write about you. Like Hemingway said. You’re what you know best. Write about being a woman. Your kind of woman, in your situation. It’s something that most women will understand and empathize with.’

‘Empathize with? How many women live in the Outback?’

It would have been absolutely natural to sit down on the bed beside her. But again he lacked the nerve. He said:

‘The Outback is only an extreme example of the condition in which many women – if not most women – find themselves in suburbia. All over the western world.’ He waved a finger. ‘They start a career. Then they get married and raise a family and the career is sacrificed to the drudgery of housework. The struggle to make ends meet. Meanwhile, the husband’s career goes on. He has the stimulus, the companionship, the promotions, the job-satisfaction. Finally the kids grow up and leave home. What’s Mum got left? Even her housewife’s job is virtually taken away. What does she do ?’

Helen was staring up at him. ‘Right!’ she said emphatically, and took an aggressive swig of wine.

Her emphasis surprised even the optimist in him. Surely this was the moment to sit down beside her? He did so, three feet away, and marshalled his thoughts rapidly.

‘But you must write it as a story, Helen. Not as a poor-me autobiography. You must create verbal pictures the reader can see and feel. With a plot which makes the reader want to know what happens next, how the heroine handles this problem. Then …’ He raised his thick eyebrows. ‘Then you’ve created a worthwhile work of art, baby.’

Helen was hanging on wisdom. That familiar baby didn’t offend her this time. ‘And?’ she demanded. ‘What does our heroine do?’