Steve Toltz - A Fraction of the Whole

After he left, Smithy said, with forced nonchalance, “How do you know Oscar Hobbs?” and I said, “You know, from around,” and because I’m as pitiful as the next man, with the same howling ego, I felt for the rest of that day like someone important.

Still, I was confounded. This man wasn’t just running after Anouk like a snorting dragon, he was actually infatuated with her, and she was shooting him down! Power may be an aphrodisiac, but one’s own prejudice is a turnoff, and evidently the more potent of the two. I remember her dragging me once to a rally where the speaker said the media barons were in the pocket of the government, and then a month later to another rally where this speaker said the government was in the pockets of the media barons (she agreed with both), and I remember trying to explain to her that it only looks like they are, because by coincidence the government and the newspapers just happen to have the exact same agenda: to scare the shit out of people and then to keep them in constant freezing terror. She didn’t care. She decreed her everlasting hatred for both groups, and nothing could persuade her otherwise. I began to think of Oscar’s rich and handsome face as an amusing test of the strength and vitality of her prejudices.

I arrived home around sunset and walked dreamily through the advancing shadows of the labyrinth. It was one of my favorite times in the bush- the edge of night. As I approached my hut, I saw the Towering Inferno on the veranda waiting for me. We hurried inside and made love and I studied her face vigilantly during it, to make sure she wasn’t thinking of anyone other than me. To be honest, I couldn’t tell.

Half an hour later a voice was at the door. “Knock knock,” the voice said.

I grimaced. It was Dad this time. I climbed out of bed and opened the door. He was in a bathrobe he’d bought months earlier, and the price tag was still hanging off the sleeve.

“Hey, tell me something about that girlfriend of yours,” he said.

“Shhh, she’s asleep.” I stepped onto the veranda and closed the door behind me. “What about her?” I asked.

“Is she on the pill?”

“What business could that possibly be of yours?”

“Is she?”

“As it happens, she’s not. She has an allergic reaction to it.”

“Great!”

I took a deep breath, determined to bear him with as much patience as I had stored in my depths. His grin drained the pool.

“All right. You win. I’m curious. Why is it great that my girlfriend is not on the pill? And this better be good.”

“Because that means you use condoms.”

“Dad. So fucking what? ”

“So- can I borrow some?”

“Condoms? What for?”

“To put on my-”

“I know what they’re for! I just- I thought prostitutes brought their own condoms.”

“You don’t think I can sleep with anyone who isn’t a prostitute?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You don’t think I can attract a regular citizen?”

“As I said, no.”

“What a son!”

“Dad,” I began, but I couldn’t think of an end to that sentence.

“Anyway,” he said, “have you got any?”

I went into my bedroom and grabbed a couple of condoms from the bedside table and took them back to him.

“Just two?”

“All right, take the whole pack. Have a party. I’m not a pharmacy, you know.”

“Thank you.”

“Wait- this woman. It is a woman, isn’t it?”

“Of course it’s a woman.”

“Is she in the house now?”

“Yes.”

“Who is she? Where did you meet?”

“I can’t see what business that could possibly be of yours,” he said, and walked off the veranda with a slight lilt in his step.

Strange things were afoot. Anouk was being pursued by a man dubbed by Guess Who magazine as Australia ’s most eligible bachelor, and Dad was sleeping with unprofessional person or persons unknown. New dramas were stirring in the labyrinth.

The morning birds, those little feathery alarm clocks, woke me around five. The Towering Inferno wasn’t in bed beside me. I could hear her crying on the veranda. I lay in bed, listening to those little deep gulping sobs. It was kind of rhythmic. Suddenly I knew what she was up to. I leapt out of bed and ran outside. I was right! She had her little mustard-sized jar pressed up against her cheek and she was depositing a new batch of tears. It was almost full now.

“This is no good,” I said.

Her eyes blinked innocently. That pushed me over the edge. I stepped forward and ripped the jar out of her hand.

“Give it back!”

“You’ll never get him to drink it. What are you going to tell him it is- lemonade?”

“Give it back, Jasper!”

I unscrewed the lid, gave her a defiant look, and poured the contents down my throat.

She screamed.

I swallowed.

It was awful-tasting. I tell you, those were some bitter tears.

She looked at me with such intense hatred that I realized I’d done an unforgivable thing. I thought it had the potential to curse me for life, like disturbing a mummy in his tomb. I had drunk tears that were not shed for me. What would happen to me now?

We sat in our respective corners watching the sunrise and the bursting of the day. The bush began to seethe with life. A wind picked up and the trees whispered to themselves. I could hear the Inferno thinking. I could hear her eyelids fluttering. I could hear her heart beating. I could hear the ropes and pulleys lifting the sun into the sky. At nine she rose wordlessly and dressed. She kissed me on the forehead as if I were a son she was duty-bound to forgive, and left without a word.

Not ten minutes later I sensed something, a disturbance. I strained my ears and heard distant voices. I threw on my bathrobe and left the hut and wove my way toward them.

Then I saw them together.

Dad had locked the Inferno in a conversation. Dad, a labyrinth within a labyrinth, was talking at her as if he were engaged in some vigorous activity like a tree-sawing competition. Should I do something? Should I stop him? Should I scare him away? How?

He’d better not be asking her about her allergy to the pill or about her preference for ribbed over flavored condoms, I thought. No, he wouldn’t dare. But whatever he was saying, I was certain he was doing me more harm than good. I watched them anxiously for a couple more minutes, then the Inferno walked away while he was still talking. Good for her.

That night we were in a pub. It was a busy night, and when I went to get the drinks, I kept getting elbowed. Everyone crowded the bar, trying to get the bartender’s attention. Some pushy customers waved their money in the air as if to say, “Look! I have hard currency! Serve me first! The rest of them want to pay with eggs!”

When I returned to the Inferno, she said, “We need to talk.”

“I thought we were talking.”

She didn’t say anything to that. She didn’t even confirm or deny that we had just been talking.

“Anyway,” I said, “why do you need to preface talking by saying we need to talk? You want to talk? Talk!” I was getting worked up, because I knew more or less what was coming next. She was going to break up with me. Winter had entered my body all of a sudden.

“Go on,” I said. “I’m listening.”

“You’re not going to make this easy for me, are you?”

“Of course I’m not. What am I, a saint? Do you think of me as an especially unselfish person? Do I love my enemies? Do I volunteer in soup kitchens?”

“Shut up, Jasper, and let me think.”

“First you want to talk. Now you want to think. Haven’t you thought this out? Didn’t you at least compose a speech in your head prior to coming out tonight? Don’t tell me you’re improvising! Don’t tell me this is something you’re just winging on the spot!”