Steve Toltz - Quicksand

I slid the paper across the table.

— Here are the bank account details. Just a simple transfer.

— Later I could see the funny side of it. At the time, though, as you sauntered across the yard, I asked the biology teacher, Who’s that prick? I see you met our new student, she said. He’s going to cause some trouble, and by that she meant that you were so striking, she could almost hear the popping of hymens.

I got to my feet and an ice cube hit me in the chest. A nebulous cloud of guilt swept over me.

— I’ll let myself out, I said, and as I stepped onto the front porch, the door slammed behind me, marking another blow to the prospect of ever liking or respecting myself again.

XIX

In the hammock, the ropes straining under our combined weight, laptop between us, we refreshed my bank account page every few minutes, hoping for the electronic transfer of funds. Clouds skipped by and the cold winter sun failed to warm our bones as we listened to the waves, listened for a siren, and refreshed the page again. By late afternoon the money was still not in the account. It started to rain and we moved inside. The storms were a gift; they broke across the sky. I camouflaged my body with hers. All I ever wanted was a succubus to possess me, I thought afterwards, as we lay on our backs gazing at each other in the mirrored ceiling.

Mimi was in the shower when her mobile phone rang on the bedside table. I answered it.

— Who’s this? a voice asked. Hello? Hello?

At first I feared it was the police but then laughed at myself — the police don’t ordinarily call and arrest you over the phone. In any case, that hello was emanating whiffs of restrained jealousy. Holy hell: this was him. Elliot Grass.

I tried to conjure the face of this panicky acrobat, this unlucky poet, and imagined him in a corridor, a long line of irate inmates scowling impatiently behind him.

— You afraid to talk to me, you piece of shit?

— Not at all.

He grunted, as if the sound of my voice had sullied his ear. I stubbed out my cigarette in a seashell. An engulfing silence followed.

— I thought I was unlucky, I said. I’ve driven drunk without headlights on acid in the rain during a sneezing fit, and I’ve never killed anyone.

— Mimi told me some very interesting things about you, Aldo Benjamin. You are quite the unfortunate human being.

— You’re pretty unfortunate yourself.

— You sound like a real loser.

— Is it my imagination or are higher security prisons generally more hygienic than lower security prisons?

— Maybe I’ll send someone over there to look in on you.

— I’ll put the kettle on.

— You’ve got a smart mouth.

— Go smoke your own moustache.

— How’d you know about that?

I hung up and mentally changed my diagnosis from narcissistic personality disorder to antisocial personality disorder. Mimi was still in the bathroom. When the phone rang again, I picked it up on the first ring.

— Don’t hang up, please. Sorry. I didn’t mean to be aggressive. I just want to talk to you for a minute. That OK? You seem like a smart guy. Can you talk a minute?

— What do you want?

— She answering her mail? She lets it build up.

I said that I would look into it. His breathing grew easier.

— Is she taking her medication? The red pills.

I said I thought so. I’d seen her take pills but I hadn’t noted the colour.

— And how are her feet? She gets dry and cracked heels. She has to put a special cream on.

Now I wasn’t sure. Had I noticed anything ghastly about her feet? As far as I could tell, they were perfect specimens of female feet.

— And another thing. She looked a little thin last time she visited. She eating all right?

— She’s eating fine.

— And what about sex? She having orgasms? She doesn’t get them from penetration, you know. You gotta stimulate the clitoris.

I hung up again and turned her phone to silent. I went out onto the balcony where a bunch of drunk Hamlets were soliloquising simultaneously. I downed a couple of beers then returned to the bedroom where the deceased was half awake, sprawled across the bed in a patch of moonlight.

— Mimi, I said, lying down beside her. Can I kiss you?

— We’re done asking permission. We can move on to a state of implied consent. I don’t even really care if you fuck me while I’m asleep. Let’s just use each other up, OK? Until there’s nothing left.

— Jesus, Mimi, I said, though the idea of tramping about in her soft hollows without her timing me was pretty appealing, so we went at it. We had been going four or five minutes when Mimi’s body slackened and harsh sounds came out of her, like a throat clearing itself over a loudspeaker. Worse, when I tried to kiss her, her mouth was off limits. Why? Was she mad? No. She was asleep!

— Hey, I said, shaking her. Why do you have to take sleeping pills every night?

— I wasn’t asleep. I was listening to every word you were saying.

— I wasn’t talking. I was making love to you.

— You told me that already.

We self-medicated our way through the following week, with much sleep-fucking and quiet lamenting and a near-constant gazing out to sea.

On the morning of the eighth day, ten thousand dollars was in my bank account, transferred from one A. Morrell. The blackmail was an unqualified success! Morrell was going to pay up, month after month. Mimi was a beautiful wreck with a grateful smile. Like seasoned criminals toasting the heist, we went out to celebrate the imminent cock-blocking of Elliot’s assailants. Over after-lunch foot massages in comfy leather recliners I noticed she was basking in the radiated calm of her own relieved heart; Mimi was helping Elliot and I was helping Mimi and all was well in the world. It was only when we arrived back at the residence that the heaviness returned, weightier than ever.

— We have a new artist staying with us, Adrian Oldenburg said. Come say hi.

Yes, bailiffs, you guessed it. Standing there, in the corner of the room, was Mr Morrell, smiling without using his mouth. Mimi let out a small cry of distress.

— Hello, you two. I think we may have met, he cackled.

Every muscle in my face and body tightened and I stood rooted to the spot; I thought of The Fussy Corpse , and how it was to be dissatisfied with every conceivable outcome, and paralysed by that dissatisfaction, to do nothing while the storm of indecision and impotence raged inside you.

XX

— That’s it! Goodbye Zetland High! Forever! They gave me a touching farewell, I wish you had been there. Forty-two years on the job. It was a bit emotional. Well, of course it was. I was like a stepfather to those sexting rascals. Now I’ve done it! All my life I’ve been saying to students: Esse quam videri . To be and not to seem. And I never took my own advice! But this time, when the dark allure of the paintbrush beckoned, at long last I heeded its call!

He was like a bereaved man in the first stage of grief — hysteria. Cheerfully bounding from one side of the room to the other, he was almost delirious while giving me strange, complicated looks, as if I were a disinherited son who’d come to borrow his car.

— I just booked a space at this lovely artists’ residence. I’m giving myself six months, which I believe should be plenty of time to prepare.

He grabbed me and Mimi by the hands, greeting us like his liberators.

— What month’s a good time for an exhibition? What if it rains? You know the people of Sydney won’t step outside their homes if they’re in danger of being struck by a raindrop. In any case, it should be a medium-sized space. Perfect for twelve or fourteen works. Not too many. Scarcity is value.