The Best of Fiona Kidman's Short Stories (32 page)

Is that not the question, deep within each and every one of us?

What I do know, and this is absolutely true, is that when the couple left the motel the following morning in their Cordia Turbo, they were both beautifully dressed and turned out, and they both carried briefcases. The young woman's hair was in place and her full mouth was covered afresh with glossy lipstick. She ran her pointed little tongue around the outside edge of her lips and her smile was as sleek and shiny as pudding. Now I think of it, she may have had a little too much.

W
HEN
F
RANCIS RINGS
M
ICHELLE
to say he is going to prepare dinner she is glad he can't see her expression. He would know how her heart sinks. The only way, in her experience, that Francis knows how to prepare dinner is to ring and book a table at a restaurant which costs enough to paper a hallway, or buy Jeremy's school shoes. Francis works in an accountancy firm and he believes that one day he will become a partner. They still have to be careful with their money; indeed, it is because of their care that Francis seems set to prosper, in the ‘medium to long term', as he often puts it.

‘Can you get Jeremy to bed early?' he says, as if five-year-old Jeremy is still an infant. ‘I'm going to cook. Or better still, can your mother take him for the night?'

‘What's the difference between him being asleep at home or at Mum's place if we're not going out?' Francis makes a little tsst on the other end of the phone. She hears laughter in the background, a woman calling out, ‘Have a nice day,' and a man saying, ‘Brierley's is up ten today.' She knows that it is already decided. If she says that she cooks every night while Jeremy practises handstands or the recorder in the kitchen, she can tell that it won't make a blind bit of difference.

‘It's about time I gave you a little surprise,' Francis says.

‘What sort of surprise?' asks Michelle. Surprises are what you give to children, and even then she isn't sure they are a good thing. Surprises aren't always nice, and who is to say that children have any special training to deal with them.

‘Ciao, catch you later,' says Francis. ‘Don't you do a thing now, will you?'

Michelle puts the phone down, knowing that she will have to change. She is wearing stretch jeans and a woollen jersey decorated with pink and yellow appliqué daisies.

Francis is tall with crust-crisp curls. His gold-and steel-rimmed glasses
are level with the top of the refrigerator. In order to clean it, Michelle has perched on the kitchen steps just before he comes in; she can't see over the top but he can. He takes off the jacket of his Ermengildo Zegro suit and ties a new apron around his middle. The apron is made of glossy red-and
white-striped
vinyl with
MIX WITH ME
written across it in black letters.

‘What do you reckon? Smart?' he asks, turning this way and that for her to admire.

‘Very smart.' She tidies away the paper that the new apron has come wrapped in. On the bench lie more parcels. ‘How was your day? Who did you garotte?'

He ignores this. ‘An apéritif?'

‘Sure,' says Michelle faintly. ‘An apéritif, of course.'

Delicately, Francis undoes another parcel to reveal a satiny black box. Inside the box six champagne glasses nestle on velvet. ‘You'd have thought somebody would have given us decent glasses for a wedding present. Did we forget to put them on the list?'

‘I think we needed sheets at the time,' says Michelle.

He holds a glass against the light and flicks the rim, listening to it ring. ‘Real crystal.'

‘What are we going to eat?' she asks.

‘Uh-uh. Don't spoil it. The recipe's in the eating.'

The meaningless phrase annoys her. ‘What recipe? Is it one of mine?'

‘Don't ask.' He is full of mystery and importance. ‘Well, no, it's one of Roxanne's actually.'

‘Have a nice day,' says Michelle.

‘Sweetheart, am I going to make dinner or are you just going to stand and grump at me? Why don't you go and put your feet up? That's the point of it all.'

Michelle feels a quarrel coming on. Last night they had mince for dinner. There was plenty to eat and she had managed it all on just five dollars fifty, which left eleven dollars in her jar marked miscellaneous and housekeeping to get her through until tomorrow, and Francis's pay day, provided Jeremy didn't have an unexpected school donation to make. She would have met the budget target for the third week in a row.

Francis is looking at her the way he does when his team loses a game on Saturday. He is an ace hockey player. Anyone as good as he is doesn't like people who let the side down. Michelle reaches up and plants a kiss on his chin, deciding that it will take too long to recover from an argument. His moustache tickles her nose. ‘Marry me?' she says.

‘Sorry, I'm already taken.' He puts his arms around her. ‘God, you're beautiful. Love you, really do.'

‘I know.' In fact, Michelle is not always sure. She has a longish face, a nose larger than she cares for, a swan throat and biscuit-coloured hair with a tendency to dryness. She has changed into a blouse and darker skirt, of a colour she now perceives as hay-like, although the labels said beige when she bought them. The clothes make her feel the same indistinguishable colour all over.

Roxanne, whom she has met only once, has a shiny voluptuous face with a wide glossy mouth. A forty-year-old with a cheerleader's legs, she dresses in silk suits, tailored to measure on her annual trips to Asia, the skirts a hand's width above the knee, and wears clouds of Poison perfume. In summer she paints her toenails dragon red. Roxanne sends Michelle spare packets of florist's crystals when her husband gives her flowers, and hints, infuriatingly maternal and charmingly old-fashioned in their tone. Roxanne says to clean the wallpaper with stale bread, Francis tells her when Jeremy's fingerprints appear in the bedroom. And: Roxanne cleans her copper pans with vinegar and salt. Just recently Michelle has had a message to wash her black lace in equal quantities of milk and warm water and iron it between newspaper. Michelle's underwear is old, clean and of indeterminate colour. She owns a camisole for wearing to the doctor.

Francis says: ‘Go and sit down, okay? Relax.'

‘I'd rather sit and talk to you.'

‘Ah-ah. I want to be alone.'

‘Okay, okay.'

Michelle puts away toys that Jeremy has left strewn behind him in the rush of excitement inspired by his sudden visit to his grandmother. Francis likes order in his household. Michelle and Francis live in a pretty house on the edge of a park, two-storey, three-bedroom brick and cedar, rumpus room, internal access to the garage, flat section and good fences. They will pay for it by the time Francis is forty-eight, with accelerated payments, good
management
and, please God, no redundancy, just forget about the promotion for the moment.

When she has finished picking up toys, Michelle rearranges the striped cotton cushions on the new suite, bought on hire purchase, three months free credit, fifteen months left to pay. Francis would have liked a white suite but Michelle said, well, you try to keep Jeremy and his friends from putting their dirty feet on white. Wait till they're coming home from hockey. Francis has been waiting since Jeremy was born for him to come home from hockey, although so far the boy holds his stick upside down like a walking stick. The pale blue compromise already shows signs of Jeremy. Michelle moves the cushion further to the right, and picks up the newspaper just as Francis appears with the champagne.

She takes tiny sips and lets the stars run down her throat. Her eyes widen. ‘Dom Perignon.'

‘The real thing,' he says, for the second time. ‘Gosh, didn't we have some great times?' He refers, of course, to those years which they now talk of as when they were young, before life became serious. They don't want to turn the clock back, they have often agreed, it is easier to be thirty than twenty, all that emotion, so draining. But now there is a definite light of recall in Francis's eyes.

‘Francis,' she mutters feebly. ‘What are we celebrating?'

‘Sweetheart, lighten up, we're just having a good time.'

‘Oh, yeah. I'll drink it slowly.'

‘Don't. There's another bottle where that came from.'

‘Tsst,' she says.

He smoothes his apron as he gets to his feet. ‘Uh, where do you keep the Spanish onions?' he asks. ‘We do have Spanish onions, don't we?'

‘We've got plenty of onions,' says Michelle. ‘I didn't ask them who their parents were.'

‘This is serious, Michelle. I need half a Spanish onion.'

‘Darling, we have ordinary down-on-the-farm onions and a couple of spring onions, past their best though you wouldn't have noticed if I'd put them in a salad.'

‘I would, too, they get strong when they're old.'

‘Hopefully I will too,' says Michelle. ‘Man of impeccable taste and flavour buds, I guess you'll just have to make do. Use the ordinary ones, it won't make that much difference to the flavour.'

When he has retreated, glowering, to the kitchen, Michelle starts the paper again. A race meeting has been held, a woman with razor-sharp cheekbones wearing a hat like a flying saucer has been short-listed for the fashion award, two rapes, one abduction, a murder on the back page of the front section, and Francis is back looking worried.

‘Saffron threads?'

‘Packet in the cupboard above the bench. Lower left.'

‘I found that. I'll rearrange that cupboard for you some time. I had to hunt high and low.'

‘So what's the problem?'

‘It's powder, not threads.'

‘I'd use the powder.'

Michelle sees a disappointment she doesn't understand clouding his face. ‘The recipe says to soak the saffron threads for ten minutes. There must be a reason.'

‘I really think it'll taste the same. I'm sure it's worth a try.'

He takes his glasses off and rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘It'll have to, I guess. Oh, I wanted this dinner to be nice for you.'

‘It will be, it will. I'm really enjoying myself,' Michelle says, stretching out in what she hopes is a luxurious way.

‘More champagne?'

‘Why not?' The bottle is nearly empty anyway. His hands smell of fish when he hands her the glass.

Michelle skips the business section of the paper, looking for the star signs. She is a Leo. A surprising opportunity will come your way, dress attractively but on the conservative side, an evening out may include a business meeting. She yawns. They have a point, an evening at a restaurant is beginning to look appealing after all, but is it business?

There must be a message in all of this. Francis clearly has a need for style that she doesn't appreciate. Her friend Lisa, whose parents pay for her to have analysis, says that a partnership recognises the needs of both partners. The cat uncurls itself from a chair and walks towards her, waving its tail and stopping to rub itself against her legs. Michelle envies the cat. He, at least, is fed. Even a dish of cat food has a certain odd charm about it. Salmon in aspic jelly, perhaps.

Francis's voice is tentative when he comes into the room again. ‘Michelle, honey, what is a bung Marie? Well, sweetheart, your French is better than mine.'

‘A bain-marie? You want to know what a bain-marie is?'

‘Mmm-hmm. Please, Michelle.'

‘You mean Roxanne didn't tell you what a bain-marie is?'

‘Don't be like that, Michelle, Roxanne likes you.'

‘Great. I like Roxanne too. I really really like Roxanne.'

‘So, what's a bung Marie?'

‘Try the roasting dish.'

‘Forget it, Michelle. Just forget it, I'll go out and get us fish and chips.'

‘But it's true. It means setting your dish in a pan of water while it cooks. The roasting dish will do fine.'

Francis kisses the tip of her nose. ‘I'm sorry,' he says. ‘You're going to like this meal. It's even calorie counted. Three hundred and ninety.'

She has arrived at the crossword when he appears again. He looks dishevelled and runs his hand through his hair.

‘Michelle. Sweetheart. Tomatoes.'

Michelle is light-headed. ‘T-o-m-a-t-o-e-s,' she spells quickly. ‘Wait, I don't have a clue for that.'

‘Have we got any? This is the very last thing I'll ask you, I swear.'

‘Cooking Man, I don't have a tomato in the house. They're out of season and seven dollars a kilo.'

‘I cannot make this dish without four tomatoes. Will the corner dairy have any?'

‘The greengrocer might still be at the shop.' The greengrocer is Michelle's friend. He works late polishing oranges and counting chrysanthemums when other people have gone to bed. Michelle means for Francis to go to the shop but she knows he wants her to go. He vanishes back to the kitchen without a word. Crashes echo through the house.

She walks through the dining room to the kitchen. Francis has set the table with candlesticks and the best placemats. Even a placemat looks tasty to Michelle as pure clean hunger works its way through her like a knife, like a famine she has never experienced. She thinks, grimly, that she may soon move into a state of religious exaltation.

The scene in the kitchen is awesome. Francis presides over devastation, his apron splattered with something that has disguised its origins. Pots and pans stand all over the floor. Eggshells and their contents litter the bench from one end to the other, they cascade on to the floor, they dribble down the cupboards, speckle the windows, overflow out of bowls, they have exploded on the ceiling. Whole eggs have their ends pierced, a needle sits on the windowsill, suggesting that Francis has been endeavouring to blow out the contents.