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After she had seen Aaron walk off to find his flight, Lee became numb. She couldn't remember where, in the expansive San Francisco airport parking lot, she had left the Volvo. It was so infuriating. She walked around every level twice before she was able to find it. She wouldn't ask for help, she didn't want to have to admit to anyone that she had no sense of direction, especially when she was upset. All her friends knew she couldn't read maps and regularly got lost. She insisted it was only for short periods of time. I always find my way eventually, she would say.
Aaron's plane was already in the air by the time Lee steered the Volvo up the entrance ramp to the Bayshore Freeway North, homeward bound. The freeway was busy now with the usual downtown commuters, hundreds of thousands of them. Looking at the poisonous, brown air hanging above the downtown area she decided she would not go anywhere near that mess today, no matter what. She turned right, to the east and away from the geometric horizon of the city skyline. She accelerated now, the needle on the speedometer nudging the speed limit, feeling smug as the cars approaching her slowly inched their way toward the city.
––––––––
Lee parked on the street in front of their house on Ordway Drive to avoid reversing out from their narrow driveway onto the road. She heard the phone ringing but there was no chance she could get to it before it rang out. As she had expected, the ringing stopped as she flung the back door open. She stopped dead in the middle of the kitchen and groaned when she saw the mess from the previous night and their rushed breakfast earlier that morning. She quickly blanked it out of her mind - she had work to do in her studio, there was a new client she wanted to impress.
The phone started up again and she pounced. 'Hello.'
It was her friend and fellow photographer, Zack Douglas. 'Hello babe, did he get away okay?' Zack asked.
'Yes, he's gone.'
'Are we weepy then?' he joked.
'Yeah... you know gushy old me. But don't anybody worry about me, I'll get by.'
'Of course you will.'
'What's happening? Is everything okay?'
'Yeah, all okay here, but your clients, you know the glass people, they called to say they were running a bit late. They'll be here by ten.'
'Right, okay... thanks Zack,' she spoke as she made a note to herself. 'Great,' she said sarcastically, 'that means I get to clean the kitchen before I leave.'
'Sorr-eeee,' he sang into the receiver, holding the last note.
'That's okay... it's good, it's what I call being flexible. Do you like the way I absorbed the news of their lateness and diverted my immediate attention to domestic chores instead.'
'Clever you,' Zack laughed. 'Got to go, someone's banging on the door, see you.'
'Bye.'
Lee hung up, turned to face the kitchen mess and the phone rang again.
'Hello, Lee here,' she said.
'Lee, this is Richard.'
Lee went stiff and silent. It was him, his voice was deep and mellow, exactly as she had remembered...
Last winter Lee had spent a week on assignment on an oil rig in the frozen seas of the Baffin Basin near northern Greenland with twenty-nine men. When she got back she framed her prized 24x20 colour blowup from that trip and hung it on the wall above her desk at the studio. The picture teemed with atmosphere, to Lee, it was special: a clear, cobalt-blue sky, white ice with pale-blue shadows contrasting against the orange, man-made, steel rig. A huge, foreshortened tangerine sun rested on the horizon and Richard Stevens commanded the right-hand foreground.
From the moment she saw him, Lee felt drawn to Richard. On her last night, suspended above the icy Arctic seas, caring nothing of the consequences, she gave in to her feelings and slept with him. It was the first time she had been unfaithful to Aaron in six years. And it wasn't as though there hadn't been opportunities or suitors testing her resolve throughout that time. The bitter-sweet taste of adulterer's guilt still lingered in her mouth; she had kept her secret safely locked away, vowing never to share it.
His voice cut in on her reverie.
'Richard Stevens remember, from Greenland, you were... '
'Of course Richard, I remember... how are you?'
Lee's heart drummed loudly in her chest. He really should not be calling her house. What happened between them in that remote place felt right and should remain there, undisturbed, a cherished memory. For Christ sake... that was there and long ago; she felt desperate.
'I've been meaning to call you before today but every time I get to town... .'
'Richard, I'm married.' She cut across him.
He paused before answering.
'I know that.'
They both fell silent, both felt awkward as they scrambled to find a footing for this conversation.
Their brief affair had been something special for Lee, it was exciting and delicious but it was one-off. She was certain they should never meet again. She didn't want to conduct an on-going love affair with Richard, or anyone else. Back then, above the ice, thousands of miles away, the isolated setting, the handsome man - she was so attracted to him, so incredibly aroused.
'Can we meet, for coffee?'
'No Richard, I can't.'
'Yes you can.'
'No, I don't think so. We can't start this up.'
'We wouldn't be starting anything, I just want to see you.'
'I know and I would really enjoy seeing you too, but I'm married Richard... and I love my husband.'
'But I thought when we... '
'No Richard, that was something special. Let's keep it that way, okay?'
'If I could just see you.'
'No, Richard, I really can't.'
They both took refuge in the silence that followed. She remembered looking back at him as her helicopter took off that last day; he thought of Lee naked in his bed, frantically pulling him to her.
'I have to go to work now.'
'No... please.'
'Good-bye Richard.'
'Wait... '
'No, really... good-bye.'
Lee depressed the two pieces of plastic that cut her conversation off and slowly replaced the receiver. She felt nervous, exhilarated, a warmth rushed through her body. She stood on her toes, reached high with both arms and sucked in a deep breath. She paced the kitchen, looked out the window, in the fridge, at the sink, at the stacked plates - she frowned - then sat down and stood again.
God it was all... so sexy, she thought to herself, as vivid memories of their love-making came flooding back.
––––––––
Aaron was met at Sydney airport by a chauffeur with a sign that read: Stones. He was embarrassed when he actually saw the man holding the hand-written message in his hands - people might think he was there to meet the Rolling Stones. It was Werner's doing, he had given the expedition the code word Stones. Aaron planned to test stones, soil and vegetation that would hopefully verify his theories about northern Australia's mineral wealth.
The drive to downtown Sydney was brief, lasting only fifteen minutes. Aaron stayed at the Hilton that night and fly to Darwin next morning. Before he went to bed that evening he wanted to test his equipment. His phone, fax and colour printer checked out okay; the laptop, modem, passwords and decoding scramblers were in place and working; and, importantly, the sensitive diagnostic, geophysical-chemical programmes were on-line. His connection to home base was via satellite. He used no conventional landline communication; all information had to pass through an advanced technological security gate system, in fact, the same one used by the U.S. military services. It had been originally been developed by TransGlobal, so it protected more than the billions of dollars TransGlobal had at stake.
The next afternoon, Aaron disembarked in tropical Darwin. He strolled across the shimmering airport tarmac to inspect the helicopter and the motorbike he had asked to have specially mounted on it. He had held both a chopper and a conventional aircraft licence for many years and he chose to fly into remote locations rather than bush-bash his way in four-wheel drive vehicles. Cross-country bikes were more efficient once he had taken the chopper to ground.
He checked inside: the camping needs he requisitioned before he had left the office were there. Everything appeared ready for his departure for the outback in the morning as scheduled.
That night in his hotel room in Darwin, Aaron downloaded maps from the mainframe computer in San Francisco into his laptop then he sifted through the colour codes which indicated the surface minerals and vegetation. This diagnostic method was not 10 per cent accurate which was the primary reason Aaron had to go into the field. He needed to chemically test ground samples: vegetation, soil and rocks. Once he had done that, he would soon know what minerals were present. He had written a report several months ago outlining his theories on this particular region; but he hadn't mentioned the three white dots he had found in the high satellite resolution photographs. These unusual landmarks were situated seventy-five kilometres equidistant, in a straight line - running north and south. The dots both confused and excited him.
Aaron sat on the balcony of his room and looked at the black, moonless sky. It was hot and humid. He had spent countless evenings in remote Australian camp sites looking at skies identical to this one. He hated moonless nights. Lee said it was because they were moon children - again because of their birth dates. They put him on edge.
He jingled and swirled the ice through his fourth Scotch as he sat facing the cool, gusting zephyr coming off Darwin Harbour. The red and green night lights of a handful of fishing vessels could be seen off in the distance. Aaron would spend the following night in the King Leopold Range, seven hundred kilometres to the south west. He looked along the south shores and emptied his glass and resisted the temptation to call Lee. 'She would love this country,' he said to no one.