Green

We’ll never be the same, the two of us. I don’t usually have to be nose-diving towards consequences before I’ll notice them, and adjust my course. But, like anything else, it’s much more complicated than that. And I think we’re coming through the other side. We started off in different worlds and we’re still living in them now, even if I forget that sometimes. And even if my family circumstances aren’t quite as I’d once thought.

I didn’t realise what it all meant to Frank. It seemed like simple bad behaviour, that’s how he told it at the time. A romp without a conscience, without anything else to it, without a second thought. And now he’s thinking of it as over, as if that means every part of it’s finalised. What happens to Ron and Zel and Sophie? I don’t know. But that’s up to Zel. I don’t know if she should tell and what she should tell, but I’m pretty sure that that bit of it isn’t up to me. I’m not pushing into this one again.

My mother tells me to take the video camera to the party at the Todds, since I didn’t take it to Ness’s seventeenth. ‘I know you’re an avant-garde film-maker,’ she says, as I’m wondering how to tell her that parties are exactly not what I want a video camera for, ‘but why not have a practice with it? But don’t make a party video. Make it a documentary to show me what these people you work with are like.’

And she’s bought me two blank tapes and charged the camera, so mid-afternoon I’m in town catching a Carindale bus with the airline carry bag over my shoulder.

At the Todd’s house there are signs pointing round the side, and the front door is locked. We’re all welcome via the tradesman’s entrance today. Via a flagstone path that winds among fern enclaves and tan-bark garden beds to the side door of the downstairs bar.

There’s half a besser block propping the door open, and it’s the rise-and-fall crowd noise saying darts, near miss, that comes out to meet me.

It’s the Mowers crowd versus one version of the Chickens crowd, a couple of members of the other A team. No Frank yet, and no Sophie, as far as I can see. No Zel, either. The sliding doors are open and there’s a keg on the patio, with people lining up to refill jugs. Ron’s standing there chatting to the queue, benevolently proprietorial, with a half-full jug—but no glass—and a foam-dipped moustache.

‘I’ve got a plan,’ he says when he comes over. ‘Oh, wait, I should fix you up with a beer.’ He looks around for a glass, but not particularly hard. ‘I’ll get you one soon. Anyway, the plan. TV ad. Not straight away, but it’s something to work towards. You could star as the chicken and direct. It’d be like Woody Allen.’

‘Yeah.’ But, I’m thinking, not much like Woody Allen. There’s more noise from the darts. Someone’s just missed a triple twenty. ‘I think,’ I tell him while I work out what I think, ‘it’s a great idea, obviously. But I agree we shouldn’t do it straight away. Walk before you run, that kind of thing. And think how the Mowers crowd’d feel.’

‘Don’t worry. It’s a different market, different rules. And they’re nowhere near as visual. Have you noticed that? I have. So, as an actor, how would you take that on? How would you be the chicken?’

‘How would I be the chicken?’

‘How would you make the transition from roadside to film?’

‘We’d better get me that beer.’

Out on the patio there are glasses, and Ron pours us one each.

‘I happen to have put a lot of time and thought into being the chicken,’ I tell him. ‘You’re talking to the right person. There’s a lot, I think, that would translate from one medium to the other.’

‘Is it that chicken head-space issue? Getting into the chicken head space?’

‘Partly. The problem is, it’s a very small head space. It doesn’t do to be too much like the chicken. There’s a story about the movie Marathon Man. Dustin Hoffman was running himself ragged to get ready for his part, to get into the role, and he was talking to Laurence Olivier, who was his co-star. And he said, “I’m running myself ragged so that I can get into the head space for this part. What do you do?” And Olivier said, “I act”.’

‘Yes,’ Ron says slowly, as if a mystery’s revealed itself. And perhaps it has, but who knows which mystery? ‘Yes, I see. I knew you were the one to talk to.’

It’s worse than small talk, and it doesn’t get better when Ron starts pressuring me about rounding up a newspaper to check session times for Desperately Seeking Susan. Or when he moves from that to a Zel update.

‘Progress on a lot of fronts,’ he says in a wink-wink, nudge-nudge kind of way that makes me long for small talk, or more on the subject of how an actor might be a chicken. ‘She’s at a hair expo right now, as a matter of fact. She’s getting back into the hair caper. You should have heard her talking about it, mate—side-parted bobs, corkscrew perms—buggered if I know what half of it’s about, but it’s good to see her enthusiastic. And then there’s the other fronts too, of course . . .’ Wink wink, nudge nudge. ‘I’ve got a plan up my sleeve. A bit of a romantic weekend at the Gold Coast in a couple of weeks. I put in some fast talking, scored us an upgrade to the honeymoon suite. Might even push it to three nights.’

‘Sounds great.’

‘Yeah, doesn’t it? Of course, you only get the complimentary bottle of sparkling wine on the first night but, still, pretty bloody good, hey? Sophie’ll take charge of the various Worlds while we’re away. Her exams’ll be over by then. She might need to run a few things by you from time to time. That’d be okay, wouldn’t it?’

‘Sure.’

Some time-out is rapidly becoming essential. I’m beginning to miss those tedious hours alone in my room with Beischer and Mackay.

On the pretext of putting my bag out of the way—whatever that means—I escape the party and go upstairs into the house. Sophie’s in the kitchen, by herself, leaning against a bench and drinking a glass of Diet Coke.

‘Hi,’ she says, obviously not expecting to be interrupted.

‘Hi, I just . . . I just needed a break actually, so I said I had to find somewhere for this bag. No, wait, I think you’ve seen one of these before. I was looking for someone to play the Star Trek drinking game with.’ She laughs, and that’s something I haven’t heard for a while. ‘How are the exams going?’

‘Pretty badly.’

‘Is Clinton coming along today?’

‘I don’t expect so. How about Phoebe? Or Jacinta?’

I’m over lying, but I can’t immediately come out with anything better, so I make a kind of Hmmm noise, as if the whole thing is best left alone.

‘Hmmm? What’s hmmm?’ Or, in this case, not left alone. ‘What’s the story with them, really?’

‘Really? Okay, the last person I was involved with was Jacinta. We saw each other three times. Two of those times went so badly they’d make the Star Trek drinking game look like a night out you could have as a prize in a raffle. I crashed and burned weeks ago and it’s definitely for the best.’

‘Oh, right. And Phoebe? Where did she . . .?’ She looks at me, then looks away, at the bottles on the counter. ‘Doesn’t matter.’ What am I supposed to say? I can’t tell her I invented Phoebe. Imaginary friends haven’t served me well lately. ‘Do you want a drink? I’ve got rum in this Diet Coke. I can get you some.’

‘No, I’m fine thanks. I’ve got a beer somewhere.’

‘What do you really have in the bag? If it’s Star Trek printouts don’t tell me.’ She takes another mouthful of her drink. ‘Okay, tell me.’

‘It’s a video camera.’

‘You got one?’

‘Well, it’s on loan. My mother had the idea that I might use it here, but I don’t think so.’

‘No. It doesn’t really need to be recorded, does it? Your mother probably wasn’t thinking of watching a lot of darts. I’d be happy never to go back down there, actually. I should get you a drink. No, you’ve got one. That’s right. Sorry.’ She starts spinning a tissue box on the granite bench top. There’s an awkwardness right now that we didn’t used to have. ‘I should probably go,’ she says. ‘Serve some stuff. Food, you know?’ She picks the box up and puts it on her head. ‘Do you ever do this? Just to check if you can balance it?’

‘I know someone who used to do something like that as a posture test, and I’ve never felt good about posture.’

‘Right.’ Suddenly, she looks as embarrassed as a person with a tissue box on their head might be, as though it must have been put there by someone else, but it’s her problem now.

‘But that was just my mother, with the posture test. And, um, you balance it pretty well. And on the subject of my mother, and, um, other people called Phoebe, well, I can’t remember the first time we—you and I—talked about that but I’m pretty sure some wires got crossed . . .’ At the moment, I might even settle for listening to Ron talking about having sex with Zel. It’s a topic that’ll come up some time in the next few weeks, after all, and it won’t be worse than this.

‘I could help you with that bag. You could put it in the pantry. It’ll be safe there.’

‘That’d be very useful. Thank you. And I was also going to look for a bathroom.’

‘Oh, sure. Everything’s upstairs. There’s a toilet just off the bar downstairs, but if I were you I’d go upstairs. Mum’s got this rule about people keeping to Dad’s areas of the house at these parties but, for you, we can probably make an exception. It’s the last door on the left.’

‘Thank you.’

She puts down the tissue box and takes my bag. The transaction—since that’s what it seems to have become—is done. She should have given me a ticket or a number, in case someone else was looking after bags when I came back for mine later. I want to get even more out of here than before. Hide and kill time and then go.

The stairs are near the front door and the corridor on the second floor runs the length of the house, ending in an arched window that overlooks the back garden. I try the handle of the last door on the left, but it’s locked. Inside, someone clears their throat. Obviously I’m not the only one with upstairs toilet privileges.

From the window I can see the edge of the patio and therefore the edge of the party and, over to one side, a feature that was out of view before, a large rectangular area covered with gravel and displaying concrete renderings of several famous statues. It looks as though I haven’t had the full tour after all.

I walk back along the corridor, towards the stairs. It’s better to pace than to crowd whoever’s in the bathroom. Through one half-open door—I’m guessing Sophie’s—I can see a single bed with Holly Hobby sheets, a brown vinyl beanbag and clothes strewn everywhere.

I turn at the stairs and there’s still no sign that the last door on the left might be about to open.

It’s not a long corridor, so I’m back at the window quickly and turning again. Turning, and catching a glimpse of a very regal shade of purple through the door opposite the bathroom, which isn’t quite closed. I give it a nudge and it opens, and there’s a purple heart-shaped bed, with a jacuzzi fitted along the border of the right ventricle and mirrors on the ceiling above, also making the shape of a large heart. I’m sure the only sheets you can get for that bed come with a bunny logo.

It’s eerie, being this close to the scene of Frank and Zel’s encounters, the lair of the Evil Ddotnor. I can even see the phone Frank called me on, next to the bed. It’s ceramic and brass, and the ceramic parts are decorated with little blue flowers.

I can also see the door to the ensuite. And that guy in the bathroom across the hall seems to have taken up permanent residence. Okay, no contest. I’ve waited enough. The ensuite is mine.

I’m just about to flush when I hear voices—completely unfamiliar voices—coming into the bedroom, and then the sound of water thundering into the empty jacuzzi. All I can do is close the lid as quietly as I can, and sit down. The tub fills noisily, and more slowly than I’d like it to, then the hum of the engine and whoosh of the jets drowns out the words but not the giggling. Giggling and, within minutes, moaning. Two types of moaning—sharp panting moaning and a kind of deep buffalo moaning and what am I doing that I keep getting stuck in toilets? First the Paradise, now this.

It’s the detail I don’t like. This’d make a great story on Monday, or after my exams. The ‘who did what with whom in the jacuzzi at the party’ story. I’m always up for those, but listening to the actual doing part is something I could really skip. I stick my fingers in my ears and think about amniotic fluid, but the sounds of cattle and panic will always win. Would you please get this dreadful bovine sex over with and leave?

One last moo and it’s done.

I hear the slop of a large body coming out of the tub and the pad-pad of heavy feet on the floor. On their way, dammit, to the ensuite. The door swings open, and a big nude bald man from the Mowers darts team jolts to a halt.

I smile, shrug, as if it’s just one of those things.

‘Towels,’ he mouths and does a jiggly demonstration of drying. In case I ever doubted it, there’s the evidence: the international symbol for towels is best not done nude, at least by men. Not unless you also need to signal the international symbol for pendulum.

I open a cupboard and, fortunately, it does have towels in it. I pull out a couple and toss them over. He winks, and shuts the door. There’s a different tone to the murmured talk now, and it’s mainly him speaking. Then the jacuzzi is turned off.

How does this kind of scene happen? Who is it who goes, mid-party, ‘Hey, why don’t we go put one away in Ron and Zel’s tub? That’d be a lark.’ Or perhaps it’s the darts victory ritual. The Chickens people were looking very much like the B team when I last saw the score.

They talk in whispers and I’m trying not to listen to their dressing noises. The towels hit the laundry basket, feet pad-pad away across the thick carpet, the door to the corridor clicks shut. The last of the water gurgles down the plughole.

I give them ten seconds, then another ten. I flush and I leave the ensuite. I cross the scene of the cliché and, when I open the bedroom door, the bathroom door on the other side of the corridor is open too.

Movement out of the window and down in the garden catches my eye. It’s Frank. He’s here. And he’s with Sophie. He’s chasing her off the patio, across the lawn and around to the sculpture garden. And he’s holding my borrowed video camera up to his head as he runs.

I don’t know what it is I’m seeing, but it looks like life passing me by again. They’re too far away for sound, so it hardly even seems real. It’s a silent movie of life passing me by, but it’s real enough. I get to have a stupid conversation with her in the kitchen about bags and tissue boxes and toilets, Frank gets to chase her round the garden. And, since before he squeezed his first zit, Frank would have been chasing girls around gardens for one reason only.

Step away from the window, I tell myself. This is all getting much more depressing than it’s supposed to be. It’s yet another reminder I don’t need that Frank’s form is nauseatingly better than mine and his unpartnered intervals much shorter. It’s easier, I guess, if you’re prepared to go out serially with members of the same family, and not fussed about generational issues.

But nothing, no signal from Sophie in the kitchen, said ‘chase me’ as she slouched against the counter taking mouthfuls of rum and Diet Coke and getting our conversation over with.

I want Clinton to come along now and break this up. A Frank and Sophie combination would make work hard to bear. Frank gives me details. Zel excepted, he always keeps me up to date with his liaisons, and here’s one I really don’t want to know about.

I step away from the window, go back into the bedroom and stand there for a while feeling stupid. I’m tired and I’ve stopped caring about what people think, so I lie down on the bed. If anyone else wants to have sex at this party, they can do it in a fern enclave or wait till later. This room is for depressed single people who are no good at darts and should be home studying.

And I wish the ceiling didn’t reflect that quite so honestly. There I am in the mirror on this big purple heart, my head in the left atrium, my body in the left ventricle, looking very unbullworked and very over this. In the sculpture garden, Frank kicks sand in my face and Charles Atlas tells him he won’t stand in his way.

They can do whatever they want, of course. Of course they can. Frank will, given the chance, because that’s what he does. He even told me he might do this, and Frank would call that considerate. ‘What more do you want?’ he’d say, and maybe he’d be right. But he doesn’t understand. There are some things you don’t admit to, even when provoked. People should sense them if they know you, and they should act accordingly. And they shouldn’t make a move on Sophie and chase her round the garden. But that’s never been Frank—sensing things—and I can’t complain if it isn’t Frank now.

With Sophie it’s not the same. I deserved better. We were friends and then it all changed. She thought I was having an affair with her mother and she kept it to herself for weeks, turned cool and less friendly. And I behaved like an idiot for her and did every single thing Frank thought I might, because it was fun to do it but also because there was a chance she might have noticed.

And how does it work out? Frank has the affair with her mother, I don’t tell her and he gets to chase her round the garden. How could she think that about me, and how could she think it for weeks and let it spoil things? I’m angry again. And that stupid conversation in the kitchen. She’s shut me out. She’s a bag handler and a giver of directions and we share a chicken suit and, after these past few months, that’s what it’s down to. All it’s down to. And I’m angry because I let her get to know me, a lot of me, out the back of World of Chickens. I’m angry with me for doing that too, for putting quite a lot on the line without ever taking one actual risk.

‘Phil,’ she says. She’s at the door. Standing in the doorway, her drink in her hand.

‘What?’ It’s not friendly, the way it comes out. But that’s fine. It’s not supposed to be.

‘What do you mean, “what”?’

‘I’m having a break from the party. Remember?’

‘I just wanted to talk to you. To talk to you about something.’

‘Some other time, maybe. After the exams. That’d be better. If the timing of things in my life is any issue to anybody.’

As if I want to hear about her and Frank now. As if I’m some loser who needs to have it broken to him that there’s something going on. I should tell her I’d be happy just to watch the video highlights later. Next weekend, maybe. They can both come over. There’ll be pizza. How about that?

‘You should leave me alone,’ I tell her instead. ‘I’ve had enough of all this for now. And thanks for looking after the bag so well. Good to see No one fucked around with the camera.’

‘No, I . . .’

‘I’ve got exams next week, and you know how that affects people’s moods? Put it down to that.’ I sit up. I stand. I wanted to keep lying down to look as if I didn’t give a shit, but it doesn’t work that way. ‘I’ve had enough of this, right? You, Frank, every bloody Todd I’ve ever met, my parents, Gilbert, Sullivan and this whole stupid small-town life. You don’t even know what life looks like anywhere else, anywhere that really counts. Have you read Bright Lights, Big City? It’s about New York . . .’

‘I’ve read it. And it didn’t seem to be about New York to me. Not really. It seemed like it was about a guy . . .’

‘Whatever. It would really be better if you left me alone now. We were friends, you thought I slept with your mother and you kept that to yourself for weeks. The fact that you even thought it . . .’

‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry about that. Give me a break. I had a lot of things happening at that time, and . . .’

‘Busy? You were busy? Busy, so therefore I was sleeping with your mother, and now I give you a break? Usually when I see people are busy, I sleep with their mothers.’

‘That’s not it.’

‘I have had enough of hanging around with people who think that way.’

‘You don’t know how I’m thinking.’

‘Well, that’s fine, because I’m pretty much sick of how other people are thinking, and what I’m thinking is that I’ve had enough. All my life is at the moment is study, shit from everyone I know and time in a chicken suit. There’s not a whole lot of fun. I think I could do better.’

‘Better? What’s that about? This gets so boring. Every time you shit on your life—which is pretty often—you’re shitting on all of us. Me, Frank, whoever. If you’ve got a problem with all of us, line us up and tell us. Don’t just leave it at having a go at me. If you’ve got a problem with yourself, deal with it. I made one mistake, one fucking mistake, and you’ve decided it’s unforgivable. You think you could do better? You think you could have some better smarter life somewhere else? You don’t even have the guts to try. You were born for that chicken suit. You’ll never go to UCLA.’

And, with that, she hurls her drink at me and it’s almost as though it has physical force, rum and Diet Coke cannoning into my chest and sending me backwards until I’m sitting on the bed.

‘Fuck,’ she says. ‘Fuck. That was stupid. I didn’t mean that. I . . . oh, fuck.’

She runs from the room and the rum and Diet Coke soaks through to my chest, cold and trickling down inside and showing up dark on the front of my shirt. A door slams. She’s shut herself in her bedroom, and I can’t believe the things I said. There are ice cubes on the carpet and brown streaks of drink in the off-white shag pile.

I go after her. I run down the hall and I knock on her door and she says, ‘Go away.’

‘Do you really . . .’

‘Yes, I really want you to go away.’

I don’t know what to say, I don’t know what to do.

‘Sophie . . .’

‘I have several tubes of Colgate freshmint and I’m not afraid to use them.’ She laughs at her own joke and, for a second, things aren’t as bad as they were.

Frank appears at the top of the stairs, video camera slung casually over his shoulder.

‘What’s happening, kids?’ he says.

‘I want Phil to go away.’

Frank mouths the word ‘winner’ and comes up to the door. ‘Okay, Soph, Philby wants to know, is this one of the times when it actually means go away, or does it mean you want him in there?’

‘I’m so embarrassed,’ she says, probably to herself. ‘So embarrassed.’ And that’s followed by the sound of punches thumping into pillow.

‘Looks like we should go,’ Frank says. ‘It sounds like she’s beating the shit out of Holly Hobby in there.’

‘Phil.’ It’s Ron’s voice from halfway up the stairs. ‘The chickens need you. Your World’s falling apart at darts, mate, and I’m thinking only you can save them.’

‘Go,’ Frank says. ‘Go. Do it for chickens everywhere.’

‘But what about . . .’

‘Don’t worry. Just go.’

So I leave him outside Sophie’s door, I go with Ron and my feet even make a sound something like ‘trudge’ in the shag pile. I am escaping from my escape from the party. I don’t know what’s going on now. I’m not used to fighting with people, and I’m not used to anything that ends with a door between us. And then walking away, leaving Frank in my place.

Ron points to my shirt front on the way downstairs and says, ‘Bit of an accident with a drink, hey? We should all stand well back when you’ve got a dart in your hand, should we?’

‘Standing well back could be a very good idea.’

Ron’s behaving like the host with the most because people throw drinks at his parties. He thinks it’s all going perfectly, and that there’s nothing better than a lot of beer and a lot of darts. Party Central, and he’s the station master. Ron, ugly people just fucked in your jacuzzi. I want to tell him that, but today he can have the contented smile and I’ll play the darts and eventually this’ll all be over.

‘Hey, mate.’ It’s Frank’s voice. He’s up at the railings above, looking down at us. ‘Sorry, Ron, but I might have to come and get Phil soon. We’ve got to head off and hit the books.’

‘You guys really earn those degrees, don’t you?’ Ron shakes his head as though our dedication’s something to marvel at and it’ll kill us to leave. ‘Still, can’t go before you’ve had a game, can you?’

Darts. I expect that I’d be bad at darts, or at least not good, at the best of times. This is not the best of times.

Soon, I’m flinging the darts into the board with some force but no aim, and I’m working a few things out. Ron’s cheering me on, unambiguously my buddy and, let’s face it, I want his daughter so much that I’ve sent her to her room and left her punching her Holly Hobby pillow, with only Frank to help the situation. Sophie and I have had a conversation that I will never understand. Perhaps two conversations—one in the kitchen, one upstairs—fitting neatly together like the Titanic and a large iceberg, and ending in grinding and carnage.

I should never have invented Phoebe. Or all of the other things I’ve made up as I’ve gone along. I should stop being so full of shit and start being full of something else instead. Look at Vanessa Green. She wanted tree lopping in the same kind of way I want film making, but she made it happen. I should be making things happen. Or at least trying, instead of hiding out here, in fear of Los Angeles. Hanging around at parties at Sunnybank Hills and Carindale, silently seething about them not being New York. Seething about grass and darts and who left the lights on. And so what? Seething about Sophie, and all that.

Geography’s not the problem. It is what it is, places are what they are. And so what if they can’t all be Manhattan? So what if some people’s map of the world is bounded by the Hudson and East Rivers? It happens that my map’s bigger than that, even if it includes places where people argue about six lights, or grasses that’ll grow under fig trees, or whether or not people have the guts to do certain things. And all of that has to be as real as anything else.

It feels real enough, when the drink hits you in the chest, when the chance is gone, when you’ve taken another conversation at some stupid angle and turned it all wrong.

Darts, the new tactic: death or glory. I fling ambitiously at the triple twenty every time. I miss every time. The poor form of World of Chickens slumps to an improbable new low. Barb is pushing me aside saying, ‘Here, give me those,’ when Frank comes down the steps.

‘We should be off, I reckon,’ he says. ‘I’m guessing the team’ll find a suitable replacement.’

And finally, my darts time served, Ron lets us go. ‘Righto lads, good to see you. See you back at the World, then. Thanks for everything.’

‘I can catch a bus,’ I tell Frank when we’re going through the kitchen on our way out. ‘A bus into town, then another one home.’

‘It’s raining.’

‘They still run them in the rain. They’ve got roofs on them now. Besides, waiting at the bus stop would give me a chance to rinse my shirt out. It’s starting to get sticky.’

‘It’s dark, it’s raining, it’s very off-peak and you’ll be waiting ages. Sticky is the least of your worries. And anyway, your camera’s in my car. For safe-keeping. People were really starting to dick around with it. Mainly me.’

In the car, before he gets the chance to speak about what happened upstairs, I tell him I don’t want to discuss it. I know we had that talk where he checked if I had any kind of interest, and I know what I said and let’s just leave it at that.

I’m going to go home, I’m going to study Beischer and Mackay, I’m going to pass obstetrics. Even though, right at the moment, I don’t care about it at all. I don’t care about anything, I don’t want to talk about anything.

‘You know,’ Frank says, three songs later during an ad break on Double B, ‘once you’ve rinsed out the shirt, I think this is going to be fine.’

‘Yeah, right. It’s such a special shirt, after all. If it’s in good shape, I’m pretty much guaranteed to be okay.’

‘You, and your special shirt, and your rum smell and your video camera.’ He’s trying not to laugh, but not trying hard. ‘Party boy. You should play the tape when you get home.’

‘Yeah? I really don’t think I’m likely to.’

‘Okay, here’s what I’m saying. Play the tape. You get inside and you play the tape. After that, it’s totally fine for you to be in whatever mood works for you.’

‘If this involves your arse and anything you found in their kitchen . . .’

Now he lets the laugh out. ‘I’m so easy to read, aren’t I? Bugger. I always wanted to be complex and interesting like you, but the old arse joke—it’s too tempting. How could you go past it? No Tim Tams though, not this time.’

‘Oh, no. What did you use?’

‘Watch it and see.’

My parents are out when I get home. I want to throw the tape in the bin or at the very least erase it without watching it, but I told Frank I wouldn’t. So I stick it into the machine, and press play. I know my mother will come home from rehearsals right now, as soon as Frank’s buttocks are gleaming from the screen.

The picture crackles, from black into trees, shuddering trees. Sophie running away shouting ‘piss off’, an invisible Frank laughing. He traps her among the statues, her back to the Venus de Milo. He’s got her looking west, straight into the sun. She’s holding her hand up and he’s losing her eyes in a triangle of shadow.

EXT. GARDEN. LATE AFTERNOON

SOPHIE’s back is to a statue, as though she’s pinned there, having been caught. She still has her glass in one hand, but she’s spilled at least some of her drink during the chase.

FRANK

So, how’s it going today, Soph?

SOPHIE

You’re sure there’s no tape in that thing?

FRANK

Of course. But you can still look through it if you press the button. It’s like watching you on TV. So, Sophie, tell everyone what you think of the party so far.

SOPHIE

It’s as bad as I thought it’d be. Slightly worse.

FRANK

How about that Mowers crowd?

SOPHIE

Exactly. How about that Mowers crowd? Chickens rule, Frankie.

FRANK

And what do you think of Philby?

SOPHIE

Phil? Why?

FRANK

Just wondering.

SOPHIE

(She frowns, drinks) You’re not lying to me about the tape, are you?

FRANK

There’s no tape. It just looks like TV when I look through it. Like you’re on TV. It’s like a doco.

SOPHIE

So, what was the question?

FRANK

What do you think of Philby?

SOPHIE

What’s it to you?

FRANK

Okay, how are things with Clinton?

SOPHIE

Clinton? (She pauses, drinks) Over. If you really want to know. Fucked up for ages, finally over a week ago. Friday of last week. Not one of my better days. For all kinds of reasons. Anyway, I think I have to go now. There’s something I have to do. Something I have to fix.

INT. BEDROOM. LATE AFTERNOON

SOPHIE is sitting on her bed, propped up by her Holly Hobby pillow. There’s a Madonna poster from about 1981 on the wall behind her, and various objects that suggest she transplanted her childhood bedroom here when they moved to the house about four years ago. She looks distraught.

FRANK

So, you’re embarrassed, you were saying.

SOPHIE

Stop this stupid pretend TV thing.

FRANK

Sure. Just tell me what you think of Philby.

SOPHIE

I don’t think that matters now. I think we just had a big fight. I threw my drink at him. I’ve never done that kind of thing in my life. He’s, like, practically my best friend, or he was until I did something really stupid. And I know it was stupid and I went in there, where he was—I’d been looking all over the house—I went in there to tell him things. Fix it, and stuff. And he shouted at me and I shouted at him and I threw a drink at him. And I don’t know how we pretend I didn’t and go back to going halves in a chicken suit.

FRANK

Supposing I suggest you have an interest.

SOPHIE

Supposing I suggest you turn that thing off.

FRANK

And how long might you have been harbouring these feelings?

SOPHIE

I’m not a feeling harbour. I’m not a harbour of any kind.

FRANK

Anything to stop you making some kind of move?

SOPHIE

No way.

FRANK

No way?

SOPHIE

That’s right. I don’t know what he’s thinking. I don’t know what he wants. He’s got accepted into UCLA. Why doesn’t he send them the money and go? I don’t know what he wants. What would I say? What would I say to him? Okay, there’s this bit on page two of Bright Lights, Big City where the guy talks about the likelihood of where you aren’t being more fun than where you are. I might say that to him. And then I’d say, dickhead, have fun where you are. But that’s enough. Enough prose. Now I’m going to do a poem. Are you ready for the poem?

FRANK

Yep. Always.

(There’s a bad attempt at close-up, losing half of SOPHIE’s face, then a change of mind and reversion to previous framing.)

SOPHIE

‘Had we but world enough, and time, This coyness, Lady, were no crime. We would sit down, and think which way To walk, and pass our long love’s day.’ He said that once. It’s from a poem, but the poem’s about time, so don’t get any big ideas, just because it’s also from a coy bastard. He said it a couple of times in the chicken suit. On the back steps of the World.

FRANK

And you can remember it all.

SOPHIE

Well, yeah.

FRANK

What do you think that means?

SOPHIE

I don’t know. What do you think it means?

FRANK

I didn’t say it. What do you think it means?

SOPHIE

(This time like de Niro) No my friend, what do you think it means?

FRANK

Are you talking to me?

SOPHIE

Are you talking to me? We watch a bit of Scorsese round here now. Are you bullshitting me about having no tape in there?

FRANK

Why would I do that? I’m against bullshitting. You know that. There’s not one tactic in me. That’s what they say. All I’ve got’s the direct approach. Ask Phil. So, trust me, I’m a three-quarters doctor. If I scrape through surgery.

SOPHIE

I know I’ve blown it. I accused him of sleeping with my mother. I’m guessing that’s one of those automatic strike-out things.

FRANK

He’s not the kind of guy who’d do that. It’s just not him.

SOPHIE

Thanks for your support.

FRANK

Hey, I’m just calling it how I see it. It doesn’t mean you don’t have my support. Some people are like that and some aren’t. And, I figure, as long as you’re up-front about things, there’s not much to complain about.

SOPHIE

Are you sure there’s no tape in that? The red light’s . . .

FRANK

That’s just because my finger’s on the button.

SOPHIE reaches out, the picture goes to crackles.

Frank’s buttocks don’t appear once. I rewind the tape, and I play it again. I take it out, I put it in my room, and I rinse my shirt. I let another ten minutes pass, and I call the Greens. It’s Frank who answers.

‘It’s Phil.’

‘Figured it might be. Good timing. I just walked in.’

‘I’ve watched the tape.’

‘Which bit did you like best? The bit where I had Ron’s spare wig coming out of my arse like a bear from a cave, or the bit where I clenched his spare dentures between my buttocks and made them talk?

‘Well, they were good, but I preferred some of the quieter bits, actually. The character-based stuff.’

‘Yeah, surprisingly subtle, wasn’t it? I like the way you don’t even see the argument scene but, if you’re going with The Taming of the Shrew formula, it’s pretty much understood to be inevitable now, so you can run it off camera.’

‘Very clever.’

‘Well, it’s all down to characterisation, and having that understanding of the inner workings of people. I think that’s the key to being a really good film-maker.’

‘So do you reckon I should call Sophie?’

‘I can’t believe you’re asking me for advice.’

‘Yeah, sorry. I think it was just a reflex. What I meant was, I might give her a call and see what she’s doing tomorrow. I will give her a call, now. And apologise for my share of all that. For my excellent work off camera. I hope Ron doesn’t answer. I know he’d be a pushover for a trip to the movies, but it’s just not the same.’

‘Even if your mother thinks it is.’

‘My mother . . . not a word of this to my mother.’

‘Never. You can trust me. Anyway, I owe you. I owe you something. Even when you were really shitty with me, you didn’t blow my cover. But, yeah, you should call Sophie. I’m sure I’m not the only person who’s been thinking all along that that looked obvious. Not that that’s a problem, is it? Not in terms of my movie. It’s all about the journey, isn’t it? Something like that. I think I can remember someone saying that.’

‘Yeah, me too. Some loser in one of his many angry moments.’

‘Hey, that’s “loser who helps people”, not just loser. There are plenty of losers around who are selfish pricks. Remember that. You should stop being shitty with us all for a second—however justifiable it is—and look at what you’ve done. Look at Ness, look at every single Todd, look at the World. Look at me. You could have done nothing, and you didn’t. And it made some kind of difference, right?’

‘Thanks. There’s still a fair bit to sort out, but thanks. I should go. I’ve got some paperwork to take a look at.’

Back in my room and under a pile of other things—obstetrics notes, miscellaneous junk—I find my UCLA documentation. The offer is about to expire, and maybe I was going to let it. Maybe I was going to let it slip quietly away, rather than risking a few weeks somewhere very different. I’ve made a lot of noise about getting out of here, and I’ve probably never looked like doing it. But all that noise is probably not even about here. This place is just an easy thing to be dissatisfied with, a fall-guy for anything that isn’t working the way I’d like it to.

‘If you’ve got a problem with yourself, deal with it.’ Sophie shouted that at me like a football coach who’d done a weekend counselling course. There’s nothing lank about her when she’s angry.

So maybe I’ll go to LA for December and January. LA. As if I’m any closer to comfortable with the idea. LA and an emergency room—how can I be ready for that? How can I? Who knows? But the time and place to work that out is December in LA, not here and now. And if I go and I hide in my room there all my free time—if I get free time—No one’ll know but me. And in a couple of months, I’ll be home. And maybe I’ll go out of my room sometimes, and maybe it’ll be good. I might meet people, do things.

Two or three shifts a week at World of Chickens between now and then should get me there—the airfare and some spending money. Not a lot of spending money, but some.

My mother’s car glides in under the house and I hear her coming up the steps. I don’t know how you go about getting a bank cheque for thirty-five US dollars, but she will. It can’t be hard. I’m sure there are people braver than I am who do it all the time.

I’m going to do this. I’m going to fix the paperwork up now, I’m going to call Sophie and tell her and then, in six months, I’m going to see how things work in LA. After that, who knows? But it’s as good a place to start as any.

I’m going to do this. I might be a long, long way from a lot of the cities where the big decisions are made, but I’m going to travel wherever I have to travel and do whatever I have to do. And if it doesn’t work out—if I never shoot a frame and end up as a GP or a medical specialist or selling cars—it won’t be because I haven’t given it my best shot. So, here goes.