CHAPTER 35

Viv put down his phone and headed back inside. He had finished work early and always walked laps of his backyard when on the phone at home.

He disliked thinking about the past, especially his time in Sydney. The others remembered it as a golden, free, fun-filled period, but it hadn’t been like that for him. Back then, he didn’t understand how he was different. He kept making himself do the things that normal twenty-year-olds were supposed to do – socialising, parties, drinking – but they just made him anxious and stressed. The rest of the band loved living together, being in a band together, hanging out together. He had tried to go along with it, all the time feeling like an alien. He didn’t know how to banter, never quite got the in-jokes, never felt relaxed, and hardly ever made the others laugh. When he did he had no idea why.

He had lived with Dev, Joe, Leanne and Gary. Too many people. His escape was university. His law lectures contained over a hundred students, but only the lecturer spoke, so it was almost like being alone. He listened and wrote. It was peaceful.

He studied in the library, because whenever he came home there were people in the living room, and they looked at him strangely if he retreated to his room. He hated the group discussions about shopping, cooking and cleaning. He liked washing-up, but hated talking about whose turn it was to wash up. In the band, he kept out of discussions about how songs should sound. Every song needed a drumbeat, and thankfully he was left largely alone to provide it.

The music wasn’t the problem. It was the before and after – the travel to and from gigs, the waiting around, the drinks afterwards – that caused him angst. He felt especially uncomfortable and awkward whenever Sal or Dev were near. They were too outgoing, too confident, too beautiful. Just being in the same room as either of them made him feel self-conscious.

At the time, he thought his inability to fit in meant he was some sort of weirdo. Now he understood that it just meant that he was different. He didn’t like groups, which was why he now lived, worked and usually rode alone. As a result, he was much happier.

He knew people in and around Bullford Point, but he never felt the need to ‘catch up’, whatever that meant. Occasionally he went to the club on a Friday night, more out of a sense of duty than to experience enjoyment. Joe’s return had made him feel as if he should do more of that, and he had, but he was relieved he didn’t have to anymore.

He went upstairs to his room. Sometimes he still thought about particular women, but only sometimes. He knew he wasn’t cut out for a relationship. Sometimes he got a little lonely, but only sometimes.

Recently Dev, after years of basically ignoring him, despite only living just over the bridge, had got in touch. He wasn’t an idiot. He knew what she wanted. 28 Bayview Avenue. She knew he was attracted to her and she was trying to exploit it. However, knowing what she was doing didn’t make him immune to it. When they met, he had told himself to stay calm and strong, and yet found himself leaning eagerly forward and nodding along with everything she had said. It was unsettling.

He needed to clear his head. He opened his cupboard, intending to change into his lycra and go for a ride, but instead found himself drawn to the bottom drawer, where he kept all the clothes he never wore anymore, but wasn’t quite ready to throw out. He dug his hand to the back and pulled out a plastic bag, then kneeled by his bed, reached under and grabbed another one.

He sat on the bed, took a syringe from the first plastic bag and a vial from the second. He opened the vial, held it tightly between his thighs, carefully lowered the syringe into it and drew up the liquid. He placed the syringe on his bedside table, the empty vial next to it, and then pulled down his pants. Sitting back down, he picked up the syringe, rolled over a little, found a vein in his left buttock, injected and slowly depressed the plunger. He dropped the syringe, and lay back.

There was no effect yet, apart from the familiar trickle of self-hatred at his weakness. It would pass, he supposed. He would go for a ride later.