Our Magic Hour (29 page)

Julian came back. It was decided. He paid cash for the bike. He gave Audrey his car
keys. ‘Come on. Let's get dinner before we drive back. I'm buying.'

She followed him, parked facing the creek, sat looking at the water while he ran
into the shop. They drove in convoy to the beach. Audrey was turned around by the
lakes, the inlets, the ocean, the creeks, surrounded by water on every side.

He'd bought crayfish, wrapped in newspaper. They sat on the beach and ate with their
hands, cracked open the claws with his Swiss Army knife.

Audrey looked at him sideways and he said
What, what?

‘Crayfish, motorcycles. It feels extravagant. It's nice.'

‘That bike is a piece of shit.'

‘I'm not talking about the bike.' She wiped her hands on her thighs. ‘The other day
Pip said to me, “Julian does exactly what he wants to do.”'

‘Yeah?' He folded up the paper into a loose square. ‘That's good. Philippa, the ideologically
pure altruist. Julian, the young libertine.'

‘Don't twist it. I'm not passing judgement. I said it's nice.'

They drove home separately. Julian was in front, riding in the centre of the road.
Audrey turned up the radio in his car and sang to herself all the way home.

Flint

Audrey saw a poster for a gig, a band she knew from home. They were launching an
EP. Claire grimaced.

‘Sorry, comrade,' she said. ‘I've got no one to look after El. I can't ask Julian
this week. He's being an arsehole. And my parents are in Cairns at the moment.'

Audrey asked a woman from work, shyly; she asked Julian, but he was lethargic about
it, and she would not cajole him.

She went to Marrickville by herself. It was a warm evening, still light when she
got there. The smokers were clustered on the pavement outside. Audrey could only
dimly remember what it felt like to be a part of a group like that: the walks to
friendly pubs where she'd always run into someone she knew, struggling into stockings
at the last minute to go and see Minh's band on some filthy stage, saying goodbyes
on the cold street afterwards.

Being alone made her timid. The girl at the door did not smile. Audrey got drunk
while she watched the support acts, standing by the bar, then wriggled her way between
shoulders to the front. Being alone made it easier. The crowd was gentle; it was
a Thursday. Everyone stood patiently under the red lights.

Audrey had seen the band play before, an earnest, jangly garage rock that made her
sentimental. Songs for drives on sunny days, windows down; songs for nights at the
Corner, where she'd drink to get loose in the limbs; songs playing from the radio
in the afternoons when friends came round. Audrey kept watching, kept her body moving
in mild agreement with the drums, but she was bereft.

The room emptied out quickly. Audrey had another glass of wine. In a mirror she saw
herself, drunk and blurry, and was glad she was alone with her hazy grief.

The buses had stopped running. She stood on the footpath trying to hail a taxi, and
finally called Julian. He came to get her at once.

He watched her as she fastened her seatbelt.

‘You didn't have to go by yourself,' he said.

‘I wouldn't have wanted you to come along because of that. I just wanted to see some
rock and roll.'

‘Have you been crying?'

‘Yes.' She wiped her nose and laughed. Julian switched on the interior light. She
said, ‘Oh, don't,' and he turned it off again.

‘Are you all right?' he asked.

A groan forced its way up out of her chest, an ugly sound. She looked out the window
at the unlit buildings. ‘Thanks for picking me up.'

He edged away from the kerb. The streets flickered by, slow and yellowed under the
streetlamps. Audrey saw signs for the airport. When they got to Anzac Parade he turned
left, instead of down Rainbow Street, and she asked where they were going.

‘I want a thickshake,' Julian said.

‘Can't you wait till we get home?'

‘Nah. I want chips.'

The McDonald's opposite the university was lit up. Its Australian flag flicked limply
in the fuggy night. Julian paid for his food and they sat out on the stair at the
entrance. He fished fries from the
paper bag, saying, ‘God, this is so good,' and
Audrey watched him. His legs sprawled out on the asphalt.

‘Don't you want any? You must be hungry. You're pretty fucked.' He wiped his hands
on the cheeseburger wrapper. A bit of lettuce hung from his top lip.

Audrey began to laugh. ‘
I'm
fucked,' she said.

He stood and held out his hand. ‘Come on. Let's go home.'

Her supervisor asked if she'd be interested in a five-day intensive family-therapy
workshop. Audrey said yes. She was still photocopying pages from psycho-oncology
journals to read on the way home. They had titles like ‘Transitioning to Survivorship'
and ‘Psychosocial Inventories for Siblings of Children and Young People with Progressive
Malignant Diseases'. It all made sense, but sometimes she still felt clumsy. In a
family session earlier in the week, the child's mother and father had ended up just
talking to each other, with Audrey barely facilitating. At the end they'd both shaken
her hand and thanked her graciously, but she felt as if she'd done nothing at all.
That's okay
, one of the other workers had said.
Sometimes you just need to be there,
providing the context for discussions they wouldn't have at home.
But Audrey wasn't
sure.

‘There's also a clinical skills course,' Henry said. ‘It's not a professional development
requirement, and I know you're on contract, but if you're looking at doing this longer
term it might be worth a thought.'

Audrey hadn't thought past the end of her contract. He smiled. ‘You're doing a really
good job,' he said. ‘You came into it with no warm-up. It's different from child
protection.'

‘I guess it's still child-focused,' she said.

‘Yeah, but the goalposts are pretty different.' They were standing in the social
work department, Henry with a hand on the door. He had a neatly trimmed beard, thick
brows, eyes that made him look
perpetually consoling. It was the right face for his
job, Audrey thought. He reminded her of a German shepherd.

‘Anyway,' he said, ‘let me know.'

On the train she thought about her old job. She was careful not to remember it as
easier than it had been. She'd felt out of her depth for a year, maybe more, at the
Preston office. But eventually everything was easier. Whatever meagre reputation
she'd had was of a nonjudgemental, dogged worker. She'd felt capable until she hadn't,
at the end.

She got off the train early, hoping to catch Claire and Elliott at home. They were
blundering through the front door. ‘I'm glad it's you!' Claire said. ‘I'm about to
drop El at tennis near Mum and Dad's, but I've got to go to the wholesaler after
that. Do you want to come for a drive? I can shout you some baby's breath.'

They drove through suburbs Audrey didn't recognise. She tried to map it all out in
her head, but the city was still a stranger. The van's air conditioning cut in and
out. Audrey felt sweat collecting behind her knees.

Claire knew everyone at the market. Audrey moved idly up and down the aisles, scanning
the flowers, saying their names to herself. She could hear Claire's laugh. Once her
face appeared above a bunch of gladioli.
Come here a sec
, she said, and tugged at
Audrey's arm. She led her into a refrigerated storeroom. Audrey felt the chill of
the concrete floor through the soles of her sandals.

‘Isn't it better in here?' Claire said. She put a hand to Audrey's head like she
was checking for fever. She crouched down by a bucket of carnations, white spattered
with red. ‘Once, when I was in TAFE,' she said, ‘I pulled out a bunch of hyacinths,
I think. They had fat stems. And I felt something against my hand, and it was a rat.
It had gone stiff in the bottom of the bucket.'

Audrey came home to an empty house. She ate a nectarine right down to the stone,
juice spilling between her fingers. She waited for Julian. She lined up her nectarine
pits on the table. She made dinner. She lay on her bed and talked to Emy: her heart
contracted when she saw the pixelated face on her laptop screen. She waited for hours.

When he finally arrived he was wasted. He collapsed on the couch and asked for a
drink of water. Audrey filled a glass from the tap, but by the time she returned
he'd already gone upstairs to his room.

She pushed open his door. His limbs were flung out at odd angles, the sheets puckered
around his groin. Face crumpled into the pillow, lips parted, eyes half-open.

‘Move over,' Audrey said, shutting the door behind her. ‘I'm getting in.'

‘Not tonight,' Julian grunted.

‘Nice try.'

‘Not tonight,' he said again. ‘I'm really fucked.'

Audrey stopped short, arms poised to strip off her singlet.

‘Oh—all right.' And he was asleep.

Her hands f lew apart in frustration. She felt ugly and base, standing there in her
underwear.

She was in the change rooms at the baths, peeling off her bathers, when her phone
rang. She let it go, thinking she'd call back when she got home, but the ringing
started again.

‘Hello?' She held the thing away from her dripping hair, her face.

‘Oh, thank Christ, Audrey, listen, do you know where Julian is?'

Claire was crying.

‘No, he's probably still at work, or—what's happened? Are you all right?'

‘We're at the Children's. We've been in an accident. Elliott and me. Someone ran
a red light and slammed straight into the side of
the car. They've taken El into
surgery, and I can't get on to Julian.'

‘Oh, shit.' The blood had drained to her feet. She tried to think of what to do.
‘He said he was finishing up on a case this week, but I can't remember when. He could
be working late. What if—I'll come and meet you. We can keep trying him.'

Frank was in the kitchen cutting up vegetables. He lifted his face to smile at Audrey
as she lurched through the door, but he saw her face. He'd turned off the stove,
grabbed his car keys before she'd even finished the sentence. She dialled Julian's
number again and again as they drove up Dudley Street.

‘Where's his office?' Frank asked.

‘I don't even know. Up near the state library, I think.'

‘Right in the guts. I'll never get there in the traffic.' He pulled up to the kerb.
‘Better if I just keep trying to call.'

He leaned over the console and gave her a quick, awkward hug.

Inside Claire was pacing. A cut above her left eye had been sutured. When she saw
Audrey she stopped walking and held out her arms.

‘Oh, Clairy.'

Claire's weight fell against her. They sat down on a bench.

‘He's okay. He's okay,' Claire said. ‘He's in recovery. It just took so long, and
I didn't know what was happening, and I can't reach Julian. He was on the side that
was hit.' She dragged her sleeve across her face. ‘We were in the little Honda, not
the shop van.'

‘What did they say? Is he conscious?'

‘Not yet. He ruptured his spleen. They had to remove a kidney. When the ambos took
off his T-shirt his tummy was all purple.'

She put her head between her knees. She said
Fuck, I'm going to be sick
, but she
didn't move. Audrey handed her a polystyrene cup of water. In the carpark she tried
to call Julian again, reached his voicemail.

‘Listen, Julian—' The anger evaporated the minute she started.
She began again. ‘Everything's
okay. Elliott's come through it all really well. If you get this, don't worry. Everything's
okay.'

When she went back inside, Claire was talking to a young woman in surgical scrubs
whose voice was too low for Audrey to hear. Claire had a hand over her mouth. Eventually
she said, ‘I'm really, really grateful, but I don't want to hear everything right
now. I just want to see him.'

The doctor nodded, murmured something else. Claire glanced up at Audrey.

‘Still can't get on to him,' Audrey said.

‘It's okay. My parents are on their way. I can see him now.'

‘Do you want me to go to yours and get you some clean clothes?'

‘Oh,' Claire said, ‘that's good of you.'

There was a mottled bruise across her chest where the seatbelt had done its job.

Audrey caught a cab to Redfern. The driver kept the meter on while she ran inside
and collected things hastily. It was strange being in the house alone. It was empty
without Elliott.

She tried Julian again on the way back to the hospital. There was an enormous, white-knuckled
fist of a moon down low. She realised she was clenched, sitting in the front seat
of the taxi. The plastic bags cut into her fingers.

After she paid she stood outside helplessly. She didn't even think she'd be allowed
into the intensive care unit. Her phone vibrated in her hand: Julian.

‘Where are you?' he asked roughly.

‘In the carpark. I just got back. Where are you?'

‘Here, with Claire and El. I'll meet you outside the ICU.'

Something heaved inside her chest when she saw him. He was ashen. His tie was choked
into a knot, tugged to one side, like he'd yanked at it.

Audrey dropped the plastic bags at her feet. ‘How's he doing?'

‘Fine. He woke up for a bit, but he's asleep again. The doctor keeps saying how quickly
kids bounce back from stuff like this. I reckon she's said it ten times. But she
says the surgery went really well. Have you seen her? She looks about eight.'