The Windy Season (27 page)

You are, Paul, she said. She traced a finger through the film of sweat on his breastbone.

He moved in behind her, pressed his chest against her back. In the dark he found her cheek and swept the few strands of hair on her face back to her ear.

I had this guy treat me so bad once.

Paul put his lips to her neck and kissed it.

So bad, Kasia repeated, and shook her head. She reached up with her right hand, her arm brushing his face, and she cupped her palm behind his neck, raking her fingers across his scalp.

What? Paul asked. What did he do to you?

Kasia straightened her body and breathed out hard. Just bad shit, she said.

You know, she said abruptly, turning to face the ceiling as though the thought had jolted her awake, one time he tried to have sex with me while I was sleeping. I woke up and he had put himself inside me. Can you believe that?

She rolled over again, and he felt her relax against him once more. He waited for her to continue speaking but she didn't.

Who? he said. Who are you talking about?

A guy I was seeing. Last year.

Was he your boyfriend? Paul asked, trying his best to sound indifferent, detached.

No, not at all. Kasia sighed. We were not really going out. It was just a fling. Two or three weeks.

Paul could hear her breath slowing but he was alert. His thoughts stirred and gathered speed as though his brain was rebooting, and as he lay there, limbs tightening, his eyes adjusted to the darkness.

I had fallen asleep, she whispered. We were out at a bar with his friend. I was very drunk. We went back to his place and I must have passed out. I woke up and he was inside me. I did not move. I do not know why. I have no idea why I did not stop it, say something. But I just did not believe it, that he was doing this to me, thinking that I was still asleep.

She pulled his slackened arm from her waist across her body, tangling his fingers in hers.

He finished himself off, she continued. Got up and, you know, cleaned himself. He asked me to leave afterwards. He did not want his housemate to know I had been there. Like he was ashamed of me.

That's shit, Paul muttered. He drew his hand away and rested it, unmoving, on her hip. And he imagined another hand, someone else's, where his was.

Yes, she said, sounding more awake. It was shit. Kasia rolled her head towards him. In the dark Paul wasn't sure if her eyes were open. She turned her face back to the pillow.

I found out later that he was hooking up with other girls that night, at the bar. He would tell me to go get him a drink and he would be hooking up while I was gone. I had no idea it was all happening. I was so drunk. So stupid.

How did you meet him?

He worked with my brother and me at a restaurant in London. I guess he must have come over for a drink one time. It was not like this went on forever. I only saw him for a bit after it happened. Maybe two or three times. He stopped calling me. He moved on. It was not this huge relationship or something.

Why did you put up with that? Paul asked, and allowed himself to wonder if she would have been so passive if it had been him, whether she would have allowed him to be that way.

I do not know why I let him treat me like that. I never would before, or now. Why for him? I do not really know.

How old was he?

He was not that old. My age, maybe a year or two older.

And you liked him?

He was handsome, yes. He was travelling as well, like my brother and me. French. Maybe it was the accent, she said, with a laugh that was a brief exhalation of breath.

She traced his forearm with a fingernail and he didn't move.

Are you okay?

I'm just tired, he responded, aware of the contradictory energy of his voice, the force in it.

You seem unhappy, she said. Is it Elliot?

I don't really care anymore.

You do not care?

I'm sick of talking about it.

Okay.

Everyone treading all over him, going through all his shit like they're welcome to it. It's like it's a fucking puzzle, like it's some game to them.

I am sorry, Paul. I do not think it is a game.

He didn't reply.

I am sorry, she said again, now wide awake.

Forget about it.

Are you okay with me?

How many people have you slept with? he asked.

What? What are you talking about?

Nothing, he muttered. Just a question.

Where did that even come from?

It's just a question. Why can't you tell me? How many people?

I would never tell you that, Paul. It is not a big number, but it is none of your business.

Five? More than that?

God, she sighed.

Ten? he said, attempting a laugh. Fifty?

What is this about?

I just want to know, he said, hearing how weak the words were. I don't give a shit, really.

What does this have to do with anything? I told you about some creep and you want to know how many people I have hooked up with?

Paul didn't say anything.

I should not have told you that. You did not need to know. I was just trying to say how much that I thought you . . . She trailed off, giving up on the sentence.

They lay together in silence, his hand inert on her waist. A part of him knew he should hold her, apologise. But in that moment he was convinced of his right to those questions. He turned towards the wall and heard her sigh again.

You think I am a slut? she said. It was dark, and she was silent, but he knew she was crying.

Paul rolled over onto his back, saying nothing, leaving her words to fall into silence, like letting a glass fall from a counter.

In the morning Kasia was gone. He went out into the living room, expecting to find her sitting on the couch, angry but wanting to talk, but she wasn't there. He called her phone and knew somehow she wouldn't answer. He felt the panic rising in him, fear surging cold in his limbs. He felt like screaming, felt like crying too, but he couldn't.

USS
San Jacinto

ELLIOT AND PAUL HAD FISHED FOR TWO
hours alone under the lamp on the Cottesloe groyne, caught nothing. Used nearly two whole bags of bait, the mulies thawing and falling apart in the wind current, pecked by blowies. It was midnight when Elliot decided they should head home.

Up above the dunes there was music, boozy chatter from the bars and restaurants. Easter long weekend. Elliot suggested they walk the beach.

So where you staying up there, in Stark? Paul asked. The sand beneath his bare feet looked almost blue, agleam under the floodlight of the surf club.

I'm sharing a house, a little way out of town.

With a girl?

Yeah.

What's her name?

Tess.

She your girlfriend?

Fuck's sake, Paul. Yeah, I guess.

Paul laughed uncertainly, knowing he was forcing the topic.

Why didn't Tess come down here with you? Paul asked, breathy in the soft sand, carrying gear, the rod and bucket.

She didn't think Mum and Dad would approve of her. She's probably right.

Is there something wrong with her?

Nothing's wrong.

Okay.

They stepped into shadow, beyond the lights of the strip.

Elliot sighed. There are things she needed to get free from. She was having trouble in Stark. I didn't see it at first. He paused. There's always something you cannot see.

What do you mean?

It is never simple, his brother said. It is never how it looks.

I know, he said, trying to sound like he did.

You don't, Paul. His brother had stopped walking, a motionless silhouette against the dark of the dune.

There are things you don't get, Elliot said. About our family.

You mean about Dad?

Elliot went silent.

I know about the Gulf War, Paul said. Operation Desert Storm.

How?

I found some things, on his computer. A photograph. He was a combat systems officer.

So you know he bombed people?

He didn't, Paul said.

Guided missiles, his brother replied. Tomahawks.

That's not right, Paul insisted. Australians didn't bomb shit. I read it all.

He was an exchange officer. He was on an American ship. The
San Jacinto
.

Paul's eyes were tiring, trying to focus on Elliot in the blackout of the beach. He turned to the sea, to the flashing of the reef markers and freighters, the lights of the island. He thought of the images he's seen, the ones his father had searched. Blackened rubble. Corpses burnt to bone.

The Professor killed people? Paul asked, but it wasn't really a question. He knew now that his father had.

They were the first ship to fire at Baghdad, his brother said.

How do you know all this? he said, turning back to Elliot.

I remember Mum telling me, years ago. I was a kid, don't know why she did but she told me, all of it. Think she had no one else.

Paul heard Elliot drop his gear to the sand. His brother sat down.

And last year, Elliot continued, they were in the garden, didn't think I could hear them. Mum was crying. Dad was trying to talk her out of leaving him. Promised her he'd get treatment.

For what?

Dissociative disorder. Post-traumatic stress. He was discharged from the navy because of it, years back. Same year I was born.

Paul set down his rod and bucket, sat next to him. He couldn't see Elliot's face.

You never said anything.

What could I have said?

That the Professor was fucked up?

That's not how it was, Paul. And you were young. You didn't need to know.

Know what?

That nothing is ever how it seems. That you can never really know a person. There is always a secret.

For some moments they didn't speak.

But he should have told us, Elliot said eventually. I wish he'd told us.

It's Dad, Paul said. He doesn't talk about things.

Why? Elliot asked.

Paul thought about how strange it was to hear his older brother ask him a question in that way, like he really needed an answer.

Don't know, he muttered. It was all Paul had, all he could offer his brother, and he wished he could say more. He listened to the shadow sitting beside him, wondered if Elliot was crying. Then Elliot stood, picked up both of their rods from the beach.

Can you bring the bucket? he said, in a cooler tone and Paul knew the subject was done. That they'd never speak of it again. And then Elliot walked towards the stairs that rose out of the dark to the gaudy brightness of a car park. Paul watched him go, saw his brother's shape dissolve into light.

Land of children

THE DULL SLICK OF THE INLET CHURNED
under the engines, an eruption of black sediment, like cold coffee disturbed. They went noisily along the riverbank. Paul looked at the town and hated it, dreary in the morning dark, lightless except for the miserable glow of the toilet block above the inlet car park. They were the last boat out of the mouth. Jake had arrived late again, setting them back an hour.

Paul wondered if Michael knew Kasia had left Stark, if he had heard anything, if he might even know where she had gone. Jules had been tight-lipped when he had gone to the tavern to look for her. She confirmed that Kasia had left town, adding only that she had said she did not want to be contacted.

It was afternoon before Paul could speak of it.

She's left, Michael, he said. She took off. I don't know where.

The German looked at him without surprise. Yes, I heard.

Jules told you.

There are no secrets in this place, Michael said. You should know that by now.

Where is she?

She said she is from Poland, did she not?

You think she's gone home?

Michael shrugged.

How could she?

I think it is a good thing.

What? Why?

It is her life. If she needed to go, I think it is good she went.

Paul stared at him. But I love her.

Do you?

I do.

What did you give her?

What did I give her?

Why should she stay? Michael said. What did you give her? Respect?

Respect? You don't know anything. You don't know about her and me.

What did I say about secrets, my friend? There are no secrets in Stark.

Bullshit. It's all there is. Everyone has a fucking secret. Including you.

Me?

When were you going to say you're running back to Oxford?

You have been going through my shit.

You're enrolled next semester. What happened to seeing the world, Michael?

Is that what you do? the German said. Creep around like some pervert, pry on other people's lives?

Paul exhaled.

Is that what you did to Kasia? Did you dig around a bit too much?

None of this is your business.

Ha. Now you want privacy? Michael laughed bitterly. I mean, what the hell did you do? Jules told me Kasia was upset. You were unhappy with her? Angry?

No, Paul replied. I wasn't.

You get what you give. Treat the world like shit, you will have shit raining down on you.

What are you talking about?

You have been such a little boy, Michael said, his teeth gritted. A scared little boy. Such a brat.

Fuck off.

You do not own her, Paul.

I said fuck off.

I thought you were better than that, Michael said. Better than them. Michael pointed in the direction of land. All the scared little men in this place, trying to own everything. Trying to rid the town of anything that makes them uneasy. Scared of their women. Scared of sharks. Scared of foreigners. Terrified of the past. The future, too. Always scared and trying to act so fucking tough. Michael yelled something in German, looking skywards. And I thought you were bigger than that, he continued, returning his gaze to Paul. You need to grow up. You all do. This whole place, Stark. It is a land of children.

As
Arcadia
grunted into the inlet at dusk Paul noticed flashing police lights in the car park and a crowd gathered at the foot of the jetty. Standing beside him on the deck, Michael stiffened, eyes wide as he stared at the scene. But all Paul could think of was Kasia, and how ugly Stark was without her.