just pierced my throat with his claw!” I say, freaked out. “It’s like a fucken horror movie in here!”
“Oh … ok,” Tori said, like there’s something seriously wrong with me.
Jackson licked his paw, relishing the moment.
While I looked for something to compress the bleeding, Tori said she needed to meet me that night on the rooftop of a bar near her place – and we argued when I said I didn’t want to be outdoors while sick. She finally agreed we could meet at her place, and there was a pause.
“I’ll see you then,” she said.
“Is everything ok?”
“Yeah. Sure.”
Then she hung up.
That was weird, I thought, as I pressed some toilet paper against my throat. Actually – that was more than just weird. Why does she have to meet me? And why was she so insistent on meeting on that rooftop?
The phone rang again.
“Sorry to call again,” she said, in a softer, nicer voice.
“Don’t be, it’s always nice to hear from you,” I said.
Yes, I actually said that.
“You asked me, and I don’t want to lie anymore,” she said. “Everything isn’t ok.”
That night I drove to her apartment and listened to her tell me about how the heart wants what the heart wants – which wasn’t someone who’d leave in the middle of sex because he forgot to feed his cat (in my defence, that only happened once – and I lost my mojo once I imagined Jackson moping around his empty bowl). Rejected and dejected, I bought some Portuguese chicken on my way home to soothe my now-single soul while telling myself she’d come crawling back.
After all, she told me on our first-year anniversary that she could never live without me, that I was her soulmate …
Well, it turns out she can live without me, since she never came back, crawling or otherwise.
5
It’s past 6:30pm, I’m running late, and yet I still tuck into the pub near the cinema to grab a pre-humiliation beer and check on my appearance.
I’m wearing my suit jacket, the one Tori picked out for me in an op shop because she thought I needed something decent, and as I stare at myself in the grime-ridden pub mirror I rumple my hair artistically, straighten my glasses, wipe my brow and take a deep breath.
My heart’s pounding.
It’s not that I want to see Tori, or that I want to get her back, but if you do happen to bump into your ex then … well, you know the score. You want to look smokin’. You want to look better than they remember, you want to take them by surprise, because the petty part of you wants them to doubt themselves, to wonder if they made a mistake … perhaps even ask you back, pleadingly, with tears in their eyes …
Ok, maybe that’s overdoing it. But any regret on Tori’s part, however slight, would be nice …
I force myself away from the mirror.
Is it possible Tori left me because she thought I was vain? I did notice the judgemental look in her eyes whenever she caught me looking in the mirror, or taking too long in the bathroom; I always imagined her bitching to her friends, saying, “He spends more time in there than I do …”
Who knows all the mistakes I may have made?
I do realise my vanity isn’t a good quality, same as I realise I’m making a mistake in going to the film premiere now, same as I realise that even though I don’t want to see Tori I … well, that I kinda do. I haven’t seen her since she dumped me, and it doesn’t feel over for me. I didn’t argue, I didn’t scream, I didn’t give her a piece of my mind. I just left and bought chicken.
The movie’s already started by the time I arrive, which makes the usher cranky. He takes me to the theatrette but, instead of leading me to an empty seat inside, he just shuts the door behind me.
The room’s pitch black, and as my eyes adjust I can see every seat’s taken – except one right down the front. I head down and inch into the aisle, whispering apologies, until I come across a man who won’t budge his legs to let me through.
“Sorry,” I whisper, trying to move forward only to bump into his legs again.
“Sorry,” I whisper again.
I look at the man’s face bathed in the cinema light and realise he’s … well, let’s just say he’s a well-known TV presenter, a man who always acts gentle and benign on screen: and yet whose face is now screwed up in anger – far more anger than any normal person should show in this situation.
“Who do you think you are?” he hisses. “Why can’t you arrive on time like everyone else?”
He’s still refusing to let me through, but by now I’m panicked and can’t go back. I clamber over his legs as he hisses in a way that would frighten even my cat, and I plunk myself down in the seat next to him.
He mutters something I will not repeat here and, mortified, I force myself to ignore him and fixate on the screen, where a larger-than-life version of my ex is fondling a bare-chested handsome hunk with a hard six-pack.
I put one hand over my soft belly, which has never seen a sit-up in its adult life, and consider putting my other hand over my eyes.
◆
The movie was awful.
I mean … holy shit.
The after-party’s crowded with people drinking fake champagne, no doubt to repress the past two hours, and as I queue for a glass I see the movie poster featuring Tori behind the drinks table.
She looks so damn innocent in it, so bloody sweet.
My mind’s sluggishly trying to process everything: that I used to date this girl dominating the wall, that I lost her, that …
Someone taps me on the shoulder, some guy who used to work with Tori at a café I no longer go to.
“It’s a great picture of her, isn’t it?” he says, a goofy expression on his face and a beer in his hand.
“Yeah,” I say.
“She’s like a young Brigitte Bardot, isn’t she? That’s what everyone’s sayin’. They reckon she’ll make it big – and to think I used to work with her.”
“I guess,” I say. “You know she broke up with me, right?”
“Oh!” he says, backing off as if I’m contagious. “Oh, man, no, I didn’t. I’m sorry.”
“That’s ok.”
I’m such a loser.
“So … you going well?” I ask.
“Yeah
