anymore. My usefulness is over – he’s got his spanner, fixed his bloody bike, had a couple of nights in a decent bed, a nice hot shower – which he doubtless needed – and now he’s on his bike again. Without so much as a cheerio …
Then she thought: Maybe he left a note on the kitchen table?
She began to scramble out of bed to check; then she restrained herself angrily.
A note – so what? Is a note good enough for a guest to leave his hostess? Is that how to treat people?
But maybe the note said he was just test-riding his bike after its repairs? ‘I’ll be back in an hour’?
Again she began to get out of bed, then she stopped herself once more.
What’s this? she demanded. Why this frantic curiosity to see if that little hippy left a bloody note? Frantic anxiety … This hope. You’re hoping that he hasn’t left. God, this is pathetic. You’re pathetic, Helen McKenzie! You’re turning into a dotty middle-aged woman desperate not to be slighted by a little New York hippy on a Harley-Davidson! This is what you’ve become!
She closed her eyes and lay there, her head hurting.
But isn’t it normal? Normal just to … hope for some enjoyable conversation? Shouldn’t everybody have the right to wake up expecting at least some human company?
She threw back the covers and swung out of bed. She unlocked the bedroom door, dashed on tiptoe down the passage to the kitchen door, slid back the bolt and hurried in.
There was no note on the table.
She stood there, naked, eyes darting over the surface as if she could will a note into existence.
Her shoulders slumped and she felt like bursting into tears. She put her hand to her throbbing brow.
Pathetic, McKenzie.
She took a deep breath. And, oh, her head …
Well, to hell with it, she was going to chase this hangover away with a beer! She’d never done this before, but what the hell! Clyde thought nothing of treating a hangover with a beer at sunrise, so why shouldn’t she? He was a responsible man and if it wasn’t degenerate when he did it, why should it be for her? Besides, she felt like being degenerate.
She fetched a can from the refrigerator. She poured it into a glass and took three big swallows. It went down into her system like a balm. She immediately began to feel better. With a grim sigh, she slumped down at the kitchen table.
Not only pathetic, but boring – that’s what she was! That’s why that little jerk had left without even a see-yer … Boring, and so insignificant that it didn’t matter if he was rude to her. A has-been Outback wife who’s so boring he’d wanted to leave yesterday afternoon – she had encouraged him to stay and then got so drunk that he thought it was best if he just folded his tent and pissed off in the dawn to avoid another encounter, another boring entreaty for him to stay yet one more boring day …
Boring boring boring and useless – that’s what she’d become! Because she hadn’t used her head for years. She wasn’t even physically attractive anymore!
What’s that got to do with it? she demanded. That’s how boring you’ve got, you mix things up, muddle arguments, bring in irrelevancies! What’s your fat body got to do with this? With that little hippy on his 1000cc Thunderbird or whatever it’s called? God knows – and this is the absolute honest-to-God dinkum truth – God knows she hadn’t the slightest physical interest in him. He was so … little. Besides, she’d never been unfaithful to Clyde in her life – and she’d had a few opportunities – possibly more than most wives out in the boondocks – and it honestly hadn’t crossed her mind to be so with little Ben Hippy Sunninghill. He had made a few remarks that could have been interpreted as a come-on, and there was that moment he tried to hold her – but she’d frozen him right out! And he’d backed right off, hadn’t he? So maybe they weren’t come-ons. So what’s your disgusting body got to do with this?
But, anyway, it’s true. Look at you!
She looked down at her naked legs.
Look at those cellulite-dimpled thighs, your tummy sticking out. Your stretch-marked tummy. Look at your floppy boobs …
Helen sat up straight, pulled her stomach in, crossed her legs and stuck her chest out a little. She looked down again.
Now that is how she used to look all the time. That’s how she should look, and could again if she wasn’t such a boring mindless slob!
She got up impatiently, fetched another can of beer, ripped off the top and took two big swallows.
Oh, she was impatient with herself … She strode from the kitchen into the hall, and glared at herself in the full-length mirror, her can of Four-X in her hand.
What a slob! She pulled her shoulders back, tummy in. Stick your tits out! There …
She looked at herself. Not bad – for forty-two. And four kids. Okay, she was about ten pounds overweight, but then she always was a big girl – ‘well-nourished’, as Clyde said (he’d got that out of some book and loved to raise a laugh with it). She would have preferred ‘Rubenesque’, or better still, ‘statuesque’. But dear old Mother Nature never meant her to be slim, and certainly not flat-chested – she was intended for breeding, that had been clear at Cathy’s age. (As it was clear about Cathy: but at least she wouldn’t be stuck in the Outback – she’d probably end up editing some glossy fashion magazine.) But, my word, she needed to lose those ten pounds …
‘Don’t I, Oscar?’
She froze, staring at herself. Oscar?
She closed her eyes. ‘Oh God, my Oscar …’ And she gave a deep sigh, and turned and walked slowly back to the kitchen. She sat down heavily at the table, leant on both elbows and dropped her head into her hands.
She sat there, nursing her light, unreal head, trying fiercely not to think about Oscar. Then she snapped herself up straight, stood up grimly, went to the sink and tipped away the rest of her beer.
‘Out, out, damned spot! Damned cellulite!’
She turned and strode back to her bedroom.
She had a shower, and washed her hair. She pulled on a fresh shirt and jeans, combed back her wet hair and tied it in a ponytail; she even put on some lipstick. Then she stomped through the house, out the back door, to the Land Rover. She started the engine, rammed the gear lever, and roared off up the track towards Billy’s hut.
To see if he had sobered up. To give him a few instructions. To bring some order to this neck of the woods!
It was eleven o’clock when she came grinding back down the track towards the house. She slammed to a stop in the yard, scattering chickens and ducks. She scrambled out, slammed the door, and strode for the kitchen. She was going to radio Clyde right now – haul him up from underground if necessary
