not sure at the moment, mate,’ the firefighter said, reaching for what looked like an enormous crowbar from the back of the truck. ‘Most have battery backup so they’ll work for a bit. Your phone’s probably working, just jammed with everyone trying to make calls. I’d keep trying.’ He turned and jogged towards the Hannes Swartling building after the other two, and as they watched they entered by a side door.
Cressida stepped to the edge of the road, craning round it to check the traffic.
‘Terrorist attack is what I heard,’ the man at the bus stop was saying.
‘What? I doubt it. More likely a power surge. I know one thing, I wouldn’t want to be them in all that clobber. In this heat?’ said another man.
‘Sorry, gotta go,’ said Cress, ducking behind a car and dodging others to the other side. Weaving through the crowd she hurried along the footpath, looking for Felipe’s characteristic figure. He would tower over everyone in his usual non-surgical-days uniform of Momotaro denim and a tight Calvin Klein Slim Fit black t-shirt (bought in a three pack), the pecs and shoulders of daily ocean swims notable underneath. But when she got to the Westin, the doors to the hotel were closed and the foyer was dark, with no sign of Felipe. She perched on an aluminium bench seat and speed-dialled his number, not remembering until the high-pitched beep that the phone wasn’t working. Where was he? She untied her ponytail, shaking it out to loosen some of the sweat, and looked up at the exact second the space above was sheared by lightning. Momentarily the masses in the square below were visible, and it was like finding herself in a giant nightclub; in the returning dark, people’s faces were unreadable, black bobbing heads converging. Yells and crashes sounded from the murky dark down closer to the harbour. She was thirsty, and a headache was beginning to flower behind her left temple. Suddenly she felt small, and surrounded, fear coiling in her stomach. Whether Felipe turned up or not, how on earth was she going to get home? Then her phone rang.
‘Pip,’ she said, collapsing into the bench seat at the sound of a friendly voice. Pip Buchanan, her office-mate for the first two years of her time at Hannes Swartling.
‘Cressida, I heard. How awful!’
‘I know. It’s total bedlam here. Fifty people at the bus stop and no-one’s going anywhere.’
‘I’m talking about the partnership vote, silly.’
‘What? Oh. Yes. I know. Malakas,’ she said, using her father’s favourite expletive. ‘How did you hear?’
‘Um.’ There was a pause and a rustle on the handset, then Pip continued, ‘Brian Prendergast told me actually. Where are you?’
‘Outside the Westin. What about you?’
‘In a water taxi. We were at Aria – the bloody lights went out right in the middle of the spanner crab. Anyway, they couldn’t take cards without any power, could they, so we didn’t have to pay. Is it still going where you are?’
‘Yep,’ Cressida said, watching a gaggle of people surge around a taxi, yelling and banging on the roof. ‘Cripes, now a fight’s breaking out over a cab.’
‘Oh God, really? They’ll get it back on soon,’ Pip said. ‘I bloody hope so, anyway. I’ll get rapidly homicidal in this weather without air conditioning. How are you getting home?’
‘At least you’re down by the harbour. I’m bang in the thick of it in a wool skirt and stockings. Um, not sure yet,’ she said. ‘Walking, probably.’
‘Poor you. I’d come and get you if I could. By the way it’s pouring here. Hope the rain stays away from where you are.’
‘Jesus, really? That’d put the icing on it. I …’ Just at that moment a fat drop landed on Cressida’s knee, and more pinged on the seat next to her, then out of nowhere a sheet of water roared across the square from the sky behind the Hannes Swartling building. Three weeks of forty degrees and it was raining now? Cressida scrambled for the tiny umbrella in her handbag.
‘Hang on,’ she yelled. ‘I’d better go. Are you okay getting home?’
‘Yeah I’m fine. You too I hope. Good luck finding Felipe!’ her friend yelled back, and Cressida hung up. Feeling like a gazelle on ice, she ran across the paving to the overhang of the nearest building, where thirty other people huddled looking out at the rain. Down at the bus stop, the queuing workers stood with heads bent sideways like horses in a field. One woman had her face to the sky letting the drops pelt her cheeks. Cressida half longed to do the same, feel the rain wash the sweat from her face and where it stuck to her clothing, but that would ruin her blowdry so she didn’t. Looking around she decided there was only one thing for it. She’d have to walk, and hope Felipe could look after himself. Quickly she closed the umbrella and fished her running shoes out of her gym bag, standing awkwardly to slip off her heels and jam first one foot then the other into the runners. She stashed her heels in her handbag and put the umbrella up again, pressing the speed dial to Felipe again with the other hand. Hopefully the mobile phone fairy was still on the job. He picked up on the first ring.
‘Felipe? Oh thank God,’ she said, feeling another wash of relief. ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you.’
‘Darling, where are you?’ he said. ‘Are you alright? You sound distressed.’
‘There’s a bloody blackout here. And it’s pouring.’
‘Cressida, what are you yelling for?’ he said, irritated. ‘What’s all that racket in the background?’
‘It’s the rain. Sorry. Look I’ve been trying to call you. It took ages even to get out of the building, let alone on a bus. Where are you?’
‘What do you mean? I’m at the hospital of course …’
‘Oh,’ said Cressida, stopping. Someone behind her ran into her and swore, and she apologised, cupping the hand with the umbrella in it round the phone. ‘But … but I thought you were meeting me at the hotel?’
‘Yes, look I know, darling, I’m so sorry – to tell you the truth I clean forgot! They’re down an orthopod registrar here and it’s bedlam; I haven’t had a minute to think.’
‘Oh. Yes, of course,’ said Cressida, concealing the disappointment in her voice. It was alright. He’d remember about the partnership vote later, when the chaos had died down.
‘And I did say to you, Cressida, that I wasn’t sure about this the night before such an important triathlon meet.’
Oh God, the triathlon. Felipe was obsessed with them, in part because he was certain it helped with seniority on the Australian Orthopaedic Association Board, of which he was a member. Cressida wasn’t convinced, but she wasn’t about to argue.
‘Yes, yes of course absolutely … Hey, um, we just had the partnership vote, Felipe … remember?’
‘I’m sorry, Cressida, I can hardly hear you – can we talk about this later? I’ll get a taxi and … oh, there’s one. Excuse me.’ Then there was the sound of a scuffle and a door slamming. ‘Oh for goodness sake. Now I’ve seen everything.’
‘What?’
‘Oh nothing. Just a bloody wardsman jumped the queue for the only taxi there’s been for half an hour. Can
