So Damn Sketchy, page 8
Our reservation for dinner goes unused, but the spa bath doesn’t. We get steaks from room service and drink three bottles of wine between us from the minibar. Lachs even wears the hotel bathrobe and slippers, which he refused to do on previous holidays. I don’t know when we finally go to bed, but I’m tipsy and exhausted. Lachs tucks me in, and we fall asleep watching Spiderman.
Lachlan’s phone alarm vibrates the whole bed with an irritating insistence that pulls me out of a deep sleep. Now, my hangover is a few days old, and I try to burrow into the blankets. Lachs crawls under the sheets with me, so we are eye to eye. I pull my knees up and curl into a ball. He kisses me lightly on my lips, then down the curve of my neck to my shoulder. A shiver runs down my spine. I love when he does that.
He whispers, “Time to get up, B. Your next present is waiting.”
I groan in response but then stretch out and lean into his waiting hug.
With my eyes still closed and the sheets pulled over us, I reply. “Does it have to be now? What time is it?”
Lachs flings the sheets back. “Yes, now! Up and at ’em!”
He drags the blankets off the bed, then walks out of the room and starts the shower. The room is cold, so I grab the remote for the heating and turn it on. I look outside. Still dark. Curiosity gets the better of me, and I follow Lachs into the bathroom.
I begin to brush my teeth and ask, “What am I meant to wear?”
Lachs peeks around the shower curtain and grins. His dimples transport me from my hangover for a moment, but his reply brings me crashing back.
“Jeans or leggings and maybe runners. You’ll want to look nice.”
My head spins, and the wine from the night before sloshes around in my stomach. I want to be sweet and tell him that I love surprises, but I don’t.
Instead, I bitch. “Are you making me do something active for my birthday? Do you even know me?”
Lachs snorts out a laugh. “We have to leave in about five mins. Get ready.”
I get changed and throw on makeup. I’m too tired to try to blend it, so I poke at my skin with the brush to wake myself up. We walk down a stone path from our room to a shuttle bus. Apparently, we’re going on a hot air balloon ride.
The bus takes us to an unused paddock. The first rays of dawn are breaking, and Lachs hugs me to keep me warm as we wait for the balloon to inflate. The morning is crisp and clear, and once the balloon lifts off from the ground, we watch the sunrise from the sky. The ride only lasts an hour, but I find it incredibly peaceful and far different from anything else I’ve ever done. Once again, when our feet are on the planet, we take the bus back to the winery for a champagne breakfast.
Whilst we’re eating, I joke, “How am I going to top this for your twenty-first?”
Lachs takes a sip of coffee and gives me a tired smile in reply. “I’m glad you’ve had a good birthday, B.”
Despite his smile, he seems a little grumpy, but I attribute that to the fact that we’re both hungover and have barely slept the entire weekend.
I smile back. “It’s been great. You’ve made it incredible. Thank you.”
Lachs points at my necklace with his knife. “Who gave you that? It’s new, right?”
“It was a birthday present.”
“From whom?”
I give him a warning look before sighing and placing a scrap of a raspberry danish in my mouth.
“Sean.” I know he’ll hate the answer.
I watch as he leans back into his chair. I can read the look on his face easily. It’s a heady mixture of anger and insecurity. I don’t wait for him to speak. Instead, I bring out the touchy subject for discussion.
“Aren’t we passed this yet? It’s a sweet birthday present, and you aren’t going to guilt me out of wearing it.”
Lachs nods, but the silence that follows pulls at my chest. We walk back to our room without speaking, and whilst we’re packing up to check out, I take off the necklace and put it into my pocket.
The mood improves on the drive home. We sing to the homemade burnt CDs that have been in Lachs’ car since he first got it. The CDs are scratched, and I only know the songs word for word for the first minute. I have no idea what the lyrics are after the track skips to the next song. The familiarity of those old CDs is nice.
Lachs drops me home, and I go back to bed to nap for the afternoon. Mum is cooking for a family birthday dinner tonight. I’ve also got the night shift at Coles, which I’ll be doing each night until my driving test on Wednesday. Adam and Sean would never let me hear its end if I failed only because I partied too hard on the weekend.
* * *
Time flies after my birthday weekend, and I realise that I haven’t seen Lachs or spoken to him much since the previous Sunday. I text him and announce that I will drive over and be there by 5 pm.
He replies with a simple: “Cool.”
I was hoping for more excitement from him since I’ll be driving there for the first time in my car. I shrug it off, though.
We’re both on university break, so I’m quite excited that we can spend more time together, and even though the weekend at the winery was amazing, I can’t shake the feeling that he’s been purposely distant lately. I assume it’s because we’ve been together for three years, so some of the novelty has worn off, but we have new avenues to explore. I’m eighteen now, which opens up many doors that were closed to us before. I think about what I can do for his twenty-first birthday on the drive to his house. I want to take him to Japan for a ski trip, but I don’t know how I’ll be able to afford it. I silently make a vow to myself to start saving my pay.
I pick up Lachs, and we go to a nearby pub for dinner. I show off that my car is a manual and tease him for not being able to drive one, but I barely get a smile from him. At the pub, I talk to the waiter more than I talk to Lachlan.
Finally, I break the tense silence and call it out. “You’re quiet tonight.”
He lets out a heavy sigh. “Let’s talk after dinner, okay?”
“I’ve got a better idea. Let’s talk now. What’s wrong?”
“Well, I applied for a semester abroad program for the end of uni.”
“What? As in next month?”
“Yeah, B, and I got accepted, so I’m going to England.”
The waiter interrupts with our food, and Lachs orders another drink.
I stare down at my plate and mumble into my food, “Why didn’t you tell me? When did you apply?” I raise my head and look him in the eye. “So, what does that mean? Are you saying you’ll be gone for three months?”
Lachs nods slowly. “At least. Maybe longer. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t know I’d be accepted, and then I didn’t want to ruin your birthday.”
We eat in silence, and I digest the information. Lachs finishes his food, but I can only manage three bites of mine. I feel too sick to eat. After dinner, I drive us back to his house. When I turn off the engine, neither of us gets out.
I sit and stare straight ahead for a while, then ask, “When do you leave?”
He gives me another heavy sigh in response. “In three weeks.”
I feel tears running down my face. “I guess we’ll just have to Skype a lot. Three months isn’t that long.”
When he doesn’t agree, I feel anguished sobs rising inside me. My eyes plead with him not to say what I know is coming next. He can see this is killing me, but I can tell he’s already made up his mind.
He looks down at his hands. “I’m sorry, B. I don’t want to do that.”
“We can try, can’t we? We can’t just break up without trying.” My voice has gone high, and I’m practically squeaking out the words.
Lachs’ eyes are red. “Yeah, I want to break up.”
He gets out of the car, walks around to the driver’s side, and opens my door. My legs are shaky, but I get out and slump into his arms. I want to tell him that he doesn’t have to break up with me to travel—that I’d had an idea for a ski trip to Japan for his twenty-first. I was going to save the money. We could have gone.
Lachs hugs me and says sorry again. I cling to him and refuse to let go, but he gives me one last squeeze and pulls back. I watch him walk inside, and I get back into my car. A flood of tears streams down my face on the drive home.
I text him whilst driving: “I love you, Lachs. Please don’t do this.”
He responds with a cold dagger of words that destroys my heart and hope: “Sorry, B. It’s for the best. You’ll be okay.”
I write out: “How do you know I’ll be okay, you reeking pile of dog shit?”
But I don’t send it. Instead, I slam my phone against the dashboard as hard as possible. It ricochets off the vent and lands on the passenger seat. I look at it and hope the screen isn’t cracked. It is.
“Fuck,” I snarl and swat the phone onto the floor.
When I get home, I make a beeline straight for my bed and spend days and days under the covers. I watch movies without actually seeing them. I don’t eat. I pretend that I’m sick and don’t tell anyone that Lachs and I have broken up. I don’t want to bring it out into the light. It becomes real if I do that.
Somewhere during the week, Lachs comes over and drops a box of my stuff on the front doorstep, and my family work out what’s happened. They make clumsy attempts to comfort me, but I’m too ashamed to face them, so I tell them to go away. They can’t possibly understand that no one has ever suffered as much as I’m suffering right now.
But then Mum says, “I know exactly how you feel, Bonnie. I’ve been where you are a few times myself.”
I’m stunned by that. She’s deliberately trying to piggyback onto my life, and I hate her for it.
THE SUMMER
EIGHTEEN YEARS OLD
I struggle to move on from Lachs for the next six months and devote my time to university. If I go out, it’s only for birthdays for someone I’m close with. I spend most of my nights at home on the computer. I chat with friends on Messenger and flirt with boys on Myspace. I spend much of my time monitoring Lachs’ social media and scrutinising any profiles of new women he becomes friends with, but in December, Tori and Emma come back from their gap year, and everything starts looking better.
I’m thrilled that they’re home, and I know they stayed at the same hostel as Lachs during Oktoberfest. Every time they tell stories about their year abroad, I always bring the conversation around to that specific week. I want to know everything that happened.
Hayley invites Emma and me to her family’s beach house on Phillip Island for New Years. Her boyfriend and a few of his friends have been invited to come along too, and the three of us girls are sitting out on the beach house deck and drinking cheap wine when the boys arrive. Hayley does the introductions, and a guy named Andrew sits across from me. I tune out the conversation at the table and look at him. He’s tall, easily over six feet, and has deep brown eyes.
I hear someone say, “Bon?” and come crashing back to reality.
Everyone at the table is looking at me.
I blush a bit. “Sorry, what?”
Hayley says, “Do you know how to change wiper blades? The guys need help.”
I shake my head. “Why would I know how to do that?”
“You can change a tyre, can’t you? I just assumed you could help.”
She’s right. Adam and Sean taught me a lot about car maintenance. I never paid attention, though. I can change a tyre, but I can’t do much else.
“Yeah, I can help, I’m not sure, but I’ll find out.”
I text Adam and ask for instructions. I want to show off to the guys.
At the beach later that day, I set up my towel next to Andrew and hand him a beer, then ask, “So, what do you do?”
“I’m a firefighter.”
I stick my tongue into the inside of my cheek whilst trying to decide if he’s being serious or not.
I smirk at him. “Of course you are.”
He smiles. “I am.”
“So, like a full-time firefighter rescuing kittens out of trees or volunteering in summer?”
“Full-time, but it’s Melbourne. We mostly do first response stuff. We need the volunteers, you know. What do you do?”
“I’m studying.” I can see by how he looks at me before staring blankly out at the water that I’m losing his interest.
My toes curl in the scorching sand as I vow to myself to stop being flippant and rude. To capture his attention, I squeeze sunscreen onto my hand and rub it onto my shoulders and collar bones.
Andrew glances at me and asks, “Do you want help with your back?”
I give him a big flirty smile. “Yeah, thanks.”
He crawls over to my towel, and I instantly get butterflies when he begins rubbing the sunscreen into my shoulders. When he’s done, I offer to put some on him.
I’m in the middle of massaging sunscreen into his back when Hayley and Emma look over and see what’s going on. They wander away from an ongoing game of beach cricket and stroll back to the towels. I’m sure their unenthusiastic efforts at fielding won’t be missed. Emma gives me a sideways glance and sits down on my towel. One of the boys playing cricket hits the ball in our direction, and Andrew jumps up to chase after it.
Emma waits until he’s out of earshot before she says, “Hitting it off, are we?”
“Oh, my God.” I fall back onto my towel and fan myself with my hand for dramatic effect. “Hayley, why haven’t you introduced us before? A hot firefighter is someone you introduce to your single friends.”
She laughs at me. “Be careful, okay? He’s a bit of a player.”
I stifle a smile. Her words sound like a challenge. I want to be the one to tame him.
The trip turns out to be a lot more fun than I’d imagined. I’m grateful that Emma convinced me to come and move on from my post-break-up rut. We spend most nights getting drunk. In the morning, we walk down to the beach, cover ourselves in tanning oil and spend the entire day lying there.
On New Year’s Eve, the girls and I play mini golf whilst the guys go off to a go-kart track. We meet up again late in the afternoon and pack the eskies with food and alcohol for a picnic on the beach that evening. By then, I’ve practically become Andrew’s shadow.
At around 10 pm, the air temperature is still above thirty-five degrees, Andrew wants me to go for a swim with him to cool off. We sneak away from our group and stroll down the beach to get away from all the people blasting their music at the same time on competing speakers. We strip down to our bathers and wade into the water, the ocean is colder than the air, so the waves sting as they smack into us.
We wander farther out into the surf until the water reaches my shoulders, and I’m on the verge of not being able to stay on my feet. We stop there and flirt and splash around for a while before Andrew moves in and starts kissing me. He reaches around behind me and pulls the end of the string of my bikini top. It comes loose and floats up to the surface. We keep making out, but I start to become conscious of how many other people are around. A group of boys is only fifteen metres from us.
I retie my bathers and say, “Not here.”
Andrew reaches out to untie it again. “Come on.”
I stop his hand. “No. There are too many people.”
“It’s dark. They can’t even see us.”
I don’t like being pushed into things I don’t want to do, so I start walking back out of the water.
Andrew churns after me through the waves and grumbles, “Okay, okay.”
He points to a shallow cave amongst the rocks. “How about over there?”
I look in the direction he’s pointing and see the cave. It seems kind of private, so I agree.
When we get back and re-join the group, Hayley offers us some pills, Andrew takes one, but I’m not interested, so I pass. We stay on the beach and drink and dance until a few hours after midnight. When we dance ourselves into a heavy sweat, we run into the waves to cool off.
New Year’s Day is our last day. Right after we leave, I’m in the car and on my way back to Melbourne when I get a Facebook friend request from Andrew. I can’t help but grin.
2008 is going to be a good year.
Andrew takes his time to text me and ask me out. We go to a trampoline park. I try to get him to go out with my friends, but he tells me he doesn’t do clubs. He comes over to my house a few times, usually quite late. He tells me stories about his work, and when he stays over, we take the mornings slow, sleeping in and going out for brunch. Mum and I fight over him. She doesn’t want him staying over when he isn’t my boyfriend, but after a few weeks, the argument becomes moot when Andrew stops replying to my messages.
* * *
I hold the phone away from my ear and grimace when Hayley shrieks, “Bon Bons! Are you coming out tonight?”
I can tell she’s already been drinking for a while. “I can’t. I’m working until midnight.”
“Fuck that!” she screeches. “Come out with us!”
I tell her again that I can’t come, and she hangs up.
I’ve been getting all the Friday and Saturday night shifts at work for weeks now. I have a new manager, and he hates me. I rethink my position on Hayley’s invitation.
I mutter to myself, “Fuck it.”
I’ve been scanning groceries since I was fifteen. The time has come for me to find a new job. I send my manager a weak and pathetic text to announce I’m quitting, then call Hayley and ask where she and the others are.
I swig back sips of cheap vodka in my room as I get changed and do my makeup. I know I’ll be hours behind the others, and I want to be at their level of intoxication, so I’ll be ready to continue with them. I get a taxi to Chapel Street and meet up with the girls.
The night is classic. We knock back shots and dance to work off the calories from our drinks. Emma throws up, Tori cries and tries to call her ex-boyfriend, Alex disappears with a stranger, and Hayley and I take incriminating photos of everyone else whilst trying to keep the group together.
When we leave, we toss up between going home or going to a club down the street that stays open until daylight. Emma already has her shoes off, so we decide to call it a night, and the girls come back with me to my house. Emma passes out almost immediately, but Tori, Hayley and I stay up for a while, singing into our toothbrushes and filming the dances we make up to the music.
