Miscarriages Chapter 11. Little boy lost

They were dry sobs, like trying to vomit up some awful thing inside his head, but it wouldn’t come out. James screamed as loud as he could to get it out, but to no avail, though it did stop the sobs. The echo of the scream reverberated throughout the empty church. “Oh! Lord!” The words reverberated in his head, He opened his eyes and saw the little crucifix looking down at him, and he reflexively turned his eyes downward, where he saw two large shoes, brown suede hush puppies they were. And in them stood a large man, dressed in a crumpled open neck shirt, blue that reminded him of his old school shirt, tucked into well pressed gabardine Fletcher Jones pants, fawn, matching the hush puppies.

“My son,” said the Pastor in a kindly voice, “let me help you.” He leaned down showing his round face, wisps of fair hair tinged with red, combed across his bald head, a smile like that of Jesus curing the sick and dying.

“I’m not your son!” James yelled, “I’m nobody’s son!” He leaped up from his haunches, a cat like leap, and tore the crucifix from the wall, lunged at the Pastor intending to pour out his rage and beat him to a pulp. Rage is a blinding force that, while endowing its owner with amazing strength beyond his ordinary capacity, also deprives its owner of its safety, not to mention reason. The Pastor was twice as big as the small, stocky James who attacked him without method or technique. The Pastor simply grabbed the wrist of the offending arm that held the crucifix, a vice-like grip that reminded James even through his rage, of Grecko’s championship fists.

“Now I think you had better put your clothes on,” said the Pastor in a calming voice, tightening his grip so much that it caused James to purse those thin lips of his, lips that were now trying to stop a scream of pain from coming out. He looked down at himself, suddenly feeling the vulnerability of nakedness. The Pastor sensed as much and slowly let go of his arm, carefully took the crucifix from his hand that quickly went limp, a movement that allowed James reflexively to cover himself with his hands. He stooped forward, aware of his pale buttocks baring themselves to the rest of the church, and of this calm man who stared at him with such kindness, it almost repulsed him. For he had never experienced such kindness in his life, or so he thought. Not even from his mother whom he now hardly remembered, not even from his new father, so-called, who when he helped him did so with a stern manner, always demanding something of him in return, always telling him what he could not do.

*

“What are you studying at the university?” asked the Pastor as he gathered up James’s books.

“I’m not.”

“What do you mean? Why are you carrying all these books then?”

“I’ve decided to quit.”

“You mean, just now, this very minute?” The Pastor frowned, his lips bunched together as his cheeks stiffened.

“Yes. Right now, This very minute.”

“But why? You look like an intelligent young man.”

“I don’t belong there.”

“What brought this on? Let’s sit down here and talk about it.” The Pastor took James, now fully dressed, by a loose dangling arm that showed no strength at all, and ushered him into a pew.

“The professor told me so. I don’t belong there.”

“But all these books you have. Looks like you are engaged and reading.”

“The Latin is too hard for me. I thought I was good, but I can’t do it like they say I have to. And I can’t keep up with the classes and I make a fool of myself in the tutorials.”

“Where are you from, may I ask?”

“Yair, well that’s it, isn’t it?”

“What do you mean?”

“The professor, that German one they have, he asked me what high school I went to and when I said Geelong, he tossed my assignment back at me and told me I didn’t belong at Melbourne uni.”

“Oh, I’ve heard of that professor. He’s an infamous bully. You shouldn’t take any notice of him.”

The Pastor still had the crucifix in his hand.

“I don’t care. Anyway, he’s right. There’s a lot of other stuff I could tell you.”

“Your father? I heard you calling out.”

“I don’t have a father. Not a real one, anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s dead. Or I thought he was.”

“What?”

James’s ears were now a bright red, his whole face and hands pulsing with the hot blood of rage. The Pastor calmly put his very large hand over James’s clenched fist, the knuckles white, yearn­ing to pound into something.

“Forget it. I shouldn’t be telling you all this stuff. I’ve been in gaol too. I have to go.”

James stood up and slowly pulled his fist out from under the Pastor’s hand.

“My son,” said the Pastor, “don’t leave now. You’re not up to it, and I wouldn’t want you to make a hasty decision of some kind. Let’s go out back to my office where we can have a longer talk in private and you can tell me more of what ails you. After all, you didn’t come in here for nothing, son.”

“I told you, don’t call me son,” James growled, his ears redden­ing yet again.

“Sorry! Sorry! My mistake. Come on out back and let’s talk it over.”

James slumped back down to the pew. He turned and looked hard into the Pastor’s kind face, The slight curl of his lips, not quite a smile, but compassionate; his eyes squinting, red-tinged eye lashes, blue eyes scrutinizing his face, offering help.

“Come on.” The Pastor stood up and returned the crucifix to its place on the wall above the small altar. James stayed in the pew, slumped forward, then leaned down to pick up his books. “You are a fine looking young man,” observed the Pastor, stand­ing at the end of the row, his big hands grasping the backs of the pews, “you have a whole world in front of you, a wonderful life ahead of you. It will be what you make of it.” James stood up, hugging his books to his chest, holding Plato in his hand. He edged sideways along the pew, towards the Pastor. “That’s the way. I’m sure we can work all this out. And if I can’t help, I know others who can provide you with the counselling that you need. I know a lot of people at the university. There is a fine chaplain there.”

James stopped and looked at him quizzically. “I’m not going to any chaplain. I don’t believe in any of that shit, anyway.”

“And what kind of shit is that?” The Pastor then spoke in soft, measured tones. “You are in the Church of Christ. You knelt before a crucifix. You have faith, young man, or you would not be here.”

“Then why am I reading this, then?” cried James, thrusting his Plato into the Pastor’s chest, “he didn’t believe in God.”

“God created Plato and many others like him. He wanted you to learn to think for yourself, to understand how wonderful and complex life is and can be. Besides, I think he did believe in God in his own way.”

“That’s not what my lecturer says.”

“University lecturers these days lack faith, unfortunately. But you, young man, I can see that you can think for yourself and that you do have faith.”

“How to you know that? Only I can know that.”

“You are here, aren’t you? In God’s church. You stripped naked before Christ the son of God. You exposed yourself to him. What more convincing act of faith can there be?”

James stared at the Pastor’s blue eyes, wide open, clearly excited. His enthusiasm was catching. Tears welled up in his own brown eyes. “I don’t even know you. You don’t know me, what I’ve done,” he said.

“I don’t need to. I can see it plainly in your eyes.” The Pastor reached out with both arms, James clung to his books, but found himself edging forward, getting close enough for the Pastor to embrace him.

And that is what the Pastor did. He hugged James to him, the books jammed between them up against James’s chest. “The Lord is with you,” whispered the Pastor, “know that he will be with you no matter what.”

James felt a kind of mild delirium as he found himself snug­gling his head into the Pastor’s shoulder, feeling the warmth of his neck against his cheek. He would have stayed there for he knew not how long. He felt safe, even saved. But the Pastor gently pushed him away and stepped back from the pews into the aisle of the church. “Go, young man, go out into the world, do good and enjoy God’s blessings.”

James stood, holding his books, full of hope. Yes, he could do it. He would go out in the world. He was young. Fit. Strong. Able. Jesus brought him here, now he would take him wherever he went. He stepped towards the door of the church. The bright light of Swanston Street awaited him in the world outside. “I don’t even know your name,” he said.

“I am Donald Ming, Pastor of the Church of Christ, and I am very pleased to meet you.”

“Gees, Mr. Ming. I’m sorry for smashing your crucifix. I’ll come back and pay you for the damage.”

“Don’t worry. But do come back and let me know how you are doing. Of course, you are very welcome at our Sunday services and our youth meetings every Tuesday evenings.”

“OK. Thank you. I promise I will come back. I walk up here every day to uni and back.” He hurried to the door, once again ready to take on the world.

“You didn’t tell me your name.”

“James.”

“James what?”

“James Henderson.”

“A nice English name.”

“I’m not a catholic, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Didn’t have to ask.”

James turned to leave, but then looked back. “You don’t look Chinese,” he said, “with a name like that, I mean.”

“My great grandmother was an Irish Scot who came out for the gold rush in 1850 or thereabouts and met her Chinese husband on the gold fields.”

“Oh,” said James, not imagining how such circumstances could have arisen. He pulled the big door open and nodded good bye to his new-found mentor, even smiling as he left. He stepped out into Swanston street, the rain clouds gone, the late morning sun shining down, full of hope. He stood in the shadow of the big door at the top of the steps. “I have the world at my feet,” he said to himself, aping the Pastor. The cool morning breeze of summer gently caressed his thick head of hair. He shook his head and sat down on the steps, his books in his lap. The breeze caught Plato’s Republic, rhythmically turning the pages. He watched them until they stopped and his eyes came to rest on one passage:

Slowly, his eyes adjust to the light of the sun. First he can only see shadows. Gradually he can see the reflections of people and things in water and then later see the people and things themselves. Eventually, he is able to look at the stars and moon at night until finally he can look upon the sun itself.

He looked up at the sun, raising his hand to shield his eyes. What lay beyond?

*

The late morning sun warmed his forehead, dazzled his eyes. Clenching his books, he shifted into the shade of the big cone shaped doorway at the top of the steps. “I have the world at my feet,” he again repeated to himself, thinking how he felt that day he bounded down the steps of the Baptist church after his Latin exam and into the arms of Iris. The warming breeze gently caressed his hair. He shook his head enjoying the breeze and felt a whiff of freedom, the pages of Plato’s republic zipping further forward, but he paid no notice. He squinted across the street into the sun. People walked up and down, busy lives, going who knows where. He looked up Swanston Street towards the uni­versity and was immediately brought back to earth. He put his books beside him and buried his head in his hands. What was it to be? Here he was, on his way to the uni, not wanting to go, convinced that he was destined to fail. But the Pastor’s en­couragement had deeply affected him. Nobody had quite spoken to him like that ever. It was advice, but advice given in kindness and compassion. All the advice he ever got from his “father” was given with a touch of resentment, always hard edged, always conditional. Do this, or you’ll be sorry. Not like the Pastor. Look to the future, youth is on your side, was what he said.

I’m young, I can do something with my life. There’s a lifetime of hope ahead. And if I don’t go on up the street to the uni, where will I go? Back “home” into my dreary little room in auntie Connie’s house in Yarraville, its lace curtains keeping out the sun, living in the bedroom that was my mother’s? I lie there on the lumpy bed, the window wide open every night, hoping that Iris will sneak in. But she’s gone again, and will never come back. And auntie Connie hovers over me, smothers me. It’s like being smothered in Plato’s cave. The Pastor is right. I have to look for­ward, go out into the world, make something of my life. I’ve been stuck in a cave far too long. I was imprisoned in that old pub and all those stupid people, now I’m imprisoned in the cave of the past, auntie Connie reminding me with every cup of tea and biscuits, of how my mother supposedly loved me. And if she did why did she leave me, sitting there with my dad, who wasn’t my dad, helping him on his way to his disgusting end. And what lay ahead? Failure assured at the uni, a fascist professor and a poofda Latin teacher self-proclaimed mentor and pervert.

James stirred, clutched his books and walked slowly down the old bluestone steps. He looked up the street and walked towards the university. Then he saw, across the street a soldier standing on the corner, stopping people as they walked by, handing out pamphlets. He sauntered to the corner and crossed by the lights. The soldier saw him approach and immediately walked part the way across the street to meet him.

“Have you registered for the draft?” he asked.

“What draft?”

“The war, Vietnam,” said the soldier, amused.

“Oh, yair, I forgot,” grinned James, “I was going to.”

“How old are you?”

“Nineteen, going on 20,” James lied.

“You have to register when you’re twenty, you know.”

“I know that. But anyway, I might enlist before that. Go over and kill a few Japs, you know,” grinned James.

The soldier looked at him, puzzled, even more amused. “Japs aren’t in this war. It’s Vietcong we have to kill this time.”

“Viet-who?”

“Vietcong. Thinking of joining up? Here’s a pamphlet to give you some information. It’s a great life. You’ll have an exciting adventure, and at the same time make a man of yourself, get out in the world, and of course, you’re serving your country, doing what every great Aussie does who loves his country. Keeping the commies out of here.”

James took the pamphlet, shook the soldier’s hand. “Goodonya mate,” he grinned. He wedged the pamphlet into The Republicand sauntered on towards the university. He had walked up to the next set of traffic lights, when he stopped, managed to tuck his books under his arm, then pulled out the pamphlet to see what it said. The front showed a picture of a helicopter landing in a clearing in the middle of the jungle. Young musclebound men with great smiling faces were leaping down, running forward into the jungle. He unfolded the brochure and there before him was a large group of happy, very youthful faces of nineteen-year-olds, just like himself, all dressed in military uniform, slouch hats, some even with arms round each other. The captions read:

Make friends for life, go to war for your country, save us from communist peril. Sign up for three years, get a big bonus at the end, and help towards your further education.

Now, one could say that James, at this moment, was vulnerable and confused. He had just ripped off all his clothes in a church and tore down a crucifix. He was lucky that the Pastor had not called the police, because with his record of arrest, he could easily have ended up in the Collins Street police lock-up. He returned the pamphlet to its place in The Republic and stood at the corner, to an observer, looking lost. But he was not lost, he was thinking. Thinking not all that clearly, maybe, but coming to a conclusion that his choices, bearable choices, were few. Failure at the uni was certain. He had tried to keep up, and especially devastating was the struggle with his favourite class in high school, Latin. The fact was, he just wasn’t smart enough, not as smart as all the others, who spoke English like the pommies, who came from fancy private schools. It hurt him deeply that he could not measure up, not like back at the pub where they all thought he was a genius. The old bastard professor Knappenberger was right. The uni was no place for him.

James looked back at the soldier, old enough to be his father, still handing out his pamphlets, engaging in jolly chit-chat with passers-by, snapping back at the occasional uni student who gave him anti-war cheek. He looked up and grinned when he saw James approaching. “Don’t tell me,” he said, “you want a draft registration card. Well I’m sorry, I don’t have them. You get them at the post office. Anyway, you should have received one in the mail by now.”

James looked the soldier in the eye. “I don’t need one,” he said, “I want to sign up.”

“Mate! You’re a uni student aren’t you?”

“Yair, but I’m done with it.”

“Young fellow, you’ve come to the right place, and I can tell you, you’ll never regret it.”

“OK. So, what do I do?”

“Come on inside and we’ll do the paper work. Of course, you’ll have to pass the basic medical first. But by the look of you, you’re just the fit and wiry young bloke we want, a good match for the Vietcong bastards hiding away in their tunnels like ferrets.”

“All right then. I’ll sign up for a year and see how it goes,” said James confidently.

The soldier laughed. “A year? Not likely. The minimum is three years. We spend half the first year training you.”

“Then I suppose it has to be three years.” James sat down on the one chair available, dropping his books on the bare steel desk, all the furniture painted with khaki army style colours. The soldier sat at his side of the desk, pulled open a drawer and withdrew a stack of application forms. He looked up and scru­tinized the stack of books. “So, you’re doing Latin and Plato?” he said. “You must be sick of it. All words and no action. You’ve come to the right place.” He leafed through the stack of forms. Here’s all the forms you need. Just fill them out, mainly all you need to do is write in your full name, date of birth, address and names of your next of kin. Then sign at the bottom there and you’re signed up, pending medical and administrative approval.”

“Administrative approval? What’s that?”

“You know, the higher-ups. The ones that’s been to uni. They’ll give you some tests to make sure you can read and write and do a bit of arithmetic. I don’t really know what they do, to tell you the truth. I’m just a lowly corporal, and that’s where I like to be.”

James leaned back on the chair. “And will they send me to Vietnam?”

“Depends, mate. You look like a pretty fit and sprite young bloke. You’d be great at dodging bullets in the jungle, I reckon,” said the corporal with a grin. His forty-year-old face lit up with a big smile that reached the entire width of his face, showing a bunch of crooked yellowish teeth. The furrows from the edges of his mouth ran all the way up to his eyes that slanted slightly inwards, mischievously squinting out from under his low brow. James looked back at him, pen in hand.

“I just sign here?” he asked.

“Yep! And then I’ll help you fill in the rest of the form.”

“And then what?”

“You wait until you get your call-up, and then you get your medical and start your training all on the same day.”

“Where do they do the training? Puckapunyal?”

“Depends. It might start there, but you’ll end up at the jungle training base in North Queensland.”

“You been to Vietnam?”

“Nah. Too old now. Hurt me leg anyway, can’t do combat any more. Did some time in Malaya, though. They were the best days of my life, that’s what. Found myself a Malayan beauty too and brought her back here. These Asian women, they treat their men, well, I’d best not tell you anymore. It’s for you to find out. Sign the form and let’s get on with it!”

James stared into the corporal’s face, a grey face, his dark beard showing, even though there were signs that he had recently shaved. It sounded like bar talk to him, like he’d heard lots of times in his days at the old pub. He leaned forward, gripping the pen tightly, holding it above the place on the form where it said signature. “Here goes!” he said.

“Press hard,” urged the soldier, “it has to make three copies underneath.”

James pressed hard, and began the down stroke of the “J.” But as he did so, a big fist clamped over his hand, causing the stroke to go off across the page.

“Stop! Do you know what you’re doing?”

James looked up, shocked and angry. It was the Pastor.

“What the fuck are you doing here? Let go of me!” James growled.

“My son! You’re signing your life away!”

“I told you, you’re not my father! Asshole!”

“I’m not letting you sign that,” said the Pastor, his figure towering above both James and the soldier sitting at his desk, meekly looking on. “Corporal, or whatever you are. This boy is not in a proper mental state to make such an important decision.”

“And who are you to say so?” asked the soldier, gaining his composure, “the kid is over eighteen he’s got a right to do what he wants.”

“First of all, he’s just a kid. Second of all, he had what I’d call a mental breakdown fifteen minutes ago inside my church.”

The corporal stood up, the metal chair scraping against the concrete floor. “Is that right, James? That’s your name, isn’t it? I’mhaving trouble reading it upside down.”

James tried to pull his hand from the pastor’s grip. The pastor laid his other hand on James’s shoulder. “You must not do this,” he said calmly, then he let go and cried, “thou shalt not kill!”

The soldier grabbed a handful of pamphlets from his desk. “I’m having no part of this,” he grumbled and walked out.

*

James was late for his Phil 1 lecture. The old door creaked when he opened it to peek in. The lecturer was down at the lectern, droning on as usual, one eye on his lecture notes and the other on the clock half way up the wall at the side of the lecture hall. James tip-toed in and slid into a seat in the top row at back. The lecturer’s voice barely carried to the back, where he sat alone. There were some twenty other students scattered about the hall, built like a theatre, seats for some three hundred students. There were supposed to be that many in the class, and on the first day of class there probably were. But the crazy system was that you could buy a copy of the lecturer’s notes for a shilling from the philosophy department secretary, or get a free copy from another student who had taken the course before. So, reasoned James, there was no point in going to the lectures unless it was a way of making you learn the material, especially because the lecturer read out his notes word for word, stopping exactly on the dot when the clock showed that the lecture time was up, and he’d even stop in mid-sentence.

James looked up at the clock. There were exactly ten minutes of the lecture left.

I don’t know why I’m here. That bastard of a pastor, pushing me out the door and up Swanston street, past the corporal still handing out pamphlets. Who did he think he was? My father? I felt like a little kid who didn’t want to go to school.

Of course, I hadn’t read the lecture notes and had no idea at what point the lecture was at. The other students I met in the philosophy tutorials told me that you didn’t need to know what’s in the notes. Just get a hold of previous years’ exam questions and swat up answers to them. They were often repeated, and if you were lucky you would have prepared answers to the questions that showed up on the final exam. But it’s only a few weeks till the exams and I haven’t done anything to study for them. I know I should have. But I just haven’t been able to make myself do it. I just go to uni and hang around the café, drink loads of shitty coffee, watch the smart bastards playing snooker or poker in the student union, maybe read Farrago. I’d even walk across to the Ballieau library and watch all the conchies working away. But I couldn’t make myself do anything.

Then came the Latin tutorial. I wasn’t ready for it, I don’t know why I bothered to go. That smart Iris look-alike with long hair, she could do everything, and the smug tutor Lepidus, his public-school tongue preening his thick lips like a Pomeranian, salivated every time she opened her mouth. He always read out the Latin for her to translate:

“Similis est haruspicum responsio omnisque opinabilis divinatio; coniectura enim nititur, ultra quam progredi non potest. Ea fallit fortasse non numquam, sed tamen ad veritatem saepissime dirigit; est enim ab omni aeternitate repetita, in qua, cum paene innumerabiliter res eodem modo evenirent isdem signis antegressis, ars est effecta eadem saepe animadvertendo ac notando.”

I looked around the class, the other students all with their heads down, trying to figure out what sentence they would have to translate when their turn came. I always tried not to sit next to her so I wouldn’t have to follow her. But this time I came in late and had to sit in the only vacant chair that was next to hers. She had lips too, voluptuous lips, that’s what I’d say; full, bright red, reminding me of Kate. I twisted around as if to speak to her, my eyes straining to get a look at her full lips. She smiled as she spoke, tossing her head back, smart bitch that she was:

“So, it is with the responses of soothsayers, and, indeed, with every sort of divination whose deductions are merely probable; for divination of that kind depends on inference and beyond inference it cannot go. It sometimes misleads perhaps, but none the less in most cases it guides us to the truth...”

“Thank you, Miss Robinson. Well done!” drooled the tutor. “Continue Mr. Henderson.”

My eyes were now staring vacantly in his general direction. All I saw was a blur of the small thin window that opened out on to the green lawn beside the library. I stared at the book, not even knowing what page I should be looking at.

“Mr. Henderson? Do you have the right page? It’s page twenty-five, in case you haven’t yet found your way.”

I remained silent, sweat running down my sides and no doubt showing in beads on my forehead.

“Mr. Henderson?”

I gripped the book with both hands, dropped my head, in a silly and hopeless way, as though the tauter my body, the better the chance of translating the passage. My lips were pursed shut, my teeth clenched so tight. “I, I,” I stuttered.

“You know, Mr. Henderson, divination may well apply in your case. I think I can safely predict that you will fail this course if you do not do the required amount of preparation for the class,” he said sarcastically. The bastard never did like me, right from the first day of class when I said fuck or something and never knew I’d said it.

“Fuck you, and fuck the rest of you,” I muttered, throwing De Divinatione on the floor. I stood up pushing over the chair and left, calling over my shoulder as I went, “I’m not playing your game anymore.”

Who knows what they said after I slammed the door. I knew what I had to do, now. Find Kate. Those lips had awakened me.

*

James squatted on the lawn and squinted at the Ballieau. The autumn sun warmed his face as it sat perched above the glass building. He turned and lay down flat, his books strewn around him. This was the very spot where Kate had roused him, that first day he had made it to the uni. He had not heard from her since that last time he stayed in her flat and serviced her like the hungry dog that he was. And Grimesy had never mentioned her to him at all, even when he was in gaol. Of course, there was no reason why he should not contact her, but the truth was he had never thought much of her once she stopped the sex. He had never thought of what they had as a relationship. More like an unstated deal, out of which he got much more than did she, or at least that was what he thought. That was his trouble. He just did not think much about anything or anyone. He took things as they came, did things without thinking. He had always been like that, impetuous, and, until Kate came along, basically out of control. It was his bad temper, that’s what his mother always said and so did both his dads he guessed, but they never told him so to his face. Mr. Counter even seemed to like his “standing up for himself” as he called it when he got into fights at the pub. Kate had taken him in tow, taught him how to control himself, that was what made their relationship so special. Not like Iris who just reacted to him in fits and tempers, just the way he reacted to her. But unlike him, her solution was to just run off and leave him. A free spirit, that’s what she was and always will be, thought James. Not like Kate. She always seemed to know what was coming next, always seemed to have a plan for herself and for him when he showed up. She was so calm, so sensible, and so good to him. Better than a loving mother. No telling him what he had to do, no threats of what would happen to him if he didn’t do what he was told. A warm, though somewhat detached mother, who just knew how to quietly and calmly get him to do everything she wanted. Of course, it helped that pretty much everything she wanted, he did too. But she wanted it in a certain way, with certain flourishes, she shaped him, that’s what she did. Not control, but sharing, nudging, caressing.

He rolled over and stared into the sun, his hand shading his eyes. It was just now dropping below the Ballieau. Someone walked past and for a moment he thought it was Kate. But no. He twisted his head around to look across at the Law School building. Maybe Grimesy would be there. He would know where Kate was. Maybe he was still getting it on with her. He had not heard much from him either, never heard from anyone because he was stuck out there in Yarraville with his aunt and her lace curtains and the scotch thistles in the paddocks outside his window. He struggled up and made his way across the lawn, past the library on to Royal Parade, crossed at the lights on Grattan street, and made his way up Royal Parade to Kate’s flat. He was standing at her door when he remembered that he had left his books lying on the grass. But no matter. They could stay there, he muttered to himself.

The flat was on the ground floor of an old two story red brick building, set in a hollow square, ringed by poorly kept low cypress hedges. Dust and dirt from the busy road swirled around as he approached the door. He knocked, but the noise of the knock was overwhelmed by the clanking noise of a tram running down Royal Parade. There was no answer. He was about to knock again when someone appeared at the doorway of the flat across the square and called out, “there’s no one there, been empty for a couple of months!”

James turned and walked away. He had better go back and collect his books, if they were still there. But on a whim, he decided to drop in at the pub on the corner just up the road. Maybe Grimesy would be there. They used to have a few beers there and sometimes that poofda professor would show up too. Though it was a bit too early, almost five o’clock. Grimesy would probably be buried in his law books or whatever he did, doing his articles they called it.

He entered the public bar and immediately felt at home, the pungent smell of smoke and beer, the noisy chatter of the blokes. “I’ll have a pot,” he said, as he dropped two shillings on the bar counter.

“Right-o mate,” said the barman.

He took one sip, licked the foam from his lips as he had done countless times, and stared blankly across the bar counter at the picture of Queen Elizabeth propped up in between rows of liquor bottles. And then he felt a light touch on the back of his neck, fingers rubbing his hair. Blood ran to his cheeks and ears and he grabbed at his neck as though to shoo off a mosquito. The mosquito was too quick for him and in its place another hand, slender, long nailed hand, smelling of a familiar hand cream, grabbed his hand and pulled it away. And there, as he turned, was Kate, grinning in all her incredible splendour, garbed in a striking black dress, a deep V to show her cleavage, shoulder-less, knee-less, a mini dress like no other.

“What brings you here?” she asked. “Buy me a beer?”

“Gees, Kate. Been looking for you. Just came from your flat.”

“Gave that up a while ago. Not there anymore,” she said, smiling, her head held back, conveying the sense of distance James had learned to accept. She was never “his” not that he wanted her to be, after all he shared her with Grimesy, or to be more precise she shared him with Grimesy.

“Another pot,” called James, “that all right, Kate?”

“A shandy would be better,” she called to the barman “if you don’t mind.”

“Shandy? What’s with you?” James asked with a frown.

“It’s a bit early. Don’t drink like I used to. So now you’ve found me, I hope you’re not looking for what’s gone long ago,” she pon­dered defensively.

“No, no. Nothing like that. Need your advice.”

“Got yourself in trouble again?” Kate grinned, squeezing his arm for effect.

“Well, sort of.”

“Well, out with it!”

“I left my books lying on the grass in front of the Baillieu,” he blurted, feeling stupid immediately he said it.

“James! That’s all? Are you in some kind of trouble?”

“No, not like that. I haven’t done anything stupid, well not that kind of stupid, though I did leave my books behind.”

“So why don’t you go back and get them? When did you leave them there?”

“Just now, just before I went looking for you.”

“James, come on then. Get it off your chest. Out with it.”

“In my Latin tute this morning, I…”

But Kate was looking past him to the door of the pub. James followed her gaze and there he saw against the bright light of Royal Parade, the silhouette of none other than professor Pulcher.

“Look who’s here!” cried Kate, clearly a little nervous, and with good reason.

“Hello darling,” purred Pulcher, “everything all right?” He looked fleetingly at James, then back to her, then stepped briskly forward and kissed her full on the lips and she responded in kind, a glint in her eye as she saw James gaping over his shoulder.

“Claude, love, you remember James here? Your favourite student from the recent past?”

Pulcher turned to James. His woolly eyebrows raised and lips pushed forward into a smirk. He frowned. “Oh, yes, of course,” he said, speaking as though James were not there, “this is the one who nearly got us locked up, the one that killed that wretch of prostitute.”

Kate took a deep breath and quickly grabbed at James’s right fist which she knew would be coiled, clenched ready to strike. “James was cleared of all that, weren’t you James?” she said, squeezing his fist and nudging her foot forward to press on his toe as well. Pulcher stepped back a little, cringing, as though he expected to be hit.

“You fuckn poofda shit!” he cried, his fist straining against Kate’s grasp,

“James, now, these things happen you know. Calm down.” Kate looked back at Pulcher and smiled, “James is going through a bit of a crisis right now. I’m sure he didn’t mean that.”

“I think I’ll leave now while you two sort this out. I’ll be waiting in the car, Kate,” he said and turned and left.

Another piece of James’s world had crumbled. He looked pitifully at Kate, eyes watering, trying not to burst into tears, embarrassed that this was so. He even wanted to slap Kate herself. Instead he blurted out, “so what about Grimesy, then?”

Now it was Kate’s turn to be upset. This little upstart, she thought. How dare he, after all she had done for him, or to him was maybe more accurate. “I don’t think that’s any of your business,” she said with a smile that could kill.

James pulled his hand free of her grasp. “I think I’d better go too. He grabbed his beer and gulped it down, then banged the glass back on the counter.

“Jimmy,” she implored using the name she always used with him in bed, “you have to understand. Dr. Pulcher and I got married a few months ago. He’s my husband.”

James stared blankly at her gorgeous eyes and those lips he had so much enjoyed. And to think that Pulcher, that lecherous poofda now owned them. “You’re fuckn crazy,” he cried, “and by the way my name’s Chooka.” He made to leave, but Kate pulled him back, determined to make him understand. In a nostalgic way, she actually loved him. He was such a dear boy, so lovable, so raw.

“I’m not that young anymore,” she said. “Don’t you understand? Women like me, we have to think of the future, our livelihood. Claude is rich, he’ll take care of me and my children.”

“But he’s a poofda, how will you have kids? He’ll fuck you up the wrong way,”

“Jimmy, don’t be a shit. Listen to what you’re saying. After all, you gave yourself up to him too, for the same reason. Money and a place at university, your future.”

James sniffed and let go of Kate’s hand. There was no reply to this. He suddenly truly understood his situation. He had no future with these people. He wasn’t going back for his books. Uni was no place for him. Yet again, Knappenberger was right. How many times would this have to happen before he believed it? Then he did what he thought he would never do. He turned his back on Kate, that voluptuous beauty of old, and swore that he would wipe any memory of her out of his mind.