It’s funny what you remember about the biggest moments in your life. Lamb Korma. When Ben made the announcement that ended our relationship, I swallowed an unchewed mouthful of fatty Lamb Korma that lodged itself in my chest. I couldn’t figure out if the pain was from the Korma or if it was because Ben had just told me that he was moving to rural Kenya to build mud-brick schools for the next two years.
And whenever I thought about Ben after that, the first thing that came to mind was fatty brown Lamb Korma.
I’d gone out for dinner that evening confident that Ben was about to ask me if I wanted to move in with him. For the last year I’d dropped hint after hint, which he never seemed to take. But his text message, two nights before, made me hopeful that the time had come.
Lil, I booked us a table for Friday at Madras Palace at 8. I’ve got something important to ask you! My shout ☺
He’d never, ever booked a restaurant before. We were both at uni, me studying medicine, while he was an architecture student. There wasn’t any money for restaurants – Nando’s in front of Game of Thrones was a treat for us. And then, when he came to pick me up, he produced flowers that had been hiding in the back seat. Red roses no less!
I’d been with Ben for almost four years. We were as serious as you could be without living together, so of course I assumed that moving in together was where we were headed.
‘This is it, Lil!’ He had an unhinged look about him. ‘This is the direction I needed. You know how unsettled I’ve been this past year? Well, I’ve got a real purpose now!’
As it turned out, moving in with me was the last thing on his mind. Instead, thanks to his mum dragging him to church the previous Sunday, where he was roused by the inspiring homily of a visiting pastor, my boyfriend was now a missionary-cummud-brick-school-builder who had booked a one-way ticket to Nairobi, deferred uni, given notice to his landlord and signed up for a six-week intensive language course in Swahili, all in the four days before he bothered telling me about any of it.
And what did I do as I listened to him plot a new life that didn’t include me? I just sat there, a fixed smile on my face like the village idiot, as he flapped a brochure in front of me.
When he stopped to take a breath, I ventured thinly, ‘Um, Ben, what about us?’
He reached across the table and touched my cheek with sweaty fingers. ‘Lil, I love you, but this, this is something I can’t pass up. It feels like I’ve waited my whole life for an experience like this . . .’
While he continued to babble words that were lost in the fog inside my head, I went over what I thought he’d just said to make sure I’d got it right. Was he actually breaking up with me? He wasn’t asking me to join him on this mercy mission and he wasn’t reassuring me that two years would fly past before we knew it and then he’d be home again.
I looked Ben in the eyes. His eager nod and hopeful smile confirmed that I was right. It was only nineteen hours ago that he’d been feverishly shouting my name before he orgasmed and now he was dumping me?
My idiotic smile vanished and I gasped, accidentally swallowing the lump of curried meat, which I swore settled next to my heart and burned hotly for the months to come.
I picked up a pappadum and threw it at his face. It didn’t quite have the impact I was after – floating lazily over the table, only just touching his nose and landing softly onto his plate – but nonetheless it made my feelings clear.
He had the gall to look shocked.
‘I’m leaving.’ I blinked hard.
‘Oh, Lil, don’t be like that. This will be great, I know it will – for both of us. It’ll give us a chance to grow, you know, as individuals.’
‘Grow? As individuals? Grow apart, you mean?’ I stood up with my shoulders back, in an attempt to salvage any dignity I had left after throwing a pappadum. ‘If this is what you want, fine. But don’t expect me to be happy that you’ve ended our relationship on a whim.’ I threw my bag over my shoulder and headed for the door.
‘Hey, wait, Lil! I’ll drive you.’
‘I’ll find my own way home,’ I snapped, not turning to look at him.
‘But, Lil, I didn’t even get a chance to ask you the question yet!’ he called out over the tinkling Indian music. ‘Lil? Can Wally please come live at yours while I’m away?’
That was the important question I’d been anticipating? Whether I’d take in his cat? The same cat that hissed and spat whenever I went over there?
I spun on my heel to face him, noticing that our break-up was unfolding in front of the Madras Palace dining public. I spoke nice and loudly to make sure the spectators could hear me. ‘You and your ugly hairless cat can go fuck yourselves, Ben.’ I pushed against the restaurant door and ran out onto the footpath, tears dripping down the front of my Korma-stained dress.
‘Excuse me, miss?’ A waiter called out across the car park. ‘You forgot your roses!’ He jogged towards me.
‘Oh, thank you. That was kind of you.’ I gave him a grateful smile and then rammed the cursed roses into the first street bin I passed.
I didn’t have money for a bus because Ben had said it was his shout, so I started the walk home, two suburbs away, along brightly lit streets, with the humid air sticking to my bare legs.
After a block, I took off the single set of heels I owned and carried them in one hand, while I wiped a steady stream of snot and tears with the other.
I went over all the clues I’d missed. Like how Ben hadn’t actually joined in last night when I’d talked about our future children and who they might look like. And how he hadn’t come over on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, offering a different excuse both times, when he must’ve been skulking off to Swahili lessons.
Two and a half hours after leaving the restaurant, at a quarter to midnight, I unlocked my front door and limped inside. The stinging blisters on the balls of my feet were nothing compared to the way my heart was hurting.
So I lost Ben to a visiting Kenyan pastor. Three years ago my mum took off to Africa with Médecins Sans Frontières after a Kenyan man knocked on her door looking for donations. Even though she moved back to Western Australia, she didn’t come home to Perth, or to me.
Why were Kenyans intent on taking away those I loved?
I wasn’t proud of the fact that I continued to sleep with Ben after Madras Palace night. It was impossible to see him and not sleep with him, and it was equally impossible to stop seeing him, even though I tried. I honestly tried. I ignored his text messages and deleted his voicemails without listening to them.
Then I saw him at a party and all it took was for him to tell me how much he missed me and there I was in bed with him again. The next morning I hated myself for being so weak and I kicked him out. Then we bumped into each other again. This pattern continued until the day he left.
Even as he was boarding his flight, I still held out hope that he’d change his mind. That he’d turn around and see how badly I was hurting and that he’d want to take that hurt away. He did turn around, but only to give me a big cheerful wave before he disappeared from my world.
And now, seven months later, here I was, still pining for him and holding onto his African-postmarked letters in which he sounded altogether far too happy. I hated Korma and I hated Kenya and I hated being alone.
Today I was tormenting myself about a woman called Karan. What kind of a name was Karan anyway? What was wrong with Karen? What made her so special that it was Karan? Ben had mentioned her in his past three letters. He hadn’t admitted in so many words that they were an item, but I could read between the lines. Guys didn’t call girls ‘amazing’ and ‘inspirational’ unless they were shagging them.
I received the latest Karan instalment in yesterday’s mail. Which led to me slamming down a block of fruit and nut chocolate last night.
I decided I was going to ask him straight out what the deal with Karan was in my next letter. I couldn’t keep guessing. If he’d fallen for this woman whose parents couldn’t spell, I had to know for sure so I could finally try to get my life together and make a real effort to forget about him. But I’d then have to wait at least a month for his reply, because he was off in some far-flung village where he couldn’t text, email, Skype, or do anything that would give me sleep during that time.
I found one of the few vacant stools in the café of the hospital I was working at, sat down and threw my backpack onto the stool next to it. I pulled out Ben’s letter from the backpack, spread it out on the table and wrapped my hand around my friend Arielle’s cappuccino to give it extra insulation until she arrived.
I’d made Arielle read, dissect and discuss every one of his letters. I was sure she was well and truly over finding out about the goings on in rural Kenya, but she was too good a friend to refuse me.
‘I would have bet my last dollar that you two would end up married, you know? I was sure he was the one for you, Lilz. He had me fooled. Anyway, he doesn’t deserve you. You need someone who loves the way you love, who feels the way you feel,’ she’d said the last time I showed her one of his letters.
She was right, I did want to be loved by someone wholly and unequivocally. I just wished that someone was Ben.
I took a sip of coffee and squeezed my eyes shut. Coffee this bad needed sugar. I couldn’t be bothered going back up to the counter to get it, though.
It was noisy here. Sitting in the middle of a long table, I could have listened in on any one of the three conversations going on around me. But working as an admin assistant at the hospital through summer taught me I was better off not listening.
My clinical rotations were starting here on Monday so, instead of working, I’d be on medical rounds. Longer hours, no pay. And it would mean that instead of hiding in an office behind a computer, I’d be confronted by people dying.
I looked around and noticed that the girl sitting diagonally opposite me in the café was someone I saw at the hospital most days. She’d given her long dark hair a radical cut. It was very Ruby Rose now – all spiky and short but with a long fringe that fell over her face. She looked as though she was a million miles away, picking the seeds off her salad roll.
An old man shuffled past and knocked the back of her head with his lunch tray, hard enough to push her forward. She winced, touched her head and turned but he ignored her and kept walking.
Then she looked at me with huge caramel eyes peeping out from underneath long black lashes. If eyes really were the window to the soul, then this girl’s soul was shattered to pieces. Those eyes were haunted.
‘Ouch, are you okay?’ I asked her.
‘Oh yes, thank you. It did not hurt very much.’ She had a low husky voice that was almost drowned out by the background chatter in the café, but I detected an accent. She rolled her ‘r’s.
She squinted at my name badge and then nodded quickly several times. ‘You have a beautiful name, Li-ly.’
Her smile was pretty but it didn’t take away from that haunted face.
‘Thank you.’ I smiled back at her. What happened to make you so sad? Why are you always alone when I see you? Who are you visiting here? Do you need a friend? ‘And what’s your name?’
‘My name is Anna.’ She reached out to shake my hand.
‘Oh, Anna? Hi! I was expecting something exotic. Sorry, that was presumptuous of me, hey?’
‘Not so presumptuous, no. My real name is Anwar, so you are right. But I prefer Anna.’
‘Don’t you like Anwar?’
‘It is not that I do not like it. It is that it is a man’s name. I prefer Anna.’
‘Oh right, a man’s name – as in Anwar Sadat?’
Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Yes, precisely. You have heard of Anwar el-Sadat?’
‘I studied modern history at school. So, were you actually named after him?’
‘Partly. But mostly because the name held a special meaning for my mother.’ She didn’t elaborate and picked more seeds off the roll.
‘Oh? What special meaning?’ I prompted her. God only knew why. She clearly had issues with the name. Why couldn’t I just shut up?
‘It means “full of light”.’ She hesitated then added, ‘And my family name, Hayati, means “my life”.’
‘Full of light – my life, now that’s a special name. Makes plain old Lily, after a flower, seem dull doesn’t it? If my name had a special meaning like yours it would probably be “she who can’t shut up”! Ha!’ I snorted, wondering why exactly it was so impossible for me to just shut my huge mouth.
‘I think Lily is beautiful. It suits you. But for me, I prefer Anna,’ said the girl whose eyes belied the meaning of her name.
Arielle turned up then with a handful of ‘Excuse me’s as she stumbled between the tables like a drunk. She was hauling three over-filled plastic bags that hit people in the head or shoulder as she squeezed past them. Nobody seemed to mind.
‘Forty per cent off sale at Evolution – I’m dead broke now though, hey? Ha ha!’ she announced to the café in general.
The people sitting around all smiled. But that’s the way it had always been with Arielle. People looked at her and smiled. Even before she had bright pink hair.
‘Heya!’ She kissed my cheek and plonked herself down. Her face was flushed. ‘Hi!’ She beamed at Anna. ‘Love your hair! Totally gorgeous. Makes me want to cut mine like that. Oh, yummo, cappuccino! Thanks, Lilz.’ She threw her head back and gulped some down. ‘Hey, I just heard Nick being interviewed for the game. You going?’
‘Yep. Mum and Ross are here too. We’re all going together.’
I’d only ever missed a handful of my brother’s home games, ever since he played junior football as a four-year-old. The difference being that these days I shared the spectator stands with a minimum of thirty-thousand people chanting his name.
I made a mental note to send Nick a text before the match started. It was the first game of the season, plus it was his comeback game after last year’s stress fractures. He’d be nervous for sure this morning.
‘What are you up today?’ I asked Arielle.
‘Gregory the Gorgeous is coming over this arvo and he’s cooking me dinner. I know what I’ll be having for dessert.’ She rubbed her hands together, grinning.
I tried to keep a straight face. Gregory the Gorgeous was anything but gorgeous and the idea of her ‘dessert’ made my stomach turn. Rather than hear more details about that, I slid Ben’s letter under her nose.
‘Ugh, no. What’s he done this time?’ she asked loudly enough to make other people gawk.
I pointed to the word Karan all six times it appeared.
‘Arsehole!’ she barked.
She picked up the letter, holding it close to her face, while I sipped the awful sugarless coffee.
A guy walked up and pulled out the stool directly opposite mine. Really, the person who designed these ridiculous narrow tables had no concept of personal space. When he sat, he was close enough for me to see the three concentric circles of ever darkening blue around his pupils. Wow. And his aftershave smelled good, really good. When had I ever noticed aftershave before?
He held my stare for an extended second. Seriously, wow.
‘Hi,’ I said, because it was weird to be this close to someone’s face and not say anything.
He raised his eyebrows.
Then we both looked down before locking eyes again. He took a deep breath and glanced from side to side, obviously feeling uncomfortable.
‘Feel free to go sit somewhere else,’ I blurted out before I realised how bad that sounded.
He stared at me, scratching at the stubble along his jawline.
‘I mean, I know we’re cramped here so it’s kind of weird for you to stay sitting this close.’ I bit my lip. That sounded even worse! ‘What I mean is, you can move and I won’t be offended. If you want to move. But you don’t have to move if you don’t want to. It’s not like I want you to. I just thought you might want to. You know?’
He kept his eyes fixed on me.
I lowered mine and they rested on his biceps bulging under his T-shirt.
Arielle glanced up from Ben’s letter to say, ‘Ignore my friend. She goes a bit stupid around hot guys.’
I felt myself go a nice shade of fuchsia.
He gave a low chuckle. Did this man not speak?
Arielle went back to reading the letter, and grumbling ‘arsehole’ a few more times.
The guy slurped his coffee and pulled a face.
‘I know, the coffee’s gross.’ I pointed at my cup and wrinkled my nose in a show of solidarity to try and redeem myself.
He nodded. ‘I asked for a flat white with one. This is a bad white with none.’ His voice was deep and scratchy. And he had smoker’s breath. I should’ve been turned off. But I wasn’t. Not even a little bit.
‘Yeah, mine’s the same. It’s awful.’ I inhaled and resisted the urge to cough. ‘And there’s no sugar on the tables but I didn’t want to go back and ask for it.’
‘Hmm.’ He pushed his chair back and stood up to full height, which from where I sat looked over six foot. He walked with purposeful swagger towards the counter. I kept my eyes firmly on the back of his jeans, then lost sight of him briefly as he disappeared in the queue. But he was back, right in front of me, a minute later. Wordlessly, he picked up my hand and pressed a packet of sugar into it. The touch of his warm calloused fingers sent an electric shock through me.
The voice, the breath, the aftershave, the arms, the eyes. My palms sweated a little.
Then Arielle handed me back Ben’s letter. And it hit me that Ben had established a whole new exciting life with someone else while in my own miserable existence, a stranger giving me a packet of sugar was the most romantic thing that had happened in seven months. Out of nowhere, I found myself crying.
‘Oh no. What’s the matter? Did I do something to upset you?’ His eyes were wide.
‘No, no, it’s not you.’ I waved my hand in front of my face, willing away the tears. ‘It’s my ex-boyfriend. He moved to Africa and he met this girl and they’re being all humanitarian together and here I am still obsessing over his stupid letters. And I’ve been so lonely that you touching my hand was the most special thing to happen to me for ages. Meanwhile Ben’s living it up in Kenya, shagging K-K-Karaaaaan!’ I wailed for the listening pleasure of the entire café.
Arielle put an arm around me.
‘Is that a letter from him there?’ The guy pointed to Ben’s letter with his chin as he ripped open a packet of sugar and stirred it into his coffee.
‘Uh-huh.’ I nodded, wiping my nose with the back of my hand. It left a long wet smear up my forearm.
‘Rip it up and forget him.’ He gave his dark hair a quick comb through with his fingers. ‘He’s moved on. Why aren’t you doing the same, instead of getting yourself worked up over that shit?’
I nodded again, feeling pathetic, not to mention mortified as people on either side of us had now put down their coffees to openly stare at me and listen in.
He swallowed a mouthful of coffee and looked right into my eyes. ‘The humanitarian’s a dick. It’s his loss.’
Neither of us blinked and, with our faces almost touching, for a second I could swear he was going to kiss me. All the noise in the café faded away and the roaring silence between us was all I could hear.
Then he stood up, turned and left. No goodbye. Nothing.
I gaped at his back until he disappeared through the doors.
‘He was yummy.’ Arielle sighed. ‘See his blue eyes? They were something else. He looked like Paul Walker, didn’t he? You know, that guy from The Fast and the Furious who died? The one with the eyes?’
Her words washed over me. I took the humanitarian dick’s letter and tore it to pieces.
But as soon as I got home, I rummaged through my backpack for the torn paper and spent twenty frantic minutes trying to stick it back together.
Then Mum and Ross turned up after a morning on the beach, bringing me to my senses. I gathered up the stickied- and unstickied-taped bits in both hands, pushed my foot down on the kitchen bin pedal and watched them fall in like snowflakes. Blue Eyes was right, I didn’t need that shit.
The distraction of Nick’s first game of the season was just the thing to take my mind off Karan, who I had now renamed Karan the Talking Horse, because it comforted me to imagine her having an abnormally elongated head.
Ross drove us to the ground, all of us draped in the Rangers’ red, white and green. Nick played an absolute blinder and, by three-quarter time, my voice was just about gone.
It wasn’t until well into the last quarter with the Rangers comfortably in front that I noticed Nick running at half his normal speed in a chase along the wing. The camera closed in on his face as the ball went out of bounds. He was grimacing.
I nudged Mum in the ribs. ‘There’s something wrong with Nick.’
‘What do you mean?’ She kept her eyes on the big screen.
‘He slowed down suddenly. He could easily have got to that ball but he let it bounce out of bounds. And I saw his face just then – he looked like he was in pain.’
‘He just looks exhausted to me. He was probably squinting at the bright sunshine,’ she replied.
No, he wasn’t squinting at the sun. He was in pain.
‘Ross can I have a go?’ I held my hand out for his binoculars.
With Nick magnified by the lenses I followed his every movement.
‘He’s favouring his right leg, guys. He’s limping.’
‘Is he? Show me,’ Mum said, but I ignored her and hung onto the binoculars.
Nick ran through the centre of the ground. When he moved back towards the wing I saw him wince again – every time his left foot hit the ground.
My stomach sank.
‘Lily’s right, he’s definitely bringing his weight down more on the right leg. Can I have a closer look, please, Lily?’ Ross leaned over Mum, who was sitting between us and reached for the binoculars.
‘Oh dear, I can see it now,’ Mum said softly. She paused before adding, ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’
‘Yep,’ I sighed. ‘Some of the stuff he was doing only six weeks after the stress fractures was insane. Why would they do that, Ross? Would you get your patients doing high-level exercises six weeks after stress fractures?’
‘I guess it would depend on the MRI results.’ Ross shrugged. ‘If the MRI was clear, then yeah, I can understand. Being as important as he is to the team, they’d be keen to get him back to form as soon as possible.’
‘That’s the thing, they never did an MRI. He had clear bone scans but that was it.’
‘No MRI?’ Ross raised his eyebrows. ‘Did I know about that?’
‘I don’t know,’ I replied. ‘But I think his bones would have been re-absorbing the cells faster than his body could produce them, the way they were pushing his rehab so early. I don’t think they were fully healed. And now look, he’s gone and done it again. He’ll be devastated.’
‘Don’t jump to conclusions, Lil. Maybe it’s nothing more than a cramp or some muscle tightness. It is his first game back, after all,’ said Mum, ever the optimist – or the queen of denial – I couldn’t decide which.
‘Good point, Mel,’ Ross agreed.
I watched the way Nick lagged behind the rest of the team coming off the ground, the way he broke into a jog but three strides later was walking again. And I watched his face. ‘That’s not muscle tightness. He’s using the same gait, with left foot eversion, that he used last time this happened. The stress fractures are back aren’t they, Ross?’
Twice on the drive home I tried to call Nick from the back seat of Ross’s Land Cruiser, but he didn’t answer. And he didn’t reply to my text.
I said goodbye to Mum and Ross soon afterwards. They were going out for drinks then spending the night at friend’s apartment in town before heading off tomorrow for the twenty-five-hour drive to Derby, where Ross was the only orthopaedic surgeon for two hundred kilometres in either direction, and Mum used her GP skills as a home-birth doctor.
I was sorry to see them go, especially Mum. They’d only been here a week. I sometimes resented her decision to live so far away from Nick and me, but I suppose they needed her more up there than I did here.
‘It was good to see you, sweetheart,’ Mum said through the car window when I went to kiss her goodbye. ‘Good luck starting uni on Monday. And remember what we said – try and make up for your lack of pre-reading tonight and tomorrow, love.’
‘Don’t remind me, Mum. I’m trying to pretend it isn’t happening.’
‘Lil, I understand. Oncology round is just about the hardest one after Neuro. But if you stay on top of the study, you won’t struggle too much.’
‘Mmm, okay.’ I pushed back a cuticle until it hurt.
‘You’ll be fine, I’m sure you will be.’ She rested her hand on my cheek. ‘Only two more years and you’re there. Just think, you’ve already done four years – and done them well. You’re getting closer and closer to making that dream come true.’
Whose dream? Mine or hers?
Mum checked her watch. ‘We need to make a move on. Chin up, Lily – everyone hates the start of the school year.’
I stood on the driveway and watched them disappear down the road. Then I walked back inside the empty house, which to all intents and purposes was mine while Mum and Ross lived in Derby. I didn’t have to be alone, there was a house-warming I could go to. But I couldn’t bear the idea of spending yet another Saturday night out pretending I was happy when I had a bin full of torn-up bits of Ben’s letter. I didn’t even understand why I kept writing to him when all that happened each time he replied was that I fell to pieces again.
No, that was a lie, I did know why. I said yes to that because I said yes to everything. I was Yes Lily – the nickname Dad gave me because I was the agreeable child, forever eager to please. The one who made up for Nick’s pig-headedness. And I always, always lived up to my name. So of course I said yes to staying in contact with the person who broke my heart.
In bed that night, when I couldn’t sleep, I fell back on my old self-destructive pattern of bringing to mind memories of Ben and me. This time I remembered us spooning on a lazy Sunday morning. But that memory disappeared after only a few seconds and was replaced by something new that made me blush, even though I was alone. It was of Blue Eyes in the café, and he was staring at me. And my tummy did crazy flip-flops with arousal.
Well, well, this was a surprise. I liked that I was turned on by a man who wasn’t Ben. I liked that a lot.
I hoped others like Blue Eyes would come along and I wouldn’t spend the rest of my life obsessing about Ben.
But what if others like him didn’t come along and I ended up a lonely old lady whose only companion was a hissing hairless cat like Wally?
I shook that thought away and conjured up Blue Eyes again until I fell asleep.