I was awake early, but I made myself stay in bed as long as I could, I should, I deserve it, I thought. It was Saturday, after all, and time to sleep in. Curses to 9 to 5. Curses to some out-dated work ethic.
I pissed around on my computer for the next two hours, when I promised it would only be fifteen minutes. I had some vague idea about heading out and buying my new bike. My mobile was upstairs, Jill had called twice in the two hours. She must want to talk? I wondered how badly Jill might be freaking out?
We agreed on lunch.
What time?
Let's just get there? As soon as we can?
I cleaned the blossom out of the gutters before I left, they'll over flow in heavy rain and rain was forecast. The Golden Elm, in my next door neighbours back yard, can block my gutters in one wind gust, the amount of blossom its branches are holding still. Just as well that I checked, the gutter was blocked.
I head off to have lunch, after I'm done.
It rains and rains, the roads are flooded, the street gutters full to over flowing, there is water everywhere. I thank the universe that I unblocked the box gutter, before I left. I’m glad I make myself check, at the first mention of rain coming, it has saved my atrium many a time.
(The useless roofing tradie got the box gutter wrong in the first place. It is okay if I keep it clear it works fine, but if it is at all blocked up with debris, it floods inside the house)
Jill and I eat Gorgonzola and spinach risotto. She drinks coffee, I drink hot chocolate and we eat a large piece of poppy seed cheese cake.
She seems okay, not sure what the urgency was about. She's had a terrible few weeks at work. She has hired an assistant who has been getting everything wrong.
Jill is so keen to go for a walk afterwards, you know, do a bit of exercise, that she walks out into the pouring rain.
It’s okay, it’s not so hard, she says as I watch her get pelted. She looks so funny.
When I get home, I sit on the back veranda and stare out at the rain. The deep, wet colours are mesmerising. I think about Sam? Am I missing him, when I’m away from him, or am I enjoying the space? I wonder do I want a boyfriend? They are so time consuming, you know. Is it Sam? I only think about him. Is getting into a relationship much easier than getting out again?
That pretty quickly lead onto, what am I going to do with my life?
How much longer will I have to look after Lottie? Will it feel different when she dies?
It was a melancholy moment, the rain can lead to that. It makes me think with its sweet pitter pat.
Is it terrible to be thinking that my mother’s death will change my life? Then I feel immediately sad that I won’t be able to share it with her? There isn’t much of my mother left anymore? I don’t have to wait for her death to be an orphan, the state of degeneration that she is at, I’m already an orphan.
I think about heading to Bolago. Mark, and I, are still spooky you know. I decide to go and get an Egg Flip Big M to contemplate a drive to the country. Mark calls just as I step out the front door and asks, What are you doing? Why don't you come up?
So, I’m off to the country, on my own. A rainy Saturday afternoon, just the right time to get out of the city, for the fresh air and open spaces of the rural confines.
I decide to give Sam the option to come. I shouldn’t assume things.
I'm going to Bolago, do you want to come? I’m assuming you have other plans with your boyfriend, as your last email said, Enjoy your weekend.
What boyfriend? What are you talking about?
Correct answer, I thought.
Why are you going, you will only smoke, you know that. And Anthony has prepared dinner for me already and he'll be pissed off...
Ah, the boyfriend, what did I say? Like I'd care if Anthony was pissed off. You don't sound like you want to come, that’s okay. I'll see you tomorrow... or something.
No wait on... but you know you'll smoke and its 17.30 what kind of time do you call this to be asking me to go away for the weekend?
Like the time I'll probably always ask you, that's how I am. Do you want to come, yes or no?
You need a better plan, I need more notice.
Plans man, do you want to come, or not?
But dinner is being prepared and you...
Sam it shouldn't be this hard, I’m happy to go on my own. Right at that moment, I wished I hadn’t even asked him. I'll see you tomorrow or the next day.
I hadn't driven far up the Melville Road, certainly not as far as Bell Street, where if I turned left into Bell Street it was past the point of no return, I wasn't coming back, when I got a text. Okay, I'll go. Come get me.
He looked handsome in his black ribbed jumper, as he got into the car.
He said he was giving me space to write for the weekend, since we’d spent the last number of weekends together. And here I was coming and getting him?
Then he nagged until Calder Park about better planning, that he needed more notice, when he said Shit, Shit, Shit! I have to see someone about a phone tomorrow, I can't go.
Too late. What time do you have to see him?
3pm.
3pm is no trouble, I can have you back by then.
No, no, no, I have to be back at 1pm. I have to pack it up in the box and pack everything else with it and get to the city.
1pm?
Yes, 1pm?
Okay 1 pm.
Then I put my hand over his mouth and said, Until you have something nice to say, you are not saying anything else.
His eyes brows changed, his eyes softened, he smiled under my hand, I could feel his lips move under the palm of my hand.
He leant over and patted me and I moved my hand and he said he was sorry. He was nice after that.
It rained all the way there. Randy Crawford sang.
I smoked pot and drank coffee. Sam was right, good for him. When I picked him up at too shorter notice, this was one of his predictions. The first joint I was offered, I took straight away, without hesitation and drew four puffs, my usual number. I looked over at Sam and he smiled his told-you-so smile, then he lent across pinched my cheek with his thumb and pointer finger, hard, with his cheeky look. I suck my finger to give him a wet willy and he recoils. I grrr, he grrrs, I hand him the joint, he puffs away on it like an expert, not a milliseconds hesitation.
We had a roast and drank wine. The lights were low, the fire burned slowly. We all smoked lots. Other friends were up too, Roz and Mike, Lissa and Adam. Sam never turned the pot down, despite all of his protests.
I don’t think Sam quite knows what stoned is? I mean, he gets stoned alright, but I don’t think he is aware of it yet. He just goes kind of bleary-eyed and floppy and sleepy, all the time claiming not to feel anything. We were the last to bed. Everything is fine with the world, as he is cuddled up in my arms.
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