mirages; I could see three of him. I could see the gigantic bamboo canes at the water’s edge doubling, tripling, tippling themselves into the haze. I could see wavy curtains of air flapping lazily, easily, settling on us with sleep in their folds. “The only reason I don’t come back to stay,” I said drowsily, “is that if I did, I would never do another blessed thing for the rest of my life. I’d turn into a blissed-out vegetable.”
“It makes me panic, being back,” Brian said. “I feel as though I’m suffocating, drowning. I can’t breathe. I can’t get away fast enough. I get terrified I’ll never get out again.”
“Go back to Bleak City then,” I said. “Stop whingeing. You sound like a prissy Melburnian.”
“I am a Melburnian.”
“Bullshit. You’ll be buried here.”
“Over my dead body. I can never quite believe I got out,” he said. “I’ve forgotten the trick. How did I manage it?”
I shrugged, giving up on him, and let my eyes swim in Coronation Drive with the cars. An amazing old dorsal-finned shark of a Thunderbird, early sixties vintage, hove into view and I followed it with wonder. “Who was that friend of your brother’s? The one with the Alfa Romeo. Remember that time we came burning out here and the cops —”
“You’ve got a mind like the bottom of a birdcage, Philippa,” Brian said irritably. “All over the shop.”
“Polyphasic,” I offered primly. “Highly valued by some people in your field. I read an essay on it by Stephen Jay Gould. Or maybe it was Lewis Thomas. Multi-track minds, all tracks playing simultaneously. Whatever happened to him, I wonder?”
“To Stephen Jay Gould or Lewis Thomas?”
“Neither, dummy. To that friend of your brother’s. How’s your brother, by the way?”
“He’s fine.”
“Still in Adelaide?”
“Mm.”
“Did he stay married?”
“Knock it off, Philippa.”
‘You stay in touch with her?”
“No.”
“I’m sorry, Brian. I’m really sorry about all that. Are you, you know, okay?”
“Yeah, well.” Brian shrugged. “It’s easier this way. No high drama, no interruptions. I practically live at the lab.”
“I read a glowing article about you in Scientific American. It was an old one, I picked it up in the waiting room at my dentist’s.”
Brian laughed. “There’s achievement for you.”
We lapsed into silence and drank another round of beer and stared at the river.
“Your mother said she ran into Richard’s mum.”
“Don’t get started, Philippa,” Brian warned.
“I miss them, I miss them. I miss our old gang. Don’t you?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
“I never miss anyone,” he said vehemently.
“Your mother said —”
“Okay, get it over with.”
“Get what over with?”
“The lecture on how I treat Dorrie.”
“I wasn’t going to say a word,” I protested. “But since you mention it, I don’t understand why you feel embarrassed. You were actually blushing, for God’s sake. As though anyone minds.”
“You think I’m ashamed of her.”
“Well?”
“It’s not that. I’m not. I’m protecting her. I can’t bear it when other kids smirk at her. At them. I can’t bear it.”
“Other kids?”
“There’s a lot you don’t know, Philippa.”
“I don’t know why you think they were any different from anyone else’s parents.”
He signalled for another jug, and we waited until it came, and then Brian filled both our glasses.
“They were,” he said. “That’s all.”
“They weren’t. I spent enough time at your place, for God’s sake.”
“God, I’m depressed,” Brian said.
“I spent time at Richard’s and Julie’s and Elaine’s. They weren’t any different from anyone else’s mum and dad.” Brian said nothing. With his index finger, he played in a spill of beer. We were both, I knew, thinking of Elaine.
“Sorry,” I said, “I shouldn’t have … That’s something that happens when I come back. Every so often, you know, maybe once or twice a year, I still have nightmares about Elaine. But not when I’m back here. When I’m here, we all still seem to be around. In the air or something. I can feel us.” I stared into my glass, down the long amber stretch of the past. “How long is it since you’ve been back, anyway?”
“Five years.”
“That’s your average? Once every five years?”
“It’s not that I want to come that often,” he said. “Necessity.”
I laughed. Brian did not. “You’re not usually this negative about Brisbane,” I protested. “When was the last time I saw you? Two years ago, wasn’t it? In Melbourne. No, wait. I forgot. London. June before last in London when you were there for that conference — Yes, and we got all nostalgic and tried to phone Julie, tried to track her down … that was hilarious, remember? We got onto that party line somewhere south of Mt Isa.”
“It’s different when I’m somewhere else,” Brian said. “I get depressed as hell when I’m back.”
“Boy, you can say that again.”
“Last time ever, that’s a promise to me,” he said. “Except for Dorrie’s funeral.”
“God, Brian.” I had to fortify myself with Cooper’s comfort. “You’re getting me depressed. Anyway, speaking of your mother, we’d better get going. What time’s she expecting us?”
“Oh shit.” Brian folded his arms tightly across his stomach and pleated himself over them.
“What’s the matter?”
“I can’t go.”
“What?”
“I can’t go, Philippa. I can’t go. I just can’t. Can you call her for me? Make up some excuse?”
I stared at him.
“Look,” he said. “I meant to. I thought I could manage it. But I can’t. Tell her I’m tied up. You’ll do it better than I could.”
“What the hell is the matter with you?”
“Look, tell her—” He seemed to cast about wildly for possible bribes. “Tell her we’ll take her out for lunch tomorrow, before my afternoon flight. I’m staying at the Hilton, we’ll take her there.”
“I won’t do it. I’m not going to do your dirty work for you. This is crazy, Brian. It’s cruel. You’ll break her heart.”
Brian stood abruptly, knocking over his chair and blundered inside to the pay phone near the bar. I watched him dial. “Listen, Dorrie,” I heard him say, in his warm, charming, famous-public-person voice. “Look, something’s come up, it’s a terrible nuisance.”
“You