BACK TO CIVILIZATION
December 2007
Chris Hayes-Kossmann
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We tumble out of the car in front of the new house at eight pm and stretch our legs before she unlocks the front door. I hear the dry clicking as she fiddles with the light switch in the hall. Fuck, she says. No power.
Dad unloads the car while I call the electrical company. The kid on the other end explains that our request for connection never went through. I watch Dad haul in pieces of the bed, the chest of drawers, suitcases near bursting. The hold music is jazz piano, tinkly little riffs sending me to sleep. The kid finally comes back on the line. Sorry sir, we can’t do anything today. We’ll have your power on by tomorrow afternoon. Have a nice night. Click, tone.
We navigate through the darkness with a lone flashlight, tripping on unfamiliar stairs, the smell of carpet shampoo in every room. We don’t bother to build the beds. Dad vanishes into the spare room with a sleeping bag while she curls up beside me on our mattress and falls asleep before I can say goodnight.
The screeching of the possums and the endless cycle of tyres on tarmac keeps me awake for hours.
* * *
The shock of the cold shower puts every muscle into panic mode, making me shrink into a pathetic ball, shying away from the water. Dad hammers on the door. Stop being a girl, he shouts. This is good for you. It’s brisk! I scrub under my arms as quickly as I can and towel off. In the morning light through the bathroom window I look like I’ve been drowned and resurrected, all bloodshot eyes and loose skin.
First order of business is breakfast. We lock up and wander out into the city with map in hand, taking random turns and marking them with biro. We find a coffee shop down a laneway that serves scrambled egg on toast under shadowy eaves. Dad stirs his coffee with long, slow sweeps. Australians are lazy, he explains. What everyone calls a Latte is actually a Café Latte, meaning coffee with milk. To ask for a Latte is to ask for a glass of milk. Australians are always cutting corners. I feel it would be impolite to point out that he was born and bred in Sydney, so I eat my toast in silence while she takes small forkfuls of lemon tart. She smiles at the taste. Her tongue, small and pink, keeps darting out to lick crumbs from her lips. Every time I see this I fall in love again.
Back at the house we tear into the boxes, unpacking the sheets and cutlery and the fruit bowl and my paintbrushes and the Asimov collection hidden underneath the frypan. We shout every time we find something interesting, odds and ends long forgotten that seem new again. The packing tape piles up in the corner like Christmas wrapping. She unearths a porcelain teapot, and sets it aside on the kitchen counter, promising that as soon as the power is on she’ll brew a cup of tea. The sun drops below the horizon as we assemble the bed, Dad wielding a spanner in each hand, the frame coming together into a black steel skeleton. When it is finished he produces warm beers to celebrate.
We drink together in the back garden under the shade of a Japanese maple, and the flies leave us alone. Someone somewhere is cooking lamb. We breathe in the barbecue smell and play guess-the-herbs, trying for thyme, oregano, five-spice mix. I drink a second beer as the sun sets.
She tries the main switches again when we come in from the garden. There is no response from the lights, the fans, our new microwave. I call the company. There is a different kid on the line, but the story is the same. So very sorry, but the order for your house never went out to the service trucks. No, there’s nothing we can do. Only if it was a life or death emergency situation. Do you have anywhere to stay tonight? No? I’m very sorry sir. Very sorry. Click.
* * *
Dad heads off to find a pizza place while I knock on the neighbour’s door. A shirtless man with muscles like a club bouncer answers, peering through the flyscreen with suspicious eyes. What?
I’m from next door, I explain. Just moved in. We’ve got no power for the second night now. I was wondering, do you have any candles? He ushers me into the light with a toothy smile. There is a woman in a flimsy nightgown in the kitchen pouring coffee, big breasts swinging behind satin. Did I hear you say you have no power? she says. Do you need a torch?
The man is digging through a cupboard. They did the same to us, he says. Charged us through the arse for the urgent connection, too. He finds a packet of tea lights and hands them over. Got a lighter? he asks, and when I shake my head he pulls one from his pocket.
I say thankyou, not really knowing what else to say. The man grins and shakes my hand and wishes me good luck. Do you want me to bring back the ones we don’t use? No, no, he says. Keep them. The woman smiles and wishes me a good night. Come back sometime!
Back in the house she is waiting in the dark. I light the tea lights and scatter them across the table and she kisses me softly. She tastes of raspberry. We sit there in the flickering candlelight and try to make out each other’s features until Dad knocks on the door, and then we share out the pizza and eat in silence.
We sit in a circle and light more tea lights. She has a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon from the late nineties, and pours three glasses. We each have a book, and we read as best we can in the glow, careful not to burn the pages. We speak cautiously, as if the quiet of the night is something tangible that can be broken irretrievably. The wine is deep and solemn.
The wicks are beginning to burn down. Dad is nearing the last page in his book. This is what people used to do, he says. Read by candlelight, or play cards, or talk, and when the light was gone they went to bed. Then electricity took away the night. He claps his book shut and the closest candle gutters out. The stairs creak under his feet. Don’t you two be up too late, he says, and closes the door of the spare room behind him. It is just her and I, alone in the living room, and the spots of flame dance like will-o-wisps.
We make love twice. The first time is too fast, but the second time is slow and delicate and perfect, and I can feel her heart beating against my skin like something inside her knocking very gently, saying hello, letting me know it is alive. I kiss her eyelids and dream.
* * *
The second cold shower is somehow worse, but I tough it out, shivering and mewling with water in my eyes. The towel is damp and clammy from the day before. She is still asleep when I go downstairs for breakfast, stretched out on the bed like a cheetah draped over a branch. Dad is already at the table, reading. I peel a banana, my fingers clumsy and useless. The sun has lit the length of the room, and the hairs on my arms stand up as it plays over my skin like warm breath.
The living room is still a jungle of boxes and bubble wrap, the TV sitting useless by the front door, a bookshelf standing empty. One lonely spatula has escaped underneath the wall heater. Dad tells me I have a big job ahead, and I nod. He goes back to his book.
My phone rings, making me jump. A woman is calling to tell me that the electricity is being connected today, checking that there is clear access to the meter box, that the main switch is in the off position. She speaks as if dealing with a child, reiterating every detail three times. I want to blast her but hold my tongue. The power will be on by noon, she swears. No later than midday. Upstairs there is muffled swearing; she is taking her morning shower.
Dad finishes his book, places it face down on the table. Any good? I ask. He nods. What’s it called? He shows me the cover: Childhood’s End. That’s strangely appropriate, I say. You know, helping us move into our first house. You’re off tomorrow and we have to grow up on our own.
Not really, he says. It’s about aliens.
* * *
The neighbours pass by at lunch. I wave at them through the window and they wave back. We are together, sitting about the dining table. She is eating a tuna sandwich and I am humming Adiago for Strings. The birds outside chirrup soft tunes as they chase each other about the maple. Dad drinks his beer at a languid pace, savouring each mouthful. The air is very still. Her hand rests on my knee, and I can smell the lavender growing by the front door and the moisturiser she uses, aloe rubbed into her soft palms.
We sit there a while.
She finishes her sandwich and goes to wash the dishes in cold water, and then there is a rumble outside, tyres grinding. I look out the window; a man in a reflective jacket and sunglasses steps out of a white van, checks a clipboard and vanishes around the side of the house. We wait in collective silence. The man returns, scribbles on his clipboard, climbs back into the van and drives away.
Try the lights, says Dad.
We flip the main switch in the fusebox and the TV blares static. The neon tube over the sink flickers four times and pops into life. The microwave blinks 00:00 in red, demanding our attention.
We stare at each other for a moment, and then she cheers. Thank Christ, she says. I’m making tea.
* * *
Dad is cooking the last dinner. His suitcase is already packed and in the car, along with his sleeping bag and book. I’ll just grab my toothbrush in the morning and vanish, he tells us. Leave you two to clean up your own messes. He tests the spaghetti and declares it perfect. And he’s right.
When the meal is done we stack the bowls and sit together on the carpet. The news is on; a bombing, a celebrity death, a celebrity marriage, a political scandal. Long shadows spread across the carpet and climb up the walls as the sun descends behind the houses across the road. Dad flicks on the lights; they are magnesium bright, leaving white spots dancing behind my eyelids. Isn’t that better? Dad says. I look at the back of my hand under the light. It seems washed out, paper thin, as if I could tear it in two. The air is cold, and I shiver. I look up and see Dad do the same.
It is she who turns off the TV, who fetches the candles and flicks the switches and then lights the candles one by one, and the flames dance and curl in her eyes. We cluster around the table, and hold out our hands above the little tongues of fire and feel the warmth seeping back into our skin. We can barely see the far wall of the room, but we can see each other, and for the moment that seems enough.
The candles take a very long time to burn down.
* * *
Dad leaves in the morning, waving out the window as he spins his tyres in the gravel driveway. Then he is gone, and the engine echoes down the street as he heads back to the place where I grew up, the house now empty bar Mum and himself, a house now left very quiet. I wonder if he will miss having me about; whether the rituals of making my sandwiches and washing my socks was something he had grown to enjoy. I’ll ask him one day.
Inside, the kettle is boiling. We sip our tea in the garden. I have unpacked the radio, and it is playing Top 40 tunes. She reminds me that I need to go job hunting. Thankyou dear, I hadn’t forgotten. The tea is bitter without sugar, but that makes it more honest. She kisses me on the forehead. Our house, she says. Finally ours.
I pack away the candles under the kitchen bench along with the lighter, and measure up the space where the fridge will fit when it arrives. The phone will become active within the next few days, and the ADSL line shortly after that, and everyone wants my bank details. It’s not simple, this business of putting together a house in the real world.
I hear the tinkle of glass on glass.
She is in the living room, pouring out the last of the Cab Sav. Join me? I say yes, and her fingers trace down my chest as I sip. Just us, she says.
Just us, and the lights to guide us through the night.
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