Taming the Beast

  He looked at her for several seconds. His squint emphasised the bags under his eyes, making him look thirty. ‘Something’s changed, hasn’t it? Between us?’

  ‘I don’t know. I… Yes, I think so. Maybe. I feel–’ Sarah noticed that Mike was heading back with their drinks. She sighed and leant in closer to Jamie. ‘We’ll finish this later. Promise.’

  Mike sat down beside Sarah, placing a tray with four glasses of bourbon in front of her and promptly sticking his hand up her skirt. ‘Get those into you.’

  Sarah drank, and talked to Jamie about nothing that mattered and let Mike put his hand inside her underwear. She remembered that she used to enjoy this kind of thing, but she couldn’t remember why. Mike’s finger was rough and insistent; he made no allowance for her lack of arousal, or for the fact that Jamie was sitting right beside her. She wondered how it made Jamie feel to know that his friend’s index finger was dragging at her flesh, and she wondered if he knew that she wanted it to stop but couldn’t seem to raise the energy to end it.

  At some stage Shelley and Jess joined them. Sarah was glad because it meant Mike removed his finger from her body. Shelley started talking about the problems she’d been having getting Bianca to feed properly. Sarah was disgusted by the discussion, what with the cracked nipples and infected milk ducts, but Jamie reached across the table and patted Shelley’s arm and said, you’re doing a great job, Shell, and Shelley smiled and leant across and kissed him. An open mouthed, wet kiss. Sarah couldn’t help noticing how big Shelley’s breasts were, and how pretty she looked now that the last of the pregnancy weight had dropped off.

  Sarah felt like the bad girl in an eighties teen flick. The girl with big hair and a tight shirt who seduces the nice girl’s boyfriend but loses him in the end, because she’s shallow and tacky and no match for a sweet girl with good morals and freshly scrubbed skin.

  She touched Jamie’s arm, looked him in the eye. ‘Come play the pokies?’

  He nodded, and after kissing Shelley for what felt like a long time, followed Sarah into the pub. Once inside, Sarah grabbed his hand and dragged him past the poker machines and into the back wine bar. This was the most private area in the pub, because it was poorly lit and had no pool tables or poker machines. Apart from a handful of lonely drunks and the barmaid, Sarah and Jamie were the only ones there. Sarah pushed him into a booth in the corner furthest from the door and slid in beside him.

  ‘This is better, heh?’

  He shrugged. ‘Better for what?’

  ‘For us. No one can see us in here.’

  ‘Right. Great.’

  Sarah was chilled by his voice. ‘What’s wrong?’

  He tapped the table with his fingertips and did not look at her.

  ‘Jamie? What? Have I done something to upset you?’

  Jamie snorted. ‘You’re unbelievable.’

  Sarah was totally lost. Half an hour ago she had been confessing to an unprecedented bout of unasked for monogamy, and he had been all cute and warm and glassy eyed. What had turned him so cold all of a sudden? She placed her hands over his, stopping his irritating drumming. ‘Can you give me a hint?’

  He snorted again, shaking off her hands and placing his in his pockets. ‘I just watched you get fingered for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘Oh, that.’

  ‘Do you know how that makes me feel?’

  Sarah put her head on his shoulder. ‘Yeah. I’m sorry.’

  ‘You told me you’re not sleeping with him anymore.’

  ‘No, I told you that I haven’t slept with him lately. I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it ever again. And I didn’t say I wouldn’t let him touch me.’

  Jamie sighed. ‘Do you have to do it in front of me?’

  ‘Do you have to pash on with Shelley in front of me?’

  ‘She’s my wife.’

  ‘I hate it that she’s so pretty, and she’s got those big tits, and she gets to sleep with you every night. I never get to sleep with you. And you never stare at my tits.’

  ‘You’re drunk.’

  ‘I told you that. Now are you going to let me give you a proper birthday kiss or what?’

  Jamie’s lips were stiff, his embrace reluctant, but Sarah persisted, stroking the back of his neck and nibbling on his mouth until she felt his body respond. He kissed her deeply and at length, stopping only when she slipped her hand inside the waistband of his pants. ‘Naughty,’ he said.

  ‘Come back to my place?’

  He sighed. ‘I can’t. Bianca is home with–’

  ‘Right.’ She straightened up.

  ‘Don’t be like that.’

  Sarah lit a cigarette. ‘Like what?’

  ‘You’re the one who didn’t want to be committed. You’re the one who insisted I make a go of it with Shelley.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘Unless… This thing between us… Maybe it’s time to renegotiate.’

  ‘Meaning what?’

  Jamie took her free hand and brought it to his lips. ‘You said before that things are changing. I think that you want more, and I know I do. I think we should talk about that.’

  It was what she’d been thinking, sort of. But hearing him say it, seeing the intensity in his eyes, she froze inside. She could never do it.

  ‘I think we’re doing fine as we are.’

  Jamie dropped her hand, pressed his lips together and nodded. ‘I’ll leave her, Sarah. If you’ll have me, I’ll leave her.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Sarah, I–’

  ‘No.’

  His lips began quivering. ‘But you said things were changing. You said you wanted things to be different.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Jamie, but I wasn’t saying anything like that. Nothing’s changed. You misunderstood.’

  He nodded again, and looked her full in the face. His eyes reminded her of the homeless man with one leg who begged for metho money outside the steakhouse. If he had stared at her like that for two seconds more she might have caved. But he didn’t. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, and pushed past her, his legs tangling up in hers, his crotch in her face. ‘I’ve got to get Shelley back. Bianca will need feeding.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll see you soon?’

  ‘Yeah, whatever,’ he said, and was gone.

  Sarah headed out to the main bar. She intended to get drunk enough to not care about what had just happened. Drunk enough to not care who she took home to her miserable little flat. Drunk enough to forget how pathetic she was.

  The floor surrounding the two-up tables was so packed that she had to hold her cigarette above her head so as not to accidentally burn someone. Even then it was risky, because her outstretched arm was at the level of many people’s faces. It was worth the trouble though; the mix of sweat and noise and cigarette smoke was comforting. It reminded her that she was a girl who liked the crush of bodies and the stickiness of strangers. Jamie would hate it in here. He would have an asthma attack.

  ‘Really, Sarah,’ a voice said directly into her ear ‘it is extremely inconsiderate of you to smoke in such an airless space.’

  Sarah knew that voice. Knew it because it had been echoing in her head for eight long years. Knew it because it was the goddamn soundtrack to her life. It sounded like blood rushing in her ears. No, that was real, the blood rushing, pulse slamming, heart thumping. All those sounds were real, and incredibly, so was his voice.

  In the split second it took to turn around, she braced herself for the onslaught of seeing him. ‘Fuck,’ she said, as her internal organs liquefied and her muscles went to jelly. There he was. Standing right in front of her, close enough to touch. ‘Fucking hell.’

  ‘No need to curse, Sarah. Why don’t you smoke your filthy cancer stick outside?’ He jerked his head toward the door.

  Sarah stared. His eyes were exactly as she remembered them: so green that strangers suspected contact lenses; so knowing that she felt discovered, revealed, stripped naked in every sense. She said to him once your eyes are so green, and he sai
d not as green as your heart.

  ‘Come on. Snap out of it.’ He walked towards the door, and she followed him but did not feel able to snap out of anything. She could barely breathe.

  He stopped walking when they got to the bottom of the outside stairs, so Sarah stopped too. She tried to think of something remarkable to say, but couldn’t think of anything except how when he’d said her name before it had sounded as though he was the first person to ever say it out loud. She wanted to go back to that moment so that she could hear him say it again: Really, Sarah.

  ‘Well, look at you.’ He shook his head as though he was a long lost relation who hadn’t seen her since she was three feet tall. He sighed, smiled, ran a hand through his hair. ‘Little Sarah Clark.’

  ‘Mr Carr,’ she said.

  He laughed, revealing small white teeth. ‘Are we at school?’

  ‘Oh. Duh.’ Sarah slapped her forehead. She felt fourteen.

  ‘It’s Daniel, please. And actually, it’s not Mr anymore, it’s Dr.’

  ‘Oooh! I’m so impressed. Dr Carr,’ Sarah teased, to cover up the fact that she was, in fact, way too impressed with him. It wasn’t the title. Everything about him impressed her, his speech and hair, his bearing and eyes and teeth and clothes. He was so fucking impressive that Sarah wondered why he would want to waste his time talking to her at all. Why was he even here?

  He read her mind, as he had always done. He told her he had moved back to Sydney about a year ago, that he lived in Rosehill and was the headmaster of a boys’ school in Parramatta.

  ‘Fuck!’ she said and they both laughed. ‘I thought headmasters were all old and wrinkly.’

  ‘They are.’

  ‘So you can’t be one. You’re too beautiful.’

  He reddened, and for a split second, Sarah saw him as he used to be: red-faced, sweaty, tormented. She saw herself beneath him.

  ‘And you… well, I didn’t think you could get any prettier, but…’ He touched her upper arm. ‘Are you here alone?’

  ‘What?’ She stared at his hand. Large and warm and soft. His nails were manicured and perfectly clean. There was no residual, deep down dirt in the cracks and pores of his hand like most of the men around here. How would his skin taste? Like salt or chalk or blood?

  ‘You’re here alone?’

  ‘Oh. No, I came with…’ Sarah couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything except the hand on her arm. There was something she should be noticing or remembering or saying.

  ‘A boyfriend?’ His finger tips pressed into the flesh at the top of her arm. She wished she was fatter so there was more for him to dig into. She wished she was flabby so he would grab a handful of her instead of this little pinch.

  ‘Friends. I came with friends.’

  ‘Do you…?’ He rubbed his left eye. Sarah wanted to pluck his hand away and suck his fingers, one by one. ‘Do you have a boyfriend?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That’s wonderful.’

  ‘Yes, it is. How’s your wife?’

  ‘We’re divorced.’

  ‘Oh.’ A large knot in her stomach began to loosen. She hadn’t even known it was there until she felt the relief of its unravelling. ‘I don’t know what to say. I would tell you how incredibly happy I am, but I suppose that would be inappropriate.’

  ‘No.’ Daniel smiled. ‘That would be a lovely thing to say.’

  ‘I’m incredibly happy that you are divorced. That you’re divorced and you’re here.’

  ‘You really are pleased to see me then?’ he said, wrinkles springing up around his eyes and across his brow. ‘I thought you might hate me.’

  She placed her palm on his forehead to flatten out the creases. New creases. Creases caused by events unknown, time unshared. ‘I hated you for leaving me.’

  He took her hand and held it. Pressed. Released. ‘I’m sorry. I thought it would be… I’m sorry, Sarah.’

  ‘It’s fine,’ Sarah said, and now that he was back, it was.

  He looked down at her, his lips apart, the tip of his tongue protruding from between his teeth. ‘You have the most beautiful skin I have ever seen. I just want to keep touching it.’

  ‘Since when did you ask for permission?’

  He closed his eyes and stroked the flesh of her upper arm. When he looked at her again his eyes were glassy. ‘Did I mention how breathtakingly beautiful you are?’

  Three men in bowling whites interrupted them. They were friends of Daniel’s. Or colleagues. Or something. Sarah couldn’t concentrate on what he was saying. He was so respectable and charming, but when he shook hands with the men, Sarah remembered that her first orgasm was courtesy of that very same hand. His voice made her want to close her eyes and take off all her clothes. She felt dizzy, like some Mills and Boon heroine who faints every time the handsome, powerfully muscled hero comes close. All the blood in her body had rushed to her genitals, leaving her head filled with air.

  Daniel had just said something funny. Sarah knew this because the men were laughing. Sarah felt bad that she hadn’t heard what he said, because she didn’t remember him as being particularly funny. He was always too earnest to be funny. Maybe he had changed. It had been eight years.

  The men patted Daniel’s back, nodded at Sarah, and went back to wherever it was they had come from. Daniel turned to her and started explaining who those men were and what they did and why he had to be nice to them. Something about an Old Boy’s network and an antiquated school administration system. Fucking hell, thought Sarah, let him keep talking all night, all week, forever.

  ‘You’re not listening to a word I’m saying.’

  ‘I am listening. Not really comprehending. Sorry.’

  He took both her hands in his. ‘Not your fault. I don’t think I’m talking sense. I’ve thought about you every day for so many years, and now you’re in front of me I can’t make a single sentence come out the way I want it to.’

  His hands were hot and smooth and she loved them. She remembered how aroused she would get watching him teach the class, the way he used his hands to make a point, punching the air or drawing little circles with his fingers. She loved that everyone was looking at his hands, and his hands knew the secret of what was under her clothes. And Sarah knew his secrets too. She knew every tendon and freckle and muscle hidden underneath his suit, except back then it hadn’t been suits, it had been jeans and t-shirts and a black leather jacket that he sometimes let Sarah wear on the drive home.

  She could hardly bear the thought that with age he may have changed in ways that had nothing to do with wardrobe. That maybe there were wrinkles or sunspots she had not seen, or maybe his muscles had slackened or tightened. Had he put on weight? It was hard to tell with all the clothes he was wearing, but his waist looked a little thicker than the one she used to circle with her arms. He could have a new scar somewhere, like the one she had across her back. She wanted to shine a light on him and taste, touch, pinch every part of him.

  ‘I’ve lost you again,’ he said, squeezing her hands harder than was necessary to get her attention. God, she remembered that too. The violence of those hands. The tendency to use more force when less would have worked just fine. The casual cruelty with which he would pinch or jab or scratch. The pleasure he took in making her cry and beg. She remembered that the last time she had seen him he almost killed her. She forgot what excuse she gave her parents for the condition she came home in; she remembered her grief when the last bruise faded and her body was restored to its unloved state.

  ‘Sarah?’ He squeezed hard enough to make her wince. ‘You’re making me very nervous. Say something.’

  ‘You’re crushing my hands.’

  ‘Oh!’ He dropped her hands, then quickly took them back and ran his fingers over her knuckles. ‘I forgot how small your bones are. I’ll have to be careful not to break you.’

  Too fucking late, Sarah thought. ‘Can you drive me home?’ she said.

  Daniel led her out to the car park. ‘I’ve been trying to fi
nd you ever since I got back to Sydney.’ He unlocked the door of a silver BMW and guided her into the passenger seat. ‘You moved out of home.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you’re not listed in the phone directory.’

  ‘Neither are you.’

  He smiled. ‘A school principal is the perfect target for prank calls. What’s your excuse?’

  ‘I have a thing about privacy.’

  ‘I see,’ Daniel said. ‘Is that why you’re being so reticent?’

  ‘It’s not reticence; it’s shock. And a bit of terror.’

  He didn’t speak again until they were on the road. ‘Do I scare you?’

  Sarah turned to him to answer and found herself slipping into a reverie again. What was it that made her unable to look away? He was not really handsome, not if handsome meant those dark, brooding soap opera types with swollen lips and scowling eyes. When she had first seen him she had thought he looked like Billy Idol, because his hair was blond and spiky and he wore a black leather jacket. That had been a first impression, but when she got up close she realised that he didn’t look like Billy Idol at all. He didn’t look like anybody. Everyone thought he did though, because he had a face and a body and a way of moving that made people think of movie stars or rock singers.

  ‘God, you’ve been terrified into silence.’

  ‘Something like that. When we’re together I go mental. I lapse into flights of fancy. I don’t recognise myself. That scares me.’

  ‘Do you know what scares me?’ Daniel glanced over at her, and then looked back at the road. ‘Living the rest of my life feeling as miserable as I have these last eight years. Living the rest of my life without the woman I love.’

  ‘Oh.’

  All she had ever wanted was for Mr Carr to return to her and confess his despair at being away from her and his need to have her now, always and forever. For him, only him, to say the words that so many men who didn’t matter had said. And all she could say was oh.

  He asked for her address, drove to her flat, walked her to the door and declined her invitation to come in. He didn’t kiss her, but he did press his palm to the side of her face for a long time.