Demet inclined her head towards the mob in front of the television. �The teams are marching into the arena!� she shouted.
They both squeezed back into the booth. Sitting in the far corner again, he couldn�t see the television at all.
�Will it be the Australians first?�
Dan couldn�t look at Demet or Luke. He knew their eyes would be on him.
�No.� He growled out the word. Then, apologetically, his tone softened; he was aware he had startled Katie. �The Greek team always comes out first, and the host nation comes out last. That�s how it works.�
�Fuck me,� Leanne exclaimed as she reached for her tobacco pouch. �This circus is going to go all night.�
Dan adored Leanne at that moment, her surliness, that she wasn�t impressed. He�d have to make more of an effort with her, be more friendly and agreeable.
He held his drink in both hands. He took a gulp, knowing he should be sipping, taking it slow, but he couldn�t. The syrupy drink warmed him, made him feel calm.
He drank and listened to the others talk. University was still at the centre of their conversation, but Dan didn�t understand how it could be that there was no mention of study, of classes or of books. It was the world around university that animated them, and he didn�t know anything about that world. So he concentrated on what they were saying; not its meaning, just its sound. That way he didn�t have to listen to the cheers, the euphoria in the pub and the delirium on the screen, he didn�t have to be conscious of that world at all. So he took in sound: that Leanne�s voice was nasal, that she breathed through her mouth as if she had a cold. And Katie�s tones were hushed, fragile, her words fell like feathers and Dan had to lean in to hear her. As for Luke, he spoke confidently, with no trace of the old stutter; he had a pleasing low register marred only by a propensity to monotony: You�ve always had a pompous side, thought Dan wickedly. You like the sound of your own voice. And Demet, she was still strident in delivery and pitch; what had changed was that she didn�t swallow the ends of sentences as she used to. University had trained her out of that.
Dan reached for his empty glass. �Another round?�
Leanne was the only one with an empty glass; the others all shook their heads. Dan walked to the bar, looking straight ahead but above the line of the television. The bartender smiled as she took his order but didn�t move her attention from the screen, even as she poured the beer and mixed Dan�s drink.
�Fuck me,� said Dan, �this circus is going to go all night.�
The woman was no longer smiling. �Fifteen dollars,� she snapped, her eyes still fixed on the television.
When he got back to the table, Katie was talking about living overseas. �I�d love to do my master�s in the UK. But I�d have to get a scholarship to do that and that�s pretty hard.�
�You�re pretty smart,� Luke interjected, and then added, reaching for her hand under the table, �And pretty, period.�
�Fuck pretty,� said Demet. �Katie is beautiful.�
Leanne was rolling cigarettes, one for herself and one for Demet. �Europe is Disneyland,� she said. �I only want to travel in Asia. I want to take Demet to Thailand, don�t I?�
�Please, take me, let me be your kept woman.�
�So you�ve been to Europe?� Katie asked.
Leanne nodded, licking the edge of her cigarette paper. �I took a year off after school, went through Europe, west and east, but then I came back through Vietnam and Thailand and I loved that. That was real.� She handed the rolled cigarette to Demet. �Have you been to Asia?�
Katie shook her head. �Nah. I mean, my background is Chinese but, you know, three generations back now. I�m pretty much bog Aussie Chinese.� She made a self-deprecating face, and Dan thought she was pretty, it was the right word for her. She was light, delicate, fragile as a sparrow.
�Luke wants to take me to Vietnam,� she went on. �And to Greece.�
�Why not?� Luke shot out. �We�ve got places to stay in both countries. You�ll love them both.� He tapped Leanne�s tobacco pouch. �May I?�
�Help yourself.�
Dan was reeling. He�d never known Luke to smoke. Luke hated smoking. Dan sipped from his glass, looked down at the ice in the tawny liquid. He was lost in this conversation about travelling, the ease with which the four of them could imagine flight and passage, the matter-of-fact way they had of claiming the world.
The other three had gone outside to smoke and he was conscious of the silence that had fallen between himself and Katie. He wanted her to talk, to drown out the television, the joy and pride of the crowd.
�Do you want to travel, Danny?�
She had slipped into calling him Danny. He wished he could tell her: �That name doesn�t belong to me, it belongs to someone else.� But that would mean explaining. And he couldn�t bear that, he wasn�t brave enough for that.
She was smiling, waiting patiently for his reply.
�Yeah, I guess.� He shuddered, wanting to kick himself for the inanity of his answer. Once, not so long ago, he had assumed travel, he had felt entitled to it, in the same way the others had been talking about it only a few minutes before. But it was supposed to come from his talent. Water and swimming were going to take him there�he would see every city in the world, roam the five continents. His talent was going to be his wings. Except it had failed him. He hadn�t been good enough.
And now, where would he go? What could he offer? Who would want him?
She was waiting for more. He could tell her that he�d been to Japan. But to tell her that would be to let her know about the other Danny and he didn�t know how to do that, to recover that youth. He couldn�t conceive of where that boy had gone.
Maybe she knew already. Luke�s hands all over her body, her hands on Luke, maybe he�d told her everything�all was nakedness and all was revealed; it was only perverted virgin creeps like himself who lived in subterranean worlds. She must have known, she must have known every pathetic shameful thing there was to know about him.
For the first time Dan looked her straight in the eyes, looking for signs of condolence. He was sure he could see it, in the velvety softness of her dark eyes, the tinge of sadness there. He could see the pity.
Behind him a cheer had gone up. A masculine voice yelled out, �Go Spain!� The applause for the Spanish team was loud, but then another masculine voice cut through with �Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi�. It was followed by derisive laughter, but the chant went up: �Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi.�
Katie�s hand was lying on his wrist again and he snatched his arm away.
�Danny, what�s wrong?�
�Nothing�s wrong,� he said. �God, I hate that chant.�
She nodded, agreeing. His abrupt movement had unsettled her, she was nervously scratching her elbow. �That�s why I want to leave and go overseas for a period. I hate all this nationalistic bullshit�it�s so disingenuous, just a cover for rank racism.� She let out a forced, weary sigh.
The confection of her outrage, the smugness of her righteousness, Dan found pretentious.
�Sometimes this country makes me sick,� she continued. �It literally sickens me.�
Demet said that, Luke had said that: This country, it makes me sick. As if they knew there was somewhere else they could go where there wouldn�t be nausea, somewhere else they could find home.
She was talking non-stop now, complaining the way Demet did all the time, about how small Australia was�a big country with a small soul�and she was deriding racism, cursing the government. Dan�s glass was empty and he wondered how he could interrupt her to ask if she�d like another. Dan knew he should make his next a beer; the bourbon had seeped through every part of him, his thoughts and his body were woozy, warm. Katie couldn�t shut up now, never-ending complaints fell from her lips and he was thinking, when you put a finger up a woman�s cunt, was it hot there?, it had to be wet and sticky ther
e, and he was nodding as she spoke, the way he nodded when his father ranted about the ills of the world or when Demet went on about how everything was fucked here, and so he just nodded, thinking, I could put my hand up her skirt and slide my finger inside her panties and that would wipe the look of pity off her face.
�Here, mate.� Luke was smiling as he handed Dan another bourbon and Coke. Demet and Leanne fell back into the booth, and Dan slurped greedily from the glass, letting the liquid soothe his tongue and his throat, letting the liquid soak through him.
Demet was smiling at him across the table, Luke had his arm stretched across the bench, folding in Katie, reaching out to Dan. They were thinking he was that other Danny, they didn�t know how sick he was, what evil he had become.
A roar of celebration rang from the television and it was answered in the pub by good-natured jeering. All of them in the booth stopped talking, aware of the motion of a current once more, this one with an elemental tidal force drawing everyone towards the screen. All those bodies were pushing forward, and it was as if their table had been cast adrift, quarantined from the rest of the crowd. Luke was downcast, examining his beer closely, Leanne was playing with the tobacco pouch, Katie had her hands between her knees, and Demet was fixated on Dan. Dan knew that they were caught up in the current and they wanted to be experiencing what everyone else was�they wanted to be celebrating, having fun. But they couldn�t, they mustn�t, because Dan was there, the loser was with them, and Leanne knew it, and even Katie who had only just met him tonight, she knew it, that Dan was so lacking in courage, so weak, so pathetic, so pitiful that they had to protect him from that tide.
He emptied his glass in one swill, wiped his mouth. He stood up. �Come on, let�s go and watch.�
He used his elbows, his shoulders, the weight of his whole body to battle through the throng. He shoved a man aside, and the man turned back ready to fight but one look at Dan�s face told him to shut his mouth.
Dan stopped behind a short young woman. Luke�s head was bobbing over Dan�s shoulder.
It was the Yugoslavians marching now, the athletes in white shirts and shiny blue suits. �They look pretty hot, even I�d go for some of those guys.� Dan recognised Leanne�s nasal voice and saw that the three women were behind him. He moved aside and Demet, Katie and Leanne gratefully squeezed in between him and Luke.
He watched the screen but he didn�t see bodies and he didn�t see a crowd; he translated form into shadow and movement, the flicker and sparkle of thousands of flashbulbs were waves that shimmered and diffused the light. When Dan was a child his father had read him the stories of Aladdin and the Thousand and One Nights, and he recalled the stories now, those tales of unimaginable treasure hidden in caves, how the revelation of such magnificence and beauty would strike the beholder blind. Watching the lights spray out and splinter, he didn�t see electricity, he saw shining diamonds, rubies, sapphires and emeralds, saw amber and opal, all the colours of the world splitting night into day. The people on the screen weren�t human forms but jewelled shapes gliding across it. He wouldn�t make them human, wouldn�t delineate faces, for to see faces was to see joy, to see triumph. Demet had grabbed his hand, was squeezing it tight. He couldn�t let it go, but he didn�t want her touch.
The last of the guest teams was marching behind the IOC flag, four dancing youths from East Timor, who didn�t have a country yet, and the bodies around him jostled and united in one joyous roar. Even Leanne was cheering, even she had a fist raised in the air. The noise from the television and the noise from all around him, writhing around him, through him, pulling him in so tight that he was struggling for air�they were cheering, one body one voice, and the noise was one ecstatic release. The basketballer was proudly holding the Australian flag and it was Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi and his ears couldn�t hear and his eyes couldn�t see and he had let go of Demet�s hand and had his hands cupped over his ears and was gulping for air, because all of his work and all of his training and his youth and his dreaming, his entire self; he should have been there. He opened his eyes and there, in close-up, was Kieren Perkins, waving to the fevered crowd, and as the camera began to pan across the Australian team, that group of golden boys and golden girls, he knew that he had to inhale, he had to open his lungs, and so he turned and was fighting for breath, pushing and shoving and kicking and elbowing until he had broken through the deafening mass, and was on the footpath, in the open air. There wasn�t a car in sight, there was no one on the street�not one other being to share his humiliation. He was alone and wretched in the world.
He was alone. He sucked in gulps of air.
He put out a hand, steadied himself on the wall. It sickened him how much hate he had inside him. All I am, thought Dan, is hate.
�Danny�you OK, mate?�
Dan spun around, facing Luke. �How many times have I got to tell you, cunt? It�s Dan, not Danny. I�m Dan!�
Luke stepped back, his face drained of colour, aghast. He looked so miserable Dan wondered whether he was going to cry. Dan told himself that was how he could do it, how he could snatch the pity from their eyes, rip it away from them. Luke no longer looked like a man; he was again the callow schoolboy who would do anything for Danny, who worshipped Danny.
Except that he wasn�t that Danny. That Danny didn�t exist anymore.
Demet had also come out and she wrapped an arm around Dan, brought his head near to hers, so they were touching. He started to pull away, but relented. There were no words and she knew that.
But Luke, of course, the reader, the swot, the prefect and straight-A student, he had to use words, he had to talk. �Let�s all go back to Katie�s place, it�s just around the corner.� He offered Dan a hesitant smile. �I promise, no telly.�
Dan shrugged, he didn�t care. Just as long as there was more alcohol. He wondered how he could have denied himself it for so long. It deadened thought and anaesthetised sensation�it gave you the most delectable numbness. He would drink till he passed out. On Katie�s floor, on the street�he didn�t care.
�Katie got grog?�
He noticed the look exchanged between his two friends.
Demet squashed the butt of her cigarette on the tiled wall of the pub. �I�ll grab the others. There�s a bottle-o down the road.�
But Luke spoke. �I�m really glad you chose to be with us, mate.� He placed a hand on Dan�s shoulder. �I was sure you�d be at Taylor�s party tonight. It means a lot to me that you�re here instead.�
At first Dan didn�t quite hear the words. Or he heard them but they didn�t quite make sense, were just more sounds in the night. Was Luke slurring, was he drunk? But the words began to shift into a pattern and the pattern began to form a sentence and the sentence stunned him. �What are you talking about?�
Once again, Luke looked like that frightened schoolboy.
Dan repeated, �What the fuck are you talking about?�
�Sorry, Danny�Dan, I�m sorry, I thought you knew about Taylor�s big party tonight. I saw him at uni this week, he told me about it and I just assumed you would know.�
And Dan said, quietly, smiling now, �Yeah, of course, the party. Shit, yeah, I�d forgotten about that.� He made sure to grin, to hold his body straight, to breathe in and breathe out as if everything were normal, as if night wasn�t day and the rending of the vault of the sky had not happened. Luke and Martin, at university together, in their world together, the world he didn�t belong to.
He smiled, he stood straight, he breathed normally. But inside, deep inside him, he understood what the songs meant, that the songs told the truth when they referred to a heart breaking.
He scooped Luke up in a wrestling tackle, held him from behind, whispered hoarsely in his ear, �Of course I was going to choose to be with you and Demet tonight. Of course I was.� He let go of Luke. He thought, I could just tell him, I could just reach out to my friend and I could just say sorry.
He thought of Ta
ylor and Luke at uni together, in that other world together.
Mustering all his will, all his strength, he faked a long, bored yawn. He forced cheer into his voice. �Mate, I�m pretty zonked, I think I�ll just go home. I really think it�s time I headed home.�
He ignored Luke�s protests, backed away, then turned and broke into a run. He could hear Luke calling after him, he knew that his friend had given chase. But Dan was running so hard that his feet were pounding the earth.
He ran. There were no cars, no taxis, no people on the streets. He ran like an automaton, without thinking, without being. The opening ceremony had been a hydrogen bomb; it had emptied the world of people. He was the only creature left alive. And he had no idea where he was, he couldn�t see a street sign.
Across the road an electrical goods store had three televisions on display, all on, all showing the opening ceremony.
Dan crossed the street, and looked through the iron bars at the biggest screen. The ceremony was still unfolding but there was no sound, and everything on the screen�the crowd and the athletes, everyone and everything�seemed puny. It was no longer the overwhelming spectacle it had seemed to be in the pub. It is nothing to be afraid of, he told himself. It was just sound and light and movement.
The stadium was in darkness and a woman in a wheelchair held the Olympic torch aloft. Dan knew that the old lady was Betty Cuthbert and the woman pushing her wheelchair was Raelene Boyle. �Cuthbert,� whispered Dan, �you were at Melbourne and Rome; and Boyle, you won silver in Mexico City.� He stretched out a finger, as if to touch the screen. �I know how you were cheated in Montreal,� he continued whispering. �I think I can imagine what it cost you not to go to Moscow.�
He watched the play of shadow and light.
When Shane Gould was passed the torch Dan crossed his arms so tightly across his chest that his lungs contracted. The woman was jogging around the track, between two tiers of mutely cheering volunteers and officials, but she was staring ahead, her pace constant, the torch held high. Dan was mouthing silently, to the beat of her feet hitting the track: Munich, two hundred metre individual medley�gold; two hundred metre freestyle�gold; four hundred metre freestyle�gold; eight hundred metre freestyle�silver; one hundred metre freestyle�bronze. He watched Shane Gould hand the torch to another athlete, and for a moment he didn�t know who it was. Then he recalled the face, Debbie Flintoff-King, the athlete who won the four hundred metre hurdles in Seoul, the 1988 Olympics, the first Olympics he remembered seeing as a kid.