Love and Other Perishable Items Read Online Free PDF Page B

calling from Brad’s place.
    “Oh, how is Brad?” I ask with considerable Tone.
    She balks, then recovers and says he is fine.
    “Well, that’s great, Michaela,” I say. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear that. Now why the fuck are you calling me?”
    She says she is still hoping we can be friends.
    Friends. Let me share with you, dear reader, or indeed anyone who will listen, why Michaela’s hope that we “can be friends” is a vain one.
    When I think about her life in Perth, I feel jealousy like a sickness. I can taste it in my mouth and feel it pulsing through every cell in my body. It expands my capillaries. It thuds in my ears. I don’t mean just jealous of Brad. That’s not casting the netnearly wide enough. I am jealous of her family: her parents, sisters, uncles, aunts and cousins, who see her all the time, who get to celebrate with her every Christmas and birthday. I am jealous of all her mates, who get to go for walks on the beach with her after class, who play soccer with her on Sundays, who drink with her at the session afterward, who come over to watch campy movies every Monday night. I’m jealous of the bus drivers whom she buys tickets off, for their moment of proximity when she dips her bus ticket into the ticket reader. I’m jealous of the salesclerks who get to sell her packs of chewing gum and newspapers, for the momentary greetings and brushes of skin when she hands over her money. I’m jealous of the hot water from the shower that slides over her skin and soaks into her hair. I’m jealous of the mirrors that reflect the brilliant brown warmth of her eyes. I’m jealous of the pillow on which she lays her cheek at night. Bastards, all of them. They have so much and I have nothing.
    Did I mention that I have Tom Waits playing as I write? I do. It’s certainly not hosing down the fire. And I’m not going to be wrapping this up anytime soon, let me tell you.
    Her shoulders. That collarbone.
    Brad gets to kiss her shoulders at will. He can have an all-you-can-kiss buffet of shoulders anytime he likes, and I can’t bear to think about it. But suddenly I can’t think of anything else.
    That’s why I can’t be friends with her—as she dared to suggest at the airport, and by letter, and now by phone. The gall of her! I really miss you, Chris. We were always such great mates, Chris. Let’s at least salvage one part of what we had, Chris . She’s just trying to salve her own conscience.
    How does she think it would work, this friendship gig? So, Michaela, my friend, my buddy, tell me, how did Brad fuck youlast night? Mmmm-hmmm, mmm-hm. Yes, and tell me more, old pal—tell me from the very beginning. ’Cause you know, mate, I just can’t stop visualizing a variety of scenarios. Were you sitting on the couch together watching TV after all the other roommates had straggled off to bed? Maybe you were curled up together on the couch and the program you were watching finished. As the credits rolled, he turned your beautiful face to his and kissed your soft, perfect lips. Maybe then he raised the remote up over your shoulder and turned off the TV. You climbed the stairs to his room with your arms about one another. Did he undress you on the bed, lying down, helping you struggle out of item by item of clothing, a painstaking but delicious process? Or maybe it was too cold for that and you both just quickly took your own clothes off standing up and then dived under the covers. No, come on, Michaela, you can tell me, we’re all friends here! Give me the details, go on! Think of me as one of the girls. What have I been up to? Um, let’s see now, bit of this, bit of that. Going to uni, going to work, jerking arhythmically like a fish on a jetty, suffocating in the vacuum left by your departure, having half-waking dreams about the time we made love for three days, hallucinating that your lips just touched my neck … The usual.
    So messy. Holding the pen is not as easy as it was. And I’m