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But what world had her phantom lover come from? May wondere
d before forcing her mind back to the more prosaic dilemma of eighteenth-century trading routes and their influence on the spread of Christianity.
May’s distraction continued all day—through the rest of her lectures, on the bus she took down Parramatta Road to the vintage shop, which almost caused her to miss her stop, and then all through the three hours she worked as a shop assistant. It was an emotional state her sister mistook for shock at losing Mitch.
“You can talk about it, you know; mental health isn’t a taboo subject anymore—and, hey, we know all about it, don’t we?” June, older and five months pregnant, volunteered, again drawing May back into the present.
“What are you talking about?”
“Mitch, of course, all that warlock thing. It must have been horrible. I guess it brought back stuff about Karl’s breakdown. God, those were horrible years.”
“It was a little disturbing. . . .” May stared absentmindedly at her sister, wondering whether vivid sexual fantasy might also be deemed a mental health problem.
“And of course you’re grieving now; breakups are really hard,” June continued in that patronizing tone that always seemed to insinuate that she had a monopoly not only on experience but also on the higher moral ground. Nope, there was no way May could ask her sister to lend her the rent money now. It was a question of sibling pride.
“He gave me a cat.”
June looked at her blankly.
“You know, as a parting gift. A big black thing. I think it’s about the most beautiful animal I’ve ever seen.”
“But you don’t even like cats,” June blurted out.
“I know,” May replied, and to her amazement she found herself blushing.
After her sister left May checked her e-mail using the store’s computer. There was still no response to her posting about a flatmate. She then checked her bank balance—at the very worst perhaps she could pay the rent using one of her three credit cards, two of which were already well over their limit. Her balance appeared on the screen in black relentless fact. As she stared at it incredulously, she realized she was far poorer than she had imagined. A fluttery panic began to creep up through her stomach and she felt sick. She’d always relied on Mitch to manage their finances, and now the vague memory came back to her of being surprised that he hadn’t asked to see her bank balance mid-month like he always did. Had this been another sign of his impending breakdown? Her panic grew—how would she find the rent in three days?
She opened a window onto the university website to look at her ad. “Female student seeks flatmate. Two bedroom flat with garden, large bedroom, nonsmoker please. $1000 per month including gas and electricity.” The ad was sandwiched innocently between a couple of others, one for a male flatmate to share with five other male students in a large house, the other for a lesbian flatmate to share with two lesbians. May noticed that both advertisements involved considerably less rent than she was asking—was that why she hadn’t had any responses yet? But she couldn’t afford to drop the amount, not if she wanted to keep the lease.
Sighing, she closed down the computer and stared out the shopfront window. It was almost dark. Finally it had started to rain, breaking the heat wave. Great sheets of water cut the streetscape diagonally, splashing against leaves and steaming pavement. The traffic had slowed and people rushed from bus shelter to shop awnings trying to keep dry. None of them had her problems, May thought bitterly. The neon light switched on outside, illuminating the shop till. It seemed to gleam seductively at her. May knew the takings wouldn’t be added up until the end of the week, by which time she might have found the money—who knows? Surely June wouldn’t mind if she borrowed a few hundred dollars, especially if May returned the money before she noticed.
Quickly she opened the till and slipped several fifty-dollar bills into her purse. Trying not to feel guilty about it, May grabbed her bag, locked up the shop, then ran out into the heavy rain. Hatless and coatless, she was drenched to the skin in a few minutes. Lifting her face to the drumming caress, she spun around. It felt like a baptism, a new beginning, yet she couldn’t fathom why she felt so excited about doing something as simple as going home—home to an empty flat. Then she remembered she was going home to the cat.
• • •
The bathwater was deliciously hot, hot enough to redden the skin and exorcise any conscious thought or anxiety, which was exactly May’s intention. She stood for a moment in the center of the bathroom, naked, the full-length reflection in the mirror a white and pink ghost, the cool tiles under her feet. In the hallway outside she could hear the soft scratching of Shadow’s claws against the door. She’d locked him out deliberately. This was to be her time, an indulgence of the spirit, and she needed to think.
Earlier she’d been grateful for the company of the cat. She’d cooked herself a meal and served him the rest of the tuna. She had planned to feed Shadow by the back door with his plate on the floor, but after she’d served him and had sat at the table with her own plate, the animal had refused to touch his food. Instead he gazed at her with a hurt and slightly indignant expression. It was a standoff until, finally giving in to the cat’s unspoken demands, May had put his plate on the kitchen table, in the place that was traditionally Mitch’s seat. To her amazement the cat immediately leapt up and sat neatly on the chair, waiting until she had begun eating before delicately munching the food off his own plate.
“Jesus,” she’d said out loud, “you really do think you’re a man, don’t you?” to which he meowed—just once—as if in agreement.
“Okay, but just this once—don’t get any long-term ambitions. Remember you’re on a lower rung of the evolutionary ladder.” But the cat chose to ignore the comment.
As she watched him it was uncanny how his presence felt so human. Every time she turned her back to him she could feel him observing her—but not in the instinctive way of an animal but rather in an intensely curious, intellectually alert manner. It was beginning to unnerve her, which was the reason why she had decided to lock him out during her bath. But here he was, scratching furiously at the bathroom door, demanding to be let in. Determined to ignore him, she stepped into the water, perfumed with a mixture of baby oil and rosewater. A fragrant cloud lifted up as she broke the surface. Grateful for the luxury, May slipped down into the hot water, stretching her body out full length. A purplish mark on the inside of one of her thighs caught her eye.
She lifted the leg out of the water to take a closer look. It was a bruise, a distinctive kind of marking that reminded her of something else. A love bite. She ran her fingers across the surface—a faint pricking of pain ensued. That’s what it was, not a bruise but a love bite. But how in hell had it managed to appear on the inside of her thigh? Unless . . . unless the lovemaking the night before had been real. The thought drifted up with the curling steam, forming a remarkably phallic shape before dispersing. May closed her eyes for a minute, determined to dismiss all lewd thoughts.
Shadow’s scratching at the door stopped and was replaced by a sudden yowl of discontent, startling her. Steeling herself, she sank back down into the embrace of the warm water, the bruise livid against her pale skin. It just wasn’t possible. Or had her imagination transformed fantasy into such realism that her actual body had created external manifestations of those dreamt sensations? If phantom pregnancies were possible, perhaps phantom lovemaking and phantom love bites were also. It was not a comforting thought.
Shadow’s yowling became louder and more desperate by the minute. In the apartment above, May could hear the slam of her neighbor’s front door, followed by the soft plodding of his footfall. A taxi driver who worked morning shifts, he’d often complained when Mitch and May played music after midnight. The last thing he would be tolerant of was a loud cat. Swearing softly, May got out of the bath and, dripping water across the bathroom floor, let the animal in.
“Now for Christ’s sake shut up or else I’ll have to drown you,” she warned. The cat, as if in reply, leapt up and perched daintily on the toilet lid, which was firmly shut. “And don’t look,” May added for good measure, still convinced the animal was preternaturally intelligent.
She stepped back into the water, sank down low, and closed her eyes, determined to regain the delicious meditative state she’d been in before, a dancing, colorful mind state that involved no thought whatsoever. As she was just getting close, a faint splash outside her consciousness danced across her mind’s eye in the form of a white dot. She decided to ignore it, but it was followed by a louder splash and then the brush of a foot against her inner thigh. She sat up with a jolt, displacing water that sloshed over the sides of the bath.
Standing naked and looking down at her, his feet firmly planted on either side of her legs, was the man who’d appeared the night before. Foreshortened, the most visible thing about him was his penis. Fully erect, it stood out from his torso and hung above her like some exotic fruit, full and dusky, blooming out defiantly. Above that the muscularity of his body rippled upward, prominent mauve nipples erect on each arc of his pectorals. His large veined hands hung down by his sides, the slight awkwardness of them in repose only adding to the beauty of the juxtaposition of his rippling torso.
Without thinking May reached up and, kneeling, took his cock into her mouth. The taste, scent, and size of him was as real as the water dripping down her breasts and back. Above her she could hear the man groan (or was it purr?) as she increased her pace, curling her tongue around the large tip, taking him deeper and deeper into her throat until she sensed he could take no more. She lifted her face away and pulled him down to his knees. She stared into his eyes in wonder, touching his lips with her fingers as he took them into his mouth, sucking. Then her fingers wandered up to the sides of his head, her left hand curling around one of his ears. As she traced the ear she noticed that the bottom half of the left lobe was missing, as if it had been torn off in an accident. The image seemed vaguely reminiscent of someone or something else, but before May could remember exactly why, she was distracted by him pulling her into a long, deep kiss. His tongue searching her mouth caused a flood of erotic desire to wash through her, forcing her to steady herself with one hand against the edge of the bathtub.
