Jezz’s Daily Story

Her hair was Cadmium Red, in a bob curled up under her ears; she wore a floral dress with straps that hung loosely on her sunburnt shoulders. She was Canadian, and her accent lingered over the cash register long after she took my money and wrapped up the three tubes of oil paint I’d taken absentmindedly.
    “What do you paint?” she’d asked. She was short, and she looked up at me with wide eyes.
    “Paint? Oh, not much, lately. It’s hard to be inspired these days. Not much new to see.”
    “Oh, that’s not true.”
    “I need to travel. Been here too long.”
    “Oh, no,” she said. “This city is magical. There’s always something new to see.”
    “You think?” I said.
    “I know!” She smiled.
    “Thanks – see you,” I said. but I stayed there as she smoothed back her hair and crumpled a receipt and threw it in the bin.
    “You alright?” she asked.
    “Would you show me?” I asked.
    “Show you?”
    “It’s okay,” I said. “Forget it.”
    “No, no – I’d love to, I mean, I have to work until Friday, but – the weekend is okay. Maybe, Saturday afternoon? Nowhere too far, we could meet here and walk?”
    “From here?” I asked. “I mean, there’s nothing – you’re sure?”
    “Oh, I’m sure. Saturday morning?”
    “I’ll be here.”
    “Don’t stand me up!” she said.
    I smiled and nodded and thought about her accent on the way out. I walked home, not by the busy highway but down the rows of tree-lined suburban streets which ran crookedly to the main beach’s promenade. Those were the streets I grew up in; there wasn’t a low brick wall or nail-marked telegraph pole I hadn’t hidden behind with a water-pistol in hand. I’d stumbled back home up those hills drunk; weaved across them effortlessly on bikes and skateboards; photographed ceramic pipes exhumed outside renovated homes, and written poems about the sound of the lorikeets in the straight palms and hunched gums. I thought of the Canadian girl leaning on one of those trees, maybe at the park off Shirley Street or up by the headland, grinning, stroking her flame-red hair, and asking me what I thought. I would hug her and tell her it was terribly inspirational.

On Saturday I waited outside with my hands in my pockets. She came out of the shop wearing high shorts and a t-shirt, the strap of her bikini tied behind her neck in a yellow bow. She was holding a plastic bag with four small tubes of gouache, a brush and a pad of paper in it. Her hair was as brilliant as ever, and I wanted to touch it to see if it was real.
    “Hi!” she said. “Here, this is for you – a present. And don’t open it!”
    It was sealed by a thin strip along the top edge.
    “Oh, you didn’t need to, I mean I have plenty of paint. This way? Thank you, though. I’ll use it.”
    “Oh, you’ll use it alright.” We waited at an intersection while glossy cars filed past around the corner.
    “Scarlet red?” I asked, looking at the contents of the clear bag. “Aquamarine? I guess we’re not going for a bushwalk.”
    “Very clever! Here, this way.”
    “We can go down here, if we’re headed to the beach. It’s a nicer walk,”
    “Sounds good,” she said.

We left our shirts and Havaianas on the sand, between the lifeguards’ red-and-yellow flags, and walked to the corner of the beach where the shore met the rocks. I carried the plastic bag limply, not sure of its purpose.
    “Are you ready?” she asked, looking back at me. She was standing with one bare foot on a shell-encrusted rock. She smoothed back her hair again, pushing it behind her ears. I thought she might pull it off; reveal a bald and smooth scalp shimmering in the bright sun. But she only took my hand, and we waded out into the water.
    We swam out around the broken base of the headland. The bag of gouache was clutched in my trailing hand as I tried to keep up with her. The sun was bright and it was hard to see in the glare – I wanted to ditch the bag, submerge myself completely and overtake her from below. But I didn’t – I let her lead until we had rounded the corner, past where the fallen rocks became sheer wall, to where there was nowhere to climb out. I didn’t know if she wanted to swim all the way to the next beach; all the way across the city’s rough and battered coast.
    “Here,” she said, spitting out a bit of salt water. “Follow me. And careful of the bag!”
    There was a little gap at the base of the cliff I hadn’t noticed; a narrow slice which was covered and uncovered with the lapping of the waves. She dived down and I saw her red hair just below the surface until it disappeared under the cliff. I ducked down too, struggling to swim in the darkness, with my left hand holding the bag to the surface. I wasn’t sure if there was room to breath but I came up anyway when I couldn’t swim any further. It was dark in the cave, too.
    “Hey,” she said. “You alright? You can let. You can let the bag go.”
    “I’m alright,” I said. A wave washed over my mouth. “Dark in here.”
    “Yeah,” she said. The sound of her words echoed up with the sound of the water slapping the rocks in the low lying cave. “It’s nicer at low tide.”
    “I’m sure,” I said.
    “You can,” she said. She spat out more water. “You can sit at the back and see the sunset coming through the gap. At low tide.”
    The bag of gouache bobbed in the dark water next to me.
    “Do you want to go?” she asked.
    “No,” I said. “Let’s wait a minute.”
    And so we waited in the dark cave for while, until our fingers were wrinkled from the water and the bag of paint floated out under the gap and we had to follow it.