congressing seemed inadequate to express how obsessed we were becoming, how exquisitely ill. We reminded ourselves it was barely a month since the start and yet here we were panting ‘I love you’ in time with each thrust and each expelling, ‘I love you’ in the aftermath, curled groin to buttock in a foetal lull position.
Soon that was not enough. ‘I want to be with you forever’ and ‘Never leave me’ needed to be added. Her saying it, and me saying it in return. ‘If I can’t be with you I couldn’t live. I’d be better off dead.’
That was not enough either. ‘Can I tell you something?’ said Tilda. ‘I am about to be very serious.’
‘Say it.’
‘First say you love me.’
I said it and she said it right back, with a tender tap on my chin.
‘Okay. The thing I want to say is, I would even want to make a baby with you. I’ve never felt that, ever.’
I was really famous now. I had been selected from the world’s millions of males to join my self to hers and create posterity through our genes. I was too flattered to reply.
‘Have I said too much?’
‘No.’ I was the most important man in the world at that moment. I wanted to savour it.
‘Please say something.’
‘I would be honoured to do that with you. I would be honoured to be its father.’
Tilda said thank you. She put her chin on her cupped hands upon my shoulder. She said it was a beautiful sensation to congress with me and have my sperm inside her. It was like being joined even when we physically weren’t. ‘We should start thinking about how we’re going to live.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘How we are going to make money.’
I big-noted we shouldn’t worry about that. I’m a clever fellow, am I not?
We didn’t need to panic, Tilda said. She had $40,000 due from her half of her marital assets. But where were we going to live? London was so very far from anywhere she was used to. She was used to sunshine and clean air. If she had a child she would want the baby to enjoy those benefits too, not be closed in by snow and darkness and fog. ‘But I’ll go wherever you are.’
‘I’ll go wherever you are.’
‘Don’t you have prospects in London?’
‘Of course. But not if you won’t be happy.’
Chapter 21
That’s how I got here—Scintilla.
Say Australia to me and I still can’t tell you much. It has a ground beneath your feet like any other place. The sky has a fiercer, whiter sun. I wasn’t here for those things. I was here for Tilda. She was Australia to me. We were citizens of us. I know it is not a healthy way to live, but it is how we ended up living. If I want nature there are Tilda’s landscapes decorating the walls, stripes and splashes of what she calls Abstract Passionism. If I want something to read there are Tilda’s medical records to remind me of life and death. If I want sport I can jog for an hour in the forest. I can play jump-the-snake in summer on the forest track.
Straight off the plane from Amsterdam—it was late January—we thought we might settle in Melbourne. It had old joined-up houses like dingy London streets, frilly iron-lace edges and brick of reddish brown. ‘Good ole Melbourne,’ Tilda called it, like a fond putdown. But she preferred the flat plains two hours’ drive to the west. There, if you ignored the barbed-wire fences, it was like beholding fields of wild dusty desert and not just farms. She wanted to strike out in that direction. We’d sleep off the jetlag and then head westward into the summer heat.
We camped in her studio in Fitzroy, a suburb with the dingiest London look of all. Her rent was paid up till mid-February, so that gave us planning time.
By ‘studio’ I mean a partitioned floor shared by four artists above a lighting shop. The rules stated no lodging was allowed—the property was for art work only, not bedding down in. But there was too much smell from turps pots and soaking brushes to give away the funk of our congressing and
Soon that was not enough. ‘I want to be with you forever’ and ‘Never leave me’ needed to be added. Her saying it, and me saying it in return. ‘If I can’t be with you I couldn’t live. I’d be better off dead.’
That was not enough either. ‘Can I tell you something?’ said Tilda. ‘I am about to be very serious.’
‘Say it.’
‘First say you love me.’
I said it and she said it right back, with a tender tap on my chin.
‘Okay. The thing I want to say is, I would even want to make a baby with you. I’ve never felt that, ever.’
I was really famous now. I had been selected from the world’s millions of males to join my self to hers and create posterity through our genes. I was too flattered to reply.
‘Have I said too much?’
‘No.’ I was the most important man in the world at that moment. I wanted to savour it.
‘Please say something.’
‘I would be honoured to do that with you. I would be honoured to be its father.’
Tilda said thank you. She put her chin on her cupped hands upon my shoulder. She said it was a beautiful sensation to congress with me and have my sperm inside her. It was like being joined even when we physically weren’t. ‘We should start thinking about how we’re going to live.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘How we are going to make money.’
I big-noted we shouldn’t worry about that. I’m a clever fellow, am I not?
We didn’t need to panic, Tilda said. She had $40,000 due from her half of her marital assets. But where were we going to live? London was so very far from anywhere she was used to. She was used to sunshine and clean air. If she had a child she would want the baby to enjoy those benefits too, not be closed in by snow and darkness and fog. ‘But I’ll go wherever you are.’
‘I’ll go wherever you are.’
‘Don’t you have prospects in London?’
‘Of course. But not if you won’t be happy.’
Chapter 21
That’s how I got here—Scintilla.
Say Australia to me and I still can’t tell you much. It has a ground beneath your feet like any other place. The sky has a fiercer, whiter sun. I wasn’t here for those things. I was here for Tilda. She was Australia to me. We were citizens of us. I know it is not a healthy way to live, but it is how we ended up living. If I want nature there are Tilda’s landscapes decorating the walls, stripes and splashes of what she calls Abstract Passionism. If I want something to read there are Tilda’s medical records to remind me of life and death. If I want sport I can jog for an hour in the forest. I can play jump-the-snake in summer on the forest track.
Straight off the plane from Amsterdam—it was late January—we thought we might settle in Melbourne. It had old joined-up houses like dingy London streets, frilly iron-lace edges and brick of reddish brown. ‘Good ole Melbourne,’ Tilda called it, like a fond putdown. But she preferred the flat plains two hours’ drive to the west. There, if you ignored the barbed-wire fences, it was like beholding fields of wild dusty desert and not just farms. She wanted to strike out in that direction. We’d sleep off the jetlag and then head westward into the summer heat.
We camped in her studio in Fitzroy, a suburb with the dingiest London look of all. Her rent was paid up till mid-February, so that gave us planning time.
By ‘studio’ I mean a partitioned floor shared by four artists above a lighting shop. The rules stated no lodging was allowed—the property was for art work only, not bedding down in. But there was too much smell from turps pots and soaking brushes to give away the funk of our congressing and
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