She brings the light in

Just the slightest movement of the curtain as she stands by the window. Just a touch. That’s how she brings the light in, Jacqui does. Just before dawn, with only the smallest movement of her finger, and in comes the light. I see it reach the Golden Cane Palm, highlighting the larger fronds, their dark becoming green. Jacqui looks at those fronds, as I do, while the light begins to fill the room. She turns her head to me as if in a studied pose, rehearsed. She asks for music to be played. I insert a CD – piano and cello. Should be perfect for dawn’s arrival. It doesn’t matter what they’re playing, as long as it suits the light coming in. That’s what I want: a romance of this moment. Soon, she says, she’ll make herself a chai tea, and a latté for me. But not now. We’re both watching the light create an almost magical effect, knowledge-bearing. I haven’t forgotten that the light will continue to arrive until nightfall, but at this moment the subtle transition from night to day is distinctly visible. Jacqui remains by the window, her face turned away. I wonder if she’s thinking what I’m thinking: that this moment is all romance. The music could be helping, but possibly not. No, it’s not the music. It’s something else. She’ll think, make the tea and coffee, then she’ll talk. I sit watching her, asking myself what she might say. The light reaches the stylish sofa and lounge chairs, the rosewood bookcase, her sketchbook on the coffee table – returning each of them to their daylight images. It also returns Jacqui and me. She looks resplendent, even at six a.m., in her creamy sarong, hair still tousled from sleep. We’ve not showered, just risen from bed. The sarong is perfect, the light perfect, maybe all is perfect. It’s odd how we met. If she hadn’t stepped out of that boutique at that precise moment, and if I hadn’t left the hotel’s restaurant when I did, it wouldn’t have happened. Jacqui standing in the sudden downpour, weighed down by parcels, looking for a cab. That’s what she said, that’s how we met. Once I saw her I kept watching. Wet, bedraggled, but staying where she was, loaded up with fancy shopping bags, hugged by a tight black dress, she looked brilliant. Even in the wet weather, her short blond hair drenched, rain running down her face, something about her touched me. I was about to get into my car when she saw me. ‘I can drive you,’ I said, and she accepted. We began with polite conversation, but it wasn’t long before the atmosphere in the car was charged with energy, at least for me. I wanted to keep looking over at her, but the driving conditions were too risky for that. I began saying whatever entered my head, with her nodding and acting civil, and when I ran out of ideas I said the next thing that occurred me. ‘If I’d accepted a second coffee at the hotel across the road, I wouldn’t have seen you.’ ‘If I hadn’t tried on that last dress,’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t have been outside the boutique just then.’ I was about to reply, but she continued. ‘I wanted to spoil myself. My husband left me this morning.’ That stopped the conversation. Why does someone tell you that? I freed my right hand and reached over to her. ‘Name’s Lucas.’ I looked back to the road, waiting for her to take my hand, but she didn’t. She held my gaze, though, when I looked back. ‘Jacqui,’ she said. ‘I’m not in a trusting mood.’ Which surprised me, because anyone who steps into the car of a complete stranger would have to be reasonably trusting. Or was she desperate? I was confused, trying to decipher what she meant. She knew what I was thinking. ‘Your car will take me home. Let’s leave it at that.’ Good idea, I thought. I was happy with her attitude, but was trying to decide what to say next. I needn’t have worried. ‘Take the next exit from the highway, then the second turn right.’ The authority of her voice matched her physical appeal. Tall, broad shoulders, chic earrings, sparkling, determined eyes. I wondered why her husband had left, and why she had told me. Rain fell heavily as we headed up the steep hill from the highway. ‘After you’ve turned, second on the left, then to the end.’ Her directions took us almost to the top, rain washing down the road, increasing the effort required to keep the car from skidding. Rain was bucketing down as I pulled up near the front door. The gardens needed care. Through the glass doors I could see a soft, late-afternoon mood created by the front room’s elegant lighting. I instinctively grabbed her shopping bags from the back seat and dashed to the verandah. She was soon by my side. ‘Thank you,’ she said. I was looking at her close up. Taller than me, physically imposing. ‘Could you use that second coffee?’ Standing close to her, I forgot what she had said about trust, and accepted. Jacqui sits next to me on the sofa now. ‘We should talk,’ she says. I nod expectantly. I’m actually still thinking of how we met. Nothing like this has ever happened to me. It seems odd. What am I doing here the morning after? What is it she wants? I was just in town on routine business and had been hoping to drive around in the hire car and see a bit of the city. Now Jacqui’s speaking. ‘What did you think of last night – us meeting and you staying?’ I know what I want to say, but need to be careful. Jacqui was active enough in bed last night, but we’re clearly using each other. At first I stumble. ‘It just sort of happened, didn’t it?’ She is unimpressed with that, fiddling with her sarong and glancing away, so I keep going, hoping to do better. ‘It seemed natural – as if it was supposed to happen.’ She prefers that, I can tell. ‘The rain on your face and clothes, standing outside the shop. It was quite natural, figuratively speaking.’ I’m more confident now. ‘When I saw you outside the boutique, something opened up for me. It seemed natural to offer you a ride.’ I haven’t mentioned us sleeping together, but it’s a start. ‘As I told you last night, I’m a dress designer,’ she says. ‘My husband, or ex-husband, I should say, has a factory where the dresses are produced. That boutique is one of our outlets.’ ‘You purchase your own dresses?’ She smiles. ‘No, those are from a competitor. Her stuff suits me, I get ideas from her. I take what I need.’ Is there irony in her voice? ‘But about later. We slept together. Any thoughts about that?’ She is smiling as the light begins stealing its way around the drawn curtains, creeping from other rooms into ours, playing across her face. It reminds me of a spider spinning its web. I’m aroused by her, she can see that. She’s so confident, so physically imposing, her smile enchanting. ‘I feel close to you,’ I say. ‘I wasn’t expecting to sleep with you, but it felt right in some way. Your husband leaving left me a bit confused, of course.’ I don’t know why I mentioned that. Jacqui looks down at her feet. ‘There have been affairs.’ ‘Many affairs?’ ‘Many.’ ‘How did you cope with that?’ Jacqui’s steady gaze holds me. ‘I had the affairs.’ She’s trying to gauge my response now, her admission halting everything but the spreading light. Our conversation, our minor body movements, even the music seems to pause. The last is an illusion – the music begins again with the next track. I feel stupid in my assumptions about her, but worse are the seconds of inner drama as I try to recover. ‘Excuse me,’ she says, and rises to throw open the blinds at the opposite end of the room, flooding everything in light. No shadows. When she returns, and before she speaks again, I can see she’s uncomfortable for me. ‘Tell me, Lucas. If you’d known I was the unfaithful partner, would you have refused my offer last night?’ Of course not, I think. ‘I don’t think so,’ I say. My feelings are mixed. Confusion, embarrassment – yet she’s exotic. ‘I’m sort of footloose at present,’ I say. ‘Footloose? I like that in a man.’ She says it so matter-of-factly I laugh. ‘I’ll make tea and coffee,’ she says, kissing me on the cheek as she rises from the sofa. How quickly she made last night’s meal. How efficient were her hands and fingers. The hands of an artist. I’d hoped the earlier suggestion of coffee was a kind of introduction to her life, and the dinner suggestion confirmed it. As evening approached she dimmed the interior lights, creating a soft mood. In the kitchen she turned on the lamp over the counter to aid the food preparation. Watching her rearrange the décor in such manner was enchanting, though it appeared everyday for her, as if the events were routine. I was enthralled. I watched her make a salad of rocket, tomato, avocado, a sliver of anchovy and cheese from France. Then she found Turkish bread and an Australian chardonnay. The movement of her hands was different in ways I can’t describe. ‘It’s best not to spend too much time on a salad,’ she said, lifting her head to look at me. ‘Overwork can swamp its subtlety. Much of life is like that.’ Whatever her theory, the salad was delicious and the wine perfect. We talked about the commonplace over dinner, none of it personal. I told her about my work in the IT industry, how demanding it could be, but she wasn’t all that interested. ‘Computers aren’t me,’ she said. ‘I do my emails and browse websites I need, but I don’t keep up with the latest developments.’ She was clearly bored, but we were both smiling at each other, and I was wondering where the dinner, the wine and conversation were headed. When she took my hand I returned the pressure. ‘I’m working tomorrow, sketching new designs. When I do that I like to go to bed early.’ That’s how it happened. Nothing too romantic – nice, businesslike, nothing overdone. When I woke this morning she was tight up against me, holding me tenderly. For a moment I sensed dependency from her but quickly dismissed this as an illusion. She had the aura of a strong, independent woman who knew what she wanted. That’s what I liked. With Jacqui everything seemed so clear. She stirred when I rose and soon we were in the lounge room. And now the tea and latté. She came straight to the point. ‘Lucas, would you like to meet again?’ I sipped my coffee. ‘Yes,’ I said, but I wasn’t being honest. I wasn’t sure how I felt. Something about her bothered me. Besides, there were things I hadn’t told her about myself. ‘It can’t be this week, though.’ I also went straight to the point, reminding myself it was Wednesday. ‘You’re with someone else?’ She sipped her tea. ‘Correct.’ I couldn’t resist a jibe. ‘At least he’ll be happy.’ ‘He’s a she,’ she said. I hid my surprise this time and merely nodded. I was learning from her strength. Maybe that’s what I wanted, her strength. Maybe that was my motivation. At least I can’t betray her, I thought. ‘No children?’ I asked. ‘I preferred a career. You?’ ‘A boy and a girl.’ We both sat there sipping and thinking, then Jacqui rose. ‘I want to start work soon, so I’m going to shower. Want to join me?’ I declined this invitation and stood up to go. I didn’t know why I refused, recalling last night, but I wanted to be direct with her. As we hugged goodbye she said, ‘I liked your hands on me last night.’ Then she walked to the bathroom. I was elated as I drove away. Meeting someone like Jacqui was a new experience for me. It was still relatively early when I returned to the hotel room. The curtains were pulled across the window and the lights were off. There were two curtains, a delicate see-through one behind a heavy beige drape. I pulled the drape open a touch to let light into the room, liking the shadows I created, then gradually opened it fully. The shadows more or less disappeared, but the incoming light was muted. I stared down at the city beginning its day. A different effect from Jacqui’s house. A different romanticism. Then I noticed the room phone’s message light blinking. It wouldn’t be Anna, she’d use my mobile. If it was Jacqui, that had me thinking. The hotel is opposite the boutique, so she could easily obtain the number. Then I began to worry that my enchantment had beguiled me. Surely it was a coincidence, her leaving the boutique at the moment I reached my car. But she was standing in the rain – why not under the shop’s awning? And surely a boutique staff member could have phoned for a taxi. My musings became deeper. Would Jacqui have accepted a ride from anyone? More importantly, did the husband exist? In which case, what was Jacqui’s motivation? I turned all this over in my mind before realising I didn’t care if there were answers or not. I was worried about my own motivation. I went back to the window to gaze down at the city. A weightless mist hung over the early traffic, the striding fitness walkers, the business proprietors arriving for the day. I thought about Anna and why I’d deceived her. I didn’t know, but I was missing her and the children. I watched the mist form into rain, lightly running down the hotel window. Enchantment had turned to melancholy. What was Anna doing now? I would phone her soon.

Michael Whitting

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