Wicked Game

  April 2003 We are on the bus to Broome.    'I know we've only known each other for about a month,' says Steve, 'but it feels like longer.'    'Am I that boring?'    'Don't be silly.' He squeezes my hand. 'Normally when you start going out with someone you only see them once or twice a week on dates, but we're together practically all the time.'    'Yeah, I suppose.'     Are things moving too fast, I wonder. Broome for us is all about the beach. We swim in the turquoise sea and lie on the warm sand. He falls asleep. I write our names in shells.     Early one morning we walk to Cable Beach and in a spot where no one is around swim out to sea. He pulls me close and kisses me, moving my legs so they're wrapped around him. He pushes the front of my bikini bottoms to the side.    'We can't,' I say.    'There's no one here.'    'But what if-'    'No one will know.'    ...

  April 2003 We travel on the greyhound bus through the hot, stark north.    We act like last night didn't happen. My face feels misshapen from crying and there is an emptiness running through me.     I shouldn't have believed Steve when he said 'April Fool.' I stare out at the endless landscape. I didn't believe him. I just wanted to. Now maybe I don't but it's too late to change my mind.        The film 8 Mile plays on a TV screen at the front of the bus. Steve slips his hand up my top and whispers about my green and yellow purple hills.    'Green and yellow and purple?' I say.    He runs his fingers over the flower and leaf pattern on my top. 'Green and yellow,' he says.    'Purple?'    He pulls my top forward so he's looking down it. 'In there,' he says.    'They're not purple.'    'I could make them purple.'    I think that sounds painful.    We play han...

  March - April 2003 We are somewhere, somewhere in the Northern Territory near the sea. Perhaps it is Darwin, but with the warping of time, space and me that happens around Steve I can't be sure where I am.    We are walking, looking for somewhere to swim in the sea. The roads are empty and endless. Steve is sure there is a beach somewhere nearby.     A truck slows down as it passes. Two men look out of the open window.    'Are you lost?'    'We're looking for the sea, to swim,' says Steve.    They give us directions. 'It's lovely there,' they say.    We find a beach. It's not lovely but we swim anyway, wrapping our bodies round each other in the water.    'What's that smell?' I say.    'Maybe it's you.'    'Hey.'    He sniffs. 'It smells like petrol.'    We look around. The dark blue water. The brick walls.    'Let's go,' he says. 'This isn't a good place t...

  March 2003 I can't get used to how everything is smudged and blurred with Steve. I'm losing track of time, place, myself.    In pubs he likes to put music on the jukebox. The U2 songs One and With or Without You . Avril Lavigne's Sk8er Boi .     'I can't believe you like Avril Lavigne,' I say. 'She's music for teenyboppers who think they're edgy.'    He grimaces. 'Don't be snobby.' He tells me he sang and air guitared Sk8er Boi after he bungee jumped.    'I saw you,' I say. 'I thought you were a wanker.'    'But that didn't stop you coming home with me that night.'    I shake my head. 'Even though Brandon told me you were an asshole.'    'Did he? He probably just had sour grapes.'    'I don't think so.' I doubt Brandon would have wanted to touch me with a bargepole knowing where I'd been.    'And then Marie tried to put a spanner in the works, on the way to Alice Spring...