‘The meeting didn’t happen, okay?’
I frown. ‘Why didn’t the meeting happen?’
‘I was going to take the train to the city, but I couldn’t find an all-day parking spot at the station. The most I could find was two hours. So I didn’t go.’
I stare at him. ‘Because you couldn’t find anywhere to park?’
He rolls his eyes. ‘You have no idea how difficult it is to find adequate parking.’
‘I wouldn’t say I have no idea. Such a thing as moving a car around is actually very easy to imagine.’
‘Are you trying to be funny?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘Was that funny?’ I am genuinely curious. But he doesn’t respond.
‘Why didn’t you just pay for parking?’ I ask.
‘I didn’t have any money.’
‘I thought you did have money. You’re not homeless, right?’
He’s red in the face now. ‘I didn’t have any coins,’ He makes a noise like ugh and clenches his fist into a ball, like he is angry.
‘Why are you angry, Wally?’
‘I’m angry that I missed the interview, okay? I’m angry that you’re following me when I want to be alone. I’m angry because you keep calling me Wally!’
He’s the most upset I’ve seen him. I think of something Janet said to me once when a borrower had been very angry that a book they had reserved hadn’t been returned yet. The borrower said she had walked a long way in the heat to get to the library and she wasn’t leaving without the book. She had become quite aggressive indeed. Janet had apologised profusely and offered to personally drop off the book to the woman when it was returned. Then Janet had asked if there was anything else she could help her with. That was the moment the woman broke down in tears and confessed that it was the anniversary of her son’s death, and she’d been desperate to escape the day by losing herself in a good book. Janet had driven the woman home via the bookstore, where she’d purchased for the woman not only the one she’d reserved, but also several others.
‘Why were you so kind to her?’ I had asked when Janet returned to the library. ‘When she’d been so rude to you?’
‘Angry is just a penname for sad,’ Janet had explained. ‘In my experience, nine times out of ten, if you are kind to the angry person, you will calm them down and find out what is really going on with them.’
‘You know,’ I say to Wally, ‘I have a parking spot, at my place. I’m a five-minute walk from the train station. You’re welcome to park there if you have another meeting. Or anytime, really.’
He frowns, his expression different again. Not angry, more confused. ‘That’s very generous.’
‘Not really. I don’t own a car, so it just sits there empty.’
He appears to think about this for a moment.
‘I do have one thing to ask in exchange, though.’
Wally crosses his arms. ‘Oh? What?’
He watches me through narrowed eyes. His eyelashes are long and dark and curled, like an old-fashioned doll.
‘I’d be most grateful,’ I say, ‘if I could keep calling you Wally.’
To my surprise, Wally throws back his head and laughs. And even though I’m not sure why we’re laughing, I laugh too.
I arrive at the bowling alley at approximately 6.30 pm on Wednesday evening. I’m unable to confirm the exact timing due to leaving my phone at home. This oversight is unlike me, and I attribute it to the low-level anxiety I’ve felt all day at the prospect of visiting a bowling alley. A bowling alley, with its noise and lights and smells, is most definitely out of my comfort zone. Part of me, the rebellious part, feels excited about this. The rest of me is struggling to breathe.
I caught the bus here. Wally had offered to drive me but small talk in cars always gives me a headache, so the bus seemed a safer option. The flyer in the staffroom said it was a 6.45 pm meet-up for a 7 pm start, which would allow everyone time to select their bowling footwear and to collect their meal coupons and tokens for the pinball machines. (Learning about the pinball machines had been a blow. Games tended to be loud and bright, and I hate loud bright places.) But I’ve prepared for it as best I can, and I find myself feeling cautiously optimistic.
I feel pleased to see that I’ve beat Wally here, even if he arrives just a few minutes after me, at 6.33 pm, jogging up the ramp, hat bobbing on his head. He’s in such a hurry he almost runs past me.
‘Wally,’ I say, as he’s about to jog through the entrance.
He slows to a stop and smiles tentatively, his gaze close to my face. Then he begins to speak.
‘I’m wearing earplugs,’ I say. ‘So I can’t hear you.’
Wally blinks. Then his mouth moves again.
‘I said I CAN’T HEAR YOU,’ I say louder.
He pushes his glasses up on his nose and then gestures for me to remove an earplug. Reluctantly, I do.
‘I just enquired as to why you are wearing those,’ he says, pointing to my eyes.
‘The swimming goggles? I find they work better than sunglasses to block out the garish lights at these kinds of places.’
The barest of smiles appears at Wally’s lips ‘I . . . see.’
I am aware, of course, that the goggles are a fashion faux pas, but I’d hoped that people might just go with it and assume they were some sort of new trend.
‘Listen,’ Wally says. ‘While your earplug is out, I wanted to say that I’m sorry for being rude the other day. I hadn’t been to this sort of meeting in . . . a while. And you were right, it wasn’t about not being able to find a parking spot. I shouldn’t have got snappy with you.’
You were right. These words remain lodged in my head. You were right. And not just about anything! About something in the muddy confusing world
