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Elizabeth took off her wedding ring and flung it across the room. It ricocheted off the wall into the goldfish bowl and lay gleaming amid the waving oxygen weed and murky sediment. She stretched out her legs on the couch, settled her head on a cushion and turned on the TV, clutching the remote tight against her chest.
Flocks of white birds soared across the television screen.
"Every few decades," intoned the polished voice of the documentary presenter, "heavy rain falls in the desert. Water cascades to the lowest point and the arid desert becomes a lake. Myriads of pelicans fly in from thousands of miles away, gliding at great heights from thermal to thermal, to feed and breed. The wilderness springs into life."
*
Next day at the shopping mall, a white-haired man caught Elizabeth's eye. He was tall and
straight, striding with a determined step.
"Elizabeth?" He stopped in front of her, his voice barely audible above a passing group of
teenage girls.
"Good gracious," Elizabeth said, her hazel eyes opening wide. "It's you, Jeffrey!"
"It's been a long, long time," he replied.
"Half a lifetime."
"Shall we?" he asked, nodding at the nearby coffee shop.
"One cappucino and a latte?" The waiter bent over the table.
"Yes, thank you," said Jeffrey, indicating the latte was Elizabeth's.
"My husband died last month," she said, staring at the swirling cinnamon heart.
"Oh, sorry. How're you doing?"
She leaned back, running her fingers through silvery hair. "Do you want an honest answer?"
"Of course."
"Badly, although I know I'm better off without him."
Jeffrey nodded.
"I used to think," Elizabeth continued, " one day I'll do this or that. One day everything'll change and I'll be happy. But now I'm running out of one days." She tried to open a sugar sachet, but her hands were trembling.
"May I?" Jeffrey leant across and ripped off a corner, pouring a fine line of white grains into the cup.
"It all feels...arid," Elizabeth began, then fell silent, staring past Jeffrey's face. "Like a lifeless winter desert," she continued, after a while, "with no chance of rain and no hope of spring." She pulled a face. "I turn seventy tomorrow."
"Seventy's not old. You're looking good."
"Thanks. How old are you?"
"Seventy-five."
"You don't look it. You know, I've often thought of you over the years," Elizabeth said, "remembering how helpful you were, when I was such a troubled young woman."
"A woman doesn't stop feeling attracted to other men just because one man has slipped a ring on her," the Reverend Jeffrey Bailey had reassured her, long ago. "It's only natural, particularly for a woman in your marital situation."
"But I feel so bad, and me, a Sunday School teacher!"
"Your feelings of attraction towards other men arise from emotional needs that are not met in your marriage. Feeling the feelings, though, is different to doing the deeds."
"I just feel bad about feeling tempted."
"We can't always help how we feel."
"But it's wrong!"
"Would you condemn a person parched with thirst for looking at someone else's glass of water?"
She had seen Jeffrey for a weekly counselling session over six months or so, sitting across from him in his cosy study while he listened attentively, touching his dog collar occasionally where a couple of locks of his then black hair curled naturally over it. Shortly afterwards he'd left for a parish in another city.
Gazing into Jeffrey's soft blue eyes as she sipped, Elizabeth blushed remembering the guilty secrets she'd confessed to him, so long ago.
And the one secret she hadn't.
Jeffrey wiped his moustache with a paper serviette. "There's no need to be embarrassed over the past. We're all prey to temptation, even ministers. Maybe especially ministers." He picked up their two teaspoons and toyed with them.
He lowered his voice. "I fell in love with a parishioner once," he confided. Elizabeth had to lean forward to hear him against the noise of the barista grinding coffee in the background.
"It was the hardest thing I ever went through. She was a very lovely person." His face reddened. "I can tell you this now I've retired from the ministry and my wife has long passed away."
Elizabeth's hands pressed hard on the arms of the chair, her fingers white against the scarlet of her nails. Minutes passed with neither speaking.
"Of course, I kept my feelings to myself and the woman I was in love with never knew," he continued, "although there were moments when I wondered if she guessed..."
*
That night Elizabeth had a dream. She was perched on a damp lichen-covered seat in the graveyard of an English country church, surrounded by headstones and ancient yew trees. She was shivering, her scarf pulled across her face.
Then the scene changed as quickly as it had unfolded. Jeffrey's face flashed into her mind and the graveyard vanished. She heard a noise, like a rush of wings, a great flapping and splashing. She saw birds coming in to land on a lake, their mates greeting them with elaborate crossing of beaks and head bowing, and kangaroos bounding in from a desert to drink from swelling rivulets and pools.
A man strode towards her, taking long steps, like a moon walker, and sat beside Elizabeth on the warm sand. He laid his hand over hers and leaned into her. She thrilled to the touch of his curls. Without speaking they marveled at the scene before them, the grey silhouettes of browsing animals and birds darkening as the sun sank.
The moon rose. A warm breeze sprang up and ruffled Elizabeth's hair. Music began to play. The man stood, pulled Elizabeth to her feet and they danced till dawn.
*
In the morning, Elizabeth rang Jeffrey. "I'm sorry about yesterday," she said. "I thought I should give you a ring."
"Just as well I gave you my number, then."
"I'm really sorry I rushed off like that. I can't imagine what you thought!"
"You hadn't even finished your coffee and you suddenly took off!"
"I don't know what came over me."
"Really, it's okay. I was the same after my wife died. Home alone, depressed, afraid to go out."
"Plus for me, the idea of turning seventy..."
"Life begins anew at seventy and today's your birthday! That's something to celebrate!"
"Is it?"
"It's good to get older - when you consider the alternative!"
Elizabeth laughed into the phone.
"Look," Jeffrey said. "If you're not doing anything tonight, how about we go to the Cosmopolitan Club? We can have a meal together, by ourselves or with others, depending on how you feel. There're some lovely people there."
"That does sound nice."
"And there's a dance on tonight, if you feel up to it. Would you like to be my dancing partner?"
The end.
Tagged in Bruce Costello