I knocked forcefully on the door. Often times his door was left ajar – either by intent or omission – but it seemed securely in its place today. After I had knocked, I leant forward and put my ear to it, hoping to hear something from inside.
It seemed unlikely that he would be out of the apartment. The man had an uncanny ability to assume a position in front of his big screen tv and remain there for hours on end. If he was sick (and the last I had seen him, he certainly didn’t seem well), he would only leave his place to pick up diet coke or python snakes or perhaps to order Thai food from one of the local places down the road.
I knocked again, and louder. It was possible he was in the shower. He had sixty-five of those a day. If he was in the shower then I may also need to wait for twenty minutes before knocking again, as the duration of his showers rivalled the length of time he could sit in front of the tv.
When I finally heard the slow, loping grace of his bare feet on the floor boards of his flat, my heart leapt in my chest.
“Julian,” I called through the door. “It’s Katie. Open up!”
He walked to the door and pulled it open, standing gloriously in the hallway in his ‘jorts’ and vintage Chevrolet t-shirt. I didn’t have time to admire how perfect he looked – while I had been waiting I had felt the floor beneath me buckle ominously. The shock waves were continuing to roll through the city. If their focal point was the centre of Martin Place or near thereto then by increasingly expanding circles we would feel the same magnitude quake in short course.
“Haven’t you been listening to the news?!” I demanded angrily as I stormed in.”What are you doing bumming around for? Get your shit together!”
“Whoah. Hold on!” He said, following me into the flat. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know what’s going on.” My tone was still curt, touched with anger. I found myself blaming him for this unpredictable situation. “Martin Place is caving in and all the buildings are falling down.”
Julian walked over to the tv and switched it on. I didn’t think there would be any power but surprisingly it blinked to life. There was nothing alarming about the programming – as Julian flicked through the channels the regular, scheduled shows for three o’clock on a Thursday afternoon were still playing.
“Put it on channel two please.” While I spoke to him, I rifled through his closet for a bag to carry some things in. I assumed he would have a backpack – didn’t most boys? Unfortunately, Julian wasn’t like most boys. The best I could find was his mother’s overnight bag which she had left in his closet from her last visit.
I dragged it out and started stuffing some jumpers into it.
“Katie, what are you doing?” Julian asked, standing over me. “Where do you think we’re going with all this? Why don’t you just stop for a minute.”
I paused and straightening, standing almost eye to eye to him (despite his regular protestations about his superior height).
“Look, I think something bad is happening.” I said. “There are shock waves going through the city – it can’t just be a bomb or something like that. Maybe it’s an earthquake. I don’t know. But all the buildings are falling down and if we stay here this one will probably fall down to.”
He was about to argue with me – explain the physics behind the structural soundness of nineteen twenties apartment buildings or some such – but before he could there was another tremor and the ground wobbled. A wide crack split in the facade of the wall closes to us. I saw that he now believed me.
“What else do we need?” He asked.
“I don’t know. Bring some food. Do you have a torch? Bring your phone in case we can get reception.”
We spent a few minutes throwing some things together. Julian lived a fairly spartan lifestyle so there wasn’t much to collect. I went hopefully to the kitchen, but predictable the cupboards were mostly bare. He had a few heat up microwave meals which I took and a sealed bottle of water which I dropped in the bag too.
Julian then held the door open for me and we headed back toward the central stair case. Contrary to previously, the staircase was now crowded and noisy with people. I saw that other cracks had broken in the foundation and that the building was slowly crumbling from the unsteady ground which had originally given it such reliably, structural support.
As we passed the tenants on the stairs, some with children, others seeming only half awake, we caught the snippets of conversation which followed such an event – “What the fuck is going on?”, “Can you get reception?” “I never get reception with 3″ “Does anyone have wireless on their phone” “What are the government doing about this.”
More than once I caught Julian’s eye and he gave me a look as if to say ‘who are these fuckwits?’ I was surprised by him. I would have thought he would be adamantly standing his ground and refusing to leave the building, doggedly, though vainly, trying to regain reception in his blackberry so he could read the latest newscasts on SMH.com. Instead he was listening to me – really listening to me! And when we emerged on to the street and I said to him quietly, “Let’s go to Rushcutters Bay.” He nodded.
There were boats at Rushcutters Bay. Dozens of them. I was not against lying, cheating, stealing or soliciting my body in order to get on to one.
We headed in the general direction of the bay. Before we did though Julian made me stop at a convenience store. Whoever had once manned it had long since left and a handful of people were picking choicely from the aisles, taking full and unabashed advantage of the moment to steal. When he emerged again, he had two plastic bags of food, candles, and diet coke.
“Was that really necessary?” I said derisively, indicating the diet coke. “Yes.” He replied simply. “In that case I’m getting some scotch.” I replied, and so we made a second detour to our local bottle shop before continuing our progress to the water.
