Memoir - Week 9
I wasn’t sure where we’d
find café-quality coffee well past midnight in ‘downtown’ or anywhere-else
Canberra. But it really didn’t matter. Although, I did feel a certain amount of
pressure to locate something, just to show Erin I had some idea of what was
going on around the joint – that she wasn’t in the car holding hands with a
loser of some sort.
We left the parking lot and
headed for the trendy suburb of Manuka. No coffee located. All shut.
Tsst…bloody Canberra.
Normally such a scenario
would’ve bothered me, thinking it was my fault. And I would probably have
dredged up some similar memory causing me greater anxiety in the moment. Like
when I took a girlfriend, Lara, to dinner for the first time. In fact, it was
our first date. There was a mix up with the reservation. Although it was the
restaurant’s fault, I took it on as mine and felt insecure about the whole
evening.
“No, don’t you understand! What did
I just say? You’re stupid. Look. First you multiply seven by…”
His father would be imposing,
sitting cross-legged, speaking in explosions and frowning in his big brown armchair
at the back of the living room. Julian was kneeling in front of his towering father,
feeling useless, scared and sobbing, trying to understand his father’s
explanations of the math homework. It all just became a blur in the end. All he
could think of was his father’s angry hand gripping the pen. And the
frightening voice. That angry hand and the frightening voice.
But, being with Erin I felt so much more at ease. My head
was clearer and I confidently decided on an alternative to coffee – to instead
swing by a bakery known for staying open late. Thinking of this alternative may
seem only logical or even pathetic. Yet, it probably represents the first
interaction of its kind between Erin and me – I was displaying more confidence than in years before, whereas, Erin was innocent to such change in me for
now.
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