VILLAGE OF FADING DREAMS (5)

For seven long weeks the swimming pool was closed, boarded up, out of bounds.  DANGEROUS WORK SITE blared the notice on the outside door.  KEEP OUT strung up on a metal hurdle doubling as buffer inside.  Even the keyhole was taped over, as if Jurgen the caretaker suspected someone, Maxwell in particular, might discover some chink in his defences.

Then one evening, while snooping around, Maxwell detected only one sign bearing WORK IN PROGRESS on a sawhorse.  Yet obviously there was no work being carried out there and then.  So perhaps when the workmen had signed out, they were unaware that some residents might be desperate to test the waters.  Besides, Jurgen would have knocked off already, about 4.30.

The Intrepid One tried the door handle cautiously.  Unlocked!  Cautiously entering the pool area, he noticed the extension of the freshly painted cream panoply above the uncovered water.  Kneeling down on the decking as if giving thanks, he lowered his hand into the water.  Warm, good-o!  Without further ado, he jumped at the chance to get changed – Bugger management!

When Emergency Relief Assistant Marion went to check on the wellbeing of the rarely sighted Marg Barlow, who latterly had attained centenarian status, but still regarded by her close neighbours as an infamous chronic smoker, she found the shrunken old biddy sitting huddled up on her shallow ground-floor balcony wrapped snugly around in a fawn-coloured shawl over her shabby pale blue dressing gown down to carpet slippers a crusty greyish brown.  In her trembling, knotty, stained fingers, she was clasping a cigarette.

‘Now, Marg, you oughtened to be out in this cold weather, you’ll catch your death.’

‘Just leave me alone,’ muttered the wizened oldie, with a curt dismissive wave.  ‘I’m dying to finish this ciggie.  That’s all I want.’

Yez, case of gaspers’ heaven.  And she’s got away with it all these years. Good luck to ‘er!                  ‘Here, let me bring you a blanket.’

‘Just leave it!’ Marg snapped, staring through the wisps of retreating smoke at the grey clouds shrouding the skyline. ‘All I wanna do is finish this liddle bewdie in peace.’

‘I do worry about you.  You know that, don’t you.’

‘I wish you’d stop being so daft and sentimental.’  Marg spat something

distasteful or imaginary, then snatched another drag.

‘I know you know me for a bit of a sook,’ said Marion, unable to resist spreading a selvedge of shawl round Marg’s back. ‘Merry Christmas, Marg!  Have you got family coming to visit?’

The old crone growled and shoved her hands to the tousled collar and tugged it tight.  ‘S’pose,’ she muttered.  ‘Just the bounty hunters.’

Ever cheery but overly anxious about her charges, Marion couldn’t help but smile.  What a card!  She’s defied all the odds!  You can’t help worrying about the old soul, though, can you?  It takes all sorts.

Following fifty-three days of residential muttering and banging on in frustration, the renovations in the swimming pool were completed.  Ben Golding, passionate advocate of water aerobics, was agitating for the pool to be made available for his class.  ‘We’ve missed seven lessons, Maeve, so we really should get a wriggle on to make first use of the pool.’

Alarm bells rang in the manager’s ears whenever the short, stumpy figure of Ben shambled into view near front office or stubbornly loitered at the desk, prominent teeth gritted in a disarming smile.  The old fart was bound to mount a long-drawn-out case to change something, even if it was a mischievous way of showing up her own deficiencies.  No, she refused to be baited  ‘The pool itself is ready, but the new settings and furniture have not been installed.’

A quizzical frown arched above the glasses of the Jewish octogenarian and former Olympian hockey goalkeeper for New Zealand.  ‘We don’t need to wait for the trimmings, Maeve.’  These days his laboured wheezing punctuated a voice crackling with hesitant phrasing, uneven but resolute.  ‘Just your go-ahead and access to the dumbbells and noodles.’

‘Ah, no, just hold your horses.  We haven’t hung up the nets yet to contain those nick-knacks.  More to the point, I’m organising a celebratory opening next week, every resident invited, followed by a special afternoon tea and entertainment.’  She offered one of her most lubricious smiles, but kept mum about the gyrating belly-dancer, a six foot Pacific Islander.  Otherwise he’d cack himself.

‘Entertainment?’  The old Kiwi’s lined face fell, with suspicion then frustration.

‘Yes, it’ll be a lovely surprise, I can promise you.’

 With a series of blinks, ‘But if the pool is ready . . . We’ve lost so much valuable time
 already.  Two months.   I implore you, Maeve, to permit the class to commence on
 Wednesday  morning, the usual time.  Then you can have your ceremonial, your official
 opening, the following week.’

 Resting her chin on her bunched fists, lips pursed, Maeve was frowning in reflection, before
 releasing a long sigh.  This man could be a stubborn pain in the arse, would always present a 
 thoroughly prepared case aimed at tripping me up.  Fortunately, he doesn’t possess all the
 facts of the situation.  Recognising the ex-private school headmaster in his solemn, puffed-
 out demeanour, she refused to be intimidated.

 ‘Please consider the residents’ needs,’ Ben crackled on.  ‘They’re desperate to have the pool
  back.’

  After several seconds,  ‘Oh, all right,’ she released a sigh of resignation.  ‘I’ll make an
  exception for the aquarobics people.  I’d rather you didn’t let on to the other residents.  Act
  discreetly, otherwise the swimmers will be up in arms, claiming I’m favouring one group
  over another.’

 ‘Yes, yes, of course.  I’ll inform the class by phone, one by one.’

 The following Wednesday morning saw Maxwell scurry down to the pool, the regular
  trailblazer for water aerobics.  Following a slapdash hot shower, he tentatively savoured the
  steps winding down into the pool.  Thank god!  After all this time.  Unbelievable neglect! 
  Utterly disgraceful.  Eight weeks wasted!

  Yow!  Enthusiasm spiked.  The water was freezing!  He clenched his buttocks, clenched his
  teeth.  Undaunted even so, he was reckless enough to push out strongly into free style, head
  below water, middle ears suffering penetration, churning frantically to lessen the shivers.
  After ten laps of madcap flapping, he felt a trifle more at home, though panting hard for
  breath.

  As the rest of the class drifted in with eager anticipation, mainly ladies, their first question
  was invariably urgent and apprehensive:  ‘How’s the water?’  For there was no sign of
  clammy atmosphere or any other early participant buoyed up by the pipe that discharged hot
  water into the end by the steps.

 ‘I’m trying to stir it up,’ said the goggled-up Maxwell, irritated that they huddled and
  haggled with the shivers, staring morosely at his wavelets.

 ‘If it’s too cold for me, I refuse to go in,’ said Shelley with disgust, plump arms hugging her
  body, the youngest bar one of resident women at seventy-three.  ‘I can’t stand it.’

 ‘I’ll go and fetch Jurgen,’ said Ben, downcast.  ‘This is utterly disgraceful.  Maeve promised
  us thirty-one degrees.’

 ‘We pay so much service fee,’ muttered Beat Stack.  ‘It’s just not right.’

‘And we’re not teenagers any longer,’ observed Margaret from the exclusive sixth floor, who
  had recently turned ninety, much to the disappointment of her two portly, grey-haired sons,
  who were only too aware of their inheritance fast disappearing down the maw of Twilight
  Living.

  Meanwhile, Maxwell, trying not to show off with arms reaching straight back by his ears
  for the backstroke, a purist style that the chronically stiff arms of the others could never
  attempt these days, but to set an example of determined forward motion, was beginning to
  feel acclimatized, as long as he kept swimming, though more rhythmically now.

 ‘Is there any hot water coming through?’ said the genial Walter Dudgeon, ex-navy man, in
  his dowdy dark blue dressing gown, as he shuffled in behind the huddle in tan leather
  sandals.  ‘Jurgen probably hasn’t been told we’re having a class.’

 ‘Come on in!’ Maxwell hailed the whinging malingerers, trying to suppress his rising
  irritation.  ‘It’s not so bad once you start moving but keep your shoulders under water.’  And
  move he did, swimming an ungainly underwater butterfly stroke for the first time ever in a
  breathless pounding flurry, as if to celebrate being water-borne again.

  Marigold Chesney was one of four women who had attended the recent funeral of their
  husbands all within one month of one another:  Marigold had been sundered from Noel;
  bewildered Beat Stack found herself cast adrift from Clem; Gladys had resigned herself to
  the inevitable when Cedric again fell and bumped the back of his head; Shirl had watched
  Lester give up the ghost to lung cancer.  For several weeks the quartet had seemed
  inseparable, all wearing a brave smile and clucking together at their own dining table.  What
  price, thought Maxwell, any of the resident males would pal up in a twosome if they’d lost
  their wives? No longer did they even worked alongside one another in the men’s shed.

 He was peering over the latest jigsaw set out on a table looking out over the front garden
 when Marigold snuck up behind him. ‘Hello, Maxwell.  Have you got this one sorted?  It’s
 driving the rest of us to distraction.’

‘No, Marigold, I haven’t got the patience.’ There followed an awkward silence.  Maxwell
 was  loath to mention Noel’s passing.

‘What are you doing for Christmas?’

‘Nothing special,’ replied Maxwell, always reluctant to reveal his anti-social tendencies.  
 Besides, he was fussed that ‘O come all ye faithful’ was being played on the intercom in the
 lounge for the third time that day.  It was desk-bound Irene’s task to switch on recorded
 music and she had stayed the course with these mechanised carols since the first of
 December. ‘What about yourself?’

‘Same as usual.  My daughter has invited me over.  I asked her, ‘What would you like me to
 bring?  “You don’t have to bring anything, err but if you insist, smoked trout.”  I love smoked
 trout pin-boned, so I’m just popping down to Woollies.  I’m just a bit, you know, trembly. 
 It’s the first time.’

‘First time?’

‘The first time I’ve spent Christmas without Noel.  We’d been married for sixty years.’

 Maxwell noticed Marigold’s pale blue eyes moistening. ‘Gee, that’s a long stretch.’

            ‘We were so right for each other. To his dying day he still remembered the first time he saw
             me.  Descending a steep, spiral staircase.  In a gorgeous, full-length, bottle-green gown, just
             like Scarlet O’Hara.’ She performed a dainty swish of a half-pirouette with radiant smile, as
             if the memory of half a century was still tender. ‘It’s hard to believe but we seldom disagreed
             on anything. Noel was always calm and considerate, even though he suffered from various
             cancers for the last thirty years. Never complained. The specialist recommended that when               all those cancers on his scalp suddenly   blossomed forth, they should be cut out.  All up, he
             had cancers in seven major regions in his body.’

            ‘Oh, dear!  Poor Noel!’ Maxwell hoped Marigold hadn’t sensed the feebleness of his
             response.

            ‘Yes, for nearly one third of his life, he was eighty-five, he had to endure seven different
             cancers.  The worst situation was that the top part of his skull, the cranium, was removed, so
             looking down on him when he was seated, there was literally a crater.’  Marigold’s nose
             twitched with disgust.  ‘Staring into it, as I would have to, was like looking at a piece of raw
             steak.’

Maxwell’s eyes widened, eyebrows lifted.

           ‘He always insisted on me changing the dressings. O god, anything but that!  It was the last
            thing I wanted, but how could I refuse?  I tried hard not to show my revulsion.  When I
            removed the dressings, they were wet and very on the nose.  All sorts of muck slithered down
            his neck.  It was a disgusting business.

           ‘One time he asked if he could take a squiz at the top of his head.  I glanced at the doctor
            beside me and she shuffled awkwardly.  I took my cue from her.  ‘No, darling,’ I said, ‘it’s no
            different from how it looked years ago after your first operation.’ I lied, of course.    
            Nonetheless, Noel accepted my word without any more ado. He always trusted me. I felt
            dreadfully guilty.  Fortunately, as you would’ve noticed, he was obliged to wear a beret
            down almost to his eyebrows.  Underneath, he had several metal staples implanted in the
            bone.  Such a grisly sight.’  She shivered her cheeks.  ‘Macabre.’

           ‘You would never guess Noel had once been a high-ranking policeman, would you?  The
            Vice-Squad.  Had to work sex crimes.  Saw a side of human misery the rest of us couldn’t
            begin to comprehend.  And yet he was so placid a man.  Seldom spoke to anyone about his
            job, save me.  Those shocking times in the seventies with the blossoming of massage
            parlours   and nightclubs in the CBD, Number 96 on the tele, which roused the temperature of
            vulnerable young kids with full-frontal nudity and a range of previously taboo subjects, such
            as gay relationships and the drug culture.  An amazing transformation in what was generally
            characterised as a nation of prudes and wowsers. Suddenly our values were turned upside
            down, but Noel never faltered in his duty, I’m proud to say.’ She gave one of her
            spontaneous    smiles, when her face mellowed into a rosy glow of creases.’

A very short and thin lady, Flo Oddy was seldom spotted these days, nor was she often heard.  Invariably she would take her cue from husband Cyril’s ability to jolly along conversation. Her small, round face and urchin cut suggested an elfish vision of the world.  Whenever she entered the lounge, hesitantly nowadays, she would trail silently half a dozen steps behind the stooping crouch and slap-slap of sandalled feet of her lop-sided husband, her usually pallid face quite washed-out.

What if the bowel does burst? she wondered again.  The surgeon said something about faeces and bacteria being released into the blood stream.  But the thought of having to endure a stomach bag, rather, stoma bag, to collect the . . . O god, how disgusting!  And what was that about gas gangrene?  If only I could fast forever and survive on intravenous drops.

For his part, Cyril was far more open, matter-of-fact, blunt even.  She won’t go anywhere. Scared shitless she is that she’ll stink the place out.  Or vomit something up on the pavement.  Fortunately, she doesn’t have much appetite.  You’ve got to drink water, buckets of the stuff to re-hydrate.  I keep tellin’ her, but will she listen?  Another thing:  when the gas builds up in her belly and she’s doubling up with cramps, she’ll suddenly let rip a very loud fart. Just what the doctor ordered!  Yet she’s mortified!  Doesn’t bother me none.  But the missus is shot-through with embarrassment.  You’ve got to eat, I tell ‘er, but she merely sticks a hand on her belly and gives a pathetic shake of her noddle.  Vim’s gone right out of the poor old duckie.

           ‘Voila!’ announced Maeve Warren, as she cut the laguna blue ribbon and formally opened with             an extended right arm the swimming pool door to eager or curious residents trailing behind
            her. Moving toward the edge of the pool, she flung out her left arm and declared in turning
            round, ‘Now you can enjoy  the illusion of luxuriating on the Mediterranean!’  Remembering
            Maeve’s poor judgement over the refurbishment of the lounge/dining area, and all that catty
            criticism over the lack of bright colours, the clunky mirrors and drab carpet, Ben Golding and
            wife Patti were mumbling their disgust at the new-look pool in their ponderous
            circumambulation behind Maeve’s pied-piper enthusiasm.

‘The colours are so bland,’ lamented Patti in a muffled whisper.  ‘Pale yellow walls couldn’t be more dreary.’

‘No,’ sighed Ben, for he’d had no influence over the new design.  Even the noodles, dumbbells and floats were strung up in what resembled fishing nets in place of the cumbersome bags.  ‘So pretentious!  And all these 1930s posters is such a cliché.’

‘Just look at that eyesore over there!’ exclaimed Patti.  ‘Will that give us an accurate daily   room temperature?’

‘I hardly think so,’ said Ben.  ‘Jurgen’s probably fixed the room temperature to read twenty-five degrees, so that we’ll never really know.’

But when the early-bird residents filed in crosswise to the far corner, there was a creeping acknowledgement that some care, imagination and even taste had gone into the design.  At this nearer end were positioned a five-seater settee with flat waterproof mattress and three pale-patterned cushions.  On either side were stationed two wickerwork armchairs, the back and seat comprising a middle pattern of small triangles that divided top and bottom rows of horizontal weave.  From this view, as you promenaded along the right bank, sprouted three green-leafed dwarf trees in basket pots full of white pebbles and another woven armchair.  Two lifebuoys hung on the wall like giant Polo mints.

Lingering over the details, Maxwell for one relished the flavour of warmer climes, approved of the yellow walls that obviously suggested the sands of La Cote d’Azur and San Sebastian, names given on two of divers posters framed in white borders.  His imagination was thrust back to those British Rail illustrations decorating the compartments of steam trains in the 1950s inviting passengers to holiday on the Cornish Riviera or among harbourside villages in Devon.  A wave of nostalgia swept over him with the taste of yellow clotted cream hard-packed in silver tins that would arrive in the mail from the West Country.

Other commercial images of beach belles saluting the sun on tiptoe, a surf beach on which rested a surf board in the shape of a giant fish together with small boats beached at an angle, rows of multi-coloured bathing boxes, kneeling children with buckets and spades beneath striped beach umbrellas, and posters of Playas de Andalucia and Atlantic City seaside hung above a cosy two-seater wicker settee.

And on the nearside wall hung a thermometer, so bold, vivid and over-sized that Maxwell judged it a charming aesthetic feature that contrasted nicely with the softer tones of this new ambience.  But where was that exotic but fake bird of paradise with purple and orange scapes that used to reach up over the recessed side of the four-sided spa?  That also made an impact on his imagination.

One might wonder how Flo could possibly have endured over half a century of marriage to Cyril with his niggling mannerisms and high-pitched bleat of a voice.  Yet even with his strangely crooked back that left him walking bowed down like a doddery Groucho Marx and the heavy plod of his slipshod scuffle, usually got away with discharging whimsical, if not downright teasing cracks that could crease up the most frumpish of matrons.  In water aerobics, he invariably found himself out of sync in the walking routines round the inside walls of the pool.  Without his hearing aid, he was a lost soul, albeit with a bemused grin, un-self-conscious.  Nor could he read the body language of others’ threshing underwater limbs. Was the instruction, ‘Knees up, high as you can!’ or ‘Keep your head up high, as you stand!’  In any case half the class couldn’t remember which direction from Ben’s poolside position signified ‘Clockwise!’ or ‘Anti-Clockwise!’ Even Maxwell had to stop, steady and glance round at the others, slack-jawed and perplexed, fussed further when several gazes fell on him whenever Cyril cried out, ‘Maxwell will know!  Follow him!’

Even when causing a giggling pile-up of primly costumed ladies who, in turning, abruptly, confronted the bemused Cyril, now facing the wrong way, he ever remained unfazed with a twinkle in his eye.  For he relished the close physicality of this bevy of buxom curves and cubist bodies and warmly appreciative smiles at his expense, especially when mooching up close and stooping to transfer the large, slippery plastic ball under water into the grip of apprehensive female hands with a salacious downward glance and surreptitious smirk.  Shamelessly, like a mischief-maker thirteen years young, he would throw open the change room where Maxwell was towelling down, teasingly hold the door wide open opposite the poolside steps and declare with a throaty pipsqueak chuckle, ‘Have a squiz, ladies!   How’s this for a pair of biceps!  Tee-hee!’  For such a silly man, it was difficult to believe that he enjoyed reading medieval history, especially about ‘that dreadful shocker’, Henry VIII, and ‘that right old balls-up of the War of the Roses.’

Of course, Maxwell didn’t own any biceps, he being long and stringy, and always would be, but in any case he wouldn’t have a bar of such crass behaviour.  Nevertheless, he thenceforth saw Cyril as slightly less dotty.

With a background in the building trade, the trim, bespectacled Jurgen Hoffmeister had made himself indispensable to Chiltern Towers over the years as a cheerful, imperturbable and willing on-site, jack-of-all-trades.  Invariably dressed in navy blue shirt and overalls, he would also oversee a number of tradies chiacking into reception after eight o’clock, explaining the nature of their job to one another after office staff had inducted them and presented the group with a temporary swipe card.  Jurgen’s first job of a morning was to collect and deliver the newspaper(s) of choice to every apartment front door by trolley.  He kept very fit walking every workday the length and breadth of this impressive six-storied, white-painted building and various garden paths, before attending to the maintenance requests of residents, the watering roster of the garden hoses and feeding requisites of the goldfish. With an app on his mobile that counted the steps and distance walked, he frequently clocked up twelve kilometres per day.

It’s just over a year ago since the new cooling tower was installed at Chiltern and the time I spend maintaining it has substantially reduced.  No longer do I visit the seventh floor on almost a daily basis to ensure the cooling tower is running as it should.  Previously, high winds would often cause the boilers to go out, requiring me to re-set them.  The noisy pump, leaking fan and other failing component problems have almost vanished with the new tower.  These days I go up to the cooling tower twice a week to give it a check and make sure it’s ticking over.

As a change from the range of diverse practical tasks at Chiltern Towers, Jurgen hoped to spend some time over weekends on his artwork, painting in delicate watercolours or drawing nude models in pencil at the Chiltern art class housed in the old redbrick fire station, a talent that belied the emphasis on weighty physical tasks in the nature of his job, or disappearing into the bush on photo shoots, seeking out the elusive platypus or wombat.  But married life didn’t afford such luxuries.

‘If a career maintenance man can’t be a Mr Fixit in his own home,’ complained his long-suffering wife, Mona, ‘we’d be in a fine pickle.  There’s always something that needs doing about this house.  Never mind that grandiose Chiltern Towers!  Didn’t it used to be a convent?’

Which he was constantly reminded of on Friday afternoons when she handed him his To Do! list.

As a vegetarian, Maxwell took a self-righteous stand against dining in Chiltern Towers’ restaurant.  But he couldn’t refrain from a compulsive partiality for the chef’s cakes, even though micro-sized they could be gobbled down in two mouthfuls.  The fruitcake was by far the most lively with its studs of deep blue fruit, orange peel and striking yellow mix. The coconut and ginger variety was understated and easy to digest. Unfortunately for elderly citizens, these delicacies crumbled too easily, so nodules could frequently be discovered in the creases of cushions – but rarely by Clay, the young assistance maintenance man, who usually had his head in the clouds listening to the lyrics of Marty Robbins or Johnny Cash on his earphones fifty years too late.

Maxwell also appreciated the chef’s attempts to broaden the assortment of teas offered beyond Lipton’s teabags, such as ginger & lemon, chicory, peppermint etc. Though always willing to oblige, Andrew the chef, nicknamed Andre, did have misgivings about volunteering as an emergency relief assistant on Christmas Day, as none of the regular staff or part-timers wished to leave their own family festivities.  But his wife, Aileen, a New Zealander, was flying out to Auckland to spend the hols with her parents. He couldn’t easily explain his decision to himself, given the previous Christmas Day he was bored witless.  The female resis had completed every jigsaw in the building and there were no inmates to check up on by phone or, if anxious, clamouring at their apartment door.

In desperation, all he could think of was pushing sixteen wheelie bins from the basement up to street level and align them neatly kerbside.  Then, when that was done, pushing them back again one by one.  But that repetitive, pointless task killed only thirty-five minutes.

‘I did that three times.’  He elongated the vowel sound while putting up three fingers. ‘On such a stinking hot day! I was worn out!’ his voice rising in melodramatic indignation.

‘Sisyphus got off lightly,’ mumbled Maxwell.

‘Who’s he when he’s at home?’

So this year Maxwell had invited the laid-off chef, another expatriate Englishman, to a game of table tennis in the activities room.  At two o’clock Andrew turned up in his usual blue denims and striped sports shirt carrying a small travel bag.  And, after casting a cautious eye over the playing area, suddenly disappeared into the cubicle of a kitchen store area in the corner of the room.

Maxwell wondered what ruse Andrew was cooking up, while he needlessly fussed through the motions of checking the height of the net and brushing away imaginary specks of dust from the dark green surface of the table.  When the lofty figure burst out, Maxwell was taken aback.  Decked out in blue shirt with white trim, blue shorts and blue and white socks, not to mention the black thick-soled boots he cheffed in, the opposition obviously held serious intentions, if not high hopes.

‘How come you’re wearing Chelsea’s strip?’

‘Stuff Chelsea, mate!  These are Portsmouth’s colours!’

Maxwell stifled a laugh and affected serious concern, not wishing to give further offence to Andrew’s home-grown loyalties, if not sensibilities.  By merely aiming to keep the yellow ping-pong ball in play, he contrived to save the wildly swinging and awkwardly stumbling opponent from further humiliation – except on the scoreboard:  21-2, first set.  Nevertheless, he was embarrassed that the tall, elegant, smooth-moving chef on the dining floor was reduced to a cumbersome clod in the sporting arena, especially when stretching for the forehand swoosh that missed everything but the far wall.

Wednesday was Maeve’s preferred day to take a sickie, especially if the residents’ monthly meeting on the previous day had worn her to a frazzle.  Inevitably, there were complaints levelled at management, some piss-weak.  Should serviettes be folded triangular or square?  Oh, get real!  Can a carwash be installed in the underground car parks?  No, it would take up four parking spaces.  Is the emergency button in the swimming pool waterproof?  Yes, of course!  Do you think I’m an idiot?  Why does Dexter Bland keep banging on about the pain suffered by some residents bouncing over the speed humps in the car parks?  Putting in a small ramp would defeat the purpose of having the humps. Besides, our ramps comply with Vic. Roads specifications.  I’m sorry about those residents who receive a nasty jolt when they go over them, but they must slow down!

Then there was the anxiety of presenting ‘the litany of sorrows’, the list of running repairs: leaking parapets on balconies, $450,000; external painting $60,000; lift maintenance $100,000; basement leaks $30,000; tiled membranes $250,000 . . .

‘I do apologise,’ Maeve was saying, removing her glasses so that she didn’t stare down her audience as in the early days, pre Twilight Living, ‘about the no-show screening of the film on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.  Our cinema is a nightmare at present.  Please be patient.  The problem is the Apple TV black box. The signal is not getting in.  I don’t know why that is.  I have the same system at home and it’s never been an issue.  Going forward, I do have some brighter news. The new lift buttons will be installed next month.  I’ll put a time schedule in your mailboxes, as you may have to use another lift for a brief spell.  Also,’ she looked down at her notes, ‘I intend to create a think tank from residents interested in discussing films that have more appeal than those screened recently, so that we can build numbers.  I gather there were only a handful in the cinema on Sunday afternoon.’

All of a sudden there was an angry scraping of chair legs as the flabby, balding figure of Dick Bellchambers struggled to his feet and let go a savage salvo.  ‘You shouldn’t be telling us how to choose movies, Maeve, that’s not your job.  It’s the job of the social committee.  I’m sorry if I’ve offended you, but I’m sick and tired of Twilight Living running the place.’

Still standing, Maeve groaned inwardly, sensed she was trembling.  Keep a lid on it, she told herself.  Don’t let him bully you like he did when he was treasurer on the residents committee. ‘I certainly don’t want the responsibility of choosing the movies, merely to invite twelve suitable residents to make the choice.’

‘Well, just let the residents committee decide.  You don’t need to stick your oar in or even steer the tiller!’

‘Twilight Living,’ Maeve recovered in her address to the sixty-one residents in attendance, ‘have global minimum requirements.  That’s to say, they are very strong on Health and Safety.  They don’t want window cleaners hanging from ropes outside your balcony windows.  It’s better to have them pass through your apartment to use your own balcony.  The ‘pole’ cleaning method was not effective last year for floors above two storeys.  Not only were windows left smudged, but the cleaners themselves got drenched below.’

Slowly, awkwardly, Ben Golding got to his feet but emphatically dismissed with a swipe of an arm the scurrying Dr Hugh Thwaites, bringing the hand-held mike while trying, with head cocked at a curious forty-five degree angle, to nut out if it was switched on or off.  ‘The pool has been closed again because of the condensation already forming.  That was . . .’

‘Use the mike!’  ‘We can’t hear you!’

‘I was a teacher and headmaster for fifty years,’ Ben protested, as Hugh bent low and fiddled on with uncertainty.

‘Still can’t hear you!’

‘And I never once needed a mike,’ Ben struggled to get out, but his squeak of words sank under the increasing racket.

‘You do now,’ muttered Maxwell to himself.  ‘Stubborn old bugger.’

Finally, Dr Hugh had located the ‘on’ switch and thrust the microphone towards Ben’s hand that jibbed it away.

‘As I was saying, the reason for the recent reconstruction was to ensure that condensation was not a problem.  Now it appears that more investigation should’ve been done before the start of recent reconstruction.  For instance, using oil-based paints instead of water-based paints, in spite of the costing.’

‘Mm, you need to be an engineer to explain this,’ Maeve broke in, searching for words.  ‘Remember, the pool is getting old too.’  She gave a weak smile.  ‘Look, if you want the water temperature to be warmer, condensation is inevitable if the air temperature and water temperature are five degrees apart.’

‘But elderly people in their eighties and nineties, some with disabilities, find the water far too cold to swim in.  No wonder the pool is under-used.  Yet it remains Chiltern Towers’ number one attraction.’

‘I’ll see what I can do,’ said Maeve, to push the meeting along. ‘But it will mean that your service charge will have to be raised.’  She looked over the top of her glasses and glanced from side to side’

‘Yes, I ‘d like to say something,’ said the usually timid Gert Freebody.

‘Good on you, Gert!  Go for it!’

‘I’m sick and tired of superficial flowers.  Stick ‘em in the dumpster, I say!’

After the outburst of laughter had died down, Maeve, gave an understanding smile and nod:  ‘I hate all these dried flowers too.  But you have to consider the budget.  We are looking at re-vamping.’

!

Maxwell was at an abject loss.  How could this deception have possibly happened?  After all those warnings, the numbers of people duped.  He’d been advised time and again, Never ever give out your personal details on-line. Seniors stuck out as sitting targets, easy prey.  Only the other day, Gerard Baxter, sensible chappie, was stung for five hundred dollars over the phone, easy as blinking.  Computer malfunction, the scammers claimed.  Just so happened that Gerard was experiencing problems with his computer.

Now it was Maxwell’s turn to be put through the wringer.  The impractical man was mesmerised. Was this the proof that he was suffering the first stages of dementia?  Or was it Alzheimer’s?  He could never remember the difference.  Already his scalp was sensing heat spots breaking out, his voice drying up, his armpits feeling moist, a sinking sensation that drained all energy.  Nervously cautious, his eyes went creeping up edgewise to that rank email. 

Dear Apple client, User Agreement changed, Recent updates . . . read the opening caption.

There has been some unusual activity on your computer recently.  There may be evidence that another user is using your account and slowing your computer down.

Breathing heavily, Maxwell struggled to recollect his dealings over the past week.  Yes, his lap-top did take five or seven minutes to open email. Yes, not infrequently did he fail to close down all programmes.  It was conceivable that someone was trying to hack into his computer. Fortunately, he was canny enough not to do any banking on-line.  Even so . . .

To check your identity, please fill in all the boxes:  name, email address, bank details, visa card number

He lingered a long time, reading and re-reading the small print, his mind wheeling in circles but fogging up, stumbling over the same questions, their very answers.  Even his legs felt drained, immobile, save a sudden twitch every few seconds.

You must fill in all the boxes, including the last three digits.

Now where had he heard that voice before?  In fact, he’d carried out that instruction without trepidation not so long ago.  But when, where?  It was very familiar, too familiar. Yet that lurching sick feeling of helplessness, sheer frustration and despair held him captive, invaded, corrupted, shot through with the wretched confusion of old age.

Fidgeting on his seat, forefinger poised on the mouse, cursor quivering, the prickles of heat sinking resistance, that itchy finger poised over, the cursor trembling towards . . . the tension was so unbearable, he clicked the mouse emphatically.  There, be done with it!  Immediately there sprang up a sepia dark and dense page, a chart of so much meaningless detail, hieroglyphics in very small print, a maze of minutiae with no central key or meaning.  Quickly, somehow, in spite of himself, o what the hell, he despatched the email, rid of all doubt, placed trust in Big Brother Apple.

Gulping at a ristretto coffee in the lounge, nagging doubt took hold.

‘How are you Maxie boy?  You okay?’  The tall, slim frame of chef Andrew was hovering in his black and white uniform, ever solicitous if he sensed a pall of depression hanging over any resident.

Should Maxwell say anything?  He felt so dumb, so ashamed, so miserably feeble.  Words jammed up in his brain.  Andrew stood there, waiting.  ‘Yeah.  Just a bit anxious, that’s all.’

‘Why?  What’s up?’

Reluctantly, inevitably, in slow, measured terms: ‘I think I’ve made a big mistake.’  The pregnant pause was a dead give-away. ‘I’ve received an email.  Purportedly from Apple.’

‘Oh yeah?’ Andrew’s cheery face always ready with a quip suddenly hardened into a frowning expression.

‘I’ve been asked to give my bank details.’

‘Yeah?’  Maxwell didn’t dare look up.  ‘You haven’t though, have you?’ insisted the chef.

Maxwell appeared to shrink in on himself.  Without looking up, wheedling in a voice suggesting some injustice had been perpetrated, ‘Well, it seemed so convincing.  This is Apple, after all.’  Maxwell pressed his lips, gave the slightest of nods.

Andrew tried to restrain himself.  ‘Yes, but you should never give out your bank details, whoever it is.’  More quietly:  ‘It does sound dodgy to me.’

Maxwell was getting the wind up good and proper, desperate to act, move quickly.  What was the time?  Ten to four.  The bank closed in ten minutes.  Better whiz down to the bank, no messing. 

Striding along at breakneck speed, streamlining dawdling shoppers, he mounted the steps of the Providence bank just as one of the consultants was about to lock out any latecomers.

‘Excuse me,’ gasped Maxwell, ‘I think I’ve been scammed.’

‘You’d better come in then,’ the young lady said, only mildly concerned, looking down at her mobile phone.  ‘Take a seat.’

‘I thought I’d be too late.’

‘Just take it easy.  Someone will be available soon.’

But no one was.  The whole building seemed hollow.  That last-minute flurry had fled.  The young consultant was constantly checking her mobile.

Maxwell’s insides roiled with impatience at doing nothing, staring out the window at the passing bustle.  After ten itchy minutes:  ‘Look, I have another appointment.   I must go.’

‘Oh, but don’t you want to close your account?’

‘I don’t know.’  He was almost howling.  ‘I can’t just sit around waiting.’

Puzzled at the customer’s instant change of plan, she said, ‘Wait a moment.  I’ll give you the after hours number of  Providence.’

That feeling of utter helplessness to which he was subjected seemed to be occurring more frequently these days with advancing years, his mind swirling in fog, slower to string words together, the precise words to make sense of the notion, sense of the world.  Then he’d feel like whimpering, like a five year old at primary school caught swearing, or drowning in front of a year ten class on a rainy Friday afternoon.  Energy levels dipped sharply when the victim despised himself.

Stay calm, he told himself, you must stay calm; there was nothing to gain by sliding into panic.  Yet, unbelievably, he drove his feet hard down on the pavement to meet his 4.30 commitment to play table tennis with Bernie back at Chiltern Towers, even though his companion was invariably late himself.  Surely not today, though, when his own outer world was crumbling.

As usual, Bernie wasn’t waiting for him in the activities room, didn’t apologise for his tardiness, didn’t even smell the fear that must have showed up in Maxwell’s eyes and didn’t sense any distraction in his match play.  Somehow Maxwell must have shut out the howl of truth that his life-savings were at this very moment dribbling away.  What a howler indeed!  Even then his focussed stroke play was passing fair.  Bernie suspected nothing.

Immediately the five sets concluded, Maxwell was impelled, however reluctantly even now, to dash upstairs and ring the bank’s night service to cancel his credit card, couldn’t face the stark reality that he’d been robbed blind.

‘Thank you for holding.  We are currently facing a lengthy queue.  Please hold the line.  Your expected waiting time is seventeen minutes.’

Lying stretched out on the beige carpet, cradling the phone, Maxwell noticed his right hand trembling, his heavy heart pounding, couldn’t even find a comfortable position.  It required a major effort not to slam down the phone and run screaming into the night.  Reminding himself not to beat himself up but stay calm, think clear, not dwell on his panic and shame, stupidity and sheer helplessness – would he ever again regard retirement, the ageing process, as a fresh stage in life, a new chapter to enjoy?

Silently, he pleaded for the customer service girl to return to the phone, willing her back. 

Then breaking through this agonising wait, he dredged up his last meeting with Desai at the bank, the Indian consultant who somehow had taken a shine to him.

‘I have the sense,’ the young man once said, in his deep mellow voice and short vowel sounds, ‘you and I are on the same wavelength, isn’t it?  So I will ask you, what is ‘mindfulness?’

At first, Maxwell didn’t catch that mouthful of a word.  ‘In what context?’

‘I read about it in a book about right consciousness in mystical thinking.’

‘I’m sorry, Desai, I can’t help you, except in its literal meaning.’

‘So what is the sense of it?’

‘I imagine it means being aware of what you are doing or what you are thinking at the present  moment.’  What could be clearer than that, he might have added.

Desai looked despondent.  ‘No, no.  Mystics, they say something more.  You see, mindfulness lies in the hearth of Buddhist meditation.’

But for Maxwell, his own basic interpretation was enough, a nudge to remind himself not to fall so readily distracted that he’d forget where he placed his spectacles or his door key or to record on his calendar the due date for his credit card payment; or only last week shoving open an electronically operated exit door at Chiltern Towers instead of gently pressing the impossible-to-miss red button.  ‘Yes, but in meditation don’t you try to empty your mind of everyday clutter in order to still it?’

‘What is ideal thing is you must pay attention, isn’t it?’

‘To what?’

‘To those thoughts what come up in the present moment and why do they.’

‘I used to try not let my mind wander.  Otherwise I’d find myself getting angry.’

‘No, you must avoid emotion.  Keep calm, pay attention.  So can you check meaning of “mindful intervention”?  Next time you come in, you ask to see me and explain this expression, please.’

What a clumsy phrase, thought Maxwell.

At long last, a connection, a genuinely calm voice, clear and ungarbled.  The lass called up his account, reassured him that no money had been withdrawn or unknown purchases made in the last three hours.

‘O thank you so much,’ he gushed out, eyes closed tight.  ‘You’ve saved my life.’

‘No problem,’ she said, too cheerily, as if it wasn’t.

‘I’m such an idiot!’ he blubbered.

‘Don’t be so hard on yourself.  There’s no damage done.’

‘I can’t thank you enough.’  Such was his sense of shame and stupidity and uselessness.

‘Not at all.  That’s what I’m here for.  Now do you want to close this account and apply for a new credit card?’

Walking back home, Maxwell had tears welling in his eyes, little-boy tears of gratitude, tears of utter release from an unbearable weight, tears of whimpering joy.

Never could he explain his gullibility at the hands of those fraudsters working the cybernetic swamp.

When Bernie Kendal entered the activities room the following week, he had the clenched expression of a man wrestling with suppressed anger.  Eyes cast down at the floor, rather than greeting Maxwell with a warmly meant if loud and raspy hello and occasional handshake with slight deferential bow and faltering Mem Sahib.  ‘What does that expression really mean, by the way?’

‘Is something the matter, Sahib Kendal?’ asked Maxwell tentatively, as he sometimes felt spoken at rather than to when Bernie was riding one of his hobby-horse grievances.

‘Yes, something is definitely up,’ he growled.  ‘Or perhaps down, really down.’

Though his curiosity was immediately aroused, Maxwell played dumb.

‘Rosie’s been rushed off to hospital.  Sabrini.’

‘Oh no.  I thought she was recovering.’

Bernie gave a shrug of his shoulders.  ‘Obviously not.  Last night she was in agony. The pain in her ankle had blown up again and became unbearable.  They assured us they’d cleaned out all the infectious gunk.  That’s the danger of going on holiday overseas and not having access to competent surgeons.’

Maxwell was about to ask if they had taken out medical insurance, but thought better of it when he remembered seeing Bernie by the mail boxes holding up a trembling sheaf of documents, muttering, ‘Bills, bills, bills!  It never ends.’

Lying in bed still awake, Rosie Kendal knew the symptoms well.  For many years she had lived with arrhythmia, an irregular heartbeat.  She pressed the bedside buzzer. Pressed again. Sounds of clattering down the corridor quickly drawing nearer.

‘Yes, what is it?’ said the first nurse, a young chatterbox blonde who sounded annoyed. ‘We’re very busy right now.’

‘Well, I’m sorry to have disturbed you,’ Rosie piped in a thin voice, more indignant than apologetic, ‘but I’ve just had palpitations.’

‘Blimey O’Reilly!  How long ago?’

‘About five or six minutes.’

‘O god, we must act quickly.  Lyn, fetch Dr Brady.  He should be in the next ward.’

‘We’d better call your husband at once.’

‘No, please don’t!’  Rosie’s face took on a haggard shade of pale. 

‘It’s standard procedure, Mrs -’

‘But it’s three o’clock in the morning!  My husband will go crazy with anxiety.’

‘We’re obliged to do it, whatever the time.’

‘No, please don’t fuss.  No, please don’t.  I know how to click it back.’

Returning to Twilight Living from Chiltern Library took only five minutes walk that sometimes included a dash across High Street. Most mornings Maxwell aimed to arrive at the library entrance before ten o’clock in order to hustle to his favourite window seat that obscured the bright rays of the northerly sunshine.  He was desperate to escape his apartment, as if the age-old routine of choofing off to work every morning was ingrained.  Still suited to the reverential hush of libraries in his own youth, he tensed up at the prospect of kiddies’ story-time:  tiny tots as well as six year olds who should’ve known better couldn’t refrain from running up and down the aisles, while their mums were carrying on loud conversations with their mobile phones, unaware or unconcerned that their charges were dropping books on the floor to gain attention, oblivious to their shrieks of excitement.  When a gaggle of mums and kiddy-winks had the temerity to dance to the hokey-pokey, Maxwell beat a hasty retreat.

            Entering the east side of Twilight Living, he was surprised to see Marigold Chesney
            ensconced in an armchair in the recess adjacent to the eastern doorway, just out of the sun’s
            cheerful but blinding rays of noon.

‘So this is this your secret half-way house, Marigold?’ he teased.  ‘What are you reading?’

‘Christopher Koch, Taswegian writer. I do like his writing,’ she almost purred. ‘The closely observed way he evokes rural Tassie in those days of the bushranger.  It’s so vivid, I’m almost there myself in dear old Launceston.  Sometimes I feel so entombed in my own apartment, now that Noel’s departed.’ 

‘I know what you mean.’

‘Oh, I don’t suppose you could do me a favour, could you?’

‘Of course, no worries.’

‘Could you open a jar for me?   My arthritis is so bad.  I don’t have the strength in my wrists.  I’ve had an operation to remove the bone in my right hand.  My apartment is just round the corner.’  He followed her down the dog-leg corridor, casting a glance at the prints of the ruins of Pompei. ‘Please come in.’

‘Wow, this is exquisite! Such spacious rooms. So much light from the courtyard.  Oh, I say!  You can look across to the Towers’ main entrance.’

‘Now this is the kitchen.  More like a ship’s galley, but big enough for me.  Here’s the jar.  Cider Vinegar.  Have you ever tried it?

‘Every day for dinner.  Two teaspoonfuls of cider vinegar and two of Melluca honey.  Excellent for digestion.’

‘I can’t unscrew the lid. I’ve had this bone removed.’  She held out her right hand with knobbly joints.  ‘I can see you have strong wrists.  Thank you.  Oh, can you do this one too?  Do you like dates?’

‘Yes, dried dates.  I take a handful before swimming.  Good for energy before table tennis and the gym.’

‘And here’s another.  Date syrup.  I’ll give you a taste.’

He frowned and ummed.  ‘I suspect it’ll have too much sugar for me.’

‘Oh, come on, you’re as skinny as a rake.  You need building up.’

‘Mm.  Very creamy but err just a tad too sweet for me.’

‘Come through to the lounge because I want to show you my tribute to Noel.  I had this plaque made to showcase his four medals he won in the force.  The photo was taken on our wedding day.’ 

Framed in the middle of a square plaque awarded by Victoria Police, Noel was unrecognisable to Maxwell, who remembered only the tall, thin, virtually silent Noel with a short, white margin of thin hair about his ears beneath a black beret.  Here he was a striking man, soaring above the petite Marigold.

‘I would never have recognised him. Plenty of black hair then, black moustache.  Quite a bit taller than you.’

‘Yes, I always felt protected when I was with him.’  Then her voice dropped into quiet reflection.  ‘Nine operations in twenty years, poor love.  And never complained.’  Maxwell respected the pause of further reflection.  ‘Noel always regretted not going to war.  Felt he’d missed out somehow.  D’yer know?’  She looked up into his face, as if appealing.

Maxwell gave a gentle nod or two, but didn’t understand.

The death of Ben Golding came as no surprise when Shelley sidled up to the west lift where Maxwell was standing stork-like on one leg in a favourite stretch and murmured in a solemn, confidential voice.  ‘Ben’s gone.  Patti told me this morning.  Passed away in his sleep.’

‘Ah, well,’ said Maxwell, slow in coming forward.  ‘I s’pose it’s all for the best.’

‘Yeah,’ said Shelley.  ‘They kept him alive long enough, but you wonder, don’t you, when they’ve got gangrene in their legs, poor circulation, blocked bowels, there’s not much you could do for him.’

In his mind’s eye, Maxwell conjured the hideous picture of Ben’s unnaturally dark brown stumps; indeed, he felt repelled when Ben unsteadily clung to the rail as he lowered himself into the water to commence a lesson, more so at the thought of those, short, stubby, calcified limbs entering the steaming hot spa.  Wouldn’t some of that obnoxious gangrene seep into the water through his worn, paper-thin skin?

Yet respect was due to this man of many parts, not to mention his pacemaker, so downright defiant, still determined to live on his own terms.  Apparently, he’d insisted on returning home to the Village.  What was the point of being propped up with medications by a team of surgeons who were still divided on how exactly to treat him, to keep him alive?   Perhaps he knew he was close to death anyhow.  The first time Maxwell laid eyes on Ben’s release – escape? – from hospital, the old stalwart was being wheeled around the lounge by his diminutive Patti, puffing her cheeks, stopping for a brief chat with the handful of residents one Saturday morning.  Even then Maxwell wondered if this was a farewell tour of familiar faces planned by the pair of them.

As the wheelchair approached the pillar behind which Maxwell was pretending to read the weekend reviews, he heard Patti’s subdued voice. ‘Oh look, there’s Maxwell.’

Close up, slumped as if shrunken in body, Ben was doing it tough.  Breathing itself was sterterous and in the act of speaking he couldn’t help shifting gears from squeak to croak every few seconds, yet despite resignation to the inevitable, the old fella could still raise a wry smile.

Throughout the laboured exchange, Maxwell remained more or less speechless, but umming supportively, unable to bring himself to thank Ben for his sterling voluntary work in water aerobics, as if it would confirm their final meeting. Yet he certainly admired Ben for not revealing any self-consciousness over a wracked, discoloured, deoxygenated body; or for not being embarrassed about presenting old chestnuts dripping with nostalgia, such as Vera Lynn’s wartime classic, We’ll meet again, or happy-go-lucky Abba or The Merry Widow. Most of the class loved his choice of golden oldies, but it was questionable whether it coaxed extra rhythm, energy or even attention from ageing bodies, as the group struggled through his basic routines, two or three less inhibited putting more energy into sing-along with the recording artists whilst awkwardly hopping on their left foot or bunny-hopping – Alma Budgell unashamedly belting out I’ll do it my way and the silver-haired, ever-beaming Damian Whiting resurrecting himself as castrato in the Platters’ hit Only You.

Whatever Maxwell’s misgivings with the group’s failure to grasp or even listen to instructions, he for one always felt brimming with energy after drying himself and stepping on the scales, full of vigour renewed.

           

                                                                                                Michael Small

December 30, 2016-August 10, 2017