I lay in no pain except what was coursing through the brain I had somehow damaged. No existential trauma but the effects were very clear to others. The slurred speech, the right sided weakness, especially the upper quadrant,
It took a while to determine more accurately if bleeding or clot based, and when clot based was determined aspirin dissolution was indicated. No one had said
“Gee you’re lucky, you could have died.”
My facilities right side were limper, try as I might it took huge useless effort to get fingers and points to work accurately.
Mourning what might have been lost seemed self indulgent, I’d no interest in giving them up.
“If they’re gone they’re gone, get on with what you got.”
Looking around many have less. Who cares? Are they dead?
Keeping to my self though offered time to think about the past, the long past, the immediate past, and the past which sits there unresolved.
What are somethings about? How do chance happenings change things?
Lying in bed there was no apparent need to worry as she was. I slumbered. We were awoken by the security lights coming on.
“What was that?” we asked each other incessantly when awake.
” Probably a cat or something. Do you want me to look?” I answered reassuringly.
“Yes but be careful he might do anything .”
I started to wonder who he was as I disentangled from her legs and crossed the room.
At the peak of the curtains the light from 500w bulbs inched over the rings. Though very dark in the room my eyes were adjusting in the gloom. Round the end of the curtains I peered out.
” Nothing there hon,” was all I could see at this acute angle.
“Yes but he’s cunning. He knows not to get in the way of the light beam coming on. It will have scared him into the shadows.” she trembled, “Go look out the door to be sure.”
So to be sure that’s where we went, out though the half opened bedroom door and left through the lounge entrance to the locked front door. I fumbled with the keys, she behind.
The screen door was locked tight. I peered out. The faux cobbles peered back. In the harshness of the security lights I saw naught. Then I noticed that the pedestal of a fountain appeared knocked over.
” Was that always like that?” I asked.
” Well yes and no,” she whispered over my right shoulder. “It was ok till he knocked it over when he came before I had the lights installed.”
“How do you know it was him though?”
” David, it was him alright, he did all the plants with the weed killer.”
And true enough all the plants were dying off in the proudly planted landscaped array. She’d shown me this on my first or second visit but maybe it had not sunk in deep enough or at all, the reason for the browning.
“And the fountain too hey?”
“Yes that too. He made it look like a hoon job and me a worried old woman.”
Without a doubt he had. He’d meet her on the net but when his ruse was discovered, she’d disengaged, or so she thought. Perhaps he’d done it before. The drink driving, the unsocial working hours gave legitimate reasons to be out and about at all hours.
He had made her his possession in his mind, not her’s.
She was slowly isolating herself with her increasing security consciousness, short term then long term friends were falling away. A complex web of family relationships ( which I never really understood ) were unravelling, or so I thought.
“Yes, when I called the cops they took ages to come and said they understood but I had no evidence.”
I had heard this before, many times, and tried to ensure every occasion was cop reported. It caused issues, the lack of funding thus staff, the distance and the inevitability of not getting the same rostered on person.
“Well there’s no one there,” I said to the wind and the screen door.
“He’s been been here, I know it, I can sense it.”
I yawned, “Well he might have been but I can’t see any evidence from here.”
” Well he has ” she insisted before I snored off.
Perhaps she slumbered and off. I’d dropped into the sleep of the dead and she well awake before breakfast. I tied a dressing gown around me before tackling the dawn lit forecourt. It must have been raining I thought as I looked at the sheen on my car roof and on the drive, but was astounded to find a bird appeared to have left a calling card on my roof and bonnet.
“Look at this will ya. A bird has shat all over my car, any rags?”
” Oh I’m so sorry, hang on and I’ll see what I can find.”
I went closer, the bird shit seemed to bubble and the grey paint was evidently lifting
“Fuck” I thought, ” must’ve been there a little time.”
And the size of it made me wonder whether in fact elephants had taken flight or maybe a flock of pterodactyls.
She came out the front door as I was looking at the offside.
” They look like they were going south west to the north east” I exclaimed trying to make
sense of what I was seeing. The bubbling was apparent and instinctively I went to wipe it off at the same time saying,
“Where’s the hose, might be quicker to spray this off.”
I was surprised at the speed of her reaction.
“No, no, no don’t do that, no it’ll only spread and make it much worse, the guy who re did my car said that’s the worst thing you can do.”
By now I was over at the offside, and there it was, the doors front and rear panels spattered with the same grey slimy goo.
“Shit!” I thought , ” that’s all over the door and down to the mud flaps.” Got me thinking of whether the elephant flight could have shat so low. Clearly this was human.
“He’s stood on the footpath and covered your car and the driveway. Look over there, and there and there too,” she said pointing to where in the sunlight it was obvious that the drive was glistening.
And it was so evident that the trajectory was man made and the pattern of some one throwing paint stripper, maliciously.
“It wouldn’t have taken all that long I figure, better call the police,” I offered.
“Oh I’m so sorry I didn’t want to involve you, I didn’t,” she bleated, ” there’s no point telling the cops. Last time I went they might have well laughed. They never came.”
“Well get on the phone and report this now, I can wait till they get here.”
So we called the cops who came and eventually the forensic police, van and all the CSI stuff. They didn’t want the sample she had kept from her car stripping, preferring to treat each case separately.
“Well it’s not good mate, a complete paint job I reckon.”
All I could think of was my departure soon to Japan, the insurance, and quotes hassle.
At least it will save parking at the airport all those days.
When I returned from Japan the car was fixed.
The Hobart Chinaman 