The Gap

Jake had to travel about as far as he could from what he had to see it for what it was. Even then, it took a while for him to regain his sight.

Australia was different. He’d been warned that it would be, but like most tourists he disregarded everything he heard, apart from the danger presented by the spiders. For the first two weeks he lifted the toilet seat and refused to sit on it for fear of the ignominy of a death sat atop a porcelain throne. 

He knew of the myriad unique dangers this strange and wonderful island held and the local news did not disappoint when it reported on a homeowner walking into her back yard to discover a two metre croc swimming in her pool. Said homeowner seemed to be more annoyed at the silence of her so-called guard dog. “Didn’t bark once. Useless mutt!”

The following week a dog did bark as it caught sight of an even bigger croc swimming in pursuit of a couple of young lads. This owner had shouted warnings at the lads who had eventually cottoned on and made a desperate swim for the jetty and ladders halfway along the pier the dog and its owner were standing on, enjoying the early morning sun. This woman had had the presence of mind to take a couple of snaps of the croc as it very nearly reached the fleeing young men. They were lucky. The croc missed its meal by a matter of inches. 

This article reminded Jake of a clip of an old Aussie beer ad. 

“Are there sharks in this water?” 

“Nah!” and then whispered, “the crocs ate all the sharks.”

The crocs in question were salties. Mostly, they kept to the fresh water rivers, but excursions into the sea were not uncommon. Jake had visited a croc farm and seen the folk lore. These were ancient creatures and cold blooded killers, his distaste for them increased as he watched one through a glass screen. It lay patiently under the water. It could do this for an age. But when an unsuspecting animal came to drink at the water’s edge, the croc would launch itself at frightening speed at its unsuspecting prey and drag it into the water. The power of their bite was formidable, but they didn’t chew their meals, instead they performed a death roll and drowned the poor animal and left them in what a guide called their larder, an underwater spot wedged under rocks where the meat would rot and be easier to eat, the croc latching on and spinning until it removed a snack sized portion. 

Jake couldn’t understand how such a cold animal thrived in the incredibly hot environment of the Northern Territories, but then there was a lot he did not understand as he embarked upon his gap year. A year that he came late to, having started university a few years after his peers. All the same, he bit the bullet and embarked upon a well-worn adventure. He arrived in a state of post university chaos. A twenty something with everything to prove, but no clue as to how to go about doing so. And to this enthusiastically unfocused chaos was added a burden of heart-breaking confusion. The heartbreak occurred on his very first day and confusion lay in the timing of the painful revelation that he was subjected to. This was made all the worse because he had known something was wrong but had chosen to crack on all the same. He hadn’t seen an alternative, but then he’d not once looked for one.

Timing isn’t always everything. Occasionally time ropes in a friend and on this occasion time had opted for location. The location was Alice Springs, a romantic name that was most likely chosen to label a romantic notion, because, unless Jake was missing something, the place was in the arse end of nowhere and all it had going for it was its complete and utter isolation. If someone was after getting away from it all, then Alice Springs was the place to fulfil a wish that should have been more carefully opted for. 

There was another romantic notion here though. Jake had come to Alice Springs to reunite with his girlfriend. Jake’s girlfriend just happened to be called Alice and so the place seemed apt. In the midst of young love, it had been more than apt. Invisible planets had aligned and imaginary horoscopes had been read. This was all meant to be.

Alice had been a year ahead of Jake. They had met in a student nightclub at the end of Alice’s second year. Both of them too drunk to remember how it was that they had made each other’s acquaintance, but it was most evident that they had when they woke up together on Alice’s sofa, or rather the sofa in Alice’s house share. They had been rudely awakened by Alice’s housemate Jan’s giggles as she made her way through the living room to the only bathroom that lay on the other side of the kitchen.  

Both Alice and Jake had awoken with a start and experienced a flash of shocked comprehensive incomprehension. Neither understood anything of their situation until they clapped blurry eyes on each other and an echo of the previous night brushed upon them both. As one, they checked their stated of clothedness and ascertained that they were still in possession of all their clothing, including their footwear.

Alice was the first to speak, “you’ve got pizza on you,” she stated.

Jake nodded at Alice’s chest and then, realising how this may look and be taken, had the decency to blush, “so have you,” he said trying not to look at the take away foodstuff that was welded onto her left breast.

To save further blushes, he looked down at his chest to see that he was wearing his slice like a seventies kipper tie, “quite fetching isn’t it?” he said grinning at the absurdity of it.

They unpeeled their late night snack and Jake refrained from eating his. He was hungry and slightly hungover and cold pizza was just the ticket. He fancied that Alice had faced a similar dilemma. Thankfully, she located the pizza box which was to her side of the sofa and offered him a slice. Jake noted that the box was down two slices. They’d fallen asleep before eating any of the pizza. He found this astounding failure amusing. Something to dine out on. Something that they would tell the kids.

Only, that eventually had ended in the crappy airport in the equally crappy Alice Springs. At least Alice had had the decency to meet him and update him face to face on the clandestine developments in her life in the six months since she’d gone on ahead to Aus. 

Jake had tried to listen to her sorry tale of not meaning to fall in love, and how it was the real thing and so totally and utterly unavoidable. There was a roaring of waves in his ears and that worried him because he was in the most landlocked location he’d ever visited. Under the sound of the waves was an indignant voice that was whittering away about how their love was the real things and also completely and absolutely unavoidable, and the follow up to this which was how the merry hell had she done this when she was already in love with him? That just was not possible and therefore this was not happening.

Jake was about to pinch himself when Alice said something that made the cogs in his mind seize. But for good measure she was waving her engagement ring at him and grinning in a faux show of bliss. An agog Jake watched her surreal dance and then there followed a beautiful moment of temporary demonic possession.

In that moment, Jake was afforded an eerie calm and focus. Everything else went away and there was only him and Alice. Not in the way that it was, but in a parody of that. A fitting spotlight for him to say goodbye in a way only this visiting demon could make land, “oh! Get fucked, you treacherous bitch!”

Those were not Jake’s words. They were not even an expression of his sentiment. Jake was too numb to express himself and by the time he had thawed out, he knew he would be incapable of any adequate expression when it came to this unexpected betrayal, the implications of which reached further than this particular moment in Alice Springs. Alice had pulled the rug from under him and his plans were in tatters. All he had left to him was his stubborn determination not to turn tail and head right back home. He was not going to give up and add that to this loss. He would go forward, even if he didn’t know where exactly forward was. Not going back was a start.

First though, there was Alice’s reaction to the words that had issued forth from Jake’s mouth, but that were not his own. Her expression had receded from that idiotic and thoughtless happiness in the context of her breaking Jake’s heart. He was glad to see that dissolve. It could never have been real in any case. 

Alice seemed to scroll through a selection of expressions and this added to Jake’s indignation when she landed on her own form of indignation, but hers was righteously indignant. She eyed him with undisguised contempt, upset at him for not playing the part she had written for him. Only now did he see that she was deluded. She had expected him to be happy for her. Happy that she had found true love and her one and only. She’d not once thought about how this played out beyond her acceptance of her obligation to actually tell him that she had met someone, moved on and agreed to marry them. Jake had not only waited for Alice, he’d packed everything up and brought it here so they could be together, sharing the adventure of a lifetime. Now he had been deprived of that and already he was considering he practical impact of his travel partner dropping him from a great height. There wasn’t only the sudden and unwanted isolation. Travelling alone was a very different prospect to having a travel partner in crime, there was also the question of funds. Alice had found a job online and she was here to accumulate travel funds. Jake had a horrible feeling that she’d fallen for the farmer’s son. Uncharitably, he found himself thinking about how getting in with him would have improved her living conditions overnight. Another practical consideration, but one that he was best dismissing.

Now Alice had the temerity to look hurt. How dare she look hurt! She was doing this and inflicting it upon Jake. He wanted to protest, but telling her to stop looking hurt didn’t seem right. He’d already landed a blow and it was best left at that.

It was Alice who spoke, “you’re better than this, Jake.”

Jake’s eyes widened and he wanted to swear at Alice. He wanted to repeat what he’d already said, but instead he sighed and took a moment. He at least attempted to be better. He shook his head and looked at Alice anew, “you know what? I am better than this.” He picked up his rucksack and as he shouldered it, he realised that he’d dropped it in anticipation of a welcome hug that had never happened. Now his rucksack was hugging and it was a promise. There was always a promise, it was just a case of seeing it for what it was. The weight of his possessions reminded him of the road ahead. His road and even in the face of this shock development, it felt good, and it felt right.

He held his hand out for Alice to shake. She didn’t take it. That told him something that he didn’t want to hear, but maybe needed to hear all the same, “I deserve better. So thanks for this, Alice. I hope you get everything you deserve.”

He lowered his hand and walked away and out of the airport. This turned out to be a grand gesture. He had needed to walk away. That was what the situation called for. Standing there like a lemon and waiting for Alice to leave him was never going to happen. But now he was a stranger in a strange land and didn’t have a clue what he was doing. He began laughing at the absurdity of it all, and then he burst into tears only for the laughter to come rolling back in. 

Of course he was a stranger in a strange land. That was the point. Now it was a case of acquainting himself with this land and all of a sudden he understood that by doing that, by embarking upon this journey, he would find himself. He was looking forward to getting to know this stranger. He thought he was going to get along with him just fine. Mostly anyway. He wasn’t going to raise his expectations too high. He’d done that once before and that hadn’t been fair on him or on Alice.

Jake had walked around in a circle remembering that, like a lot of places, the airport was nowhere near the town or city it was named after. As he returned to the airport building he’d been relieved to see Alice leaving. His relief had turned to pain as he saw her approach the man he’d lost her to. Thankfully she was too busy hugging him and chatting as they got into his pickup to see him re-enter the airport and head for the bar. He’d needed a drink, time to compose himself and then make a plan. 

As he sipped his first, ice cold Aussie beer someone stepped up to the bar alongside him, “alright, matey!”

Jake had turned and grinned at the greeting, “alright!” he’d echoed raising his beer in greeting.

“Waiting for the minibus, eh?” the lad had said as he paid for his beer.

“That’d be the minibus to the…?” Jake had asked.

“Backpacker’s hostel,” the lad had said giving Jake an appraising look, “were you headed elsewhere?”

“Nah,” said Jake, deploying the smallest of white lies, “I just hadn’t planned beyond landing and grabbing a beer!”

The lad chinked Jake’s beer glass with his own, “a man after my own heart!”

They both drank to that.

“I’m Sid by the way.”

“And I’m Jake.”

Jake wasn’t to know it yet, but in the wake of the loss of his relationship with Alice, he’d just met a lifelong friend. But then, that was how friendships worked. No weight of expectation to stifle a relationship that was just another friendship, but dressed up fancy and often forced to be something it wasn’t.