The thing about your year in Adelaide is that, being at the edge of the world, out of time and out of place, it carried a sense of displacement with it. A sense that nothing was actually real. A sense that followed you out the door and into the busy fall street. And that you carried with you onto the tram to Glenelg in the lowering light.
You weren't sure why you were going or what would happen when you arrived. Arrived wherever it was that the hastily scribbled set of directions were taking you. But you still made an effort to dress the part. Seductively cute, you thought, catching your reflection in a shop window as the tram rolled to a stop. Would there be a seduction? You don't wear that kind of underwear if there isn't going to be a seduction.
The shop window featured a sort of winter scene, so that, as the tram lurched forward again, your reflection looked like it was skating along the ice. What a weird choice to go skating in a short black dress with spaghetti straps. The thought made you laugh a bit, out loud.
Aussies are famously friendly, but in Adelaide not too friendly, you'd found. In a city where everyone seemed to know everyone else, they could be a bit stand off-ish with outsiders. But a bit of thigh could do wonders, if you want to warm people up.
"What's funny?" He asked. It was a good voice. A nice voice. Full of broad Australian 'A's'
You nodded toward the window where your reflection was just sliding off the end of the ice into a gray cement void.
"For the best," he told you. "You're not dressed for it anyway."
He was meant to get off at Victoria Square, you learned later. But instead sat with you all the way to Brighton road. And when you stood to get out, he seemed to wash along behind you. Off the tram and up the road.
When you fumbled the paper with the directions and it floated back toward the tram line, he scooped it up, handed it back and asked "where are we going?"
You thought of a thousand reasons he wasn't coming. But a warm smile opens as many doors as a short skirt, and you were too charmed to object. So along you both drifted, up the road to the address on the paper.
The party was a bust. At least insomuch as he wasn't there. Hadn't been there before you arrived, and never showed before you left. The good underwear for nothing. Perhaps.
But it was also not a bust, in that your companion was as charming as his smile. The two of you existed in a world of your own. The party more an impression of colors that swirled around you, than a tangible thing you were forced to interact with. The music felt muffle d. Even though it was busy enough, you were untouched, un-jostled. The cigarette smoke drifted past without tangling in your hair. And you were secretly thrilled to find yourself in a little bubble with this beautiful person. Enjoying all his focus and attention. All to yourself.
He told you about the city. About how Adelaide was unique in Australia as a free city and how its design of broad avenues and abundant public squares was supposed to reflect the open opportunities available to its residents. He told you about Rymill Park, how it had once been a meeting area of the aboriginal people of the area and how the lake was a man-made construction, just 50 years old.
And while he spoke, his soft gray eyes never strayed from yours. Never traveled down to where you toyed with your short hem. Never lingered on the pendant you wore long enough to lay in your cleavage. A strategic choice that paid no dividends now. Rather than lingering on your curves, his eyes seemed to look beyond yours, seeing the city he described.
The last Royal Hospital tram left at 11:30. You assumed you had hours left, but were surprised to see midnight creeping up on you. What would be a mere half-hour ride was a full two hour walk, if you missed the tram. Not doable in those shoes. Better to run for it than trying to walk the Anzac highway barefoot.
The sun was still up, just, when you had arrived. Now everything looked altered, ghostly in the moonlight. The crash of waves in the distance propelled you up the street. You held your shoes by their straps as you ran, the chunky heels clunking together on each step. With your purse in the other, your hands were too full to take the one he offered. As your legs pumped, the hem of your dress inched higher. But even so, it felt like you floated through the night.
Luckily you made it in time to just catch the tram, which left the Brighton Road stop three minutes later than you'd thought. You were the only two inside, collapsing into your seats and breathing hard.
A strand of hair had escaped and was falling over your face. He reached up a hand to brush it back for you, but then pulled it back, uncertain, his eyes falling down to the low neckline of your dress for the first time since you'd met.
You tucked the hair behind your ear and were about to say something, it's hard now to remember what, when the tram jerked to a start and you were on your way back. You looked ahead for a moment as the tram rolled forward. And when your eyes returned to his face you could see that his were fixed on your lips.
You still don't know what came over you. Your own eyes dropped to his lips and you were just reeled in. Was that the first time you actually touched? When your lips met his.
There was no discussion, but somehow he ended up at the door to your place. Your shoes back on your feet and his hand in yours. You giggled as his lips brushed your neck and you shushed him... or yourself?
Your roommate barely looked up as you tumbled in the door.
"Go well?" she asked over her shoulder, her eyes fixed on the computer in her lap. "Did he show up?"
You made a vague, negative sound and she said, "figures". She never looked up or even noticed your guest. And that was just fine with you. Some things you just want to keep to yourself.
