Anna Trevena sat at a table in the university café with a rapidly cooling cup of coffee in front of her, looking disconsolately out of the window at the students hurrying to or from lectures.
Most of us when we are troubled see others as being free from woes, and that is how Anna saw those passing students; none were afflicted with anxieties and troubles like her -- or so she thought.
"Come on Anna, I've already fixed up a date for you."
The speaker was Joshua Kendal, one of Anna's troubles.
"I've already told you Josh, I've got a lot of work to do, so..."
"But it's a special occasion -- a celebration -- we're old mates and I need you there."
There it was, "old mates." That was just how Josh saw their relationship, but not how Anna saw it, or more accurately, felt it.
They had got to know each other in their penultimate high school year. Handsome and dynamic Josh was the sporting darling of the girls, but academically he was well behind the class. On one occasion Anna had helped him with a math problem, and thereafter he constantly came to her for assistance with his class work.
Like any of the girls Josh deigned to notice Anna had been thrilled by even this attention, and it would be true to say that Josh in his final year owed much of his success to Anna's coaching. Now both of them were studying law at the university, and Josh still came to Anna for help.
Josh was a problem for Anna because she felt herself to be in love with him, but she knew her love was not returned in the manner and measure she longed for. "Mates" was the operative word, and Anna had watched Josh fall in an out of love with what to her seemed an endless stream of attractive girls. He even discussed his romantic tangles with her, seeming not to realise what pain he caused her.
Now, and not for the first time, he was suggesting a double date. He reassured her that the guy he'd fixed up for her was a "real hunk," and she was sure to like him. From Anna's point of view there was nothing to say that the real hunk would like her; but that was another of Anna's problems which, in due season, must be explained.
"So it's a celebration," Anna said, "what will be celebrated?"
"Aha, that's for you to find out, and you'll only find out if you come with us."
"This date you've fixed up for me, is it anyone I know?"
"No, I don't think so," Josh replied, "that's something else you'll only find out if you come with us."
Anna really didn't want to go. She felt that it would be the way it always was on these double dates. Josh would have some super model type girl as his date, and Anna would have to watch them fondling each other in an early preparation for what was to come later.
To make the situation worse, her date, if he was halfway decent, would be carefully polite to her, while drooling enviously over Josh's date. Afterwards her date would see her home, bid her a civil goodnight, and go off languishing for what he thought Josh was getting.
"Look Anna, it really is important to me that you are with us tonight. It's...it's a big moment in my life and...and it's at the Crown Restaurant."
If it was at the Crown Restaurant it had to be something special. Anna sighed resignedly, "All right Josh, if it's that important..."
"It is...it is..."
"Then I'll come."
"Wonderful, I knew you wouldn't let me down and I promise you'll have a marvellous evening."
He rose, "I've got a tutorial to attend; I'll pick you up at seven thirty, okay?"
"Okay, I'll be ready."
Josh made his way out of the café and Anna sat on for a while thinking about the evening to come. She knew she was a fool to have agreed to go on the date; it would be another evening of torment for her, but Josh always seemed able to get her to agree with whatever he wanted of her. The one thing he didn't seem to want was what she most avidly desired to give.
She drank the coffee and grimaced. University cafe coffee always resembled dishwater, but cold it was even more repulsive.
* * * * * * * *
She had no more lectures or tutorials that afternoon, so she headed home to the small unit she rented.
She had a tutorial paper to prepare for Monday and that had been what she had intended to work on that evening. It was just like Josh to drop a double date on her at the last moment.
She sat at her computer and typed furiously but the words just didn't seem to flow as she wanted them to. The paper wasn't as she wanted it to be, but, it would have to do. All the time the words that arose in her mind were, "Why doesn't he love me as I love him?" Torts didn't seem to matter when it came to how she felt about Josh.
She gave up and for a while lay on the bed thinking about Josh; the evening to come; what her date, the "hunk" would be like, and what the celebration was about.
She dozed off still thinking about Josh.
Awaking with a start she saw the bedside clock pointed to six fifteen. Josh had said he would pick her up at seven thirty. She got up and made her way to the shower, and under the warm spray ran her hands over her body; no wonder Josh couldn't fancy her, a fat girl like her. Afterwards in her bedroom she looked at herself in the long mirror.
What she saw was the image of herself as she thought herself to be; fat and unattractive; the ugly duckling.
Alice, her older sister had always been the beauty, but she...how could anyone be attracted to her? 42 D bras size; hips like...like a rhinoceros, and legs...well not too bad, but who saw them when she hid them beneath the jeans she habitually wore?
She hadn't been feeling too well lately. There was that buzzing noise in her head and headaches that she had not experienced before. The law studies that she had once found easy to cope with had started to become like a steep hill she had to climb and she found herself getting irritated when Josh came asking her to explain this and that to him.
But it wasn't only Josh. She seemed to have become the font of wisdom for a lot of her fellow students. "Go and ask Anna," was a constant cry, "she'll know."
She had become a sort of academic agony aunt; the solver of other people's problems. But it wasn't only academic matters; they came to her with their boy and girl friend entanglements and their difficult relationships with parents. In fact she seemed to have become a maternal bosom for them to cry on.
She turned away from the mirror and began to consider what she would wear for the forthcoming celebratory evening. She paid little attention to clothing, her normal wear being jeans and a shirt, with a coat on cold days. The selection was narrow and she finally settled for cream cotton trousers and a white shirt; the shirt worn over the trousers to cover what she thought of as her fat stomach and over-large hips.
It is as well to point out at this stage that the negative image Anna had of herself was not what many would have considered to be the reality. She was an intelligent young woman but like many others she had fallen for the allegedly ideal image presented by the media and advertisers; the consumptively thin models of the catwalk, or the digitally enhanced figures appearing on everything from cornflake packets to advertisements for horrendously expensive cars.
To begin with Anna was not fat. Certainly she was buxom but in the hourglass figure style. Her classical features, another cause of discontent for her, included a Grecian nose which she thought too long, a mouth she thought too wide, a chin with a little dent in it she thought ridiculous, and eyes -- well yes, her eyes; these were what she saw as her one redeeming feature, long lidded and dark.
Her hair, if she had taken a little trouble with it, might also have been another attractive feature, but she paid little attention to it, her normal way of dressing it being to carelessly drag a comb though it occasionally. It was chestnut brown and in the course of nature had natural waves and curls that with Anna's perfunctory treatment of it was usually a tangled mess.
Having dressed, she now performed her comb dragging operation, and with that, considered herself ready for the evening -- or as ready as she'd ever be.
This poor self-image Anna had of herself put her constantly on the defensive about her appearance. If she wondered why the dates Josh arranged for her seemed to take so little notice of her after the first half hour, it was this defensiveness that was the problem. Thinking she was getting in ahead of them and expressing what she imagined they were already thinking, she made disparaging remarks about herself and virtually apologised for their having been "stuck" with her for the evening.
The effect of this on her dates was the reverse of what she intended. They took it to mean that she did not like them and she was "stuck" with them; that the disparaging remarks about her self were intended to make sure they didn't try to get to know her better.
There might have been some truth in this latter thought in that she really had eyes only for Josh, and as all her dates were double dates arranged by Josh, the poor guys had little chance with her anyway.
* * * * * * * *
So Anna was ready for the evening but only just in time. The doorbell rang and she went to answer it. On opening the door and in the dim light of the hallway, she thought for a moment she was seeing two Joshua's.
Then Josh grinned and said, "This is my brother David. You remember, I mentioned him to you. Dave, this is Anna."
Anna vaguely recalled Josh mentioning his older brother David who at the time of mentioning was in London. He worked as a training manager for a London based company that had branches throughout Australia. He had been in London to be himself trained in the latest electronic communications.
"Yes, I do remember you mentioning him, and then turning to David, said, "Have you been back long?"
"Flew in two days ago, but I didn't expect to get such an attractive date so soon."
Anna ignored this comment since her attention had been drawn to the fact that the men were both wearing evening suits.
"My God," she said, indicating their suits, "this really is a formal evening and I haven't got a..."
"You look charming as you are," David commented, as if to avoid her further embarrassment.
Then Anna produced one of her negatives.
"There's no need to be polite, I know how I look, and I haven't got any evening wear anyway, so you'll have to take me as I am."
The moment the words were out she regretted them. On first appearance, and although he looked very much like Josh, David seemed to have a more serious manner than the somewhat exuberant Josh. His words had seemed to be sincere, which was more than could be said of Josh, who flung compliments around like confetti when it suited him.
"Time will tell," Anna thought, and then said, "I'll just get my handbag and be with you."
As she walked away David whispered something to Josh. Although Anna did not catch the words, she put her own interpretation on them, which went something like this; "Why did you land me with this frump?"
When she returned they made their way to Josh's car, Anna and David sitting in the back. As they drove off Anna called out to Josh; "This isn't the way to the Crown."
We've got to pick up my date first," Josh replied.
They drove on until arriving outside one of the more upmarket blocks of flats.
