Getting Real

45. Epic



The noise and activity backstage was frenetic; a mix of celebration and farewell and the business of packing up for the last time. Jake knew he’d have to wait for Rielle to say her goodbyes before he could claim her attention. Meanwhile he was getting plenty of attention himself, with various crew members giving him grinning thumbs ups and excited high-fives.

It wasn’t often road crew and talent got together, and it had never happened so spectacularly on anyone’s watch, so their thing had everyone buzzing. And that was on top of the fact Jake hadn’t freaked out in the Hand.

“What was that?” Glen laughed. “When did you suddenly get okay with heights?”

“I had a little therapy.” Jake, winced from a too hard thump on the back from a passing Bodge.

“So you lose the fear and get the girl. Epic, mate.”

It was both epic and well worth the time and money Jake had scraped together for every hastily scheduled, uncomfortable behavioural therapy session, with a line up of psychologists in every city they’d been in since Perth. Now he had practical techniques to use to control his acrophobia and he no longer thought he might die if he had to climb a ladder or stand on a balcony. But it wasn’t just the therapy, it was Rie. Against her fears, his were so insubstantial. Having her call him out on them so brutally was the kick he’d needed to get help and get past it.

But that didn’t mean he was entirely fearless.

Fear now took the form of a fairy-tiny, punch packing, physically sensational, wolf raised, guilt stuck, rock goddess. And Jake had no idea how he was meant to cope with his anxiety about being without a daily dose of her.

At least the full force of separation would wait another day. Rielle was making her way down the corridor towards him, hugging crew members, handing out gifts and throwing glances his way that could melt sinew.

By the time she reached him, Jake was a knot of scratchy desire, irritated by the process it would take to get her alone. Tonight Ron Teller was hosting a big tour end party at the Casino.

“Have a brain snap did you, Jake?” She stopped in front of him, laughter expanding her wet spandex-covered ribs. She shook her head. “How did you do that?”

He reached out for her. So little time left to have that privilege. “Slowly and with considerable expense.”

“Did you do it for me?”

“Hell no. Much as I love you, Rie, I did it for me. You just gave me the boot up the backside I needed to get on with it.”

“But you never said anything. You never told me,” she grimaced, “and I should’ve noticed. You were fine on the flight to Melbourne. That day with the shirts in the Hand and on the balcony at the hotel and still I didn’t get it.” She frowned at him, annoyed with herself for missing the clues.

Jake shrugged. “Some things you have to do by yourself.” He pulled Rielle close, and moved his lips against hers. “And some things you really should do with someone else.” When he felt her shiver, he kissed her deeply in the noisy corridor among the crew and the partying entourage, and neither of them cared they weren’t alone.

After Rielle changed, they rode Bonne back into the city and went to the party. Rielle because it was the job, and Jake because he needed Ron for his next salary cheque. They stayed only as long as it took to be noticed—not hard in Rielle’s case—and then slipped away quickly before anyone would miss them.

After the haste came the oddness of hesitancy. Jake felt its weight like slow suffocation. Some of the early tentativeness they’d had with each other returned. Back at the hotel, they were suddenly awkward with each other, the silences too dead quiet, their laughter too bright, too loud. They were both discomforted by the realisation they were pressed hard against the barrier of the last few hours they had together—that whatever happened next would be a new, unknown, uncharted territory.

Sitting cuddled on the balcony with the dark harbour spread out before them, Jake felt heavy with all that’d remained unsaid, by all they’d avoided, skirted around, left vague and open-ended. He wasn’t coping well with the uncertainty. It wrecked his concentration, it made him twitchy with the knowledge his supply of Rielle was about to get cut off.

He didn’t need solid gold guarantees, but he needed something from her to hold him through the time they’d have to be apart.

“So, what next?”

Rielle lifted her face to his. “Who knows?”

He shifted with discomfort. “You freak me out when you say stuff like that.” Her eyes looked black in the filtered light from the room behind them, black with ideas too dark for him to want to see.

“I thought you’d had therapy for that.”

He sighed. “They haven’t invented therapy for dealing with you yet. I’m being serious. Don’t dodge me.”

In her slow silence, Jake heard the sound of absence. He waited while bats wheeled and screeched at the city lights. Their chattering calls, fast and agitated, echoed the anxiety he was feeling.

“Rie, tell me what happens next?” He was unable to leave it unsaid, prickly about her being in control of the pace of their relationship.

She moved to sit across his lap, a knee on either side of his hips. She took his face in her hands and kissed him gently and infinitely tenderly. “I have a week in LA. Then we start Europe. After that, it’s the US. I don’t know when I can see you again. I don’t know how this is going to work.”

Jake felt like the rope used in a game of tug-of-war. Her words stretched him one way into an endless empty anticipation of being with her, but her touch dragged him the other. He was pulled taut with longing and immediate desire for her.

“I can come to you,” he murmured. He felt her smile form under his lips.

“You have a life too.”

He laughed softly. “Not that you’d notice.” His life had collapsed around her. He should’ve gone home, back to his flat. He should’ve found a new job to go to by now. He’d kept away from Ron at the party, because he didn’t want to miss a second of being with Rie. He knew he should’ve spent more time with his parents and found out what their argument was about too. It was unlike them to shout at each other. So many parts of his life seemed redundant, now Rielle was at its centre. He wondered briefly if that was a good thing, and rationalised it was the only thing.

“We’ll work it out.” She stood, stretching her hand for his, taking him inside to her bed where words were simple and effortless, and the truth in their coming together was a better solution to not knowing what came next.


He hated having to leave her, curled asleep, but he was still on the job and there were things that needed his attention besides the woman he’d happily let invade his every waking thought and half his unconscious dreams. He hurried through the work required, avoided getting tangled in side conversations, and got back to the hotel as soon as possible.

A housekeeping trolley was parked across the entrance to their suite. He pushed past it, calling Rielle’s name. Odd that she’d let housekeeping have access now instead of waiting til after checkout later in the afternoon.

“Can I help you, sir?” The housekeeper gave him a shy smile and watched him with wary eyes.

Jake gave her a curt nod. She aggravated him. He wanted her gone, so his last few hours with Rielle would be without interruption. He called her, his time with more urgency. The suite wasn’t that big and she’d hardly be hiding, unless this was a game. That idea made him smile.

“Sir, can I help you?” said the housekeeper, again.

He eyed the closed bedroom door. “Can you come back later?”

“No sir. I cannot. I need you to please leave.”

“This is my room.” He smiled at the notion of how much of Rielle’s life he’d appropriated as he strode across the lounge and dining rooms, flinging open the bedroom door. No Rie, and a perfectly made up bed, the bathroom empty.

“No sir, this room is unoccupied.”

Jake turned back to her. “What?” Then it hit him like an icepick to the back of the head. Rielle wasn’t here. He went across to the wardrobe and flung open the door. Padded hangers danced in the empty space; drawers were naked. In the bathroom cabinet, blank shelves stared back at him. On the floor by the bed, his bag was packed and zipped.

“Please sir,” said the housekeeper, following him into the bedroom.

He stared at her, confused, cold to his core. “Where is she?”

He got a one shouldered shrug.

Rielle didn’t answer her phone. It seemed to take an immeasurably long time to make it down the corridor to the bank of lifts, wait for one and ride it to the lobby. An eon passed before he made it to the top of the queue of people at reception, had the special guest relations manager paged, and asked her about the room. But it took no time at all to understand Rielle was gone.

In the two hours he’d been attending to tour wrap up details, she’d packed, checked out and disappeared. She still wasn’t answering her phone, and he had no idea where she was.

He left a message, trying to keep the panic from his voice. There had to be an explanation for this. He went back to the room and grilled the housekeeper about a note—surely there was a note. No note. He called Rand.

“It’s Jake, is Rielle with you?”

“No,” Rand barked. “Come to my room now.”

Rand had the door to his suite open when Jake arrived. “What did you do?” he said, his voice a low, angry growl.

Jake’s hands came up in a defensive gesture. The last time he’d seen Rand this angry he’d been about to pummel Stu. “I don’t know where she is.”

“Tell me what you did to her.”

“I fell in love with her and now I’ve lost her,” Jake said, completely bewildered by Rand’s attack.

“F*ck!”

He stared at Rand, looking for an answer in his green eyes so like Rielle’s, while the fear and panic he’d kept tucked down started churning in his stomach.

“She’s gone.”

“Gone where?”

“Home.”

“What?”

“She took a private jet, Jake. She’s gone back to LA.”

“No, she can’t have. She wouldn’t leave without telling me.”

Rand went to the bar, poured two glasses of rum, left the coke out and handed one to Jake. “She’s gone.”

The colour drained from Jake’s face, the breath left his body. She must’ve planned this days ago and never hinted at it. When she told him she loved him and sobbed on the bathroom floor, did she know she was going to cut and run? He gulped the drink, held the empty crystal glass tightly and when Rand said, “She took Jonathan with her,” he pitched it across the room, shattering the mirror behind the bar.


With Sharon by his side, Jake kept it together to help the rest of the band check out and get to the airport. Sharon took Jeremy and Brendan to the domestic terminal for their Queensland flight and Jake took the rest of the group to the international terminal.

In the airline lounge, Rielle was the absent force. Everyone knew she’d cut and run with Jonathan, but no one was talking about it, at least not to Jake.

How and Roley took up residence at the bar. Ceedee sat on Jake’s knee and hugged him, pressing her soft cheek against his stony clenched one, and when the Bali flight was called, Stu clasped Jake’s hand and gave him a shoulder bump.

Jake sat on with Rand and Harry, too sunk in his own misery to be embarrassed by witnessing the last moments of their parting. Harry was set to finish the documentary and join Rand in Europe for a brief stint before taking up a freelance contract in LA.

The two of them sat shoulder to shoulder, thighs touching, hands clasped, talking softly. Harry wore a funky black diamond pendant. It was Rand’s parting gift, in place of the very white, very large diamond engagement ring she’d made him put back in the box. There was nothing anxious or wretched or fearful about them. They were serene in the knowledge they’d be together again soon.

When the LA flight was called, Rand kissed Harry long and slow, holding her close and savouring the feel of her body in his hands. He looked like he was hearing music. Watching them was like sticking pins in his eyes, a fork in his heart, but Jake made himself look as penance for his short-sightedness and naivety.

“Been fun,” said Roley, slapping Jake on the back.

“Been f*cking fantastic,” said How, holding out his hand to shake. “I love Australia.”

Jake shook How’s hand, shook Roley’s, and offered his hand to Rand, who knocked it aside and bear hugged him instead, saying simply, “I’m sorry,” before releasing him.

“Gentlemen, it’s been a pleasure,” said Jake.

The three men made a noisy exit from the lounge, with Rand coming back twice to kiss Harry. And then they were gone.

“You okay?” he asked Harry.

She sniffed. “I’m great.” She smiled though her snuffling. “I’ll see him soon and we’ll talk every day.”

“Been terrific to work with you, Harry. I wish you all the best in LA and with Rand. You both deserve to be happy.”

“Thank you. I’m so sorry about Rielle. I thought things would work out for you. I really did. I don’t know what to say except give her time.”

Jake nodded, more to be polite than anything else. The possibility that there was a reasonable explanation for what Rie had done was as slim as air. She’d cut and run; ruthlessly, stealthily, deliberately without a word. She’d thrown their relationship in his face by taking Jonathan with her. What explanation could she have for that, and how could he ever find it in his heart to forgive her?

When there were no more details to attend to back at the stadium, the hotel or with the crew, Jake collected Bonne and went home for the first time in over two months. There was a pile of mail stuffed under his door courtesy of his downstairs neighbour: flyers, bills, a second notice for the unpaid gas. There was a fridge full of condiments and nothing to put them on, and a dripping tap in the bathroom that needed a new washer. There was a musty smell, a blown bulb in the galley kitchen, a trail of ants and an unmade bed. He was tired, cranky and frustrated beyond words. And at the back of those feelings lurked deeper emotions: anger, bitterness and resignation.

He stripped the bed, realised he had no clean sheets and slept on the bare mattress, his phone by his side, hoping she’d call and wake him so he’d have the satisfaction of hearing her excuses and the pure pain of knowing precisely where they stood.

The morning’s heat building up in the small flat woke him. He was thirsty and disoriented. It took him a moment to realise he was looking at the rental beige painted ceiling of his flat and to understand she hadn’t called. He did a rough time conversion— maybe it was too early for her to have landed—but he knew that was a lie. He could call again, but that was the problem—again. She’d only earned so much forgiveness, and he was owed a call, a text, something. Surely she’d do that for him.

He dragged himself up, showered and dressed, shopped for groceries. He came home and stocked the fridge, swept, scrubbed and vacuumed, washed and dried sheets and towels. He made the bed, fixed the tap, logged onto his PC and paid bills, left the ants to their enterprise. He went back out for a coffee and dawdled over the newspaper. He made a mental list of people to call to organise work. He came home and chopped onions, cooked mince for spag bol—all the time waiting for the phone to ring. All the time thinking, this was the other side of purgatory.

It wasn’t til late that night, when he was almost asleep in front of an X Files repeat, that the phone did ring and after that he had a whole fresh hell to worry about.