The Ornithologists

I should have more to do on a Thursday afternoon than sit outside a cafe and watch girls go by. Unfulfilled potential, however, is an unflagging offsider. So is Tom.

“Would you?” he asks.

I look and decide there’s too much khaki.

“Probably, but I wouldn’t tell anyone about it.”

Appalled, his eyes widen and he shakes his head.

“Sif! I’d change my whole food pyramid if I had that. I’d stop buying groceries.”

“Maybe she could buy you a matching combat cap.”

“I’d get you one too. They let gays in the army now, don’t they?”

“Fuck you.”

We both laugh as I tear open a sugar sachet and add to the set of concentric circles I’m making on the table. I shape my mandala with a teaspoon whilst Tom types a message. He groans and stretches his legs, the heels of his New Balances scuffing on the pavement.

“What are we doing?” he asks.

“Far too little.”

“How’s the blog going?”

“People are reading it. I don’t know. I think they like it. Who knows? It’s hard to convince people I actually speak this way. I imagine they find it pretty self-indulgent.”

I brush flecks of fourth wall from my scalp. A dapper shorthair with a satchel and granny-arsed denim shorts walks by.

“How about her?”

Tom can’t adequately countenance his disgust. He arches his eyebrow and spits his response through his teeth.

“You’re definitely gay. No way at all. Not for all her Guild Bookshop wages.”

There’s a definite fiscal element to girl watching. The more attractive a girl is, the more you would be willing to pay for her congress. Often, no transaction would take place at all and you would allow her to do things that are of no conventional sexual utility (i.e. “Man, I’d let her set fire to my pubic hair and walk on my back wearing golf shoes just to touch her elbow. Then I’d write her a cheque.”) By contrast, the less attractive you find a girl, the more inflated the price of even the slightest contact becomes.

“How much to give her a backrub?” I enquire.

Tom squints against the light reflecting off a motorbike.

“Six million.”

We laugh, a couple of sensitive boys too clever to admit we really want to find a big spoon. The barista comes and clears our table, stacking glasses into each other while I brush half a kilo of sugar to the floor, embarrassed.

“As much as we hate on all the plebs, really we’re the ones sitting here like mugs while they do what they want. We’re the chumps in all this.”

I agree, and resolve to turn my life around as soon as I finish my toast. A couple of ageing Italians yell inanities across the street at each other and feign throwing punches before walking in opposite directions, smirking. Arthur is reverse parking his Suzuki in front of us. He gets out, takes a bucket of rope off the passenger side and affixes a tiara to his ‘Bad Boy 4 Life’ hat.

“Alasdair. Alasdair.”

“G’day Arthur.”

“Something like…something about…um…there’s one of the um…East Pilbara region or something like that. Rain. Gonna rain with a bit of um…orange, per se. Only East.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”

I smile: he does likewise; mildewed tombstone teeth, worn from one too many hand-rolleds. He chuckles and points at his head before walking away, the message imparted.

“Arthur seems to be the only one around here who enjoys himself.”

Tom nods, shifting on his seat. The shadow cast by our table is gradually lengthening and we’re almost on our way when the Big Issue vendor catches us.

“Bloody…you boys been havin’ a perve or what? AHAHAHA!”

“Not this one – he likes blokes.” says Tom.

“Ohrrr…poof, are ya? Mate, long as you bloody do it in yer own house ay, AHAHAHA! Nar, you boys are orright…I used to be like yez…”

He scratches his balls contemplatively.

“Young, dumb and full of fuckin’ cum! AHAHAHAHAH!”

The first two statements are redundant; the third is proven by the stains on his pants.

“We’re just waiting for the right one” I reply, stroking Tom’s thigh.

He draws his top lip up over his teeth and tells us we’re “funny cunts” before going on his way, dragging his trolley behind him. Tom looks over sheepishly.

“Maybe there are worse things than being a burnout.”

“Being an old burnout?”

“Yep.”

I feel the sweet grit under my feet. A young secretary in a pencil skirt walks out of the bank and crosses the road toward us. Her heel catches on the pavement and she spills half a sugar-free ‘V’. The can rolls behind her and we watch as she pivots and hurriedly bends to pick it up. Tom speaks first.

“We’re such fucking creeps.”

“Agreed. She doesn’t look the marrying type, though.”

“I just really want to talk about Faith No More and let her rock me to sleep.”

“No sugar, thanks – she’s sweet enough.”

“I don’t think we should hang out any more.”

And I’m not quite as bored as I should be. We get up, stretch and tuck in our seats. Across the street, Arthur kicks a ragged soccer ball into traffic, narrowly missing an Audi and we walk home as my toast is left cool and intact in the afternoon shade.