Chapter 18: At The Scotsman

Chapter 16: Foam Heart

Yoshi picked up the white foam heart and gave it a squeeze. Clutching it in his hand he crossed the corridor and stuck his head through the door of the office opposite. Spying Marshall sitting there with a furrowed brow and the frayed end of a pencil bouncing between his teeth, Yoshi gauged the weight of the heart and sidearmed it at his target. It flashed past Marshall’s back and thudded into the filing cabinet behind. He turned around confused, but not surprised. He raised an eyebrow at his attacker and removed the buds from his ears. He tapped the spacebar.

            “What’s going on?”

            “Got surgery. You said you wanted to sit in?” Yoshi moved towards him and bent to pick up his heart but Marshall blocked him with his chair, spinning around to stamp his foot down on the ball.

            “You going now?”

            Yoshi stood back up. “I’ve got everything ready, yeah.”

            “Can you give a second? I wanna get this sentence right.” Marshall extended his hand and picked up the heart and showed it to Yoshi. “Thanks.” He put it behind his monitor. Yoshi backed slowly out of the room keeping his eyes trained on his friend all the way. Marshall put the buds back in and turned back to the screen. He unpaused his music and tilted his forehead at the text before of him, bathed in the vacuum of noise.

KLF4 binds Cyclin D2. G1/S arrest. KLF4 up at 18h; PC3 and MPP. cc w/draw imp for C.

            He played around with his notes, expanding, contracting, typing, deleting, cutting, inserting, until he was happy with the progression and cadence of the sentence. Finally, after 5 minutes of piercing thought he re-read what he had written.

As the transcription factor KLF4 directly binds the Cyclin D2 promoter to suppress cell cycle progression at the G1/S boundary (Klaewsongkram et al. 2007), increased KLF4 protein within 18 hours of the addition of Phenrododiol to both murine prostate cancer primary cultures and the PC-3 cell line indicates the imperative for cell cycle withdrawal in prostatic tumorigeneisis (Figure 5.4B and C).

Marshall leaned back and wrapped his hands around the back of his head. He saved the document, locked his computer and went to look for Yoshi. He found him loitering over Leigh’s shoulder reading the latest edition of the West.

“Hey Leigh. You ready Yoshi?”

“Hey Mar.” She waved, but didn’t look up from her paper.

“Yeah.” Yoshi stretched up to his full height, such as it was, and stretched, yawned. “Let’s get going.” He picked up his sterilised toolkit from his desk, while Marshall grabbed the rope of the esky and followed close behind.

Yoshi swiped his card against the sensor and opened the door into the gowning room. They pulled blue plastic booties on over the top of their shoes and slipped their arms into scrubs, tying them blind behind their backs. They proceeded through the ante-side of the airlock and into the animal facility to render themselves anonymous behind duck-billed facemasks and surgical gloves.

Marshall started up the bio-cabinet and doused the cold steel with jets of ethanol, wiping the surface dry with a paper towel. Yoshi inspected the cardboard tags on the front of the Perspex boxes, pulled one down from the stack and placed it in the bio-cabinet. He removed the lid and snatched at the tail of an unsuspecting mouse. Lifting it from the cage and onto his sleeve he checked it for signs of injury or weakness, letting it move around on his arm with its tail held between his fingers, gentle yet firm. Judging it to be healthy he set it back into its cage, picked up a littermate by its tail and repeated the process for each mouse. He moved with all the skill afforded by years of practice. Content he placed the cage in a carry box and selected another from the stack. He inspected the animals in kind and added the second cage to the box. Marshall watched intently from the side.

Yoshi placed the box onto a trolley and cleaned up after himself with ethanol, keeping it all as sterile as possible for the next person. Yoshi removed the aluminium mouse barrier from its slots in front of the door, pushed the trolley through and replaced the gate.

They took the mice to the lab and Yoshi set up his implements- forceps, scissors, scalpel, pins, board, scales, saline, paper towels, ethanol- before grabbing the tail of the nearest mouse. He clucked softly at the mouse as he let it relax on his sleeve; it nestled into the crook of his arm. When Yoshi prized it away from the fabric of his sleeve it flattened itself out and flew like superman. When it was lowered onto a metal grill it instinctively gripped tight to the wire and pulled against the force fixing its tail. The ball of Yoshi’s thumb came down onto the back of its neck before it even had time to contemplate its situation. Yoshi pulled the tail straight backwards and rolled his thumb over the neck until his palm faced away. Vertebrae dislocating cracked dully. It all happened so fast. Yoshi, expressionless, pinched the neck to make sure it was properly broken. Both men turned away so as not to watch the convulsive death rattle.

Once it stopped kicking, Yoshi weighed the mouse, announced the readout for Marshall to record in the red notebook, and sprayed its torso with ethanol. He cut off the tail with scissors, then through the skin halfway up its back and tore the skin from the lower half of the body before pinning the animal to the board. He peeled away the fat pads and connective tissue of the abdomen and delicately removed the prostate. After rinsing with saline and weighing it Yoshi cut it in two, placing one piece in a plastic tube and dropping it into the dewar of liquid nitrogen, and mounting the other in a mould of Vectashield and freezing it over a boat of isopentane sailing on a sea of nitrogen.

The ritual was repeated for each animal. For the last two Yoshi offered Marshall the opportunity to gain some experience.

“Guess I’d better learn sometime- pad the CV and all that.”

They switched places- Marshall onto the stool and Yoshi looking on from the side. Marshall replicated Yoshi’s movements as best he could. He felt the crack of the neck, pinched the scruff and felt for the separation of the vertebrae. Feeling no bumps he released the tail. The body twitched a few times, legs kicking frantically at the air, before settling motionless atop the wire mesh.

“That really gives me the creeps, how it keeps kicking.”

“Yeah. I still find it disconcerting. It’s even worse when you manage to unnerve yourself.”

“What. You psyche yourself out?”

“Oh from time to time. Everyone loses their nerve sometimes. It can be weeks before you can do it again. You can’t plan for it. It just happens. I’ve had to get one of the tech’s to step in for me before.”

“Shit. I guess it goes to show that Chinks have feelings too.”

“Still, it’s the best way. The quicker, the better. The mouse doesn’t have time to get unnecessarily stressed. The faster and less handling the better. Sod my feelings.”

“I guess so…”

Marshall adjusted the eyepieces and the torches on the dissecting microscope. Yoshi sat by and instructed him through the surgery and extraction.

“So how are things going with Hazel?”

“Yeah, pretty good.”

“Just pretty good?”

Marshall smiled.

“Your head’s been in the fucking clouds these past few weeks.”

“Has it?”

“Yep. She’s got quite a hold on you, hasn’t she?”

“I guess so. She is pretty great.”

“I’ll say. If you fuck it up I will personally smash you. She’s smokin’.”

Marshall laughed. “I’ll bear that in mind, then.”

“Make sure you do.”

Marshall maneuvered the forceps to expose the posterior of the prostate. Both he and Yoshi held their breath as he lowered the scissors. The sharpened tips trembled lightly. Tentatively he snipped first the vas deferens, ureters and urethra before removing the prostate itself, slicing it in two with a scalpel.

“I’ve got a couple of old breeders that should probably be culled. Do you want to start up an old-age primary?”

“Mmm. I guess I should. Do you have any spare digest medium?”

“In the coolroom. In the yellow rack I think. It’s a couple of weeks old, though,” said Yoshi.

“Meh. It’ll be fine.” Marshall waved a dismissive hand at him. “If you want to go get them I’ll stay and get everything set up.”

“Sure.”

“Have fun.”

“You too.”

Chapter 12: Whatever Happened to Chivalry

They lay back on their towels in silence and buried their feet in the sand as the sky behind turned dusty with the approaching sunrise. The first of the gulls shook themselves clean in the pools amongst the rocks of the breakwater as the night’s hood was pared back. The first sleepy rays peered in strands over the ridge of dunes to pierce the pale mist hovering over the ocean, a beacon to a new day.

Alby formed the nucleus of the group, with Pilar’s head on his chest and Hazel’s on his stomach, their bodies stretched out perpendicular to his. Alby’s hand lay casually on Pilar’s taut brown stomach, and Marshall listened to the madness turning in Hazel’s stomach.

They squinted against the ignited sky. The tide rushed half-heartedly against the sand. The morning was unhurried; they had nowhere better to be other than right here soaking in the dawn and the gentle lapping of the ocean. Their breathing marked time with the ebb and flow and their heartbeats murmured in alignment. It was Saturday morning and the world would move in its own time.

A handful of morning joggers passed along the wet sand between the group and the sea, their panting adding syncopated beats to the early morning rhythm. Swimmers adjusted goggles over their sockets as they squeaked across the sand and porpoised into the fragile surf.

“Whyyyyy,” Pilar complained. “Why would anybody do that to themselves?”

Alby chuckled.

“It’s sick is what it is,” Hazel agreed.

Alby snorted.

“Alby, you really would laugh at anything, wouldn’t you,” Marshall said.

His volume increased into an unabashed guffaw. Heads complained at the assault on their comfort.

With time the shadows of the dunes retreated up the beach and the sun cast its autumn rays across their bodies, lizards warming up to the activities of the day. They hid their eyes behind their elbows and meandered to the realisation of dehydration and the first gentle throbs starting to pulse through their heads.

“Is there any more drink? I’ve got a hangover coming on.”

Alby shook the blue polystyrene container to be met with a hollow silence. “Nah, we’re all out.”

“That’s because you dumped the dregs over my head, you arsehole,” shot Pilar.

He sighed. “Yeah. Those were the days.

Marshall snorted.

Pilar wiped the sticky remnants on her face against Alby’s chest and let her head fall back down and let out an exaggerated sigh. They lay catatonic for another while as the crescendos in their heads grew.

“My head’s really starting to hurt.”

“Yeah.”

“Me too.”

“Mmmmm.”

“Need.water.*gasp*.Can’t.move.”

“Urrrggh.”

“Hey guys, I’m fine! Not drinking does wonders for your body. I feel like I could run a marathon!”

A light came on in Marshall’s head- not once had he seen Alby with a drink in his hand. He was now even more confused about where Alby’s boundless energy came from.

“Lay down, shut up and keep still, motherfucker.”

Alby stayed were he was, laughing silently to himself. The world reverted to its reverie as they lay there prone and mouths agape, basking under the warming sun. Isolated pods of towels, shirts and thongs accumulated along the beach. A crisp offshore breeze picked up and the sound from the sea got heavier. The squeaking of feet grew more prominent as real estate on the waterfront became ever more scarce. Grandparents eyed the four of them cynically and diverted their grandchildren away. Regulars muttered to each other at the incursion.

“Fuck this.” Hazel reached down and grabbed a handful of Alby’s leg hair, ripping them out with a sharp snap of her wrist. Alby writhed like a cut snake, disturbing the harmony of the cluster and sending them sprawling and towels flying. Hazel squirmed away from Alby’s grasp and Marshall face-planted into the sand. He came up spitting grit. Pilar squealed in delight as Alby got hold of Hazel, hoisted her over his shoulder and set off towards the water.

Pilar turned to Marshall with a grin wide on her face. “Aren’t you going to try and save her?”

“She got herself into that mess...” he shrugged.

“Tut. Whatever happened to chivalry?” she put the back of her hand against her forehead and swooned mockingly. Alby was running into the wash, Hazel bouncing precariously on his shoulder. He launched her like a shot-put into a wave breaking just in front of them. The slap of skin against the approaching wall of water was sharply audible from the beach. They winced. Hazel came up spluttering, strands of copper plastered against her face. She caught sight of her attacker and, ignoring her reddening skin, sprang headlong at him, catching him by the legs and hobbling him until he too fell into the sand-churned water. She pushed his head under again for good luck and walked, smiling serenely, from the sea. Alby sat in the shallow sandy water and laughed.

As the easterly began to throw sand along the beach they collected their belongings and trudged heavily back through the soft white dimples to the car park. Alby jostled with Pilar while Marshall ran his hands over Hazel’s bottom under the pretence of wiping sand off her underwear.

“I’ve got sand all up in my bits,” complained Hazel.

“Ummm, his name’s Marshall…” was the ignoble response from Pilar.

They bundled everything into the boot and meandered back through the suburbs towards the city. Marshall and Hazel spooned across the back seat, their hands wandering surreptitiously. Pilar slumped against her window and fell asleep, while Alby concentrated on the road from behind foggy eyes.

“Can you put some music on?” Marshall asked. Alby obliged, sliding the cassette into the machine with a clunk. The subtle hiss of white noise emanated from the speakers as the tape wound on. Under the cover of noise Marshall slid his hand inside Hazel’s underwear, an act so brazen that he himself was shocked. His heart accelerated into cacophony as his fingers dislodged grains of sand clinging to her hairs and skin. Hazel arched her back, bit her lip and breathed out measuredly as his finger entered her, giving herself over to his touch completely. She held onto him in solidarity. Alby kept his eyes fixed on the road ahead while Pilar softly snored.

Arriving at the girl’s house, Marshall readjusted his jeans. Alby and Pilar slumped inside, eyes half closed in front of their exhaustion. Hazel glided sleekly across the paving like a cat warm from the sun. Marshall thought he heard her purring as he followed, bent over like an old man.

Inside her room they quickly disrobed, wiped the sand from their bodies and fell into bed. Sunshine streamed in around the edges of the curtains. A line sluiced across the bedspread. They set upon each other again, this time without any illusion of restraint. There was no pretence of romance, only lust and raw undisciplined sex. They devoured each other as if they hadn’t eaten in days; skins of salt and sand. Barely restrained, he bit her nipple and pushed a finger inside her. She grasped his cock forcefully and massaged its end. Their breathing was course and ragged.

As he lay threatening atop her she asked if he had a condom.

He groaned. “Shit.”

“Shit. Fuck.”

“Sorry. I don’t go out expecting these things to happen.” He rolled off her, bitter at his thoughtlessness.

“No no. It’s not your fault.” She slapped her forehead. “Shit. I’ll have to search Donna’s room.” Hazel rolled out of bed muttering, tied a towel around her body and padded down the hall. Marshall hid his eyes behind the crook of his arm and berated himself.

Hazel crept past Pilar’s door and into Donna’s room, careful not to make any noise lest she disrupt her friends and become the focus of their teasing. She opened the top drawer of the bedside table and rummaged through loose pieces of paper and boxes of aspirin, tampons and antihistamines. She found what she was looking for and removed a silver foil square from its box. She slid the drawer shut and turned to leave the room. Twin silhouette’s blocked the doorway. Marshall heard Pilar’s shriek, Alby’s rumble, and Hazel’s hissing at the pair of them, the sound of a door closing and hurried footsteps approaching. Hazel returned grasping a square of foil like a trophy above her head. She smiled a tilted smile.

“That was so embarrassing! I’m not going to hear the end of this.”

Marshall blushed. “Well, we don’t have to…”

“Oh god yes we do!” She straddled him and lowered her head to his. He smiled. She held his wrists to the headboard and slowly traced her lips down his neck, his clavicle, his torso. Her hair tickled his skin and it broke out in goosebumps. The raw passion that had threatened to burn them alive had collapsed into something more languid and erotic.

They lay prone for a few moments before he removed the condom and deposited it in the plastic bag next to her desk. A strange sense of embarrassment rolled over him as he turned towards her and saw her eyes looking, through half closed slits and lips turned upwards into a lazy smile, at his manhood. He felt her scrutinise him and worried how he measured up. He blushed and pulled the sheet up to his throat. They held hand for a few minutes before rolling over, all too aware of the unfamiliar presence of the other at their backs, and slept restlessly, steadfastly refusing to thrash around for fear of disturbing the other.

The phone started to vibrate next to the bed. Marshall lurched. Yoshi. Through bleary eyes he hit the power button. He lay staring at the ceiling rose, his sudden insomnia powered by the admonishing beats of poisoned blood at his temples and an acute awareness of the quiet body next to him. He could feel the black bags beneath his dry and bloodshot eyes; his throat a cracked mud flat. He swallowed what saliva he could produce and waves of discomfort followed the peristalsis down his neck. What’s the time? With his arm over his face he listened intently for the telltale clicking of a clock. Nothing. He groaned. Rolling over he picked up his phone from on the hatbox and switched it back on. The display told him the hour. 2 hours sleep? You’ve gotta be kidding me! It beeped a received message. Voicemail.

“Har-Mar SuperStar! It’s Yoshi. Just calling to see if you want breakfast. Give us a call.”

Marshall rubbed his face. He swivelled to sit on the edge of the bed before standing up, careful not to wake Hazel or to move too fast in case of vertigo. Hazel rolled onto her back and flung an arm across where Marshall had been sleeping. She looked at him with one eye open, watching curiously.

“Want some water?”

“Mmmm *cough* yeah.” She smiled.

He slipped his pants on and snuck into the kitchen. He rinsed a glass from the bench under cold water, eliciting a yelp from the shower. He grimaced, mouthed an apology at the wall, and raided the fridge for the remnants of the apple and orange juices in the door. He removed them from their rack and delivered them to Hazel’s room. She had wrapped herself in an oriental dressing gown and sat cross-legged on the bed awaiting his return. Her hair hung in knotted tendrils over her shoulders. Smeared makeup, dark rings and the furrows in her pained brow lent her the unnerving appearance of a brothel madam. He held the cartons out and she pointed at the orange juice. They scrutinized each other in the cold light of day down the lengths of the plastic bottles.

“I didn’t get water coz someone’s in the shower. Didn’t want to disturb ‘em.”

She dismissed this with a wave of her hand. “Fuck ‘em.”

The wooden floorboards reverberated from rapid and heavy footfalls coming their way. The shadows of two legs were visible through the crack beneath the door. “Are you guys fucking?” Silence. “Hey? What are you up to?” Hazel and Marshall could hear two voices whispering, then muted giggling. They held their breath.

A woman’s voice. “Hey Hazel. Do you wanna watch a DVD? We’re watching DVD’s. You can choose. Hazel?”

“No thanks,” she sang.

“We’re coming in...”

“Fuck off!” Hazel shouted.

The latch scratched metal on metal and the door creaked as it slowly opened. Marshall leapt to lean against the inside of the door, the weight of one man leaning against the other; an inverse tug-of-war. Hazel helped him and together they managed to get the latch to click back into place.

“Awww, c’mon. We can make popcorn.”

“We’ll be out in a minute. Just give us a sec, alright?”

“Are you naked?” Alby turned the doorknob again and Marshall braced himself against the door again. Alby’s inevitable giggle could be heard though the door.

“No we’re not naked. Just give us a minute.”

“All-riiiiiight,” a singsong reply.

Marshall and Hazel waited a moment, but shadows remained.

“Go away! We can see you under the door.”

Pilar clicked her tongue and the sound of socked feet echoed down the hall.

“You too, Alby.”

“Awww.” He skipped away down the hall after Pilar.

Hazel blew a raspberry. “Do you want to stay for breakfast? I don’t know if we have much, but we could rustle something up. If you can put up with those two, that is.”

“Nah. I got a call from Yoshi.” Hazel looked at him non-plussed. “Asian-looking guy, scrawny, about this high.”

“Ah yeah.”

“He wanted to know if I wanted to get breakfast. I think I’ll get a lift home with him. I don’t want to walk home like this.” He felt like he was trying to come up with excuses. “Thanks though.”

They watched at each other awkwardly. Marshall shuffled his feet. “I should call him back and confirm, though.”

“OK.” She abstractly pushed at her hair and looked around at the mess she’d made of her room in the panic of deciding what to wear the night before. Discarded costumes lay over the back of a chair, the foot of the bed, on the desk. Used tissues dotted the floor. She berated herself for leaving her room in such a state. ‘At least I’d made my bed’ she thought. She started to clean around him while he made the call, trying to convince herself that she wasn’t always so untidy. She wrote down her address on the back of a piece of scrap paper for Marshall to relay, then sat back on the edge of the bed. Marshall tried not to stare at her inner thigh gleaming through the gap in her gown.

“He’s getting a taxi now.”

“OK. Cool. Do you want to wait on the step?” It was more of a rhetorical question as she started to move towards the door.

They emerged into the daylight and sat down on the tattered blue couch, averting their eyes from the blazing morning sun. The scent of nectar from the bottlebrush next door drifted on the wind. Dozens of bees flitted over the stamen. They sat in terrible silence taking in the sights and sounds of the Saturday morning. Everything seemed to be happening hazily, lazily. They slouched and sighed. If you had to be up and about on a hangover morning, this was the type of morning that could makes all the troubles and drama of a hangover worthwhile. They smiled across the driveway, only partially watching each other in the periphery. The night was now a hazy memory. Each passing minute further obfuscated the accuracy of the night before. By tomorrow it will have blurred into a series of discrete events and by-lines: pre-drinks (standard), concert (wasn’t the music great?), after-party (madness), beach (sexy swimming; the ride home), bed (sex. unaccountable sex).

“So... Can I umm get your number… or...”

“Ummm, sure. I guess.” Both thought it would be left just as a one-night-stand, but neither wanted to be the first to admit it. How do you just leave? Do you say ‘Thanks’? Maybe it’s better to get their number to save face?

Marshall wrote her name (What was it? Hazel), then number, into his phone and hit ‘save’. “OK then. Thanks. I guess.” He extended his arm awkwardly towards her.

A smile spread across Hazel’s face at the absurdity of the situation; almost laughed. She accepted his handshake. “No problem. Thank you.”

Now it was Marshall’s turn to smile. They both recognised it for what it was. A fling. A one-night-stand. Hedonism.

A yellow taxi crept carefully up the street trying to identify the numbers on the letterboxes. Marshall waved it on to where they were. “Well, thanks again. It was a great night. I had the most fun ever.”

“Me too. See you again some time. Enjoy your breakfast.”

“Haha yeah. You too. K.F.C. Mmmm,” he rubbed his belly sarcastically. While fried food seemed like a good idea now, he knew that it would seem like a bad idea later. Hazel laughed.

“Bye.” They waved, embarrassed, yet satisfied with the way things had paned out all the same.

Marshall got in the car and buckled his seat belt. As the car started to roll forward Marshall held his hand up towards the woman on the couch. He felt a sudden pang of misery that in all likelihood this would only be a one-off. It was a bitter feeling, of opportunity missed, or worse, wasted. Her eyes met his dolefully. Alby and Pilar rushed out the front door waving madly. “Bye Marshall. Bye!” they shouted, setting the neighbours dog to barking. Hazel swung her fist around and caught Alby in the ribs, setting him off into hysterics as the taxi pulled away from the curb.

As they set off down the road Yoshi extended his hand for a high-five, and bashfully Marshall obliged. “Good work.” They shared a smile.

 “So?”

“So what?” Marshall asked trying to act cool and collected, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

Yoshi looked at him incredulously and dropped it for the time being. “To KFC! Get the man some celebratory chicken!”

“How about you. What did you get up to?”

“Casino. Came out a hundred and fifty ahead. That’s booze for the week. The rest goes towards celebratory chicken! My shout”

“Damn straight.” Marshall afforded himself a chuckle at the absurdity of life.

By the end of the day, after nausea and a nap, Marshall had convinced himself that he would message Hazel. ‘What the hell’ he reasoned ‘what do I have to lose? We had fun, right? Why shouldn’t I message and just see what happens.’ But when to send the message? I don’t want to seem too eager, but don’t want it to seem like some bored after-thought.’ He wrestled with himself, this eternal question, then told himself ‘Fuck it. Just send it now. Fuck the consequences.’ Something about the combination of the night and the hangover had given him a new bout of confidence. Or recklessness, it was hard to tell which. He wasn’t expecting it to work out for him, and if he did so happen to be shot down in flames at least he had had a go. And that at least was something to take away from it other than just the fading memories and nostalgia for bygone joy.