Sunny Garden

   

By eight-ten I have spent fifteen minutes pacing alone outside the New Farm Deli.
    In the world of signs, this is not good.
    Rachel Vilikovski is nowhere to be seen.
    I go into the deli, I buy a coffee. Around me people sit in groups from two to ten in size, and I am the only group of one. And there is no way I look cool. No way I look like the sort of person who can sit in a coffee shop alone, reading a Veny Armanno book and attracting the attention of sixteen-year-old babes. Not tonight. Tonight I am sure it is visible that I am only half a night out.
    At the counter the man says, Is there a Richard Derrington here?
    This is bad. I knew it was bad, It's bad. I go to the counter.
    Rachel called, he says. She said to tell you she's running a bit late and she'll meet you at the movie. (p. 248)

    So I wait at the Village Twin. Eight twenty-five. Outside the Village Twin trying not to look up and down Brunswick Street. Trying to gaze nonchalantly at the fluoro lights of the medical centre across the road. Eight-thirty. Telling myself not to look at my watch. Ten minutes pass. Eight thirty-two.
    Richard Derrington, she says behind me. I turn around. You were away somewhere then.
    Yeah. I'm back now. Hi.
    Hi.
    She gives me a smile, more than just a quarter now, but no explanation.(p. 249)

Continue with the Zigzag Street tour.

Excerpts from Zigzag Street are © Nick Earls and are used with permission.

All virtual tour photos are © Liz Perkins and may not be reproduced without permission.

Disclaimer:
Sunny Garden is designed, written and maintained by Liz Perkins, in cooperation with Nick Earls and Penguin Books. Any questions about Sunny Garden should be directed to Liz

All original contents are © Liz Perkins.