Maha Sidaoui

When I think of my friend Peter, I inevitably think of the Indigo Girls, who sang:

‘And the best thing you’ve ever done for me 

is to help me take my life less seriously.
It’s only life after all.’

A few years ago I called him after an argument I had with my then teenage stepdaughter, who spat the cliché, ‘You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not my real mother.’

I relayed the story to him, then waited for words of wisdom – some encouraging sentences that would make me feel less sad or hurt. 

After a short pause he asked, ‘Well did she at least say it with an American accent?’ 

I was sixteen when we first met. My sisters and I were on our way home from a Lebanese wedding. Helda managed to convince my parents to take separate cars, so that we could leave way before the usual finishing time of three in the morning.  

Helda’s light blue Kingswood smelt of cigarette smoke and perfume. The hot pink lipstick-stained filters overflowed in the ashtray and cassettes jammed the glove box. Jamal sat in the back and we quickly exchanged a glance. We knew we weren’t going home. Helda had a plan.

She drove us to Lygon Street and I hung my head out of the window letting the evening cool breeze wash my face. I watched restaurants, cafés, groups of friends, families and boys zip past. Musical horns blared from cars and the subwoofers thumped out a bass that rocked entire cars. 

Helda illegally parked on a corner and Jamal I quickly got out.

‘Where are we going?’ I asked Helda, as I tugged on my black dress that was riding up my thighs. 

Ignoring my question, Helda puffed the chiffon sleeves of her gold Vivienne Westwood dress and then tweaked Jamal’s orange tipped fringe. Even though Jamal was only fourteen she could easily walk into a club, it wasn’t just her dazzling eye makeup and dusty pink blush, she also had a confidence that would prevent anyone from questioning her. 

Helda looked me up and down and said, ‘That dress is wasted on you.’ 

I was wearing an Azzedine Alaia super tight dress with one large silver zip that started at the collar and unzipped diagonally all the way to the hem. The large lapels on either side came over my head like a hood. I had only ventured this look in private, where I pretended I was Grace Jones from the cover of Put some Grace in your Face, compilation album.

Jamal and I followed Helda down a backstreet until we could no longer hear any noise. We were still excited as we walked towards a glass shop front with fluro lights that shined light on the cobblestones laneway.

To my disappointment, Helda walked us into a coffee shop.

We sat at a wooden round table while Helda smoked Benson and Hedges, Jamal sipped her Coke and poked ice cubes with a straw and I stared out the window.

‘This place has just opened, it’s supposed to be cool.’ Helda declared looking around at the empty tables. 

The owner stared at us from his stool behind the counter looking more bored than me. 

Down the laneway I saw two figures coming towards us. I watched as they walked and talked with their hands, stopping to laugh, composing themselves, then stepping towards us again.  

‘Sasha!’ I screamed. 

All three chairs scraped across the tiles, I was first to get to the doorway and hug her. 

I stared at the tall guy with curly black hair as he smiled watching Helda and Jamal hug Sasha who screamed our names as a way of introducing us.

‘And this is Peter.’ She added as we all sat down.

‘How long has it been since you all saw each other?’ he asked.

‘Yesterday.’ We all said at the same time, laughing some more.

Sasha lived around the corner from us and we had known each other since primary school.

Peter leaned back in his chair and stretched his long slender legs away from the table.

‘When did you guys meet?’ I asked.

‘Tonight.’ they both said laughing. 

They spoke over one another as they explained how they had finished a shift at the ice-cream shop Norgen Vaaz.

‘We’ve been looking for a bar, when we saw the light from the street and then those jars.’ Peter pointed to a shelf.

Even the bored owner looked up at the jars of olives above his head. 

‘They looked like vodka bottles from the street.’ Sasha said laughing.

‘It was a mirage.’ Peter added and we all screamed with hilarity again.

When the café didn’t get busy and Sasha and Peter had given up the idea of finding an after work drink, Helda drove us all home. 

Sasha and Helda smoked in the front seats and when The Carpenters sounded from the speakers, Peter clapped his hands and said, ‘I have this album.’ 

He knew all the words to their songs and together we sang, ‘We’ve only just begun,’ and when we said goodbye, I must have declared my love for Peter out loud, because as Jamal put her head on my shoulder, she yawned and said, ‘I really love him too.’