‘Oh we know, Albie, we know,’ said Connie, regarding the accordionist through narrowed eyes. The girl, meanwhile, was scooping the contents of many tiny jars of jam into a croissant. ‘I hate these little jars, don’t you?
‘I’m sorry, we didn’t quite get your—’
‘Cat. As in the hat!’ She patted the black velour bowler that she wore at the back of her head.
‘And are you Australian, Cat?’
Albie tutted. ‘She’s from
‘Same thing!’ She gave a loud bark of a laugh. ‘You guys better get some breakfast in you, before I eat it all. Race you!’
Over the years, at conferences and seminars, I’ve had some experience of the breakfast buffet system and have noticed that when confronted with a table of ostensibly ‘free’ food, some people behave with moderation and some as if they’ve never tasted bacon before. Cat was of the group that believes that ‘eat as much as you like’ is a gauntlet thrown down. She stood at the juice dispenser, pouring a glass then downing it, pouring a glass then downing it; juice-hanging, I call it and I wondered, why not just open the tap and lie beneath it? I smiled at the waiter who shook his head slowly in return, and it occurred to me that if management made the connection between last night’s accordion workout and the woman now piling a great mound of strawberries and grapefruit segments into her bowl, then we might be in very real trouble.
We shuffled along the counter. ‘So what brings you to the Eternal City, Cat?’
‘Paris isn’t the Eternal City,’ said Connie. ‘The Eternal City is Rome.’
‘And it’s not eternal,’ said Albie, ‘it just feels like it.’
Cat laughed and wiped juice from her mouth. ‘I don’t live here, I’m just passing through. I’ve been bumming round Europe ever since college, living here, living there. Today it’s Paris, tomorrow Prague, Palermo, Amsterdam — who knows!’
‘Yes, we’re the same,’ I said.
‘Except we have a laminated itinerary,’ said Connie, examining the empty grapefruit container.
‘It’s not laminated. What I mean is, we’re going to Amsterdam tomorrow.’
‘Lucky you! I love the ’Dam, though I always end up doing something I regret, if you know what I mean. Party town!’ She was filling a second plate now, balancing it on her forearm like a pro and focusing on proteins and carbohydrates. Lifting the visor on the bacon tray, she inhaled the meaty vapour with eyes closed. ‘I’m a strict vegetarian with the exception of cured meats,’ she said, loading dripping coils of the stuff onto a plate already overflowing with cheese, smoked salmon, brioche, croissants …
‘That’s certainly quite a breakfast you’ve got there!’ I said, smile fixed.
‘I know! Albie and me’ve worked up quite an appetite,’ and she gave a low, dirty laugh and snapped at his buttock with the bacon tongs while Albie grinned sheepishly at his plate. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘most of this is for later on.’
That, to my mind, was crossing a line. The buffet was not a picnic-making facility nor a come-one-come-all larder. I had resolved to be nice to Albie’s new friends and their eccentricities, but this was theft, plain and simple, and when a banana followed a jar of honey into the capacious pockets of her velvet shorts I felt that I could restrain myself no more.
‘Don’t you think maybe you should put some of that back, Cat?’ I said, light-heartedly.
‘Beg pardon?’
‘The fruit, the jars of honey. You only need one, two at the most.’
‘Dad!’ said Albie. ‘I can’t believe you’d say that!’
‘Well, I just think it’s a bit excessive …’
‘Awk-ward!’ trilled Cat in an operatic falsetto.
‘She’s not eating it all now.’
‘Which is exactly my point, Albie.’
‘No, fair enough, fair point — here, here …’ And Cat began tossing jars and fruit and croissants back on to the table willy-nilly.
‘No, no, take what you’ve got, I just think maybe don’t put stuff in your pockets—’
‘See what I mean, Cat?’ said Albie, gesturing towards me with an open hand.
‘Albie …’
‘I told you, this is what he’s like!’
‘Albie! Enough. Sit.’ This was Connie, with her sternest face. Albie knew well enough not to argue, and we returned to the table, took our seats and listened to Cat …
… how she loved New Zealand, how beautiful it was but how she’d grown up in a boring suburb of Auckland, so dull and middle-class, mile upon mile of identical houses. Nothing ever happened there — or rather, things did happen there, terrible things, but no one ever talked about them, they just closed their eyes and carried on with their dull, conventional, boring lives and waited for death.
‘Sounds like where we live,’ said Albie.
Connie sighed. ‘I challenge you, Albie, to name one terrible thing that’s happened to you in your whole life. Just one. Cat, poor Albie here is scarred because we didn’t let him have Coco Pops back in 2004.’
‘You don’t know everything about me, Mum!’
‘Well, I do as a matter of fact.’
