RICH SON POOR SON
July 10th 2008 15:23
Jude and I went to Portside Wharf. “Dean,” he said. “You don’t have a girlfriend because you’re never brave enough to call a girl a cunt.” He was giving me relationship advice again.
There was an art installation there made by this woman named Hiromi Tango, where people can write down thoughts and dreams and feelings and everything else they want to write and stick it to one of its walls.
One note said, “Jeremy I still love you.” One note said, “I cry every night.” One note said, “Some day you will be cool.” One note said something about penises.
If you live in Brisbane, come visit it some time. I even left a personal note on one of the walls – see if you can find it. I wonder if it’s been vandalised yet.
It’s pretty obvious that Portside Wharf is a place for wealthier people. It’s pretty obvious because Jude goes there all the time. It’s also pretty obvious because it feels safe. Whenever you feel safe, you know you’re in a wealthier area. Old men only check out young girls subtly, there isn’t shit smeared all over the toilet cubicle walls (and the toilets aren’t glowing bright blue), there’s no one asking you for train money, every second car is a BMW or a Mercedes, there are a lot of neckties, there’s no Hungry Jacks, there’s no KFC, there are no children, it’s white, it’s quiet.
We went to a swanky bar. I drink a lot but know nothing about wine. I’m classy that way. My trick is, to impress a girl, I’ll always ask for the house wine. I’ll be with the girl, and we’ll be in front of the waiter, and I’ll grin, and I’ll go, I’ll have two house whites, thanks. It always fails because the girl always asks me, “What’s the house wine?” Once, Vail asked me, “What’s the house?” Whenever the waiter asks me to choose from a list of house wines, I shit my pants.
So as I stood with Jude in front of the bartender, I asked for a house white. In swanky bars, it’s different. They actually show you the house wine. They bring the bottle in front of you and prove to you that they’re actually going to serve you the house wine and not some other, better wine. The bartender showed me the house wine and pointed to the label, just to make sure that I knew it was the house wine. “Is this what you want, sir?”
I looked at the label. I had no idea what I was looking at. “Uh... yes. How did you know?”
The bartender looked confused. “What do you mean?”
I glanced at Jude, who was walking away. “I don’t... know.”
“Sir?”
The bartender and I looked at each other for a while.
“Just pour me the wine,” I said.
Jude and I drank and watched the Brisbane River; it slept and crinkled and lived right in front of us, in front of the bar we were in. Jude leant back and grinned and told me about his week, about his girlfriend, about the world. I told him about my week. We laughed once in a while. We drank more. When I was young, a family friend of ours who worked at the airport gave my mum and I free business class tickets to Sydney. We both sat there, in the airplane, amazed. I couldn’t believe it. I kept telling mum, I can’t believe this shit. The air hostess knew me by my first name. We were given newspapers, we were given placemats, we were given salt and paper shakers, we were given space, we were smiled at, people asked me if I was alright and I grinned and I said, Hell yes. After some time, though, I heard some kid crying behind the curtains, back at economy. I heard people saying, Excuse me. I looked down, at my shorts, at my old Puma sneakers. I put my earphones on.
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