The Last Appointment of The Day

11 am. First appointment of the day. I shouldn’t laugh, but: “Relationship issues?”

You’ve been married a month and your “issues” amount to her having hobbies and you having a narcissistic mother. Let me know when, after 13 years of biting your tongue and pulling the weight of two grow-ass adults, you’re on the shit side of a bitter divorce, operating a failing counselling service from a campervan, while a man who collects fingertips awaits delivery of the $15,000 you owe him thanks to a two of spades that should have been an ace.

The spoon could stand up in this fucking coffee and it still isn’t strong enough. I linger over the sugar as the next poor bastard raps on the door.

“Ally, welcome.”

“Hey, Dr… Sorry, I still don’t know your name.”

“Jack will do.”

17 minutes in, she’s whining and I’m doodling a Pac-Man in my little black book of client notes.

“So, when you say ‘values’ you mean: you want to contribute less to the bank balance and spend more time planning the renovation and working on…”

“Having babies!” a vapid giggle bubbles up like Mentos in Coke.

Gross. I push on.

“Ok, having babies, and less time spent…” I glance at the page where I seem to have sketched my ex as one of the ghosts about to be devoured by Pac Man, her stupid ponytail setting her apart from the luckier spectres “Having ‘pointless fun’. What does that mean?”

She leans toward the book balanced on my knee, imagining it, I’m sure, to be filled with poignant observations and ideas for treatment, not merely thousands of small, crude drawings that would be meaningless to anyone else. I snap it shut.

“I dunno,” she shrugs. “Video games, dates, hanging with his friends.”

God forbid.

I sense I’ve reached my trivial concerns quota for the day. And it’s not yet lunch. “Well, I think you’ve made good progress here, getting this all...Out in the open. Same time next week?”

Quick scratches in the book, she’s got a hair appointment at 11, how’s 1?

She’s not the last clueless sad sack of the day, but at least their own self-absorbed pity parties distract them from the less-convincing aspects of my framed ‘diploma’ sheathed in a thin layer of dust on the tiny fold out table. I move it now, lay out a plate.

Suddenly, a soft knock, nervous, tentative.

“I’m just packing up, if you want to make an appointment, I can” –

“Sorry, but I really need to talk to someone.”

“Ok, well, you can make a time, or I can give you the details of an after-hours counsellor...”

“I just need advice.”

And I just need a tumbler of gin and last night’s leftover fried rice, so...

“See, I... I just came into some – a lot – of money. Now. Well, today, actually, and, I don’t know what to do about it.”

I guess the rice can coagulate a little longer. I hope my suddenly-piqued interest manifests as an air of professional concern and not Scrooge McDuck-style dollar signs where my irises once were.

“Why don’t you take a seat?”

“Um, thanks.”

“So. You’re rich?”

“Yes. Well, no, not normally. I just - I found out today. Dad left me a $500,000. He passed, see, last month, and, well yeah, crazy, but!” Palms up, apologetic. “He left me a chunk of change, apparently.”

“Right.” Drawing my notebook from the desk again. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Oh, thanks. I didn’t know him. Left when I was a baby.”

“Is that why the money poses a problem?”

“Yes. Well, no, it’s great, but yes. Kinda.”

“How old are you?”

Young brows, knitting like old ladies. Scrappy flannel shirt, clinging to sweat-soaked ribs.

“Nineteen.”

“Is that the issue? You don’t know what to do with it? Fun or school, that sort of thing?”

Another frown. “No, it’s... the condition, the means.” Silence hangs like a painting. “Dad wasn’t, how can I put it? Legit. He was off the books.”

‘Aren’t we all’ I think, glancing down at my notebook where, obscenely, a small sack with a dollar sign is scrawled.

“He made his money illegally?”

A nod, catching his head in his hands on the downward dip.

“So, you don’t feel like you can ethically take the money?”

Another nod.

“But, if it’s in an account, a trust, there must be a legitimate legacy...”

“It’s cash.”

“Sorry?”

“It’s cash.”

The clock is suddenly very loud.

“See, I’m not exactly... on the record, either. Illegitimate, they’d have said, in days gone by.”

Among other words.

He reads my mind. “A bastard, I guess.”

A long pause, an uncomfortable, impromptu staring match.

“I go by all manner of names. I’m a drifter, I guess. He never owned up to me, ‘til now. Left me a trunk, just sitting in his old house. I didn’t know what to do, I grabbed $20k of the cash,” he kicks the beaten Hong Kong shopper to his right “and left the rest at his shack for now.”

“I see.” The gin calls, only slightly louder than the 20 grand that’s sitting not 40 centimetres away. I’m not sure how long it will stay that way, so I move to give him an out. “Well,” I say, slapping my knees, “I’m sure it will improve your lot no end. No more rough sleeping for you.”

“Oh, I couldn’t. I mean, that’s why I’m here. Dad - my father - he was alone at the end. He reached out to me, several times. I didn’t come.”

Scratching at his arm, a bug bite, maybe, or the rash of guilt that having a conscience brings on. I briefly wonder what that’s like, my eyes dragged back to the bag that sits between us.

“He needed me, and I ignored him.”

“He abandoned you.”

“Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

I sigh, scrub my palm across 3-day growth. “So, let me get this straight.” I take a deep sip from my water bottle, traitorously filled with water by past-me who obviously forgot that life sucks. “You’re a criminal.”

His hands shoot up, hostage-style.

“Sorry, drifter - with no identity and no family; except this dead father of yours, who laid no claim to you.”

“Yeah.”

“And he – your dad – has no record of this money himself, and you’re... Debating the ethics of spending it on booze? Food? A home?”

“I guess.”

“I see… Who else knows?”

“What? Oh, no one. I saw your sign out on the grass,” – his hands forming a banner in the sky - “’Life advice’ - and I came straight in.”

“Your mother?”

“Dead.”

“Girlfriend?”

“Nope.”

“Friends? Acquaintances? Blokes you smoke pot with once a month?”

“Nah, I’m a loner. I’m off the record, I’m nobody’s friend.... And pot makes me tired.”

I sketch a square.

“So?”

“So, what do I do? Take the cash from a man I never gave the time of day? Never sleep straight again?”

“Do you have kids?”

“Not that I’ve met.” A nervous chuckle. “I mean, no. Where I lay my head is home, you know?”

I live in this van, son, what do you think? Out loud I manage “Would you like a drink? Gin?”

“Yes. I mean, yes, please.”

I plop a small smiley face on the page. “Great.”

Tumblers, ice, clear courage. “Music?”

Led Zeppelin springing to life. Kashmir.

“I just feel like - I’m invisible in life - I was certainly invisible in Dad’s. I’m no millionaire, you know?”

“Someone would miss you.”

He seems to take this as a statement. I mean it as a question.

“No, really, they wouldn’t. That’s the thing. Millionaires are somebody. I’m nobody.”

“How’d you get here?”

“Walked. I don’t own a car.” His bony shoulders slump, his eyes glazing over as he studies the floorboards.

“You tired?”

“Yeah, must be the gin. I don’t usually drink.”

Yeah… Must be something like that. I almost feel sorry for the kid.

“Man, yeah…” Stumbling to stand. “Whoa. It’s gone to my head something fierce.”

Sagging at the waist, he takes one step, then a misstep, kneeling now, his face inches from my cryptic little notebook, tossed on the couch.

I allow myself time for three more shots but no pity, as I retrieve the baseball bat intended for intruders, but also handy for unexpected guests carrying wads of cash. It’s heavy in hand but light to swing. First, I move the book aside.

Such a wet sound; wetter the second time.

He’s a slight lad, but so heavy, especially compared to the bag that he found so cumbersome to bear.

With difficulty, I stumble toward the railway tracks, abandoned and almost invisible in the cloying darkness.

‘Anonymity’, I think to myself, ‘such a blessing and such a curse.’

I trudge back to the caravan, not in any shape to drive, yet acutely aware I’ll drive all night. By dawn my debt, not my digits, will be in ‘The Captain’s’ hand, and I’ll be on a highway to who knows.

They might find the boy, that trunk, even my little black book, but none of them will give up their secrets.