Star Sailors by James McNaughton

Author:James McNaughton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Victoria University Press

Jeremiah knows he can’t sit still in his tiny hotel room and nut out a message about love that will satisfy all stakeholders. He needs to go out to have any chance. He changes into his light waterproofs. ‘Love,’ he says to himself. In the corridor, light shines from under his neighbour’s door. The insomniac Spaniard’s awake again. He considers softly knocking and asking him for help. He stands at the Spaniard’s door, fists clenched, afraid of hearing something.

He runs fast out of New Hokitika. His responsibility follows. It’s high stakes. High stakes now. A message must be written and sent to Wire before dawn. He can’t fail. He can’t lose the promotion, the house in Masterton, the money, the power and the glory. My life, he thinks, is in the balance. Right here. Right now. He accelerates and spurs himself on with thoughts of failure. To fail will mean being stuck in the tiny flat on Mt Victoria. Being stuck on the third floor at Venture Tower, watching the young guns come in and climb past him on the ladder. Have Le Stratton lord over him. Drive an old car, ride an old racing bike, paddle an old kayak, have Mandela go to second-tier schools, have Karen tighten her budget further. Not possible!She will leave him for some wealthy arts philanthropist or something, and take Mandela. That’s the worst of it: losing his family. And having to carry on. Light rain begins to fall. He runs faster.

Something about love, he tells himself, something positive and snappy, that will please millions and satisfy the corporate stakeholders and their shareholders. And save my life. What? What? What?

He stops, lungs bellowing, legs burning. He hasn’t paced himself. Ahead, the last streetlight out of town is swarmed by swirling drizzle. He struts to it on stiff legs. He’s never really noticed it before, beyond being a three kilometre marker. It’s old-style, Victorian, like in London Jack-the-Ripper days. The answer, he thinks, must come to me here, now. His breath bursts in clouds in the dirty light. Love, he thinks, the central tenet of all religions, the common thread that binds them. He pulls up his sleeve. ‘Definition,’ he puffs at his screen. ‘Love.’ The screen flashes, projects text and scrolls.

love

/l^v/ noun

1. an intense feeling of deep affection for a person.

‘parents feel intense love for their children’

He brings up synonyms: affection, attachment, fondness, tenderness, warmth—they blur before his eyes. What else?

2. a deep attraction based on sexual desire.

‘No.’

‘It was love at first sight.’

3. a great enthusiasm and pleasure in something.

‘His love for the sea.’

He scrolls down through affectionate greetings conveyed to someone on another’s behalf, to the salute at the end of a letter, to a friendly form of address: ‘Don’t fret, there’s a love.’

Scores in tennis and squash fill him with an increasing sense of terror. There’s no mention of what Leaf was on about, nothing about impartial love or disinterest. What can that mean to the common person if it’s not in

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