A long weekend of good feeling and alcohol in the City of Melbourne, reconstituting lost pieces of myself that reside in the memories of Marcelle and Brendan Renkin. The week starts with initial apprehension- Brendan and his friend Damien are in Sydney. There is old love and hurt feelings, and the possibility of awkwardness. For some reason this awkwardness doesn't materialise, as it sometimes does, in defensive sparring and mockery: we drive to Melbourne together in harmony, talking about Australian identity, about pedophilia, laughing at the contraband foodstuffs in the boot that Brendan's brother has acquired by questionable means and sent south to his numerous relatives. Marcin and Brendan talk about Russian politics. I watch them with proprietorial pride- such good boys, look how they get along. They turn out to have other things in common besides their romantic involvement with me. Look how modern, how mature we all are, driving towards Melbourne without discomfort or envy, discussing the nature of the universe and smiling at each other. As I write this I realise it sounds as though we are driving towards some horrible denoument, but we aren't. Things are simply alright.

In Melbourne there are shades of scores of other trips to stay with Marcelle. We giggle for days about nothing much, consume bottles and bottles of booze, dance and drink and eat. We lie in bed and talk to Marita and cuddle her daughter. We go to the shopping centre and buy cheap and hideous Australiana for Marcelle to distribute when she gets back to Panajachel. We finally have time for silence as well as constant jabber.

When we leave them on Sunday afternoon I succumb to a terrible feeling of loss which I have not felt since Marcin left me 5 years ago in Awasa. I pine (mainly for Marcelle- I have erected defenses against Brendan long ago) all the way to Albury. It takes several days after returning to Sydney for the good feeling to reassert itself, and I remember leaving them another time, nearly ten years ago when I came back to Australia. It was a definitive separation for me and Brendan, though I didn't really acknowledge it at the time. They drove me to the bus station in Manchester. It was a gritty, grey autumn day, eddies of wind blowing takeaway wrappers and empty plastic bottles around the benches. I kissed them goodbye as they stood there in the turbulent air, and instead of doom and impending loss I felt simply happy to know that somewhere in the world, the two of them existed. Toxic blues eliminated through the usual metabolic processes, I feel the same now.