Royal Telephone

Keith stood in the doorway of his old bedroom. All was quiet, except for the synthetic-blend carpet, which was loud and proud in both colour and pattern.

It was brighter in the corners where the furniture used to be, a little flattened and faded elsewhere. Muted blobs of Blu-Tack showed where his posters of 1980s pop stars had once covered the streaky, low-sheen walls. Only Lionel Richie remained. Keith didn’t have the heart to take him down.

Picture by Vitalijs Barilo

‘Keith, love, where are you?’

‘In here, Mum.’

‘I’ve finished packing the last of the kitchen things.’ She beamed up at him, eyes crinkling and cheeks dimpling in honest delight. ‘I still can’t believe it. Me, in a brand-new, two-storey house with a view of the river. Two storeys! And an ensuite with a spa bath. What would your father say?’

Keith thought he had a fair idea. His father had run his own trucking company for thirty-five years before passing on to the big rest stop in the sky. Honest and gruff, he’d been suspicious of anything fancy. Or new. Or nice.

‘That Trevor is such a generous boy.’ She brushed some fluff from the crease of her sensible mauve trousers. ‘And so successful now, too. Did you see his billboard on the main street, near the community bank?’

Keith managed to smile back. ‘I must have missed that one.’

His older brother Trevor had always been the first, most and best in the family. The first to win prizes at athletics and swimming, the most charming and outgoing, the best at clever money-making schemes. When they were teenagers, Trevor had brought home a parade of beautiful girlfriends while Keith was still working up the courage to ask Jenny Thistlethwaite to dance with him at the Blue Light Disco. On weekends, Trevor and his mates would sort through junk at the local tip and sell odd things to odd people from the city – it turned out they were collectors items and fetched a handsome sum. Meanwhile, Keith spent hours in his bedroom listening to Madonna and Bon Jovi, or lurking in the philosophy section of the local library, where he was rarely disturbed by another human being.

Now here they were in 2023. Trevor was a razzle-dazzle real estate agent with his face on a billboard in downtown Wongadilly. A loving son who’d bought his widowed mother a fabulous new house. And Keith? Keith was a sessional philosophy tutor at a second-rate university in the city, six hours drive away.

***

‘Did I mention the fishpond and the Balinese pergola?’ she said.

Keith kept smiling while he carried boxes and hatstands, unpacked crates of crockery and sifted through his father’s record collection: Roy Orbison, Johnny Cash, some Merle Haggard. Country music royalty, as to be expected. But at the bottom of the pile was Lionel Richie’s chart-busting album from 1983, Can’t slow down. Puzzled, Keith turned it over and gazed at the moustachioed Lionel on the back cover, looking urbane in a pastel-pink jacket over a grey t-shirt and pale jeans. At the top righthand corner was a small sticky note in his father’s blockish handwriting: Hello, is it me you’re looking for? Big jokes, Dad.

After several more hours of bending and sorting, Keith’s mother was finally settled into her palatial new digs and Keith could head out for some air. And a stiff drink. Or several.

***

The evening air was warm. It carried the scent of cut grass and cow pats, overlain with jasmine. Keith walked towards the centre of town and the Fisherman’s Arms, its only pub. Apart from a few new houses, everything looked the same as it ever had. There was the phone box where he used to ring Jenny when he wanted to have a proper, private conversation, without anyone listening in on the extension. Jenny had liked Madonna, too. And philosophy. Or so she’d said.

Keith reached the phone box and stepped inside, for old times’ sake. He put his hand on the orange receiver, lifted it to feel its comforting weight in his hand again. There was even a dial tone, long and burry. Wongadilly, the place that time forgot. On the silvery wall behind the phone was some old graffiti, scratched with the point of a compass: Trevor is a spunk. Sigh. There was something else, too – a small card attached with four neat pieces of sticky tape.

TELEPHONE TO GLORY
Feeling troubled?
Life getting you down?
Call 1800-BIG-GUY

‘Telephone to glory.’ Keith remembered the song from Sunday school, and Miss Winstone plonking away on the poorly tuned piano. It took him back to cold mornings in St John’s church hall with its scuffed floorboards, high windows and shiny mustard curtains.

Telephone to glory, oh what joy divine!

I can feel the current moving on the line

Made by God the Father for his very own

You can talk to Jesus on the Royal Telephone

Even then, Keith had thought the premise unlikely. What the hell, he was going to try it. The ten-digit number made a retro beep-bop-boop sound as he pressed the telephone buttons to dial. Two rings, three.

‘Hello, Keith,’ said a smooth, deep voice with a hint of an Australian accent.

‘Umm, hi. Who is this?’

‘Jesus, of course. Jesus Christ. Son of God. Prince of Peace. Et cetera.’

‘Right. How are you?’ What a stupid thing to say. Keith felt his face redden.

‘Marvellous. Thanks for asking. But you, Keith – I sense you’re feeling troubled.’

‘A bit.’

‘Life getting you down?’

Keith didn’t answer.

‘I’ll take that as a yes. Well, I’m here to listen. What’s troubling you today?’

‘The same as usual.’

‘You mean your brother? Mr Man-about-town, handsome-face-on-a-billboard Trevor?’

‘How do you know Trevor?’

‘I’m the Big Guy, remember. I know everybody. Besides, he’s pretty hard to miss, even from up here.’

Keith felt the bitterness rise, filling his chest with sour misery. ‘Because he’s so amazing and impressive?’

‘No, because he tries so bloody hard.’

There was a longish pause. Keith stared at the concrete floor of the phone box and the patterns his shoes had made in the grime.

‘Let me tell you something about Trevor.’

‘Okay.’

‘Trevor is desperate. Desperate to be admired. Desperate that nobody finds out the true size of his penis.’

‘Which is?’

‘Average. Perfectly fine and workmanlike, but nothing remarkable.’

‘Are you sure you’re Jesus?’ Keith asked.

‘Of course. How else would I know these things? I know everybody, and I know everybody’s secrets. On the whole I keep them to myself, in a kindly way. Love is patient and kind, after all, as Paul wrote in his first letter to the Corinthians.’

‘So he did.’

‘Between you and me, Paul wrote a lot of things, not all of which align with our official policies up here in celestial HQ. Some of his attitudes to women were so passé. And the trouble they’ve caused!’

Keith felt his head spinning.

‘However, I digress. Don’t let Trevor get you down. Embrace all that makes you, YOU, Keith. You’ll find that it’s enough.’

‘Okay. Thanks.’ Crikey. Jesus had been reading self-help books.

‘And Keith? You can call me anytime, day or night. Line is never busy, as it says in verse two. Put me on speed dial. You’ll be glad that you did.’

The line went dead.

***

Fifteen minutes later, Keith was enjoying a vodka martini in the beer garden at the Fisherman’s Arms. The bartender – a backpacker from Sweden, by the height and blondness of him – had taken the drink order in his stride and had even produced a couple of olives and a little paper umbrella. It was purple with tiny white spots. Keith was systematically opening and closing it, thinking on his conversation with Jesus, who in retrospect had sounded a lot like Richard Wilkins. Was he being taken for a ride?

Another voice boomed nearby. ‘Keith, man. Little Bro. How’s it hanging?’

‘Hi, Trev.’ Terrific.

‘Mum told me you were here, back from the big city, helping with the move. Thanks, mate. I’ve been flat chat at work, totally smashed. Spring, you know? It’s crazy. Everybody wants to sell.’ He pulled out a chair and sat down, then took a long draught of his pint.

Keith hadn’t seen Trevor in a couple of months. Up close, he wasn’t looking good. He had dark smudges beneath his eyes and a pallor beneath his unseasonable tan.

‘Yeah, spring. Of course. How are things otherwise? How’s Brooke?’ Brooke was Trevor’s second wife, fifteen years younger than his first. The situation was such a cliché that Keith winced inside every time he thought about it. Although to be fair, two wives were two more than he had managed to marry.

‘Next question,’ Trevor said.

‘Meaning?’

‘Brooke and I have been having a few problems. Quite a few.’

‘Oh? Oh.’

‘Yes. Oh. She moved out last week.’

‘I’m sorry.’

Trevor took another long swallow from his pint. The western sun glinted off his chunky platinum neck chain. ‘Not only did she move out, she moved in with Moonbeam, her yoga instructor. They’re living an Instagram dream over the studio in Haversham Lane. Moonbeam, I ask you. Is this Wongadilly or Mullum-fucking-bimby?’

Keith had no answer to that. ‘Another drink?’

‘Thanks, don’t mind if I do.’

When Keith returned from the bar, a woman had joined Trevor at their table by the wisteria-covered water tank. It was Donna McGinnity, wearing a designer suit and designer shades, her hair sleek and her expression stern. Five years ago, Donna had inherited her grandfather’s local crime business. By all accounts she was a natural, expanding the enterprise from petty theft and fell-off-the-back-of-a-truck schemes to loansharking, indoor horticulture and even some import-export work. It was amazing where an MBA could take you these days.

Two of Donna’s goons stood nearby, faces and tattoos glowering. One of them looked a lot like Wayne Jacobs, who’d played cricket with Keith in the Wonga Wonders under-fifteens.

‘You know I’m good for it,’ Trevor was saying.

‘Do I?’ asked Donna. She raised an immaculate eyebrow.

‘Absolutely. One hundred percent. I’ll have it to you by midnight tomorrow.’

‘You’d better, Trev. We’d hate for anything to happen to that gorgeous face of yours. Or your mother’s lovely new house.’ She saw Keith approaching and smiled. ‘You make sure your big bro comes to the party, okay?’ And with that, she and the goons were off.

Keith sat down and drained his second martini in one gulp. ‘Trev, what the actual?’

‘Sorry, mate. I didn’t want you to know. A short-term cashflow problem, that’s all.’ Trevor tapped his beer glass in a syncopated rhythm.

‘Uh-huh.’

‘My new development down by the river – council put the rezoning on hold after last year’s flood. Everyone’s banging on about climate change, one-in-ten-year events, yada yada. I don’t see what the fuss is about, to be honest. Couldn’t we just build the bloody houses on stilts? They do it in Queensland.’

Keith was incredulous. ‘So you borrowed money from Donna?’

‘I tried the bank first. I’m not a complete idiot.’

‘How much do you owe?’

‘Five, plus interest.’

‘Five thousand bucks? I could give you that on my sessional tutor’s salary.’

‘No. Five hundred thousand. And the interest is up to a hundred and seventy-five-k.’

‘Farrck. How are you going to get that by tomorrow?’

‘I have no arsing idea.’

***

Keith slept badly and woke to the screeching of sulphur-crested cockatoos. It was a glorious, sunny Saturday, but a small stone of dread had lodged in his heart. He stared for a while at the river red gums outside the bedroom window; they were gnarly and graceful, leaves rustling. Oh, to be a tree. Then he straggled out of bed and shuffled to the kitchen in search of coffee.

His mother was making pancakes at the induction cooktop, set above a gleaming oven so large it could roast a wild boar. ‘Your favourite, love. For our first breakfast in the new house.’

‘Thanks, Mum.’ He kissed her on the cheek.

‘Then I’ll be off to bowls. I’m pairing with Gail Thistlethwaite today. Jenny’s mother.’

Keith sipped his coffee.

‘You know Jenny’s back in town, don’t you? She’s working at the library. As head librarian, in fact.’

‘No, I hadn’t heard.’

‘Such a wonderful girl. Woman now, I suppose. And she’s broken up with that Murphy boy. He was never smart enough for her. You should give her a ring.’

‘Muu-um.’

‘Alright, you don’t need me organising your social life. No doubt there are lots of wonderful, smart women at your university, too.’

When she was gone, Keith picked up his phone.

‘Hi, Keith. Great to hear from you again.’ The smooth, deep voice was soothing.

‘Hi, Jesus.’

‘Feeling troubled?’

‘More than you could imagine.’

‘That Trevor’s gotten himself into a pickle, hasn’t he? Billboard or no billboard.’

‘What are we going to do?’

‘I have a plan. Meet me at your old house, 9 pm. Tell Trevor. No-one else.’

The line went dead.

***

Right on 9 pm, they pulled up in Trevor’s red Audi TTS coupé.

‘Who are we meeting again?’ Trevor asked. Keith had been vague on this point all day. ‘Not her?’

A tall woman was standing next to the front gate. Her hair and make-up were elaborate, her hot-pink satin outfit incongruous in Wongadilly, even on a Saturday night.

‘Hello, Keith,’ she said, in a voice reminiscent of Richard Wilkins.

‘Jesus?’ asked Keith.

‘The very same. In disguise of course. We don’t want to start any wild talk of the End Times.’

Disguise, drag, what’s the difference? thought Keith. Aloud he said, ‘Jesus, this is Trevor.’

Trevor stood open-mouthed. ‘Jesus Christ?’

‘Yes.’

‘Back on Earth, like the second coming?’

‘Thirty-second coming, actually. I like to visit now and again. Why don’t we go inside where we can talk?’

Keith unlocked the front door and they walked down the hallway to his old bedroom. It was gloomy in the twilight. He could smell its familiar smell, feel the hard carpet beneath his feet.

‘Everything you need is inside you, and inside this room,’ Jesus said, with a flourish of hot-pink sleeves. ‘Let nothing more be hidden between brothers, Trevor. The truth will set you free.’ Then Jesus was gone. Poof. Back to Heaven. Or the Royal Telephone Call Centre.

‘What was that about?’ Keith asked.

Trevor was looking shifty.

‘Trev?’

‘Umm, well, maybe about Jenny. Me and Jenny.’

‘What do you mean, you and Jenny?’

‘Keith, mate. It was just the one time. At Chooka’s twenty-first. I made a move on her. She turned me down flat.’

But Keith wasn’t listening. His rage swelled. With half the women in Wongadilly lusting after him, Trevor had made a move on Jenny? Keith swung his fist towards Trevor’s symmetrical, handsome face. Trevor ducked. Keith’s fist continued on, through the Lionel Richie poster, through the flimsy wall to something cool and solid.

‘Arrgghh,’ he shouted, in pain and anger. ‘Bastard!’

‘Me or the wall?’ asked Trevor, from a safe distance.

‘Both.’ Keith pulled out his hand. Plaster rained down; Lionel Richie tore in two. Through the hole, Keith saw something glinting. He reached in again and made the hole bigger. ‘Gold,’ he said.

‘What?’ Trevor grabbed an edge of broken plaster. ‘Fuck me.’

They counted twenty-four gold bars, one kilo each, tucked away within the wooden framing.

‘There’s a card.’ Keith picked it up and opened the envelope.

To my sons, Trevor and Keith,
The proceeds of the trucking business, to be shared
fifty-fifty between you. I told you I didn't hold with banks.
Look after your Mum,
Love Dad xx

Later that evening, they met Donna McGinnity in the shadowy lane behind St John’s church hall. Trevor parked his Audi nose-to-nose with Donna’s black Maserati and collected a small, floral-patterned suitcase from the back seat. He and Keith escorted it to Donna; its spinner wheels made crunching noises on the uneven gravel.

‘This should cover everything I owe, plus a bit more for your trouble,’ Trevor said.

Donna gestured to a goon, who bent down and unzipped the case. Seven gold bars nestled there, like the perfect carry-on luggage.

‘Trevor Moss, you never disappoint.’ Donna winked. ‘And that’s what I hear from the ladies around town, too.’

Trevor smiled and nodded. Keith snorted. The brothers edged backwards to their car, climbed in, reversed sedately along the lane to the street, then fanged it for the Fisherman’s Arms.

***

Through an open door from the main bar, Keith saw Jenny Thistlethwaite sitting at a table in the beer garden. He took his double vodka martini, complete with purple umbrella, and went to say hello.