Darryl was the quintessential bloke.
He wore football boots on Saturdays and he’d down a couple of tinnies after the game. He’d fart. He’d burp, and he’d always leave the toilet seat up. He was a grease monkey down at the garage on the corner. Not the one near the post office, but the one up by the liquor shop. He’d often joke that he’d never give up his wrench in that workshop, given its proximity to the grog. Indeed, he’d often marvel, ‘Mate, I’ve got it all’.
Except, at his core, he knew he didn’t.
He needed someone to laugh at his jokes, as if on cue. He needed someone who knew the difference between a whisk and a spatula. He had a vague idea that he needed more than a casual encounter; afterall, in a town like his, there was only so many times he could swipe right. He needed someone who he could affectionately call his ‘Mrs’.
He couldn’t believe his luck then, when a trim brunette with large gold hoops in her ears made eyes at him from across the pub. He smiled. She smiled. She moved her delicate hand to her face to brush some of her hair behind her ears. He gave his noggin a bit of a scratch. He picked up his empty schooner and mouthed, ‘Fancy a coldie?’. She approached him with a flirtatious coyness and as she introduced herself as Lola, Darryl knew he was onto a winner; he reckoned it was love at first sight.
As the moon transited across the sky, the pair’s words started to slur as Lola attempted to drink the broad shouldered fella under the table. She told him she was a nail technician and flashed around her fresh acrylics, while he told her about the garage. As the night came to an end, Lola put her arms around Darryl’s neck and slurred, ‘Carn you come 'round tor-morro and check out me mother?’.
It would have been polite at that point in the evening to describe Darryl as shit-faced, but the question gave him reason to pause. The question was one which should have made him shudder, but he didn’t. His eyes seemed to come to consciousness and he felt the hair on his legs stand on end. The metric he most commonly used to measure relationship was hours, and he’d never met a girl’s mother before. He wasn’t perplexed, and the haze of his drunken stupor was being replaced with an unknown clarity. Darryl looked back down at Lola, and respectfully kissed her on her cheek, whispering, ‘Absulutuly – I’ve neever wanteded anyfing more in me life’.
The next morning Daryl woke with a sense of purpose in his new relationship. Of course, it was moving quickly. Some would call it too quickly, but he didn’t care. He could see his entire life before him – he’d ask Lola to move in next week. It’d be good actually, she’d bring a bit of feminine cleanliness to his abode. He was pretty sure the glass in the oven shouldn’t be black, but he’d never thought of wiping a cloth over it or whipping around with the vacuum. He could already imagine his mates checking out his new sheila, and introducing them to his little chip off the old blocks. He figured they’d end up with three boys – all footy kids. He could almost smell the sponge cake Lola would be making on a Sunday night. He admired the vision of suburban bliss and set off to meet Lola’s mother.
He stood on the footpath outside Lola’s house wearing his only button up shirt and his good thongs. It was a neat three bedder in a good street and it even had a camellia growing under one of the windows. The house’s façade could be dated by its red brick exterior and the cracks in the path to the front door. Lola had spied Daryl standing awkwardly, from her window and raced out to meet him. She was still in her trackpants, but he thought she looked a million bucks. He thought she was floating as she descended the stairs from the porch. Lola called to him from the door to head straight ‘round the back. He thought that the sun seemed to shine a little brighter in Lola's presence. And then it seemed to Daryl like time was standing still, as he too, stood still next to a faded green roller door.
Daryl turned to Lola, and with sweaty palms and an increased heartrate he said, ‘I’ve never done this before – what’s your mother’s name?’. Lola looked confused and laughed off what she thought was an odd question. She raised up the garage door and said, ‘Righto, here she is. It’s so great of you to check out the motor for me’.
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