“What kind of biochemical algorithm?”
“A mix of lipids and alkaloids, electrical energy, magnetism – the stuff you should’ve learned in high school.”
Over the years I’ve become used to such pronouncements, usually based on his fascination with obscure papers on astrochemistry. Joe is a walking TED Talk in that way – often mystifying, but sincere.
When I took Charlotte into his surgery with a bewildered parrot clinging to her arm, Joe was managing the difficult birth of a white mouse doe’s first brood. Michael Hutchence was in such bad shape he turned gloomily aside from the wriggling pink titbits on the examination table and buried his head in his loved one’s armpit.
“Oh hello,” said Joe, with a quick glance. “Michael causing trouble, is he?”
“It’s pathological, Joe, I can’t take it anymore.”
“He loves you, Charlotte, he doesn’t know what else to do.”
“That’s your solution?”
Joe stopped what he was doing and began the pastoral care that makes him so good at his job. Charlotte was struggling, I think, embarrassed by the threat of breaking down, and Joe filled the space between them with an easy compassion. Without being invasive, he seemed to connect to a vulnerable part of Charlotte she was reluctant to reveal. Radiating kindness, he handed me his box of surgical gloves. “Tim, do us a favour and take over the delivery. So far the young mum’s doing okay. Charlotte and Michael, come with me.”
They went into his office to consult while I kept an eye on the doe to stop her killing her pups, something that mice often do if they’re disturbed during birth.
After half an hour Charlotte left without Michael. On her way out she wrapped her arms around Joe in an intense hug. It was obvious she was deeply relieved.
“What did you say to her?” I asked, when he’d shown her out of the clinic.
“A lot of things, but in the end we talked about astrochemistry.”
“Astrochemistry?”
“Actually, astrochemistry and love.”
“Not your rant about the cosmos? She’s medically trained, Joe, she’ll think you’re a lunatic.”
“Not at all, she liked the science. I just said everything living is connected by a biochemical algorithm, including women and parrots, and a vital part of that biochemical algorithm is unstoppable attraction created by sentient genetics.”
“In other words, aside from ruining Michael’s life by locking him in a cage, there’s not a lot we can do.”
“Well, no.”
Eventually, Joe convinced Charlotte to farm Michael out to her uncle Ralph, a retired show boy from the cruise ship circuit; but the real outcome for Charlotte was a reinvigorated marriage. Judging by what I witnessed in the surgery that day, Charlotte’s vulnerability had turned to relief then, I hope, happiness.
Which brings me to the true point of my parrot story. Joe Franken’s record of loving animals is brilliant. His relationship with our female customers is unique. But his history with women outside the clinic is a mess. He genuinely believes love is a fundamental part of the universe, but what begins in a shower of stardust often collapses in six months or a year with a sad phut. Even though the end is rarely sordid, it’s always demoralising, and Joe retreats back into his work for months on end.
For as long as Joe and I have been friends, we’ve been anxious to find “The One”. Now that we’re both in our late thirties, this inclination has morphed into a desire to start families but, with the exception of myself, I’ve never known anyone so hopeless at making love last as Joe Franken. Neither of us is predatory by nature, nor are we misogynists. We’re just a couple of vets searching for the certainty of shared devotion.
2
It was about a fortnight after Joe saved Charlotte’s marriage that Sophia Luca walked into the surgery and took over our lives. If we’d seen the invisible supernova detonating around her, I think we’d both have hidden under our desks. Joe was recovering from a dating disaster and I’d been left out with the recycling, after six months with an emotional avatar.
“Women and men love in different ways. Correct?” Joe asked suddenly one evening after work. He’d had a hectic afternoon in a high-rise apartment with a young couple and a hyperventilating pug, and we were self-medicating in his surgery with a beer.
“When it comes to pugs? I’m not sure,” I said.
“Don’t be obtuse, Tim, I’m talking about human beings.”
“Well, I think you can safely say that Homo Sapiens have been struggling with that question for about seventy thousand years.”
“That’s not a response.”
“Okay, I’m listening. Get on with it.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’ve been working together for twelve years, Joe, I know when you’re about to download.”
He looked at me for a long beat, his eyes resembling a ring-tailed possum’s, magnified by heavy spectacles. “Remember that date I went on a few weeks ago?”
“No.”
“Yes you do, Olivia, the American neurologist visiting Sydney University. The one I met on Acadamic Singles.”
“Nope, sorry.”
“Well, we had a couple of drinks, well, several drinks really, and pretty much connected straight away.”
“You don’t drink.”
“That’s not the point. So I suggested dinner. All good. We were walking past Ariel’s Books in Darlinghurst and she said she wanted to buy an engagement card.”
“So sudden.”
“Hilarious. Anyway while we were looking I found a pamphlet by Wittgenstein.”
“The philosopher?”
“Correct. So I read her the title: Love Is Not a Feeling.”
“And?”
“Well, love isn’t a feeling is it? Love is something complex and profound born in the chemistry of cosmic attraction. Pain is a feeling. You can stop pain with a pill, but you can’t take a painkiller for love.”
“And you pointed this out buying an engagement card?”
“Yep, she told me Wittgenstein was ridiculous and it started an argument.”
“Love hurts, you know that.”
“Sure it hurts, but you can’t take painkillers.”
“Yes you can,” I said, pointing to a packet on his desk.
“What?”
“Paracetamol.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s new research. Paracetamol helps reduce the physical and neural responses to rejection.”
“Tim, love is a state of being.”
“Well, she’s a neurologist, she’d understand that.”
“Apparently not. We argued all the way to the restaurant until she said she was sick of the sound of my voice, and jumped into a cab. What sort of woman says that to a man on a first date?”
“Depends. What was the argument about?”
“I just asked if women need to know more about love from a man’s point of view.”
“What, all women?”