Back Down The Stairs

Sometimes, locals call Melbourne's downtown area The CBD - The Central Business District. I think this is when they wish to elite the feel of an afternoon they have to spend there.

"I've got an interview at my lawyer's office in The CBD."

"I'm gonna meet up with her in The CBD and I'll break up with her then."

"I gotta drive to The CBD to get a sandwich."

Something like that...

Mainly though, most everyone in that Southern city of trend, comfort, effort and caffeine calls it The City.

The City is laid out across a perfect, square grid of streets, laneways and tram-tracks. There was a time when most of that grid was a dangerous place to walk at night. There were a few open and well-lit boulevards with generously wide, slate-coloured sidewalks and they were a safer bet. As were the dim rooms behind doors cut out of the side of buildings which were filled with booze, pasta and heroin dealers. They felt particularly safe. But other than those few beacons, everything else was grey and foreboding.

This is how I remember it - recalling The City now and how it seemed to me then. It may not have been like that. It is however important to this story that you know it was like that. Before. That it was Dangerous and Criminal. And not in an exciting way. You should know, that at night The City was once a quiet and sinister grid made up of a heavy darkness and stillness that would only be broken on occasion by the screams of a desperate escape and the shining reflection of a street-light off a switchblade.

A Light On The Bridge

The first message came through as I was searching for new pictures of an old girlfriend. Facebook was new to me. New to most people at that time. Now it is something else. Back then - in its early days - for me it was a way to play with fantasies.  A thought or a feeling or a memory would rise into me as I lay back on the couch or whilst dipping a rice cracker into a tub of hummus and I'd bend open the laptop and search for an old name or face to add to my Friends List. Or send some vaguely provocative message to someone already on it.

Fantasy is so easily spoiled by action and I spoiled a lot of fantasies by rambling around Facebook with the taste of pureed chickpeas in my mouth.

This particular 'First Message' was from someone not on my Friends List. I didn't recognise her either. It was a girl and she was certainly a stranger to me.

"Hi. I'm ----. How's your Friday?"

That is what the message said.