Читать книгу How to be a Good Veronica - Michael K Freundt - Страница 4

Erskineville feels like a suburb within a suburb; it's hard to find because if there was a sign to follow and then you checked to see where you were you would've passed it. Veronica’s motherlived in a little cul-de-sac, “The Crescent”, a circular piece of bitumen around a grassy patch that was a neighbourhood battle ground and therefore always unkempt. No. 3A was a small worker’s cottage, moderately renovated, one room wide and three rooms deep, with a garden bit out the back that was so dark from next door’s overgrown and invasive bamboo, even weeds couldn’t grow. As Veronica drove up onto the footpath and parked, leaving just enough room for a two seater to pass, three sets of curtains, 5B, 12A and 19B1 were parted by arthritic fingers. A woman stood on the little verandah of 3A with her arms folded and watched the parking manoeuvre with a wry smile on her face. She was about seventy, slight in stature which made her permed head of hair seem too large for her face, and she wore a plain wrap-around house-skirt that in anybody else’s wardrobe might be called a cut-off dressing gown. Despite this, and the hour of the day, she was heavily made up and wore very large jewellery; too large for her size Veronica always wanted to say. This was Rene, Veronica’s mother, but everyone called her Sally.

“Mr. Tilly, Crazy Nell and Itchy-Bum will all be round later to see what you’ve bought me,” said Sally nodding towards the three sets of now swaying curtains as Veronica passed though the little iron gate.

“Sorry, I didn’t bring you anything,” said Veronica.

“And they’ll want to know why,” she said suggesting an explanation had to be made up.

“Because you didn’t tell me what you needed,” seemed to Veronica her only option: she wasn’t going to play this game.

“Then they will be so disappointed. Come in, you know the way: nothing’s changed.” She turned and went inside. Veronica followed. The first room on the right, they were all on the right, was ‘the front’ room, then a bedroom, and then the rest of the house. This was really where Sally lived; kitchen, sitting room, library, and den all rolled into one, with a bathroom and loo out the back. It was cluttered but homely, dusty but warm and what free surfaces there were could not put up with too much close attention. Sally was a little lax with housework.

“So what have you been doing today?” asked Veronica as she sat in an overstuffed chair. She got the answer she expected.

“Waiting for you,” said Sally as she looked up at the tea cups in the cupboard above the sink.

“Would you like me to get those for you?” asked Veronica on cue.

“Would you darling? I can’t reach them as easily as I could.”

“Why don’t you put them somewhere where you can reach them?”

“But they’ve always lived up there. It’s where they belong. Besides I only use these when you’re here, so for so few outings, there they’ll stay.” Veronica should’ve seen that one coming. “I use the chipped ones and I keep them in the cutlery drawer: I don’t need much cutlery.”

Dear god! “But what would you have been doing if I wasn’t coming?” asked Veronica as she retrieved the cups and saucers.

Sally returned to her seat. “Waiting for you,” she said as she smoothed her skirt over her knees.

Veronica gave out an audible sigh.

“It’s true!” said Sally “The inordinate number of hours in a day is the biggest challenge of my life. I got such a thrill the other day when I went to the Lapsong Souchong tin, instead of the usual Earl Grey or the Russian Caravan. There was only one tea bag left! That meant I had to go down the shops again. That’s at least an hour and a half, and longer if I take smaller steps. I was ecstatic!”

“Oh, Sally, it can’t be that bad.”

“What are you saying? I’m talking here about a highlight of my day. You should be happy for me. I know I was. Do you have milk?”

“You know I don’t have milk.”

“Just checking. I’m always up for a surprise these days. And there is always the slim possibility that now you do take milk, and I’d be up for another trip to the shops. Just imagine!” Veronica noticed that Sally had sat down again and was, no doubt, waiting to be waited on.

“Shall I make tea?”

“Would you darling? Thank you.”

While Veronica prepared the tea Sally chatted away. “I found a twenty dollar bill in a Bryce Courtney book last month: did I tell you? Got such a thrill I went to the bank, took out some cash, and hid a total of $150 in a selection of books chosen at random. That’s a lot of money but think of the cornucopia of surprises.” She gazed longingly at the rows and rows of dusty books above her. “And now I can’t find any of it.”

“Do you need some cash?” asked Veronica as she carried two mismatched cups with mismatched saucers to the little coffee table and put them down on a pile of New Ideas dating from 1974.

“No, I need some surprises! Thank god you’re here and I’m hanging out for you to stay longer than usual: another surprise! This could be a real red-letter day. But don’t think I’m complacent. Tomorrow’s another day, some bright spark said once, and if this day gets too exciting tomorrow’s bound to be shit.” She looked at her daughter who was putting sugar in her cup of tea obviously not paying attention to her mother.

“You’ve already put sugar in your tea.”

“I take two.”

“Yes, I know. I was just trying to be polite.”

So to change the subject, “You said you had something to tell me.”

“Oh that.” Sally immediately became weary. She sat there with her eyes closed as if garnering the strength to go on. And then... “It’s always hard to tell you of an idea I’ve had because you’re so dismissive of my ideas, always have been.”

“M-u-m,” whined Veronica as a warning. She only called her that on occasions like this.

Sally took a deep breath and sighed her idea: “I’m going to take out a loan and turn the front room into a bed-sit so I can rent it out.”

“That’s a great idea,” said Veronica all smiles.

“A-n-d,” drawled a big-eyed Sally staring at her daughter.

“Oh,” and Veronica’s face fell.

“I need you to go guarantor on the loan.”

“Oh Mum! I don’t know whether I can do that.”

“Of course you can do that. You’re self-employed. You keep telling me how well you’re doing. You’re always so busy. Even I have to make an appointment to see you.”

“If you need more money I can help you out a bit every now and then.”

“It’s not the money, it’s the company.”

“But you’ve always lived alone.”

“Technically, yes, but there’s always been someone around.”

“You want a man to move into the front room?”

“Not necessarily. I was thinking more of a university student. The uni’s not far away. A young girl, perhaps, who would come and go and bring some life back into the house.”

And make you cups of tea and cook you meals at night. “University students are very busy people, studying and getting on with their own lives.”

“You’re enthusiasm for my idea is overwhelming,” she said flatly. “As usual.”

“OK. Will you let me think about it?” said Veronica depressingly aware of the disappointment she had sparked.

“Mah! I know what that means.”

“I promise I will think about it,” she said as seriously as she could. And then to change the subject, “So let’s look for that money.” She got up and immediately started taking books at random from the shelves.

“Not like that,” chastised Sally. “You need to do it methodically.” And she put her tea down and got up and joined in starting at the end of the bottom shelf. While she leafed through book after book Sally chatted away about someone she heard of who very successfully took in a university student and she stayed for four years! Veronica was only half listening: what was really on her mind was the slight unease she felt about explaining her job, to a loan manager - a stranger. It was easy putting “Psychologist” on an airport exit card but another thing entirely explaining to a loan manager. Would they happily agree to her guaranteeing a loan if they understood her work? She didn’t think so. There must be another way. Her disquiet at explaining her job led her to wonder if she really knew how to explain it. She had never explained it to anyone. Diane thought she knew what it was so didn’t ask. What did Jack know? What did Jack understand? How exactly would she explain it? Was her need for a man really a need to get out of her job? This question disturbed her. It was like making eye contact with herself in the mirror. Shit! What’s wrong with me? Was her lonely life really a protection from other people’s opinions? From their judgements? Their assumptions? Their prejudices? Was looking for a man similar to looking for misplaced money in a dusty library of books?

“Found one!” shouted Veronica as a $20 bill fluttered to the floor out of the pages of Jennifer Weiner’s In Her Shoes .

“Hurray!!” shouted Sally, overdoing it a bit.

At the little garden gate, as Veronica was leaving, Sally could not contain her curiosity. “Darling, I need to know what you really think about ... about my idea.”

Veronica looked her mother in the eye and said, “I’m not completely sure, yet, but I promise I will think about it. How much will it cost?”

"Twenty five thousand dollars,” said Sally with a look of concern on her face.

“Right.” It was a lot more than she could get her hands on. A loan was the only way. “Just let me think about it.” She was now thinking of her own fears. She would have to understand how she was going to explain her profession to a stranger, so she simply said, “I’ll call you.”

“Bye.”

Veronica kissed her mother on the cheek; she smelt of ponds cream and book dust.

“Bye.”

As she got into the car her mobile phone buzzed: it was a message from her five o’clock : Mr. Pyne wanted to reschedule. He was sorry for the late notice: world war three had broken out – Mr. Pyne was known for his exaggerations - but he had still made the payment and would contact her soon. She thought no more about it except for a brief reminder to call and cancel the babysitter when she got home.

What did concern her was the unresolved issue of her own attitude to her work. One could call it social work. She did, but when sex was involved was it social work still? Yes. Veronica stood firm: she had seen a need for strong psychology-based personal consultancy work and because such a profession didn’t exist she was confronted with the fact that the closest freelance occupation was the sex industry. Sex, and its use in her chosen profession, had occurred to her early in her mental planning and she was pragmatic enough to understand that sex played a very important part in the social and psychological makeup of the clients she hoped to attract. Being a graduate with a psychology degree made her also understand that it was usually ill-taught attitudes or bad role-models that caused sexual, psychological, and social dysfunction and that if her plans were to be fulfilled the issue of sex as a tool of her trade had to be addressed. And that’s exactly what she did: she addressed it and accepted it. The times in which she lived also made it possible: modern internet banking technology, freer sex industry laws and a growing sense among women of their own sense of their self-worth. Why then, now, was she influenced by Diane’s barbed comments? Was her chosen profession something she needed to plan to get out of? Was that what she really thought? It wasn’t conscionable when she set up her website, “The Red Site” and began operating (her marketing prowess wanted her to call it the ‘red light’ site but thought it compromised her serious intent). Had her practice morphed into something else? Had it changed without her knowing it? Was she truly on top of her game? Was her fear of explaining her work the reason why she was alone? Was it Jack’s forthcoming tenth birthday that had triggered all this? None of these questions were answered as she parked outside her little house. Jack was home but, as she would see, he wasn’t alone.