Читать книгу The Fine Colour of Rust - P. O’Reilly A. - Страница 12

My sister Patsy has only been in the house for five minutes and she is already enthusiastically embracing the joys of country life.

‘When are you going to leave this dump and come back to Melbourne?’ she says.

She’s parked her brand-new Peugeot on the street in front of the house, and I think nervously of Les, the farmer further down the road. On a hot day Les sometimes drives the tractor straight off the field and heads to the pub. His Kelpie sits beside him on the wheel hub, barking madly at cars overtaking them. Late at night, Les will steer the tractor back home down the road, singing and laughing and nattering to himself, the dog still barking. No one worries because the worst that can happen is him driving the tractor off the road somewhere and him and the dog sleeping in a field. But no one ever parks on this road at night.

‘So Patsy, let’s move that beautiful car of yours into the driveway and swap with mine. Wouldn’t want anyone to steal it!’

‘You’ve got no reason to stay here,’ Patsy goes on. ‘That bastard’s not coming back and the kids are young enough to move schools. Mum’s gone to the Gold Coast, so she won’t bother you. Come back to the real world.’

I have thought about going back to Melbourne. A part of me believes that being in Melbourne would magically make me more sophisticated and capable. My hair, cut by a hairdresser to the stars, would curve flatteringly around my face and my kids’ teeth would straighten out of their own accord.

‘Can’t take the kids away from the clean country air,’ I tell Patsy. When Tony and I first moved to the country for a better-paid driving job he’d been offered, we shifted from an outer western suburb, treeless, grey and smelling of diesel, the only place we could afford a flat. Everyone there was miserable and angry and even our neighbours tried to rip us off. For the same money as that poky flat we rented a three-bedroom house with a yard in Gunapan, only forty minutes’ drive from his work in Halstead, and still had enough money for dinner out once a week. Now I’m a single mother with two kids, I could never survive back in the city. I’ve developed a vision of a life where I, deserted mother scrag, can’t get a job in the city, don’t know anyone, spiral down the poverty gurgler until I become an over-the-counter pill junkie watching Judge Judy in my rented house in a suburb so far from the centre of Melbourne it has its own moon. I can’t feed the kids because I’ve spent all our money on an Abserciser off the telly and the chemist keeps asking me has my cold cleared up yet.

‘Loretta!’ Patsy shouts. ‘I said, are you a member of the golf club? George is getting into golf in a big way, so I thought we could play a round when she gets here. Apparently the local course isn’t too bad.’

‘No,’ I mutter, still feeling queasy from my Melbourne vision. ‘I think you can buy a day pass. It’s a bit yellow, though. They’re using recycled water on the greens.’

The next evening, when Norm drops in, George has arrived. She’s sitting on the couch with her arm around Patsy. I’ve wondered how Norm will react when he finally meets Patsy and George. I haven’t told him a lot about my sisters and their families.

‘Unbloodybelievable,’ Norm announces from the doorway, before he’s even put a foot in the room.

‘What’s that?’

He’s got something under his arm. Something green, with wheels.

Norm looks down as if he’s forgotten he was carrying anything. ‘Oh, a trike for Jake. Found it when I was rearranging the junk in the yard. It must have been hidden in that tractor rim for years. No, what’s unbloodybelievable,’ he puts the tricycle on the floor and waves a sheet of paper in my direction, ‘is this.’

‘You’d better meet my sister and her friend first.’

I introduce them all and Norm stuffs the paper in his pocket before shaking Patsy’s hand, then George’s. He looks George in the eye and says, ‘Welcome to Gunapan.’

‘Thanks,’ George says, wiping her hand on her jeans. ‘Into cars?’

‘Nah, love, I’m a recycler. Salvage and parts for all things man made,’ Norm says. He splays his hands in front of him. They’re spectacularly dirty today.

‘Norm, didn’t I buy you some soap?’

‘Don’t want to strip the natural oils from my sensitive skin,’ he says turning his hands over to examine the palms, which are equally filthy.