Page 81 of Thursdays at Orange Blossom House
‘I don’t see why you’re so upset,’ he says grumpily.
‘Because Mum was missing, Dad. And I had to leave work.’
‘She wasn’t missing. She just wasn’t here.’
‘Or in the street. Because you looked. You told me.’
‘No,’ he concedes.
‘So where was she?’
‘I don’t know. She just … came back.’
‘After how long?’
He glances at her, then to one side, then the other. He’s probably preparing to lie to her, which means her mother could have been gone for hours.
‘Hard to say,’ he mumbles.
‘Where were you?’
‘I’m not her jailer!’ he replies, his voice raised.
Patricia has a moment of feeling like a naughty child – except it was never her father who disciplined her. That was her mother’s job, because her father was so often at sea.
‘Yes, you are, Dad. We both are.’ She sighs. ‘We talked about this when I moved back in. How I have to work so we can afford to stay here, which means you have to be the one to keep an eye on Mum when I’m not here. You said you would. You said— ’
The catch in her throat takes her by surprise. She doesn’t know if she’s upset that her mother was roaming the streets, not in her right mind or any mind at all; or if she was more scared than she realised when she got that call, and now it’s catching up to her. Or perhaps she’s angry that this is her life now, that these are her responsibilities, and she can’t even go to work without something going wrong.
The other day it was her mother burning her hand on the kettle when she checked to see if it had boiled. A few days before that she left the hose running for hours. Each time, her father wasn’t paying attention. Not because his own mind is faltering, but because, as he told Patricia, he’s still not used to his wife not being there. She was always the sharp one. The one who remembered all the names and birthdays and phone numbers. She could recite the names of all the prime ministers from Barton to Fraser.
That’s when her memory started to become fuzzy – while Fraser was still in The Lodge. She thinks Bob Hawke was the compere onBandstand, and Paul Keating is a used-car salesman whose ads run every night at 6 pm, when the news is on. ‘Don’t buy a Falcon,’ she’s taken to murmuring when she sees him, which Patricia tries not to take personally given that’s the make of her car.
‘Dad,’ Patricia says, leaning on her elbows, dropping her head into her hands. It feels so heavy, like her brain is full and it’s dragging her towards the earth.
‘Yes?’ he says in a more conciliatory tone.
‘We have to think about a home.’ She lifts her head and her neck pings.
Great. Yoga is two days away and she won’t be able to stretch it out properly until then.
‘No, we don’t.’
‘Well, you don’t want to be her jailer, and I can’t be here all the time. But if she wanders off again she might end up in the ocean, or hit by a car.’ She throws up her hands. ‘Or walking to Timbuk-bloody-tu.’
‘I’ll be more careful,’ he says, and she sees something in his eyes she’s never seen before: fear.
She doesn’t know if it’s fear that he’ll be alone most of the day if her mother moves into a home, or that his marriage will be effectively over because his wife won’t live here any more. Or maybe that the home might be his destiny too, one day.
Patricia hopes not. He’s in solid shape, and his brain works fine. He has niggles and pains and other problems, but that’s it … for now. There’s no reason for him to need constant care. No more than Patricia herself needs it. No more than everyone needs it. Someone to love and cherish them. To care for and comfort them all the days of their life. In sickness and in health. They’re vows of marriage, but more than that: they’re vows of love. They apply to everyone we love.
Patricia doesn’t like her mother, but she loves her. So she will love and cherish her, care for and comfort her in sickness, as it’s turned out, even if that care might take the form of finding someone else to tend to her on a daily basis. Because they can’t properly care for her here. The mother she knew – her father’s wife – is gone. It’s tragic, and it’s mundane. They’re not special. They’re just the latest family to have to make a tough decision in the name of love.
‘Dad,’ she says calmly, ‘we’ve tried. We’ve both tried. But she’s worse. She’s a lot worse. We just don’t see it because we see her every day. But she’s barely speaking now. We haven’t noticed because we talk all the time, or the TV’s on. Her eyes are …’
She hears him sniff loudly and looks at him. Her father – the mostly silent, strapping man she grew up with – has his head in his hand, hiding the side of his face from her.
‘She’s not there any more,’ he says gruffly. ‘I know.’
