by Sasha Wasley
‘Pris’s birthday?’ I pointed to something suitable. ‘How about this one with cupcakes on it? Pris loves cakes and scones and things.’
‘Yes.’ Mrs Brooker didn’t seem to be taking in my words.
I tucked an envelope around the card for her.
We returned to the counter and she caught sight of the ball poster. ‘Oh, look! That’s you, love!’
‘Yeah.’ I didn’t look at Mum.
Mrs Brooker gazed at it. ‘Don’t you look pretty? You and Richard must be proud, Penny. How I longed for a daughter when I was young – although I was just happy to have a child by the time Angus came along.’ She tapped the date on the poster. ‘I hope Angus goes to the ball. I think he wants to. Didn’t he say he wanted to, the other night?’ She appealed to me.
‘Yes, but I don’t think he wants to leave you all by yourself for the night.’
‘Nonsense. I don’t mind. I’m quite used to my own company. I’ll tell him he’s going, no bones about it.’ She passed my mother a five-dollar note.
‘Oh, Lottie – hang on a moment,’ Mum called as Mrs Brooker left the shop ahead of me. I stepped back inside and she beckoned me to the counter. ‘Tell Angus, if he wants to go out for an evening – to have a night off – Caroline is very welcome at our place.’
I looked at her eyes, the same hazel as mine, and nodded. ‘Um, do you know how to get something really burned and sticky off a pot?’
The lines in her forehead deepened. ‘Have you damaged one of Mrs Brooker’s pots?’
‘No! I’m trying to clean something. I didn’t do it.’
I wasn’t sure she believed me. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Elbow grease, I suppose. Have you soaked it? I’m no domestic goddess – try googling it.’
‘No phone,’ I reminded her.
‘Oh.’ My mother seemed shocked, as if she’d thought that was just a cover story – that I had been concealing a spare phone all along and just pretending to go without.
‘Bye.’ I hurried after Mrs Brooker.
She was waiting outside, her eyes on a little boy pulling his pregnant mother by the hand. It wasn’t until we were in the car, rolling along the road out of town to Brooker’s Farm, that she spoke again.
‘I don’t see your mother as often as I used to, these days.’
‘Oh, really?’
‘No. We used to spend a lot of time together. You and Angus were good friends before you went off to kindy. I can’t count the number of times you played together at the park.’
I tried to picture Angus and me at the park, our mothers chatting on a bench.
‘She’s very good at seeing through people’s façades, is Penny,’ Mrs Brooker went on. ‘Good at seeing how they want to present themselves and how they really are, underneath all that. Empathy, I think they call it.’
This wasn’t the definition of empathy I knew. And my mother didn’t strike me as especially empathetic. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘Well, she has an understanding of what people need, not just what they want. My mother was the same. She knew what people needed, rather than concerning herself with what they said they wanted.’ Mrs Brooker watched the trees flash by. ‘My mum was very good at buying gifts for people, for instance. She could pick out wonderful presents – the perfect thing – for anyone.’ She turned towards me slightly. ‘When I turned sixteen, all I cared about was music. My favourites were the Easy Beats and Johnny O’Keefe. I asked for a radio for my birthday but my mother, she knew me. She knew how I waited for the music program every night and sat by Dad’s radio with my eyes squeezed shut, praying that they would play my favourite songs. Easy Beats, I would whisper, please, please, please Easy Beats! All I wanted for my birthday was that radio. On my birthday, I got home from my typing course in Wallabah, tossed my shoes into my bedroom and was about to go to the kitchen for a cup of tea when I heard Neil Sedaka singing ‘Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen’. I swung around and saw it – my very own record player! And a little stack of albums, all my favourites.’
‘That’s so lovely.’
I tried to relate this example of empathy to my mother. When I was sixteen, she gave me some playbooks: Crimes of the Heart, Hedda Gabler and The Vagina Monologues. I never read them, although I played Hedda in a production years later.
‘No more praying at the radio!’ Mrs Brooker said. ‘How I loved that record player. I played it every moment I had to myself. My younger sister used it while I was out one day and she scratched my Johnny O’Keefe album. I cried buckets over that. My father got quite cross with me for carrying on.’
‘Sisters, huh? Elizabeth left the lid off my favourite OPI nail varnish once and it went gloopy. I was so mad at her.’
‘Do you get along with her in general?’ Mrs Brooker asked.
‘We get along these days. We’re very different, though.’
‘How so?’
‘Well, Lizzy is a nurse – practical, down to earth.’ Mrs Brooker waited. ‘And I’m me.’
‘You’re quite practical and down to earth,’ she said.
That felt good. ‘You think?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘I think most people would consider Lizzy the down to earth one. She’s very real, always has been. She doesn’t care what people think of her. She’s more interested in doing than being – know what I mean? She doesn’t live by the rules about how women should present themselves or act.’
‘That’s unusual,’ Mrs Brooker said.
‘Yeah. It’s a bit of a gift. It makes her Mum’s favourite, too.’
‘Favourite!’
‘Yeah, we don’t exactly get equal treatment.’ She looked doubtful so I hunted for an example. ‘Growing up, our rooms were always a mess, right? Mine was a mess of clothes and magazines, face mask packets and makeup. Elizabeth’s room was a mess of books and pressed flowers, roller blades and this collection of weird stuff she’d found, like a burned beehive or a sea fossil. But guess who got snarked at the most? It wasn’t the mess – it was what I had lying around that Mum hated.’
Mrs Brooker was unconvinced. ‘I very much doubt that your mother has a favourite,’ she said. ‘She might understand Elizabeth more than she understands you, or feel more comfortable with her, but I’m sure she loves you just as much.’
Mothers had to say that. It was in the code.
Angus knew I was due at Jo and Toby’s place, so he got back to the house around four in the afternoon and went for a shower. I helped Mrs Brooker peel some potatoes, then headed out the front door. Angus was seated on the verandah with a beer.
‘How was your day?’ I asked him, slipping on some shoes.
‘Got plenty done. I’ve hired a picking crew to start tomorrow. Nectarines are a couple of weeks off but the first plums are ready.’
‘That’s good.’ I took a breath. ‘I saw my mother today. She said she’ll keep an eye on your mum any time you need. So, if you want to go to the ball, you know, you can. She’ll help.’
He nodded thoughtfully.
I fidgeted with my bag. ‘Want me to confirm it with Mum?’
‘No, it’s okay,’ he said.
So he’d changed his mind – after our kiss, no doubt. He’d remembered his policy. Fine, whatever.
I dug in my pocket and passed Angus my two hundred dollars. ‘Better late than never. Board for the past five weeks.’
He looked at the notes in his hand. ‘No, thanks.’ He attempted to hand them back but I wouldn’t accept.
‘Please let me pay so I don’t feel like a freeloader,’ I said. ‘You’ve done heaps of work. You’re not a freeloader. You’ve helped with jobs around the house and farm, and you sorted out the spare room for Mum—’
‘She did that.’
‘Bullshit. She wouldn’t have been able to do it without you. And you’ve taken care of her. You’ve allowed me to get on with harvest. I should be paying you.’
He attempted to pass it back again but I still refused to take it, so he caught my wrist in his strong hand.
I watched helplessly as he manoeuvred the four fifties into my hand and closed my fingers over them.
‘You’re not paying,’ he said. ‘Mum and I have needed you, and you’ve been here for us. Thank you.’
I pocketed the money but I knew he kept his wallet on the hall shelf. I could put it in there later when he wasn’t looking.
‘I’d better go. Catch you later.’
‘Have fun,’ he said, spinning the beer bottle inside the stubby holder. ‘I’ll shut the gate for you.’
Jo and Toby lived in a fibro home that had been painted aquamarine some time in the seventies.
‘We’ll renovate one day,’ Jo said, leading me inside. ‘The farm’s finances are still recovering from peach spot. I’d love to knock the whole thing down and build a new brick and tile,’ she confided. ‘But Toby’s attached to this place, so we’ll probably end up keeping at least some of it. Look who’s here – Aunty Lottie!’ Jo said to Amelie. The baby was sitting in a puddle of toys on the lounge-room floor.
‘Are Toby’s mum and dad still around?’
‘Nah,’ she said. ‘His mum died years ago and his poor old dad’s in a home. Incontinence,’ she whispered. ‘And his bones are like porcelain. He wouldn’t stop bloody farming and kept taking falls. He’d recover from one broken bone and go straight outside and break another one in an orchard somewhere. We didn’t find him till eight o’clock at night, once! It was sad but we had to call it – we couldn’t see any other way to stop him. Toby goes and sits with him almost every day, but. Except during harvest, of course.’
‘Toby’s out in the orchards now, I suppose?’
‘Yeah, we’ve got a crew in.’ Jo glanced at the kitchen. ‘Hang ten, I’ll just go and stir our dinner. Sausage casserole.’ She grinned.
‘Well, it is a classic,’ I called after her and she hooted with laughter.
Amelie watched me solemnly for a few moments. I smiled at her and she wobbled where she sat, then banged on a toy telephone between her starfished legs. With each bang, it said Brrrrr-ing! and Hello? Who is it? and Okay, bye-bye now! in an American accent. Jo returned with two generous glasses of wine.
‘Thanks so much for letting Mrs B rope you into this, by the way,’ she said, passing me one. ‘It might sound crazy, but it’s been stressing me out, bigtime. My cousin’s seven months preggers with a girl and I promised her all Amelie’s newborn gear, but every time I go in and start trying to pack it up for her, I can’t do it. I end up with a box with three crusty burp-rags and a onesie that never fit right. I want her to have the stuff, I honestly do! I don’t want to look like a tight-arse, but I just can’t seem to part with anything.’
Jo looked embarrassed, only meeting my eyes for a moment. She sipped her drink.
‘I totally get it,’ I assured her, perching on the edge of the couch. ‘You adore Amelie and it must have been a treasured time in your life. It’s hard to let that go.’
‘Actually …’ Jo stared at the baby. ‘Actually, it was a hell of a time if I’m honest. I was so tired. So ball-breakingly tired and the breastfeeding was hard and Ammers would scream all evening and I’d just sit on that couch and cry during midnight feeds. The house was a pigsty. My mum was so far away and I needed her close, but it was seeding time and I couldn’t ask her to leave the farm. She was needed. Well, I thought so anyway. Later, when I admitted how much I struggled, she said she would have dropped everything and come if she’d known.’
Tears were coming to my eyes. ‘You poor thing. It must have been so hard – and lonely.’
She sat next to Amelie, nodding. ‘And Tobes didn’t really get it. He’s crazy about Amelie – loves her to bits. He’d sit with her for hours, carry her around when she cried, but – I don’t know. There’s a difference. He’s a good dad, helpful and everything, but he was only ever helping. Not doing. There’s only one doer when it comes to newborns and that’s the mum. The buck stops with you. It’s like they’re still part of your body somehow. It takes a couple of months for that to wear off.’
‘Did you have post-natal depression?’ I ventured.
‘Maybe. I’m starting to think PND’s the norm rather than the exception, if the girls in my mums’ group are anything to go by. Looking after a little baby does your head in. You’re always tired, even when you get a reasonable night’s sleep.’ Jo met my eyes. ‘I feel guilty. I should have treasured that time more. I didn’t realise how fast it would go. It feels like years ago now.’
‘Maybe that’s the reason you struggle to let go of her newborn stuff?’ I said. ‘It could be a way of retrospectively treasuring the newborn stage.’
Jo stared. ‘Holy shit. You might be right. Damn, Lott. You are good at this.’
I laughed. ‘I’m not, really. Mrs Brooker made me realise I’d been doing it all wrong. She really knows how to hold something in her hands and decide if it brings her joy or not. I never did anything like that. I just pretended to declutter my apartment on Instagram and people started following me and asking for advice, and I acted as if I knew Marie Kondo’s method back to front.’
‘Mrs B said you’re doing a declutter of your own.’ Jo moved Amelie’s toy phone and it went off again. Hello? Who is it?
‘Word’s getting around,’ I said wryly. ‘I’m trying to get rid of some parts of me I don’t like. Stuff that’s got me in trouble.’
‘Like what?’
I repressed a sigh. ‘Looks, acting, phone, stuff,’ I rattled off.
Her forehead creased. ‘But you’re checking if each thing brings you joy first, right?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Like, acting for example. Angus and Toby reckon you were good.’ She watched me expectantly. ‘Does acting bring you joy?’
I opened my mouth and closed it. A flashback to high school: playing Scarlett O’Hara at seventeen – the way the words rolled out of my mouth and how, when I looked across the stage at the lanky gay sixteen-year-old boy playing Rhett, I felt Scarlett’s whirl of love and anger. The way I got lost in another being’s needs and desires when I was acting, and coming off stage felt like coming down from being high.
‘I mean,’ Jo was saying, ‘I’d hate to see you throwing stuff away if it’s stuff that really brings you joy. I can see why you’d want to get rid of some of those things. Or at least make sure you’re in charge of them rather than the other way around. Like social media n’shit. But if there’s something on the list that does bring you joy – proper joy, not just a few seconds of feeling liked or whatever – you should probably hang onto it.’
I watched her in silence. Jo drank another mouthful of wine.
‘I had to get rid of all of it,’ I heard myself say. ‘It came as a package. I only cared about getting famous and I would have done pretty much anything for a like, follow or a role. For invitations and freebies and recognition.’
‘That’s a thing,’ she said. ‘Influencers. But it’s a valid job these days. Weird, but valid.’
I shook my head. ‘But it doesn’t end. You’re always chasing, never satisfied. Running a race you can never win because there’s always someone bigger, more sought-after, more followed, more popular.’
Jo gave me a bemused smile. ‘Maybe that’s why drugs are such a problem in the celebrity world. Because people are forever chasing something and the high’s the only way to relax.’
‘I always thought so,’ I said. ‘There’s no summit. You get to the top and you see another mountain to climb. That’s what makes people messy – that’s what got me into a mess. That’s why I had to draw a line – no more faking.’
‘Yeah, but is acting the same as faking?’ she persisted. ‘You don’t reckon there’s a way to pull it out of everything else? Make it about acting, performing, and not about, like, getting famous? Can you be real, but still be an actor?’
‘I’ve forgotten how.’ I really didn’t want to talk about this any more.
She tipped her head. ‘You’ve forgotten?’
‘I forgot
where the line was between the real me and the fake me. It’s just how the industry works.’
‘You’re telling me there’s no one in the acting industry who’s their real self, ever?’
‘I doubt it.’ But I knew there were some. ‘They’re in the minority. And they don’t get respect. There’s this girl, Cordelia Grocock. Heard of her?’
Jo shook her head, mouth twisting in amusement. ‘Grocock?’
‘I know, right? Jordan, Tamsin and I used to despise her. I mean, who in the industry is called Grocock and doesn’t take a stage name? She was always so honest on social media, it made us want to barf. Like, she’d post a close up of a pimple and say something like, “Just my luck on the morning of an audition.” Who does that? Then later, she’d post a pile of used tissues and say, “Didn’t get the part. I blame the zit.” It was so cringe. Once, she posted a photo of all these receipts and said, “Finally sorted out all my tax claims. Now onto the income declaration – this should take about four seconds.” Hashtag starving actress. Jordan and I almost died. She just laid it all out. How did she ever think she was going to get a part, behaving like that? She was so openly desperate.’
Jo was grinning. ‘She sounds funny. Did she have many followers?’
I nodded. Tamsin and I used to bitch about Cordelia’s growing number of followers, saying it was only because people couldn’t look away from a car crash. I glanced at Jo’s face and it occurred to me that maybe it was Cordelia Grocock who’d had it right all along. She probably had followers because she was real in an industry where fake was the tired old standard. Christ, it was Jordan and Tamsin and me who looked desperate – with our fake-perfect lives.
Jo seemed to sense my abrupt dip in mood and scooped Amelie up. ‘Come on, madam. Time to show Aunty Lottie your room. Let’s get this done so we can sit and relax after dinner.’
Jo gave me the baby and led the way, grabbing a couple of boxes out of a spare bedroom off the hall.
The baby’s room was painted soft yellow with a kookaburra frieze around the walls. There was a timber cot in one corner and an old white wardrobe in another, as well as a bookshelf full of board books and a change table stacked with baby wipes and unused nappies.
