by Wendy James
Angus murmurs his assent, wonders how long he will have to sit here, wishes he had taken up the offer of a beer, a whisky, even.
‘You might think I’m overreacting – you’ve only been seeing her for a few months, haven’t you? And I do know that these youthful … entanglements … aren’t likely to be serious. No doubt you’ll be hopping in and out of bed with dozens of girls, all sorts of girls, before you find someone suitable.’ She gives a tight smile. ‘But the thing is, Angus dear, you need to be very careful. A girl like this, from a background like that …’ She takes a breath.
‘The thing is, Angus, I believe that this particular girl is likely to be very ambitious. She’s pulled herself up this far, from such a very … difficult background, to a place in a premier girls’ school – and yes, that’s a remarkable achievement certainly – but I have to say that I think your getting involved with such a girl could be very dangerous. I’ve seen it before – quite a few times over the years, actually. Boys like you, with expectations, responsibilities, position, who get caught by these very clever girls – mushrooms, my old granny would have called them – and it’s always, always, always an unmitigated disaster.’
His mother frowns at him, expectant, but Angus only shifts uneasily in his chair, gives a nervous smile, says nothing. She sighs. ‘Do you remember Bruce Davies, dear? He was an old friend of your father’s, boarded at New England when he was a boy; they had a big property out near Moree, Swan Hill. No? Well, he married a local girl, a Moree girl – Susie someone or other. She came from a terrible background – a big Roman Catholic family. The father was a drunk, deserted the family and shacked up with some gin; the mother had to work as a barmaid, or took in laundry, or something equally dreadful, to support them all. But this Susie was exceptionally bright, and quite beautiful to look at, naturally. She went off to teachers’ college in Sydney, and then came back to town to teach.
‘Anyway, she and Bruce got married, much to the dismay of his parents: there was some friend of the family he’d been keen on for years; they’d expected him to marry her. They were married and almost immediately it all turned to disaster. Bruce did the right thing, gave one of her brothers a job – overseeing the shearing or something like that – and evidently he did something appalling – stole from them, I gather. Terrible business.
‘And then the woman herself, Susie, couldn’t cope living so far from town; she wanted to keep her job, hadn’t realised how isolated they would be, what life on a property was like – the hard physical work, lack of company. Of course when children came along, things got worse. She became an alcoholic, a depressive, and …’ His mother takes a breath, as if steeling herself. ‘Well, she ended up killing herself and the two children. Drove the ute into their dam one weekend when Bruce was away. Bruce was never the same after that, poor fellow. He went bankrupt eventually, lost the property. He had a stroke a few years ago, not long after your father passed on. He was only fifty-five.’
She pauses a moment in deference to both unseasonably deceased men. ‘I worry about these things, darling. I know you just think I’m terribly old-fashioned, but you have to credit me with some knowledge – some perspective on the way the world works.
‘I know we’re meant to think that we’re all equal these days, that a person from the gutter is just as good – or can be just as good – as a prince.’ She gives a sad smile, ‘But you should never believe it, Angus. I know your Jodie seems like an entirely estimable girl, and I’m sure she’ll go on to have a successful life, a career, a decent husband, children.
‘But she’s not for you, Angus. And if you’re – I’m not sure how to put this – if you’re conducting an affair with her, you’re just not playing on a … a level field. She’ll be expecting something more from you. Girls like that always are. It won’t be light, it won’t be a fling for her, dear. She’s not like Susy Baldwin, or Annabelle Briggs, or the McDonald twins, or any of the other girls you know. She doesn’t have security, options of her own. You need to get rid of her, dear, before she hooks her claws in. Before she gets you where she wants you.’
But her cautionary tale seems irrelevant and excessive, her analogy unjust. He can see no drawbacks to continuing his relationship with Jodie, can see no drawbacks in pursuing a relationship with any girl, if it comes to that. Angus is still just a boy, after all, despite what his mother says. He’s bright enough, he’s not bad looking, he comes from a good family (and in Arding good means old, established, with connections, as well as money), he’s a decent bowler, has a powerful backhand, swims for the school. He’s not quite school captain material – has never excelled at rugby or public speaking, which are non-negotiable qualities in a leader – but he’s a prefect, trusted by teachers, popular enough with his peers. He’s a kind boy, responsible, reliable – the type who helps old ladies across the road, chats to parents politely, pitches in to clean up after parties. He helps his older brother with work on their property in the holidays – doesn’t even mind shearing – though he’s not keen to make a career of farming. Which is lucky, as he won’t be – that’s his brother’s blessing and burden. In the way of second sons, he’s been promised to the law already – and the law will suit him down to the ground. He’s cautious, unimaginative, methodical. He’s easy-going, even tempered. He really never does anything other than what’s expected of him, never plays outside the rules, has never caused his mother a moment’s grief.
Until Jodie.
Angus had known Jodie – or known of her – for years. She’d been there in the background, at parties, at school dos – known, but not really known, in the way that these things work between boys’ and girls’ schools. But they’d got together at a bachelors and spinsters, in what he’d thought was a completely spontaneous alcohol-fuelled mutual attraction. Someone (who, Angus can’t quite remember, though it may have been one of the McDonald twins) had told him later that Jodie had had the hots for him for yonks, had been working up courage to seek him out, angling for invites to anything he was likely to attend.
He’d taken her to see a film, and they’d ended up together again at some other party – just snogging, nothing serious; they weren’t officially an item. But then he had, with no one better in mind, decided to ask her to be his Formal partner. She hadn’t said yes immediately, had appeared to consider the question very seriously before giving a strangely grave assent. ‘Thank you,’ she’d said. ‘Thank you, Angus. I’d really like that.’ She’d always wanted to go to a New England School formal, she’d confessed. She’d heard that the music was usually fantastic, and the food was always excellent. And this might be her only opportunity. She had smiled slowly, shyly, then, her enthusiasm obviously genuine, if muted. He had expected either the cool, casual consent or over-ebullient enthusiasm typical of most of the girls he knew, so Angus had been surprised, and oddly touched.
It was Jodie’s gravity, this quality of restraint that attracted him initially, and that continues (a circumstance that surprises even Angus) to attract him – almost against his better judgement. Her unselfconscious solemnity made her very different to most of the Grammar girls: the jolly hockey-sticks and horse-mad types favoured by his mother – her peers’ daughters, the girls he had known all his life. They were nice enough, fun with a capital F, bright, cheerful, enthusiastic, endlessly confident, utterly focused, all knowing what they wanted, where they were going – but all a bit samey to his way of thinking, interchangeable, with their regulation perms, their regulation clothes, regulation smiles, their regulation attitudes and aspirations. But Jodie – Jodie was different. She was beautiful to look at – slender, blonde, her features refined, regular – and there was no doubt that this had a good deal to do with his initial interest. But there was nothing else that was regular about her. Not her clothes, nor her manner, her bearing, even her accent – nothing was quite regulation, nothing was quite as expected. Though she appeared to have plenty of friends, and was obviously well respected in the school community – like him
she was a prefect – somehow she wasn’t entirely in her own milieu, wasn’t quite comfortable. She was watchful, circumspect, always sparing in her conversation, cautious in her convictions.
He knew that she came from a difficult background, but when they were together, she wasn’t at all interested in talking about this, about her life. ‘So what do you talk about?’ one of his mates had asked him impatiently, obviously put out by Angus deserting him for this girl. ‘What the hell do you do with her all day, Gus, if you’re not porking her?’
He couldn’t answer. What did they say, what did they do? They had, the past few weekends, taken a picnic and driven out to the Wash Pool, a waterhole in one of the nearby national parks, found a shady spot under a tree, close to the water, and had spread out a blanket and simply lain there most of the day. He wasn’t porking her, no, but they were close to it and getting closer (though this was not something he was going to discuss with his mate). They had spent hours in a state of constant arousal: touching, sucking, rubbing, moving inexorably towards that moment, yet never quite arriving. They would drink a bottle or two of beer – Angus always drinking the lion’s share – eat chips, chocolate, fruit. They would talk abstractedly about this and about that, though he could never recall later what it was they discussed. He talked about his plans, he supposed, and Jodie hers, though he couldn’t if pressed have related what hers were: Sydney, he thought. Uni? Nursing, maybe. Or was it teaching? But he enjoyed Jodie’s company far more than he would admit to his coarse-minded friend, avid only for titillating details of sexual conquest – her seriousness, her lack of pretension, the odd dignity of her uncertainty, her indefiniteness. But most of all he enjoyed her unquestioning admiration of him, of Angus. An hour or two spent in her presence and Angus felt himself taller, better looking, more intelligent, more in control. Jodie made Angus feel good about himself; she made him feel like a man.
8
Though she’s never forgotten her mother-in-law’s early attempts to get her out of Angus’s life, and her patent disappointment when they actually married (there’s not a single wedding photo where Mrs Garrow senior – Helen now that Jodie is ‘family’ – is smiling), over the years Jodie has managed to get along well enough with her. Both women are united in their approach to Jodie’s chief preoccupation: increasing Angus’s health, happiness and success, and that of their children. The two women have built up a relationship that, if not exactly friendly, is one of mutual respect, with each recognising in the other certain similarities of character and temperament. Angus’s mother respects Jodie’s loyalty, her devotion (only what’s due) to her son and her grandchildren (whose upbringing she can only fault in small ways – details rather than the bigger picture). Jodie is well aware that in exchange for her efforts in rearing and nurturing this next generation of Garrows, Helen is willing to overlook, even forgive, Jodie’s background – which, admittedly, Jodie has done her best to escape. Jodie has ensured that her own family have made no shameful incursions into the respectable world of the Garrows – her mother is kept at arm’s length, so there are no painful meetings between the two grandmothers, and her brothers, who don’t get out of Milton much, are easy enough to avoid altogether.
Happily, both of the children fit neatly into the Garrow matrix: Tom is really just a miniature version of his father – bright and respectful, easy-going – and is clearly his grandmother’s favourite. Hannah is rather a different matter – she is perhaps a little too bright, displays signs of adolescent restlessness, is prone to taking unnecessary risks – revealing a worrying resemblance to Angus’s Aunt Ruby, a (reputedly) lesbian potter who lives in the nearby mountains, the Garrows’ own blackish sheep. And Helen is critical of her granddaughter’s current physical lushness, her plumpness – something she feels Jodie needs to take more seriously. She tries herself with pointed comments about diet and exercise, about the curse of excess fleshiness, all of which Hannah, being the type of girl she is, pretends to ignore.
Her mother-in-law knows, of course, about Angus’s past infidelities (is there anyone in town who doesn’t?) and though there has been no conversation between the two women about the matter, and confidences would have been awkward, Jodie is aware that Helen respects, even admires her stoicism, her ability to walk with her head held high, to stand by her man. Perhaps Angus’s tendency to stray was inherited; Jodie knows from family gossip that her marital experience is almost identical to Helen’s own. In any case there is a tacit understanding, perhaps shared by many other women of their particular class and situation, that this is a reasonable price to pay for security and position – and, perhaps, affection.
Angus rings his mother, at Jodie’s request, the day after their conversation with Peter. Jodie makes an ineffectual attempt to reorganise the pantry while he makes the call from his study, can hear the quiet murmur of his explanation, a short silence and then the unmistakable sound of the phone disengaging. She gives up on stacking the Tupper-ware neatly and rushes up the hall and into the office where Angus is sitting at his desk, an odd expression on his face.
‘Well? What did she say?’ Jodie is slightly shocked by her own intense anxiety, would not have expected she’d be quite so afraid of her mother-in-law’s disapproval.
‘She was fine.’ Angus gives a deep sigh, shakes his head as if to clear it. Jodie notices that his shirt is untucked, the centre button come undone, his pale stomach peeking through. She has to work hard to resist the impulse to move toward him, tidy him up. ‘She said that you’d been put in an impossible situation, that she’s behind you, behind us, one hundred per cent and that she’ll be making her position clear to anyone who cares – or who dares! – to ask.’
‘Oh God.’ Jodie sits down heavily on the other chair, looks at her husband wonderingly. ‘You’re kidding, aren’t you? I thought she’d be appalled, that she’d —’
‘I know.’ Angus rubs his eyes, grimaces. ‘I did too. She didn’t seem at all surprised though, that’s the odd thing. But she couldn’t know anything about it, could she? You’ve never told her anything, have you?’
Jodie gives a hard, short laugh, doesn’t bother to reply.
‘She said she’d call in sometime today or tomorrow to talk to you. To help work out a … a survival strategy, she called it.’
Despite the notice, Jodie is caught off guard when her mother-in-law arrives late that afternoon. As usual, she tramps up the side of the house to the back entrance, the soft crunching of gravel and the dog’s excited yelps, signalling her arrival. This is a habit that never fails to irritate her daughter-in-law – the surprise element of Helen’s appearance putting her somehow on the defensive, leaving her no time to prepare. Jodie is in the kitchen, simultaneously peeling the potatoes for dinner and helping Tom with his maths homework. Helen stands for a few moments outside the screen door, coolly surveying the scene, before walking in.
‘My goodness, Thomas – look at all that homework. They push you children so hard these days. I don’t think I ever saw your father do his homework. Then again, I suppose he was boarding at this age.’ She plants a kiss on the top of her grandson’s head, then turns to Jodie. ‘I wonder if Tom could take a little break, watch some TV, play something on the computer, just while I talk to you, dear?’
Tom looks up at his mother eagerly, she nods, and he skips away quickly, before minds change. Jodie hears the slam of his bedroom door, and then more faintly the television, the distant sound of gunfire from his Wii.
Helen sits down in Tom’s vacant chair, rifling through his books and papers aimlessly. ‘Where’s Hannah?’
Jodie shrugs. ‘She’s out. God knows where. I’m not expecting her home anytime soon.’
‘Good. We can talk plainly, then.’ Helen motions to the chair beside her. ‘Leave dinner for a moment – it can wait.’
‘Do you want tea? Whisky?’
‘No. Nothing.’ Impatient now. ‘Just sit down. We need to talk.’
Her life appears to have been reduced to a series
of directions to be obeyed, and Jodie follows the command without question, though ordinarily she would baulk at being ordered around by her mother-in-law, would attempt some slight gesture of resistance. She sits down at the table, takes a deep breath, prepares for the onslaught. Despite Angus’s assurance of his mother’s support, Jodie is wary – she can’t quite believe she will be let off without some unpleasantness.
Helen looks at her for a long moment, frowning, and Jodie wills herself to meet her gaze steadily. So closely regarded, Jodie is made suddenly, shockingly aware of her mother-in-law’s advancing age, her deteriorating physical condition – her once fine features seem suddenly undefined, her shoulders stooped and frail, her eyes rheumy, dull.
Helen looks away first. ‘As I’m sure you know, Angus has told me all about … everything.’ She gestures vaguely, expressing the inexpressible. ‘Now, I’m quite sure that between you you’ve sorted out some very sensible plans to deal with the situation, and you probably feel you don’t need my opinion or my advice. But,’ she adds dryly, ‘I’m going to give you the benefit of my wisdom anyway.’
Jodie forces a gratefully encouraging smile.
‘Actually, I’m not going to give you my opinion. It’s largely irrelevant, anyway, isn’t it? And all I really know is what Angus has told me, which I suspect has been cleaned up somewhat – trying to save me, from being shocked, no doubt.’ A slight humorous lift of the eyebrows. ‘Though it might surprise him to know I’m pretty unshockable. Anyway, that’s neither here nor there – what I do want to give you is my advice on how to handle others – the town, your friends, the children. Angus.’
