The Blinding Light (15 page)

“Patrick? Are you alive?”

“No.” The answer was muffled in the pillow, but I heard it.

I chuckled. “Do you want a painkiller?”

“No.” There was a little pause while he reconsidered. “Oh, fuck me. Yes. Bring me the whole fucking packet.”

I grinned to myself. My bad habits were rubbing off on the guy. I’d never heard him swear so much. I fetched some tablets and a glass of water.

“Here,” I said, putting them down on the bedside cabinet.

He waved me away. “Just leave them. I’ll take them in a minute.”

“Nah ah!” I disagreed. “If I leave them, you’ll go back to sleep. Take them now, and I promise you’ll feel better in a little while.”

“No.” God, the man was like a little kid.

I folded my arms across my chest. “Do it now or else I’m leaving you—”

“Don’t care. Go away.” He still hadn’t lifted his head from the pillow.

“You didn’t let me finish. Sit up and take these tablets or else I’m leaving you and taking Gregor with me.”

Finally, he turned his head to the side. “Shit, you’re a sadistic bastard.”

“Yep. Now drink up.” I waited until he made a move toward the drink before I was satisfied. “I’m going to steal some of your clothes to wear and then I’m jumping in the shower. I’ll make pancakes for brunch, okay? That way you can eat ’em hot, or if your stomach needs some more time, they’ll be fine for later and you can eat ’em cold.”

Patrick found the glass of water, and I rummaged through his drawers, looking for some clothes to borrow. “Are you staying?”

I shook my head, even though I knew he couldn’t see, and pulled out some trakkies. “Nah. Sorry, man. I’ll make you pancakes but then I have to dash. Maria says that something’s wrong with Mum. She won’t get out of bed or some shit. I have to go over and sort it out. I don’t know why the fuck I have to do it all the time. I’m sure it must be Lizzy or Ellie’s turn now. But, no. Maria calls me and then calls Lizzy when I don’t answer, so then Lizzy
and
Maria call me. Now I have to take the bus over there ASAP and be back by six tonight for my Tav shift.”

At the mention of The Tav, Patrick groaned and buried himself under the covers again. “Don’t mention that place to me for at least another forty-eight hours. That Charlie served me something evil, I swear it.”

I laughed and left him to his raging hangover.

I
RAPPED
my knuckles against the door to Mum’s house and let myself in with my key. Someday the police are going to pull me over and search me, and I’m going to be interrogated about how many sets of keys I actually have on my key ring—my place, Mum’s, Ellie’s, Lizzy’s, Patrick’s, and The Tav’s. At times it feels like a huge weight I’m carrying around, both physically and metaphorically.

Mum’s state housing accommodation was tiny but functional: three bedrooms, one bathroom, a lounge room, a kitchen, and a laundry that was more of a nook than a room. I’d grown up in this house and had swept the floor so many times I could recreate the pattern of the floorboards in my sleep. The house had seen four babies raised in my lifetime, but since the place was at least thirty years older than me, I’m sure that many others had lived within its walls.

The house was old and sad, but I loved it anyway. No matter how bad people thought my childhood was, I didn’t care. I survived. I thrived. I loved these walls. Similar houses in the neighborhood had either been bulldozed and rebuilt, or renovated and extended. Mum’s little house looked like the poor cousin in the street these days. The suburb had certainly changed since I was in high school. Those days you didn’t walk the streets after dark. I wondered if the State Housing Commission would keep the house when Mum finally moved out, or sell it for a huge profit. Not that Mum would be moving out anytime soon. The woman was nowhere near getting her life together.

The front door opened directly into the lounge, and by habit I had a look around to check how bad things were. I was surprised and impressed that Maria had managed to keep things neat. Picking up after Mum was sometimes a full-time job. I took a small sniff and was pleased that I couldn’t smell any second-hand smoke or the stale odor of Mum’s cigarettes. I’d have to ask Maria what she used.

“Maria?” I called.

I heard a yell from the back and found my baby sister wielding a pair of hedge trimmers, attacking the bushes in the backyard.

“Hey, doll,” I greeted her.

She dropped the trimmers on the grass and came to give me a hug. “Thanks for coming over, bro. You’re about four hours late, but it’s good to see you.”

“Oi!” I protested. “I worked until after one o’clock in the morning. I need my beauty sleep!”

“It didn’t work,” she teased back. “I can’t see any beauty from where I’m standing.”

I narrowed my eyes in her direction and crouched down, ready to pounce, but she knew my intention and screeched the way only teenage girls can and took off running. I laughed and sprinted after her. We circled the yard a couple of times before I caught her and hoisted her up over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry. She shrieked.

“Put me down, Jake!”

“Now, where do you think I should put you down? In the rose bushes?”

“No! Don’t you dare!” Of course we both knew I wouldn’t do something like that, but it was part of the fun.

“I know! In the rubbish bin!” I started toward the large 240-liter bin in the carport.

“No! Please! Don’t! I take it back, I take it back. You’re beautiful. Supremely gorgeous.” Maria was laughing so hard, I could hardly understand what she was saying.

I looked around the backyard and spotted the perfect punishment. “Ah ha ha!” I roared like a pirate. “It will be water punishment for the prisoner!”

“What?” Maria began to kick and squirm. “No! Please, Jake!”

I pulled her into my arms and made for the birdbath. Maria screamed and laughed as I held her threateningly over the small bowl of water until her butt was just an inch from the surface.

“Stop! Jake! I’ll do anything. What do you want?”

I halted and cocked my head to the side. “Anything?”

“Yes!”

I considered for a moment and then lowered her to her feet, steadying her while she found her balance. “Okay, then. Tell me The Truth.”

Maria sagged in an exaggerated manner and looked up at me with beseeching eyes. “No,” she wailed. “Not The Truth.”

But I was firm, even as my lips were twitching madly, trying to let a grin escape. My eyebrows rose. “You said anything and I demand The Truth.”

She sighed dramatically and pouted. She was adorable but she wasn’t getting out of the promise. I wanted The Truth, so I glared until she finally began to recite the words I had taught all my sisters from an early age. The words I simply referred to as The Truth.

“You are the best big brother in the whole world. You are strong
and
handsome
and
smart
and
witty.
And
you are
always
right. I couldn’t ask for a better brother and that is
The Truth
.”

“Thank you.” I was gracious in my victory. I put my nose in the air and sauntered away. Maria laughed and called me a pig but followed until we were sitting comfortably at the outdoor table.

I turned serious. “So what’s up, doll? What’s wrong with Mum?”

Maria looked at me with eyes far older than her seventeen years. I felt terrible that she was left to look after our mother. The world shouldn’t be like this. “I don’t know, Jake. She’s sick or something. She hasn’t been out of bed for days. She lies there all day, then she’s up all night, eating crap and watching TV.”

“Is she on a binge?” I asked. It had happened before—solid weeks of drinking all night, then more drinking to get rid of the hangover.

“No. That’s the weird shit, Jake. There’s no drinking, no cigarettes. She’s been chewing these gum things and peppermints like last time she tried to give up smoking, only ten times worse. I haven’t seen her with a cancer stick for over two weeks, but she’s not drinking either. I’m scared, Jake. Is she dying or something?”

“Are you sure she’s not drunk? It’s not the first time she’s hid it in her room.”

“I haven’t been watching the booze as closely. The lack of smoking’s easy to spot, but I don’t know how long it is since she’s had a drink. At least four days for sure. Maybe even two weeks.”

I was surprised. “She didn’t go out last night?” I couldn’t remember the last time Mum didn’t go out on Friday night.

“No. See? I’m really scared for her.”

I swallowed hard, tamping down my fear to try and reassure my sister. I didn’t know what was going on. Cancer? Could you get emphysema at forty-four? Liver cancer? A brain tumor? A brain transplant? My mother not smoking
or
drinking was unheard of. She’d tried to give up both over the past twenty years, but always relied on one or the other. She’d done rehab a couple of times to dry out and ended up chain smoking to stop the cravings. The couple of times she’d tried to quit smoking she’d gone on alcoholic benders to overcome the nicotine withdrawal.

I squeezed Maria’s hand. “Give me five minutes. I’ll go and have a word with Mum.”

I approached her bedroom with trepidation. A dead body was at the top of my “God, I hope not” list, followed closely by my mother merrily slugging down a bottle of vodka with a strange, naked man in the room. Again.

I didn’t bother knocking, giving her less time to hide the evidence of whatever she was up to, but she wasn’t doing anything more than sleeping. I pulled the curtains slightly open to let in some sunlight, and Mum rolled over and blinked a couple of times.

“Mum?”

She smiled feebly at me, her face pale and drawn. “Hey, love.”

Her appearance did nothing to dispel my fears about a serious illness. She looked more terrible than usual. Her hair was lank and her face lined with wrinkles. Dark circles pooled beneath her eyes, giving her a ghostlike edge. Years of hard drinking and smoking had given her skin a sallow look that two weeks without had not taken away. Her lips were dry and cracked, her eyes sunken in her skull, and her bones more prominent than usual and definitely more visible than healthy.

“What’s wrong, Mum? Are you sick?”

She pulled herself into a sitting position. The nightgown that she wore was thin and shapeless and I made a mental note that a new one would be on my list of things to buy her for Christmas. The local Op Shops often had nice ones with their tags still on for a really good price. Her stick-thin arms poked out of the faded pink material; her fingers were permanently stained from the cigarettes.

“I’ll be fine, love. Don’t worry about me.”

That answer did nothing to allay my fears. I sat down next to her and grabbed her hand. “Of course I worry, Mum. You’re my mother, the only one I have. So I have to look after you, don’t I? Because a boy needs his mummy at times.” I was laying it on a bit thick, but she looked so ill I thought she needed cheering. “Have you seen the doctor, Mum?”

She pushed her hair out of her eyes. “Yeah, love. I saw him a couple of weeks back. Just a stomach flu, he told me. He also told me to get off the smokes and stop the drinking, so I thought I’d give it a good go this time. Not those half-arse attempts like before.”

I was skeptical but willing to hope. Again. “That’s good, Mum. But you have to eat too. Healthy stuff or else you’re going to fade away to a shadow.”

She tried to smile, but it wasn’t convincing.

“How long since you had a shower?” Her shrug told me everything. I gave her a cheerful look. “How about you go and jump in and have a good wash and do your hair and everything? I’ll hang around for a bit, so when you’re finished I’ll cook you something nice, huh?”

She agreed and hauled herself out of bed to stumble to the bathroom. The minute the door closed, I grabbed all the blankets and sheets and dragged them off the bed. As I stripped the bottom sheet, I took a minute to check under the mattress and down the sides of the bed for hidden bottles of booze. Mum was a kidder—she kidded herself that she was going to give up, all the while hiding a stash away where I couldn’t find it.

I was surprised to find her room seemingly empty of alcohol. Either she was serious this time, or she’d done a better job of hiding it. Maria wandered in, and I asked her to grab the vacuum cleaner. She vacuumed while I shoved the sheets in the washing machine and took the blankets and quilt outside to peg on the line. There wasn’t enough time to wash and get the blankets dry, so some sunshine and a light airing would have to do.

I returned to her room and grabbed handfuls of dirty clothes she’d left lying around, using one of her old shirts to give a quick dust to the dresser. Together Maria and I remade the bed with fresh sheets. I then searched Mum’s drawers and wardrobe for bottles but came up empty. My heart was strangely buoyant.

The last thing I did was open the window in her room, and reminded Maria that she would have to come and close it before dark. There were no security screens, and the last thing we needed was someone breaking in.

Back in the kitchen, I switched the kettle on and quizzed Maria.

“Have you been paying the bills? Is there enough money?”

“Yes. There’s nothing outstanding. I’ve been paying them as soon as they come in so Mum can’t drink away the money. I’ve even had enough to put a bit aside, just in case. Maybe Mum can pay you back some of that money.”

I turned to Maria with a stern look. “That was my choice to pay Mum’s debts. If or when Mum pays me back is something that’s between Mum and me. Don’t you worry about it. If there’s extra money, then stash it away like I showed you. You’ll be in university next year and you may need it for books and stuff. How are your savings going? I’d feel a lot better if you had a car to go to university each day next year. Especially if you’re staying here with Mum.”

“I’m fine with staying with Mum, Jake. I know Lizzy got out as soon as she could, but Mum and I get along well. I’ve nearly two grand saved up toward a car and Maurice has promised me more hours over the holidays. Mrs. Jansen also needs me to babysit her three devils once the primary school is out for the term, so I should be raking it in over January. Dad promised me that if I could get five grand together, he would give me another grand to pay for insurance and transfer fees.”