Inspiration

20

Inspiration

    Inspiration struck David in the wee small hours. He just suddenly opened his eyes and there it was, all bright and shiny. “Ooh!” he gasped.

    “Wha’?” mumbled Dot, turning over. “Rose—?”

    “No, she’s all right,” he whispered. “Ssh, go back to sleep.”

    “No, I’m awake now. Got a headache.”

    “That muck Deanna insists on mixing up as Boxing Day cheer,” Deanna’s brother-in-law diagnosed heavily. “Why the Hell did you drink it?”

    “Because it was there.” Dot sat up, yawning. “It’s stuffy in here, I’ll open a window.”

    “Dot, let me—”

    “No, I have to have a pee, anyway.”

    “Go, go, stand not upon the order of your going.” David lay back against the pillows, examining his inspiration. It was still all shiny and bright.

    “Listen, Dot,” he murmured after she’d had a pee, checked on Rose, opened the bedroom window, made sure the fly screen which doubled as a security screen was locked, and taken some paracetamol with a large glass of water, which in his expert opinion was gonna make her need to pee again before she could get back to sleep.

    “Mm?”

    “Don’t fly off the handle, just listen.”

    “I am.”

    “We need Nefertite’s room, now that Rose is getting bigger and we’re thinking of trying for another.”

    “You said get Christmas over before I have to start chucking up—”

    “Yes, of course. And I would do the whole nine months for you if I possibly could. Just listen.”

    Dot subsided.

    “We need her room, so we get hold of Bob’s mate Gazzo with the kitset houses and to save money just buy the kitset this time, not the labour, and ask Jack to put it up for her!” he hissed.

    “Cripes,” said Dot numbly.

    “Throw them together, see? Don’t say they haven’t got enough in common, darling, this’ll give them the opportunity to find out if they have! And she’ll need to make decisions over the stuff for the inside, that’ll be bound to throw them together even more!”

    “Yeah,” said Dot numbly.

    “What do you think?” asked David anxiously as the silence lengthened.

    “That’s brilliant, David!” she said in awe. “Um, Gazza, not Gazzo, though.”

    “Uh—” David muttered to himself. “If you say so.”

    “She will have to pay Jack a decent whack, though.”

    “Of course, but I don’t think she’ll notice any illogicality, darling, and the way we put it to her will be, he needs the work!”

    “Good one! And the way we put it to him, she can’t afford bloody Gazza’s prices!” Dot collapsed in muffled sniggers.

    “We’ll keep right out of it,” murmured David,

    “Given how good the both of us are at interior decorating, that’ll be hard,” she agreed happily.

    “Mm. Might have to hogtie Deanna, though.”

    “Nah, I’ll wise her up, and anyway her and Bob are gonna start a family this year!” she reminded him.

    “Right. The perfect excuse. Uh—damn, there’s Bernie, though. He did all the colour schemes for our places.”

    “He’ll be too busy, ’cos you’ll of put the hard word on him. If all else fails he can get out in the bush with his paints and do some pot-boilers,” said Dot firmly. “The last lot of wrinklies have decimated their stock anyway.”

    “Didn’t Ann claim they’d all have bought and posted the Chrissie prezzies long since?”

    “They’ve been buying stuff up for next year, ya nana,” she said heavily. “Plus and next year’s birthdays and anniversaries.”

    David gulped.

    “Never mind, we don’t have to be like them,” she said comfortably.

    “No, thank God,” he agreed gratefully. “Um, well, put it to her tomorrow?”

    “Today, ya mean. Well, yeah, strike while the iron’s hot, eh?”

    “Too right!” The lovely, cool pre-dawn of the hills was filtering through into the bedroom. David lay back and closed his eyes, just for forty winks…

    Out like a light, discerned Dot drily. She thought over his brilliant scheme carefully. It still seemed brill’, however. Well, the fly in the ointment might be that maybe Jack wouldn’t agree, but apart from that… Blast, she shouldn’t have had that huge glass of water. She’d been really bad when Rose was on the way and unfortunately it didn’t seem to have entirely worn off. Maybe she didn’t really need to, it was only because she was thinking about it… No. Blast. Resignedly Dot crept out of bed and went to have another pee.

    Nefertite went very red and dropped her piece of toast on her satin dressing-gown. “Of course, darlings; why didn’t you say Rose needs the room?” she gasped.

    “No!” said Dot crossly, bounding up to get the sponge. “—Here. She doesn’t! I mean, she hasn’t so far, ’cos she’s only been little. Only, um, well, she’s getting bigger and, um—”

    “Stands up in her cot and watches us with those big bug-eyes while we’re doing it. It really puts Dot off,” said David calmly. “Even though of course she doesn’t understand and wouldn’t care if she did. And we do want to start another baby.”

    Nefertite sponged blindly at her dressing-gown. “Of course! I mean, you should have said earlier, Dot! I’ve got the flat in Sydney—”

    “That’s another thing,” said David firmly, since Dot was just standing there looking completely dismayed. “Don’t pretend you’ve enjoyed this frantic year of master class crap and bloody spur-of-the moment concerts that the ABC advertised six months before they suggested—”

    “That’s a gross exaggeration,” said his sister weakly.

    “Not so gross as all that. My point is you took on too much and you didn’t enjoy it. And kindly don’t breathe the words ‘Australian Opera,’ they’re a load of selfish idiots who’d work you into the ground without a second thought!”

    “David,” said Nefertite in a trembling voice, “I’m committed to them for next year.”

   “You’re committed to whatever you’ve signed up for and nothing else. And don’t tell me the South Australian Opera wants you in Adelaide, they’re not getting you!”

    “I could stay with Kate and Jim,” she faltered. “She’s already invited me.”

    “Aunty Kate can sit on it,” said Dot grimly. “They’ve got pots, they can always come over here if they wanna see you.”

    “Quite. No more travelling,” said David firmly. “You can pass over anything they ask you to sign to me from now on. I’m doing agent for you, and don’t argue!”

    Nefertite didn’t argue: she burst into tears. But after quite some time it emerged these were tears of gratitude and relief, so David made a pot of real coffee and Dot made another round of toast, and once Rose’s loud screeches had been silenced with half a banana and a promise she could have a sip of Daddy’s coffee, they were able to discuss it all seriously.

    “A dear little house like yours!” she beamed, all smiles. “With a verandah?”

    Her relatives sagged. “Yes,” said David limply. “Well, that’s how they come.”

    “Will I have enough money, though?”

    “Yes,” said Dot firmly.

    “What about all those credit cards you’ve been paying off for me, though, Dot?” she asked fearfully.

    “What?” said David limply.

    “Don’t get excited: all she means is I’ve been managing her money online. She never realized that if ya pay off the balance every month, not just what they put in large print on the bottom line, they can’t charge you interest. I have paid them all off, yeah, and I reckon I’ve saved her about three thou’ in interest, all up.”

    David choked on his toast. “What?”

    “Over the year,” said Dot calmly. “She’d let them pile up, see, and she was paying interest on the interest. The buggers were charging her twenty-nine percent.”

    “What? That’s usury!” he choked.

    “Well, yeah. I’ve consolidated them. Well, most of them aren’t any worse than each other but I let her keep the MasterCard: same as mine, so if there are any probs we both close our accounts, geddit? And this year they had quite a good wine offer, ’member?”

    “Er—marginally drinkable plonk. Well, yes, a wine offer’s better than no wine offer, and Bob was happy to take the ones I couldn’t face off our hands at cost.”

    “Yeah. So you can definitely afford a kitset, Nefertite,” said Dot happily. “Mind you, Bob’s mate Gazza charges through the nose for labour, we worked out that that’s how he makes most of his profit, so what we thought was, get Jack to build it for you at a reasonable price.”

    “Whuh-what?” she faltered, turning very red.

    With a huge effort David and Dot refrained from glancing at each other. “Well, yes, Nefertite, he needs the work,” said David on a firm note.

    “Yes. He could start right away, you see. The horse trekking crappola isn’t nearly enough to keep him busy full-time and they can’t afford to pay him,” added Dot, suppressing the point that Jack had refused very loudly to accept more from Gil than his keep.

    “Buh-but darlings, would he want to?” she faltered.

    “Why not?” retorted Dot, sticking her rounded chin out.

    “Yes, why not?” murmured David. “Why don’t you ask him, Nefertite?”

    Dot’s jaw dropped: that had definitely not been part of the plan!

    “I—I don’t think I could,” said Nefertite faintly.

    “He is a qualified master builder,” David pointed out mildly.

    “Yeah. Have a bit more coffee and some more toast, Nefertite, you’ve hardly eaten anything for the past two days,” said Dot, recovering herself. “If you don’t wanna ask him, David can. Like some banana on yer toast?”

    “Ba’na!” cried Rose immediately.

    “Shuddup, Greedy, you’ve had yours, this is for Aunty Nefertite.”

    “Um, yes, banana with raw sugar would be lovely, but isn’t it fattening?” said Nefertite weakly as, ignoring her infant’s wails, Dot briskly peeled a banana and reached for the sugar bowl.

    “Bananas are full of potassium, it’s really good for you. –Go on, stick this in your gob, All Stomach,” said Dot genially, handing her cherubic infant the last couple of centimetres off the end of the banana. “And a person who ate half a dozen of David’s little tart thingos last night after no dinner and hardly any lunch and half a piece of toast and Vegemite for breakfast and hardly touched her Chrissie dinner the day before that, can shut up about fattening, see?”

    “Yes!” said Nefertite with a weak laugh. “Help, have you been keeping track of me, Dot, darling?”

    “You better believe it!” replied Dot insouciantly. Though she did avoid her husband’s eye as she said it.

    Some time later David wandered back to the house after what he’d declared was just going to be a stretch of his legs to find the kitchen empty except for his wife. “Did Rose go down for her nap?”

    “Sort of. Bunged her in her playpen in the lounge-room and she had a fight with Teddy and Panda and then biffed those fuzzy stuffed blocks Aunty Kate sent her all over the room—more method in Aunty Kate’s madness than what I thought,” admitted Dot, grinning, “and then demanded Bananas In Pyjamas and had a tantrum because it wasn’t on—she can’t get it into her noddle that it won’t automatically come on when ya turn the TV on.”

    “Um, darling, she is only two; perhaps if we tape the bloody thing for her?”

    Dot looked dubious. “Wouldn’t that give her the idea that she only has to shriek for what she wants and she gets it?”

    “Ugh. Um, no, tell you what: put it on for her before she starts shrieking!”

    “Brill’!” she gasped, going into a helpless giggling fit.

    “So has she gone down for a nap?”

    “Well, she let me put her down,” admitted Dot, “and then she stood up in her cot and started that shaking the bars business”—David winced—“and shouting: ‘Sing! Sing!’ So I said she could sing in there, but that didn’t go down too good, she wanted to go in Aunty Nefertite’s room to do it.”—David put his hand over his face.—“Yeah, that was pretty much my reaction, too. So I fetched those ruddy bananas in pyjamas that Deanna made her for Chrissie—yeah, pandering to the obsession, we know,” she said before he could point it out again—“and said she could sing to B1 and B2 and Mummy, and don’t ask me why, but that went down a treat.”

    “So what did she sing?”

    “Jingle Bell Rock, of course,” admitted Dot. “Well, the usual: ‘Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell ro’,’ over and over again.”

    David had expected as much; nevertheless he winced. “Right.”

    “You did say she could carry a tune.”

    “Yes, but why Jingle Bell Rock?” he said wildly.

    “Dunno,” said the infant’s mother cheerfully. “Well, you were the one that encouraged her last year. Blame yaself if she’s hooked on it. Hang on—she’s finished!”

    “Uh—oh, Nefertite,” he realized, smiling. “Mm. Jack's out there again, even though she started late this morning. His excuse was our picket fence could do with a lick of paint, and he certainly had a paint brush in his hand! I’ll just drag him in for a cuppa.”

    Dot filled the jug and sat down to await events, whiling away the time by examining the plastic carry-bag David had dumped on the table. One of Nefertite’s: it had the dreaded David Jones herringbone logo on it. Or possibly not logo, couldja register herringbone? Anyway, they used it. Black on white. Ultimate taste. …Leaves. Uh—well, maybe they were the lemon myrtle he’d said he was gonna look for. Looked just like leaves, to her.

    “Jack was very kindly smartening up our fence and wondering if he could do anything else for us, darling,” said David smoothly, ushering him in, “so I explained he could do something substantial for us, but it’ll be better if we wait for Nefertite, then we can all discuss it together.”

    Poor Jack was looking distinctly wary: no wonder! “Hi, Jack,” said Dot kindly. “Fancy a coffee? Just instant, not his Greek stuff.”

    “Yeah, ta, Dot; that’d be great,” he agreed, sitting down beside her.

    “Find some lemon myrtle, didja?” said Dot to her spouse as he sat down looking airy.

    “Uh—yeah. Sort of. I think Bob’s right and it doesn’t grow round here naturally, the only bushes seem to be on Blue Gums’ property.”

    “So didja nick some?”

    “No, you horrible woman, I went up to the ecolodge, snuck round the back and spoke to the chef! Then we wandered out and picked some legally. He was interested to know I’d managed to get rocket to grow up here but somewhat disappointed,” said David drily, “when I had to admit it was bolting to seed like crazy and I couldn’t figure out what I’d done wrong.”

    “Don’t think you’ve done anything wrong, it’s the climate,” said Jack mildly. “Thought lemon myrtle was a tree?”

    “Yeah,” agreed Dot, showing him the contents of the bag. “See? The experts reckon you can use it like lemon rind in your cooking, only it’s even better.”

    “Right. So whatcha gonna make with it, David?”

    “I’m not sure. Well, Alfie had some ideas. Might try it with fish.”

    “Is that his name?” asked Dot.

    David smiled at her. “Alfredo for professional purposes! Alfred, but his Mum and Dad have always called him Alfie. He’s a Londoner by birth: they came out when he was three. God knows what his dad thought he was doing: he was a sous-chef at a big London hotel.”

    “He was getting a better life for his wife and kids, whaddareya?” returned Dot amiably.

    “Mm. He did get a job in a Sydney hotel—this was in the late Seventies, Alfie’d be in his thirties—and after some years of pointless struggling against the tide of Australian laissez-faire, gave it away and started his own little restaurant. Did really badly for a few years and then gradually a clientele with slightly more educated palates started to turn up—well, slightly, he had to give in to the Nineties’ passion for chopped chilli on everything. He sent Alfie home to get some proper cooking knocked into him—I gather that was a shock to the system! But he stuck it out.”

    “Good on him,” said Jack sturdily.

    “Yeah,” agreed Dot.

    David smiled. “And so say all of us! Finished his training, then went slightly off the rails working for a fellow who belonged to the little piles of well-handled, tepid muck school—I think there was a romantic interest there, reading between the lines—gave it away and came home. Just in time to discover that most of his dad’s street had been bought up by a development consortium—it’s got a sea view, really lovely site, but a bit out of the way when they set up there—and his landlord had sold the building to the buggers.”

    “Jesus!” gasped Dot in dismay.

    “Yeah, he told me that, poor joker,” agreed Jack sympathetically. “That was that, eh?”

    “Yes. The old man was over sixty: he didn’t have the energy to start all over again. Helluva pity, because they’d just had some really good publicity on that SBS foodie programme and they were serving two sittings every night, completely sold out. So the parents retired and Alfie had to go the rounds of the Sydney restaurateurs, all of whom, of course, were jealous of his training and didn’t want a bar of him. Finally managed to get work at one of the better hotels and stuck it out for four years, during which time they had three chefs, each one more temperamental than the last.”

    “Yeah,” agreed Jack. “The last one was a German bloke: Hans, his name was. Ya wouldn’t think that Germans’d be temperamental, would you? But he was: used to have screaming fits because they weren’t clean enough for ’im.”

    “Yes. In a big kitchen, Dot, everything’s washed at the end of the day: walls, benches, the lot,” said David, smiling at her.

    “Right,” agreed Jack. “Alfie said he tried to point out that they were skimping on it but he wasn’t the boss, so nobody listened to him. So they got it in the neck when the new chef arrived—serve ’em right. Alfie would of stuck it out if Hans had wanted to stay on, but he didn’t: the management weren’t giving him any support. So he decided to try his luck in Western Australia: had a mate over there and they thought they might open their own restaurant, and that was when Alfie saw the ad for the job up here. So he jumped at it.”

    “Mm. How did you meet him, Jack?” asked David.

    “I was giving Vince a hand to lug some supplies in the week before they opened—that ning-nong that’s their so-called head groundsman is pretty useless, about all he’s capable of is standing around in ’is flaming sunhat—and Alfie was there, checking out the kitchen. Tried out the stove, gave us lunch and everything!” he beamed.

    “What was it?” asked David.

    Jack gave him a dry look. “Not what you might think. Fish and chips. His dad’s recipe. Never tasted anything like it. Sort of what you always thought fish and chips oughta taste like, if ya get me drift. Made the batter for the fish himself, with beer.”

    “Real chips?” said David with a smile.

    “Yeah, from real potatoes,” said Jack, sighing deeply. “Only ever had them one other place in Australia.”

    “Where?” asked David with interest.

    “You won’t of heard of it, mate. Place George knows of. In a dirty little back street. Well, its name’s Kooka’s, but like I say, you—”

    “Kooka’s!” cried David and Dot. “We go there!”

    “Eh?” croaked Jack, his jaw sagging.

    “Of course! The only place in Sydney where you can get real chips along with your real steak!” said David with a laugh.

    “Kooka’s,” discerned a velvety voice from the doorway.

    “Um, yeah!” gasped Jack, stumbling to his feet. “Gidday, Nefertite. Don’t say you know Kooka’s!”

    Nefertite was very flushed, her relatives observed with interest. She came in, smiling. “Of course! The only place to go after the performance when you need actual food, Jack!”

    Jack was also rather flushed, and this could have had something to do with the fact, her relatives recognised, that Nefertite was clad in a glowing muumuu in shades of red and orange on deep blue. And very evidently no bra: if this hadn’t been pretty obvious anyway, the thing was slipping off one rounded bare shoulder.

    “Yuh—uh, yeah. Not trying to claim the opera types go there, are ya?” he croaked.

    “No!” she said with her liquid, gurgling laugh. “Only a very small minority! –Sit down, Jack, don’t stand on ceremony.”

    Weakly Jack sank down onto his chair again.

    “Does she look as if she doesn’t know what actual food is?” said David mildly.

    “Shut up,” ordered Dot. “Get us a bit of cake or something.”

    “To take the taste of the instant coffee away—mm. Or would people rather have tea?”

    Everyone voted for tea and a pot was made, and David handed a tin of small crescent-shaped biscuits.

    “So how did you types get to know Kooka’s?” asked Jack feebly, once he’d got some tea down him.

    Nefertite, Dot and David all opened their mouths. Then they shut them, looking disconcerted.

    “Was it Ann?” said David at last.

    “Nah, I knew it before then. Well, it was one of Dad’s haunts, he used to take me and my older brother there the nights Mum was on duty at the library, Jack,” admitted Dot. “We’d dump Deanna and the twins on Aunty Allyson.”

    “Ann did know of it, though,” said Nefertite.

    “Yes, that’s right, her dad used to go there!”

    “That evening we went with Ann was the first time I’d been,” murmured David.

    “Yes, of course, the time Daffy was out here!” cried Nefertite.

    “Daffyd Owens. Welsh,” Dot explained to Jack—redundantly, some would have thought, her husband reflected in considerable amusement. “He’s a singer, too. He’s all right, though.”

    “The accolade,” David explained to Jack, grinning.

    “Funny bugger,” the New Zealander returned stolidly. “Liked it, did ’e, Dot?”

    “Yes, he loved, it, Jack: we all had a lovely time!” she beamed.

    “It was after the show, you see, Jack,” explained Nefertite. “Neither of us felt like food beforehand.”

    “Yeah, got that, Nefertite,” he agreed. “So ya get nervous beforehand, even though you’ve been doing it for ages?”

    She shuddered. “Mm! It’s not so bad in a longer running thing, of course, but one still gets butterflies and doesn’t feel like a heavy meal before the performance.”

    “Bad for you, anyway, to sing on top of a heavy meal,” added David. “Too much diaphragm work needed!”

    Jack nodded seriously. “Yeah, that’d be right. Um, so what did you want to ask me, David?”

    “Oh—that,” said David lamely.

    It was very clear to both his wife and his sister that he’d lost his nerve.

    “As a matter of fact,” said Nefertite quickly, realising that Dot wasn’t sure whether she should speak up or not, “we wanted to ask you if you could build me a house, Jack!”

    “Uh—yeah,” said Jack numbly. “Well, I could, yeah. Where?” he croaked.

    “Here, of course!” she said, smiling her lovely warm smile at him.

    Jack felt rather as if he’d been down one of those bloody water slides—ya know? Ya stomach drops through ya feet and ya go whoomph! Splat! Horrible. “Up here?” he managed.

    “Of course, it’s Potters Road or nothing!” said David, beginning to recover himself.

    “But, um, you been working down in Sydney all year, Nefertite,” he fumbled.

    “Yes, but I don’t want to live there, perish the thought! I let them talk me into too many commitments, Jack. But David’s going to do agent for me and stop me accepting too many engagements, and I’ll just be able to do a few concerts and my teaching.”

    “Right. This at the Conservatorium?” asked Jack, going rather red: he’d never pronounced the word before in his life.

    “Yes. I like teaching. I don’t take the ones who are just starting out, of course, I’m not a trained voice teacher. But I enjoy passing on what I know to the more experienced ones.”

    “Mm. Getting them to take it on board’s another matter,” said David drily.

    “David, you can’t expect to teach here on the same level as in London,” she murmured.

    “That had dawned,” he said, making a face.

    “He’s done a lot of teaching, that was what he mainly did in Adelaide, and he did some in London,” Dot explained. “Only when they lined some up for him at the Conservatorium here he was disappointed in the people that came. But there aren’t many people that play the piano at a professional level.”

    “No, right. I see, so it was the piano, not the cello, was it, David?”

    “Yes—well, that was what they asked for. It paid well, and it helped to keep me busy the year that our house was being built and Dot was still working in Sydney.”

    “I geddit. So, um, well, talking of houses,” said Jack awkwardly—he was starting to wonder if they were, any more—“had you thought about what you want, Nefertite?”

    “Pale yellow, I thought, Jack,” she said earnestly.

    “Uh—yeah. Well, yeah, that’s doable, if ya want a wooden house.”

    “I rather think,” said David with a laugh in his voice, “that pale yellow’s as technical as it’s gonna get!”

    “Oops, was that wrong?” said Nefertite with a smile.

    “No,” said Dot quickly. “She loves pale yellow, don’t you, Nefertite? Only she can’t wear it, her skin’s too sallow,” she explained to Jack. “Sort of the colour of my lovely North African caftan you gave me?” she said to her sister-in-law.

    “Yes, exactly, Dot! And perhaps with a white trim? I think I am thinking of the caftan!”

    Jack looked dubiously at David.

    “Pale yellow,” he confirmed. “Dot wore it last night.”

    Yep, it had been pale yellow with a white trim, all right. “Right. I’ll get you a colour chart, Nefertite,” said Jack kindly.

    “But that is the colour, Jack,” she said in bewilderment.

    Jack cleared his throat, avoiding everybody’s eyes. “Uh—no. Gotta match it to the right paint, see?”

    “Oh, yes,” she said blankly.

    “Got no idea,” explained her brother with a grin.

    “She wants a kitset house like ours,” said Dot firmly. “See, we can get one off Bob’s mate, Gazza—mind you, he won’t give you a discount unless ya buy two—but anyway, he charges like a wounded bull for the labour, and she hasn’t got much capital. Well, I’ve been making her put most of her salary into super, ’cos she didn’t have any. Only that stupid flat in town’s been eating into it—you can get rid of it right away,” she ordered her sister-in-law. “There’s no sense in paying rent for a place you’re not gonna be in.”

    “But I—I have got that engagement with the Australian Opera, Dot,” she faltered.

    “You can stay with Aunty May those nights,” said Dot very firmly indeed. “She’ll love to have you and she’s lonely with Rosie overseas, and they’ve got bags of room.”

    Cripes, did they always go on like this? Making up his mind to it that if someone didn’t take charge of this lot they were never gonna get anywhere, Jack said very firmly indeed: “Right, sounds like a good plan. I shouldn’t think this Gazza bloke’ll be on deck between Christmas and New Year’s. Runs his own business, does ’e?”

    “Yes,” agreed Dot.

    “Right, we’ll get hold of him as soon as possible after New Year’s. You’ll need planning permission, too, if ya wanna put up another house up here.”

    “No, we’ve got that, Jack,” said Dot sunnily.

    “Eh?”

    “Yes: it was always the plan for Nefertite to come out, you see, and Bob said if we were going through all the palaver with the council we might as well get it over with in one fell swoop and include a house for her on the plans and if we never got it up, too bad, they won’t complain if there’s one less building than they’ve allowed for.”

    “Right. Well, I’ll get down the council offices soon as poss’ after New Year’s: take a dekko, just to make sure. Ya realise if it’s on the plan it’ll have to go where it specifies?”

    “Mm,” agreed Dot, nodding her curly head.

    “Will it?” said David blankly.

    “Yes,” replied Jack definitely, not bothering to try and figure out if the bloke was taking the Mick or not, because if ya did that, you’d never get anything sorted!

    Maybe he hadn’t been, because he said: “Well, uh, I think we’ve got a copy squirreled away somewhere… Have we, Dot?’

    “Yeah, it’s under ‘Plans’ in the filing cabinet in Nefertite’s room.”

    “Go on, Nefertite, show him,” said David, looking at his watch and making a face. “Damn, gone ten-thirty; I don’t know where the Hell the morning went. I’ll have to get off to work.”

    “You spent most of it looking for lemon myrtle with Alfie,” Dot reminded him.

    “Mm. Well, have a look at the plan, Jack, and then you’ll be able to show her the spot. But don’t expect it to get more technical than pale yellow! She is capable of choosing furnishings, but you’ll have to make all the decisions about kitchen cupboards and so on.”

    “The standard pattern: no optional extras,” said Dot firmly.

    “I thought a bidet would be nice, Dot,” she said wistfully.

    “See?” said David, as Jack’s jaw dropped. “Look, I’ve simply got to dash, I’ve got two sides of lamb to butcher and if I don’t get ’em on the spit soonest—”

    “Yes, go!” said Dot loudly.

    David dashed out.

    “Show him the filing cabinet, Nefertite,” said Dot calmly, beginning to gather up mugs.

    Nefertite stood up, looking at him hopefully. “If you’ve got time, Jack?”

    “Yeah, sure!” he agreed, getting up.

    “Um, but is it spoiling your Christmas holiday?” she said doubtfully.

    “Nope, Susan Pendleton’s already done that,” he said drily.

    The Susan woman? Nefertite looked up at him fearfully. She was a tall woman but Jack overtopped her by several inches. “Andy MacMurray’s daughter?” she faltered.

    “Right: George’s sister. Landed herself on poor old Andy without warning.”

    “I see… So how did she spoil your Christmas?” said Nefertite faintly.

    Jack held the kitchen door for her and looked down at her, smiling. “Well, you name it, she done it! Through here, is it?”

    “Oh—yes! Thank you!” she gasped, going out.

    “Well, I got out of it, mind you,” Jack admitted: “been kipping over at the Jardine place. George’s mate Pete is up here for the holidays, so Susan needed my room, but believe you me, if Andy’s place was the size of Buckingham Palace I’d of found some other excuse! Anyway,” he said cheerfully as Nefertite opened her bedroom door, “she insisted on asking all Gil’s lot over for Christmas dinner, so that was it: hadda go. She’s been nagging George and Pete to death: they’re really down in the dumps, and so’s poor ole Andy: she always tries to smarten ’im up when she comes up here, ya see. Well, I think young Phil and Jen enjoyed Christmas Day—though mind you, Jen’s mum was shoving her oar in, too—but I dunno that any of the rest of us did. I can’t tell you exactly what she done to the turkey but I can say I’ve never tasted anything as peculiar as what she calls stuffing. And there was no gravy.”

    “No gravy?” said Nefertite, staring.

    “Nope. Gravy’s too fattening, geddit?”

    “But for Christmas? With a turkey?”

    “Right,” agreed Jack pleasedly. “Bet David done gravy for the punters, eh?”

    “Of course. We didn’t have a hot meal ourselves, but he’s going to do us a lovely evening meal for New Year’s Eve. Roast duck, and he said he could do orange sauce or his caper sauce or gravy, and Dot and I both chose gravy, of course! –But what did she serve with it, Jack?”

    “Only vegetables. The worst by far was the kumara thing—sweet potatoes, think you’d call them—with scorched marshmallows on top.”

    “Ugh!” said Nefertite, shuddering. “American, would that be, Jack?”

    “Think so; well, turkey’s an American bird, but that’s no excuse. Well, um, you probably would of liked the rest of the vegetables, but they weren’t my idea of Christmas.”

    “Roast potatoes?” she ventured.

    “You’re joking!”

    “If they’re were no roast potatoes and no gravy with the turkey, that isn’t my idea of Christmas,” said Nefertite firmly.

    “Isn’t it?” said Jack on a weak note. The bedroom had obviously been in use as an office because it had a computer workstation and the filing cabinet, but it smelled deliciously of Nefertite’s scent. “Uh—no, well, good on ya. Sprouting broccoli, how’s that grab ya?”

    “Is sprouting broccoli the sort with all the sta—”

    “—stalks: yeah.”

    “I hate it!” she said fervently.

    “You and me both,” he agreed, opening the filing cabinet. “Shit, she’s organised, eh?”

    “Yes, very. She’s used to working in an office with computers and so forth, you see.”

    “Right.” He found the right folder and withdrew the plans. “See?”

    “Um…”

    “This here’s where we are, David and Dot’s place, see? That’s the Andersons’ place.”

    “Um…”

    “This is north,” said Jack helpfully.

    Nefertite looked at the plan and licked her lips uneasily. “But, um… Well, where is north, Jack?”

    Uh—shit. “Look, come on, we’ll go outside and I’ll show ya, eh?” he said kindly, taking her arm. His fingers sank into the flesh and Jack felt his ears go very red. Cripes! That was a turn-on and a half!

    “Yes: thank you,” said Nefertite faintly, letting him take her by the arm and lead her up the passage to the front door, and outside, and up the path and through the little wicket gate.

    “Now,” said Jack, turning the plan so as its north actually was facing north, “this here is where we are, see? That’s their house.”

    “I see!” beamed Nefertite.

    Ooh, heck, she was pressing her tit against his arm, obviously didn’t realize she was doing it. “Uh—yeah,” said Jack weakly, his blood hammering in his veins. “Um, see, that’s the Andersons’ place, to our left, and up the back a bit, that’s where you have your open-air concerts, isn’t it?”

    “Oh, yes: it looks like a building on the plan,” she agreed.

    Uh—yeah. Technically it was a— Never mind. “Yeah. And over to the right a bit, see that other building behind Dot and David’s place? No, on the plan, Nefertite,” he said weakly as she peered into the distance.

    “Um… Oh! I see!”

    What with the tit pressing against his arm again, Jack’s own eyes had gone a bit fuzzy. “Mm. They wanna leave the trees, see? Um, trees looks like funny circles on the plan. So you’d be just up by them gum trees. Not too far away for you, is it?” he said as she looked anxious. “You’d have a clear line of sight down to David and Dot’s back door.”

    “Oh, good!” she said in relief.

    “Right. Could put in a bit of a path for you. Not to mention a bit of shelter for his vege garden, it’s getting too much wind. Come on, wanna go over there?”

    “Yes, let’s!” she beamed.

    Righto, then. Firmly taking her arm again, Jack led her off. “So what veges do ya like?” he said as they passed David’s garden. Yep, needed a bit of shelter.

    “Almost anything roast and fattening, Jack!” said Nefertite with a guilty laugh. “Well, roast potatoes, of course. And I’m very fond of bell peppers and aubergines the way David does them in the oven, with olive oil and a bit of garlic. That’d be Greek-style, I suppose.”

    “Sounds good,” said Jack amiably.

     Nefertite sagged in relief. So she’d said the right thing? After a moment she ventured: “I do like Kooka’s, you know, Jack.”

    “Right!” said Jack with a sudden loud laugh. “So ya do! Steak and chips girl, eh?”

    “Yes,” agreed Nefertite, beaming up at him. “That’s me!”

    She was a lot more than that, of course, but—well. It’d do, for a start! Ann had been right all along, hadn’t she? Nefertite was all right!

Next chapter:

https://theroadtobluegums.blogspot.com/2022/11/scheduled.html