Finding Grace Read online

  Have another lychee.

  … … …

  Buying textbooks is a very harrowing experience. Not only do I have to spend all the money that I had saved up over Christmas, but also I know that I have to absorb everything in those books within the next fourteen weeks.

  When I got home I plonked all the books on my desk. I could hear Mr. Preston in the lounge room singing along to something by Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong.

  Mr. Preston was dancing with Grace.

  Will I find when we meet again,

  The glamour, the glory still aglow.

  Mr. Preston was whirling Grace around the lounge room. He's quite light on his feet for a big man. I sat down on the lounge to watch them. Grace was staring blankly at Mr. Preston's chest, one hand draped over his shoulder. I looked down at her feet. Sometimes he would lift her off the floor and spin her around. I thought I could see her feet moving, even anticipating the steps that Mr. Preston was going to make.

  Mr. Preston was singing, loudly, and badly, but he was taking great care, leading her very gently and lifting her up when she missed a step. She looked very small in his arms.

  On her feet were shiny red patent leather shoes, squaretoed with a wedged heel. Beautiful shoes.

  When they'd finished, I clapped, and Mr. Preston bowed. “Thank you very much, my dear. You see, our Grace is quite a mover.”

  He gently lowered Grace into her chair. “Dancing is the best way to wear in a pair of new shoes, I always say.”

  “They're lovely shoes.”

  “Yes, they are. Grace has always loved shoes, haven't you, my dear?”

  He clapped his hands together, beaming at me. “Care for a glass of wine?”

  I walked into the kitchen and fetched two wineglasses while Mr. Preston opened a bottle of wine.

  “Will you not have a glass?” asked Mr. Preston from behind me.

  I turned to face him. He was smiling at me. He had the two glasses in his hands. I was confused. “Isn't one of those for me?”

  “No, this is Grace's glass.”

  “You're not going to give her alcohol!”

  “Why not?”

  Because she can't control herself. Because she's at our mercy. Because she has no choice. It's like giving wine to a baby.

  “Well, it's not right.”

  He handed me one of the glasses. “Taste this.”

  I took a sip.

  He frowned at me. “This is a very good wine.”

  I don't really know anything about wine but I liked this one. It had a sort of buttery taste. “Yes, it's very good,” I responded, wanting to sound as if I knew what I was talking about.

  “What hideous crime has she committed?” Mr. Preston asked me.

  “Pardon?”

  “I'm asking you, what hideous crime has Grace committed that she should for all eternity be condemned to never tasting a great wine?” He held my gaze for a moment and then took the glass from my hand and carried it over to where Grace was sitting leaned over staring at her new shoes.

  “You know, I think you are the most bright, vivacious and exciting person I have ever met.”

  I whirled around, banging the cupboard door shut. If he thought there was going to be some sort of Sean Connery/Michael Douglas type of action happening here, then he was wrong. He—he didn't even know me!

  I was just about to open my mouth and say so when I realized he was talking to Grace.

  “Ever since I have known you, you have always chosen the best of things for yourself. I have watched you for many years. In all things, you always savored textures: creamy Camembert, fresh light cotton, rich dark chocolate, soft wool. But the thing you have always enjoyed most was a full dry white.

  “You would sit on this chair or out on the veranda with one foot tucked under you and sip a glass of wine. You would take small sips and roll it over your taste buds, telling stories, listening to this music, laughing or quietly watching the sun go down.” He handed her the glass. “I hope this meets with your approval.”

  I wondered again what their relationship was, before. He took an unusual amount of interest in her care for a lawyer. But he's not her husband, otherwise he would live here. Besides, he touches her tentatively. He's comfortable with a certain degree of familiarity, but not like a person who is touching someone with whom there is real physical intimacy. He touches her like a brother or a cousin. And this is a house clearly arranged for one. This house is feminine. Grace was single.

  “Were you in love with her?”

  Mr. Preston looked up at me sharply. I was reminded of the look my grandfather (Nanna's “hubby”) used to give me when I asked a personal question. Grandpa would give me that look and then he'd say, “And how're you off for socks and jocks then, hmm?”

  Mr. Preston had this look on his face as if he was going to ask me how I was off for socks and jocks. His eyes were screwed up a little. There was a tenseness between us.

  “I mean, that's a pretty personal observation, that's all. It sounds as if you were in love with her.” I was embarrassed and I could feel a blush coming on, so I turned and opened the cupboard door again, pretending to look for something.

  When I looked out again he was smiling. The tenseness was gone. “Everyone was a little bit in love with Grace.”

  He stood up and walked over to where I was standing against the kitchen bench. “You know, it's only now that I can tell her things that I've always wanted to say. I was always afraid that she would …”

  Crawl over the dressing table in the middle of the night with lizard's eyes?

  He shifted on his feet. “You see, Grace had this way of belittling people. Insult was an art form for Grace. Over the years she had perfected it. I just never wanted to be on the receiving end of that abuse.”

  “Is that why you're here? Is that why you do this—the wine and shoes and everything? Because you were in love with her?”

  Mr. Preston shifted on his feet again. I was overstepping the mark this time. But he answered anyway.

  “I owe Grace. I would never have got as far in my career, in my life, if it weren't for her. In a lot of ways I had the career that she should have had. I didn't recognize it at the time—the unfairness of it. See, that was her other skill—getting you to do things by making you think it was your own idea. She was a master manipulator.”

  He paused for a moment. I realized that with the pause the opportunity to find out more was gone, for the time being, anyway. The conversation was gently steered in another direction.

  “I see the way people treat Grace. I see her sisters coming in here and taking away her beautiful things—things she so carefully collected over the years. I see nurses and carers speaking to her as if she's some kind of slow child. I hear people talking about her as if she isn't in the room.”

  I frowned, and looked in toward the lounge room where Grace was sitting. “Like you are now?”

  “I'm trying to tell you something. Pay attention.” He frowned at me and paused to make sure I was listening.

  “I went to see her in the hospital and I watched them shoveling tasteless pureed muck into her face.”

  Just like I have been.

  “Grace was just sitting slumped in a chair with slippers on. It was so ugly. There was no dignity, there was no life— no grace. Here was this exquisite, intelligent woman sitting there in slippers with pulpy gray slop dribbling down her chin. It was obscene.”

  He was standing with his hands on his hips, frowning at me. I could see anger in his face.

  “I don't know how much she can feel or understand. I don't know whether she still thinks or dreams, but I have to give her the benefit of the doubt. There have been times when she has been unkind or cruel, but …”

  Mr. Preston shook his head slowly.

  “Can you imagine a worse hell than being humiliated and pitied for the rest of your life? Grace, who delighted in music and in wine and food and literature and art and surrounded herself with beauty and light.” />
  He circled around with his hand palm up.

  “If you knew Grace then, you'd know that nothing could be more offensive, nothing could be more abhorrent to her than spending the rest of her life this way.”

  Mr. Preston looked tired and old.

  “If I can in some small way alleviate that pain, if I can in some small way give her something like a shadow, a hint, a scent on the breeze of pleasure and, and—well, of life. That's why I do this, I'm trying to give her a spark. I'm trying to give her back a sweet taste of her life—her old life. Do you understand?”

  He was looking at me intently.

  “I think that's why I chose you. You have life in you. When I saw you, I thought that you had that spark. It's very important to me that you understand. It's very important for Grace.”

  I looked over to where Grace was sitting with one leg under the other. Prickles was on her lap again. She was looking out the window. She was resting the wineglass on the arm of the chair. Sitting there in her shiny new shoes, she might have been mistaken for an ordinary person. She might have been a very wealthy ordinary person—with a maid.

  This morning we have been blessed with a visit from two of Grace's sisters.

  Tight Mouth is Brioney. There is another one called Angelica but she lives somewhere far away and doesn't visit except at Christmas.

  The woman with the rubber gloves, her name is Charity. She's about as charitable as Saddam Hussein.

  Charity is glad Angelica doesn't visit more often, because “her husband owns a car dealership and she dresses up like a tart and thinks she's better than everybody.”

  Anyway, they “just popped in to see how things are settling in.” Also wondering what sort of hours I was working, and whether there was anything that was in the way?

  I explain that I'm settling in well, that I'm working all the time and that everything is just fine where it is, thank you very much.

  Tight Mouth Brioney, with the Beatles haircut, is in legal administration (prison warden?) and teaches something called “quilling” at a community college.

  What do you suppose quilling is, then? I guess that it's somewhere between fletching and quilting, and carry on with the conversation as though I'm up on arts and crafts. She's one of those tall, big-boned women with a long neck. Her long neck is even more noticeable because she has no chin. She looks like something, but I can't put my finger on it.

  Rubber Gloves Charity is short and podgy. She has three incredibly bright and talented children, Jeremy, Bianca and Simone. I nod and smile but I'm not really listening. She's one of those people who talks to the ceiling, so I don't think she notices. She also fluffs her hair while she's talking.

  Brioney explains to me while Charity is “powdering her nose” that Charity's husband is a crook who's probably going to end up in the clink and that her children are totally spoilt. She doesn't whisper but talks in a low voice and nods gravely when she finishes a sentence. While she's talking I'm looking at her head.

  What does she look like?

  According to Brioney, Charity never got her figure back after having babies and it's probably too late now. She says she thinks I should understand that the relationship between Charity and Angelica has been strained because Angelica has a perfect figure and Charity is jealous. Grave nod.

  She also tells me that there's a good solarium at her gym and I should go there and “get a bit of color to me.”

  I was going to explain that if I went to a solarium I would get blisters and spend the rest of the day frequently passing out. I have very sensitive skin. I was going to tell her that, at best, all I can get is a bit of a beige. I think better of it and just smile instead. People who tan don't understand people who don't, in the same way that people who enjoy jogging don't understand people who don't. Jogging is another activity that gives me blisters and makes me pass out.

  Charity whisks me out the back while Brioney makes a cup of coffee and tells me that Brioney is living in sin with a lazy man who gambles and that he's never going to make an honest woman of her because she won't do the simple things, like cooking a decent meal, that make a man happy.

  She talks in one of those hissy whispery voices with her eyes very wide. She puts her hand on my forearm as she talks so I can't get away.

  She tells me that there's a lot of fuss these days about women's rights, and of course she's all for it, but there are more women than men and if you want a good one, sometimes you have to compromise a little bit on your feminist ideals.

  She tells me that I shouldn't wait too long to have children because they're such treasures and if I don't have kids soon I'll end up old and lonely like Brioney.

  She also tells me that she feels I should understand that the relationship between herself and Angelica has been strained recently and it has nothing to do with weight, whatever Brioney thinks about it.

  They both explained to me in front of Grace in normal voices that they felt it was a tragic thing that happened to Grace because she was so successful in her career and everything, but they had always secretly thought that she only got as far as she did “because she wore short skirts, if you get my meaning.” Grave nod, wide eyes.

  They made furtive glances in Grace's general direction as though they were afraid she might stand up and dispute the matter.

  Because I am eighteen I know a great many things; for example, I know that sticks and stones are indeed very effective mechanisms with which to break bones; however, a few poorly aimed (or sadly, well-aimed) words can have someone's metaphorical eye out and therefore one ought not wave one's words about willy-nilly.

  I told Grace when Brioney and Charity left that I thought her sisters were a pair of gossipy old cows and I hoped they would never come back.

  … … …

  Jan arrives in the early afternoon for Grace's physio. My first lecture is tonight. I'm very nervous.

  I walk through the park with my bag on my back and a fresh, bright, new notepad under my arm.

  There are several exercise areas with wooden equipment and a sign that tells you what you are supposed to do. I have a turn at the balance beam. It's only about a foot off the ground, but I'm pretending it's the high wire at the circus.

  I'm trying to do a drumroll, but I sound more like an out-of-balance ceiling fan, so I do the Jaws suspense music instead.

  I'm thinking it's weird beginning the day at seven o'clock in the night.

  I 'm really looking forward to starting university. I'm a nerd. I'm not ashamed. I have a passion for science fiction. I've had braces. I put up my hand to answer questions. I go to the library. I even peek through my textbooks before the start of term.

  So, I get to the university. There is a huge car park at the front the size of about two football fields, and two paths going down through the buildings. I pick the closest one. There are trees everywhere and students lying about on the grass slapping themselves.

  I'm walking down the path to the lecture theater. I'm early, as every self-respecting nerd should be. There are a few other nerds waiting here too. They're slapping themselves.

  Why are they slapping themselves?

  I put my bag down at my feet and tighten the jumper I've got tied around my waist. I slap my forearm.

  Mosquitoes!

  A little cloud of mosquitoes circles lazily around me.

  The door to the lecture theater opens and people start to come out. I choose a seat up front and I put all my fresh, bright, new colored pens out on the little half-table in front of me.

  The first thing the lecturer tells us is that he's going to have the pleasure of the company of at least seventy percent of us for the same course this time next year, because that's the failure rate.

  “Not I,” says the nerd.

  We have a halftime break. All the other students file out to go to the toilet, or smoke, or chat to each other. I sit at my little desk, underlining the key phrases in purple and turning my bullet points into cheery little stars. I've always taken gr
eat pride in my notes.

  After the break, the lecturer puts up the dates of all the assignments and the chapters we are supposed to have read. I take down the dates and cross-reference them into my diary.

  At the end of the lecture an Asian bloke approaches me. He's smiling and he's nodding. He's got long, thick black hair tied at the nape of his neck.

  I think he says something about can he borrow my notes because he doesn't speak English very well, he's only been here for a short while and he can't keep up with the lecturer. I think he said his name was Hiro, but that could well have been part of the explanation.

  I can feel an enormous radioactive blush coming on, because I can't understand what he's saying, and for some reason I'm finding that intensely embarrassing.

  I can feel the redness rising up my neck and my chin first. Just my neck and chin. Everything else is a nice ordinary ivory. So I pull my collar up to my bottom lip. I'm nodding at him and smiling, like suddenly pulling your shirt up over half your face is a perfectly ordinary way to behave.

  The blush has crept up the back of my neck and over my scalp to my ears. I push my chin out to keep the collar of my shirt over my chin while I let go with my hand. I'm undoing the jumper around my waist. I drop the collar and quickly wrap my jumper over my head so the collar reaches down to my eyebrows and the sleeves are wrapped loosely around my neck.

  Every self-respecting nerd carries a jumper, even in the height of summer. Every nerd knows it's important to be prepared for any eventuality.

  I think he's telling me that he'll find me and give the notes back to me in the next day or two. I don't really know. I'm not concentrating on what he's saying. I'm blushentranced.

  The blush is creeping down my temples and across my cheeks and since I can't put the jumper over my whole face and still maintain even a shred of dignity, I look intently over Hiro's shoulder instead.

  I'm thinking to myself (safe now that I'm looking at something else, therefore he can't see the blush, good old Rachel logic in action) that Hiro is going to run off with my bright, fresh, new notepad with each paragraph written in a different bright, fresh, new color and I'll never see him again. But since it's got only one lot of notes in it (and I'm a nerd who is excited about learning so I've already memorized it all anyway), I give the notes to him. He walks backward away from me still smiling and nodding.