‘Does it? I can’t smell anything,’ I replied, when I obviously should have just said, ‘Okay.’
‘It smells of sex in here, it’s putrid,’ Elsie muttered, and closed the door as she left.
Confused, I spent more time than I should have sniffing every corner of and item in my room, trying to detect this apparent fragrance of fornication. My nose was powerful; I was the one Mum usually asked if she wanted confirmation of mould, or dust, or bushfire, or expired milk. It found nothing. I smelt my own body as best I could, and while it was a little stale, it was notthat, or anything that would have been picked up from half a room away. All the while, a sinking dread set in, a certainty that I had been found out, that Elsie had somehow discovered the truth about what Fran and I had done the night before. But that was impossible, and anyway, I had done nothing wrong.
We never had the sex talk in our house, not that I remember. My parents relied on school to cover that part of our education, and the entirety of our Catholic teachings on the subject constituted one health lesson about life-threatening STIs and the inevitability of teenage pregnancy for those who made bad choices. The boys and girls of our grade were split up for the class, and it was impressed upon us young women that sex was something that happenedtous, more than something we could actively participate in. It was something to hold close, to not hand over until you were really sure, and if you handed it over, you were worth less after that – unless you married that first person, I suppose. The boys were taught to put condoms on bananas; I do not think shame featured so heavily on their curriculum. Different playing fields, yet again.
In the shower, I puzzled over the conundrum, and it stayed in my mind as I dressed, and took myself upstairs. Dad was sitting on the lounge, comfortable with his cup of tea and the news. Mum was chopping vegetables for a salad at the counter.
‘I couldn’t find the smell you were talking about,’ I said, hoping to ease her worries of a malodorous failure on my behalf, hoping that was all this was about.
My room was always untidy, but it was also very clean. I wanted the air between us to be clean, too.
‘Nora!’ she said in shock – an admonishment, a warning.
‘Is it getting musty down there?’ Dad chimed in. ‘You should run the air-conditioning for an hour or two to dry it out – it’s the dampest room in the house. I don’t think the builder put great insulation in the walls when we had it built in, to be honest. He gave us the best quote, but I think he cut some corners.’
‘No, it’s not damp,’ I replied, unsure of what I should or should not say next.
‘We bought the dehumidifier last year, remember?’ Elsie added, explaining everything and nothing to Dad.
‘So, what’s the smell then? Has something died? I hope we don’t have rats again – this place was overrun with them when we first bought it, wasn’t it, Els? But we’ve been getting regular pest treatment every year, so if there are rats I’ll be asking for my money back, and a free service, at the very least.’
Still, Elsie did not elaborate further. Dad had turned from the television to our conversation, and I did not know how to avoid answering a question. I did not know how to shut up.
‘Mum thinks it smells like sex, which is a weird thing for a person to think a room smells like, and I haven’t had sex in there recently, so I have no idea what might be causing the smell,’ I blurted out.
If I had not been holding the full attention of my parents before this response, I certainly was afterwards.
‘Nora, don’t be so foul,’ said Elsie, turning away as though she could not bear to look at me.
‘What do you mean by “recently”?’ Dad asked, at nearly the exact same time.
‘You’re the one who said it smelled like that, not me,’ I said, choosing to reply to the less awkward of their responses.
Mum looked at Dad, Dad looked at Mum, and they continued communicating whatever they needed to communicate to one another in increasingly tense silence. I waited for someone to break it, and when no one did, I tried to do it myself.
‘Can I help you with the salads?’ I asked, and Elsie looked at me as though I had suggested adding bodily fluids to the balsamic dressing.
‘You can get out of my sight, and come back when you’re ready to apologise for speaking to your father and me like that,’ she said, clutching the salad bowl in her arms.
I looked to Dad, who would not meet my eyes, his own back on the TV as though nothing had transpired. He would not have my back, I understood; he never could when it counted. That was their deal: he worked and lived the frictionless life he wanted; she was in control of everything under this roof, including me. It was little wonder Luke and Olivia had left as soon as they did. And so I went back downstairs and stayed in my room, racking my brain as to how she knew about what I had shared with Fran, when all the other times I had done it, she hadn’t had a clue. It was suffocating, the constant surveillance and judgement – to have someone seemingly know all, and understand none of it.
I could not stop ruminating, frozen that way, still in my bed when I heard Mum placing plates on the counter, even when I knew they must be eating without me, even when dessert must have ended, even when the sun had set. Missing out was my punishment, and I accepted it. That night I scrubbed my room from top to bottom, culled my wardrobe, sorted my bookshelf, had an everything shower, and still could not rid myself of the feeling of being unclean.
20
Christmas Eve
The household is slow to rise, not quite ready to face any lingering contempt; better to let it settle like dust so we can ignore it again. I delay my appearance upstairs for as long as I can, but when it is clear that everyone else is together, I find myself joining them, on autopilot, not in control of my body. It is natural to want to be with them, still my default setting.
In the living room, Luke is laying out the Christmas puzzle pieces on the table, and Olivia is searching the television cabinet for ourIt’s a Wonderful LifeDVD. Even my parents have progressed past the use of DVDs, but they keep the player for this one day of the year.
Elsie is drinking coffee at the bench, a plastic bag in front of her that I know contains a new set of pyjamas for each of us. She is already wearing hers – green satin with a cream trim, and her face looks untroubled, almost relaxed. I am always struck by her beauty, an ongoing refutation of everything I am being told to feel about aging from the targeted ads on my phone. Maeve is in her high chair, eating chopped fruit. The mango smells like sweet sunshine, and I let myself enjoy the scent and the calm of the scene. It may be easier to recall memories filled with friction, but perhaps that is perceptual laziness on my behalf; perhaps I need to work harder to store more moments like this.
‘Nora, your posture is terrible. You need to start lifting some weights; scoliosis runs in the family, you know,’ Luke says, looking over from the dining table.
I straighten my back; he is not wrong, and the tone of his voice is. . . comradely. It is almost as if my verbal freak-out earned me a modicum of his respect, which is convenient and truly messed up. Elsie begins to fuss, and the morning moves forward, stillness adjourned. Somehow, Dad being hospitalised for a heart attack–like panic episode has not deterred us from our schedule of rigidly planned holiday festivities. Change the schedule, are you mad? Dad is taking it slightly easier than he would otherwise, staying seated on the couch while the rest of us get moving, but no one seems to want to mention anything beyond that. It is a new day, and there will no doubt be new grievances on which everyone can focus. But then, here I am focusing on the fact that other people tend to focus on grievances. She is a dirty hypocrite, folks. I think about bad phone calls, and time, and how I should look for the good even half as much as I look for the bad.
