Screw Loose (18 page)

Chelsea looked quite annoyed. ‘Food and beverages are not sex-specific, Zeynep! I'll have a
very
strong man's coffee then.'

Zeynep hurried off to the kitchen, turned on the jug, then dashed out the back to finish Juliet's teeth. Juliet quite liked getting her teeth cleaned; she wagged her tail. Zeynep wondered how she was going to tell Chelsea it was out of the question that she stay the night.

When she dashed back in, the jug had boiled. She found her father's coffee and one of her mother's best cups with minarets and date palms on it and got out the sugar. Poor Chelsea. She was an only child and lived in the most perfect house in the world, but she had never really found true happiness. Her parents had split up, and she'd fought with her mother. What she really needed now was a caseworker.

Spooning some coffee into a saucepan, Zeynep wondered what to do about the toffee ice-cream. They only had ice-cream for birthdays, but there was baklava in the cupboard. Although it was Mehmet's yet again, and he would go off his head when he found it was missing, a good Muslim family is always hospitable and Chelsea had warned Zeynep many times about being selfish. She got out the cake and put it on one of her mother's
Views of Istanbul
guest plates. The smell of coffee was filling the kitchen as the saucepan on the stove gently rumbled.

‘Where are you?' Chelsea called from the laundry.

‘Coming!' She poured out a little coffee and carefully made her way to the laundry, where Chelsea was staring miserably out the window.

‘May I have another handkerchief?'

Zeynep put the cake and coffee down on the top of the washing machine and rushed off to her bedroom. Chelsea kept you on your toes.

When she came back, Chelsea took the handkerchief and blew very hard. Zeynep rested her head on Chelsea's back.

‘I feel so humiliated by my mother,' Chelsea moaned.

‘Talking about me like that behind my back! I don't think she likes me, Zeynep.'

‘Of course she likes you. It's a mother instinct. They like you even when you're crabby.'

‘Is calling your own child cheap a mother's instinct, Zeynep?'

‘You're really expensive, Chelsea,' said Zeynep. ‘Here's the coffee. We don't have ice-cream. Is baklava okay?'

‘Baklava? That's a type of ammunition in this house.'

Zeynep giggled. Perhaps Chelsea was cheering up. But then she moaned again.

‘Craig Ryan in the spare room! He goes to raves. He throws peanuts in the air and catches them in his mouth!'

‘That's quite clever. Matilda must have taught him.'

‘Don't mention her name!'

‘But you really like Craig, underneath,' Zeynep said, trying to sound caring.

‘I find him typical of his type – eye candy, but ocker eye candy.'

‘If your mother is with his father, it would be illegal to marry him now anyway,' Zeynep explained confidently.

‘
What?
Who said anything about marrying Craig Ryan? Are you mad? I never intend to marry.' Chelsea burst into loud sobs. ‘What put that idea into your head?'

‘Just… well, you've always wanted to improve him. I thought you were getting him ready for marriage.'

‘Marriage, maybe. But not to
me
! Craig Ryan has bad grammar. Craig Ryan bites his nails. Craig Ryan thinks Matilda Grey is attractive! For heaven's sake, Zey.' Chelsea took a sip of the coffee. ‘I caught them down by the river doing it!'

Zeynep was confounded. Surely that couldn't really have happened? And on public property?

‘Zeynep, do you have a spare room?'

She panicked. What should she say?

‘I suppose
you're
going to reject me now?'

‘No, of course not. It's just… well, it's just that they remember the time I came home from your place drunk. And they don't like anyone staying.'

‘Well we won't tell them, will we? Do you want to force me to take a hotel room?'

‘No. But we don't have a spa or anything.'

‘Humble surroundings don't worry me.'

‘Well … there isn't a spare bed.'

‘There's yours. We will sleep head to toe.' Chelsea looked at her pleadingly. ‘You're not afraid Georgia will get jealous?'

‘No!'

‘There's a long tradition of harems in your parents' country.

Imagine it's centuries ago and you've been forced into a harem with me.' Chelsea blew her nose again.

Zeynep thought about that and held back a shudder. Her parents wouldn't like this at all. She would have to hide Chelsea in the laundry 'til her family had gone to sleep, then sneak her up the hall and into her bedroom.

‘You could sleep in that cupboard,' she suggested, indicating the one in which she'd hidden Angelo.

‘In a broom cupboard? Me?'

Zeynep took the handkerchief from Chelsea's hand and dabbed away at Chelsea's cheeks. ‘I'm sorry. It must be very hard, but my parents are so strict.'

‘I may as well sleep under a bridge. I'm homeless, and I'll just have to get used to it. I can sleep in a doorway, risk my life. I'm sure that sleazebags wouldn't be interested in an attractive girl sleeping in a doorway.'

Zeynep gasped. ‘No! Please stay! We'll sleep head to toe,' she said, and immediately regretted it.

EIGHTY-TWO
BEDROOMS

I
N THE ARRIVALS
lounge of Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi, Georgia Delahunty felt one thing above all: the absence of Tamsin Court-Cookson. Tamsin hadn't been allowed to come to India with her after all. Her mother had put the kybosh on the idea for security reasons; she was worried about abduction. The daughter of the Deputy Prime Minister had limited freedoms.

‘We'll text every day, and Facebook,' Tamsin had promised.

Something magical was happening between Tamsin and Georgia. They always had fun together. Tamsin, in her sarcastic way, turned even the most ordinary things into a joke, and she was a great rowing teacher. Under her guidance, Georgia was already an emergency in the school rowing team – not bad after only two weeks' attendance.

As a romantic little farewell gift, Georgia had presented Tamsin with a wooden bookmark she'd been working on after school, with Tamsin's name burnt into the wood. It was a fine piece of pokerwork. Tamsin had kissed it.

The humidity smothered Georgia as she stood in the customs queue. She pulled out her mobile. Fortunately, her father had paid for international roaming. ‘Arrived hot kisses George.' She pocketed her phone.

Georgia's parents were waiting for her in the arrivals hall. They stood at a distance from the crowd, protected by their servants.

The shoving throng parted as her mother approached and placed a garland of scented flowers around Georgia's neck. Georgia sneezed explosively as she kissed them both and, surrounded by the servants, they made their way to the waiting car.

Her mother and father had come dressed as if they were going to a fancy-dress party: her mother in a turquoise sari, with diamond rings flashing on her fingers and a pearl stud, set in diamonds, in her nose; her father in a bright-red coat, with several strings of pearls around his neck. Some people bowed as they passed. There were even photographers. It was ridiculous.

The chauffeur stood rigidly to attention as Georgia climbed into the back of the car, a shiny Rolls Royce. A pressing crowd and camera flashes disturbed her as the car drew slowly away.

Her parents said little, but they smiled and waved several times.

Attached to the back of the seat in front of her was a medallion of a dancing Indian couple. The man, who must have been a god, had pale blue skin and dreamy eyes. The woman was beautiful, and her extraordinary breasts suggested implants.

Her mother noticed Georgia looking, and explained that the woman was a milkmaid. The bloke was Krishna. She didn't explain why he'd gone blue.

Georgia's phone vibrated. She flipped it open. ‘Miss u heaps sizzling kisses too.' She flipped it closed and smiled.

‘Now Georgia,' her mother said, taking her hand as the car moved carefully into the cacophony of the city, ‘this isn't Australia. India will shock you. Close your eyes if anything offends you.'

After the bland orderliness of the plane, India was a threeringed circus. Her parents looked straight ahead, but Georgia had a policy, inaugurated after watching
Texas Chainsaw
Massacre
when she was ten, of never screaming or covering her eyes when she saw anything terrible.

‘How are your Aunty Pam and Uncle Brendon?' her mother asked.

‘They're praying for me.'

Her parents laughed.

She remembered the family prayer for her safety in a pagan country. ‘You know they worship cows,' her aunt had said, shaking her head in despair. If only she could see the blue man and the amazing lady in the little panel in front of Georgia.

‘What do they believe will happen to you?' her mother asked.

‘I suppose they think I'll turn Hindu.'

‘What a wonderful idea,' said her father, laughing again.

‘Now Georgia, are you enjoying your new school?'

‘It's great,' she answered. She decided not to mention too much about Tamsin. ‘I'm doing a school-based apprenticeship with Mr Deare, the maintenance man. He's really excellent.

We're putting a roof up soon.'

‘Jolly exciting,' said her father.

The car now slowed to a halt in front of a cow, which was eating something from the road. As they waited, Georgia saw a little girl squatting in a gutter, sifting slowly and meticulously through a pile of refuge – mostly discarded cardboard and plastic, by the looks of it. The child appeared to be searching for something. Georgia looked away then glanced back, and the child was chewing.

She said nothing to her parents as the car moved on – this was their country, not hers.

Finally they reached a freeway. The car sped up, and the purring engine and the blurred scenery beyond the windows lulled her parents to sleep. Then Georgia's eyes closed, too, and her brain shuffled images: people on the plane; Tamsin's face when they'd said goodbye; Tamsin explaining angrily that her mother wouldn't let her travel; the little girl squatting on the road sorting refuse.

These images formed a disturbing loop to a soundtrack of honking and far-off shouts, which was finally broken by a distant voice. Her father's. ‘Are you thirsty, Georgia?'

She opened her eyes. She was thirsty, but she shook her head. She just wanted to get into a bed. The chauffeur must have understood what her father had said, because the car suddenly swerved towards a roadside vendor and he got out and bought three cans of Dr Pepper, passing them through the window without making eye contact. A crowd gathered around the parked car and watched them drink.

‘Ah, delicious Dr Pepper,' her father said when he had finished.

‘It's very hot in India,' her mother murmured, ‘but the rooms in the fort are quite cool. It's built on a hill and catches the afternoon breeze.'

The car started again, and her parents returned to their slumber. The three empty Dr Pepper cans rolled around on the floor. Georgia stared out the window; fields and villages rolled by.

About an hour later, they came to a stretch of road along which whole families seemed to be living in small tents. Each family had a pile of rocks, which they were breaking with little hammers. As the car slowed again, Georgia watched the women smashing rocks the size of her fist into rocks the size of matchboxes. Children, too, were working with their mothers.

Slowly, family after family rolled past her window, heads down, hammers beating. Georgia now felt a kind of panic.

This was so strange, so unlike anything in Australia.

Her parents began to stir and apologised for having nodded off again. They were approaching the fort. ‘There it is! The ruin on the hill.' Her mother pointed.

‘Ruin!' her father scoffed.

‘It's four hundred years old,' her mother said.

The fort looked as big as the Sydney Opera House. It was impossible to believe it had anything at all to do with her. Four or five stories high, it was constructed from brown-and-white stone and was surrounded by a wall. Huge gates in the wall swung wide as the car approached, and two men ran to close them as the car passed through. The men stopped and saluted, and the car drove between two stone elephants.

‘Home at last,' her father said, and pointed into the distance.

‘We once used that lake as our landing field. Your grandfather had a seaplane. It was much faster, but it became ridiculously expensive to maintain, and I had to let something go. The fort is a huge responsibility to maintain.'

‘All that is the fort?' Georgia asked.

‘Eighty-two bedrooms,' said her mother.