narratorAUSTRALIA Volume One

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  Things can get a bit heated when we argue. Mostly over silly things and I’m sure every couple argues. Mother used to argue and my father would just retire to the shed. He loved that shed. Barry, my mother would shout, you can’t hide out there forever. I tried to hide in my room. Mother would stomp around the house for a bit then she’d go quiet and father would come inside and act like nothing had happened. We all did. If you don’t talk about it, it doesn’t exist. That policy kept the family going.

  I think every married couple has their ups and downs. Though I’ve not heard the neighbours. They must fight quietly. I’m sure John loves me although he never actually says it these days. He used to say Marj, I love you. But now he mostly keeps himself to himself and that dog. I call it dog but he is all over it with lovey dovey talk. Smoodle he calls it. It makes me sick the way he goes on about that dog. I said as much and he said I was incapable of loving anything. I love you John I said, but he’d gone out the door with that dog by then and he didn’t hear. I don’t like to stew when we row. What’s done is done and so I made him a nice dinner. But he didn’t come back till late. The dog had it in the end. Good for something I suppose. It never liked me from the start. It would cower away from me and seemed a bit skittish. John would say, it will get to know you, just give it time. I found it an annoyance more than anything. Always hanging around.

  I said it was not to sit on our bed, but John just ignored that request. We had to take it to the vet when it started to limp. The vet said for the princely sum of $400 that it had a sprain, probably from falling down stairs or something. It didn’t bark much, but it must have annoyed the neighbours because we found it one day tied to our fence half dead in the hot sun. John took it to the vet but they said it was just too weak, heat exhaustion or something. Vet said we had to make a decision. They do it with a needle apparently, just a little prick and it’s all over. John took it home in a blanket. That’ll have to go out with the rubbish I said, meaning the blanket, but he took it to mean the dog and we had a spat in the car. I said I meant the blanket and he said he knew bloody well what I meant. He’s always seeing things that aren’t there. And usually at my expense.

  I’ve never been good with animals. They just don’t like me. I was given a little bird once but it died of fright mother said. It had a very sorry life in that little cage. It lost all its feathers. Stress the man at the pet shop said and asked did we have a cat. Because birds can be quite bothered about cats taunting them through the bars. Brings on stress and then they pull their feathers out. No we don’t have a cat mother said and she looked at me as if it were my fault. Then one of my aunts gave me a kitten. That didn’t last. We found it hanging in a tree and the boys around the corner got the daylights knocked out of them for that prank. John said a dog wasn’t a good idea. It’s for the best I said.

  It’s buried in the back garden.