Slights by Kaaron Warren

there and couldn't figure out what she meant. I had left-over things, a tin of beetroot in a bowl, some Chinese, some Thai. There was some bolognaise I made myself which was pretty bad but tasted okay on toast.
      Maria left the kitchen and I heard her and Peter muttering. I followed; he was tidying the lounge room, using her technique of piling things into drawers and shoving them into cupboards. He was moving more quickly than I'd ever seen him move, clutching up armfuls of my things: bras, books, shoes, undies, magazines.
      "I can't believe you, Steve. They'll be here any minute. Where's the drinks, at least?"
      I opened Dad's liquor cabinet. It was something we'd never touched; Mum used to take the glasses and bottles out every now and then and dust the shelves, but everything went back where it came from. She never took to alcohol, preferring something sweet and tasty, lemonade or juice.
      The times I drink are always troublesome.
      "There's heaps here," I said. There was vodka, scotch, rum, brandy. And tonnes of wine under the house. Dad used to have visitors sometimes, when we were all asleep. I loved the comfort of male voices, a low hum which would wake me, not because it was loud, but because it was continuous.
      I never saw Dad bring home new bottles, but the old ones never seemed to empty, either.
      These were the bottles I indicated.
      "You're fuckin' joking, Steve." Peter swearing was pathetic; he did it so rarely he actually pronounced the "g". Maria stomped about, sweating, red, freaking out. I couldn't figure out what the big deal was. I'd seen a party. Everything was a mess and the bottles were half-empty. It seemed easy to me.
      Maria said, "We'll just have to keep them in here and the kitchen. Oh, God, what's the toilet like?"
      I shrugged. "It's okay. The walls are pale purple and the tiles are white, but I don't mind it." She stared at me. I wondered if she was thinking, "Thank God we live across town."
    She said, "I mean, how filthy is it?"
      "Well, I usually do my shits down here, but it should be okay. I've been constipated lately."
      Peter said, "What's the yard like? Maybe we can put them out there."
      "It's looking good. I've got jasmine in one corner. Won't be long before I do the next batch." I liked to dig for hours on end, sleep, eat, buy my needs from Mrs Beattie at the corner shop. I really enjoyed entering that place. It was dark, cool, small, the goodies all lined up like a marching band. I loved picking things up and putting them down, just out of place, until Mrs Beattie said, "Can I help you?" as if I hadn't worked there for three years, from the tender age of fifteen. Her arms were fatter than ever, and she hadn't bought a new dress in years, so you could see a tight line of strain pressing into her flesh.
      The thing she hated most was the way I bought lollies. I had half the kids doing it too; they had a fine instinct for what irritated an adult.
      "I'll have a red traffic light. And a green traffic light. And another red traffic light. And a yellow traffic light. And a green traffic light," until my bag was full. I don't even like lollies; I gave them to all the sugar-starved children.
      While I worked in the backyard, I didn't have to think about the bad stuff, like Mum, or not being able to drive, or losing my courier job, or everyone hating me. I thought about the yard and how I would fix it. I kept finding things which reminded me of Dad; I thought of him a lot. I don't know why; it was stuff I'd never seen before; so many things, so many. All of them things precious to men. There was not a woman's thing amongst them. Nothing to remind me of Mum.

    People started to pile in to my house. "I'm so sorry," they said fifty times each. "Your mother and your father, too."
      I wanted to be outside, digging.
      People muttered about the house, picking up our things. "Such a terrible loss, when the father died," I heard them say. "I