The Blinding Light (2 page)

My inner smarty-pants was laughing at me. Desperate was an understatement.

Mrs. Martha West pursed her lips again. “Do you have any sort of cleaning experience at all?”

I gave a small cough. “I’ve been cleaning up after my sisters since I was old enough to use a flannel, ma’am. I’m the oldest, Mrs. West. My mother was a single mum, so I was left in charge a lot. I can do any sort of household chore you want. I’ve done cleaning in my jobs, too. Not houses, but I’ve cleaned bars and shops and offices and trucks and even pets. You tell me what you want done, and as long as you’re paying me and it won’t give me AIDS or rabies, I’ll clean it.”

That seemed to meet with her approval. She shuffled aside my appalling record of employment and picked up a manila folder. The folder seemed to hold only a couple of pieces of paper, but whatever was inside was unpleasant from the looks of it. I tried to see what the label on the front said, but I could only make out the word “Stanford.”

The file was closed and put neatly on her desk, perfectly aligned with the edge. Mrs. Martha West leaned forward on her elbows and addressed me earnestly. “Mr. Manning—Jake. I started cleaning houses when I was fourteen. I grew up in an orphanage and there wasn’t much else that was available to a girl in those days. I’ve cleaned houses for the rich, for the famous, for the obnoxious, for the prejudiced, for the offensive, for the crude, and even for royalty. I’ve put up with attitudes and rudeness my whole life. Don’t get me wrong, most of my employers were extremely nice. Those people are now my clients and they are unfailingly polite and lovely. But there are some out there who are just… angry with the whole world.”

She tapped the manila folder and leaned back in her seat. I was confused and unsure how to answer. But the woman continued her story without input from my side of the desk. “I’ve worked hard to get where I am. I’ve been an honest employer to those who are easily taken advantage of and I’ve built my business with a reputation for excellence. I have over two hundred women on my books who can clean for me
—
some men too, but mostly women. And not one of those women will take on this client for me.”

“Oh.” It wasn’t the most intelligent response, but I was baffled.

“Yes. Word has gotten around about his attitude and none of my regulars will have a bar of him anymore. He has gone through dozens of housekeepers, eight this year alone. Mr. Stanford has been a client of Housekeepers Inc. for over ten years. Word gets around, Mr. Manning. No one is game to take him on. So I’m interviewing you. You sound desperate. Are you willing to hear more?”

Gulp
. “Ahh…. What’s wrong with the… ahhh… client?”

Mrs. Martha West was straightforward. “He is rude, churlish, ungrateful, ill-tempered, arrogant, fussy, and completely anal about his house. But he pays good money. If you take on this job you will be required for six hours a day, five days a week. Mr. Stanford will have you come into his house and do the required tasks while he is at work, so you don’t need to ever see him, but he is irritable and will be extremely rude in his instructions and requirements. Perfection is demanded and he will not be slow to tell you when you have failed. Are you still interested?”

I smiled slowly at Mrs. Martha West. “Them brass balls you asked about? I have them here. You want me to clean a house and put up with shit flying my way? Hell! Sounds like my childhood all over again. When do you want me to start?”

I
WAS
given a uniform on the spot and directed to Tammy’s desk to fill out my paperwork. Tammy seemed to be a nice girl—younger than me by several years but with a bright, bubbly smile. She fished some papers from a file, then handed me a pen with a cheery smile and an apology.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize Mrs. West was interviewing this morning so I didn’t have the forms out ready for you. I’m usually better organized than this. Just start filling these papers in and I’ll get you an employee record going.” She flashed her dimples at me again and began to type at the computer on her desk. She was sweet and cute, but as I’ve mentioned before, I’m gay, and therefore her cuteness did nothing for me. She just wasn’t my type.

Some people have a type, some people don’t. My mother, for example, has a type. Old and boozy. I guess that’s being a bit judgmental. I’ve seen her with young and boozy guys too. The common denominator in all her men? Free with their alcohol.

Mum tried hard but she seemed to have given up caring lately, which bothered me some, but not as much as it should bother a completely loving son. I guess I had cleaned up after her so many times that some of the love got bogged down in other smelly stuff.

My type, however, was less clearly defined. I didn’t fall neatly into a gay, stereotypical characterization either. I was too big to be a twink—and at twenty-six I was rapidly becoming too old as well. I was not big and hairy enough to be a bear and I was not a gym-rat either. Poor people can’t afford the gym. And I was not a jock by any stretch of the imagination—I don’t do well at team sports of any kind. I was just Jake – average build, average-colored hair and eyes, average intelligence, average looks.

So my type had really become whoever was interested in me when I was interested in sex. And then there was that added layer of tops and bottoms. My good mate Davo is a top, 100 percent of the time with no exceptions to the rule. Ever. He has a standard pickup line: “Are you a bottom? Yes? Hi, I’m Dave.”

I guess that stops any disappointments later on during the relationship—the whole fifteen minutes of it, anyway. Davo has been topping his way through life since I’ve known him.

Me? I’m a little more flexible. Versatile, some people call it. But I think that’s the most fun about being gay, you can switch it up however you want. I know this guy down at The Tav where I work; he’s about fifty but still pretty attractive. He has this act going—limp wrist, daahling, sweetie-pie-sugar-cakes type thing. He likes wearing business shirts buttoned to the collar with cardigans, and on most Fridays he’s available if you want a quick fuck in the toilets. At the first suggestion of a wink from a prospective hookup, he’s off his stool and bent over the toilet in one of the cubicles, ready for action.

He’d given me the green light since I started working there three months before. But I just hadn’t been interested. I think he accepted it, and we had ourselves a good chat some nights. He confessed to me recently that he’s been in a relationship with a guy for nearly twenty-seven years. I was surprised and asked him if it was an open relationship with multiple partners. Gary smiled and told me no, but he had needs that his partner can’t fulfill. Namely topping. Gary told me that in his relationship he always tops because his lover refuses to. So they have a rule—Gary gets his jollies on a Friday night with whomever he wants, and for the other six nights a week he goes home and fucks the hell out of his man.

Not exactly my cup of tea, but it takes all kinds, right? For me, position is more about emotion and taking turns. Some nights I feel angry and just want to top the heck out of a willing man, other nights I like it when he takes care of me.

But whatever my type (or nontype), any person with a vagina and breasts was just not it. So I smiled at Tammy and didn’t try to initiate conversation. Unfortunately, she was a talker.

“Welcome to Housekeepers Inc.!” She flashed her dimples at me again. I sighed internally.

“Thanks.” I didn’t bother to look up from the standard employee information form I was filling out. This didn’t stop her.

“I’m Tammy, by the way.”

Perhaps if I just don’t answer, she will shut up. One… two… three… fff
—

“What’s your name?”
Oh, jeez.
The girl didn’t even make four seconds!

“Jake.”

“Jake or Jacob? I really like Jacob. If I have a son I want to call him Jacob. It’s such a nice name.”

One… two… thr
—

“Do you live around here?” Her voice was actually quite annoying, now that I came to think about it.

“No.”

“I live over in Thornlie. Do you live over that way?”
Subtle, thy name is Tammy.

I thrust the first piece of paper at her in desperation, the one with my details on it. Perhaps if she were typing she couldn’t talk as well. I began to fill out the taxation forms.

“Cool. Thanks. Oh, I see you live down near Fremantle. That’s nice. I’d love to live in that area. I’m glad you’ve got neat handwriting. You wouldn’t believe some of the forms I have to decipher.”
Dang! How do women manage to do two things at once? Talking and typing?

“I’ve worked here for three years now, so I guess you could say I’ve seen a lot of forms filled out. Lots of people come and work for Housekeepers Inc. just for a couple of months until they get another job, but some have been here for ages. The hours are good and Mrs. West pays you decent wages. Lots of non-English speaking people work here. So, does Mrs. West have you on board for the Peterson Tower job?”
Holy fuck!
She was like one of those yap-yap-yappy dogs.

“No.”

“So what are you going to be doing?”
Yap, yap, yap….

“Cleaning.”

“Which contract, do you know?”
For God’s sake people! Control your animals!

“Stanford.”

The silence from the other side of the room was deafening. I looked up from putting in my bank account details for their payroll to see Yappy Tammy staring at me in horror. True, bone-deep horror. Picture an unwitting person coming upon a murder scene. Picture walking in on your best friend and lover doing the dirty. Picture Paris Hilton realizing her bag is not real Prada but a Chinese rip-off.

I had managed to silence her completely. Her mouth worked for a moment, as if it were going to form a word or two, but nothing emerged. Obviously Mr. Stanford was as bad as Mrs. West portrayed.

She was frozen for a while before she almost whispered, “Stanford? No way!”

I shrugged and she looked ready to cry. “But… but… you seem like such a nice guy and if you go and do Mr. Stanford’s house you’ll be out of here in three weeks! And I just met you.”

I didn’t know whether to be offended or not. She thought I was nice?
Ha!
And she thought I would only be able to hack three weeks of rudeness?
Wimp!
In the end I decided to address this silly thought she had about me liking her and nip it in the bud. I handed her the last of the papers and leaned over so I was almost touching her ear. “I’m gay. And I’ll bet you the last five dollars I have in my wallet that I’ll last longer than three weeks. See you around, doll.”

I walked out the door of Housekeeping Inc.’s offices clutching my uniform and the address of my client. I shook my head at calling Tammy a doll. The endearment had just slipped out. I called my youngest sister that all the time. I needed to stop that or else my big-bad-and-gay image might hit the dirt.

T
HE
FOLLOWING
morning, I rode my bike to Mr. Stanford’s house with my uniform tucked neatly in my backpack so that I could change into it once I arrived. His house wasn’t too far from mine, but miles apart in terms of grandeur. Whereas my humble abode, which I shared with three other people, was a three-bedroom flat on the third floor with a view of nothing, and was located on a very busy highway, his home was a sprawling heritage house on a huge block only a couple of streets from the river. The house was one of those old 1930s houses with a veranda wrapped around the entire house so that in winter you could pull your rocking chair into the warming sun, but in summer you could find the ocean breeze.

The properties on either side of the house had been bulldozed and rebuilt into stylish and expensive two-story monstrosities, but Mr. Stanford’s house sat regally between them, keeping true and simple.

A small white picket fence enclosed the front yard, which was full of flowers in neat borders and a freshly trimmed lawn of bright green. A large jacaranda tree was perched between the footpath and the road, and another leafy green tree I couldn’t identify was planted in the center of the front yard, providing ample shade to the surroundings, which made the place feel cool and welcoming.

To one side of the house there was a cream cemented driveway, leading to a new, fully enclosed garage, so I leaned my bike against the fence and sat on the driveway in the shade to wait for the current-but-departing housekeeper to arrive and show me around. Mrs. West had advised me that a Mrs. Lena Lee would be showing me the ropes for the next two days, and then I was on my own.

Mrs. Lee turned out to be an older Chinese lady who spoke in broken English and had a perpetual frown. I wondered if the frown was permanent or a result of Mr. Stanford. She drove a beat-up old Camry, which she parked in the driveway and exited before giving me a glare that was worthy of a gold medal at the Frowning Olympics.

“
Mista
S’anford no like oil on
hees
driveway, so make sure you have car that no leak.” Well, hello and good morning to you too, Mrs. Lena Lee.