Thought Crimes by Tim Richards Read Free Book Online Page B

good laugh, and responded with yarns of their own, but the genuine types were really touched by his tales of a mother who struggled to give him a chance after his father died. When he’s told guests that staff are only free to leave the resort for six weeks every three years, and that admin encourages them to take pay in lieu, they’ve been shocked speechless.
    No one understands what it is to be Australian until they fully grasp the terms of Australian friendliness. For Australians, friendliness is a superstition; a way of defraying the fear of being considered selfish or mean-spirited. To refuse friendliness is much worse than refusing a gift, since refusal is likely to activate the tensions implicit in ‘the friendliness paradox’. The more you try to be sincere, the further you are from true sincerity. If inscrutability is the cliché one attaches to Asians, one ought to approach Australians with an appreciation of their paradoxicality.
    Hizu chooses to see this paradoxicality as a quality worth nurturing. What better than to be someone whose candour generates a sense of mystery?

    He is in the canteen, reading Recollections of Ludowyck B. , when seized by an appealing fragrance. A hand descends to clasp his own. While her fine hair caresses his cheek, Nobuko whispers into his ear.
    â€˜I worked late-shift at the casino with Nori last night. What did you do? He’s after your balls.’
    â€˜He thinks you can stay Japanese and wear Australianness like a mask. And he says that’s what admin expects from us.’
    â€˜He might be right.’
    â€˜In terms of head office, I’m sure he is. But only a cretin would be in this for show. One day, he’ll triple guess himself.’
    Gently squeezing his arm, Nobuko warns Hizu to watch his back.

    Probationary staff are attending their final culture class when the General Manager arrives to ask them to help search for two female singers who’ve managed to leave the entertainer’s annex and enter the casino. Hizu finds himself paired off with Missy, who treats the matter as a grave emergency.
    â€˜Entertainers don’t always maintain a good-faith relationship with the resort and its clientele. Some of them have history with our guests.’
    â€˜They just want to rub shoulders with celebrities in the gaming room,’ Hizu suggests, trying to sound laconic as possible.
    â€˜Well, the guests pay top dollar to make sure their shoulders are only rubbed on request … One bad incident, and all this could vanish like it never happened.’
    If it vanished, would she return to Sweden, or try her luck in Australia?
    â€˜Australia’s not an option. This is Australia now. All that’s worth keeping.’
    He wants to ask, worth keeping for whom?, but even in an intimate moment like this, it’s more than his job’s worth.

    In the year he’s been at the resort, there wouldn’t have been more than thirty unaccompanied female guests, and willowy Suzette is by some distance the youngest, no more than forty or forty-one.
    She travels with a black and white border collie named Max.
    As he pulls back the curtains to show that the casino complex can be seen from her living room, she says that she has no interest in gambling. She expects to play thirty-six holes each of the ten days she’s at the resort.
    â€˜You’ll enjoy Von Nida then. Plays long this time of year, but that adds to the challenge.’
    â€˜Do you like golf ?’
    No one asks obvious questions like that, and he’s unsure how to answer. Though a competent caddy, he’s only played two rounds in his life.
    â€˜I’m interested in what the game represents to people,’ he tells Suzette.
    While Hizu answers her request to pour two whiskies, she tells him she was just about to turn pro when the transitional government outlawed pro tournaments. During the past two decades, she’s played in the States, India,