Ghost Child by Caroline Overington

Author:Caroline Overington [Overington, Caroline]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Random House Australia
Published: 2009-12-08T11:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

Lauren Cameron

I wonder if I might begin by asking an impertinent question: how many times have you had sex? I mean, with how many different men? You may not know the answer. Many women these days have no idea. They have to stop and think about it. I can tell you exactly. If you don’t count the last time, then I’ve had sex with nineteen different men. Does that sound like a lot? It depends, I think, on when you were born. If you were born in the 1930s, or even the 1940s, then nineteen lovers probably sounds like more than is decent. Working, as I’ve done, on an Old Timers’ Ward (it’s the Alzheimer’s ward but I can’t help thinking of them as the Old Timers), I’ve met plenty of women who assured me they met the love of their life at a dance hall when they were seventeen, and never again looked at another man. Who can say if they’re telling the truth? Maybe they had a fling when US troops came during the Second World War or something. I don’t know, but I do know this: the rules about women and sex changed around 1970. It was to do with Germaine Greer, apparently, and with the arrival of the Pill.

These days, it’s easy to find women who would happily admit to having nineteen lovers over their lifetime, and maybe they’re not yet done.

I didn’t have sex with nineteen men over a lifetime. I had sex with nineteen men in a very short period of time: in the four years between the ages of thirteen and seventeen. Then, for ten years, I didn’t have any sex at all. It’s not that there was anything special about Number 19. Truth be told, I can’t remember Number 19’s name. I didn’t give up sex because I found the right man. I gave it up because I recognised – finally, and too late – that it wasn’t helping me get where I wanted to go, which was up and out of the Barrett Estate.

Some people are puzzled as to why – not to mention how – a girl of thirteen might embark on a series of sexual relationships. Well, I had no parents: my mother was in prison for the murder of my younger brother; and my father – well, I’ll get to him, but let’s say he was mostly off the scene. When I was a little kid I lived with foster parents and they didn’t really instruct me about men and boys. What I learnt, I learnt from books. My first foster mum, Mrs Islington, used to tell me, ‘Nobody can be lonely if they’ve got a book in their life,’ which is true, but when you get life’s lessons from books – especially the books on Mrs Islington’s shelves – well, real life can be astonishing.

Mrs Islington started me off with Cinderella, and then Snow White, and from there we got through The Secret Garden, What Katy Did and anything by Enid Blyton.

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