Free The Girl Who Passed for Normal by Hugh Fleetwood

I’m quite used to flying, you know. I flew out to SouthAmerica two years ago. My other daughter’s out there. She bought me a ticket.”
    David nodded and looked amused. “Good‚” he said. He cleared his throat. “I guess you find it hot here after England.”
    The fat, sweating woman said, “We’re having a very good summer in England.”
    David nodded again and said, “Good.”
    “Did anything happen today?” Barbara said.
    David shook his head. “I made one brilliant suggestion and told two dirty jokes.”
    “What do you do, David?” Barbara’s mother said.
    “It’s sort of difficult to explain.”
    “Well, I expect I’ll be capable of understanding.”
    “I try to teach computers,” David said. “You see, you can teach a computer to say —” he paused, grinned, and resumed in a monotone — ‘All — Jews — blacks — homosexuals — and — intellectuals — are — wicked —’ but you can’t get a computer to put that sentence together by itself, say it meaningfully . That’s what I’m trying to do.”
    Barbara sighed.
    *
    Later David said, “Your mother doesn’t approve of me.”
    “You didn’t expect her to, did you? You tried your hardest to make her disapprove.”
    “I don’t see why not. I don’t disapprove of her.”
    “But you want her to disapprove of you.”
    “Yes, I guess I do. It makes me feel — wicked. It amuses me!”
    “You were behaving very childishly.”
    “Oh, fuck off.”
    The month passed, very hot and uncomfortable.
    Whenever David was with Barbara’s mother he tried to amuse her, but she was not amused. Barbara tried to excuse David to her mother, but her mother always said, “I think David’s very nice.”
    “You might think he’s very nice but you don’t approve of him, do you?” Barbara said.
    “I don’t approve of him for you. He’s not your type.”
    “Who is the right type for me?”
    “Howard was.”
    “Howard’s dead.”
    “There are other Howards in the world.”
    “I don’t want another Howard.”
    Her mother sniffed. “It’s your funeral.” She sounded quite satisfied.
    Ten days after her mother had gone, Barbara received a telegram from a hospital in London: “Have had heart attack. Please come home. Mother.”
    She phoned the hospital. “Yes,” the doctor said, “your mother’s very ill.”
    “I don’t know what to do,” Barbara told David.
    “Well, you have to go home, don’t you?” David said. Then, seeing her look, “Oh for God’s sake.”
    *
    That evening she said, “David, I’ve been thinking. You wouldn’t like to go to the Emersons’ while I’m away, would you?”
    “What am I going to do with the girl? I can’t see myself dancing.”
    “You could teach her to read.”
    “She really can’t read?”
    “I don’t know. I think she can read the words, but she can’t put them together to make sense of them.”
    “Exactly my line of work, you mean.”
    “Well it is, isn’t it?”
    “When am I going to do my work? And what happens when there are my meetings?”
    “It’s only for two hours a day. And your meetings are always over by three, at the latest. Anyway, I’ll probably be back before your next round.”
    “How much does the woman pay?”
    “Ten dollars an hour.”
    David nodded. “Well, I guess it might be interesting. Field work, sort of.”
    “Then you’ll do it?”
    “It depends if those two ladies want me, doesn’t it?”
    “Oh, they’ll want you. I think they both liked you.”
    “Perhaps Catherine doesn’t want to learn to read.”
    “I don’t understand why she can’t. She’s so very slightly retarded. And she can chatter in Italian to the housekeeper, and watch the television quite happily.”
    David laughed. “Oh, she’s sly. I’ll try and give you some answers when you come back.”
    “Will you miss me?”
    “Well, I guess I’ll be wearing the same clothes till you come back, and the house will get sort of dirty, and I’ll be spending my hard-earned