Vera Returns To Marta City (Ch.11a) : Vera Talks To Her Father

Vera had some time today. Her sudden return from the space station to ground duties at the Marta City MIOST headquarters was a shock, a very big shock! Her career had suddenly nosedived, straight back down to the home planet, but the bigger shock was that she was alone again, without the physical comfort of a man, so recently discovered. Because of that greater loss she was buttressed from the distress of her demotion and the black marking of her career progress through life. Without having tasted love she would have felt the career shock far more.

There were small immediate compensations however. The Organisation’s staffing organisers had been unable to ready an immediate position for her at the time point of her return. She had been told to wait at home for “a few days” until a position was allocated, and surprisingly given the circumstances of her return, generously, she was allowed a basic wage for not working during the period of transition. She was still due to take the continued exams of her level. She had missed one or two exam targets while in space, partly because of the heavy workload she had encountered, but also, she had had to admit, because of the study time she had missed while basking in the sunshine of Luvius. The “old” Vera would have used this opportunity to do some serious revision, but the “new” Vera seemed to have new priorities. She could no longer motivate herself to the same degree as before. When she studied she daydreamed, when she entered her console’s education packages she found she became likely to drowse and she ended up fighting sleep. She could only manage short bursts of study, interspersed with long periods of daydreaming, or long flights of fancy through the films or entertainments of the Vidnet.

She had informed her family of her return from space from her Vidnet console before she had transported back. She had linked with Father – distant on a Gallano-Lunian contract in Ulypt far to the east and south. His warm friendly face had become suddenly very disappointed as he took in her news. She knew she had always been a great source of pride to him, even though their busy lives had so often kept them apart, and she was hurt to see the hurt that her failure brought him. ‘I was so sure you would be alright up there,’ he ruminated. ‘You’ve always done so well before.’ She had told him about Luvius on a previous occasion, and now as he queried her she explained the part that her relationship had played in her downfall. He took her explanations without comment or judgement, and it occurred to her that there was something bland about the way he remained constantly polite and refrained from passing judgements. The father she remembered of her childhood had been always kind but also stricter. He had always encouraged her to follow the advice of her teachers, to work harder, to have the highest goals. The father she remembered of that time would probably have been annoyed with her for losing the best chance of her career progress that she had. He would have shown distress and criticism but also the encouragement to try again, at whatever cost to keep working and not to miss out on her future.

She noticed for the first time how much more mellow he had become. He was ageing too. It was not the first time she had noticed that of course, but this time she recognised it in his attitude. Even her mother’s retreat into the Mental Institution had not caused the earlier attitudes of his life to change. He had easily come to terms with Mother’s weaknesses, criticising at first but then accepting because he knew it would do no good. He valued Mother too much to abandon or lose her. She was his only chance at sexual and romantic attachment and he hung on to her carefully because she was all he had. He must have had much disappointment but she was his, an attractive woman in her youth, and strong in her obstinate beliefs. Despite her recoiling from the demands of society she possessed vitality in her own world and this doubtless gave her a continuing allure in the eyes of Father.

‘Are you disappointed, Father? You don’t seem angry with me. I am glad you are not, but I thought you might be.’ She prompted him for greater reaction.

‘No, Vera. I am disappointed, of course. It was a great opportunity for you. I know you must have worked hard. If you were distracted by your boyfriend, I cannot blame you.’ He waited for a few moments. ‘I have never said much to you about this before, but I will now. I look back on my own life, and wonder what the most valuable aspects of it have been. And you know I have come to the conclusion that my relationship with your mother, and of course the raising of such fine children as you became were the most important. Mother and yourselves were more important in the end than all the great things I achieved in my career. Much of the achievements of my career have been repeated, many times over, and many of them were commonplace achievements, which others of our profession have also achieved, many times over. But the love I shared with your mother, strained as it has often been, was genuine, and looking back, it has meant more to me than my career. So I do not blame your for choosing your boyfriend over your career. Probably you made the right choice at the time, for I am all too conscious as I am now fifty-six, that we only live once, and you must take love where you can find it. I did not always appreciate that in the past, but now I understand it.’

‘Thank you, Father,’ whispered Vera, for suddenly she felt the tears descending on her. To receive the blessings of her father for the “crimes” which her managers had berated her for, was a relief that she had never expected. ‘Father, you have changed over the years. I did not expect you to understand so well.’

He smiled, and he no longer was the bland Father she had thought earlier. She now understood that his blandness was a sign of the understanding that comes with age.