CHAPTER 32
After consulting the accommodation list the clerk at Centrelink had given him and making a few phone calls, Reuben found a room in a boarding house at New Farm, not far from where Thommo had lived. It was an old Queenslander that had been converted into half a dozen bedrooms with a communal kitchen and bathroom. It smelt of stale cooking oil, sweaty socks and old men; but at $150 a week, it would do until he found something else.
His room reminded him of his childhood bedroom. Faded floral wallpaper, single bed with chenille bedspread and an old wooden cupboard with the door ajar because there was no key to lock it. It was musty but clean.
Hey Mum, I’ve blown it again. He saw her face before him, disappointment etched in the lines. The same look he’d seen countless times befo
