Read some of Graeme Simsion’s new book The Rosie Effect in this exclusive book extract

The Rosie Project, a romantic comedy about a university professor with Asperger’s looking for love, was last year’s literary hit. Read an exclusive chapter from Melbourne author Graeme Simsion’s sequel The Rosie Effect, out September 24.

The Rosie Project author Graeme Simsion with 'Hope' for new book, The Rosie. Picture- Nicole Cleary

ORANGE juice was not scheduled for Fridays.

Although Rosie and I had abandoned the Standardised Meal System, resulting in an improvement in ‘spontaneity’ at the expense of shopping time, food inventory and wastage, I had been permitted to reinstate the beverage component in order to control our alcohol consumption. Living together had led to an unhealthy rise in drinking, and we had agreed that each week should include three alcohol-free days.

Without formal scheduling, this target proved difficult to achieve, as I had predicted. Rosie eventually saw the logic of my solution.

Fridays and Saturdays were obvious days on which to schedule alcohol. Neither of us had regular classes on the weekend. We could sleep late on the following mornings and possibly have sex.

Sex was absolutely not allowed to be scheduled, at least not by explicit discussion, but I had become familiar with the sequence of events likely to precipitate it: a blueberry muffin from Blue Sky Bakery, a triple shot of espresso from Otha’s, removal of my shirt, and my impersonation of Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird.

I had learned not to do all four in the same sequence on every occasion, as my intention would then be obvious. To provide an element of unpredictability, I settled on tossing a coin twice to select a component of the routine to delete.

The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion

I had placed a bottle of Elk Cove pinot gris in the refrigerator to accompany the divers’ scallops purchased that morning at Chelsea market, but when I returned after retrieving our laundry from the basement, there were two glasses of orange juice on the table.

The orange squeezer was in the sink and Rosie had omitted to rinse it. Citrus leftovers become difficult to remove if left for long. I fixed the squeezer problem then directed my attention to the more serious issue.

Orange juice was not compatible with the wine.

Drinking it first would desensitise our tastebuds to the slight residual sugar that was a feature of the pinot gris, thus creating an impression of sourness in the wine.

Waiting until after we had finished the wine would also be unacceptable. Orange juice deteriorates rapidly — hence the emphasis placed by breakfast establishments on ‘freshly squeezed’.

Rosie was in the bedroom, so not immediately available for discussion.

In our apartment, there were nine possible combinations of locations for two people, of which six involved us being in different rooms.

In our ideal apartment, as jointly specified prior to our arrival in New York, there would have been thirty-six possible combinations, arising from the bedroom, two studies, two bathrooms and a living- room-kitchen.

This reference apartment would have been located in Manhattan, close to the 1 or A-Train for access to Columbia University medical school, with water views and a balcony or rooftop barbecue area.

As our income consisted of one academic’s salary, supplemented by two part- time cocktail-making jobs but reduced by Rosie’s tuition fees, some compromise was required, and our current apartment offered none of the specified features.

In retrospect, we had given excessive weight to the Williamsburg location, recommended by our friends Isaac and Judy Esler, doubtless on the basis that they lived there themselves. There was no logical reason why a (then) forty-year-old

professor of genetics and a thirty-year-old postgraduate medical student would be suited to the same neighbourhood as a fifty-four-year-old psychiatrist and a fifty-two- year-old pottery artist who had acquired their dwelling before prices escalated.

The rent was high and the apartment had a number of faults that the management was reluctant to rectify.

Currently the air conditioning was failing to compensate for the exterior temperature of thirty-four degrees Celsius, which was within the expected range for Brooklyn in late June.

The reduction in room numbers, combined with marriage, meant being thrown into closer sustained proximity with another human being than I had ever been before.

Rosie’s physical presence was a hugely positive outcome of the Wife Project, but after ten months and ten days of marriage, I was still adapting to having a partner. I sometimes spent longer in the bathroom than was strictly necessary.

I checked the date on my phone — definitely Friday, 21 June.

This was a better outcome than the scenario in which my brain had developed a fault that caused it to identify days incorrectly. But it confirmed that there had been a violation of the alcohol protocol.

My reflections were interrupted by Rosie emerging from the bedroom wearing only a towel. This was my favourite costume, assuming ‘no costume’ did not qualify as a costume.

Once again, I was struck by her extraordinary beauty and inexplicable decision to select me as her partner. And, as always, that thought was followed by an unwanted emotion: a short but intense moment of fear that she would one day realise her error.

‘What’s cooking?’ she asked.

‘Nothing. Cooking has not commenced. I’m in the ingredient-assembly phase.’

She laughed, in the tone that indicated I had misinterpreted her question.

It took only a few seconds to realise that it was Rosie who had made the error in assuming cooking was underway. Preparing would have left all possibilities open. Or she could have asked, ‘What will we be eating?’ Of course, the question would not have been required at all had the Standardised Meal System been in place.

‘Sustainable scallops with a mirepoix of carrots, celeriac, shallots and bell peppers and a sesame oil dressing. The recommended accompanying beverage is pinot gris.’

‘Do you need me to do anything?’

‘We all need to get some sleep tonight. Tomorrow we go to Navarone.’

The content of the Gregory Peck line was irrelevant. The effect came entirely from the delivery and the impression it conveyed, in this case leadership and confidence in the preparation of sauteed scallops.

‘And what if I can’t sleep, Captain?’ said Rosie.

She smiled and disappeared into the bathroom before I could pursue the orange juice problem. I did not raise the towel location issue: I had long ago accepted that it would be stored randomly in the bathroom or bedroom, effectively occupying two spaces.

Our preferences for order are at different ends of the scale. Mine has always been at the rational, consistent, efficient end. Rosie’s is at the other end. When we moved from Australia to New York, Rosie packed three maximum-size suitcases.

The quantity of clothes alone was incredible. My own personal items fitted into two carry-on bags. I took advantage of the move to rationalise and upgrade my living equipment and gave my stereo and desktop computer to my brother Trevor for spare parts, returned the bed, linen and kitchen utensils to the family home in Shepparton where they had originated, and sold my bike.

In contrast, Rosie added to her vast collection of possessions by purchasing decorative objects within weeks of our arrival. The result was evident in the chaotic condition of our apartment: pot plants, surplus chairs and an impractical wine rack.

It was not merely the quantity of items: there was also a problem of organisation.

The refrigerator was crowded with half-empty containers of bread toppings, dips and decaying dairy products. Rosie had even suggested sourcing a second refrigerator from Dave the Baseball Fan. One fridge each!

Her approach to dealing with the fridge-clutter problem would increase clutter on the macro scale. Never had the advantages of the Standardised Meal System, with its fully specified meal for each day of the week, standard shopping list and optimised inventory, been so obvious.

There was exactly one exception to Rosie’s disorganised approach.

That exception was a variable. By default it was her medical studies, but currently it was her PhD thesis on environmental risks for early onset of bipolar disorder.

She had been granted advanced status in the Columbia MD program on the proviso that her thesis would be completed during the summer vacation. The deadline was now only two months and five days away.

It was an exaggeration to describe Rosie’s approach to anything as organised. A better word was focused. I had been criticised for a similar level of focus when I was young and developed successive interests in chess, cryptic crosswords and coin collecting.

‘How can you be so organised at one thing and so disorganised at everything else?’ I had asked Rosie, following her installation of the incorrect driver for her new printer.

‘It’s because I’m concentrating my study; I don’t worry about other stuff. Nobody asks if Freud checked the use-by date on the milk.’

‘They didn’t have use-by dates in the early twentieth century.’

It was incredible that two such dissimilar people had become a successful couple.

This is an exclusive extract from The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion, Text Publishing, rrp $30. For details, go to textpublishing.com.au/books/the-rosie-effect

Originally published as Read some of Graeme Simsion’s new book The Rosie Effect in this exclusive book extract