Gang of Four

by Liz Byrski

  Liz Byrski was born and brought up in England and has lived in Western Australia since 1981. She is the author of ten non-fiction books, and has worked as a staff and freelance journalist, a broadcaster with ABC Radio and an adviser to a minister in the WA government. Liz now lectures in professional writing at Curtin University. Gang of Four is her first novel.

  Also by Liz Byrski

  Gang of Four

  Food, Sex & Money

  Belly Dancing for Beginners

  G A N G OF

  F O U R

  Liz Byrski

  Pan Macmillan Australia

  First published 2004 in Macmillan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  This Pan edition published in 2005 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  1 Market Street, Sydney

  Reprinted 2005 (twice), 2006 (twice)

  Copyright © Liz Byrski 2004

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  cataloguing-in-publication data:

  Byrski, Liz.

  Gang of four.

  ISBN 0 330 42157 3.

  1. Middle aged women -Fiction. I. Title.

  A823.4

  With thanks to Crumbs Cafe, Devonshire Street, Surry Hills, NSW, for providing the venue for the cover photograph.

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Typeset in Palatino by Midland Typesetters

  Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group

  Papers used by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests. The manufacturing processes conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin.

  These electronic editions published in 2004 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced

  or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  Gang of Four

  Liz Byrski

  Adobe eReader format 978-1-74197-141-5

  Mobipocket format 978-1-74197-543-7

  Online format 978-1-74197-744-8

  EPUB format 978-1-74262-514-0

  Macmillan Digital Australia

  www.macmillandigital.com.au

  Visit www.panmacmillan.com.au to read more about all our books and to buy both print and ebooks online. You will also find features, author interviews and news of any author events.

  CONTENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ALSO BY LIZ BYRSKI

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank my family and friends who have, for so long, encouraged me in my writing. Special thanks to my son Neil for many patient readings of early drafts and to Carolyn Polizzotto for those clarifying discussions about the journey from non-fiction to fiction. Thanks, too, to my agent Sheila Drummond for her faith in my work; to Cate Paterson at Pan Macmillan for giving my manuscript a home; and to editors Sarina Rowell and Jo Jarrah for their thoughtful and professional treatment of Gang of Four.

  5W–Women Welcome Women World Wide is an international friendship organisation for women. I would like to thank the women of 5W for allowing me to feature the organisation in this book, and encourage readers to visit the website at: www.womenwelcomewomen.org.uk

  ONE

  There was a moment when she first woke, a moment free of any sense of the day ahead; a moment before she opened her eyes and when all she could feel was the warmth of the early sunshine falling on her face through the open curtains, and the soft heaviness of her body relaxed after sleep. A moment of innocence before reality interfered.

  Isabel got up, pulling on the cotton wrap that lay crumpled on the rose velvet chair. The chair had belonged to her grandmother and later to her mother – it was part of her history. She stared at it, seeing herself at five in the pink organza fairy dress her grandmother had made for Christmas, climbing onto the chair and claiming it as her fairy throne. Perhaps having the chair in her own bedroom nearly fifty years later wasn’t a particularly good idea. She might swap it for the one in the spare room, maybe get it reupholstered.

  Doug stirred, rolling onto his side. ‘Up already?’

  ‘Things to do.’

  ‘Mmm. Want me to help?’ he asked, closing his eyes again and pulling the bedclothes around him.

  ‘No, it’s fine – I’m better on my own.’

  He nodded, eyes still shut, reaching out his hand to her. ‘Merry Christmas, darl.’

  Isabel took the outstretched hand and bent to kiss his stubbly cheek. ‘Merry Christmas.’ He was almost asleep again.

  Alone in the kitchen she switched on the kettle and opened the fridge. The turkey, trussed, stuffed and covered with a damp cloth, sat pale and bulky on a middle shelf. She glared at it, took out the milk and closed the fridge. It was only half past six, plenty of time yet. She took her coffee out onto the deck, gazing across the jumbled rooftops to the grey-green smudges of Rottnest and Garden islands. A couple of yachts, their sails gleaming red and white, raced towards the open sea. Down in the town the bells were ringing for early mass.

  A perfect morning, a perfect Australian Christmas Day 1996. But the weight of the day wrapped itself around her, and she was ashamed of her own ingratitude. She had a husband, children and grandchildren who loved her, a beautiful home, enough money. What sort of person was she to feel so overwhelmed with gloom and resentment on Christmas morning? It would be the same as last year, and the year before and the year before that, as many years as she and Doug had been married – this would be the thirty-fourth. Had she really cooked that many Christmas dinners, served thirty-four turkeys in the sweltering sunshine, ignited thirty-four rich dark puddings and carried them to the table swathed in brandy flames? Children had been born and grown to adulthood, and now they came with their partners and their own children. And through it all she had been there cooking the Christmas dinner, performing the same rituals, while her mother and stepfather grew older and sicker and finally died, and while Doug’s parents grew younger and more energetic, like an advertisement for superannuation funds. And here she w
as, doing it again. In the lounge the tree sparkled with tiny white lights, towering above the mound of presents. The weeks of work, shopping, wrapping, cooking and planning would be as nothing by the end of the day. And she would still be here, with this leaden exhaustion, this resentment, this longing to be free of the responsibility, free of the burden of their expectations.

  She remembered the delicious promise of that waking moment and wanted it back. She wanted to stretch it, examine it, turn it over, see what she could make of that crystal clear sense of lightness and freedom. It followed her as she dried herself after a shower and wandered back into the cool bedroom. How tempting it would be to stretch out on the bed, close her eyes and let Christmas pass her by. The taste of stillness and solitude haunted her all morning, even as she spread the cloth on the table and counted the cutlery. There would be one less this year. No Eunice, no extra space needed for her wheelchair, no one reminiscing about crisp European winters, roasted chestnuts and snow-clad city streets bright with decorated trees and horse-drawn sleighs. Isabel sighed, put away the extra set of cutlery and spread the place settings a little wider. Her mother had died in November; there would be more room at the table this year.

  Deb and Mac came first. She heard them from the bedroom, their voices preceding them up the steps as they argued above the children’s excited squeals. The house was filled with noise and movement. Danny and Ruth thundered along the passage to the bedroom, pausing breathless in the doorway.

  ‘C’mon, Gran, it’s Christmas,’ said Danny from behind a Spider-Man mask, a red and black cape swinging from his shoulders. ‘Look what Father Christmas brought me.’

  ‘I got a fairy dress,’ said Ruth, trailing behind in ruffles of pink net.

  Isabel got up and hugged Danny. ‘I barely recognised you, you look so scary,’ she said, and she picked Ruth up and set off with them to the lounge. ‘Do you know, Ruth, I had a pink fairy dress like that the Christmas I was five.’

  ‘I’m four,’ said Ruth thoughtfully, her tinsel tiara lurching at an angle.‘

  ‘Well, you must have been a very good girl for Santa to give you a fairy dress when you’re only four.’

  The others all seemed to arrive together, Luke with his girlfriend Cassie, Kate and Jason explaining that they would have been earlier but they had to phone Jason’s mum in Noosa, and Doug’s parents struggling under a load of parcels.

  Christmas Day drew Isabel into its net, trapping past and present, blurring their boundaries until her limbs felt leaden and her face ached with the effort of smiling. They sat around the table surrounded by the debris of Christmas dinner, the dirty plates, the drying pudding, the torn crackers and paper hats.

  Luke raised his glass to her. ‘Fantastic dinner, Mum!’

  The others followed, her family, eleven faces she knew so well and loved so much, flushed with food and wine, their smiles weary with pleasure and contentment, paper hats at rakish angles, the little ones sliding wearily off their chairs.

  ‘To Mum – thanks for making it all happen, this year, last year, next year,’ Luke said and they echoed his toast.

  Isabel smiled into the stillness as they drank. ‘Thank you, I’m glad you enjoyed it … but … well, maybe not next year.’

  Confusion and disbelief hung in the silence.

  ‘I mean, maybe it would be nice to do something different,’ she said, nervous suddenly at speaking such heresy. She looked down to the far end of the table where Doug was cutting a piece of cheese.

  ‘Different?’ said Luke, his glass still raised.

  ‘Well, we might want to go away somewhere, your father and I, perhaps …’ Her voice faded as Doug looked up from the cheese in amazement. ‘Well, me,’ she went on. ‘Maybe I might …’

  ‘Your mother’s got post-Christmas stress disorder a little early this year,’ Doug said, putting the cheese on his plate and picking up his glass. ‘We’ll be here! Here’s to next year and the year after that and …’

  ‘Next year,’ they said, raising their glasses again, relief visible in every smile.

  And Isabel raised her glass and drank, but in that moment she knew that next year she would not be there. Speaking it had made it inevitable. Those few words had changed everything and there was no going back.

  ‘I keep meaning to ask you what all that stuff was on Christmas Day,’ Doug said, swinging the car into his parents’ driveway. It was New Year’s Eve and they were on their way to another ritual meal.

  ‘What stuff?’

  ‘About not being here next year, going away.’

  ‘I need a change,’ she said. ‘We could go away perhaps, do something different.’

  He switched off the engine and opened the car door. ‘We’ve always done it,’ he said stubbornly. ‘It’s a family tradition, like tonight with Mum and Dad.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, stepping out of the car. ‘But that doesn’t mean we have to keep on doing it. It doesn’t mean we can never take time out.’

  He clicked the remote control irritably and the car doors locked with a snap. ‘It’s important,’ he said. ‘To all of them, the kids, the parents, everyone.’

  ‘You mean it’s important to you.’

  ‘Yes, if you like – me too.’

  ‘And what about me?’

  ‘You never complained before.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, there you are then. You need a rest, Iz.’ He put his arm around her shoulders. ‘Why don’t we go down south for a few days? You could phone that nice place with the spa.’

  Isabel turned to see his profile in the fading light and wondered, not for the first time in thirty-four years, how it was possible to feel so totally misunderstood by someone you had lived with and loved for decades.

  The councillor for the North Ward paused. He had been on his feet repeating himself for ten minutes. Isabel stared at him hard, willing him to wind up, but he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, picked up another sheaf of correspondence and took a deep breath to begin again. She peered at him over the top of her half-glasses.

  ‘Yes, thank you, Councillor Williams. As you’ve said, it’s a complicated issue with serious budgetary implications. I suggest we refer it to the finance committee for consideration and ask for a report at the March meeting. Those in favour? Against? Thank you, that’s carried then.’

  Shocked by the speed with which his plans for a day centre had been dispatched to the finance committee, Councillor Williams grunted irritably and resumed his seat. The relief was palpable; councillors began to pile their papers together.

  ‘Well, that brings us to the end of the agenda, Councillors. The next meeting is on Monday the twenty-fourth of March. I declare the meeting closed at ten minutes past ten.’

  The chamber buzzed with noise and movement as people got to their feet and began to leave the chamber. The council’s CEO, Sam Lewis, slipped his files into his briefcase. ‘You’re unusually brutal this evening, Madam Mayor,’ he grinned. ‘Mr Williams didn’t know what hit him.’

  ‘I feared we might be here till midnight,’ Isabel said. ‘Old Mr Martino was already asleep and I think I heard him snore. Another five minutes and at least half the chamber would have been snoring with him.’

  ‘You don’t have to convince me,’ Sam replied. ‘I’d lost track of what he was saying a couple of minutes after he started. Can I buy you a drink?’

  She shook her head. ‘Thanks, Sam, but not tonight. I’ll be in on Wednesday morning if we need to discuss that issue about the heritage register.’

  ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘But, Isabel, before you go, have you – well, have you thought again about running for a third term?’

  ‘I have and I’m not. I’ve had enough, Sam. I need a break and it’s time the council had a change, anyway.’

  He shrugged, stopping at the door of his office. ‘I still hope you’ll change your mind.’

  ‘No way,’ she smiled. ‘I’ve got other plans.’

  It was after ten but she wasn
’t ready to go home. She needed time by herself. She considered a coffee on the cappuccino strip but dismissed it – she would be a sitting target for anyone with a council gripe. Almost without thinking she drove across the intersection, and headed towards the refuge. It was a rambling old fibro house with a metal roof and wide verandahs, half hidden behind a tall, thick brush hedge which was starting to encroach on the pavement. There would be complaints from the neighbours, so she’d have to remind Loretta to get it trimmed. They got enough complaints about the residents and their unwelcome visitors without having to cope with complaints about the hedge.

  Isabel pulled into one of the four parking bays at the front, switched off the lights and wound down the window. The sound of the Bee Gees floated across the garden, and through a lighted window she could see a couple of women dancing to the music. The double wooden doors were open, protected, like the windows, by steel security doors, a safeguard against the angry, sometimes violent men who were prone to roll up in the middle of the night demanding access. Over the entrance was a small curved sign announcing ‘Isabel Carter Refuge for Women’. Isabel gazed at it with affection. She had fought, first as a private citizen and later as a councillor, to get the city to fund a refuge and then to buy the house, and she was prouder of it than of anything she had done since.

  She got out of the car and wandered over to the seat beneath the big peppermint tree, remembering the tears of pride in her mother’s eyes as the then mayor cut the ribbon and declared the refuge open. ‘Be proud, darling,’ Eunice had said, gripping her daughter’s hand. ‘Your passion drove you to do a wonderful thing.’ She had hung on grim-faced as Doug and Mac struggled to manoeuvre her wheelchair over the gravel, but her pride in her daughter’s achievement was obvious.