The Fence

by Meredith Jaffe

  Frankie withdrew to the twins’ room, who mercifully were at ballet lessons with the nanny and not there to witness their father’s betrayal. She collapsed on Amber’s bed, hugging Waddles the penguin to her chest. Her whole body flooded with heat, blood pounding in her ears. How long, how long had this woman been in her bed? An awful thought slapped her in the face. Whilst she was at work imagining the twins learning first position, wishing she could be there to see them stick out their bellies and point their satin toes, Brandon was with this woman. Not thinking of his children at all. He had undone everything. How could she continue to work five days a week when Brandon was clearly no longer a fit parent?

  During the three hellish months of their separation, Frankie took the children to lunch at her mother’s and made the mistake of sharing her feelings.

  ‘Even with two nannies on permanent rotation and the cleaner in twice a week, I’m exhausted.’

  ‘Cut back your hours,’ said Noelle as she placed a platter arrayed with an elegant spiral of fruit in front of the children.

  Frankie almost slammed down the Royal Doulton teacup. ‘I can’t afford to, Mother. I have a mortgage, bills to pay; the money has to come from somewhere.’

  Noelle sniffed and shot Frankie a glance. ‘You made your choice, Francesca.’

  There was so much Frankie wanted to say. Noelle had given up work the day she married Frankie’s father, Bernard, so she could maintain a harmonious home for her barrister husband, and everybody else, including her six children, had come a firm second. How much that hurt, still hurt, burning Frankie up with resentment that she, only a child herself, was left to organise her younger siblings so they did not interfere with her mother’s priorities. For Noelle would never be the dog that bit the hand that fed her, even if she, as the dog in this scenario, was a very pampered poodle.

  ‘I don’t have a wealthy husband to keep me,’ Frankie said, although why, she didn’t really know. She despised her mother’s lifestyle and as a teenager had been determined to model her future on her father’s life. But she had not been smart enough to get the marks needed to follow her father into law at Sydney University. She had studied Commerce at the University of NSW, a place her father, to this day, insisted on calling Kenso Tech, a nickname from its days as a science and technology college in the suburb of Kensington. She had worked so very hard not to be her mother and to gain her father’s approval. For what?

  ‘I don’t know why I came here today,’ she blurted out.

  Her mother placed butter biscuits on a tray and pushed them in front of the children. When Francesca took one, she pursed her lips. Another of Francesca’s failings. She didn’t inherit Noelle’s fine bones. She, of all the children, inherited her father’s figure, a beamy ship to burrow its prow through the waters of life.

  ‘Because you are lonely and tired and wondering whether you have made the right decision.’ Noelle sat to the left of the head chair of the dining table. She would never dream of sitting in her husband’s chair, even when he was not there.

  ‘You have chosen to focus on your career, neglected your husband and children and now here you are.’ She dismissed Frankie’s life with a flick of the wrist. ‘Why have children if you don’t want them?’

  Frankie slapped her hand on the table. ‘I love my children but I have to use my brain as well, otherwise I’ll –’ she was about to say ‘become a narcissist like you’ but modified it to say, ‘go mad.’

  Noelle snorted. ‘You were determined to marry a man who was nothing like your dear father and now you are complaining that he doesn’t work, doesn’t provide and has failed as both a husband and a father.’

  The words stung. It was true that one of the reasons she was attracted to Brandon was that he was the exact opposite of her father. Brandon didn’t want a career that made him absent from his children’s formative years. She’d loved that about him. It’s just that it would be easier if he wasn’t so hopeless at all the other stuff – the cleaning, shopping, running errands stuff, the tedious stuff wives do. And she had no intention of being her mother, with all the home help money could buy, so bored she ironed pillowcases and tea towels.

  ‘Hasn’t feminism taught you anything?’ Her mother sighed, crossing her long legs and tapping a manicured nail against her teacup.

  Francesca drank her coffee in a single draught, hoping for a caffeine hit significant enough to combat the wave of exhaustion threatening to overwhelm her. Unable to muster a suitable reply to such an outrageously hypocritical question from her mother, she said nothing at all.

  Noelle carried on as if Francesca had answered, ‘You can’t have it all and certainly not at the same time.’

  Can’t you? Frankie thought. What was the point of a degree and years climbing the corporate ladder if all you ended up doing was sitting at a toddler table from IKEA cutting shapes out of Play-Doh?

  ‘When was the last time you visited a hairdresser?’ Noelle went on. ‘You look disgraceful. Look at your nails.’

  Frankie did. She’d been biting them again, the cuticles scabbed from where she’d breached the skin. There was choco­late under the nails from making cupcakes with the kids to distract them from killing each other for five minutes.

  ‘Anyone can see you are not coping, Francesca. So it appears you must swallow your pride and quit your job. Stay at home and do a proper job of raising your children.’

  Frankie went to say that couldn’t be the only option but her mother waved her down and continued, ‘Or haul your sorry excuse for a husband home, forgive him but remind him who wears the pants in this relationship.’

  ‘But how?’

  Brandon had shacked up with the Brazilian barista, whose name she now knew was Camilla. It had lasted a few weeks and he was now sleeping on his brother’s couch until he could afford a place of his own. He was working but not enough to stand on his own two feet. There was a grim satisfaction in that. To see that his callous actions had a price. When he picked up the kids each week, he dropped hints about resuming the status quo. Frankie wanted to believe it was because he loved them, her, but she was scared that it might only be that she was his meal ticket. Could she endure that so her children no longer cried in the night for their absent father?

  Her mother was well aware of this. ‘Sell the house and its memories, sack the nannies and the cleaner and move him to the suburbs. If I were you, I’d have another baby. If that doesn’t keep him too busy to spread his love around, then nothing will.’

  ‘Four children! We’re only just coping with three under five.’

  Her mother raised an eyebrow. ‘Precisely.’

  And that’s why Bijoux was conceived, to keep her father faithful. For the first time it dawned on Frankie that maybe her mother’s fecundity was not the status symbol she made it out to be but an act to bind Bernard to her. Frankie wondered what misdeeds her father had committed for her mother to punish him with a lifetime of her fawning attention and numerous offspring. For even a man as financially successful as her father would have to think twice before divorcing a woman who had borne him six children, each with an expensive private school education. Frankie realised that her mother’s veneer of elegance might conceal a savviness acquired from her impoverished childhood.

  So the next time Brandon came to see the children, she invited him in for coffee and floated the idea that she might consider having him back under certain conditions. Brandon agreed with an eagerness Frankie knew was founded on desperation. She did not tell him about her plan to fall pregnant but rather framed the resumption of their sexual relations as a way of cementing the deal. Only when she confirmed her pregnancy did she pretend to relent and allow Brandon to move back in. And only after Bijoux was born did she announce that she had found their new home.

  ‘It’s the perfect house,’ she told him as he sat in stunned silence on the floor, surrounded by Duplo, the twins crawling all over hi
m. ‘It’s a short trip to the nearest train station, which will be great because you know how I loathe catching the bus. Plus it’s a quiet suburb, close to some of the best private schools, and it has a pool!’

  Her mother had warned her, ‘Don’t rush into anything. Men’s egos are fragile. Let him move back in, feel a sense of security, before you break the news.’

  He disentangled himself from the children and came over to where she sat nursing Bijoux. He stood there, dejected, struggling to find the words.

  ‘Rosedale?’ he managed.

  Frankie smiled. ‘Yes. It’s certainly not in the hub of things but it will be good for the children to grow up in a quiet, leafy suburb with plenty of space to run around.’

  Brandon had grown up in such a quiet, leafy suburb and had vowed never to return. He felt helpless staring at Bijoux, suckling at Frankie’s breast. Frankie was not the girl he married. There was a hardness to her now and not just because she had found out about Camilla. But he only had to think of his brother, how divorce had cost him financially but the real price was the estrangement from his children. It was a wrecking ball swinging indiscriminately, destroying all. Too late, he realised, he had short suited himself. Frankie held all the cards.

  ‘He will be miserable about it for a while,’ Noelle had said, ‘but he will come round. After all, what choice does he have?’

  ‘I don’t see any other option,’ Frankie said, as Bijoux fell off her breast, fast asleep. Frankie laid her over a shoulder as she did up her bra and adjusted her top. ‘We need a fresh start.’

  And she stood, feeling less victorious than she had imagined in the face of his obvious despair. ‘We need to think of the children.’

  As the words left her mouth, she recalled how often she had heard her mother utter that phrase whenever Bernard remonstrated over one of Noelle’s decisions. It was a code. A shorthand for whatever arguments were conducted behind closed doors, away from big ears. She had arrived at a point in her marriage where compromise had given way to capitulation.

  ‘Of course,’ she added, ‘we will have to compromise. There will be no more nannies or cleaning ladies. You will have to pull your weight.’

  And here they are, pulling into the driveway of their future. The old lady next door is raking leaves from under the trees on the street, she can see the husband in the shadows of the garage.

  ‘Guess what, guys?’ She grins at the children, indicating that they are to turn off their tablets. ‘This is our new home.’

  ‘Yeah,’ yells Silver, fumbling with his seatbelt.

  ‘I need a wee,’ Amber whinges.

  Marigold begins clapping her hands shouting, ‘Out, out, out,’ loud enough that baby Bijoux wakes with a start and begins to cry.

  Frankie opens the car door and disembarks.

  Outback + Outdoors

  July In the Garden with Gwen Hill

  Plants, like humans, are fussy about who they have as neighbours. We can’t always choose who we live next door to but fortunately our gardens are our own territory.

  Companion planting is based on plants complementing each other. Factors such as the depth of their roots or the density and canopy of their foliage influence how well they rub along together. Chives have been used for centuries to control pests and visitors to wineries will see rosebushes planted at the end of rows of grapevines. They act as an early warning sign of mildew, which has a deleterious effect on both roses and grapes, as well as a means of attracting beneficial insects.

  Be careful which plants you pick though: French beans love cabbages and strawberries but grow cabbages next to strawberries and you’ll make both unhappy.

  Tip of the month

  If you’re sick of battling the common weed dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) maybe it’s time to rethink your strategy. Many cultures have long used the leaves as a salad green and in Western herbal medicine both the leaves and the roots are considered a liver tonic. The flowers are excellent in a light jelly, reminiscent of the taste of honey. A recent study reported in Australian Natural Sciences found that a high cholesterol diet can be combated by adding dandelion – well, on rabbits at least! So maybe enjoying a tisane of dandelion or some jam for your daily bread will not only rid your garden of weeds but gain yourself a health benefit too.

  Gwen’s July

  The desecration of Babs’ memory begins with the buddleja. The Desmarchelliers or the Boyds, whichever they are, Gwen finds it confusing that they can’t use the same surname but then hyphenated the children’s. She is constantly calling the husband Mr Desmarchelliers and the wife Mrs Boyd when really they are both and neither. Starting at Gumnut will soon wipe the smile off their faces. How many four year olds can wrap their tongues around Desmarchelliers-Boyd? None of their children will be starting school until they are sixteen because it will take them that long to be able to spell their surname.

  ‘They’ve hacked down the buddleja.’ Gwen bursts in on Eric who has earmuffs on and is turning a piece of wood into the side of a dollhouse. He continues feeding the timber through the machine oblivious to Gwen’s distress. Breaching their unwritten rule, Gwen switches the lathe off at the powerpoint. That gets Eric’s attention.

  ‘What the . . .’ he begins.

  ‘Those dreadful people have hacked the buddleja along the front verge. All of them, down to the ground.’

  Eric sighs and removes his earmuffs. ‘Perhaps they’re pruning them?’ he suggests.

  ‘In July?’ Gwen crosses her arms for fear they will fly off and commit harm, maybe box Eric around the ears for his reason­ableness. ‘That’s not pruning, that’s destruction.’

  ‘I thought buddleja were hardy. Won’t they grow back? Not everyone is as informed a gardener as you, Gwennie.’

  But Gwen is no longer listening. Creeping over to the shadowy corner of the garage, she spies on the Desmarchelliers, the whole lot of them at work in the garden. ‘Oh dear,’ she cries as His Lordship paints weedkiller onto the remaining stumps. That’s the end of the buddleja then and a large contributor to the fertility of their garden is killed in a stroke. Contemplating the decimation of the butterfly population and the ripple effect to the rest of the garden brings a sheen of sweat to her brow.

  This is all Eric’s fault. He insisted she overcome her first impressions and extend the hand of friendship. About a week or so after they moved in, as the packing boxes diminished in their garage enough to tell her they were settled, Gwen went into the garden and collected a basket of produce. Mindful that their children were young, she ignored the brussels sprouts and the cauliflowers and instead picked a bunch of English spinach and carrots and threw in some lemons and a dozen mandarins. As an afterthought, she included a jar of her homemade dandelion jam.

  She chose a weekday as it lessened the likelihood of running into Francesca. ‘You’re intimidated by her,’ Babs chided in her head. ‘I am not,’ Gwen replied. ‘That girl is like an ocean liner, sailing her course without care or concern for those who cross her path.’ Gwen had thought that sounded quite witty but Babs hadn’t laughed. As she picked her way up the Desmarchelliers’ drive, past their overflowing bins, waving good morning to Val who was collecting her Northshore Advocate from the letterbox still in her nightgown and slippers despite it being after ten, Gwen told Babs that since the husband was home full-time, it was he that she would have to build bridges with. ‘He’s not an ocean liner then?’ imaginary Babs said. Gwen thought about this. ‘No, he’s one of those little yachts that skitter about and almost gets run over.’

  Gwen knocked on the door and waited, wishing she could put down the basket but not wanting to ruin the impression of her standing there, the bounty from her garden front and centre. Inside she heard a fight erupting between the little boy and one of his sisters. ‘I want it, I had it first, no you did not. OW! Da-a-ad!’

  She smiled. Some things never changed. When it became a
pparent her knock was going unheeded, Gwen rapped more sharply and the door swung away from her hand.

  ‘Yes?’

  Brandon stood before her, his hair an unbrushed thatch. He wore tracksuit pants slung low over his hips and a polar fleece with a glob of something that might have been porridge congealing on the collar. On his face was one of those silly little facial hair designs young men went in for these days. Val’s Murray had one – a bit of fluff under his bottom lip as if he had a permanent blind spot when shaving.

  ‘Good morning, Mr Boyd. How are you?’ Oh dear, Gwen thought, she sounded like she’s selling something.

  ‘Yeah good thanks, Mrs Hill.’ He yawned and stretched. Marigold had wet the bed again last night. Another 2 am strip and wash, singing her back to sleep, waking to find himself curled alongside her, his aching back reminding him that a toddler bed was not built for two.

  As he pulled his arms over his head, Gwen noticed the tattoo snaking around his forearm, the words ‘Silver’ and ‘Amber’ ensuring the world would know of his undying love and devotion to his offspring. There was no ‘Marigold’ or ‘Bijoux’, maybe they were hidden somewhere under that polar fleece, a love heart with an arrow through it perhaps. Still, it was no worse than those casts of their newborn’s feet and hands people went in for these days. One of the mothers at Gumnut had brought in an actual cast of her entire newborn. It was a grotesque thing, for all the world like a stillborn baby.

  Mr Boyd stayed in the doorway, no invitation for a cuppa or any indication she was welcome. Cursing Eric, Gwen decided it was best to get this over and done with. She knew how it was with young children, there was always some catastrophe brewing. As she opened her mouth to speak, there came a loud wail and Brandon raced away to deal with the crime.

  Gwen stood there, unsure what to do. She wasn’t used to standing on doorsteps. In this neighbourhood, one barely needed to knock. It was ‘Yoo-hoo, it’s only me’ and in you sailed. Well, at least at Babs’ and Val’s it was. Then again, Val had said the same thing happened to her when she had tried to welcome the Desmarchelliers-Boyds to the street.