The Fence

by Meredith Jaffe

  As Christmas creeps closer, they slip further apart. Brandon tries to prove his worth. Each night Frankie comes home to a cooked meal. The baskets of washing diminish. As she eats roast lamb on a bed of chickpea mash, she can’t stop herself saying, ‘It’s amazing how much more you achieve since you’re not banging the barista.’

  Brandon flinches because he knows what she’s really saying. She’s saying this fixes nothing. When he’d told Camilla, ‘This time it’s really over’, she yelled and screamed at him in broken English but as frightening as her anger was, it is nothing compared to the sickening wrench when he glimpses how broken Frankie is. His anger, his weakness has done this.

  Frankie calls her mother. Though she knows she’ll receive little sympathy from that quarter, at least Noelle won’t gossip. She pours out the whole sorry story, concluding, ‘We can’t stay together, Mother. You said get him away from temptation, keep him busy, but it hasn’t worked.’ Frankie checks that Brandon is still outside vacuuming the pool.

  ‘Are you sure that’s the right answer, Francesca? If Brandon goes, you will have to replace him with a nanny, possibly two, and you’ve been down that path before. What alternative do you have?’

  The other option is long day care, five days a week, but Frankie can’t bear the thought of Bijoux starting childcare so young and, more importantly, she is now four months pregnant.

  Noelle reads her mind. ‘The baby’s due in early May and you’ll need time off. It seems to me you can neither afford nannies nor kindergarten fees. Perhaps you should not have spent a small fortune on that fence.’

  Frankie flinches. Noelle spends some minutes expounding on her theory that they must work things out before Frankie cuts her short, ‘Brandon’s coming. I’d better go.’

  He isn’t coming. He’s still faffing around with the pool but Frankie cannot listen to another word her mother has to say. Because if Noelle is right, she is stuck with Brandon as well as a fence she hates. It’s a cruel irony that if they hadn’t built the fence, she could afford to throw Brandon out. Now she has the ugliest fence on the north shore, a philandering husband, another baby that was certainly conceived whilst he was busy with Camilla and the prospect of enduring his presence until at least three months after this baby is born. The rock of economic necessity wins over the treacherous moral high ground.

  Sitting at the computer, Frankie stares at the screen. In the meantime, the first hurdle is to get through Christmas. In happier years, they’d discuss what gifts to buy in great detail, working out which ones were from Santa, which ones from them. This year Frankie hasn’t bothered consulting Brandon. It’s her money, she’ll spend it how she likes. It’s quite liberating dropping the pretence they are equals. No more avoiding words like ‘breadwinner’ and ‘house husband’. No more involving him in decision-making because that’s what couples do. Theirs is a marriage in name only.

  She flicks to a screen filled with skateboards. Another issue caused by the neighbours.

  ‘Mummy, Mummy, I want a skateboard,’ Amber pleaded the day after Diane Slaughter’s eldest daughter rode her skateboard up and down the drive a million times. The noise was relentless, giving Frankie a cracker of a headache, which of course she couldn’t take anything for because she was pregnant.

  ‘You’re too young for a skateboard,’ she’d told Amber.

  ‘No, I’m not.’ Amber had stamped her foot. ‘I’m almost five.’

  ‘And that little girl looks like she’s at least eight.’

  Amber changed tack. ‘Please, Mummy, I really, really, really want one.’

  Amber has a nasty stubborn streak. When she really, really, really wants something, she digs her heels in.

  The kindergarten had sent home copies of the children’s letters to Santa. They sit in a file on Frankie’s desk. She retrieves Amber’s, which is a long argument as to why she wants a skateboard but also includes requests for a microphone and a bikini.

  ‘Over my dead body, sweetheart,’ Frankie says aloud. No four year old of hers will wear a bikini, especially one as precocious as Amber.

  Silver wants a drum kit, a Wii U and a big boy’s bike. Marigold wants that Grow Up Daisy doll she keeps seeing on the tellie so she can have her own baby like Mummy. Frankie smiles. ‘You can have this one if you like, sweetie,’ she says, rubbing her hand across the tightness of her stomach. Marigold is the only one thrilled there will be a new baby in the house. Although she ignores Bijoux, Marigold likes snuggling up to Frankie’s belly and chatting to her baby sister.

  ‘It might be a boy,’ Frankie tells her, but Marigold is adamant that it’s a she and has already named her Ruby.

  *

  Thanks to Klaussman & Sons’ policy that all staff must take annual leave the week of Christmas, Frankie is home when Eric Hill knocks on her door. Though it is well past nine o’clock, she is still in her dressing-gown, eating the crust of Bijoux’s Vegemite toast. She opens the door to find Mr Hill standing there with an enormous dollhouse at his feet.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she says, suspicious of the neat old man and his little house.

  ‘Good morning, Mrs Desmarchelliers. I come bearing gifts,’ announces Eric. It’ll be fine, he’d told Gwennie when she questioned his confidence that the neighbours would accept the gift. Once she sees it, how could she possibly say no?

  Frankie glances at the dollhouse, which she notices has an enormous rosette stuck to its roof.

  ‘Is that for me?’ Amber slides around Frankie’s bulk and kneels in front of the manor house.

  ‘And me,’ Silver adds, elbowing Amber aside.

  ‘It’s for both of you, remember?’ says Mr Hill. ‘That’s what we agreed.’ He smiles at Frankie. ‘Amber and Silver asked me to make them a dollhouse for Christmas. It’s a little early.’

  The old man’s audacity amazes Frankie. Does he really think he can buy her children’s affection? That making them a dollhouse will undo the last six months? Some people will stop at nothing. Wrapping her dressing-gown tighter, she says, ‘You shouldn’t have.’

  Mr Hill plays with the lid of the small box he is holding. ‘It’s my pleasure. They saw it in the garage and asked if they could have it. It’s based on a house I saw on Grand Designs. The chimneys were a right fiddle but I like a challenge.’

  ‘Can we take it inside, Mummy?’ Amber tugs on Frankie’s sleeve. ‘I want to open it.’

  ‘I haven’t put the furniture in yet, Amber. That’s in this box.’ Mr Hill offers Amber the box and she takes it as if it holds precious jewels.

  ‘I’ll carry it in for you, if you like,’ Mr Hill suggests, eyeing the mound of Frankie’s stomach.

  ‘I don’t,’ Frankie is lost for words. Turning, she sees Amber and Silver scrabbling through the box, making admiring noises as they handle tiny pieces of furniture, showing each other miniature beds and dressers and a ceramic toilet. Mr Hill has already lifted the dollhouse and is waiting for her to step aside. She has been ambushed. ‘On the bench will be fine,’ she manages.

  She clears a space at the end of the kitchen counter and Mr Hill deposits the house.

  He lowers the front facade and Amber and Silver finger the carpets and wallpaper. Against their obvious delight stands their mother twisting the cord of her dressing gown as if trying to tie up all the sadness that leaches out of her. Such a beautiful woman, such an unhappy family.

  A strong urge to fix the problem overwhelms him. He likes fixing things. Gwennie always tells him he’s the handiest handy­man she knows. Withdrawing five figures from his pockets, Eric hopes to distract her from her melancholy. ‘I’ve brought you the dolls too,’ he says passing the twins a doll each. ‘They’re you, see? Amber and Silver.’ Pressing two others into their sad mother’s hands, he says, ‘And this one with the red hair is Marigold. And here’s baby Bijoux.’

  Frankie is overcome by the urge to cry. This perfect littl
e house with its model family. When Silver prises Bijoux from her grip and puts the doll in the cot in an upstairs bedroom saying, ‘Night, night, Bijoux. Sleep tight,’ she bites her lip.

  ‘And here’s Mummy and Daddy.’ Eric passes Amber the dolls, which she discards in preference for setting up the kitchen.

  Frankie watches her children play. Mr Hill is showing Amber how the door of the oven opens, Frankie watches Amber ooh as she opens the pantry door to see rows of tins and packages painted onto the shelves. Silver lifts the toilet seat and whistles as his doll self has a wee, making Mr Hill laugh. In the face of the old man’s generosity Frankie finds it hard to reconcile how at ease with him her children are when his presence in her house makes her stiff with displeasure.

  Eric Hill beams. ‘I’ve never met a child yet that doesn’t like a dollhouse,’ he says.

  You have now, thinks Frankie. She never liked dolls when she was a child. Probably because she had real ones in the form of her siblings to dress and feed.

  ‘Gwennie said you wouldn’t like me bringing the children a gift but I said, “No, Gwennie, I can’t break a promise.” I knew you wouldn’t mind,’ he says, placing a hand on her arm.

  Frankie stares at it and pulls away, making as if to get a better look at the house. To his credit, it is well made, she thinks, but nothing will compensate for the abominable way the Hills have behaved since they moved here.

  ‘Children, thank Mr Hill. He has to go now,’ she says.

  Eric Hill looks surprised at this but Frankie sweeps him out the door, manufacturing a shopping trip to Rosedale Square.

  After she locks the door behind him, she turns to find Silver’s male doll pushing tiny clothes into a toy washing machine. Amber’s doll holds a phone to her ear and Amber transacts a gruff conversation with whoever is on the other end of the line.

  She allows them to play with the dollhouse all day, although its presence, their obvious joy at it, makes her feel as if the Hills have invaded her home. In light of the recent Camilla revelations, she wonders whether the Hills have become a convenient scapegoat for all the words she and Brandon should have shouted at each other. Perhaps it’s not the Hills, not the fence, she thinks, staring at the perfect miniature home, but us. The thought lodges in Frankie’s brain where it festers. When the children are tucked in bed, Frankie packs the dolls and the furniture into the house and locks it. Though she is not supposed to be climbing ladders at her stage of pregnancy, she balances on a chair and clears a space in the cupboard above the linen press and shoves the dollhouse inside.

  *

  Christmas Day dawns overcast and humid. The children run into Frankie’s bedroom to wake her. Brandon is already up making pancakes and brewing coffee. He stops to join the children in a circle around the tree. They pillage their Santa sacks for the chocolates, bubbles and the mini packs of Duplo Frankie always includes. Brandon fusses over each child as they rip the paper from their presents. Frankie eases herself onto the couch and takes photos, capturing pictures of the very happy family they aren’t.

  Silver’s eyes widen when he unwraps the drum kit. He wants to play right away so Brandon helps him put the kit together. Marigold hugs her Grow Up Daisy doll, rocking her whilst singing a lullaby. Bijoux shakes a box of Duplo, laughing at the noise. Amber begins to cry.

  ‘What’s wrong, darling.’ Frankie touches Amber’s shoulder. ‘Don’t you like your karaoke machine?’

  Amber shakes her head. ‘I wanted a skateboard.’

  ‘But you asked Santa for a microphone too and look what he gave you instead,’ she says, upselling the karaoke machine. ‘Why don’t we plug it in and sing a song?’

  Amber’s face erupts into a violent mottled pink. ‘Santa promised me a skateboard.’

  Frankie tries to keep the edge out of her voice. ‘Well maybe Santa, like Mummy, thought you were a little young for a skateboard.’

  ‘And I asked for a bikini,’ Amber yells.

  Frankie struggles to remain sweet-tempered in the face of Amber’s disintegrating behaviour. ‘You’re not behaving very nicely, Amber. Remember how we put gifts under the Wishing Tree at Rosedale Square? Lots of children get nothing for Christmas and you have plenty of lovely presents.’ Probably too many, if she’s honest with herself. Each year she tries to ration the number of gifts, each year she overindulges them. ‘Grandma and Grandpa will have presents for you too,’ she adds, hoping to distract Amber from her mood.

  ‘Do we have to go to Grandma’s?’ Silver lisps, holding the cymbal whilst Brandon screws it onto the stand. Brandon smirks and ducks his head so she won’t see but Frankie does. None of them enjoy Christmas at her parents’ house. Noelle has so many rules and expects the children to eat in the formal dining room and use the correct silverware. There’ll be white damask tablecloths starched and ready for the inevitable spillage from four small children. Her mother’s insistence on using the Waterford crystal means a tumbler will be broken and Noelle will sigh and say something like, ‘They were a wedding present from my mother,’ even though Noelle bought her crystal ware from David Jones.

  Frankie grins and says, ‘It will be fun. You’ll be spoilt rotten.’ Though that’s true, she always feels stranded by her siblings who somehow don’t feel the same sense of filial obligation towards their parents as she does. Martin has the excuse of living in London, her sister Sophia lives in Saudi Arabia. Georgette’s in Tassie and Anabel and Flick point blank refuse to come. As the eldest, perhaps her sense of duty is overdeveloped. Perhaps she and Brandon should have moved to Perth not Rosedale.

  ‘I want a skateboard,’ Amber shouts and stomps to her bedroom, slamming the door behind her. She refuses to come out for pancakes and babycinos. Frankie sends Brandon in to negotiate but when he opens the door, Amber yells, ‘Skateboard. Skateboard. Skateboard!’ until Brandon shuts her back in.

  ‘Maybe Diane Slaughter’s right, Frankie,’ he says, re-joining breakfast.

  Frankie cuts Bijoux’s pancake into thumb-size pieces. ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Amber’s ability to self-regulate her behaviour leaves a lot to be desired.’

  Frankie doesn’t reply. To do so will mean that Brandon is right and she has no intention of giving him that small satisfaction. As further punishment, she leaves Brandon to drag Amber out of her room and lock her rigid body in the car seat. The rest of the children, clean and dressed in identical Christmas outfits, observe Amber’s audacious behaviour in silent awe. Frankie waits for Brandon to manoeuvre the multivan onto the street so she can climb in. She checks the time on her phone. It has just gone eleven. They are officially late and her mother will be furious.

  Over lunch, no mention is made of Frankie’s marital disharmony. Not least because her father drinks too much wine and ends up dozing off on the lounge. Frankie knows Brandon envies her dad’s way of opting out but she’s watching him and he knows she is watching him.

  Silver tells Noelle all about the dollhouse. Noelle is amused at the Hills’ gift giving and encourages the children to tell her more. Silver is listing the tiny toys that belong in the miniature nursery when Amber interrupts.

  ‘Where is the dollhouse, Mummy?’

  Frankie licks her thumb and wipes ice-cream from Amber’s lip, saying, ‘I packed it away until after Christmas, sweetheart.’

  ‘Why?’ Amber frowns at her.

  ‘Because,’ Frankie lies, ‘you have so many other presents to enjoy, I thought you might like to save it for later.’

  Silver stares at her from under his fringe. Noelle raises an eyebrow.

  The children have no right to be suspicious of her, she knows what’s best for them. ‘Who’d like more ice-cream?’ she says, struggling from her seat and away from the inquisition.

  When at last Noelle yawns and sneaks a discreet glance at her watch, Frankie’s relieved to finally have her cue to leave. ‘It’s been lovely, as always, Mother,’ she s
ays, stuffing toys into bags, ‘but I better get this lot home before they disintegrate.’

  ‘Must you?’ Noelle says, rising and scanning the room for forgotten gifts.

  ‘We must. Daddy’s obviously tired and you must be too after such a long day.’ Frankie glosses over the truth.

  ‘Yes, it’s a big job preparing lunch for so many. I’ve forgotten after all these years.’ Noelle gets in one last dig.

  The annual pantomime complete, Frankie hustles the children into the car and sighs in relief as they drive away. She glances at Brandon, thinks of her mother. It’s such a wretched thing to love someone and resent them at the same time. Longed for approval greases the wheels of her relationship with Noelle. How she relished the freedom of that year she spent in Europe after finishing uni. A year without her mother’s constant critique of the way she lived her life. Her choice of husband. In her mother’s eyes, nothing Frankie did was satisfactory.

  Dwelling on her mother is interrupted by their arrival home. With a start, Frankie notices that the gates are open. ‘Didn’t you lock them when we left?’ she asks Brandon as she climbs out of the van.

  Brandon says, ‘Yeah,’ but his expression is less certain. Wasn’t Frankie last in the car?

  ‘Yes or can’t remember?’ snaps Frankie, releasing Bijoux from her car seat and carrying her up the drive. She stops. The front door is open. Frankie hesitates before stepping inside, the keys dangling from her fingers. The only sound is next door’s chickens but there is a ghost of a presence louder than clucking hens. And the house, oh the house. Amber and Silver race up behind her.

  ‘Stay outside,’ she shouts. She doesn’t want them to see. ‘Brandon, can you come here please?’ she yells as she herds the children back down the stairs to the driveway.

  A dense weight settles in her chest. When he is close enough, she passes him Bijoux and fetches the phone from her handbag. Brandon stares past her, taking stock of the utter devastation.