‘Right,’ said Laura. ‘Well, I am going to go and grab myself a muffin before I put my foot in my mouth anymore. It was nice to meet you, Poppy.’
She got up and hurried away and Megs gave Poppy a sympathetic look. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Laura’s never had all that much tact. I bet you get that all the time. Other women making assumptions about why you don’t have kids or feeling sorry for you because they think you must be pining for them. It must really suck.’
Poppy was stunned. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘all the time. Sends me insane. So, considering my own parents don’t seem to get it, how come you’re so perceptive?’
Megs leaned back in her seat. ‘It’s not really hard to understand, is it? Don’t worry, I’m working on your mum for you. Whenever she comes round to see the kids and drops comments about you having them one day, I drop my own hints right back. She’ll get it eventually.’
She paused before adding, ‘So are you a part of the other group? The one we were talking about in Parramatta?’
Megs mustn’t have seen the article then, otherwise she’d know full well that Poppy was a member. She tried to shrug in an indifferent sort of way. ‘Oh, you know, it’s sort of meant to be an anonymous thing.’
Megs shook her head. ‘Say no more,’ she said. ‘Just be careful, okay? I’ve heard there’s some really nasty stuff going on with that feud. I’m a member of a Northern Beaches online mum’s group, and mostly it’s pretty good. You know – helpful advice and that sort of thing. But even within the group the women can get bitchy at times. I can only imagine what it must be like between two opposing women’s groups.’
Poppy nodded. ‘All good, I’ll be careful.’
Soon after, she managed to escape the party. On the way home she wondered what Megs would think if she knew that rather than simply being a member of NOP, Poppy was actually the founder. Would Megs feel differently? Would she be disappointed in her? And also, she was going to have to see what she could find out about the story of the kid going into anaphylactic shock. That news had her rattled.
* * *
Tuesday morning at work Poppy went to see Paul and found Frankie’s desk empty and his office door shut, the blinds drawn. She assumed they were both out at a meeting and had turned to leave when she heard a noise from inside his office and looked back. She stepped closer. She heard whispered voices.
What the hell? Were they seriously going at it right there in his office in the middle of the day? Poppy suddenly found herself wondering when and where Garret and Karleen had shared their secret trysts throughout those four months when he was cheating. Did they meet up during the day? On their lunch breaks? Did Karleen visit Garret at his work? His office was open plan, he sat in a cubical, so it’s not like he could have pushed her up against his desk as Paul was probably doing right now with Frankie. Not unless they particularly enjoyed having an audience. Maybe they rented a room at a cheap hotel. Or climbed into the back of Karleen’s car like they were teenagers.
Poppy was livid. How dare Frankie and Paul put their partners through that same humiliation and hurt that she had so recently experienced. And how dare they bring it all back to the surface for her. Enough was enough. Paul’s wife needed to know what was going on.
She stepped quickly behind Frankie’s desk and tapped her computer awake. Searching through Frankie’s business contacts she found Linda’s number and scribbled it down on a post-it note before hurrying back to her own desk.
Sitting down she pulled out her phone and opened up her messages. But now that she was ready to say something, she didn’t really know how to word it. She tried to imagine what it would have been like if someone else had told her about Garret and Karleen before they’d confronted her themselves. Would she have been less distraught hearing it from someone else? At least she would have gone into their little ‘meeting’ prepared. But would she have trusted the information if it had come from an anonymous source? And would it have been more of a shock – receiving a random text out of the blue like that?
Poppy decided to put the question to NOP. At least it was something to distract everyone from the whole MOP mess. She would post the question, wait for at least five responses and if the majority said do it, she’d do it.
Quick poll. Say you know two people are having an affair. Do you dob them in?
She tried – unsuccessfully – to distract herself with work while she waited. Eventually she checked back for comments and saw there were already about ten. She skimmed through them.
Marns – Of course you do.
Viv – I’d want to know.
Kellie – Need to know more, depends on circumstances. Can you give details?
Jess – How do you know both couples don’t have an arrangement in place where they’re allowed to see other people? Opening up your relationship to other parties can be a great way to keep things fresh. So it could be all above board.
Dianna – Absolutely. No excuse for cheating. Who cares about the circumstances.
Carla – You realise there’s always two sides to every story, right?!
In the end, the overall consensus was a resounding yes. They’d made the decision for her. It was the right thing to do. Linda deserved to know. Poppy hated the idea of another woman going through the same horrendous heartbreak she’d suffered. Hopefully Linda had a good friend she could turn to for comfort and advice. And hopefully she would confront Paul, not let him get away with it.
Poppy decided to keep it simple and straight to the point.
Linda, I’m so sorry to be the one to tell you this – but I’m an employee at Cormack and I think you need to know that your husband isn’t being faithful to you. Again, I’m really sorry.
The second she sent it, she kicked herself. She should have checked if there was a way to block her number. Although maybe that only worked for phone calls. She wondered if she should block Linda’s number now that the text had been sent so she couldn’t call her and quiz her about what she’d said. Maybe she’d been too hasty sending that message. Maybe she’d made a terrible mistake. She jumped back up from her desk and headed down to the warehouse to see what Annalise thought about the whole situation.
Poppy found her directing one of her staff on a forklift and she waited impatiently for her to finish. When she was finally done, Poppy beckoned her over and they walked out onto the driveway to chat alone.
‘So,’ Poppy said, ‘Paul and Frankie were at it again just now.’
‘What do you mean “at it”?’ Annalise asked.
‘I mean I went to see him and his office door was locked and the blinds were down and —’
‘Eww! That’s so gross, in the middle of the day with everyone right there? You’re kidding me?’
‘So it got me thinking . . . don’t you think Paul’s wife should know what’s going on?’
‘What? Like you mean you want to tell her? You really want to get involved in that?’
‘Umm, that’s the thing – I kind of already did . . . get involved.’
Annalise closed her eyes and took a deep breath. ‘Fuck’s sake, Poppy, what have you done?’ she said.
Poppy squirmed, embarrassed about her rash action. ‘I take it you didn’t see my post on NOP just now? Okay . . . so I stole her number off Frankie’s computer and sent her an anonymous text.’
‘Shit. What did you say?’
‘I just wrote that I was sorry but I didn’t think her husband was being faithful to her. That was . . . pretty much it.’
‘And?’
‘And what? That’s all I said.’
‘And did you get any response back? Like did she ask who you were or how you knew or anything?’
‘No, no reply.’
‘But she has your number now, what if she calls you, what will you do?’
‘I don’t know!’
‘Well, you can’t answer it. She can’t find out you’re from work, you could end up getting yourself fired.’
‘Oh.’
‘Oh?
What do you mean oh?’
‘Well, I did sort of mention that I was from Cormack – I just wanted to lend the text some credibility, that’s all.’
‘Jesus. And what about Frankie’s husband? You took down his number and texted him as well?’
‘Oh. I hadn’t really thought about him.’
Annalise raised her eyebrows. ‘So why didn’t he get a look in?’
Poppy looked down at her feet, considering Annalise’s question. But the answer was obvious. She hadn’t worried so much about Frankie’s husband because she couldn’t relate to him in the same way as she did to Linda. When Garret and Karleen cheated, Karleen was a free agent. She was the archetypal ‘other woman’, while Poppy was the scorned wife. Poppy had slotted Frankie neatly into the part of ‘other woman’ and Linda took on Poppy’s position. Frankie’s partner didn’t score a role. Poor bloke. Now that Poppy began to think properly about him, she felt a wave of empathy for the guy. He was just as hard done by as Linda.
‘I just . . . didn’t think,’ she said.
‘Probably for the best,’ said Annalise. ‘I mean I’m all for stirring up a bit of drama, you know me. But I’m worried that you’re potentially risking your job.’
‘So what do I do?’
‘Leave it. Promise me you won’t do or say anything else. Let’s at least wait and see if she responds to you, then we’ll figure it out from there. But if she does reply, let me know the second you hear from her, okay?’
‘Okay,’ Poppy said. ‘Hey, by the way, I meant to ask – have you heard anything about a woman from NOP giving a kid something to eat in a restaurant because the kid was bugging her and the kid having an allergic reaction?’
‘Nope, haven’t seen anyone talking about anything like that on Facebook. Why? Where did you hear it?’
‘Just something someone mentioned. Don’t worry about it.’
A delivery truck came up the driveway and they both moved out of its way. Poppy recognised the company name on the side of the truck – it was a place Annalise had previously worked for.
‘Here’s one of your old mates,’ she said.
Annalise frowned back at her. ‘One of my old mates,’ she repeated. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Didn’t you say you used to work for Langum’s Holdings?’
‘No,’ she replied, ‘I’ve never said that.’
‘Oh,’ said Poppy, ‘I must have mixed it up with something else.’
* * *
Poppy didn’t know if Annalise was aware that she’d been part of the hiring process when she was appointed as warehouse manager. That was before the two of them had become such good friends. And the truth was, Poppy had picked up on a couple of discrepancies on her resume – the dates Annalise had listed for the time spent at one of her past jobs didn’t line up with that company having gone into liquidation. But Poppy hadn’t thought too much of it – deciding Annalise was probably just padding out the time to increase her experience – and still put her forward to Paul as the best possible candidate.
But now, as Poppy sat back down at her desk, she crossed one leg over the other and jiggled them irritatedly. She pulled the elastic out of her ponytail and redid her hair, twice. What was going on here? The truth was, she didn’t believe she had that company name mixed up. She was sure she remembered Langum’s being listed on Annalise’s resume. She still had Annalise’s documents on file, so she decided to look them up to make sure.
It didn’t take long for Poppy to find the answer. She was right, and so now she had to question if Annalise had lied about more than that.
Poppy scanned the resume, looking to see if anything else jumped out at her: graduated from Fairfield High School; completed a certificate in management studies at TAFE . . . studied at Sydney University.
Sydney Uni. Sydney Uni. Why was that tripping something in her brain? It clicked – the night they went to the pub after soccer, Annalise had been wearing a Macquarie Uni jumper. Okay, so that wasn’t such a big deal, was it? Wearing a jumper with a logo didn’t really mean a thing. It could have belonged to an ex-boyfriend, or been borrowed from a friend.
But it bothered her.
It was her mum’s fault. Therese’s voice in the back of her head, questioning who Annalise was. Questioning where she came from. Poppy was annoyed with herself for never having asked. They were friends; it shouldn’t have always been about her own problems and issues. Friendship was supposed to be two-way. So why didn’t she know anything about Annalise beyond the woman she saw in front of her? Why had they never chatted about Annalise’s childhood, her family? What had high school been like for her – had she fitted in, had she liked university, had she kept in contact with any old uni friends?
Weren’t these the kinds of things Poppy should have known?
Poppy was suddenly finding herself feeling more alone than ever in the NOP disaster. Because if she couldn’t even trust her best friend – the woman who’d helped her start the group in the first place – who could she trust?
And if she couldn’t trust Annalise, did that mean there was a chance the ‘imposter’ within the group was even closer to home than she imagined? But that was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Annalise didn’t have any reason to betray NOP. They’d started the group together, they were on the same side. It didn’t make any sense.
Then again, she’d thought she and Karleen were on the same side. For a moment, she felt a pang of longing for her old friend. Not the Karleen who’d betrayed her, but the one she’d loved way back before she’d even met Garret. The one who held her hair back so she could be sick after she had five Midori Cream cocktails on her eighteenth birthday, even as she scolded her for drinking too much. The one who helped her study for her final high-school exams: ‘You’re smarter than you think you are, Poppy, you just have to concentrate.’ The same girl who once had a crush on Nolan, and Poppy had fantasised about how wonderful it would be to have her best friend become her sister-in-law.
But next she saw Karleen sitting at her kitchen table, telling her she’d fallen in love with her husband. And the longing in her heart dissolved.
Thank God Nolan had always thought Karleen was a pain in the arse.
* * *
Poppy wriggled back into the large, soft chair, then leaned forward again to examine a spot on her chin in the mirror. Blackhead, she concluded before sitting back once more. Where did that come from? Maybe she should book in for a facial some time soon. She had to admit, the treatment at this hairdresser so far was the best she’d ever received. An apprentice was bringing her a proper espresso, and she’d even been asked which hand cream she’d prefer for her complimentary hand massage.
The appointment had been set up for her by Annalise a couple of weeks back.
‘You need a change. I think you should do something radical,’ Annalise had said. ‘Get an undercut with patterns shaved into it! Dye it blue!’
‘Are you kidding me? You could get away with shaving the side of your head, I’d just look like I’d been in a terrible accident or had brain surgery.’
And they’d both fallen about laughing. But that was before everything had blown up with NOP. And before Poppy had started to have her doubts about Annalise.
She still hadn’t asked her about the lies on her resume. Poppy didn’t know how to bring it up without it seeming like she was ambushing her, but she knew she’d have to say something eventually. This wasn’t the kind of the thing you could simply ignore.
She didn’t know the hairdresser Annalise had booked her into. Poppy had never been the type of person to have a regular stylist. Usually she ducked into one of the discount ‘Cuts Galore’ salons for a quick trim and left it at that.
She decided that when her hair stylist came over, she was going to throw caution to the wind and tell her she did want something radical. Something brand new! As long as it didn’t involve clippers, the stylist could have free rein. Well . . . as long as she told Poppy what she was going to do before she did it.
A young woman with a long plait hanging over one shoulder finally approached and stood behind her, catching her eye in the mirror. She introduced herself as Wendy, and Poppy picked up a Southern American twang to her voice.
‘So sorry to keep you waiting but your stylist wasn’t feeling great, so we’ve fallen a bit behind.’
‘That’s no good. I hope she’s okay?’
“Not to worry, she’ll be fine. Now, what are we doing for you today?’
‘I need a change,’ Poppy said, a slight wobble to her voice. ‘Something completely different.’
She was waiting for Wendy to turn into one of those stylists you saw on television makeover shows, brimming with ideas and excited to have a blank canvas to work with. But instead her shoulders sort of slumped.
‘Oh yeah?’ she said, not a hint of enthusiasm in her voice. ‘So what kind of a change do you want?’ As she waited for a response she absent-mindedly pulled Poppy’s hair tie out and started running her fingers through her hair, fluffing it out.
‘I don’t . . . I don’t know,’ she said falteringly. ‘I was hoping . . . you might . . .’ She felt silly and stopped short, unsure of what to say. Maybe she should just ask for a shampoo, blow-dry, and her usual centimetre off the ends.
Poppy noticed a guilty expression cross the stylist’s face.
‘A big change!’ she said, and it was clear she was forcing an excited note into her voice now. ‘That’s a great idea. We can do that. Cut, colour, style – the works. Let me grab some pictures we can flick through and get an idea of what you do and don’t like.’
Ten minutes later they had a plan. Well, Wendy had a plan, Poppy wasn’t entirely sure she’d completely followed as she’d flicked between magazines, hair-colour charts and an album of photos of previous clients.
Next thing she’d run off to mix colour and Poppy had no idea what was coming next. What was it about hairdressers that made her lose all of her assertiveness and turn into a meek school child?
Those Other Women Page 14