Too Close to Home

by Georgia Blain

  He has fucked up, but the truth is he’d become too scared of talking to her about it, anxious he would rupture the fragile peace between them, even if its construction was based on the pretence that none of this was really happening. And so he’d booked his flights with out telling her, waiting until the day after her birthday to reveal the details of his trip, and the clumsiness of the attempt to soften the blow only heightens the fact that the whole issue has become something larger than it should be.

  They have been pretending, Freya thinks, and she turns away so that he cannot see the struggle to stop herself from crying.

  She had woken early on her birthday, happy to be where she was.

  ‘I’m forty,’ she had whispered, and Matt had turned to her, still warm from sleep, wrapping his arms around her and drawing her in close.

  He and Ella had made her a present: a book of photographs and drawings that Matt had bound. Sitting up in bed with Ella, they looked through it together while Matt cooked breakfast. Ella was, of course, only interested in the pictures that included her, and in the drawings she had done for the book.

  ‘Which is your favourite?’ she asked, and Freya gave her the noncommittal response that mothers always give, the kind of answer that used to irritate her intensely when she was a child.

  ‘I like them all.’

  ‘If you had to pick one,’ Ella insisted.

  ‘But I don’t,’ Freya said.

  ‘Say you did. Say I was going to die unless you picked one.’

  Freya seized Ella around the waist, tickling her into a frenzy of giggling. ‘It’s my birthday,’ she told her. ‘Let me off.’

  But Ella wouldn’t, so Freya did what she should have just done in the beginning – she picked out a drawing of Ella’s and declared it the one: her favourite.

  They had to leave for the country at midday. Matt was not supposed to tell her that Anna had organised a party. Freya thought it was just going to be dinner for the four of them and Ella, but after breakfast, he told her the truth.

  ‘I thought you’d hate it,’ he said.

  ‘Why would I?’ She was surprised, and then she realised: he was the one who hated the idea, so much so he had been unable to believe she could have a different response. ‘Now I’m going to have to act.’ She shook her head and laughed. ‘Jesus, I haven’t done that since uni. And I was always so bad at it.’

  ‘I need a run-through,’ she told him just before they left.

  He didn’t know what she meant.

  ‘You’re Anna. I’m me – surprised. Very surprised.’

  They were at the front door, the midday sun shining down the long hall, warm on the boards, golden and fine.

  Freya took a deep breath. ‘Getting into character,’ she said.

  ‘But you are the character,’ Matt reminded her.

  Ella sniggered as Freya shrieked: ‘Oh my God, oh my God,’ like she had won The Price Is Right.

  ‘Bit OTT?’ Freya raised an eyebrow as Matt backed away from her, arms held out to ward her off.

  ‘Just a little.’

  She punched him in the shoulder. ‘You shouldn’t have told me.’

  ‘I know,’ he said. ‘The performance is going to be scary.’

  They arrived in the early afternoon, pulling up at the end of the dirt driveway under the shade of the poplars, the leaves rustling, silvery and pale in the sunlight. High above them a flock of birds wheeled and darted, skimming low before swooping off in an orchestrated formation.

  ‘See.’ Freya pointed them out to Ella.

  Anna and Paolo were lying toe to toe on the long cane lounge. He was reading the paper, and she was flicking idly through a script.

  ‘Looking bloody casual,’ Matt whispered, winking at Freya.

  ‘Where is everyone?’ Ella asked and Freya had to remind her again that they weren’t meant to know, they had to pretend to be surprised when everyone jumped out shouting, ‘Surprise!’

  ‘Unless you’re playing some kind of double trick on me.’ Freya narrowed her eyes and looked at Matt. ‘There is a surprise and it’s no surprise.’

  ‘Now you’re getting much too complex for me,’ and he raised a hand in greeting as Paolo and Anna sat up to welcome them.

  After they had put their bags in their room, Anna insisted that the three of them go down to the river for a swim. It was, Freya supposed, part of the plan, so she put up no argument.

  She took Matt and Ella’s hands as they walked through the overgrown blackberry bushes, the sticky leaves humming with insects, and then down the track to the river.

  In the shade it felt almost too cool to swim, the sand damp and silty between her toes. She bent down and scooped up a handful of water. It was pure and sweet, clear and sparkling in the light. Matt and Ella were already wading out to where the bank dropped away, the water deep enough to float on their backs and stare up at the silky blue sky. She unzipped her dress, an old Marimekko shift that had belonged to her mother, and placed it on top of a log. Standing there, looking across to the other side of the bank, she braced herself for the plunge, her long pale limbs already feeling the cold as the water lapped over her toes.

  ‘Come on,’ Ella called out.

  ‘Come on,’ Matt echoed.

  And Freya waved to them both before knotting her hair high on her head, and tiptoeing delicately into water that wasn’t really as icy as she had thought it would be.

  Floating down to the bridge, side by side, the three of them sang songs. Ella, like Freya, had no ability to hold a tune, but Matt had a beautiful voice. Soft and husky, it underscored their own flimsy trilling, bringing a sweet yearning to their music.

  ‘Sing to me,’ Freya used to say when they first started sleeping together, and lying next to her, he would croon a slow version of one of her favourites.

  Now, in the cool of the water, he sang her old Cure songs, songs she used to love; snatches of ‘Boys Don’t Cry’, ‘Love Cats’ and ‘Fire in Cairo’, all blended together, his voice rich and mellow in the stillness of the afternoon.

  Walking back across the garden that surrounded the house, Ella was the first to see someone, a flash of a red dress as whomever it was dashed across the room and then slunk low to the floor in hiding.

  ‘They’re all there,’ she whispered.

  ‘Now I wish it was just us,’ Freya said to Matt. ‘It’s been such a lovely day.’

  He squeezed her hand.

  The ‘Surprise!’ was loud, loud enough to make her jump and appear genuinely startled. She didn’t dare look at either Ella or Matt once the initial shock wore off and she had to go through what was probably a slightly dubious performance, culminating in a tight embrace with Anna and a whispered ‘I had no idea’.

  ‘Really?’ Anna looked at her and then across at Matt, who leant against the doorway.

  ‘Really,’ Freya protested, knowing she was blushing. She was a terrible liar.

  It was a small group: Louise, Mikhala and her new boyfriend, Max, Clara and Julia, and an old friend of Freya’s, Frank, who worked as a theatre director in Melbourne.

  ‘You look wonderful,’ he said, kissing her, before stepping back because she was still wet from her swim.

  She looked at him and grinned. ‘It’s so good to see you,’ and it was; he was the genuine surprise. They had spent a couple of months together three years ago. He was directing one of her plays and she had gone down to Melbourne to do some further work on it during the rehearsal period, staying on for the start of the season. They’d known each other at university, but it was during that time in Melbourne that they became close. She had flirted with the idea of an affair, knowing she would never act on it, but enjoying the possibility, and on the night before she had left there’d been a moment, an instant of looking at each other when she knew that he, too, had considered something other than friendship. He was married now, she and Matt had gone to his wedding, and he had recently had a child.

  ‘Marianne wanted to come too,’ he said, ‘but it
’s too hard with Lola.’

  She commiserated, remembering how difficult it had been when Ella was young.

  He confessed that he and Marianne had not been getting on. ‘But I don’t want to tell you about all that now.’

  He had come to Sydney to discuss work with a few people, bumping into Anna at an opening night. ‘She made me stay on, so that I could see you,’ he said, and she told him how glad she was that he had.

  Getting changed in their room, Freya was aware that she took a little more care with her appearance than she would have otherwise. She wore a pale green dress and dark red lipstick. She brushed her hair into a long sleek ponytail down her back, and then finished her outfit with a pair of high-heeled silver sandals.

  ‘You look good,’ Ella told her. She was lying on the bed, thumb in her mouth, as she watched her dress.

  Freya kissed her on the nose and apologised once again for the fact that there were no other children for her to play with.

  Out on the verandah, the smell of citronella was sharp in the night air, and the flames from the torches made them all look younger than they really were. They drank champagne and ate from the platters of food that Paolo had prepared.

  Louise announced that she was pregnant and everyone congratulated her. If the news had any effect on Anna, she didn’t show it. Raising her glass high, her other arm around Paolo, her smile was bright.

  Standing at the entrance to the house, Matt was talking to Max. Freya had always admired his ability to start a conversation with anyone. He remained himself no matter where he was or who he was with, a simple trait that always put others at ease.

  ‘Pretty cute, hey?’ Mikhala grinned as she looked across at Max. ‘He left his wife three weeks ago.’

  He was staying with Mikhala until he found his own place. She was happier than she’d ever been.

  ‘Told you he was the one,’ and she lit her cigarette from the citronella torch.

  Freya resisted the urge to point out that Max was not the first she had described as ‘the one’. She looked over again and told Mikhala that he looked nice.

  ‘Not nice,’ Mikhala laughed. ‘Gorgeous.’

  They sat on the edge of the steps next to Clara and Julia. At the other end of the verandah, Louise was talking to Frank. She leant close to him, intense, waving her hands in the air as she no doubt disparaged another director’s work or bemoaned the cowardice of the funding agencies. Freya shook her head; she didn’t want the darkness of mean thoughts this evening. The night was clear and cool, she was happy, and as she leant back against the post, she helped herself to one of Mikhala’s cigarettes.

  ‘How’s it feel turning forty?’ Clara winked. At forty-seven, she was older, and had little patience for any complaints about the coming of this new decade. ‘It’s so young,’ she laughed, when she wished Freya a happy birthday. ‘Wait till you’re looking fifty in the face.’

  ‘It’s good,’ Freya said. ‘I’m fundamentally happy in my life,’ and as she uttered the words she realised they were true. ‘I have love, a child, work that I enjoy.’

  ‘Here’s to you,’ Clara replied.

  Freya grimaced and looked up at the sky. ‘I list all my blessings and then I get deeply anxious.’ She smiled. ‘It’s the state you want to attain, but as soon as you do, you realise the inevitability of change can only bring loss.’

  Clara looked at her and, as Freya met her gaze, she wondered where her words had come from. She was not unhappy.

  ‘I think you need more champagne,’ Mikhala told her and she leant across to fill up Freya’s glass.

  Dinner was, of course, superb. Paolo had excelled himself. After the platters of antipasto, they sat at the long table to eat risotto, followed by lamb, and finally there was the cake.

  ‘Made by me,’ Anna exclaimed.

  Matt’s speech was slightly drunken and confused, Anna’s was witty and charming and Freya’s was a shambles. She leant back in her chair and suggested they all go down to the river for a swim. Matt laughed.

  ‘You’re completely pissed,’ he told her, which she was.

  No one took her up on her suggestion.

  Louise went to bed, Clara and Julia sat on the verandah and rolled joints, Matt, Anna and Paolo began to clear the plates.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Frank offered and Freya smiled weakly at him as she confessed that her desire for a swim had passed as quickly as it had come. And then she thought, why not? It would be good to go for a walk, to sober up before she tried to sleep.

  It was difficult to find their way in the darkness. Frank followed her because she knew the path, but as she led them both into a patch of blackberries, she had to stop and turn around, holding her hands up in helplessness.

  ‘I think this is going to be dangerous,’ she warned him, giggling slightly as she looked at the confusion on his face. ‘Would you settle for a stroll around the garden?’

  They lay in the hammocks under the peppercorn trees, swaying gently as they talked.

  He’d been busy with a company that had received a large amount of funding from uranium mining. ‘They agonised briefly about whether to take it, but it didn’t take that long before they made their minds up. Unfortunately, the work they wanted to do was incredibly dull.’ He smiled. ‘Staid, old-fashioned drama – sitcom style. I loved the regular wage and being near home but I couldn’t do another one.’

  ‘Mining money.’ Freya tried to lean up on her elbow, but it was hopeless. ‘The other day I went to buy a toaster in Kmart,’ she told him. ‘Did you know you can get them for nine dollars now?’ She laughed. ‘I mean, that’s ridiculous. We rip all these metals out of the ground, send them over to China where people work for nothing producing crap that is designed to fail within weeks. I thought toasters were something you bought for life. You used to give them for wedding presents.’ She looked across at him. ‘We didn’t give you one, did we?’

  He pretended to think about it, and then shook his head.

  Trying to be serious now, she said she was sorry it had been hard with Marianne. ‘You seemed so happy on your wedding day.’

  ‘I’ve probably made it worse,’ he confessed. He had promised he wouldn’t take a job in Sydney without speaking to her first, but he’d as good as given his word he’d work on a new project, one that was top secret, and he looked at Freya meaningfully. She didn’t know what the look was meant to signify and so she ignored it.

  ‘She’ll be furious,’ Frank admitted. ‘It either means leaving her and Lola in Melbourne for a couple of months, or all of us coming up, which she hates.’

  ‘Why?’ Freya asked, her mind drifting with the slow arcing dance of the branches overhead.

  ‘She has no friends here. She says it will be lonely.’ Frank sighed. ‘And if I leave them behind she’s resentful.’

  ‘It’s hard when children are young,’ Freya told him. ‘It’ll change.’

  He wasn’t so sure. ‘Sometimes I think we have made a terrible mistake.’ His words were soft in the night. ‘We barely knew each other.’

  ‘That’s probably the best time to get married,’ Freya said. ‘When you don’t know each other, when you still find each other wonderful. I mean, who would do it years down the track?’

  She leant over the edge of her hammock to smile at him, tipping herself a little too far in the process. She heard him laugh as she toppled down onto the grass.

  ‘I’m ridiculous,’ she said, and she picked leaves out of her hair as she sat up. ‘You know, I didn’t think I would enjoy tonight so much.’

  ‘You knew, didn’t you?’

  She confessed she had. ‘But don’t tell anyone,’ she urged, her face a study in seriousness as she made him cross his heart and hope to die.

  He reached down to help her up and as she took his hand, she looked directly at him, only to glance away again as quickly as she had met his eyes. He was beautiful, she thought, here in the night, under the trees; curly golden brown hair, pale eyes and a smile at the cor
ner of his mouth. She could kiss him, drunk and careless. He could kiss her, and she wanted to because what would it really matter? No one would know. But there were years and years of monogamy behind her, a life that held her just as tightly as she had always suspected it did, and she stood up unsteady on her feet, letting go of his hand.

  ‘You know I had a crush on you once?’ she told him by way of an offering because she knew he, too, had been drawn to her in that moment.

  He smiled a little sadly as he kissed her on the cheek.

  ‘We should go back,’ he suggested, and she agreed that yes, they should.

  Later, lying in the darkness of their room with Ella on the mattress on the floor, she told Matt that she loved him.

  She was on her side, leaning on her elbow, too drunk to trust letting her head rest on the pillow. She leant down to kiss him on his forehead and he grunted in reply.

  ‘Did you hear me?’ she asked, nudging him in the ribs.

  ‘I did,’ he said, stretching out an arm so that she could lie closer.

  Moving in to the warmth of his body, she smelt the familiarity of his skin; her hand rested on the beautiful flat line of his stomach, her leg wrapped around his.

  ‘I know you,’ she said, her voice soft in the quiet.

  But he was snoring now. Asleep, while she lay there, drunk and awake.

  ALONE IN THEIR BACK garden, Freya asks Matt to tell her about Lisa.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Who is she? What’s she like? If she’s going to be in our lives, I need to know.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He looks out to the darkness. ‘I spoke to her briefly and it was awkward. It seemed so much easier to deal with this face to face, and before I knew it, I’d begun making arrangements.’ He pauses for a moment. ‘I’m sorry I was scared to tell you.’

  She hadn’t made it easy for him to talk, but still he should have persisted. He should have let her know his plans.

  ‘Then? What was she like then?’

  ‘Young. We both were. Shy, but kind of independent. Easy to be with. I don’t know. I barely remember.’