The Last Days of Chez Nous & Two Friends

by Helen Garner

BETH: Congratulations.

  They stand about, with Vicki, silent, uncomfortable, not knowing where to look.

  BETH (awkwardly): Okay—I’m going to get some food for dinner. Will you both be home? Because I’ve invited Sal and Angelo, to sort of celebrate.

  JP (trying to be light): There is something to celebrate?

  BETH (battling on): Well—I’m back. And you’re an Australian now.

  She goes off, carrying her flowers. They stand and watch her go; then they exchange a frightened, passionate look.

  Early that evening, in the dining room, Beth is dumping a folded cloth and some cutlery on the table when Vicki and JP come in from the front door. Their faces are open and soft.

  BETH (trying not to sound reproachful): I was wondering where you two had got to!

  VICKI: We saw a movie.

  BETH: Oh! Was it in black and white, or colour?

  JP (snaps, like an adolescent at his mother): Colour, of course.

  BETH (hurt): Why do you answer me like that?

  JP (his irritation out of control): Because it is a stupid question. Films are all made in colour now. How could it have been in black and white? Why do you ask this question?

  BETH (baffled and wounded): Manhattan was in black and white, wasn’t it?

  JP: You don’t even want to know! You just ask questions to have something to say! You must always have something to say!

  He marches out the back door and into the yard, to go upstairs. Beth at the table is silent with humiliation. Vicki can hardly bear to look at her.

  VICKI (in a low voice): How can you let him speak to you like that?

  Meanwhile, Angelo and Sally, dressed up to dine out, are sitting at the backyard table having a drink. They are not visible from the dining room but have heard the exchange between JP and Beth and are now sitting bright-faced with embarrassment. The baby is on the ground, in a basket.

  JP, surging out the back door on his way to the stairs, comes upon them without expecting to. He has forgotten they were coming; he jams on the brakes and shifts into sociable gear. He shakes Angelo’s hand and kisses Sally.

  Vicki slides through the yard behind him, nodding and waving to the guests; she runs up the stairs and disappears.

  SALLY: Congratulations, JP.

  ANGELO: Where’s your certificate, mate?

  JP (airily, to get a laugh): I put it in the bin.

  JP pours himself a glass of wine and pulls out a chair for himself, but Beth comes to the kitchen door with a big saucepan, about to carry it into the dining room.

  BETH: This is ready, Jean-Pierre. Can you call the others, please?

  JP puts down his glass and moves towards the stairs.

  Angelo and Sally stand too.

  On the upstairs verandah, out of sight of the guests, JP is holding Vicki in his arms. He is ardent, and urgent; but she is standing still in his embrace, frightened, with her arms hanging down and her head on one side.

  JP (whispering, as if answering her doubts): I am ready for a scandal.

  The end of the meal on the same evening. At the table in the dining room are Beth, JP, Vicki, Annie, Tim, Angelo, Sally.

  Sally is working hard, being charming to the kids who are chattering with her, unaware of the undercurrents of tension at the table. JP and Vicki are quiet. Beth is trying to cover up by being hostly; Angelo has smelt a rat and keeps looking from face to face.

  SALLY: I used to work in an old people’s home, when I was a student.

  ANNIE: Did they get many visitors?

  SALLY: Not really. They were pretty out of it, most of them.

  ANNIE: I think that’s awful.

  TIM: I’d never put my mum away. (To Annie:) Would you?

  Annie turns straight to Beth and launches into the Butterworth game.

  ANNIE: AS soon as you’ve finished your dinner, Cheryl, we’ll be taking you back to Braemar Lodge.

  BETH (falling in with the game): I’m not going back there. I don’t want to.

  ANNIE (sweetly persuasive, but with menace): Don’t be silly, Cheryl. You love it there. Matron’s a very nice lady.

  BETH (sullenly): I hate Matron.

  ANNIE (carolling): But Matron’s nice! She lets you watch ‘Perfect Match’ with all the other ladies—doesn’t she, Chantelle?

  Annie tries to hook Vicki to play her usual part in the game, but Vicki won’t bite; keeps her eyes away, with an embarrassed look.

  BETH: No. I’m not going back. This is where I belong. I won’t go.

  TIM (in stage whisper): Want me to go for a syringe?

  ANNIE: Not yet. Leave it to me. She trusts me. (Aloud:) Now come on Cheryl. Don’t make a fuss. I’ll get your cardy. Jason’s going to drive you back to Braemar now, aren’t you Jason? (to JP)

  JP and Vicki have their eyes on their plates. Sally can’t help laughing but Angelo is frankly appalled.

  JP: Arrête, arrête, Annie—not these ’orrible Butterworths.

  ANGELO: Who the hell are the Butterworths?

  ANNIE (cheerful, bright, oblivious): Oh, they’re a family of a mother and two daughters. The mother’s an old moll, and the daughters are lazy, stupid and mean.

  ANGELO (laughing in horror): You lot are sick.

  Small pause.

  BETH (abashed): Sometimes we do Chekhov.

  Sally laughs again.

  JP: It is a game of anti-working class.

  BETH (serious and tired): No, it’s not. It’s not anti-anything. I wish I was like Cheryl. Cheryl’s better than me. She’s rough as bags, but she’s got more heart.

  Everyone looks at her, surprised. She has quietly dropped her bundle.

  Later the same night, Beth is alone on the upstairs verandah in the dark, sitting on the bench.

  JP comes up the stairs looking for her.

  She looks round with a hurt expression, but glad to see him and trying to smile, hoping perhaps that he has come to say he is sorry, to fix everything. But he looks tense, overwrought, even scared.

  JP: We didn’t know where you were.

  Beth just looks at him, waiting.

  JP: I’m going to bed.

  BETH: Tu m’embrasses pas? (Aren’t you going to kiss me?)

  She means a goodnight kiss.

  JP (blurting it out): There is something between me and Vicki.

  Beth, shocked, laughs.

  JP: It’s serious.

  Beth gets up and blunders past him, in towards the bathroom, looking back over her shoulder at him as she walks away, laughing foolishly.

  Beth is standing in the bathroom in her nightie, stunned, not moving.

  Propped on top of the cupboard, wrinkled from steam, are several photos, including one of Beth and Vicki.

  Beth picks up a lump of curtain rod that is leaning against the wall and lays about her in the bathroom, smashing the photos, a vase, a couple of jars, sending shampoo bottles flying. She hits about wildly, with violence.

  Vicki is standing in the middle of her bedroom as if waiting for something. She hears the explosion of breakage from another room, and puts her hands over her face, flinching with raised shoulders.

  Beth is sitting on the edge of the bath.

  JP opens the door. He is fearful; but he crunches through the wreckage and sits beside her on the bath. For a moment they’re silent.

  JP: Are you angry with me? Are you jealous?

  BETH: What I am feeling makes jealousy seem like a surface tremor.

  JP: Why don’t you cry?

  BETH: I will. Later.

  Sound of front door slamming sharply downstairs. JP jumps.

  BETH (with mockery): Aren’t you going with your lover?

  JP: No.

  Pause.

  BETH (dully): Do you love her?

  JP (quietly and humbly): It is as if, before I did not know what love was.

  Pause.

  BETH (bitterly): And what is love.

  JP (quietly): Don’t mock me.

  BETH: I think I must be a very unbearable
person.

  JP begins quietly to cry. He leans sideways until his head is resting on her shoulder. Slowly, wearily, she puts her arm around him.

  Next morning. The café is full of bright sun.

  Beth sits at a table looking stunned.

  Behind the counter the waiter is pestering the waitress who is trying to wash dishes.

  WAITER: I wanna show you something. Come on, come on, I wanna show you something. I wanna show you this trick.

  WAITRESS (raising fingers to temples): Show it to your wife.

  WAITER: No, come on, come on, I wanna show you this trick, I won’t hurt you, I promise I won’t hurt you.

  Vicki appears at the door, still dressed as on the previous night. She does not immediately come in, but stands at the doorway in a very high state, trembling, trying to control herself.

  Beth sees her, and registers her presence without change of expression. Her face is stiff.

  Vicki approaches and stands beside the table.

  BETH (blankly): Didn’t you come home last night.

  VICKI (in a breathless rush): I just want you to know that I’ve dug my grave and now I’m going to lie in it.

  BETH (with a hard laugh, turning her head slowly to the window and back again): Oh, come off it.

  VICKI (still standing): We didn’t think you’d take it like this. JP said, ‘She’s been around. She can cope with things.’

  BETH (very level): You’ve broken my heart, Vicki.

  VICKI (flustered): JP says I’ll break his if I change my mind.

  Vicki is standing like a schoolgirl being carpeted by the headmistress: hands clasped behind her, feet together.

  BETH: How could you do it? (Her self-control is ghastly.)

  Vicki draws herself up as if about to respond to an expected challenge: this is the rationalisation she has prepared and learnt by heart.

  VICKI: The question is: am I always going to stand back and not take what I want, just because it’s yours?

  BETH (at first controlled): The worst thing, you know, is when you look back. When what you thought was solid ground behind you—just—just—crumbles.

  Beth’s facade cracks. She struggles to her feet but Vicki pushes past the chair and dashes forward with her arms out.

  VICKI: Oh, I want to kiss you.

  She seizes Beth, puts her face in Beth’s neck. Even now she takes the posture of one who wants to be comforted. They are both crying. Beth embraces her, but then lets go and steps away.

  BETH: That’s enough. Don’t come near me again. I can’t help you. I can’t do anything to help you any more.

  She picks up her bag and walks out of the café.

  JP is in the bedroom by himself, in a chaos of half-sorted belongings, with a suitcase open on the bed. He stands there with a cassette in each hand. He puts both of them into the case, then pauses, then takes one out and puts it back on the shelf.

  Saturday morning.

  Tim and Annie are playing the piano. Beth approaches, and stands behind them.

  BETH: You two might have noticed there’s a bit of drama going on round here.

  ANNIE (looks up brightly): No! Is there?

  BETH: It’s about JP and Vicki. They’re in love, it seems. And they want to be together.

  Annie bursts into childish tears of shock.

  Tim sits still, then walks out of the room.

  ANNIE (stopping crying suddenly as children do): Is Vicki home?

  BETH: They’ve gone out looking for a house.

  ANNIE (in surprised, confused tone): I don’t feel much, yet. I feel like being practical.

  She looks down at the keyboard; she’s in shock.

  ANNIE: I should be able to play this piece by now. I ought to practise more. I ought to become a more reliable person.

  Beth says nothing.

  ANNIE: DO we have to move? Where will everybody live?

  BETH: We’ll stay here.

  ANNIE (confused): Who will?

  BETH: You and me. And Tim.

  ANNIE: Maybe he won’t want to.

  BETH: We’ll need him. For the rent.

  ANNIE: Maybe he’d rather live with an ordinary family.

  BETH: You can ask him, sweetheart.

  ANNIE (functioning on automatic): Let’s go to the market. Let’s get some new cups. You’ve smashed all the blue ones.

  BETH (wildly): Let’s buy a whole new set.

  ANNIE: I know! Let’s get a puppy!

  They start to laugh, half-hysterical, on the edge of tears.

  ANNIE (calming down): When are they leaving?

  BETH: AS soon as they find a place.

  ANNIE (sternly): I think it’s silly. It won’t work.

  Beth shrugs.

  ANNIE: Shouldn’t you fight back or something? Isn’t that what women are supposed to do?

  Beth looks at her for a moment before speaking.

  BETH: DO you know what? It’s almost a relief.

  Several days later, JP and Beth are walking beside the water. JP picks up a stone and throws it at the cliff, aiming at a hole in the rock. Beth picks up another and copies him. They fall into competition, jostling each other like children playing. Their faces are shadowy.

  JP: If anyone looks down from one of those houses they would not guess we are a couple splitting up. They would say, ‘Look at these two lovers’. (He shouts defiantly.) LE COUPLE SÉPARÉ DE L’ANNÉE!!! (SEPARATED COUPLE OF THE YEAR!)

  He throws another stone.

  BETH: I loved Vicki. I used to love her so much it hurt me to look at her.

  JP: Yes—but you didn’t love me.

  BETH: I did! I did love you!

  JP: But you didn’t notice me. I have been for years lonely. I thought you were ashamed of me.

  BETH: Ashamed?

  JP (in a tone much gentler than the words): You were proud. I have made you humble.

  BETH (wildly—she is seeing what she’s lost): Our marriage was bad. It was really bad. It was hardly even a marriage at all. How could you call that a marriage?

  JP (half laughing): Well, if we are not married, how can we be separating?

  Beth can’t help laughing at his ‘logic’.

  Pause. They chuck stones.

  BETH: If you have a baby with her, it’ll be related to me. I’ll be its auntie.

  She throws a stone.

  BETH: It’s probably against the law. Some kind of law, anyway.

  JP: I don’t expect…perhaps she will not stay with me for long. She is looking for experience.

  He drops his stone and walks away. Beth runs to catch up with him.

  JP: It’s not that I want to leave.

  BETH: But you have to. Because now everything is smashed.

  She takes his hand.

  BETH (starting to cry): Your hands are always warm. What am I going to do without your warm hands?

  The back door is open and Beth is sweeping the yard with a straw broom, working hard.

  Wind is blowing through the open gate.

  Past her staggers JP with the last carton of stuff in his arms: on top of it, the saucepan in which the last meal (after the naturalisation ceremony) was served.

  He disappears out the gate.

  Annie is sitting on the stairs, halfway up, watching.

  JP comes back empty-handed, and stops in front of Beth at the foot of the stairs. Annie comes down the stairs and stands right behind Beth, as if in support.

  Beth and JP look at each other without speaking. Beth steps back to allow JP and Annie to say goodbye. Annie and JP put their arms round each other. Then Annie, trying not to cry, runs off into the house.

  JP and Beth kiss formally, in the French way: a kiss on each cheek. They hug, then step apart.

  The same morning, Vicki stands holding a broom in the kitchen of a newly rented house. Unpacked boxes are all around her. The stains of previous occupants’ lives will have to be cleaned off these walls.

  JP, carrying his carton, enters and watches her, unobserved.


  Her face is clouded. So is his.

  Tim and Annie are at the piano, working away at ‘Donna Lee’: stumbling, concentrating, working at the same passage over and over.

  ANNIE (ready to give up): Oh, it’s hopeless—I always make the same mistake!

  TIM: No, no—it’s good. It’s getting better. Now we’ll go back to the beginning and start again.

  His hands are poised: he counts them in:

  Two, three, four—

  Beth is sitting by herself at the top of the steps. The wind is blowing through the swept, empty yard. Music from the living room can be heard faintly from here.

  The telephone rings. She does not answer it.

  She gets up, goes down the stairs and heads out the back gate, walking in a resolute way.

  As she goes out, the camera rises and moves so that we can see her walking away down the lane.

  She walks to the bottom of the lane, turns the corner into the street, and disappears.