She guided Juliette through high school, and now university—the life Isabelle had always wanted for herself. Boyfriends were unavoidable for a young woman who had inherited her mother’s good looks, but early motherhood wouldn’t stunt her daughter’s life. Isabelle had made certain Juliette was aware of contraception from the time she was a teenager. Unlike her own mother who had been too afraid to mention the word sex, let alone caution her about any other traps young women could fall into.
But children eventually grew up and took control of their own lives. That’s all Isabelle had ever hoped for Juliette. Even though her daughter still lived with her, she spent more and more time out of the house as she studied, worked and explored her social life.
Sitting on her own most nights, waking to an empty bed, in an empty house, the space between Isabelle and the walls grew a little too big. The silence beneath the pad of her feet on the tiles as she moved about was startlingly loud. An expanding void in her womb.
She was aware of the years moving by like a blur of landscape seen through a speeding car’s window. Prophecies filled her mind of sitting in front of the television, with grey hair and deep wrinkles, a warm blanket across her frail knees—alone.
But that nightmare changed when a handsome, rough-around-the-edges tradesman came into her salon for a haircut. As she had run her fingers through his dark hair, snipping and clipping, and looked into his kind blue eyes, she had realised it was now or never. If she didn’t jump into the dating game, she would never do it.
Chris had sat in her chair and tripped over his words when he spoke to Isabelle for the first time and allowed her to maternally wrap the cape around him, her long fingernails brushing his skin. Her salon held the pungent scent of hair dyes and shampoo. She was dressed in tight white pants and a white singlet top that had highlighted her tan and toned arms. Silky blonde hair, so long it skimmed her waist.
He would soon learn he was nine years older than her, and she was well above his batting average. When she had asked him out for a coffee, the shock was like a stinging slap to his head.
In the days between that haircut and their first date, he had been so nervous. But his tension vanished when he had sat across from Isabelle in a small, intimate coffee shop and she had smiled at him, set her chocolate brown eyes on his and talked and talked and talked.
She was one of those people. Could talk to anyone, anywhere about anything. They didn’t have uncomfortable silences. But sometime after that, Chris had come to appreciate silence and wanted maybe one or two moments without words.
Isabelle filled her cup with frothy milk and sipped her coffee just as Juliette rushed into the kitchen. “Good morning.”
Julliette smiled, kissed her mother’s cheek. “Good morning. I’m late.”
Isabelle checked her watch. “Seven minutes late.”
“I know. It’s my stupid hair. I washed it last night with a new conditioner. Today, it didn’t want to do anything it was told.”
“You should have come and got me. I would have helped you out.”
Juliette shrugged. “I thought I’d let you get in some time with your husband.” The musical way she said husband was like that of a child teasing their younger sibling about a boyfriend.
Isabelle lowered her eyes to her coffee, a whimsical smile gracing her lips. “I appreciate that.”
Chris was home that week. He worked twelve days on, eight days off, fly-in fly-out roster to a mine site in Northern Queensland where he was employed as a mechanical fitter.
Their marriage was still very much in the honeymoon phase and that was reset twice a month by Chris’s work schedule. It was true what they said about absence making the heart grow fonder. Every time Chris came home after twelve days away was like the start to their honeymoon all over again.
Not that they’d technically had a honeymoon. Isabelle was thirty-eight. Chris was forty-seven and this was his second marriage. Neither of them wanted to make a fuss. Chris hadn’t wanted to marry again but eventually agreed when Isabelle said they wouldn’t have to have a ceremony or an expensive trip away, just a simple signing of the marriage certificate with a minimum number of witnesses and a sole registrar.
Chris was that type of person—simple. That’s what Isabelle loved about him. He was always the one person. Never wavering. No matter the circumstance, she always knew who she was coming home to.
Isabelle tipped her coffee into a travel mug with a lid. “Here. You take this. Looks like you need it more than me.”
Juliette kissed her mum’s cheek again, eagerly took the hot coffee. “You’re a saint. Have I ever told you that before?”
A laugh. “You may have. Now go.”
Juliette drank deeply from the travel mug, grabbed a banana from the fruit bowl and skipped out of the kitchen. She still had a semester left of her communications degree, but two months ago, she had landed a paid internship as a public relations and communications officer at the alumina refinery. Jobs like that, in that town, were gold, but if you didn’t know someone who already worked there, trying to get your foot in was near impossible. Isabelle was so proud when her daughter, out of hundreds of applicants, had earned the position.
She quickly made another coffee, poured it into a spare travel mug, and tiptoed to her darkened bedroom. She opened the door. Chris’s breathing was slow, rhythmical. He was on his stomach, naked backside in the air, sheets tangled around his legs. Tall and fit. Looking at her husband, even eighteen months into their relationship, had her wanting to climb back into bed with him. But her salon took priority.
She leaned over, kissed his stubbled cheek. “I’ll see you this afternoon.”
He smiled, eyes never opening, and slurred, “Have a good day.”
* * *
From one side of Gladstone to the other was only fifteen minutes, so Isabelle arrived at her salon in ample time. She unlocked the doors, put cash in the till, heaved a load of towels out of the dryer and dumped them on the front counter. There, she logged onto the computer while folding the laundry-powder scented towels.
When she noted that her appointment book was full, her shoulders relaxed. Hairdressing wasn’t where the money was at. Far from. As it was, she didn’t declare any sales that were paid with cash. If she were forced to pay tax on that part of her income too, she would have closed the doors a long time ago.
That kind of stress and strain was an obsolete concern now that she had Chris in her life. He earned a great wage, much more than she had first assumed. She had known miners in Australia worked ridiculous schedules, and their job came with real safety risks, not to mention the amount of time spent away from their families, but she had never realised they were compensated well for all that. She wouldn’t admit that to anyone, but it had been a cherry on top.
Not that they shared their finances, even since getting married and Chris moving in with her. But Chris paid for his share of living expenses and was generous when they had weekends away or went out for dinner and drinks. That was enough to alleviate the lifetime fixation Isabelle had on making ends meet.
A blissful tangle of joy filled her chest. A part of her wondered why she hadn’t found a man to fall in love with years ago. And then her logical brain intervened, reminding her that she had tried. Numerous times. But all her attempts bore no romantic fruit. No, with her early start to adulthood and responsibility, the fast-tracked mature head on her shoulders, she’d had to wait until the potential Romeos caught up.
Chapter 5
Maddison stood in the centre of the living room and announced, “Bedtime.”
Riley groaned from his place on the carpet, stomach down, his iPad before him, finger darting over the screen. Ruby was sitting next to Ben, her head resting on his lap as he stroked the hair from her forehead. Now and then, she would laugh at something she found funny on the TV, then look up at her father and he would smile down at her.
Maddison clapped her hands. “Come on. Up you get.”
The children kissed th
eir father goodnight, then snail-paced it to the bathroom. They were used to this routine and always took their time, dragging out the few sweet moments of wakefulness remaining.
When Maddison heard the tell-tale sounds of her children sprinting down the hallway, giggling and chatting, she followed them to their bedroom. A spacious room. A single bed for them both, each butting against opposite walls, leaving a big space between that had been hijacked by toy cars, racetracks, colouring books, pencils and dolls. Riley’s bed had a colourful coverlet with computer game characters. Ruby’s was soft yellow with cartoonish kittens.
She tucked Riley in first, kissed his cheek. Her fast-growing eleven-year-old boy. Her firstborn. He looked so much like his father—same fair hair and pale green eyes—and yet he had inherited Maddison’s petite frame.
She stroked his fringe off his forehead and smiled. “Good night. I love you so much.”
He grinned, flashing his recently earned new tooth that had now grown to about half the size of the others. “I love you too.”
Sitting on the mattress beside Ruby, Maddison kissed her daughter’s brow. “I’m proud of how you’re coping with what happened today.” Ruby was a smaller replica of Maddison—short, petite and with long dark hair and brown eyes. She looked younger than her age and had an unwavering expression of sweetness like she could never do or say a thing wrong. Not always the case, though.
“What happened to Ruby?” Riley asked, sitting up, pulling out his freshly tucked-in sheets.
Maddison frowned. “I told you. She had a nasty bully do something very mean to her today in front of the class.”
Ruby’s brow furrowed. “It’s no big deal. It truly wasn’t.”
“Dad said I should punch bullies in the nose if they be mean to me,” Riley said, emphasising the word ‘punch’ with a sharp jab of his fist out in front of him. “Then kick ‘em in the balls.”
Maddison sighed. “Honey, you would go find a teacher and tell them what happened. But something like this will never happen again.” Not if she had any say in the matter. “Now both of you lie down. It’s bedtime.”
As the kids settled in their beds, Maddison looked away, not quite ready to admit that they would have to go to another school because of what she had done.
Only a couple of hours ago, a no-nonsense letter from Sabrina Collins had landed in both Maddison and Ben’s email accounts. It stated that Maddison’s threatening behaviour breached the students and parents’ school and community guidelines. The safety of the children at Gladstone Primary Private school was paramount. Maddison would be granted one-time access to collect her children’s belongings from the administration building but would not be permitted on schoolgrounds going forward, and if she did, a restraining order could be sought. Therefore, it was strongly advised Ben and Maddison seek alternative schooling options for their children.
“I love you so, so much,” she said to Ruby. “If you need to talk to me about anything, I’m right here, okay?”
Ruby nodded. “I love you too.”
Maddison got to her feet and smiled at her children, though it appeared out of sync with the rest of her emotionless features.
On the way to the basement home-gym, she passed Ben who was still sitting in the living room. He turned to look at her. “All okay?”
“Just getting in a workout before bed.”
His eyes widened. “Another one?”
“Well, I could sit on the couch, eat chocolate and get fat if you’d prefer that?”
“I would prefer you to be happy.” He sighed, eyes closing for a moment. “And, maybe, now and then, to spend some time with me.”
“That would not make me happy.”
He drew a deep breath, attempting to fill the dark void her offhand comment carved out of his chest. “You don’t want to talk about what happened today?”
She shook her head. “Nothing to talk about.”
His palm slid down his face. “You threatened to kill a little girl.”
“And she deserved it.”
“Maddison, think about it.” He pointed in the direction of the school. “What you did and said was not rational. Not in the slightest. You’re spending hours every day working out. You’re bombing yourself out each night, just so you can go to sleep.”
“And who’s to blame for that, eh?”
“It doesn’t matter who’s to blame.” His voice was more forceful than he had intended, so he softened it, yet the strain was obvious. “I think you need to talk to someone. To clear out some of this painful past you’re carrying around.”
“I don’t want to clear out the past. And I’ll handle my life the way I choose.”
He waved his hand as if to say, ‘do what the hell you bloody well want then’.
And she would. She marched down the stairs, slammed the door behind her, put headphones on and blasted techno music into her eardrums.
For the next two hours, she did leg presses, calf raises, deadlifts, bicep curls, tricep dips, chin-ups, press-ups, shoulder presses, and sit-ups until she nearly vomited. She yanked her headphones off, threw them across the room and lay there on the bench, forearm over her eyes until her nausea and dizziness settled.
When able to move again, she crawled on her hands and knees up the stairs, her legs unable to hold her weight. At the top, using the wall and door handle, she dragged herself up onto her feet. Each shuffled step ignited pain so great she bit down on her lip to stop from crying.
In the kitchen, she leaned against the wall beside the fridge, panting. She pulled out a bottle of sauvignon blanc and reached into the cupboard above for her stash of Zolpidem and Diazepam—a hypnotic and a relaxant prescribed to treat her insomnia.
She shook as she popped the tablets from their casing onto her tongue, then drank deeply from the wine bottle, only stopping when the heat of the alcohol burned her throat and she coughed.
Her leg muscles trembled and ached, almost gave way beneath her, as she staggered up the hallway to her bedroom. Ben was still in the living room watching whatever TV show he was currently obsessed with. His life could be summated by three activities: running his business, time with the children when he arrived home, then when the kids were asleep, TV. He would come to bed sometime after she was already lost to oblivion.
Their relationship hadn’t always been like that. On their wedding day, as their carefully curated playlist had blared in the packed reception hall, she had circled her arms loosely around her new husband’s shoulders as they danced. When she stared into his green eyes, the intensity of emotion she held for him burned like a fire within her, filled her heart to overflowing. In his gaze and the set of his face, his fierce love for her was reflected. She had been waiting for ‘him’ her entire life and there he was, in her arms, promising to spend the rest of his days with her.
Now, she could barely look at him. If not for their children, for her deep maternal instincts to give them some semblance of stability, she would be gone. And maybe, just maybe, staying in that dead marriage was a way to punish her husband day after day by sucking every last bit of joy out of his life.
Ben knew all that. He would never admit that to her, though, because he didn’t want that punishment to end. His miserable marriage was the only thing that got him through each day, knowing that he was paying for what he had done. It didn’t alleviate his guilt, but it made it bearable.
Ben was the type of man who could make women stumble over their words no matter how composed they assumed themselves to be. He was difficult to look in the eyes because he was the most handsome man most people had ever met.
None of that excused him but pointed to the historical fact that men like him, with abundant sexual opportunities, were the most difficult to make and keep monogamous.
In the early years of his marriage, he had resisted advances from women that other men would have struggled to turn away. Opportunities that came with the territory. He was a good-looking personal trainer and worked with many fit, attractive people
.
But when he was thirty-one, along came Amber—a seventeen-year-old client who had been referred to him by her friend. Tall, athletic curves, long dark hair, plumped lips, big blue eyes. Beyond sexy and she knew it within every cell of her flawless body. Merely thinking about touching her, let alone kissing, let alone more, had made Ben so hard he could barely think straight.
Amber had ruthlessly flirted with him from the first moment they had met. And for a while, he had resisted. But over time, she artfully worked his willpower down to useless powdery dust.
One evening, after a training session, when all the patrons had gone home, he had pulled her into his arms, slammed her against the gym’s window, and used her body like his life had depended on it. He sought that opiate again and again. Every moment alone, he spent it with her. In his office, on the gym equipment after hours, in his car.
But, predictably, the hormones and lust dissipated. Amber went from a perfect body that had once sent Ben into a sexual frenzy, to an annoying, overly chatty seventeen-year-old girl who liked to talk more about the dramas her school friends were engaged in than anything worthwhile. His rationality returned and they parted ways.
Until the next opportunity arose. Then another. And another. Year after year. By the time his wife had found out about his last indiscretion, he had been with at least fifty, maybe sixty, perhaps even a hundred different women.
Most of them were staff. Clients. Women he met at conferences or in bars. He’d screw them in the alleyways, dark corners or toilets of clubs. In taxis. Parks. Their bed. His bed. He didn’t waste time on indecision; if an opportunity wasn’t a sure thing from the get-go, he moved on to someone who was.
That wasn’t his life anymore, though. He didn’t do anything like that now. His last affair had been a lesson beyond lessons, so much so, he could barely get a hard-on these days. He wouldn’t care if he never got an erection ever again.
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