Cam put his hand on her arm. ‘Wait, he’s not going to be there, is he?’ There was a stretched, vulnerable look on his face.
‘Oh. I don’t know.’ She hadn’t even considered the possibility. The thought was horrifying.
‘But what if he tries to …’ He didn’t complete the thought. His eyes were wild as he fought with his own doubts and insecurities.
‘You can trust me, Cam.’ She took his hand and clasped it tightly. ‘I’m there to see Jodie. I don’t even know if he’s still … on the scene.’
‘OK.’ He smiled at her, but he still looked worried. Layla knew he wouldn’t stop worrying until she was safely back at home. Not that she could blame him, after she’d lied to him for all these years.
He bent to pick up Ella again, Louis standing at his feet, and Layla turned and got into the car.
‘Say goodbye to Mummy,’ Cam said, and the kids chorused an enthusiastic farewell.
‘I love you,’ she said out of the window to all three of them, but it was Cam’s eyes that she sought out.
‘We love you too,’ he said, but she couldn’t tell whether he was speaking for the kids or for himself.
She gave them a final wave as she backed out of the driveway. Though she was dreading her return to Glasswater Bay for a variety of reasons, there was also a sense of relief at the opportunity to escape for a while. Over the last few weeks, she’d assumed it was her own stress that had driven this wedge between Cam and her, but now she wondered whether it went deeper than that. Maybe they’d already been doomed and this was all part of the natural unravelling of their relationship.
As sprawling suburbia gave way to rolling hills covered in brown stubble, Layla’s thoughts turned to her school friends. Shona would be fine, she was sure. While she’d mostly sided with Renee after the whole debacle, she’d never seemed to hold any lingering animosity for Layla. But without Renee to balance out their triangle, they’d drifted apart once they’d all started uni. Then Shona had gone off to London and it’d been too easy to lose contact altogether.
Renee would be another story. She’d seemed pleased to hear that Layla had changed her mind, and had immediately renewed her invitation to stay with her, but Layla knew it wouldn’t be easy. She was going to have to face this head-on. Doing that in the same twenty-four hours they’d be going to their high school reunion, and staying at Renee’s house – with her husband – would inevitably bring back all the painful memories. But amid the fear and dread this weekend represented, there was also a sliver of hope. Maybe it wasn’t too late to revive their friendship.
THEN
I pulled my jacket tighter around me, shivering, as I waited in the rotunda in the park for Scott to pick me up. Sideways rain drilled in through the painted white beams, becoming rivulets on the wooden floorboards and joining the muddy puddle that was accumulating in the centre. I stepped further under cover to avoid getting wet. I’d told Mum and Dad I was going to see a movie with Renee and Shona in Victor, so Scott and I would have the whole afternoon together in glorious anonymity.
A navy-blue car pulled up at the edge of the park, glistening wet in the driving rain. I ran down the steps of the rotunda and across the sodden, yellowing grass. Scott seemed on edge when I swung into the car.
He pulled away quickly when I tried to kiss him. ‘Careful. Don’t want anyone to see us together.’
I settled in the passenger seat and clicked my seatbelt in place. ‘I’ve been looking forward to this all weekend.’
He threw a nervous look out the window. ‘Just be ready to duck your head in case we drive past anyone we know.’
It wasn’t until we’d reached the outskirts of town and turned onto Range Road that he reached out and rested a hand on my thigh. I smiled at him. ‘This is nice. Thanks for doing this for me.’
Within minutes, his fingers had crept up my thigh and he was stroking me through my jeans. I reached across to do the same for him, but he dashed my hand away. ‘Jesus, Layla, the last thing I need is to have a crash with a seventeen-year-old in the car and a raging hard-on.’
‘Looks like you’ve got one already,’ I said with a laugh.
He glanced at me. ‘I really want to fuck you right now.’
His language had become coarser lately, more abrasive, but maybe that was just what happened as a couple’s sex life evolved. I’d read an article in Dolly that gave a tutorial of sorts on talking dirty, but the idea of actually doing it seemed ridiculous.
I’d been looking forward to having lunch together, doing things that normal couples did rather than only ever having sex, but when he turned off the highway into a rest stop, I didn’t complain. He was taking this risk to be with me; it was the least I could do.
The rain had stopped by now, and he parked the car beside a wet picnic table. There were no other cars around. Scott got out and I followed suit. Wet twigs snapped under our feet as he led me behind the toilet block. Magpies warbled in the branches overhead. A gross smell emanated from the toilets and the rough bricks of the wall grazed my hands.
There was the crunch of tyres on gravel as we returned to Scott’s car, and I kept my head down to avoid the curious stares I imagined were coming from the other car.
‘Do you still want to go to Victor?’ Scott said as we put our seatbelts back on.
I looked up at him. ‘Of course I do. That was the whole point, that we’d go out for lunch together.’
‘OK.’ He smiled. ‘Sure. Might have to be just coffee though. I have to be back by two.’
‘Oh. OK.’ I couldn’t keep the disappointment from my voice.
*
We were silent for the rest of the drive across the peninsula, but when we reached Victor Harbor and got out of the car, Scott took my hand with a smile, and I couldn’t help smiling back. Maybe this is what it would be like in Glasswater Bay one day, when we could be together for real.
Scott gestured to a cafe on the main street, and I followed him in. He ordered us both cappuccinos and we took a table near the back of the room. He held my hand under the table, and we chatted for a while: he told me about his plans to buy the vacant shop beside the cafe and knock down the internal wall so he could expand the business; I told him about applying to study pharmacy at uni, and how I was worried my grades weren’t going to be good enough.
‘So you’ll be leaving Glasswater next year, then,’ he said, his expression inscrutable. It was impossible to tell whether he was pleased or disappointed at the prospect.
‘I could still live here and commute a few days a week, like Yumi does,’ I said, but that must have reminded him of the scene in the cafe the other day, and he didn’t respond. ‘I can’t believe school is almost over already,’ I ventured after a while. ‘It seemed like it was going to last forever.’
‘Mmm.’ Scott drained his coffee. ‘Well, should we get back?’
‘Scott.’ I held my empty cup in both hands. ‘My school formal is coming up in a month. I was wondering … do you want to go with me?’
He burst out laughing, then did a double take. ‘Oh my god, you’re actually serious, aren’t you?’
My face went hot. ‘I know it’s lame, but—’
‘I’m twenty-eight years old, Layla. I’m married. I’m not going to your fucking formal.’ He shook his head, still laughing in disbelief.
Shame suffused me, hot and cloying. ‘Of course, yeah. I guess I just thought … if you were going to leave Jodie anyway, maybe …’
His expression sobered. ‘The time isn’t right, Layla. And even if I did leave her now, do you really think it’d be a good look to take my seventeen-year-old mistress to her high school formal?’
I shook my head, the hurt and disappointment burrowing their way deeper and deeper inside me. I was such a child sometimes. No wonder he hadn’t left his wife yet. ‘No, you’re right. It was a stupid idea.’
He took my hand again. ‘It’s not stupid. I understand why you want to go, but there’s a far bigger world outside of high
school. When you get out of that place you’ll realise how meaningless all that stuff really is.’
‘Yeah, I know.’
‘You’re so much more mature than your school friends, Layla. You really get it.’
His approval lit a tiny spark of pride within me, enough to keep my hope alive. Just enough.
Scott looked at his watch. ‘We’d better go.’
We didn’t hold hands as we walked back to his car. We didn’t speak. Today was supposed to signify an advance in our relationship, but it felt like things had gone backwards. Instead, we’d had sex behind a toilet block (no, he’d fucked me), a rushed coffee and then he’d laughed at me for wanting what normal teenagers in normal relationships had. And now, barely an hour later, we were already on the road back to Glasswater Bay, where we’d have to go into hiding again, and I had no indication of when that status was likely to change. For the first time, I wished I’d never let myself fall for him, that I was still the girl I’d been a few months ago, awkward and unsure but without this constant, unrelenting doubt.
‘You’re not going to leave her, are you?’ I asked quietly.
His eyes flicked to me, then back to the road. Just when I thought he was going to ignore my question, he put the indicator on and pulled over into a gravel car park that bordered a reserve on the outskirts of Tilling. He killed the engine. ‘Walk with me for a minute?’
It wasn’t raining, but a freezing wind whipped in from the coast, swirling my hair around my head as I got out of the car. The wet grass immediately soaked the hem of my jeans, water seeping into my boots, as Scott led me out into the reserve. We wandered around the border for a while before he came to a stop under a tree and took me in his arms.
‘Layla, I want to marry you,’ he said.
His glittering words cascaded over me. My heart soared with love, almost painful in its intensity. How could I have doubted him? How could I have wished this feeling away, even for a second?
‘But you’re not ready for that yet,’ he went on. ‘I think you know that.’
I gave him a tremulous smile. ‘Yeah. You’re right.’
Of course he was right! I was seventeen, still at school. Getting married now would be ridiculous. But all my childhood fantasies of fairytale weddings were already beginning to play in my head like music. He held my heart on a thread, waiting for the right time to draw me to him and bind us together forever. All I had to do was trust him.
‘There’s nothing left of my marriage,’ he said. ‘Jodie and I haven’t had sex since you and I started sleeping together. It’s over, and she knows it as well as I do, but it takes time to unpick a life, Layla. You have to understand that it’s not as easy as just walking out on her and starting up with you. There are the kids to consider, and you and I would have to wait for a while – maybe a long time – before we could be out in the open. You need to know all of this, and you need to decide whether you’re willing to wait however long it takes for us to be together.’
I bit my lip. His words made sense, and yet the idea of waiting still longer for him deflated my dreams.
He smiled gently. ‘I understand if you can’t deal with it. You’re young, and you want to live your own life. I get that.’
My heart squeezed. He was trying to let me go, to release me from the complications of hiding our love. But I didn’t want to be released. I wanted to go deeper and deeper with him, until there was nothing in the world that could pull us apart.
‘I’m yours,’ I said. ‘I can deal with anything if it means we can be together.’
His eyes shone. ‘I knew you’d understand. You’re not like other girls, Layla. You see the big picture. That’s why I love you.’
He kissed me and I closed my eyes, allowing him to sweep me away.
‘Where’s Jodie?’ barked a woman’s voice.
Startled, we leapt apart to see a middle-aged woman with curly hair standing a few metres away. She held the lead of a Jack Russell Terrier, who was jumping up and down and throwing his weight into his collar. I didn’t recognise the woman, but from the way she was glaring at Scott, it seemed that she knew who he was.
‘Who’s Jodie?’ Scott said, and there was something about his deadpan voice and expressionless face that sent a chill through me.
The woman turned away, the dog leaping around and huffing hoarsely. ‘Disgusting!’ she muttered as she stalked away.
‘Let’s go,’ Scott said.
A gust of wind buffeted into us as we walked back to the car, but it wasn’t enough to dispel the gloom that had descended.
‘Who was that?’ I asked when we were back on the road.
‘An old friend of Jodie’s mother.’ His voice was curt. ‘I’ve only met her once, at our wedding.’
‘Do you think she’ll tell her?’
His hands tightened on the steering wheel. ‘How the hell should I know? I knew it was a mistake to go out in public.’
‘Sorry,’ I said in a small voice.
He was silent. This whole thing was my fault. If I hadn’t pushed him to go out in the first place, this never would’ve happened. Somehow, I always managed to ruin everything.
It had started to rain again by the time we got back to Glasswater Bay, but Scott pulled over on the opposite side of the park to where I’d left my car.
‘Thanks for taking me out today,’ I said. ‘Sorry it didn’t end too well.’
He gave me a thin smile. ‘You’d better go before anyone else sees us.’
I undid my seatbelt and opened the door a crack. Rain spattered the side of my face. ‘I love you, Scott.’
He looked over his shoulder at the road behind us. ‘I’ll see you at work.’
I paused for a second longer, then got out. He drove off as soon as the door clicked shut again, sending a small wave of water over the kerb and onto my already sodden boots. Melancholy rose within me.
I walked slowly over to the rotunda, the rain drenching my hair until it hung in dripping snakes down the back of my neck. I wasn’t expected at home for another hour, but I couldn’t bear the thought of calling around to one of my friends’ places to kill time. The way they’d look at me. The things they’d say when I told them what had happened.
I plodded up the steps into the rotunda and sat down on the bench that ran around the perimeter. The afternoon had taken me from happiness to hurt to ecstasy and to disappointment. I thought about the woman with the dog and cringed. Sometimes our love felt so perfect that it was easy to forget that there were other people involved. But now, for the first time, I imagined all the ugly words that would be hurled at me once this all got out.
Home wrecker. Slut. Whore.
Scott loved me. He wanted to marry me. That made it all worth it. Didn’t it?
But no matter what magical things he said to me, nothing ever seemed to lift me up for long before my own misgivings dragged me down again. He hadn’t slept with Jodie since we’d started sleeping together, but what about the month before that when we’d been doing all sorts of other things – had he still been having sex with her all that time? The idea of him touching her the way he touched me made my heart shrivel. If he really loved me, how could he carry on with her at the same time?
All the contradictory things he’d told me ran together in a loop around my mind.
I want to marry you, Layla. Don’t get married young, Layla. It’ll ruin your life. I love you, Layla. Love is a lie. It tells us stories that aren’t true. You’re so much more mature than your school friends, Layla. You’re a bloody teenager.
My tears mingled with the rainwater on my face and dripped into my lap. I wished I was the little girl I’d once been, the one who still believed in true love, in happily ever afters. There’d been so many opportunities to get out of this before it had gone too far. But I loved him now. There was no going back.
NOW
Layla’s optimism began to dissipate the closer she got to Glasswater Bay. The occasional glimpse of the ultramarine sea as she crested e
ach rise along Main South Road was a sight that would lift anyone else’s heart but only settled a greater weight on hers. A hundred times she fought the impulse to pull over, to turn the car around and drive home. Her limbs felt heavier and heavier as she slowed to turn right onto Bay Road, as if she were driving to her doom. The faded sign on the side of the road had been replaced with a new one since she’d left: a vivid coastal scene that looked like it’d been photographed from The Knob proclaimed: Welcome to Glasswater Bay. Winner of Australia’s Tidiest Town 2002 and 2004.
Her stomach clenched as she passed the park. The rotunda still stood in the centre; it looked like it’d had a paint job or two over the years, but the structure remained the same. There were a few more picnic tables dotted around the park, and a fenced-off playground in bright plastic colours had sprung up near the main road. Before she realised what she was doing, she’d pulled over and got out of the car. A warm breeze sifted through her hair, smelling faintly of saltwater and seaweed, and the singed grass crunched under her feet as she crossed the park towards the rotunda.
A harried-looking young woman tried to herd her two small children out of the playground, but one of them threw herself down on the ground and started kicking and screaming. Layla masked a smile. She always found it comforting when other people’s children misbehaved.
She continued over to the rotunda and up the steps. The bench still ran around the perimeter, but it was painted forest green now. Layla sat down in the same spot she had twenty years ago after the drive to Victor Harbor with Scott. How dramatic she’d been then; how big and hyper-real everything had seemed. Her life could have been so different if she’d ended things with him that day, instead of sitting here crying over the mixed messages he’d fed her and blaming herself for all that had happened.
But it had continued, and she was powerless to shut down the memories, especially now that she was back here where it had all begun. She’d arranged to go to Jodie’s house tomorrow after the school reunion, and there was still the same creeping dread. But there was a sort of inevitability to it too. Twenty-four hours and it would all be over, and she could go home to her family and her life.
The Girl She Was Page 18