The Husband's Secret(42)

            They both stopped. It was always excruciating. No matter how hard she tried, she could never seem to synchronize her conversations with her father. Even when they were face-to-face they never achieved a natural rhythm. Would their relationship have been less awkward if he and her mother had stayed together? She’d always wondered.

            Her father cleared his throat. “Your mother mentioned you were having a spot of . . . trouble.”

            Pause.

            “Thanks, Dad,” said Tess at the same time as her father said, “I’m sorry to hear that.”

            Tess could see her mother rolling her eyes, and she turned away slightly toward the car window, as if to protect her poor, hopeless father from her mother’s scorn.

            “If there’s anything I can do,” said her father, “just . . . you know, call.”

            “Absolutely,” said Tess.

            Pause.

            “Well, I should go,” said Tess at the same time as her father said, “I liked the fellow.”

            “Tell him I e-mailed him a link for that wine appreciation course I was telling him about,” said her mother.

            “Shhh.” Tess waved her hand irritably at Lucy. “What’s that, Dad?”

            “Will,” said her father. “I thought he was a good bloke. That’s no bloody help to you, though, is it, love?”

            “He’ll never do it, of course,” murmured her mother to herself, examining her cuticles. “Don’t know why I bother. The man doesn’t want to be happy.”

            “Thanks for calling, Dad,” said Tess, at the same time as her father said, “How’s the little man doing?”

            “Liam is great,” said Tess. “He’s right here. Do you want—”

            “I’ll let you go, love. You take care, now.”

            He was gone. He always finished the call in a sudden, frantic rush, as if the phone were bugged by the police and he had to get off before they tracked down his location. His location was a small, flat, treeless town on the opposite side of the country, in Western Australia, where he had mysteriously chosen to live twenty-five years ago.

            “Had a whole heap of helpful advice then, did he?” said Lucy wryly.

            “He did his best, Mum,” said Tess.

            “Oh, I’m sure he did,” said her mother with satisfaction.





NINE


            So it was a Sunday when they put the Wall up. They called it Barbed Wire Sunday. You want to know why?” said Esther from the backseat of the car. It was a rhetorical question. Of course they did. “Because everyone woke up in the morning and there was, like, this long barbed wire fence right through the city.”

            “So what?” said Polly. “I’ve seen a barbed wire fence before.”

            “But you weren’t allowed to cross it!” said Esther. “You were stuck! You know how we live on this side of the Pacific Highway and Grandma lives on the other side?”

            “Yeah,” said Polly uncertainly. She wasn’t too clear on where anyone lived.

            “It would be like there was a barbed wire fence all along the Pacific Highway, and we couldn’t visit Grandma anymore.”

            “That would be such a pity,” murmured Cecilia as she looked over her shoulder to change lanes. She’d been to visit her mother this morning after her Zumba class and had spent twenty full minutes she couldn’t spare looking through a “portfolio” of her nephew’s preschool work. Bridget was sending Sam to an exclusive, obscenely priced preschool, and Cecilia’s mother couldn’t decide whether to be delighted or disgusted about it. She had settled for hysterical.