Lisa Heidke by Lucy (mobi) (rosie project .TXT) 📕

is complete our lives will miraculously return to normal - though without Max - but at least having a kitchen and family room will make the kids and I feel more settled. This renovation’s been going on forever and it’s wearing very thin.

‘Don’t know why I’m so concerned about my renovation when it’s obvious I’m going to be run out of town by the mother Mafioso,’ I tell Gloria later at her office.

‘And would that be such a bad thing?’ she says.

‘It’s just that -’

‘Just what?’

‘Soon we’ll have a beautiful house; Max will be back -’

Gloria shoots me ‘the look’.

‘- or not, the kids are happy -’

‘They’re kids, they’ll be happy anywhere - well, maybe not Bella but she’ll adapt . . . eventually. As for Max, whether you go to Bali or not, what makes you think he’s going to see you and automatically say, “Yes dear I’ve made a huge mistake, biggest mistake of my life. I’m coming home.” Anyway, why do you want that cocksucker back?’

‘He’s not a cocksucker -’

‘Okay, pussysucker -’

‘Gloria!’ I peer over her shoulder as she scribbles notes on head sheets. ‘What are you doing, anyway?’

‘Updating client profiles. Take Naomi here,’ Gloria shows me a photo of a leggy, horsy brunette I recognise as having been a couple of years ahead of me at NIDA, ‘used to be late twenties, now, I’ll write thirty-ish.’

‘She’s older than me.’

‘Thirty-ish means thirty-nine, you know that. She’s adventurous -’

‘Will sleep with anyone.’

‘With a contagious smile -’

‘Does lots of drugs,’ I laugh.

‘And is a free spirit,’ says Gloria.

‘Exactly, she’s a junkie.’

‘Lucy, these are my clients you’re talking about.’

I stab a finger at a photo of a woman with fluffy brown hair and huge boobs. ‘Who’s this?’

‘Isobel, very outgoing -’

‘Loud and embarrassing.’

‘That’s it,’ says Gloria, snapping her folder shut. ‘I’m closing my books until after you leave.’

‘What did you write about me?’

‘Needs a complete makeover. Voluptuous.’

‘So I am fat?’

Trish comes around, sheepish and weepy. I want to toss her out for being so cruel to me on the phone, but I know she’s devastated about Alana. Her only daughter’s run off with a married, middle-aged man, which, I dare say, isn’t the future she dreamed of when Alana was in nappies and gurgling happily. If Bella did that . . . well, I hate to think how I’d react. It certainly wouldn’t be pretty.

‘I’m sorry for what I said,’ Trish tells me.

‘Thanks,’ I say. ‘I’m sorry for this whole mess.’

She barely stays five minutes. Just long enough to give me a letter addressed to Alana. ‘Please call as soon as you see her, just to let me know she’s okay,’ she asks. We hug awkwardly, before she leaves, still crying.

* * *

‘Only take essentials,’ I tell Bella and Sam as we pack our bags that night, ready for tomorrow. ‘We’ll buy everything else we need over there.’

‘Are we really going to see Dad at last?’ Sam asks.

‘Yes, darling, we are.’

‘I can’t wait,’ Bella says. ‘Will he be at the airport to meet us?’

Given that Max doesn’t know we’re coming, it’s highly unlikely. It crosses my mind that he might even have left the island by the time we arrive.

Day 39

I’m standing at the sink in the laundry, up to my elbows in filthy lukewarm water, washing dinner plates and asking myself why Alana would want to hang out with a really bad surfer who’s more than twice her age, when Patch waltzes in.

‘You’re looking bright and breezy,’ he says. ‘I need to talk to you.’

He positions himself behind me at the sink and immediately I feel uncomfortable.

‘Ever since I saw you at the top of the ramp the other day, naked and giving me that look, I haven’t been able to get you out of my mind,’ he says.

‘That look,’ I say, stepping away from him, ‘was one of mortification. And I certainly wasn’t naked! I had no idea you and the other guy were in the house.’

‘Of course you didn’t,’ he says with a grin.

‘I didn’t!’

‘You’re lonely, I get that. You need a man and -’

‘And nothing.’

I am beyond stunned. Admittedly, I’ve sometimes constructed daydreams about Patch and his impressive biceps, but that’s where I want to leave it - on fantasy island!

‘But I was thinking maybe you and I could get together,’ Patch says, a look of growing concern on his face.

‘I’m flattered,’ I say, ‘but not interested. I have a husband.’

The worried look disappears and he laughs. ‘If you have a husband, I’m flying to the moon next Saturday night.’

He gives me a ‘Later, babe’ look (quite impressive for a man with one eye) and saunters off.

‘He thinks I’m playing hard to get,’ I wail to Gloria later over the phone.

‘Are you?’ she says.

‘Don’t be bloody ridiculous. Do you think I’m crazy?’

‘What? For not taking Patch up on his offer?’

‘No! Get real. I mean the whole taking the kids to Bali bit. Am I insane?’

‘No . . . not unless you do something crazy and end up in a Balinese jail for the next twenty years. However, assuming you don’t get nabbed for smuggling coke or ice, be a honey and buy me some celebrity perfume duty-free to add to my collection. And I mean Sydney airport duty-free, not some foul-smelling goat urine from a mangy street stall in Kuta. Oh, and I want movie-star fragrance, not designer rubbish like Vera Wang or, God forbid, Leona Edmiston. And, Luce, good luck. I’ll be thinking of you.’

* * *

After showering, I liberally apply fake tan all over my body. I hope I’ve put on enough moisturiser beforehand so the tan doesn’t collect and cause horrid pumpkin-coloured hot spots, à la Rock. I really don’t want to think about him right now. The night with Rock was a oncer! And I am not the sort of woman who goes around town having one-night stands. I can’t be leaving my intimate apparel at strange men’s apartments.

Day 40

D-Day.

The first time I wake, it’s 12.12 am, then 12.50,