How to Be Second Best

by Jessica Dettmann

  ‘You could do that,’ I say, ‘but it might not read as authentic. I think your readers might be on to you. They want the truth, if you can bear it.’

  ‘Oh, I can bear it, I just regret it, that’s all,’ she says. ‘The parts that are missing from the manuscript, you’ve probably figured out that those are the parts of my life where I really did not behave at all well. In fact I’m quite ashamed of myself.’

  ‘Maybe we can find a way of reframing those things,’ I say, ‘to a degree, anyway. But honestly, Wanda, if you can stand to tell it like it was, I don’t think anyone’s going to judge you.’

  ‘Of course they’ll judge me!’ she says, and she sits up and looks fiercely at me. ‘And so they should. I ruined several marriages. I caused children to become estranged from fathers. I’m not claiming sole responsibility for any of that, by the way, because all those men made choices when they did what they did with me, and to their families, but I’m not proud of those interludes.’

  She’s right. People might judge her harshly when they read the book. But part of my job is to help her shape what she is prepared to reveal into a form that will have her coming off in the best possible light. The way I’ll edit the book will be equivalent to gentle Photoshopping of a photograph. No one will notice it, but she’ll look a hell of a lot less imperfect once I’m done.

  I explain this to Wanda, who is remarkably surprised, considering how many books she has written and has had edited previously.

  ‘I suppose you’re right, Emma,’ she says in wonderment. ‘I just hadn’t thought of editing like that before. I mean I know how it works with fictional characters, but I suppose you’ll just treat me, in the memoir, like you would any of the characters in my novels? I mean, we can’t change what I did, but we could put in a nicer way.’

  I hesitate. ‘Sort of,’ I say. ‘But I can’t edit what you haven’t written. So if you get the stories down on paper, warts and all, we can tackle them like we would if it were fiction. I promise I won’t let you come across as too awful.’

  She thinks for a moment. ‘You can let me come across as a bit awful. Not irredeemably dreadful, but mildly shit. Because of course I do come around in the end, don’t I? When I fall in love with Monty and we live happily ever after? But there needs to be punishment before that, doesn’t there? It won’t look good if I get no comeuppance at all before my happy ending.’

  ‘I don’t think you need comeuppance, necessarily. What do you think was motivating your behaviour, at those times in your life? Was there something making you sad, something you were using these relationships to compensate for?’

  ‘Like what?’ she says.

  Something occurs to me. ‘What about children?’ I ask. ‘Was motherhood something you ever wanted? If it was, and it never happened for you, then it could work to weave through the later chapters the idea that for all the taking of what you wanted, you never got the one thing you truly desired. It could play as a mitigating circumstance.’

  Wanda looks at me straight-faced for a few seconds before erupting into gales of laughter. ‘No! I can’t think of anything worse! No offence, darling, but being a mother looks like a mug’s game to me. I never wanted babies, but if I write that people really will think I’m a terrible villain. Because, Emma, darling, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that if you’re a woman who doesn’t want to have a baby, people think you are a wicked witch.’

  ‘Then let’s not worry about finding a punishment for you in the narrative,’ I tell her. ‘Just tell the stories how they happened. They’ll be enough.’

  ‘Hmm,’ she says thoughtfully. ‘Leave it with me.’

  She settles back at the computer and works away quietly. I sit and look at pictures of the kids on my phone.

  After half an hour, she stops typing, looks up, and says, ‘I think I’ll be all right now for a while. You can go find some fun.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ I ask.

  ‘Absolutely. I’m getting it all down. I’m sure I’ll have a few more chapters for you by dinnertime.’

  * * *

  Back in my guesthouse, I check to see if any of my other editing jobs have come in, but there’s nothing. It’s making no sense, me being here. Wanda clearly doesn’t need any help. The interactions I’ve had with her could have easily been done on the phone. I’m reasonably sure now that she has dragged me up here just to annoy Carmen.

  I want to text Helen for an update, but I’m nervous. I haven’t spoken directly to her since our conversation in the street. I could try Troy, but he’ll be at work and won’t have a clue what’s happening with the kids.

  It’s Tuesday morning and Helen will be at ballet with Lola. Freya will, I hope, be off doing something fun with Dad, not kicking around in the foyer while her half-sister twirls and dances. With a bit of distance, the arrangement up until now looks absurd: one kid in a class, one kid bored outside the class. I can’t really remember why we’ve been operating like that for so long. Laura used to badger me about it, and say that Freya should just join in. She wasn’t very impressed with my argument that Freya had tried ballet and not really been into it. Maybe Laura was right. Maybe I should have persisted and just stuck Freya in with Lola each week. I just wanted Freya to have a free and unscheduled childhood, but from here it looks like sheer bloody-mindedness and I’m slightly embarrassed by it.

  I’m at a loose end. I email Suze to make sure there’s nothing I can do from up here to help with the Fun Run, and she replies immediately to say that everything is under control.

  It’s only eleven o’clock. What am I supposed to do for the rest of the day? Lie by the pool and try to stay out of the girls’ Instagram shots? Listen to The Best of David Bowie again? Watch the midday movie? Does that even exist any more? I’d quite like to go find Philip and see what he’s up to, but I don’t want him to think I’m latching on to him. I’m very bad at having nothing to do.

  Given the lack of alternatives, I let my mind wander back to Adam. Thinking of Saturday night, my first feeling, once again, is a flood of embarrassment. But I prod around my emotions gingerly for a bit and realise that although I’m mortified over his rejection, and angry at how he led me on, I’m not heartsore over him. Hmm. That’s not what I expected. I thought I really had feelings for him.

  If what I felt for Adam had been more than lust, surely now I’d be feeling more devastated that he doesn’t feel the same for me. Maybe it was just plain old lust. God, I’m thirty-six years old. You’d think I’d be able to tell the difference between lust and something more serious by now. Maybe Troy was my only chance at love, and now all that remains for me is lust. I wonder if that’s such a bad thing.

  I’m sitting on the sofa, staring out into space. I’m also considering that inside me where my soul should be is an abyss no longer capable of love, when there’s a knock and I look up to see Philip on the verandah.

  ‘Am I disturbing you?’ he asks.

  ‘No. I’m at a completely loose end for the first time in about six years,’ I say.

  ‘Well, that’s good timing for me, isn’t it? I’m heading into town. Do you want to come?’

  ‘Why not?’ As soon as I say it, I feel guilty. I have not come up here, and left my children for days on end, in order to swan about with Philip. That was not the deal. I’m supposed to be working.

  If it’s going to take Wanda a few days to write the rest of the chapters, I could fly home. I could spend two days with the kids, have the weekend with them and do the Fun Run, then come back on Monday to go through what she’s written — if it’s even necessary for me to do that in person. Then Carmen wouldn’t have to pay me for doing nothing, and my children wouldn’t be at home wondering what on earth’s happened to me.

  I push the guilt aside. Guilt and shame are useless emotions, Mum always said. When else am I going to get a chance like this, to be away from the kids, with a lovely man offering to drive me around and entertain me? Never, that’s when. And I’ve had so many years of c
harging publishers for way fewer hours than I actually work. I might just even up the ledger a bit by skiving off on the publisher’s dime.

  * * *

  For the next two days, Philip and I drive into the town and wander about, stopping whenever we feel like it to eat amazing food. I keep the receipts, though I don’t feel like I’ll be brave enough to claim them back from Carmen. It’s like being on a honeymoon, but with an almost-stranger. In fact, it’s better than my honeymoon, because Philip is a much easier companion than Troy was. Philip isn’t constantly on his phone, negotiating prices for boxes of fruit and vegetables, and when, on our second afternoon sightseeing, I wander into a shop full of white organza dresses and hand-thrown pottery in various shades of mud, he comes in and browses too, looking for presents for his nieces and sister.

  I try on a couple of Picnic at Hanging Rock-style outfits and come very close to convincing myself that I would wear these wafty creations back home, before acknowledging that I would slam the handkerchief hems in the car door and the crisp white fabric would stay that way only until I walked past the first avocado-smeared child.

  The salesgirl gushes over me when I emerge from the changing room. ‘Oh my God,’ she says, ‘that looks like it was made for you. You should absolutely have that dress. I can’t imagine any dress suiting anyone any better.’

  Steady on, I think. It’s a nice dress, but I recognise someone working on commission when I see her. Philip must see my sceptical glance, because he picks up a necklace and says, ‘Have you any more like these?’

  ‘Out the back,’ she says. ‘Just hang on a sec and I’ll go find them.’ She bustles off into the back room and Philip says quietly, ‘There, now you can try on the other one in peace. I’ll be outside.’

  Gratefully I change into another dress, and I don’t even come out of the change room in it. It’s beautiful and I wish I could pull it off in real life.

  I hear the salesgirl outside the curtain. ‘Knock knock!’ She says. ‘You all right for sizes? I’ve got those other two necklaces your husband was interested in. Is he coming back?’

  My husband? I guess we’re pulling off the honeymooners act pretty convincingly.

  I get dressed and come out. I’m about to tell her we’re not married when Philip walks back in. I go to return the dresses to the racks and he seems surprised. ‘They looked lovely, Emma,’ he says. ‘Why don’t you buy one?’

  ‘They are beautiful,’ I agree, ‘but they won’t work in my real life. I’m more a jeans and T-shirt person. Well, maybe not, but I have a jeans and T-shirt life right now. And besides, buying this sort of thing, in this sort of town? My mum used to call it the turquoise coyote effect, after she and Dad went to New Mexico and brought home all sorts of serapes and Native American-styled homewares that looked ridiculous in their art deco bungalow in Sydney. It wouldn’t fit in at home.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ Philip says, ‘but I don’t think these are turquoise coyotes. You looked so happy in this one.’ He holds out a broderie-anglaise dress with a pie-crust collar.

  I know I would look silly in this dress, swanning around Shorewood. The place for this dress is here, with the beach and wholefoods cafes. Not supermarket shopping and playing Lego on my grubby floors.

  But there’s something in Philip’s hopeful face that makes me pause.

  ‘You know what?’ I say. ‘Fitting in is overrated.’

  The salesgirl looks delighted. I put the dress on the counter and get out my credit card. Even if it never sees the light of day back home, this silly frock might remind me to take a chance every now and then.

  As the salesgirl wraps it she gives Philip what is unmistakably a flirty smile. ‘You have excellent taste,’ she tells him. ‘Your wife is a lucky woman.’

  Philip turns scarlet. ‘Goodness,’ he stammers. ‘I should be so lucky. No no no, Emma and I aren’t married. God, I’m old enough to be her—’

  ‘Emotional support peacock?’ I say.

  * * *

  By Thursday afternoon, I’m starting to get nervous about time. I have to leave here on Friday evening. If Wanda doesn’t hurry up and finish these chapters, I won’t be able to look over them before I go. If there are any problems, I’ll be back in the city and we’ll need to work through them remotely, which I don’t imagine Wanda will be thrilled about. But I truly can’t stay away any longer. I don’t want to miss the Fun Run.

  The pebbles spelling ‘Wandaland’ are immaculate this afternoon. Either no one’s been in or out of the front door today or Monty’s had nothing to do but tidy his handiwork repeatedly.

  On the door of my guesthouse, which is really beginning to feel like home, there’s a note. Emma, new chapters will be with you tonight! W. Great. I will work on them through the night and that gives us all day tomorrow to iron out any last issues. I go inside and drop the note on the counter.

  Edie sticks her perfectly tousled ombré locks through the French doors.

  ‘Philip’s going to make caipirinhas by the pool. You want in?’

  I haven’t heard anyone mention a caipirinha since about 2002. I do need to keep a clear head so I can edit the chapters tonight. But one drink can’t hurt.

  * * *

  When Wanda sends Monty down to the guesthouse to deliver her new chapters to me it is five o’clock.

  I have had four strong cocktails in the sun and without quite meaning to, regaled the girls with the whole sad sorry tale of my love life so far. Philip, whose idea it was to have caipirinhas in the first place, has listened to it all too.

  It came about because one of the girls made the mistake of asking me what my husband does. I gave an answer that was probably more than they needed. I didn’t stop talking for about fifteen minutes.

  When I’d brought them up to speed on the situation with Helen and Troy, I paused. No one spoke for a few seconds.

  Edie fished an ice-cube out of her tumbler, crunched it in her mouth and said, ‘Troy sounds like a dickhead.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I admitted. ‘He is a dickhead. I wish I hadn’t picked a dickhead to father my kids. I hope being a dickhead is a recessive gene. Maybe it’ll skip my children.’

  ‘I know lots of people who have dickheads for fathers,’ Philip said encouragingly. ‘Some of the nicest people I know, in fact. Your children will turn out beautifully.’ He holds my gaze and the demented moths erupt again in my stomach.

  I smiled gratefully at him, but then I thought of Adam. ‘They won’t have much hope if I continue to date dickheads though,’ I said, ‘and they have a constant stream of dickhead input into their upbringing.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Philip. ‘And do you?’

  ‘Possibly,’ I said. ‘I had a near miss recently. I thought he wasn’t a dickhead, but it turned out he might actually be one. Maybe that’s too harsh. He probably just wasn’t that into me.’

  ‘That sucks,’ said Clara. ‘What was the story there?’

  I wasn’t sure if I wanted to tell these people what a fool I had been to pursue a married man, who I thought I knew and loved from the way he wrote about himself in a book a decade ago. I hardly know them. But then again, I hardly know them.

  ‘It’s embarrassing,’ I said, ‘but he was a guy I used to know, from way back, and I was really into him then, but nothing happened for various reasons. Now he has a kid at my kid’s school, he’s separated — well, he sort of implied he was separated — and we’ve been getting close recently. And we got, you know, really close, and then straight after he said he’s still in love with his wife. Mortifying. I think I was just a bit of fun for him, which I don’t like, because it’s not as if I’m desperate to get married again or anything, but I do feel I deserve to be something more than someone’s back-up plan. And I also knew his wife was coming back, but I couldn’t tell him how I knew because it made me look insane, so I just waited for him to tell me and he never did. So maybe I’m the dickhead for sleeping with him when I knew, on some level at least, that he wasn’t available. I don
’t know why I’m telling you all this. I’m sure it makes no sense. Sorry. You must think I’m an idiot.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ says Edie. ‘We’ve all been there.’

  * * *

  We’ve all been there. I don’t know why, but somehow those words, from a random drunk twenty-year-old, in a bikini, on a sunlounge, who probably hasn’t actually ‘been there’, suddenly made things seem a bit less dire. Now, lying on my bed, drinking water and trying to sober up enough to read the new chapters, the knot of shame in my stomach has unravelled.

  A bit of distance from home has been a remarkable thing. I feel like I can see more clearly what matters more and what matters less. Maybe by obsessing over the kids and Troy and Helen so much, I’ve been trying to ignore myself, my own thoughts and feelings. It’s probably time to look at the shape of my own life.

  Things are never going to go back to how they were before Troy left me and, really, I probably don’t want them to. If I stand back now and look at my life, I can see that there are some perfectly fine parts, and some not too terrible parts that will be good foundations for building new parts.

  When my phone rings, I get a shock. No one has called me for several days. Carmen has retreated to email and no one at home seems interested in talking to me.

  I look at the screen. It’s Troy.

  ‘Hello?’

  From his first words, I can tell he’s furious about something. But there’s so much wailing in the background, it’s hard to figure out what’s he’s saying.

  ‘Emma? Freya, just stop crying. Take a deep breath, it’s going to be all right, but you need to stop crying. I can’t hear myself think. Emma? Are you there? Freya. Freya. Seriously, mate, I don’t know what the problem is. You need to calm down and—’ he interrupts himself. ‘Emma? What is the deal with this bloody tiger book?’

  ‘Which tiger book? The Tiger who Came to Tea?’ I say. ‘It’s her favourite book. I packed it in her bag. She has to have it read to her every night. She has done for a year. You know this, Troy. How is this news? What have you been reading to her for the last three nights?’