Genevieve had given Jane the nickname many years before, when Jane first started bullying Lindy at primary school in Hawker. The nickname made Jane easier to handle, in a funny way. It also gave Lindy a dart of happiness to hear every member of her family casually refer to Jane as Horrible Jane. Unfortunately, it had no psychic effect on Jane herself. She’d gone on to be even more horrible when she and Lindy found themselves at the same boarding school in Adelaide.
It had been five years of hell. Subtle insults. Vicious remarks wrapped up in a teasing tone. Casual ostracism. Dig after dig about Lindy’s looks, her figure, her family, her school marks, her lack of boyfriends. Relentless, but played under the radar so Lindy never felt able to go to her form teacher about it. After her sisters graduated, she had three years at the school on her own. She had no choice but to retreat into herself, away from Jane’s malice and influence. She spent lunchtimes in the library. Stayed in her room rather than sit in the common room where Jane held court. The only positive was the amount of studying she’d got done. She’d been worried she wouldn’t pass her final exams. She did surprisingly well, enough to get easily into uni in Adelaide to study for an arts degree. As soon as she’d graduated, she’d headed across to Melbourne to look for work with some of her uni friends. Adelaide was too small for her, she decided. There was surely a wider range of interesting jobs in Melbourne too. Also, she’d heard a rumour that Horrible Jane was planning on staying in Adelaide once she’d finished her dental studies. Lindy wanted to put as much distance between them as possible.
In the years since then, she’d never googled Horrible Jane or looked her up on Facebook. She’d followed Genevieve’s advice: ‘Wipe her out of your life. You never have to see her again.’ Her sister had been right, for years. Until Horrible Jane came crashing back into her life in Melbourne, three months ago.
Lindy still hated thinking about it. The evening had started so well: a night out with her two flatmates at a band venue in Prahran. She’d dressed up for once, pulling her long hair out of the two bunches and into a sleek ponytail, borrowing her flatmates’ clothes, urged on by both of them. They’d known she needed cheering up, after her latest bout of unemployment. They’d been listening to her moaning for weeks, after all. As they walked into the bar, she had felt pretty, confident; as if she were in costume. The night sped by. By ten p.m., they were on their fourth cocktail each. She’d gone up to the bar for their fifth ones, feeling even prettier, even more confident, ready for anything. She’d got talking to the man standing beside her. She introduced herself by her full name, Rosalind. He told her his name was Richard.
‘And what do you do?’ he asked.
She couldn’t tell him the truth, that she was currently between jobs. She often was between jobs. ‘I’m a lawyer,’ she said. She named a well-known Melbourne firm.
‘Snap!’ he said. ‘I’m a final-year law student. I’m looking for work experience. Do you think they’d have me?’
‘If they wouldn’t, I would,’ she said, thrilled with her own cheekiness.
Over her shoulder she saw her friends grinning and giving her the thumbs up.
Twenty minutes later, she and Richard were still talking. Forty minutes later, they were in a dark corner of the bar, kissing. He was there with his flatmates too, he told her. They were in the next room, listening to the band.
He was very cute, she realised. Tallish. Sturdy. She liked his hipster T-shirt, with its picture of Big Bird from Sesame Street. In the haze of five cocktails, she suddenly decided she had met the man of her dreams. After a five-year boyfriend drought, here he was at last! It was fate that they’d stood next to each other at the bar! And all right, he was pretty drunk, but so was she.
They were still kissing, very passionately by this stage, his hand on the bare skin under her top, right there in the bar, when the lights flickered on, signalling closing time. They blinked at each other in the sudden bright light. Then he smiled. A sweet, shy smile. Or maybe just a drunken smile, but it was still sweet and shy. ‘Can I please have your number, Rosalind? I have to go now, but I’d really like to see you again.’
She was just about to key it into his phone when she heard a familiar voice.
‘Oh my God! Lindy Gillespie! It is you, isn’t it?’ It was Horrible Jane. She didn’t look happy, either. She frowned as she seemed to notice how close Lindy and Richard were sitting to one another. ‘Do you two know each other?’
‘We’ve just met,’ Lindy said. ‘Tonight.’
It was as if Jane hadn’t heard her. ‘Richard, let me introduce you. This is my neighbour and old school pal from South Australia, Lindy Gillespie. Lindy, this is Richard, my —’
Lindy waited, expecting the worst. My fiancé. Richard was Horrible Jane’s fiancé.
‘— flatmate,’ Jane finished.
Lindy glanced at Richard. He was smiling at her. ‘It’s lovely to meet you, Lindy. Or should I keep calling you Rosalind?’
‘Rosalind?’ Jane said. ‘No one calls her that.’
‘I like it,’ Richard said. ‘Rosalind’s a great name. Not only that, she said she might be able to get me some work experience at her law firm.’
Jane laughed. It wasn’t a nice laugh. ‘Law firm? Lindy a lawyer? Well, I suppose it’s the one career Lindy hasn’t tried, if my memory serves me right.’ She turned to Richard. ‘Lindy’s mother sends out the most detailed Christmas letter every year. You should see it. My family absolutely loves it. We act it out, it’s become a family tradition for us. It’s so bad it’s hysterical. So I can tell you for a fact that since we both left school, Lindy has worked as a nurse, a nanny, a waitress, um, a barmaid . . . What have I missed, Lindy?’
Lindy was struck dumb. She could only stare at Jane.
‘Ah, I remember now,’ Jane said, laughing. ‘You worked in a petting zoo for a while, didn’t you? Until you got bitten by a galah, or was it a parrot? In front of that kindergarten group? That one made me laugh til I cried. I can’t wait for this year’s letter from your mum. She does know about your law career, doesn’t she?’
Lindy had gone beyond embarrassment. It was one thing to realise Horrible Jane now lived in Melbourne, another thing to be outed as a lying non-lawyer. But to have all her career failures reeled off like that? To hear she was a laughing stock among Jane’s family? Not just her, but her whole family the brunt of the Lawson family’s jokes? It was awful. Awful.
She stood up, mumbling something about having to find her friends. She left the bar with them minutes later, without talking to Richard again, without giving him her number. If he was a friend of Horrible Jane’s, then she wanted nothing to do with him. The next morning, she rang her mother and begged her not to do the Christmas letter this year.
‘But I always do it,’ her mother said calmly. ‘I’ve done it for thirty-two years.’
‘Then can you please take the Lawsons off the mailing list?’
‘But I always send it to them,’ she said just as calmly. ‘Why, Lindy?’
She couldn’t tell her.
That incident had led to the cushions website. Humiliated, Lindy had stayed home for the next two weeks, spending too much time browsing craft websites, filling her shopping bag with items she couldn’t afford and wouldn’t take to the online checkout. Why didn’t she try this craft business herself? she thought one night. She was creative, wasn’t she? And best of all, she wouldn’t have to actually deal with any customers face to face. There was no chance of public humiliation.
One of her flatmates worked in IT. Lindy had some IT experience herself. Between the two of them, they set up a website. It was so simple. That same night, over a bottle or possibly even two of wine, they downloaded photos of pretty cushions and wrote an almost-true biography, making Lindy sound so creative, approachable, friendly. All she had to do now was wait for the orders to pour in. Oh, and buy some cushion material. After her flatmates went to bed, she stayed up, googling suppliers. The Chinese companies were definitely the cheapest. After
five glasses of wine it had seemed like such a good idea to buy in bulk, too. And put it all on her credit card.
Now here she was. Back home, humiliated, broke and just metres away from the fruits of her mistake. Dozens upon dozens of boxes of cushion material. Wait until Horrible Jane saw them on the night of the woolshed party. Because she would see them. She was the nosiest person in Australia. She’d see them and she’d find out what was in them and why they were there. Lindy didn’t think she could bear more mockery from Horrible Jane, or any of the other Lawsons.
Lindy suddenly put down her needle, recalling the night of Ig’s accident. The date of Ig’s accident. She ran inside, still holding the cushion. ‘Mum? Mum?’
‘In here, Lindy.’ Here was the old governess’s quarters, the guestroom off the verandah that her mum only used for her overseas visitors or when Celia came to visit. She had just finished making up the bed.
Lindy was breathless. ‘Have you sent out your Christmas email this year? Can I read it?’
Angela looked at her. There was a long pause. ‘No.’
‘No you haven’t sent it, or no I can’t read it?’
‘No, you can’t read it.’
‘Why not?’
Another pause. ‘It’s too boring.’
‘Boring? How can it be boring? It’s about us, isn’t it?’
‘Not this year. I only did a quick one this year. Mostly about the weather. All about the weather.’
‘Can I read it anyway?’
‘You never usually want to read it. Why this year?’
‘Just because.’
‘Lindy, “just because” didn’t work when you were six and it doesn’t work now.’
Lindy spoke in a rush. ‘I need to see what you wrote about me. So I can prepare myself for what Horrible Jane Lawson will say to me at the party. I ran into her in Melbourne. She told me that her family acts out your Christmas letter every year and makes fun of us. Of me, especially.’ It was an edited version, but it was the truth. ‘Please, Mum, can I see this year’s letter? Just to prepare myself?’
Another hesitation. ‘Your father’s on the computer.’
‘He won’t mind me interrupting him. This is important.’
‘He might be in the middle of something important himself. Did you hear the reunion’s going ahead? In a place called Cobh. It’s where the Irish emigrants sailed from, apparently, where —’
‘Mum, are you all right?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘You seem a bit agitated.’
‘I’m fine. I’ll get the letter for you later, I promise.’
Nick passed by the doorway. ‘Computer’s free if anyone wants it.’
‘Mum does, don’t you, Mum?’ Lindy said. She held up the cushion. ‘Look, Dad, I’ve nearly finished the first one. I’ll be able to start paying you back soon. Here, take a look.’
Angela took her chance. ‘Back in a minute.’
She practically ran down the hall and into the office, where she shut and locked the door, then logged onto her email. Another twenty replies had come in, all with the same subject heading. Re: Hello from the Gillespies! She clicked on the first one.
Best Christmas letter ever, thanks! Talk about letting it all hang out!!
She didn’t need to re-read it to remember what she’d said about Lindy. Phrases leapt into her mind. Debt-ridden mess. Floods of tears. Was she always so needy? Such a drama queen? She couldn’t possibly show it to Lindy. But she had to show her something. Buy herself some thinking time.
It was wrong but she did it. She had no choice. She clicked on her template letter with its cheery border of Christmas trees. She typed as quickly as she could. It only took her a few minutes. She pressed print. Deleted the file. Double-checked she’d deleted it, and double-checked she’d closed down her email account too. Only then did she go back to the guest quarters and hand Lindy the piece of paper.
‘There you go. Short and sharp this year. Nothing for you or Horrible Jane to worry about at all.’
Before Lindy had a chance to read it in front of her, Angela went out to her pottery studio to hide again.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The day before Celia was due to arrive, Angela woke up at dawn. She knew what she had to do today. Tell Nick about the letter. Then tell the children. It was now urgent. She needed to deal with the fallout while it was just them, without Celia’s presence or interference.
It was Murphy’s Law that now she’d decided to tell Nick, he wasn’t there. She was alone in the bed. He and Johnny had camped out overnight on the far side of the station, chopping trees – or was it fixing fencing? She’d been too distracted to take it in when he told her.
In the past twenty-four hours, she’d received forty new emails about her Christmas letter. They varied between concern or amazement about the mining lease to sympathy and amusement about her other troubles. Joan said she’d been getting lots of calls too, from people in the area wondering if Angela was all right. They hadn’t dared to phone the Gillespies themselves. There had also been a flurry of new RSVPs to the party. Joan had been right about that too. From worrying whether anyone would come, Angela now wondered whether they’d have enough room or food for everyone.
The day passed slowly. Nick finally arrived home at four p.m. She had a pot of tea ready for him after he’d showered and changed out of his work clothes. Sandwiches. Cakes. He looked surprised but drank and ate everything she’d prepared. He was always ravenous when he returned from an overnighter. She asked the questions she’d asked so many times over the years, feeling like she was playing the part of the dutiful station wife. Was that what she’d been doing all those years? Playing a part? No. She had always loved hearing all the news of station life. Theirs had been a good marriage. A great marriage. There hadn’t always been this tension between them.
A tension that was about to grow worse.
She waited until he’d taken a last sip of tea.
‘Nick, I need to tell you something. Something serious.’
‘Is it about the kids? Ig?’
‘No. They’re all fine.’ She hesitated. ‘It’s about me.’
He waited. She began to talk, then stopped. They had the kitchen to themselves, but she knew that wouldn’t last. At the back of the homestead there was a wooden bench that caught the last of the sunshine in winter and was shaded in summer. It had a perfect view of the rose bush Nick had planted for her. It was one of their talking spots. She asked him to come there with her.
She waited until they were sitting down, trying to delay the moment for as long as possible. She turned and gazed at him, at that tanned, lean face, the dark hair only touched with grey. His face was so familiar to her. So handsome to her. Again, she felt that longing for him. The feeling of homesickness.
‘It’s about something I’ve done. Something that happened the night of Ig’s accident.’ She paused. ‘I was writing my Christmas letter, and I was having trouble with it. So I started a kind of stream-of-consciousness letter instead. I poured out everything that was on my mind. I wasn’t going to send it, but then Ig had his accident, and I still don’t know how it happened —’
‘I do.’
‘What?’
‘I know what happened. I’ve been waiting for you to notice.’
Why was he smiling? ‘Notice what?’
‘That it was sent out. To everyone. Right on your deadline, midnight, December the first.’
‘But, Nick, that’s just it. I don’t remember sending it. I’d never have sent —’
‘You didn’t send it. I did.’
‘You what?’
‘I sent it out for you. After you’d left with Ig, after I cleaned up. I saw your letter on the computer. I knew how much it meant to you to send it to everyone on the first of December, so I sent it out.’
She stared at him.
‘I was going to give you until the weekend to realise and then tell you.’ He was still smiling.
‘Oh, no. Oh, Nick. Have
you got any idea what you’ve done?’
His smile disappeared. ‘I thought you’d be pleased.’
She stood up, walked away, came back, trying to take this in. Another thought struck her. ‘Did you read it before you sent it?’
He looked uncomfortable. ‘Sorry, no. There wasn’t time.’
She knew it wasn’t because he hadn’t had time. ‘I wish you had.’
‘Why? It was just your usual letter, wasn’t it? “Here’s what we all did this year”?’
‘Not exactly. Nick, you need to read it. It wasn’t meant for anyone’s eyes, but lots of eyes have seen it. Everyone on my mailing list. And more, I think. People keep forwarding it on.’
She’d printed it out that morning. She gave the copy to him. Her hands were shaking.
As he took it, they heard a voice.
‘Mum?’
It was Lindy, calling from the side verandah. ‘Mum?’
‘Go,’ Nick said. ‘I’ll read it while you’re gone.’
She shook her head. She needed to be here, trying to guess how he was feeling as he read it.
‘Mum? Where are you?’
‘Go, Angela,’ Nick repeated.
It felt wrong to leave him, but Lindy was coming closer. Angela met her halfway.
‘What’s wrong? Do you need some help?’
‘How much stuffing do you think I should use? So the cushion is flat or plump? I didn’t ask in my order form and when I ring the customer’s number I can’t get any answer. Can you help me decide?’
‘Of course,’ Angela said.
It took longer than expected. More than fifteen minutes had passed by the time she returned. Nick was still sitting on the bench. He was holding her letter.
He looked up at her. She was shocked at his expression. He wasn’t angry. He looked desolate.
‘It’s that bad?’ he said. ‘You hate your life here that much? You wish you’d never met me?’
‘Nick, it’s not true, none of it —’
Hello from the Gillespies Page 12
