The Alphabet Sisters

by Monica McInerney

  The following night the cast was once again gathered in the function room. Bett’s hands were folded in her lap. She’d given up playing any of the songs. Carrie was in the middle of the group, looking mutinous. Anna was in front, extremely unhappy.

  “General MacArthur, have you actually looked at the script since our last rehearsal?”

  “I intended to, Anna, I really did. But I had trouble with the dam at the end of the bottom paddock, and I ran out of time.”

  “And what about you, Mrs. MacArthur?”

  “I looked at it. But the school fair was this week, and I had to choose between making three dozen fairy cakes or learning my lines.”

  Anna looked from one cast member to the next.

  “The dog ate my script.”

  “The cat weed on my script.”

  “I got called away to fight a fire at the old quarry.”

  Anna sighed, put her hands on her hips, exasperated. “I bet a million dollars Andrew Lloyd Webber never hears excuses like this.” Everyone laughed. That was the whole problem, she realized. No one was taking it seriously. What would Lola do if she was here? Whatever was necessary, she guessed. She’d have to do the same.

  She stood up, composed herself, mentally searched through her voice repertoire until she found the most cajoling one, and then coughed politely to get everyone’s attention. Speaking persuasively, she started talking about General MacArthur, about what he had meant to people during the war. She reminded them all about Lola’s dream, about the need for a new ambulance, about the highs and lows of acting, about pride, belief in your work, determination.

  Good heavens, Bett thought. She felt a verse of “Climb Every Mountain” coming on.

  Carrie wasn’t listening. She’d learned her lines days ago. She’d had nothing else to do in the lonely house once she got home from work. She and Matthew had tried to have another conversation on the phone that afternoon. It had ended in disaster again. Another row. More shifting blame. It was getting to the stage where they nearly hung up before they said hello to each other.

  She shot a glance at Bett. They’d hardly spoken a word to each other since that night in the office. It was all very well for Bett to say she wanted to see Matthew. What was she supposed to do? Produce him out of a hat? Say, “Here, Bett, have him back”? She longed to ask Lola’s advice, but that would mean telling her the whole story of their separation. She couldn’t bear the shame of it. If only there was some way of making things all right between her and Matthew again. She turned away as Bett looked up and caught her eye. She stared rigidly at the script, pretending to be concentrating on Anna’s speech.

  “So, please, all of you,” Anna said passionately, her voice husky by this stage. “Please have your lines and the words of your songs learned before our next rehearsal. We’ve got only a few weeks to put this together, remember. And I want to say again how much it would mean to my elderly grandmother to see her dream brought to the stage.” She lowered her voice. “You all know about the accident, and it does worry me how frail she has become, that she is losing her already tenuous grip on life. I think it would give her a real boost, and I hope you’ll all give it your best shot.”

  She gazed around. Was that woman on the left crying? Oh dear, perhaps she’d gone a little too far. “So, Bett, let’s try ‘Chattanooga Choo Choo,’ from the top.”

  In her room at that moment, Lola took a long sip of her gin and tonic and pointed the remote control at the CD player. She did love singing along with those old show tunes. There was nothing like them to buoy the spirit. But now it was break over and time to get back to work.

  Settling herself more comfortably in the armchair, she put on her glasses and studied the two rather wobbly handwritten lists on the page in front of her. She wished she’d thought of doing this years ago. Who’d have thought there could be such entertainment in the little matter of getting two people together?

  She had followed the matchmaker’s guidelines to the letter. First, draw up a short list of available suitors. Hers was short, just the two names. Then draw up a list of their attributes. She’d done that, too, based on her interviews, formal and informal, over the past little while. They were similar in some ways. Both seemed very kind, with lovely senses of humour and the necessary glints in their eyes. They both had a bit of life experience behind them, too—always a good thing. They’d both lived in the city, but had chosen to be in the country for the time being—also a good thing.

  Now all she had to do was make her final choice. It was hard enough, with both of them having so much going for them. She read the lists again. It was close, certainly, but she was veering toward the one on the left. Yes, she decided firmly. He was the one.

  All her project needed now was a name. It finally came to her and she wrote it carefully on the folder.

  Operation Richard and Bett.

  Chapter Fifteen

  At home in the farmhouse two nights later, Carrie poured a glass of wine and moved from the living room to the bedroom, then back into the kitchen, trying to decide where to do it. It didn’t help that there were traces of Matthew everywhere—a pair of boots in the hallway, his Driza-Bone jacket on the back of the door. And memories in each of the rooms, too. The painting they had bought in Adelaide not long after they were married. The lamp she had admired in an antiques store up north one weekend they’d been away, which Matthew had gone to such trouble to get for her as a surprise, driving three hours there and back. The hall cupboard the two of them had spent weeks sanding back, only to find the wood underneath in such bad condition they’d had to paint it all over again.

  She finally settled on the kitchen. She pulled a chair up to the wooden table, reached into her bag, and took out the magazine. She’d seen it in the newsagents in town that morning, its glaring cover line talking directly to her—“How to Save Your Marriage.” She’d bought a whole selection of other items to pad all around it—pens and writing pads, even a Your Garden magazine—so the woman behind the counter, whose wedding she had helped organize, wouldn’t guess.

  “You looking for a new man, Carrie?”

  She had nearly leaped out of her skin. “No, Matthew’s fine. He’s just away for work for a while.”

  “Don’t want him to catch you looking at that, then.”

  “No.” She was flaming red by that stage. It was only when she’d gotten into the car that she realized what the woman was talking about. “Fifty Most Eligible Bachelors. Tasty touch-me-now photos inside!”

  She skimmed past the perfume ads, the fashion pages, and the eligible bachelors until she reached the “How to Save Your Marriage” article. Please let it be a matter of mixing up a quick potion of pomegranate seeds and vinegar, or chanting over an old photo of the two of them, she thought. She realized a little guiltily that most of their photos were in a bag in the shed where she had thrown them after the last row. Still, at least she hadn’t ripped them up. She corrected herself. At least she hadn’t ripped all of them up.

  She skimmed the introduction to the article. Do you feel the gloss has gone out of your relationship? Not just the gloss. The relationship had gone out of the relationship. Don’t know where it went wrong? She shifted uncomfortably. Next question. Have things really changed for the worse? That was easy.

  Then try this exercise to get in touch with your feelings. Sit quietly, and recall the early days of your relationship. Think about everything that first attracted you to him, and him to you. Remember your first touch, your first kiss, the first time you made love. Let the memories wash over you. Let go of any anger you may feel now. Let go of any hurts or misunderstandings. Take your mind back to your early days, remembering the wonderful first moments of attraction.

  Carrie moved the chair farther back from the table, shut her eyes, and concentrated. She opened an eye, and read the last line again. Take your mind back to your early days, remembering the wonderful first moments of attraction. That she could do, at least. It had been the first night she met him,
when she got home from her overseas trip. At first, in all the fuss of arriving, her luggage everywhere, the talk and the chat with her parents and Lola, he’d just been Bett’s fiancé—medium height, sandy brown curls. Solid-looking. But later, in the pub where Bett had insisted on taking her, something had happened between them.

  Jet-lagged, exhilarated to be home, she remembered being in teasing form. “Normally, Matt—I can call you Matt, can’t I? I mean, we’re practically brother and sister. Normally, Matt, I’d have got to know you slowly, vetted you to make sure you were good for my sister, but I’ll just have to do a crash course now. You’re studying to be a vet, I believe. That’s good, a steady job. Now, let me see. What sort of a physical specimen are you? Should I check him out, Bett?”

  “Go right ahead,” Bett had said, laughing at her.

  She patted him down, commenting all the while. “Yes, fine shoulders, a lovely broad chest, oh yes, good, a flat stomach, too.” Bett was enjoying it, Carrie thought. “And he’s got terrific legs, Bett, hasn’t he?” She touched them as well, felt firm muscle under the dark denim. Did her hands brush against his upper thigh deliberately? “Yes, he’s gorgeous, Bett. He’ll do very well.”

  All laughter and joking, standing there arms around one another, Bett in front of them. But as she sat down, just for a moment there was an exchange of glances between her and Matthew. The laughter had gone out of his eyes and there was a flash of desire. She saw it. She felt the same thing in herself. A tiny spark, the quickest of flickers between them. And then some other friends came up and the night changed, became casual.

  Except she remembered it the next day. It was probably jet lag, she told herself. Or the pleasure of touching a man again. She’d gone traveling with a boyfriend through Asia, but they had broken up in Vietnam, after fighting in Laos, making up in Cambodia, and spending three months rowing as they traveled through Thailand. In Bali she’d had a brief affair with a practiced Portuguese man, who had certainly taught her a few bedroom tricks as well as some filthy Portuguese words, but that had been months ago.

  In the first few weeks the tension between her and Matthew masqueraded as simple teasing between a brother-in-law- and sister-in-law-to-be, encouraged by the whole family. But it was more serious than that, even from the start. There had been genuine interest in each other, wanting to talk to each other. If Matthew came to collect Bett to go somewhere, he always made a point of seeking Carrie out, just for a few moments of conversation. If she heard his voice, she, too, would find herself going to him, wandering in almost casually, teasing, joking, on the surface.

  Once or twice there was casual physical touch—when Matthew was holding a door open for her, or passing something to her at a family dinner. Just the swiftest whisper of skin against skin. With another person she might not have noticed. With Matthew it was as if all her senses had sprung to attention. Nothing was said, but the contact became something they would engineer. At a family picnic, when Anna, Glenn, and Ellen were home one weekend, they all piled into one car. Bett was driving. In the back, Carrie needed to sit on Matthew’s knee, Anna, Glenn, and Ellen squeezed in beside them, Lola in the passenger seat in front. Had any of them noticed the effect the physical contact had on her and on Matthew? The touch was like exquisite pain to Carrie, feeling his thighs beneath her, the brush of his hand against her bare arm. He slowly moved his left arm so it was almost around her waist. Just as slowly, she lowered her hand so it was on top of his arm. She felt the sunshine on it, her breathing change. Everyone’s attention was on Ellen, three years old at the time, and delirious with too much soft drink and attention, squealing each time they turned a corner, their bodies moving from side to side with the momentum. Carrie felt a slow burning between her and Matthew with each motion. When they finally arrived back at the motel, she climbed out quickly. There was just a quick glance between them, loaded with meaning.

  He felt the same way, she learned afterward. It got to the stage that she knew he was in the motel, somewhere nearby, a sort of tingling, humming between them. But he’s Bett’s fiancé, she told herself.

  Remember your first kiss …

  It happened the day he drove her to the agricultural college with him. She’d been trying to decide whether to do a course, and it was Bett who suggested she make the trip with Matthew. She was aware of dressing more carefully, choosing the pale blue dress that looked good against her brown skin and blonde hair, the strands even lighter after the long hot summer. Bett waved them off.

  They drove for an hour perhaps, not even halfway there, the teasing conversation rippling between them. She felt intensely conscious of her own body, the hem of her dress lifting a little as she moved her legs, crossed them once or twice, knowing Matthew was noticing. She had a bug to thank for the first contact. Feeling hot, she had wound the window down. An insect had blown in, right at her face.

  “Oww,” she said. “Something flew into my eye.”

  He pulled over right away, their car the only one on the long straight road. He unbuckled his seat belt, leaned across. “Let me see.”

  His hand was on her face, his face closer than it had ever been. There was a moment when all the tension between them seemed to tighten and contract until they were no longer apart but lips on lips, bodies pressed as close as possible.

  She pulled back first, reluctantly, eyes wide. “We can’t.”

  Matthew didn’t answer her, just looked at her in a way she had never been looked at before. Her stomach turned somersaults, and she didn’t say anything as he leaned toward her again, the kiss softer, more exploratory, but deeper and sexier than the first one.

  A car went past, the driver honking the horn at them. It broke the spell. He pulled away. Looked ahead.

  Carrie looked ahead, too. “I’m sorry.”

  He made a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. “I am, too.”

  They kept looking forward.

  “We should keep driving.”

  They did, silently for ten minutes, and then his hand came off the steering wheel and crossed the seat, meeting hers. His voice was soft. “Carrie, I have never felt about anyone the way I feel about you.”

  She understood what he meant.

  “I don’t feel about Bett the way I feel about you.”

  “It’s wrong. You’re Bett’s fiancé.” It was hard to say, when the touch of his hand was sending what felt like sparkling explosions into her bloodstream. She placed his hand on her thigh, and heard the little intake of breath. She thought of Bett again, and then consciously, forcibly, blanked her out. This wasn’t about Matthew and Bett anymore. It was about the two of them and what was happening here.

  “You feel it, too, don’t you?”

  She nodded.

  “We need to talk about this.”

  Ahead there was a sign pointing to a camping ground just off the main road. He turned in. The park was sheltered, too early in the morning, even on a hot day, for anyone to be there. He got out. She got out after him. They stood against the railing, looking down into the dry creek bed, not speaking, the only sounds the crackle of wind through the peeling bark on the gum trees, the warbling of magpies. The sun was hot on her skin.

  She touched his arm, and he flinched as though it had burned him. But the movement had set the tension buzzing between them again. She felt her own body respond, felt her breasts strain against her clothes, wanting to touch him again. This had to be right, this had to be real, Bett or no Bett.

  He moved first, running a hand gently from the shoulder strap of her dress down her arm. She breathed in deeply. Closed her eyes. He moved his hand, repeating the touch. She felt every nerve ending in her skin respond. She didn’t move, just breathed, as he traced the neckline, his hand brushing against her breasts.

  And then she did the same thing to him, ran her hand down the length of his arm, then his other arm, touching the skin, feeling the little hairs. Then her fingers moved from the neckline of his T-shirt, down over his chest, his stomach, and lo
wer, enough to hear a sharp intake of breath.

  It became a slow, intense trade of pleasure, taking it in turns, not speaking. He moved toward her, touching her dress, tracing her breasts through the material. It was all she could do not to push herself against him.

  Staring into his eyes, she was intensely aware of all the sensations around her, the heat of the sun, the slightest of breezes, the hum of insects. She touched his body again, running her hand over his stomach, over the denim of his jeans, watching the response in his eyes, a darkening of his pupils as she cupped him, stroked him gently.

  “We can’t. We have to stop this,” she whispered, as he held her hand against his jeans.

  “I know,” he said, shutting his eyes in pleasure as she took one of his fingers into her mouth and gently sucked it.

  The sound of a car behind them called a halt. Carrie knew she had been seconds from taking off her dress, from undressing Matthew, from making love there, in the open. It was a family, a man and woman with three small children, parking just meters from them, and immediately unloading chairs and barbecue equipment.

  “Lovely day for it,” the man called out.

  “Sure is,” Matthew answered.

  They returned to the car and sat for a few moments, before Matthew started the engine and headed back onto the main road. She wasn’t surprised when he pulled into a side road a few kilometers down and turned to her again. Some reason had come into her mind by then—the shock of nearly being caught, the shock of realizing she had been about to have sex with Bett’s fiancé. And the shock that she still wanted to.

  Another hot, deep kiss until she pulled away first. “What about Bett?” she whispered again, barely able to speak.

  “I don’t know what to do about Bett,” he answered.

  For four weeks they resisted it, trying not to spend time with each other. But it was like a fever, an addiction. The tension between them increased. There were phone calls, three, sometimes four, a day. He wrote her letters. All the while, sexual tension hummed between them.