curveball at us. He stood now, frozen, astride the threshold of the sliding glass door, one foot in, one foot out, waiting for the outcome of this Maude v. Andy stand off.
“Well, I’ve been driving all day, I’m going to the club,” Andy said testily. “Just a quick drink, I’ll be back in an hour.”
“Alright, then. Just be back in time to say a quick hello,” Maude said easily, clearly happy enough with that compromise. Then she clocked Stan, half in half out, too afraid to move lest he incur her wrath.
“Oh, look at you, you silly man!” she hooted. “Off you go!” A wave of her well-manicured hand and Stan was given a leave pass. I got the sense that if nothing else, Maude was pleased that Andy and Stan were keen to spend time together. That left me.
“Quick Nell!” Stan stage whispered to me, “Save yourself! It’s not too late.”
I looked to Maude for guidance on this men v. women stand off. “You suit yourself, Nell, I don’t mind,” she said, busying herself at the kitchen bench, “I’m easy.” But she wasn’t looking at me when she said this. Andy was no help, he was already opening the gate and on his way down the stairs to the street.
I weighed it up; a relatively easy intro to Stan with Andy playing interference, or a complete baptism of fire with my new boyfriend’s mother flanked by her oldest friend?
In a split second of travel-weary tiredness I chose the former. I wanted to see the sunset from the deck, and the easy company of men and a cold beer seemed the sensible option.
“I think I’ll . . . ” I indicated Stan and Andy outside, waiting.
“Of course!” Maude said. “I’m easy, Nell, you suit yourself while you’re here.” Then she gave me a big smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
As we walked down the hill toward the club, Andy took my hand and said, “You know, Mum wanted you to stay with her, so she could show you off to Beverley.”
“What?” I stopped walking. Stan walked on ahead of us, keeping a cracking pace in his eagerness to get to a nice cold one overlooking the surf.
“She said, I should suit myself.”
“Yes,” Andy said. “But what she wanted you to do was to stay and meet Beverley.”
“Well . . . ” I threw my hands in the air. “People should say what they mean!”
“Get used to it.”
“Should I go back?”
“It’s up to you, my sweet.”
“Andy, should I go back?”
“Yes, you probably should. Massive points score for comparatively little effort.” I looked at him then and realised I loved him. In that moment, I just wanted to do what would make him happy.
“Alright,” I said. “I’m going in.” He held onto my hand and pulled me back to him. Kissed me.
“Thank you.”
“Whatever.” I stomped back up the hill in my boots, I felt him watching me.
“Nice arse,” I heard him call out. I gave him the finger and kept walking.
When I arrived back at the house, dusk had fallen and the living room was a yellow-lit interior scene. Two women sat at either end of the couch, each furnished with a flute of champagne. They were talking their heads off. I watched them for a while, feeling mild trepidation at finding a place within this intimate twosome, then I slid the glass door open and stepped inside.
“Oh!” Maude’s face broke into a real smile. “You came back!”
She stood up immediately, as did Beverley.
“Andy said you had champagne.”
“Always,” Maude confirmed as she moved across to the kitchen purposefully.
“Oh, she’s always got champagne,” Beverley seconded.
A flute of frosted bubbly had appeared in my hand. Maude was a magician that way, she could furnish you with a glass of bubbly without you even realising it had happened. She introduced me to Beverley. There was a hint of propriety in her voice and I sensed I was already ‘hers’. I also realised that Andy had been right, massive points had been scored just for making the effort. I was now being welcomed inside rather than being viewed from a distance, with the onus on me to impress.
From there it was easy. They showered me with their attention and every answer I gave to their questions seemed to please them; what I did for a living, where I lived, my family background, where I’d gone to school.
Maude seemed to know a lot about me already. Clearly she and Andy had spoken at length on the phone in the early months of our courtship. She filled in the gaps for Beverley, making it seem as though her loyalty was just as much with me as it was with Beverley. She shifted easily between her alliance with Beverley as her oldest friend and an alliance with me as someone who would soon be part of the family.
By the time darkness had fully fallen outside, I was pretty tipsy. Which was when talk turned to Hal. It was Beverley who started it.
“So, Nell, have you met Hal yet?”
“Oh! Andy said he was appalling!” Maude jumped in, referring to our infamous restaurant luncheon meeting. “Just. Appalling.”
“He’s quite . . . ” I eyed them both, they were waiting, wondering what I would say, “evil.” It was as much the champagne talking as anything and as soon as I said it I thought, too far. They hesitated a minute before reacting. Beverley’s hand flew to cover her mouth.
“Oh!” Her eyes widened with the relish of my brutal honesty.
Maude’s reaction was more measured. She looked a bit sad.
“Oh, he’s gone mad,” she said. “He’s gotten worse over the years. He wasn’t like that when I married him.”
“He used to be so exciting,” Bev assured her. “And quite handsome.”
“He was an actor,” said Maude. “I mean, I was this girl from the country and he was so . . . so dashing, wasn’t he?” She threw it back to Beverley, who caught it deftly and passed it on.
“He was on that show everyone was watching, he played the . . . the . . . ” Beverley grasped for it.
“. . . the older brother character.”
“Yes, until he got shipped off to war.” Beverley mimed shipped off with a cursory thumb gesture that suggested there was more to that than just plot development.
“And came back as another actor five episodes later. That was unfortunate,” Maude said.
Beverley whispered to me, “He was just too unreliable.”
“Hopeless!” The frankness went up a notch. “Never learned his lines, didn’t turn up on time. Just . . . blew it.”
“Then
