Tales From A Broad (23 page)

‘Hey Samantha, next run we should go into Sentosa.'

‘Oh, no, you couldn't pay me to go there.'

‘Why not?' I feel defensive.

‘They make you keep pets on a leash.'

‘Listen, Sentosa has hills. Not just stairs, but hills. Think of it! We could go through the mall, around the docks, over Mt Faber and –'

‘Golly, I didn't see it that way. Sure!'

By the three-hour mark, we are back at the base of Mt Faber having circled Labrador Park a few times. We get some water and call Comfort Cablinks for our taxi. After you call Comfort Cablinks once, they think they know you. Here's how the second and ever-after conversations go:

ME: Hi, I need a pick-up.

DISPATCHER: Is this 9-082-4116?

ME: Yes.

DISPATCHER: Coming from Fortune Gardens, is it?

ME: No. I'm coming from Mt Faber.

DISPATCHER: You stay at Fortune Gardens?

ME: Yes, but I need a taxi from Mt Faber.

DISPATCHER: (tapping on a keyboard) You are staying at Mt Faber now?

ME: I'm just standing here waiting for a taxi.

DISPATCHER: Okay okay. Pick-up location is Mt Faber. Going to Prestons?

ME: No, that was yesterday. Today I –

DISPATCHER: You don't go to Prestons today?

ME: No, no, I need to go to Bayshore.

DISPATCHER: (tapping) Your husband is Frank.

ME: Yes.

DISPATCHER: You are Mrs Frank.

ME: Not technically, but that's okay.

DISPATCHER: You live in Fortune Gardens.

ME: Yes, I do, but I'm not there now.

DISPATCHER: But your maid is at home.

ME: Yeah. Can you get me?

DISPATCHER: Please hold for your taxi number.

Five seconds later, a voice comes on and says, ‘A blue comfort cab with a small dimple on the left rear side and an advertisement for Tiger Beer, licence plate SHA 489098, will be arriving in five minutes' time.' One minute later, it is there. The driver greets you, ‘Miss Flank. You not go to Plestons today?'

His computer screen, inexplicably, has a picture of you in your home, in your PJs on a Sunday morning. Comfort Cablinks is Big Brother. They get you where you're going and they know where you've been.

Jenny lives in Bayshore. It's a lot like Fortune Gardens except the apartments are bigger and they have two restaurants. Instead of being numbered, their blocks are named after gems. The precious ones – Ruby, Emerald and Diamond – are taller and face the sea. Opal, Jade and poor little Quartzite have a view of their superior crystals. I met Jenny through Tilda. She has three kids. The older two, Trent and Neil, are Sadie's and Huxley's ages.

I get there before Frank and the kids, but others are there. I stand dripping in the vestibule. I don't have my clean clothes to change into but Jenny brings me a towel and a glass of water.

‘Fran, Fortune Gardens is just two blocks away. Why didn't you go home first?' Jenny asks quite reasonably.

I know I'm being set up here. I will say, ‘Believe it or not, finishing at a different door makes running here just a tad less monotonous.' And the British will say, ‘Bloody stupid to run in this heat; you wouldn't catch me doing that.' And the Americans will say, ‘You are so disciplined. I wish I could find the time.' The Australians will say, ‘You call that a run, mate? Back in Sydney I ran 40 kilometres in under two hours.' The Germans will say, ‘Vatz de difrence. You get olt; you die.' The Canadians will say, ‘ '.

As I towel off, I see lots of kids, hands in chip bowls, drink boxes dented and overturned on tables and chairs, moms reaching for toys, pouring out juice and picking up muffin parts and unclenching fists for more muffin parts.

‘Jenny, where's Steven?' I ask.

‘Working.'

‘Sudden emergency?'

‘No, just the usual.'

I'm puzzled. I turn to Tilda. ‘Hugh here?'

‘He's watching the soccer at Muddy Murphy's. It doesn't start until three but last time Everton beat Manchester, Hugh was at Muddy Murphy's three hours early.'

‘I'm not following you,' I say.

‘When he watched Everton lose to Manchester, he was at Father Flanagan's.'

‘Okay … still not there yet.'

‘What's not to get? Everton won because Hugh was at Muddy Murphy's and they lost because he was at Father Flanagan's instead. So now he has to go to Muddy Murphy's wearing his green tie and have three rum and Cokes and three beers three hours before the game if he wants them to beat Manchester. I'm not going over this again with you, Fran, either you understand or you're daft.'

‘Where's Collin?' I ask Dana, afraid to show Tilda my confusion.

‘With Hugh.'

‘But I thought Collin roots for a different team?'

‘Not the point,' Tilda pipes in. ‘Collin was with him at Muddy Murphy's when Everton beat Manchester so he has to come.'

‘So, are any men coming?'

‘Oh, I highly doubt it. Jenny, it's just tea for mums and kids, right?'

On cue, Frank walks in and hands me my bag of clean clothes, takes the kids' shoes off and asks where he should stash his 12 cans of VB.

He opens one, Jenny's maid appears and takes the rest of the beer into the kitchen. I motion for him to follow me down the hall, into the bathroom. I close the door. I turn on the shower and undress. He smiles. He moves toward me. I can't decide if I should tell him he's taken the day off to go to playgroup or if we should have sex on the bathroom rug first.

‘I'm dirty,' I warn.

‘So am I.' He smiles.

‘We left the kids out there.'

‘We'll make new ones in here.'

‘I'll get nailed for exceeding my limit.'

‘You'll get nailed either way.'

‘Frank, can we stop? We're not really one-liner people.'

‘Yeah, but it was fun.'

‘Kinda. Anyway, listen, I have to tell you something.'

He starts to unzip.

‘You're the only man here.'

‘That's right, baby.' He yanks his pants down.

‘I mean at the whole party. Actually, it's not so much a party as a tea. For women. I mean, you can stay. That'd be great … Frank,
Frank
, don't be mad!'

He's hiked up his pants, buckled his belt, and left the room.

‘Your fly's undone,' I say softly to myself.

I get out of the shower and change into my ‘of course all the handsome men will be here to look at me in this' halter dress, take my cup of tea and sit on the floor with the kids and moms. I turn a tinkling ball over in my hand and absently roll it into a block castle. Strike. Frank's gone. A kid is crying. Doesn't sound like one of mine.

Valerie's cell phone rings. ‘Hi doll.' It's Sam. I've noticed he calls her several times a day. At first I thought he did it to check up on her. Now I think it's ardour. Maybe both. Frank never calls me from work. He rarely calls me from his trips either. I hardly even know where he goes. If I call him, even if I'm at my desk doing more work than he ever does, he'll say, ‘Yes, Fran?' and I better come up with a darned good reason for the call. I hear Valerie, ‘Me and Andrew are at Jenny's … Oh, before that? I guess I had the phone off. Sorry. What? Oh, that's too bad … never mind … love you too. Bye doll.' Her smile falls as soon as she flicks the phone closed. ‘Oh, poor Sam,' she says. ‘We can't go to Phuket now. He's got a big client coming. I have to make them dinner at our house.'

‘When were you supposed to go?' Tess asks.

‘Tomorrow morning. You have no idea how hard it was to get tickets anywhere this time of year. Never mind, we'll have a New Year's Eve party at our house instead. Can you guys make it? New Year's Eve at mine!' Valerie calls out.

I'm still the newest kid on the block; I'm still unsure of myself; I'm just about the only American and I don't know many recipes or have much to add to mommy-and-me activities so I have to forgive myself, though Frank never will, when I hear my own voice say, ‘And New Year's Day at ours!' I say it loud enough for the neighbours to think they were invited as well. I am already thinking bagels, lox, scrambled eggs, quiche, cheese and deli meats, pasta salads – oh, I wonder if I could find
challah
and make some killer French toast – and Bloody Marys and mimosas. Excellent idea. Except for the Frank factor.

When I get home, I take the kids upstairs and put them down for a nap. There is a note from Frank. ‘Went to work' it says. I sit on the sofa and look at the phone. I pick up a manuscript. I put it down. I wonder if I should call Frank and see if he's really mad or really really mad. But if he's just really mad, calling him might hike it up to really really and so forth and so on. I look at the phone. I start the manuscript. It's short. It's called
Heartland
. It's a picture book about sad hearts and happy hearts all living together in harmony. I know I'll pass on it. And the lucky author will be a bestseller. Everything I reject turns into a bestseller. It's my gift to publishing. If I take it on, you're destined to be mediocre. But if I hate it, it's good. ‘What am I doing?' I think, ‘I have to start getting the shopping done for New Year's Day.' I put the manuscript on my towering ‘to do' pile.

I go back to Posie's part of the house to tell her I'm going out and that the kids are napping. I hear her radio. I hear a drawer open and shut. As I'm about to knock on her bedroom door, I hear the toilet flush.

‘Posie?' I call. She peeps her head out.

‘Yes, Ma'am?'

‘Oh, you're in here. I just heard the toilet flush.'

‘I didn't hear you. I have the radio on. I just cleaned the shower.'

‘Why would that make the toilet flush, Posie?'

She is staring over my shoulder.

‘Why would that make the toilet flush? I don't get it,' I say.

‘Then I did the shopping. No more baking soda. Gone already.' She looks at my knees. I hear the tap running in her bathroom. I open the curtain-cum-door.

‘Posie! Who is this?' A man wearing nothing but a towel stands before me.

‘Who, Ma'am?'

At last I have a good reason to call Frank. ‘I knew I was hearing doors and elevators at all sorts of times,' I say.

‘So what should we do?' he asks.

‘Look, she's a young girl. Why shouldn't she have a boyfriend?'

‘What'd he look like?' Frank asks.

‘Dark, curly hair, I don't know. Anyway, she showed really bad judgement but I think …'

‘Big guy?'

‘Yeah, I think. Do you agree we should give her a second chance?'

‘Did he look like a foreign worker or a local?'

‘He was too put together to be a foreign worker, nice-looking clothes, but I don't know. Why?'

‘Nothing. I might have seen him too. A pretty boy. Yeah, sounds like the way to handle it. See you later.'

That's it.

I lecture Posie, frighten her a little about what would happen if I reported this, and fold my arms, waiting for something nonsensical to come out of her.

‘I yam ashamed. He is my boyfriend. I love Sadie and Huxley.'

To be fair, she says all the right things – sorry, in love, would never harm your kids. I give her a hug. ‘Hey, I was young once, too. Go to his house next time, okay? And no more lies.'

When I tell Frank about it all on our balcony that night with our Boxing Day cocktails (I have been forgiven for dragging him to the party and, in exchange, I promise not to work, yet again, that evening) he looks out in the distance and then to me. ‘Let's go away over New Year's. We can just get in the car and drive up the coast of Malaysia to …'

I have a freezer full of bagels and smoked salmon, a cupboard full of caviar and a pantry full of champagne. I have spent close to a thousand dollars already. I look at him, about to spill the beans. But, flash! Bam! Damn, what do they say about the mother of invention? I don't know, but she's adopted me this minute.

‘Why wait? Let's go to Phuket. Tomorrow!'

‘We could never get a flight,' says Frank.

‘It's all done, Frank.'

I am going to enjoy being the one to finally bring home a happy surprise, some prime Rittman-family-bubble time at one of the best resorts in the world.

‘Fran, I don't know how you pulled this off,' Frank says as he hands me my customary pre-take-off Bloody Mary at the Raffles Class lounge. Sadie is piling up a plate of potato chips and Huxley is eating water crackers. It's mid-morning and though I shouldn't be fazed in the least, I'm still fascinated by the abundance of food. As if auditioning for an all-Asian
Oliver
, people line up silently waiting for bowls of steaming fish porridge. Trays of sushi vanish in the blink of an eye. Bread and cheese are lobbed off the cutting board. Prawn
mee
and fried rice fly haphazardly onto the floor. Clusters of cellophane balls, once snuggling crust-free dainty egg salad, tuna and pâté sandwiches, loiter round the trash bins. Handfuls of exotic nuts are scooped out of gigantic jars into palms and cocktail napkins. Cookies are balanced beside cups of tea and coffee on china saucers.