Tomorrow was Mother's Day. Mega Meringue Day. The "big day." Probably Alice should have been preparing things--finishing off paperwork, making last-minute phone calls to check people had done what they were meant to do, but she wasn't especially interested in Mega Meringue Day. Anyway, the committee had seemed to have things under control the other day.
"Come in," she said to Dominick, her eyes on the chocolate biscuits.
"The children asleep?" he asked.
"Yes, although--" She was about to say something lighthearted about Tom probably still playing with his Nintendo under the covers, but the haircutting experience with Madison made her stop. It would be like ratting on her son to the school principal.
"How was Kate about Chloe's hair?" she asked.
"Predictably hysterical," said Dominick.
"I left a message apologizing," said Alice. "She never called back."
"You understand that I didn't have any choice but to suspend Madison?" said Dominick, as Alice took the flowers out of his hands. "I didn't want ..."
"Oh, yes, of course, don't worry about it. These are beautiful, by the way. Thank you."
Dominick put down the biscuits on the counter and twisted the bottle of liqueur around and around in his hands.
He said, "I'll know when you get your memory back."
"How?" said Alice.
"By the way you look at me. Now you have this friendly, polite way of looking at me, as if you don't really know me, as if we never even ..."
Oh God, little Chloe Harper was right. They had "done sex."
He put down the bottle of liqueur and moved closer to her.
No, no, no. Not another kiss. That would be wrong. That would not be within the spirit of "trying."
"Dominick," she said.
The doorbell rang.
"Excuse me," said Alice.
It was Nick at the front door.
He was holding a bottle of wine, cheese, biscuits, and a bunch of tulips identical to the ones Dominick had brought over. They must be on special at some local shop.
"You've fixed the lions," said Nick, delighted. He bent down and patted George on the head. "Gidday, old mate."
"I should be going." Dominick had come to the front door. Alice saw his gaze take in the flowers and wine.
"Oh, hi." Nick straightened, his smile disappearing. "I didn't realize, I won't stop--"
"No, no. I was just going," said Dominick firmly. "I'll see you tomorrow." He touched Alice on the arm and ran lightly down the steps.
"Was I interrupting something?" Nick followed her down the hallway and saw Dominick's bunch of tulips. "Oh. Everyone is bringing offerings tonight."
Alice yawned. She longed for her life to be normal again. A Saturday night at home. She wanted to say, "I'm tired. I think I'll go to bed," and for Nick to say, without turning his head from the television, "Okay, I'll just finish watching this movie and I'll be up." And then she wanted them to read their books together and switch off the lamps and fall asleep. Who have thought that a Saturday night at home would ever seem so impossibly exotic?
Instead, she opened Dominick's chocolate biscuits and ate one and watched Nick standing awkwardly in his own kitchen.
"Shall I open this?" he said.
"Sure."
He opened the wine and poured them both glasses. Alice put the cheese on a plate and they sat down on opposite sides of the long table.
"Are you coming tomorrow?" asked Alice, eating another chocolate biscuit. "To Mega Meringue Day?"
"Oh, no, I wasn't. Do you want me to go?"
"Of course!"
Nick laughed, in that slightly flabbergasted way. "All right, then."
"I think it will all be over by lunchtime," said Alice. "So you'll be able to make it to your mother's place."
Nick looked blankly at her.
"For the Mother's Day lunch," said Alice. "Remember? You told Ella you were going at the Family Talent Night."
"Oh. Yeah. Right."
"How do you cope without me?" said Alice lightly.
Nick's face closed up. "I cope fine. I'm not totally useless."
Alice flinched at his tone. "I never said you were." She took a piece of cheese. "Or have I said that?"
"You don't believe I'm capable of looking after the children for half the time. According to you, I wouldn't remember all their after-school activities, sign their permission notes, or whatever. I'd forget to read the all-important school newsletter. Not sure how I manage to run a company."
Well, you have a secretary to handle all the pesky details.
She wasn't sure which Alice said that: Snippy Alice from the future or real Alice. Nick had always been a big-picture man.
He refilled their wineglasses. "I can't stand only seeing them on weekends. I can't be natural with them. Sometimes I hear my father's voice come out of my mouth when I see them. Fake jolly. I'm driving over to pick them up and I find myself preparing jokes for them. And I think--how did I end up here?"
"Did you spend a lot of time with them during the week?"
"Yeah, I know the point you're trying to make. Yes, I work long hours, but you never seem to remember the times I did come home early. I went bike riding with Madison that time, and Friday nights in summer I played cricket for hours with Tom--well, you always say it was just one Friday night, but I know it happened at least twice, and I--"
"I wasn't trying to make a point."
Nick twirled the stem of his wineglass and looked up at Alice with an "I'm going to come clean" expression. "I haven't been very good at achieving a life-work balance. I need to work on that. If we work things out, I'll get better at that. I'm committed to that."
"Okay," said Alice. She wanted to make fun of him for saying "I'm committed to that," but Nick was acting as though it was some sort of breakthrough moment. It just didn't seem that big a deal to her. So he had to work long hours sometimes. If that's what he had to do for his career, then fair enough.
"I guess my competition doesn't work such long hours," said Nick.
"Competition?" The wine was going to Alice's head. Her mind was filled with hazy half-thoughts, glimpses of people's faces she didn't know, and vague memories of intense feelings she couldn't describe.
"Dominick."
"Oh, him. He's nice, but the thing is, I'm married to you."
"We're separated."
"Yes, but we're trying." Alice giggled. "Sorry. I don't know why I find it funny. It's not funny. It's not at all funny. I might actually need a glass of water."
She stood up, and as she walked by Nick, she suddenly plonked herself down on his lap like a flirty girl at a party.
"Are you going to try, Nick?" she gurgled into his neck. "Are you going to try really, really hard?"
"You're tipsy," he said, and then he kissed her, and at last everything was as it should be. Her body melted against his with exquisite relief. It was like sinking into a hot bath after being caught in the rain, like sliding under crisp cotton sheets after an exhausting day.
"Daddy?" said a voice from behind them. "What are you doing here?"
Nick's legs jerked up so that Alice was catapulted onto her feet.
Olivia stood in the kitchen in her pajamas, rubbing her eyes with her knuckles, her cheeks flushed with sleep. She yawned hugely, stretching her arms above her head. She frowned, perplexed, and then an expression of pure delight crossed her face.
"Do you love Mummy again?"
Frannie's Letter to Phil Kissing! At my age! Is it allowed? Is it unseemly? I feel as though I've broken a rule. I've gone full circle and I'm fourteen again.
We had a lovely night at the Chinese restaurant. It's been so long since I've eaten Chinese. (I used to take Elisabeth and Alice when they were little for a special treat. They adored it. Of course now they would be horrified at the thought. Too many calories. Or "carbs" or something.)
We shared a nice bottle of white wine and the steamed dim sums were fabulous. Mr. M. was his ridiculous self. After we paid the
bill, he asked the waitress if we could go to the kitchen and "pay our compliments to the chef"!
The little girl looked alarmed. (She probably thought we were undercover health inspectors.) I was saying to her, "Just ignore him, darling," but next thing, Mr. M. marched out to the kitchen and dragged out three young Chinese men dressed in white. There he was, clapping them on the shoulders, loudly telling them a long story about a meal he'd eaten at a fancy hotel in Hong Kong in 1954, and how this was even better than that meal, while all the other diners put down their chopsticks and stared.
I got such an attack of the giggles watching those poor young chefs with their polite, bemused smiles, nervously bobbing their heads up and down, obviously thinking this man was quite deranged. In the end, Mr. M. convinced the whole restaurant to give them a round of applause. (The food wasn't that good!)
I giggled in the cab the whole way home until finally Mr. M. said, "I think there's only one way to shut you up," and next thing he was kissing me.
I'm very sorry, Phil.
Do you mind?
Well, bad luck if you do. It's your fault anyway! Why did you need a camping trip "with the fellows" just before our wedding? You were forty years old! You shouldn't have had any wild oats left to sow. And then you happily, idiotically, dive headfirst into a river without checking the depth first. You silly fool.
Tonight a handsome man (I may not have referred to his handsomeness previously) kissed me and it was heavenly.
Do you hear that, Phil? HEAVENLY.
Am going to bed, my dear. May have drunk a little too much sauvignon blanc at dinner.
Chapter 30
It was the "big day." Alice felt like a small piece of clothing, a sock perhaps, in a large load of washing, on the spin cycle. People pulled her this way and that. At one point she literally had a person on each arm (neither of whom she recognized), trying to pull her in different directions. Worried faces, excited faces, smiley "ooh, this is it!" faces floated by and vanished. People gathered around her in worried clumps, firing questions, telling her about problems, about things that should have been delivered by now. "Where are the eggs meant to go?" "Where are the pastry ladies meant to be standing?" "The news crew wants to confirm they'll be here by twelve. They want to interview you at twelve-thirty. Is that still okay? Are we on schedule?"
News crew? Interviewing her?
Cameras flashed like strobe lights. She should have listened more at the Mega Meringue meeting. She hadn't fully grasped the immense scale of this production. It was ... mega.
They were in a giant colorful marquee that had been erected on the school oval with a banner proclaiming: "Mega Meringue Day: Watch 100 Mums Bake the World's Biggest Lemon Meringue Pie! $10 Entry. (Children Free.) All Proceeds to Breast Cancer Research."
Inside, the marquee had been set up auditorium style, with raised benches around the sides where people could sit and watch. All around the sides of the tent were placards with the names of companies that were "proud to sponsor Mega Meringue Day." Alice saw one for Dino's Coffee Shop. In the middle was all the equipment for making the pie. It looked like a construction site. There was huge industrial equipment: a forklift, a concrete mixer, a crane, and a specially created pie dish and oven where the pie would be baked. A large round conference table had been set up with mixing bowls placed at intervals. Next to each mixing bowl was a neat selection of ingredients: eggs, flour, butter, lemons, and sugar. Maggie's husband, the red-faced man on the treadmill, who appeared to run some sort of manufacturing company, was in charge of the equipment and was ordering around bemused workmen.
"Now, let me get this straight, we bake the pastry without the filling first, is that right?" he said to Alice.
Well, at least she knew the answer to that question. "Yes," she said, and then more firmly: "Yes. That's right."
"Righto, boss," he said, and hurried off.
People were filing into the tent, handing over their cash to two women from the Mega Meringue Committee sitting at the entryway. The benches were filling up fast. A group of children with brass instruments struck up a tune.
A corner of the tent had been devoted to activities for the children. All the activities had a "mega" theme. They could blow giant soap bubbles, toss around a giant foam ball, and paint on a massive canvas with oversized paintbrushes. Alice had left Madison, Tom, and Olivia to enjoy themselves.
"All coming together?" said someone.
It was Dominick. Jasper was with him, swinging on his father's hand. Alice looked up, met Dominick's eyes, and looked away guiltily. She felt like she'd cheated on him, which ... well, maybe she had.
"I'm sorry about last night," she said.
"Don't even think about that today," he answered. "Oh--but, ah, I wondered if you'd remember about tonight? Phantom of the Opera?"
Nick had taken Olivia back up to bed the night before and then left. They had agreed that their first "date" would be the following night. They were going back to their old favorite Italian restaurant. Nick had sent a text message saying he'd got the reservations.
"Um, well, I had actually forgotten," began Alice. She really needed to break up with this kind, but essentially irrelevant, man. "The thing is, Dominick--"
"Alice, my dear!" It was Kate Harper, looking especially glossy in the morning sunlight streaming through the tent. An unhappy-faced man trailed behind her, along with a sullen Chloe. Chloe's shorn hair had been cut into a stylish bob, but, it had to be said, she wasn't nearly as pretty without her flowing locks.
"That's all right, we'll talk later," said Dominick. "Let me know if you need me for anything. I'm right here for you."
"I'm right here for you too, Alice!" piped up Jasper.
"I was surprised to see Madison here," said Kate, her voice steely. "I thought you might have kept her at home, in light of ... the incident."
"Yes, well ..." began Alice. It really would have been more comfortable if she'd been in the right in this situation, instead of the indisputable, shameful wrong.
"Madison is being very severely punished," she said. Well, she would be, eventually, once Alice got around to thinking of something appropriate. She glanced over and saw Madison looking entranced as she had a turn blowing the giant soap bubbles. It was just that Madison was in such a lovely mood these days. It seemed a pity to spoil it.
"I hope so," said Kate. She lowered her voice. "Because Chloe is traumatized . She's not eating or sleeping properly. This will be something that will mark her for life."
"Kate, give the poor woman a break," said Kate's husband. "She's got her hands full at the moment."
Kate's nostrils flared, as if it had been Alice asking for the break for herself. "I realize you're busy, but I'm not sure you fully appreciate the seriousness of this. Your phone message sounded almost flippant. What Madison did was outrageous."
"Sorry! I'm afraid we need to steal Alice away from you."
It was Maggie and Nora, her friends from the Mega Meringue Committee, scooping up Alice by the elbows and smoothly dragging her away.
"You're not one of our Mega Meringue Mums, are you, Kate?" said Nora. "You might want to take a seat."
As Alice looked back over her shoulder, she saw Kate talking furiously into her husband's ear, her hand like a claw on his arm.
"I don't know what I'm meant to be doing," she admitted to Nora and Maggie. "I'm just nodding when people ask me questions." This wasn't like the netball umpiring, when her mind had somehow switched to autopilot.
"It's all right," said Maggie. "Everything is running like clockwork thanks to you."
She waved a sheet of paper in Alice's face with a running sheet for the day and notations in her own handwriting that she didn't remember writing. She could see she'd written, "STICK TO SCHEDULE!!" in full capitals and underlined it twice.
A disgusted expression crossed Maggie's face. "Oh dear, your ex is here. What's he doing here? Trying to look like an involved father, I suppose."
Ex. At the word "ex" Alice
immediately visualized her most recent exboyfriend before Nick. Peter Bourke. The patronizing one who broke her heart. But when she turned around, it was Nick coming through the marquee entrance, looking gorgeous in a blue shirt. She'd told him once he should always wear blue.
"I invited him," she said to Maggie.
Maggie studied her. "Oh. Well, all right."
"By the way, we're assuming one of us should take over as MC?" said Nora. "We could say you haven't been well. Of course, our resident troll, Mrs. H., would love to get her hands on the microphone and take credit for the whole event if we don't stop her."
"Microphone?" said Alice, confused.
Nora gestured toward a microphone on a stand in the center of the marquee.
Good lord. The idea had been for Alice to get up in front of all those people.
"Oh, no, absolutely not, I mean absolutely yes, one of you can do it," she said.
"No problem," said Nora. Her face became neutral as Nick reached them. "Hi, Nick."
"Hi, Nora, Maggie. How are you both?" Nick nodded uncomfortably at the two women. It made Alice feel protective of him to see poor Nick in the unpopular ex-husband role. Just like she'd been the "cow" of an ex-wife with his sister at the Family Talent Night.
"Happy Mother's Day," said Nick, as Nora and Maggie disappeared into the crowd. "Did you get breakfast in bed?"
Alice nodded. "Pancakes. I think they started cooking them at five a.m. There were bangs and crashes and yells. You should see the kitchen now. But I have to say, the pancakes were outstanding. I think Madison is going to be a chef one day. A really messy, bossy, noisy one."
"Sorry I wasn't there to supervise," said Nick. "Your first Mother's Day without me."
"Hopefully my last," said Alice.
"Definitely," said Nick. His eyes held hers. "I think definitely."
"Well, well, well, what have we here, Barb? Methinks it's our fine young salsa students!" Nick's father and Alice's mother were upon them. Roger clapped them on the shoulders car-salesman style, the familiar scent of his aftershave drifting across their faces like a filmy scarf, while Barb stood to the side, shiny with pride, as if Roger were once again performing a rather tricky feat.