Chapter One
NETTA
‘Impressive set of nipples on the big guy, there.’
Netta Phillips looked up from a pile of spelling tests to see Jim, the cleaner, standing at her open classroom door, eyeing off the cardboard Santa she’d stuck to it just that morning. ‘Seriously?’ She leaned over her desk and sighed. Sure enough, Santa was sporting two new additions drawn in thick black marker.
‘Kids, hey?’ said Jim. ‘Coulda been worse though, I guess. At least it’s only his top half that got the treatment.’ He poked his head into the classroom, looking around at the giant paper ornaments hanging from the beams and the tinsel swaying in the air-conditioner’s breeze. ‘Bit early for Christmas decorations anyway, isn’t it?’
Netta grinned. ‘Don’t be such a Grinch, Jim.’ She pointed to the calendar hanging on the wall behind her desk, shiny gold star stickers marking the term-four days that had already passed. ‘It’s less than a month till the big day, you know. The 3N Christmas Countdown ison.’
‘Right you are.’ Jim shot Santa a bemused side-eye. ‘Very festive. Anyway, I’m almost done. It’s time for you to skedaddle so I can lock up.’
Netta dropped her red pen to the desk and gave him two thumbs up. She was more than happy to have an excuse to cut and run— it was already almost five thirty and it’d been a ten-kinds-of-shit Friday, to put it mildly. She’d had a very tense meeting with Zara’s parents about how anxious Zara had seemed in the past few weeks, made even tenser by the fact her dad had brought along his new girlfriend, which, understandably, hadn’t gone down especially well with Zara’s mum. The aggression level had quickly risen from politely passive to that of a MAFS dinner party and the meeting had ended with Netta even more worried about her clearly struggling student. Then, during quiet reading time, a pigeon had flown into the classroom via an open window and defiled the big beanbag in the book corner with a colossal poo, causing total chaos among the kids. Her maths lesson—which she’d spent ages planning and thought would be fun—had royally tanked, and worst of all, poor little Tahli had turned up to school with no lunch again. Netta pulled out her top drawer to run a quick inventory on the stash of just-in-case snacks she kept there for Tahli, making a mental note to buy more crackers and fruit before Monday.
She grabbed her handbag and car keys from the desk and walked to the door feeling, as usual, as though she was leaving before she’d actually finished work. The responsibility she felt to her students and the never-ending nature of her to-do list meant that no matter how hard she worked, or how late she stayed, there was always more she could do. Netta loved her job, but she often felt as though it required two of her. She exhaled the frustration in a lung-emptying rush as she flicked the lights off and tore the newly nippled Santa from the classroom door, taking a moment to inspect the additions. They were actually pretty good; whoever had drawn them had even thought to include a few rogue hairs around their periphery.
‘You’re not the only one who’s had a rough day, mate,’ she said, scrunching Santa into a ball. ‘Iwisha few stray nipple hairs were all I had to worry about.’ He landed in the recycling bin with a swoosh and Netta pulled the classroom door closed behind her.
She made her way through the empty school office and out into the warmth of the early evening, across the basketball court, over the four-square grids and past the play equipment towards her car. As she passed the kitchen garden her class tended once a week, she smiled with pride at the fundraising sign on the fence, the filled gauge showing they’d hit their target. Heading up the student philanthropy club was one of the best parts of Netta’s job. Last year the kids had raised money to buy books for a school in Nepal, and this year they’d raised nearly two thousand dollars for the Starlight Foundation.
When Netta reached the staff carpark it was empty aside from Jim’s ute and her old VW Beetle, its faded cherry red paintwork enthusiastically absorbing the almost-summer heat to turn the cabin into an oven, ready to slow roast her from Elwood to the inner west of Melbourne, where she lived with her partner, Pete. The bug’s ancient engine grumbled reluctantly to life and, in lieu of air con, Netta cranked the window down as she pulled out onto the street. She took the scenic route along the coast road towards St Kilda, past waterfront restaurants and bars heaving with people unfurling into the weekend, past the pier full of runners and tourists and lovers, past Catani Gardens, where giant palm trees exploded like green fireworks against the clear blue sky. The beach was already packed with leathery old men and lobstered backpackers and every kind of person in between, and the sea air hummed with the promise of fun.
A surge of nostalgia swept through Netta as the road swooped past St Kilda West where her old apartment was tucked a few blocks back from the beach: a vintage one-bedder with walls that could tell a hundred years’ worth of stories. She’d been so happy in that place, but when interest rates had gone nuts and her increased mortgage payments had stretched her wage so thin it was practically translucent, Pete had suggested she rent it out and move in with him. It had, in a financial sense at least, been a relief—having to sell the apartment would’ve broken her heart. Even now though, two years deep into living with Pete, she still missed it sometimes. But, as she often reminded herself, she’d been alone there. The apartment had been fine for younger, single Netta, but now she was in-a-committed-relationship-and-trying-for-a-baby Netta. She was almost forty and those single-girl days were behind her. And waking up next to Pete every day was lovely.
Forty-five minutes later Netta pulled into her driveway, drenched in perspiration and almost certainly partially cooked. She sprang from the car as it creaked into rest, eager to escape the furnace. Her dress had stuck to her in all the wrong places and she plucked at it, pulling it from the backs of her thighs and fanning it out from her chest. A pool of sweat trapped in her bra escaped and dribbled disgustingly down her stomach. She decided she’d beeline for the shower and then treat herself to one glass of the pinot gris she knew was waiting patiently for her in the fridge. She’d cut right back on drinking since they’d been trying to conceive but some Friday nights demanded a little liquid escape, and this one definitely wasn’t going to take no for an answer.
She gave the old bug a friendly pat on the bonnet and made her way through the garden, past its ornamental pear trees and militantly pruned box hedges, to the front door of the house—a classic fifties weatherboard Pete had renovated to within an inch of its life before they’d met. She discarded her sandals as she stepped into the house to let the cool floorboards soothe her feet. ‘Pete?’ she called. ‘You home?’
She was met with a weighty silence, broken only by the loud tick of the kitchen clock. Past six, and he still wasn’t home. Caught in traffic, probably. Or working late again. He’d seemed stressed this past month or so. He worked hard, Netta knew that, but she’d also sensed a little bit of distance between them lately. It was nothing, she was sure. Probably all in her head. The jaunty procession of deadshits she’d dated before Pete had done a very good job of making her hyper-wary of any change in relationship temperature. One of them—the undisputed king of the deadshits—had carved in her a scar of humiliation so deep she hadn’t been able to fully trust anyone for years until Pete had come along. He was different to the others. Safe. Reliable. Comfortably predictable. They werefine.It was time to stop looking over her shoulder and just relax.
‘Oh my God,’ said Netta out loud, catching sight of herself in the hallway mirror as the front door swung shut behind her. ‘Looking good, Phillips.’ Her hair was a mad mess of sweat and wind-whipped fuzz and her face had progressed well beyond a flush into full beetroot territory in the heat of the car. She looked like she’d fallen asleep in a sauna and been woken by a cattle prod. She needed a shower. Closely followed by that one precious glass of wine.
***
Drying off after the shower, Netta heard footsteps in the hallway and smiled. Pete was home. She slid into her dressing gown and opened the bathroom cabinet to find the hair brush, but her attention was caught first by an ovulation testing kit. She took it out and turned it over in her hands. It was probably a bit early, but it couldn’t hurt to check. She tore open the packet and held the handle between her teeth as she gathered up the fabric of her dressing gown and sat down on the toilet. She’d become something of a pro at peeing on testing sticks over the last few months—a niche addition to her skill set, admittedly—but her newfound expertise hadn’t helped much. For all the tests that had announced she was ovulating, there had been far too many declaring that, nope, shestillwasn’t pregnant, thanks very much.
She washed her hands, brushed her hair and executed the increasingly complex skincare routine her face suddenly seemed to require while she waited for the result. But when the three minutes was up, she was met with an empty circle. Low fertility. No strategically timed sex ahoy.
Netta sighed and shoved the test into the bathroom bin, a familiar wave of impatience rising. That egg couldn’t hide out forever. She’d test again tomorrow, first thing.
Netta found Pete hunched over the computer in his tiny office, his face etched with the stress of the day, his paisley-patterned tie hanging loose around his neck and the first two buttons of his business-blue shirt open. His face—all strong jaw and pale, piercing eyes—was still the one Netta had fallen for, even if their nine-year age gap was becoming more evident as he neared fifty; his chiselled edges softening, flecks of silver appearing at his temples, his hair thinning at his crown. Netta felt herself relax a little at the sight of him, her tension retreating at the thought of curling up for a movie together and leaving the day behind.
Pete raised his eyes to Netta and leaned back into his ergonomic chair. He flashed her a brief hello smile. ‘Good day?’
Netta leaned against the doorframe. ‘Excremental.’
Pete grimaced distractedly, his fingers hovering over the keyboard like runners itching for the starting gun to go off. ‘You, ah, want to talk about it?’ His eyes flicked to his watch and back to Netta. He couldn’t have looked less keen to talk about it if he was bungee jumping out the window.
‘It’s okay, you look busy.’ Netta swallowed her urge to be wrapped up in his arms while she unloaded every detail of her trainwreck day. ‘I think I just want to drink about it, anyway,’ she said instead. ‘Fancy a couch wine when you’re done?’
Pete cleared his throat and adjusted his glasses. ‘Do you mind if I just …’ He gestured towards the computer. ‘I’ll be at it till late, I think.’
Netta shook her head and forced a smile as she pulled the door closed behind her, trying to ignore how distinctly second best she felt. The siren song of the wine drew her straight to the kitchen but it wasn’t loud enough to drown out the question that had once again hustled its way into her mind: what was going on with Pete? But the day had been tough enough without going down that rabbit hole too. She opened the fridge, pulled out the bottle and sighed. This one, lonely glass of wine she was allowing herself had some serious work to do.
Chapter Two
MO
