38

Don’t let it go any further.

After school drop-off, Brigitte took Ella to the new supermarket to buy ingredients for a special dinner. The Supa IGA had opened in competition with FoodWorks three years ago, but the locals still called it the new supermarket. She bought fish fingers for the kids (a veggie burger for Phoebe) to eat while watching a movie. For her and Aidan, she bought ingredients for a ‘romantic dinner for two’ recipe she’d found on the internet.

After the supermarket, they stopped at Joe’s to buy a lobster. Joe said he had a couple of crays out the back. She showed him the Lobster with lemon rice and herbs recipe, and he assured her that crayfish would work fine.

‘Sure you don’t want to make a nice fish stew or something a bit less complicated?’ he said.

She shook her head. It had to be really special.

Joe went out the back and returned with a little blue esky. He explained to her that a crayfish’s nervous system doesn’t sense pain, so it’s not hurting when you place it in boiling water.

‘It’s alive?’ Brigitte made a face.

Ella stood on tiptoes, trying to see over the counter.

Joe nodded and continued. ‘Crayfish don’t have vocal cords. When you cook them, what you hear’s not screaming — it’s just the sound of steam escaping from under the shell.’

Brigitte went cold and clammy. But the recipe said it’s much easier than you think — even for a novice cook — to prepare a flawless romantic lobster dinner for two.

She felt queasy again when Joe told her the price. She paid with her credit card and took the little esky.

They crossed the road to the ferry shelter. The sun was out and a gentle breeze rippled the water. The boats were a Monet painting on the mirror-surface.

Brigitte pulled Ella by the hand, trying to slip quickly into the passenger saloon without Jeremy noticing them.

Too slow. Jeremy leaned over the rail and asked what was in the esky. He still had a Band-Aid on his hand, and the bruise on his cheek had faded to yellow.

‘Clay fish,’ Ella said. ‘Mummy’s making a special, mantic dinner so Daddy will love her again.’

Jeremy raised his eyebrows, and Brigitte felt her face blush.

‘How’s the security system going?’ Jeremy asked.

Brigitte frowned.

‘My mate Pete from EG Security said he did some work over at your place.’

‘It’s had its moments.’

Brigitte and Ella sat on the bench seat, holding hands. Brigitte thought she heard crunching sounds from within the esky.

‘Good luck with the dinner, and all that,’ Jeremy called as they alighted on the island.

At home, they put away the groceries and made room in the fridge for the crayfish.

‘Aren’t we gunna cook him now?’ Ella said.

‘No.’ The recipe said to cook it close to serving time. ‘We’ll do it after school pick-up. Now, we’re going to clean the house and make everything look nice.’

Aidan always did the vacuuming because Brigitte said it hurt her back. It took a while to work out how to change the bag. She was vacuuming the lounge room when she heard Ella scream. She hit the stop button and rushed to the kitchen.

Ella was standing — eyes wide, hands over mouth — in front of the open fridge. ‘Clay fish got out,’ she said between her fingers.

The esky was over-turned, and the crayfish was inching across the floor.

Brigitte swore and Ella started crying.

‘It’s OK,’ Brigitte said as she threw a tea towel over the escapee. Ella screamed again. Brigitte screamed, too, as it moved when she scooped it up. She shoved it back into the esky, clicked the lid on, and blew the hair off her face.

‘Sorry, Mummy,’ Ella said, sobbing. ‘I just wanted to see what he looked like.’

After she’d brought the kids home from school, Brigitte ironed the white linen tablecloth — their only tablecloth. She found candles and polished Nana’s old silver.

She applied some of Sunny’s clay facemask, showered, rubbed herself with ‘sensual body oil’, blow-waved her hair, and put on a little black dress and a touch of make-up — no lipstick.

‘Oh my God, Mum, what happened to your face?’ Phoebe said.

‘Nothing. Just a bit of a reaction to a mask.’ She went back to the bathroom and blended a little more make-up over the rash.

At five o’clock, she filled their largest pot with water and put it on the stove. According to the recipe: If you can boil water, you can boil a lobster.

When the water was rolling, she took the crayfish out of the fridge. Finn and Ella stood around watching. Phoebe had refused to witness such ‘animal cruelty’. Finn had told her it was a crustacean, not an animal, as she’d huffed off.

The recipe instructions were to hold the lobster by its back and place it head-first in the water and then quickly cover the pot with a lid. Depending on how active the lobster is, this may be a two-person job. Brigitte told Finn she might need his help as she lifted the lid off the esky. The crayfish looked up with its little black eyes and waggled its feathery antennae. She replaced the lid, turned off the gas, and told the kids to put on their shoes and coats. They complained as they took the crayfish back to Joe’s to exchange it for two salmon steaks.

When they returned home, Brigitte put on the fish fingers and veggie burger.

She dispensed a few drops of ‘romance blend’ into her new, ultrasonic vaporiser. Sunny had explained how it worked on the vibration of water rather than heat to disperse essential oils into the air, and it had a romantic LED light.

There was no answer when she phoned Aidan to see how far away he was. Hopefully he was on his way, driving.

She heated some oil in a pan to fry the salmon steaks. Joe had told her to be careful not to overcook them. She seared the steaks on both sides and lifted them out carefully with a spatula. They looked raw in the middle when poked with a fork, so she put them back on the heat. The fish fingers were also taking a long time, so she turned up the oven.

She’d forgotten to put white wine in the fridge. There was no wine — white or red — left in the cupboard. Should have bought some in town. Harry might have a spare bottle? She turned off the salmon, left it in the pan to cool, and went over to Harry’s. Not home. He was quite the man-about-town these days. She heard the ferry docking, and ran down to ask Jeremy if he could pick up a bottle for her on the mainland.

When she got back, the stink of burning fish overpowered the aromatherapy oil. She opened the oven, and smoke billowed out. Black fish fingers and veggie burger. The smoke detector went off, and the kids came out to see what was going on as she whacked it — fuck, fuck, fuck — with the broom handle.

She opened the door and windows to clear out the smell. It was cold outside; a koala grunted in a tree. She flicked on the porch light for Aidan, and phoned him again. He answered this time, said he was busy — at the boxing gym.

When she slid the salmon out of the pan, it fell to pieces. She scraped it, along with the fish fingers and burger, into the bin, cleaned up the mess, soaked the pan, and took the Paynesville pizza-place menu off the fridge.

‘Pizza,’ Harry called through the open door. Brigitte started, and he apologised. ‘Bumped into the delivery bloke in the driveway.’ He was holding their two pizzas, and a bottle of red. He’d had a haircut and ironed the white shirt that was tucked into his jeans, but he still looked dishevelled somehow. He screwed up his nose at the smell in the house.

‘Burnt our dinner.’ Brigitte sighed and took the wine and pizzas, saying they would go perfectly together. She offered Harry some money, but he insisted it was his shout.

She served the pizza for the kids and let them eat in the lounge room.

‘You look nice,’ Brigitte said to Harry. ‘Got a hot date later?’

He laughed and shook his head. ‘Where’s Aid?’

‘Boxing gym.’ She put on Tom Waits. ‘Sit down, Harry.’

He looked at her dress and at the table. ‘You sure?’

She took two glasses from the cabinet, sat at the head of the table, and lit one of the candles. ‘Supposed to absorb odours, isn’t it?’

Harry shrugged. ‘You look tired, love. Aid still upset?’

She nodded and poured the wine.

‘Sorry, none of my business.’ He kept his gaze on the table.

‘Hope you like Margherita or Hawaiian.’

He cupped a hand over hers, and her bottom lip wobbled; she couldn’t stop it, the dam of tears broke the wall. He opened his arms, and she leaned against him, blubbering over his crisp, white shirt. ‘I don’t even like salmon.’

He stroked her hair. ‘Shh. Aid just needs some space for a bit.’

It felt like he kissed the top of her head. At the sound of footsteps on the porch, she sat up and rubbed her eyes. She’d forgotten she was wearing make-up — mascara blackened her knuckles and Harry’s shirt.

Aidan brought the cold in with him. His boxing gloves were slung over his shoulder; his hair was still damp from showering at the gym.

Harry stood and said, ‘G’day, Aid. Just on my way out.’ He left with his hands in his pockets.

‘Pizza?’ Brigitte looked up with a tired smile, and a desire to rush over and wrap her arms around him, rest her face against his chest, lead him to the bedroom, make things better.

Aidan flung the door behind him, too hard; it bounced open. ‘I can’t believe you hate me that much.’ His eyes were shining. ‘And I trusted him.’ His voice went up a few decibels.

Harry! It would have been funny, but for the anguish on Aidan’s face, the crack in his voice.

‘I saw through the window, Brigitte!’ He threw his boxing gloves; she ducked, and they narrowly missed her head, knocking over the candle and extinguishing the flame. Wax oozed across the tablecloth.

He turned to leave.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Ray’s!’ He stormed out.

‘Aidan!’

She heard another male voice in the driveway — not Harry’s — and angry words from Aidan. Then his car door slammed and the engine revved.

‘Where’s Aidan?’ Phoebe rushed into the kitchen. ‘What did you do to him, Mum!’

Brigitte held up her hands. Phoebe ran out after him. Too late — by the time she’d reached the edge of the porch, he was gunning his car out of the driveway, spraying gravel against the side of the house.

Phoebe stomped back through the house, leaving the door wide open behind her. Brigitte’s shoulders slumped, and her head wilted forward like a flower too heavy for its stem.

At the sound of scuffing on the mat, she looked up. Jeremy was holding a bottle of wine in a bag from The Old Pub. She walked over, sniffing as the cold air stung her nose.

He tilted his head, an I’m a good listener look in his eyes.

‘People are waiting for the ferry, Jeremy.’ She swapped the bottle for a twenty-dollar note. ‘Good night.’ She locked the three locks on the door behind him, turned down the music, and sat back at the table. She poured more wine, and picked at the candle wax on the tablecloth. Why the fuck had she taken notice of some crazy old fisherman?