Almost Perfect (14 page)

‘Cross the road, would you? Just cross the road, Meg! You know you want to.'

‘Get over it, Nick. She's not going to cross the road,' Louise groaned.

Louise and Georgie were watching
Sleepless in Seattle
with Nick. They should have known better.

‘If she crossed the road now and they met, that would be the end of the movie,' Georgie explained.

‘And that's bad, how?'

‘Shut up.'

‘No one asked you to watch this, Nick,' Louise reminded him.

‘I just keep living in hope that a chick flick will make sense one day, but it never happens. They're all . . . oh, what's the word I'm looking for? Stupid.'

‘Okay, vocabulary man, you just don't get it, do you? It's all about building sexual tension,' Louise explained. ‘That's what gets you in and keeps you in.'

‘It's like suspense in an action film,' added Georgie.

‘Oh please,' Nick protested, ‘do not try to compare action films to this clichéd, senseless tripe.'

‘Of course, because action films always make complete sense and never resort to cliché,' Louise remarked snidely.

‘Just so you realise.'

Georgie laughed. ‘Yeah, like when seven thousand people are shooting at one guy with automatic
weapons and they all miss and he turns around with a single handgun and mows down half of them.'

‘Honestly Georgina, you always exaggerate every single thing a million times out of proportion,' Nick chided.

‘And tell me, why do they always run upwards when they're trying to get away?' Louise mused. ‘Up stairs, up towers, up ladders – how do they think they're going to escape from the eightieth floor?'

‘Keanu Reeves manages.'

‘Yeah, with a million dollars worth of special effects.'

‘This movie could use some special effects,' Nick grumbled.

‘What kind of special effects could you use in this movie?' Louise scoffed.

‘They could blow up that stupid perfect houseboat, and with any luck, Tom Hanks along with it.'

‘What's wrong with Tom Hanks?' Georgie cried. ‘He's so sweet the way he grieves for his wife. It's so heart-rending.'

Nick pulled a face. ‘They should have called him Tom Hankerchief, he's such a baby. Get over it already, Tommy boy, she ain't coming back.'

Georgie and Louise both threw cushions at Nick at the same time.

‘Hey, watch it, Thelma and Louise,' he protested. ‘The odds are always against me around here. Where's your boyfriend anyway, Georgie? I need an ally.'

‘I told you, he's in Perth.' Georgie checked her watch. ‘Actually, he's probably on his way back right
now, or maybe not. I always get the time difference muddled.'

‘You don't see much of him on the weekends, do you?' Nick commented. ‘He hasn't got a wife and twelve kids tucked away somewhere, has he?'

‘Oh yeah, that's right, I forgot to tell you.' Georgie rolled her eyes. ‘The thing is, he has to travel a lot,' she explained. ‘And he works at least part of every weekend.'

‘Does that bother you?'

She shook her head. ‘I have to work part of most weekends too. And we see each other lots when he is home.'

‘He turns up at the shop every second day,' Louise chimed in. ‘Always with something for her, usually flowers. The beautiful, expensive kind.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Well, they're not the kind you get out of a bucket at a service station.'

‘What's wrong with the kind you get out of a bucket at a service station?' Nick asked defensively.

‘Nothing,' Louise replied offhand. ‘Who wants coffee?' she said, picking up the remote to pause the video.

‘You know, the bar keeps getting raised,' Nick complained. ‘It used to be enough to remember to buy flowers every once in a while. Now it has to be the right kind of flowers.'

‘You don't have to bring me any kind of flowers,' Louise assured him, leaning over to kiss his cheek. ‘I love you just the same.'

‘She doesn't mean that,' Georgie confided as
Louise walked over to the kitchen to put the kettle on.

‘You think I don't realise that?' Nick sighed heavily. ‘I can see having Mr Big around is not going to be so good for me. When do I get to meet him anyway?'

Georgie shrugged. ‘It'll happen when it happens.'

‘Oh, okay, you two still cruising? No names, no pack drill?'

‘It's not like that. As a matter of fact,' she said dreamily, hugging her knees, ‘we know everything about each other. We talk and talk, sometimes I think we'll run out of things to say but we never do.'

‘I don't get it,' said Nick. ‘How's it so different to any other relationship?'

She tilted her head, thinking about it. ‘I don't know, I guess it's that I don't ask him when I'll see him next, or when he's going to call. I don't interrogate him about where he's been when we're apart. And that goes both ways. We just don't make any demands of each other. And then every time he walks into the shop, or I pick up the phone and it's him, it's just the biggest thrill. Like he really wants to be with me or talk to me – he's not doing it out of obligation or because I asked him to or because it was expected of him.'

‘Who's for coffee?' Louise called from the kitchen.

They both raised their hands.

Nick looked across at Georgie and smiled. ‘Well, he seems to be making you happy.'

‘He is. He's absolutely perfect.' She let out a deep sigh. ‘Except for the sex.'

Nick covered his ears with the cushions thrown
at him earlier. ‘Not hearing this, do not want to know about my sister's sex life. In fact, would rather not be aware my sister has a sex life.'

‘Don't be such a prude.'

‘Listen, I'm your brother, I'm supposed to lynch men who want to sully your virtue.'

‘Yeah, if we were living in the Dark Ages,' Louise pointed out, carrying a tray over and setting it down on the coffee table.

‘Anyway,' Georgie sighed, ‘you don't have to worry, we're not having sex.'

Louise and Nick looked at her simultaneously, wide-eyed.

‘We haven't really had the opportunity, I guess,' Georgie went on. ‘We usually have lunch together, or sometimes if he's going to be too busy through the day he picks me up in the morning and we go out for breakfast. Otherwise we have drinks after work, maybe an early dinner. He can never stay out late, he always seems to have global conference calls or a late meeting or an early flight in the morning, that kind of thing.' Georgie paused. ‘But I still think it's a bit odd. He never even comes up to the flat.'

Louise was thoughtful. ‘Are you sure there's no wife and kids?'

‘Don't be ridiculous,' she scoffed. ‘What is it with you two tonight?'

‘Well, it's a little ridiculous that he can never stay out late, like he has a mother waiting up for him. Or a wife.'

‘He's not married,' Georgie insisted. ‘I asked him the first time we met. He wouldn't lie to me barefaced.'

‘How do you know that?'

‘I trust him, he hasn't given me any reason not to.'

Louise sighed loudly, pouring herself a cup of coffee.

‘I know you think I'm gullible, Louise,' said Georgie, ‘but I don't want to go through life being suspicious of everyone's motives. I don't want to believe people are that sinister.'

‘She has a point,' said Nick. ‘Women always think more is going on with guys than there really is most of time. Like when a bloke says there's nothing wrong, he generally means it. Whereas when a woman says there's nothing wrong, she means anything but. Just because you're all devious, you think we're the same.'

‘I'm not devious!' Georgie protested.

Nick patted her arm. ‘Sorry, of course you're not, sis, there's not a devious bone in your body.'

Louise glared at him. ‘Well?'

He cleared his throat. ‘I used the wrong term. What I was trying to say is that I think women assign complex motives to men a lot of the time. And I'm here to tell you we're not that complex.'

‘Think about it, Louise,' Georgie added, ‘if Liam was married and having an affair with me, do you think I'd be complaining about not getting any sex?'

Louise sighed. ‘Good point.'

‘Maybe he has performance anxiety,' Nick suggested.

‘What?'

‘Women think men never have any insecurities
when it comes to sex, that they'll always be more experienced. We don't know as much as you think we do. It can be pretty daunting the first time.'

‘How would you know?' Louise frowned.

‘There was a first time for us, remember?'

‘But how many other first times?'

Nick blinked at her. ‘I lost count.'

She whacked him on the leg.

‘Ow.'

‘Excuse me, Punch and Judy, could we come back to my problems for a minute?' said Georgie. ‘Nick, are you suggesting I seduce Liam?'

‘Yes,' he nodded, before shaking his head frantically. ‘What am I saying? No, definitely not!'

‘What?'

‘Would it be too much to ask that you never have sex, for your brother's sake?'

‘I hate to break the news to you, brother, but the horse has already bolted from that stable.'

‘But you're not old enough.'

‘Idiot,' Georgie laughed.

Nick dropped his head onto Louise's lap and covered his face with a cushion.

‘Imagine what he's going to be like with the girls,' Louise groaned.

He sat up again. ‘I'm not worried about the girls,' he said calmly. ‘I realise that one day, when they're old enough,' he paused, taking a breath, ‘I'll simply have to lock them in their bedrooms and throw away the key.'

The taxi pulled up out the front of the apartment block in Southbank on the Yarra River. Anna's parents had joined the migration of empty-nesters, selling the Toorak house when Anna and Mac moved to Sydney and buying a modern city apartment. Anna had been heartbroken, not that she ever said anything. They had a perfect right to sell up and do as they wished. The house was far too big for them and the grounds required too much maintenance. But she had always pictured her own children running around playing in that garden, sleeping over in her old room. She had so wanted to give her parents a grandchild, to be able to announce it one day when they least expected it. Though she suspected that all potential grandparents lived in a permanent state of anticipation of that particular announcement. Which was why she had never wanted to tell them about her IVF treatment. Anna knew how long and hard they had waited to have her, she couldn't make them go through it again. She couldn't put them through the same highs and lows, give them the same hope, only to disappoint them over and over.

But now . . . well, now things had changed.

Mac jumped from the taxi to get their bags, leaving Anna to pay the driver. The trip had been an ordeal. They had barely spoken in the car on the way to the airport and as soon as they were settled in their seats on the plane, Mac had opened his laptop and started to work, ignoring her. In the taxi from
the airport he immediately struck up a conversation with the driver about the cricket test in Sri Lanka. Of course Mac was well aware that Anna knew nothing about cricket and cared even less, still leg stumps and wickets and maidens and overs dominated the entire long drive from Tullamarine into the city. The fanatical attention to detail men displayed for cricket confounded and at times amused Anna. Today it just made her sick. She had never known Mac to act with such studied indifference towards her. But he was not going to be able to ignore her for much longer.

‘Darling, you're here,' her mother crooned into the security intercom. Mac and Anna took the lift to the twelfth floor where her parents were waiting as the doors opened. Caroline Gilchrist held out her arms, rushing forward to greet her daughter. Tall, slender and blonde, or ash these days, it was almost impossible to believe Caroline was already in her seventies.

‘Mac,' said Bernard, shaking his hand heartily. ‘It's been too long, son.'

Her father did love Mac like the son he'd never had, and Mac reciprocated the feeling. Bernard and Caroline were like the parents Mac had always wanted, and Anna was confident he would never willingly hurt them or see them upset. She was counting on that.

‘How's corporate life treating you?' Bernard asked him.

‘Cracking the whip lately, I'm afraid, Bernard,' Mac answered ruefully.

Bernard enjoyed the stimulation of the younger man. He had not taken easily to retirement. A highly regarded psychiatrist, he had served on the boards of both hospitals and universities. He still retained a couple of honorary positions, as much as he could manage really. Bernard could feel the weight of his advancing years. His mind was sharp but his body was betraying him. It was not so much retirement as old age that he despised.

He turned to Anna, smiling warmly, lovingly, in that way fathers reserve for their daughters. He still saw the four year old, the seven year old, perhaps the twelve year old, but it was hard for him to see far past that. Anna knew her father loved her, adored her in fact, but he still treated her like his little girl, and like a little girl she was still desperate to win his approval. She had his affection, but she wanted more. When she didn't quite make it into medicine after school, Anna chose psychology, telling herself and anyone who would listen that it had nothing to do with her father, it was what she wanted to do. But of course it had everything to do with her father. And the irony of it was that he regarded psychology as pop psychiatry and had never really taken her career seriously.

‘Leave the bags for now,' Caroline insisted once they were inside the apartment. ‘I have lunch all but ready, you must be starved. Come along, Anna, give me a hand.'

She followed her mother into the kitchen. The apartment was light and modern, the kitchen sleek, minimalist, pale green glass and stainless steel. But no matter how modern, it was still a kitchen and the
women still found themselves here more often than the men. In many ways Caroline had fulfilled the traditional role of wife, despite a stellar career of her own as an academic. But she had always been overshadowed by the formidable reputation of her husband. And it didn't appear to bother her one bit.

‘You look tired, darling,' Caroline said, taking hold of Anna's hands and looking into her eyes. She said it with genuine concern; it was not the kind of veiled put-down many mothers engaged in with their daughters. Caroline was not like that. They enjoyed an easy, open relationship and Anna knew she could tell her anything, which was going to make what she had to do all the harder. She hoped her mother would understand.

‘I'm fine, Mum,' Anna smiled.

‘Are you getting enough sleep?' Caroline persisted.

‘Sure, most of the time. I've just had a lot going on lately. I'll tell you all about it when we sit down.'

When everything was laid out on the table, Caroline told Anna to go drag her father and Mac from the cricket and to make it clear she would not tolerate leaving it on in the background.

‘This looks wonderful, Caroline,' said Mac when he came to the table. There was a basket of fresh rolls and a huge antipasto platter groaning with cold meats and marinated vegetables, olives and cheeses.

‘It all comes straight from the markets, Mac,' Caroline dismissed.

‘She lives at those Queen Victoria Markets,' Bernard added, opening a bottle with a corkscrew. ‘Who's having wine?'

Only Anna declined, and she didn't miss the meaningful glance from her mother when she did. After everyone had filled their plates, Anna took a sip of water and leaned forward in her chair. She cleared her throat.

‘There's something Mac and I have to tell you.'

Mac looked up abruptly, his knife and fork poised above his plate. ‘Anna,' he cautioned.

‘Well, I've been waiting for this,' Bernard smiled, lifting his glass.

‘No, Dad, I know what you're probably thinking,' Anna stopped him. She glanced at her mother. Caroline was looking slightly puzzled. ‘I'm not pregnant, though that's not for want of trying. You see, for a few years now we've been on the IVF program.'

Mac dropped his cutlery onto his plate and sat back in his chair. His expression was grim.

‘IVF . . .' Caroline said, trying to take it all in, ‘for
years,
did you say?'

‘Yes, Mum. Please don't be offended. I haven't told you because I didn't want you to have to go through it with me, so to speak.'

‘Oh darling, we're your parents. It's not your job to protect us.'

‘When did you start the program exactly?' Bernard asked.

‘Well, it was not long after we moved to Sydney.'

‘But that's seven years,' Caroline remarked, and Anna could hear the hurt in her voice.

‘It hasn't been quite that long,' said Anna. ‘There were all the investigations first, then they try you on fertility drugs, and . . .' she faltered. She didn't want
to say insemination. Anna had barely spoken to anyone about the treatment in detail, and she realised now that sharing it with her parents was a little embarrassing. ‘They try other less invasive procedures first, until eventually you're offered IVF.'

‘What made you decide to go ahead with it, Anna?' asked Caroline. ‘And Mac,' she added, ‘how do you feel about this?'

Anna spoke before he had a chance to answer. ‘We had been trying to have a baby for a couple of years with no luck, so we decided to investigate.'

‘But you knew my history, darling.'

‘Yes, Mum, but it's a bit of an oxymoron to presuppose that infertility is genetic.'

‘But I wasn't infertile,' Caroline corrected her. ‘I did get pregnant eventually. You didn't think of just adopting a wait-and-see attitude?'

‘There was no need. They didn't have the technology years ago that they have now. There were options available to me that weren't available to you.'

Caroline and Bernard exchanged a glance.

‘What about side effects?' Bernard asked. He'd been wearing the face since Anna broached the subject. The inscrutable face that he must have perfected as a practising psychiatrist. It allowed him to ask questions, comment, weigh up what he was hearing, without ever giving away how he felt.

‘There are some side effects . . .' Anna began.

‘There are many side effects,' Mac interrupted, finally getting the chance to speak. ‘Headaches, nausea, fatigue, pain. She's been through it all. Once
she even had to be hospitalised for a serious reaction to the drugs.'

‘Mac,' Anna muttered.

‘Hospitalised!' exclaimed Caroline. ‘Why didn't you tell us this was going on, Anna?'

‘Like I said, I didn't want to worry you.'

‘So why are you telling us now?' Bernard asked, his expression still unreadable. Mostly. Anna could sense his disapproval. Her mother's too. She felt defensive. She'd expected them to be miffed about not being told, but she didn't expect an inquisition. It was almost as if she had to justify it to them.

‘It seemed about time,' she said weakly.

‘We're at a bit of a stalemate,' Mac explained. Anna wished he'd just shut up. ‘The doctor's recommending that we take a break, and I agree. Anna's . . . reluctant.'

‘You should listen to your doctor,' said Bernard soberly.

‘Your father's right,' Caroline chimed in.

Anna took a deep breath, almost gritting her teeth. ‘It was more a suggestion than a recommendation,' she asserted.

‘Still–'

‘What the doctor actually said was that it was entirely up to me,' she blurted.

The silence that met her was icy. As was the expression in her parents' eyes, staring back at her.

‘Surely,' said Bernard, ‘what you meant to say is that it's up to you and your husband?'

‘Don't blame me because your little plan backfired.'

‘Could you keep your voice down, Mac?' Anna whispered irritably.

They were in the guestroom, getting ready to go out to dinner for a slightly belated celebration of her father's birthday.

‘All I'm saying is you didn't have to be so negative,' she went on, her voice hushed. ‘Now you have them thinking the program is somehow dangerous and my health's at risk.'

‘Well, it is, Anna.'

‘That's rubbish and you know it. Plenty of women go through IVF with no ill effects at all.'

‘But not you,' he replied firmly. ‘And not for such a long time.'

Anna turned away. She didn't have a comeback for that.

Mac sat down and began to take off his shoes. ‘Look, you decided to tell your parents, so you deal with it. I had to deal with it all these years when I wanted to tell them, when I was worried about you, when you were in the hospital, for Chrissakes, and you wouldn't let me say a word.'

‘Because I didn't want to worry them,' she insisted.

‘But you don't mind worrying them now?'

Anna sighed heavily. ‘You don't understand. I just didn't want them to have to go through all the highs and lows with us. I thought I'd be able to surprise them one day. Show up and announce I was pregnant, that we were expecting their grandchild.' She paused. ‘But that was beginning to look like it was
never going to happen, so I thought it was time they were told what's been going on.'

Mac was unmoved. ‘Be honest, Anna, you only wanted them to know so you could get them on side.' He stood up and walked over to the bed where his suitcase lay open. ‘But you didn't count on your parents having objections, did you? You cooked up this little game and now you're pissed off because you couldn't control all the players.' He picked up his shaving bag. ‘I'm going to have a shower,' he said, leaving the room.

‘Tom, you have an IVF program running at the Royal, don't you?'

Anna's ears pricked up but she would not join the conversation. At least not until she knew where her father was going with his line of questioning. Tom York was an old family friend, a medical researcher who divided his time between Monash University and the Royal Hospital for Women. If she hadn't known better, Anna might have suspected her father had invited Tom tonight simply to lecture her. But as she'd only made her revelation this afternoon, that was unreasonably paranoid of her.

‘I think you'll find they pioneered IVF at the Royal, Bernard,' Tom pointed out.

‘So they did,' Bernard deferred. ‘Tell me, is there much research being done these days into side effects?'

Anna groaned inwardly.

‘What, you mean immediate side effects from the drugs?'

‘No, no, I was thinking more long-term. Now that IVF has been around for a while, are they finding any causal links to cancer, for example?'

‘You've hit on a contentious issue there, Bernard,' Tom replied. ‘For years there have been concerns about the higher incidence of breast, uterine, ovarian, cervical cancers in patients, but no studies have been able to prove anything conclusively. Still IVF is relatively young. Time will tell. Why the interest?'

Bernard hesitated, glancing across the table at his daughter. Anna made sure her face conveyed a mixture of anguish and pique that would stop her father in his tracks.

‘Well I for one do not wish to spend the evening talking about cancer,' Caroline declared. ‘It's certainly not the topic for a birthday party.'

Anna picked up her wine glass and proceeded slowly, though she hoped discreetly, to drain it. Edward O'Brien was sitting to her left. He and Bernard had been psych registrars together, Anna had known him forever. He noticed that her glass was empty and immediately refilled it for her. ‘Thank you, Ed.'