Love...Under Different Skies (14 page)

But we’ve already discussed and more or less eliminated the idea of staying at the Ocean Bay, and no other options are presenting themselves. There’s not even an opportunity for Laura and me to discuss what we should do out of their earshot. They’ve got us pinned down and there’s nowhere to run.

I throw a quick glance at Laura, whose expression plainly shows that she’s thinking exactly the same thing I am. Time to throw up some classic British politeness. “Oh, we couldn’t possibly impose on you like that,” I tell them.

“Nah!” Bob waves his hand. “No worries mate, we’re happy to help out.”

“But we’ll end up ruining your evening. We’d feel awful,” Laura interjects.

“We’ve got nothing planned, love,” Sandra tells her. “In fact, we’d be quite glad of the company.”

Fuck me, these bastards are persistent.

I decide to play the Poppy card. “We’d need somewhere with room enough for Poppy, though. It’ll be too much trouble for you.”

“She’ll be right, mate,” Bob argues. “Plenty of room at our place, trust me.”

Oh God, he’s being so nice, but I bet there isn’t.

My brain tries to conjure up another excuse for us not staying with Bob and Sandra, but the only thing that presents itself is Laura’s bowel problems, and I’d rather spend a night sleeping in a pit of radioactive snakes than use that one again. I chuck Laura a pleading glance to see if she can come in and save the day, but I get an equally pleading glance straight back at me.

Oh no. I’m going to have to accept the offer. We’ll just have to hope the night goes quickly and eight o’clock in the morning comes around as fast as possible.

“Okay, well, thank you very much. We’d love to come spend the night with you.” I try to sound enthusiastic, but my tone rather suggests that this idea is actually right up there with having all of your teeth pulled. Sandra and Bob don’t appear to notice, though.

“Great! I’ll go home now and get the place tidy for you,” Sandra says.

Oh fantastic. Now we’re making the poor bitch do more housework, after she’s just spent the entire day doing it here at the apartment.

“And if you folks don’t mind, I just have a couple of things to finish over in the gardens at the back. When they’re done I’ll jump in your car with you and direct you home.”

“Okay, thank you,” I say with an apologetic tone.

This is just awful.

Both Sandra and Bob wish us a brief farewell and go to attend to their respective chores.

“That was very nice of them,” Laura says once they’re out of earshot.

“Mmmm.”

“You don’t think so?”

“Oh, it was very nice of them, but I still think I would have preferred a hotel.”

“Well, why didn’t you come up with a reason not to go?”

“I couldn’t think of one.”

I know where my wife is going with this, and I wait for the inevitable.

“I could have just told them you have trouble taking a poo anywhere within earshot of another human being,” she says snidely. “That might have done it.”

Ah, I see. We’re going to occupy ourselves with some banter while we wait. Well, why the hell not?

“True,” I agree. “Or you could just turn up in your beach whore outfit, that would probably give them second thoughts about inviting us in.”

“Funny,” Laura says with eyes narrowed. “I know—you could suggest cooking them fajitas,” she says. “Once they see you crouched over their bin, that’ll get us chucked out before you know it.”

I open my mouth to tell her she should bring around a copy of the Polish penis-slapping movie for them to watch, but stop myself. “Look, let’s not go down this route. I’ve got no problem with a bit of banter, but it’s all fun and games until somebody loses an eye.” I take her hand. “I’m sorry I got us locked out, but at least we’ve got somewhere to stay for the night.”

“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.” She looks down at Poppy. “I want to get this one inside and into bed as soon as we can.”

It takes Bob only about ten minutes to square away whatever task he was finishing off, and in no time at all we’re in the Magna and he’s directing us to his home.

“Sandra will have the place looking lovely, don’t you fret,” he says in jovial fashion from the passenger seat.

“Sounds great,” I tell him, unable to completely wipe the disconcerted look off my face. I can just imagine Sandra right now, putting the finishing touches to their home, a half-smile of expectation on her face.

Oh God.

“Take a left here, mate,” Bob says, and I oblige.

“Keep going until the road splits. We’re just on the left after it.”

We’re certainly up in the hills by this point. I’ve had to rev the Magna hard to get us up at least one of the inclines. Bob and Sandra are in no danger of flooding any time in the near future, that’s for certain.

I see what looks like another road just after the split in the one we’re on and presume Bob’s house must be after that.

Bob says differently. “Left now mate. Otherwise we’ll be headed up into the boonies.”

“Okay.”

I turn into what I thought was another road, but turns out to be a driveway. Then something very strange happens. I drive the Magna into a vast courtyard. On my right is an enormous triple garage, and on the left is a three-storey house the size of my primary school.

Poor old Bob. He must be going senile. He’s taken us completely the wrong way and now we’re going to have the embarrassment of calling Sandra to help her befuddled husband get home.

“Right then. Welcome to our house! Out you get.” Oh dear, Bob actually thinks he lives here. Look at him, poor old fool. He’s actually walking up to the front door. This is going to be excruciating. The owners will come to the door and we’ll have to lead poor senile Bob away before he shits himself and tells them he’s a train driver.

Oh no, now he’s getting a set of keys out. This just gets worse and worse. Look at him trying to get in the door. He’s actually trying to turn the key. He’s actually opening the door. He’s actua—

Hang on a fucking minute.

Bob is standing in the doorway to what is patently his home, looking at us and wondering why we’re not getting out of the car. “You guys coming or what?”

Now, I’ve never claimed to be an expert at reading people, but I don’t think I’ve ever got it as wrong as this before.

In my defence, what was I supposed to expect? Bob and Sandra seem like working-class types. You wouldn’t normally think that someone in housekeeping and someone who is employed as a gardener would be able to own a house this large and expensive.

“You have a very nice house,” Laura says in wonder as she carries Poppy across the threshold.

Beyond is an open-plan living area you could comfortably play a game of tennis in. They must have killed an entire rainforest to provide the material for the polished hardwood floor I’m now standing on.

An expansive lounge sits to our right, an equally impressive kitchen is off to the left, and there’s a dining table in the centre that King Arthur would get hard just looking at. And then there’s the
view
.

The entire right-hand side of the house is paned with glass. Beyond this is a huge deck area, replete with a barbecue the size of a country house oven and more patio furniture than you’d see on a brisk walk around home base.

Beyond
that
is the Gold Coast. All of it. A 180-degree nighttime panorama takes in everything from Surfer’s Paradise way up north to Tweed Heads just south of us. A star field of such magnitude hangs overhead it makes my jaw drop in awe.

“Bloody hell,” I say breathlessly.

“Good, ain’t it?” Bob replies with characteristic Australian understatement.

“Yes,” I gulp.

“That’s why we had the place built up here. We like a nice view.”

“You giving them the grand tour?” Sandra says, walking out onto the decking.

“You have a very nice house,” Laura repeats. My wife seems to have got stuck in some kind of default loop.

“Aw, thanks love. We like it.” She looks at Poppy, still in her mother’s arms. “I think we should get the little ’un squared away, don’t you? She looks all in. I’ll take you up to the second floor. It’s where you’ll be sleeping.”

Sandra leads the way up the mahogany staircase to an area roughly three times the size of the apartment I’ve just got us locked out of.

A super-king-size bed awaits Laura and me past a partition at one end, and Poppy has her own double bed to sleep in next door. There’s every chance she’ll want to be adopted by our hosts when we tell her she has to leave tomorrow.

I spy a fifty-inch television in what looks like a second lounge area. And the view from here is if anything better than it was on the floor below.

“Okay guys. Get little Poppy to sleep, and then pop back downstairs for a drink,” Sandra tells us. “Treat the place like it’s your own. We have this whole floor for when our kids come to stay with their families so it’s purpose-built for folks like you!”

“We can’t thank you enough for this,” Laura says as she lays the sleeping Poppy down.

“Oh stop it. We’re more than happy to help.”

Sandra leaves us so we can get ourselves settled in. This doesn’t take long as all we have are the clothes we’re standing up in. The super-king bed is so comfortable it almost makes me cry.

“I should get us locked out more often,” I say to Laura from my prone position. “This is perfect.”

It turns out Bob used to work in the opal industry. “Did pretty well,” he tells us, as we sit with the both of them out on the vast decking. To the tune of several million dollars, it transpires.

When he retired four years ago, they built this mansion in the hills at Coolangatta to be closer to their daughter Madison, who lives just north of here in a town called Currumbin. The second floor of the house, when not being used by the Newmans, is usually reserved for their other daughter Tamsin, who lives in Thailand with her rich husband and their two children.

“But why do you work at our apartment block?” I ask when Bob has finished explaining all of this.

“Well, you don’t want to get bored do you?” he says.

No, I guess you most certainly don’t.

“We like to feel useful,” Sandra continues. “So when we saw the vacancies come up we jumped at the chance.”

“Yep, let’s us keep our hand in.” Bob takes another swig of lager from his stubby holder.

It’s funny. Back in the UK Bob and Sandra would spend their days with other oily middle-class couples discussing the latest Audi convertible and complaining about the people from the Housing Association. Out here, though, you’re hard-pressed to tell the rich folk from the poor ones. Everybody acts, dresses, and talks the same. There’s none of that obnoxious superiority complex that seems to infect the British psyche once it’s earned a fair bit of money. The class system here appears to be deader than the Australian music industry. I find the whole thing very refreshing—and in the case of my family this evening, also very convenient.

The next couple of hours are whiled away talking about life in Australia (it turns out Sandra is actually from Walthamstow and moved here when she was eight), the state of our respective governments, the state of our respective sports teams, the weather, taxes, the Second World War, having children, getting older, and invisible turtles.

At ten thirty Bob takes a look at his watch. “Time to turn in, I reckon. We’ve got an early start.”

“Oh yes!” Sandra joins in. “We’re off up to Brisbane to see my sister.”

I groan internally. We’ll have to get up early as well, then. I was rather looking forward to a lie-in.

“You folks don’t have to get up at the same time as we do, though,” Sandra continues, as if reading my mind. “You stay in bed for as long as you want and just make sure the front door is slammed shut when you leave. There’s a shower in the en suite, and feel free to raid the fridge for breakfast in the morning.”

“Thank you so much,” Laura says. I can tell from the relief in her voice that she was thinking much the same thing I was about the early start.

With that exchange, the evening is over and we retire to our bedroom…sorry, I mean our second-floor apartment.

“Unbelievable,” I say to Laura as we climb into bed. “I get us locked out and it turns into one of the best evenings we’ve had here so far. What a lovely pair those two are.”

“Yes dear. You’re an accidental genius,” Laura replies in typical withering fashion. “They are lovely, but I still think I would have preferred the night in my own bed.”

“Where’s your sense of adventure, baby?”

“Next to your door key on the floor of our currently inaccessible bathroom, pal.”

I smile and give my wife a kiss. This stirs things in the trouser department.

She catches the expression on my face. “Don’t be ridiculous Jamie. We’re in somebody else’s house. They might hear.”

“In this place? It’s enormous.”

“I’m not taking the risk. Try to hold on until tomorrow when I’m less sure we’ll be putting on a performance for a middle-aged Australian couple.”

Laura kisses me back, not helping matters in the slightest. She then rolls over onto her side, leaving me looking down disconsolately at my erection and once again cursing my forgetfulness.

Laura’s probably right, though. The idea of Bob and Sandra hearing us go at it is awful. Best to let this one slide and attempt reentry tomorrow.

Laura’s reluctance to “get jiggy wid it” is proved to be the right decision some ten minutes later when I hear voices coming from directly above us. I can’t quite make out what’s being said, but it’s obvious Bob and Sandra are getting ready for bed themselves. It appears that while this palatial mansion has many, many good points, one of its less appealing characteristics is a lack of soundproofing. They could probably do with slinging a few carpets down instead of all the polished hardwood.

“See,” Laura says sleepily. “They’d have definitely heard us.”

“Yep. Good call.”

Bob and Sandra’s conversation carries on for another few minutes. I hear the bed creak loudly as Bob gets in, and creak much more softly when Sandra joins him.

This is actually making me feel a bit uncomfortable. I feel like I’m intruding in their private life. I’m profoundly glad, therefore, when I hear the click of a table lamp going off and the conversation above us stops.