I Give My Marriage a Year by Holly Wainwright

Author:Holly Wainwright
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan Australia
Published: 2020-04-14T16:00:00+00:00

Lou

18 May, 2014

‘Mocktails are bullshit,’ Lou said to Gretchen down the phone. ‘I miss vodka.’

‘The science is in,’ said Gretchen. ‘You are not on the vodkas.’

‘Sigh,’ said Lou, who was lying on her bed in her underwear, tracing the thick dark line that now ran from her bellybutton and arced over her pregnant belly and into her pants. ‘I guess I’ll still come.’

‘I’ll meet you there at eight.’

‘Eight? Are you insane? Six thirty.’

‘The place will not even be open at six thirty, Lou.’ Gretchen was laughing.

‘I’m a pregnant woman with a preschooler and a job. Being in bed by nine is my religion. I will sacrifice all before it.’

‘Fine, I’ll meet the others at nine. You and me six thirty. Can I go and get on with my shallow, selfish, late-night life now?’

‘If you must,’ said Lou. ‘But don’t be having any sex. It’s gross. That’s official.’

‘Definitely not official. See you Saturday, Lou-Lou.’

It was Sunday. Lou had two more weeks of work before her mat leave started. She was so tired that the idea of getting off this bed and going downstairs to see if Stell had fallen into their construction site of a backyard seemed all too much. Josh would have yelled up if she had, right?

The window was open and the tree was blowing the yellowing leaves around outside in a pleasant autumn breeze. Lou closed her eyes, felt the cool air on her bump. She’d been right about this room, right about this house, right about this tree. It was well and truly home now.

For a while it had looked like it would slip through their fingers as the owners decided on a nerve-shredding auction, and then there was seemingly endless paperwork, money-moving dramas and hidden costs of this and that. Every time, Lou was convinced Josh’s cold feet would turn to ice blocks and she wouldn’t be able to shift him.

And then there was her mother. When Lou had brought her mum to a viewing to actually see the house that she and Brian were helping them buy, Annabelle said they were aiming too low. ‘This isn’t a forever home, BB,’ she’d said, standing in the empty kitchen and looking out at the concrete yard. ‘You can do better.’

‘I don’t want to do better, Mum,’ Lou had said. ‘This is almost manageable. We can be happy here.’

The way Annabelle tightened her lips as her eyes swept the medium-sized rooms and the bland white kitchen and the tiny strip of front garden told Lou that her mother doubted that.

‘Mum, honestly – to me, this place is perfect.’

‘I want you to have everything you deserve,’ her mother said. ‘And a lovely big house is part of that. It’s what your husband should want to give you.’

‘This isn’t the fifties, Mum; Josh isn’t giving me anything,’ Lou said, looking nervously at the other people who were there for the open-house inspection. ‘We’re a partnership.’ She knew Annabelle was looking at the others too, and had somehow decided they weren’t the right kind of competition.

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