My Not So Functional Family by Bridie Jabour

Author:Bridie Jabour
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bonnier Publishing Fiction

Claudia leaned out of the taxi and furtively looked each way before pushing a $20 note into the driver’s hand and darting under the streetlight and into the motel car park. Each hand bore two bottles cocooned in a brown paper bag. Basking in the paranoia, she looked over her shoulder and took the stairs to her right, two at a time.

After ending the ascent with a little jump, she looked down the row of myrtle green doors and found what she was looking for. Holding the four bottles, she kicked the door three times.

A moment later it swung back to reveal a sliver of Nora, in her version of house clothes, before jamming awkwardly with a clunk. The length of chain pulled taut between door and frame at eye level. Nora’s face quickly split with a grin as she ducked back behind the green frame. Claudia could hear the chain rattling from its hook before the door opened again properly, giving a full view of Nora barefoot in tan capris and a bamboo cotton T-shirt.

How very like Nora, she thought, glancing at the now limp security chain.

Claudia took one last look behind to make sure nobody knew she was there and stepped over the threshold, raising the brown packages triumphantly. ‘I couldn’t find anything in this town but prosecco, but look what Mary had squirrelled away for a special occasion.’ She pulled open the bags to reveal Veuve Clicquot labels on warm dark green bottles.

Nora squealed. ‘It’s our secret hen’s! Secret hen’s, secret hen’s,’ she hummed the mantra to an obscure tune. Claudia giggled and opened the tiny freezer compartment of the bar fridge, inelegantly jamming one bottle in and leaving two others on the grimy white shelf inside the door and another still warm on top of the fridge.

Claudia gingerly took off her shoes and flopped down on the bed, ignoring the slightest of frowns that crossed Nora’s face as she realised her friend was wearing her beloved leggings as pants. Claudia stared at the ceiling and began her run-down of the day, which Nora had already known would somehow centre around Poppy. They fell into the easy repartee built over years of female friendship, gossip, Icelandic politics (always weird how the Euros love to have heads of state who can completely over-rule a separate head of government – what is the point?), their pick for the colour of the summer, loneliness, long-ago bosses.

Claudia told her friend how Poppy had slunk into the café after calling a taxi to the small beach town for something in the ballpark of $130.

‘Worst of all, I end up being the one who feels guilty,’ she said, staring into the moderately expensive champagne in the cheap hotel room tumbler. ‘I know she loves me, I can feel how much she wants to be close to me again, and it’s almost as if I have run out of patience with her. I can’t allow her to be close to me. Every time she

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.