Page 14 of Eva Reddy’s Trip of a Lifetime

Channelling Nancy Drew

My hangover is well and truly in the rear-view mirror by the time I join the conga line of traffic heading into town.

Maybe that’s because I made good on my promise to get into better physical shape.

I went to the gym (Thanks, Mum) and worked up a sweat that wasn’t hot-flush related.

I also conquered the treadmill without doing myself a serious mischief.

Culture Club comes on the radio. I ratchet up the volume.

Nothing can bring me down. Not the ubiquitous roadwork.

Not the aggressive merging. Not even the tosser in the Tesla with the hostile hand gestures and the obnoxious customised horn.

You have to wonder, why would anyone want their car to sound like a farting goat?

I park near the Botanic Gardens and walk along the meticulously manicured paths into town.

The sun is shining. The world is glistening after yesterday’s rain.

Everything feels fresh and new. Hell, I feel fresh and new.

If my life were a cheesy musical, this is the moment I would go full Julie Andrews, spread my arms out wide and start singing.

And to think, last night I was sobbing into a glass of cheap red wine, lamenting the end of my marriage.

I have a single chore remaining before I can put all the unpleasantness of the last two days behind me. Just one last box to tick. It’s time to engage in some amateur sleuthing and spy on my husband.

It’s obviously unnecessary and there’s a definite bunny-boiler vibe to the assignment, but I gave Rachael and Katie my word. If I don’t follow through, I’ll never hear the end of it.

Jonathan’s office is right in the centre of town and located across from an open-air coffee shop, perfect for anyone interested in doing a little half-hearted stalking.

The lunchtime crowd hasn’t descended yet, so the place is close to empty.

I position myself behind a pot plant, order a chamomile tea and wait.

I can see everyone who comes into and out of Jonathan’s office building.

And there are a lot of them; the directory board in the foyer carries the names of sixty or more companies.

And on a magnificent autumn day, it seems every employee has found some excuse to escape outside.

I sit smugly sipping my tea and monitoring the office entrance.

Now that I have embarked on a fitness program, my body is my temple.

I don’t even look at the dessert menu. My plan is to call Jonathan and have lunch with him as soon as I am done with my stake-out.

We can discuss my new job situation over a power salad.

I just have to honour my drunken pact with Rachael and Katie first. I wonder how long I need to stay in position to uphold my end of the bargain and decide two cups of tea more than covers it.

It is just after midday when I spot Jonathan coming out of the office.

He hesitates outside the building, hopping from one leg to another, just as he used to do as a fifteen-year-old.

My heart fills with love for him. All those years.

We really have grown up together. And we are still growing. Even in middle age.

Today’s shirt is a stylish pastel. He is wearing yet another new tie.

He looks good. Really good. I should never have doubted him.

Jonathan switching up his wardrobe is no different from me spending a small fortune on active wear this morning.

We are both still finding ourselves and will probably still be searching for the meaning of our lives when Emily wheels us into the nursing home.

I decide to abandon my ludicrous mission and join him.

But my bill hasn’t arrived, so instead, I wave my arms above my head, hoping to attract Jonathan’s attention.

At worst, my frantic signalling might motivate the waiter to stop staring at his phone and do something about my bill.

Annoyingly, a lack of customers has not translated into fast, friendly service.

Neither my husband nor the waiter notice me. I stand up and angle my body between the potted plant and the cake display, placing myself in Jonathan’s line of sight, but I can’t catch his eye. He is staring intently down the street as if looking for something. And then I realise.

He isn’t looking for something. He is looking for someone.

I collapse back into my chair and out of sight as a woman rushes up to him and throws herself into his arms. He responds by kissing her full on the lips. I remember our last kiss and cringe. I wonder if I repulse him. Maybe kissing me, he had felt the same rising nausea that I am experiencing now.

Jonathan and his mystery woman hold their embrace, eyes locked in that way people do when they are infatuated with one another. Then my husband slips his arm around the girl’s waist and they amble off toward the harbour.

I knock back the last gulp of chamomile tea, wedge ten dollars under the sugar canister and head out onto the footpath. The waiter doesn’t look up from his screen.

The street is busy now with shoppers. I pull a scarf over my head, make sure my sunglasses are in place and melt into the crowd.

Across the road, a building with large sandstone columns offers cover.

I thread through the city traffic and dart behind the first pillar.

Jonathan and his date stroll past, oblivious to the madwoman peering at them from behind the sandstone.

I am careful to maintain a safe distance as I scuttle from one pillar to the next.

Exposure is unthinkable. I am the scorned, middle-aged wife blundering along in elasticised cotton pants and pharmacy sandals.

My prey is leggy and blonde and wearing a miniskirt.

She is also young. From the way she moves, I judge her to be around thirty.

She still has that skip in her step, that lightness of being that I shed long ago.

We make our way down four city blocks in a game of demented Frogger, but I am the only one playing. Jonathan and his date are too focused on each other to register anything or anyone around them.

The chase finally ends at an outdoor café down at Circular Quay.

It is a touristy kind of place. The sort where the food is both overpriced and underwhelming.

But if the goal is the perfect setting for a romantic tryst, the choice is inspired.

Sydney Harbour is at its beguiling best today, a deep, sparkling blue.

I remember all those years ago when it seduced me.

I find a bench seat not quite ten metres away.

A street mime—or maybe he is a human statue—screens me from view.

It is probably an unnecessary precaution, since Jonathan and his date are cocooned in their own little bubble.

And my age and my clothing render me near invisible.

Pigeons flock around me. I must look like some kind of bag lady. Unnoticed. Unremarkable. Irrelevant.

I watch as a waiter arrives at the table with a bottle of champagne and two menus. Jonathan catches the woman’s hand and kisses it. My chamomile tea churns in my stomach, threatening to spill up and out and over onto the mime’s gold-sprayed dress shoes.

I should get up and walk away. I don’t need to see any more.

I know what I need to know. But I can’t tear my eyes away from the scene unfolding in front of me.

I’m like a child watching a horror movie through their fingers, repelled but unable to turn away.

The couple clink glasses. Share food from each other’s plates.

Hold hands across the table. I wonder if Jonathan is wearing his wedding ring and if the woman cares either way.

As my husband and his girlfriend laugh and flirt, my mind and body shut down until my entire being is numb. Next to me, the mime changes position, turning his body to me, head cocked to the side, one hand underneath his chin. It feels like he is mocking me.

Maybe I am in shock. Or perhaps I’ve already worked through the various stages of grief.

Over the last couple of days, I’ve experienced denial and bargaining and depression.

Now I have settled on wretched acceptance.

The only stage I haven’t gone through is anger, but that is not in my nature.

I’ve never been the confrontational type.

I wish I was the kind of person who could walk up to that table and pour champagne over my husband’s head and say something pithy, piercing and perfect.

But that isn’t me. I never shout or say or do anything that I might later regret, no matter however justified.

I’m too afraid of upsetting the person who hurt me.

The sun slips behind the clouds. There is no longer any trace of the glorious morning that had raised my hopes and given joy and purpose to my day. Instead, I watch as my old life retreats into the shadows.

I am just about to gather up what is left of my dignity and walk away when Jonathan whispers something into his lady friend’s ear. She giggles and leans into him. He pulls out his phone and starts tapping.

My stomach flip flops. I know what is coming.

My phone vibrates almost immediately. I turn my body away from the café as I read the text. Even now, I don’t want to be caught spying on them, as if my presence is more shameful than my husband’s infidelity.

My meeting has been moved to tonight. I’ll be staying in the city.

Jonathan and the woman laugh as she gestures for the phone. Now it is her turn to type.

Another ping.

Maybe you can go out with the girls again. You seemed to enjoy yourself last night.

My face flames with humiliation. The woman knows Jonathan is married or has a partner that he must lie to.

And she not only doesn’t care, she is taunting me for being a little unsteady on my feet last night.

She is having an affair with my husband.

And yet I am the one who feels guilty. For what?

For having a few drinks with friends after a couple of rough days?

A light breeze brushes my skin. I shiver and lift a hand to my face. My cheeks are wet with tears. I didn’t even realise I was crying.

Jonathan slips his phone back into his suit pocket and returns his attention to his date. I’ve seen enough. There is no point torturing myself any longer. What am I hoping to achieve? It is long past time to go.

The mime/statue watches me as I slowly pull myself to my feet and retrieve my handbag from the ground. We meet each other’s gaze. He brings a fist to his eye and twists it to the left and then to the right. The universal sign for sadness.

‘I hope your day is a whole lot better than mine,’ I say as I drop a fifty-dollar note into his cap.

I can feel his eyes drilling into my back as I walk away. Is there anything more pathetic than being pitied by a street mime?

I blunder along the path that hugs the foreshore. Past the ferry terminal and the train station. Past all the restaurants and tourist shops. Past the Opera House. Past the water taxi jetty. I keep on walking, trying to put some distance between myself and my shame.

When Circular Quay is well behind me, I finally sit down and gaze out at the water. Sea gulls screech. Ferries come and go. Children laugh and skitter. Joggers jog. None of it registers. I feel like I am watching the world from underwater.

Sydney Harbour has always been a place of happy memories. It is where Jonathan proposed. It is where my marriage began. Now it is also where it ends.

Nearby, a digital billboard clicks over to its next advertisement. Matthew Kirk smiles at me, arms crossed as he leans against the Channel 8 logo. That junior position at Parliament House evolved into an overseas posting and eventually segued into the anchor job on the evening news.

Sliding doors meet glass ceiling.

I don’t begrudge Matthew his success, he’s a nice guy. But sometimes it really does feel as though he is living my life.

Once upon a time I had dreamed of becoming a great journalist and writer. Of being loved by one man forever. But nothing in my life has gone to script.

Absolutely nothing.

From the journals and miscellaneous paperwork of Eva Reddy (Age 25)

June 20th, 1997

Haiku to Motherhood

New baby. No sleep.

Cracked tits. All my days are shit.

Fucketty fuck fuck.

I rang my mother tonight. Voluntarily. That tells you how desperate I am.

‘When will it get easier?’ I asked.

‘It doesn’t, Bunny.’

Sometimes I wish my mother would call a spade a monkey wrench. But she’s not one for sugar-coating things.

‘The misery just evolves into constant anxiety. So, in a few months’ time, Emily will give you maybe one extra hour of sleep at night. But you’ll spend that time worrying about why she isn’t walking.’

‘But haven’t you stopped worrying about me now? I’m married with a baby. I’m all grown up.’

She didn’t say anything. From the next room, Emily started howling again. She hadn’t even slept twenty minutes.

‘Who’d be a mother?’ I asked.

‘Well, not a man. That’s for sure.’