Lisa Heidke by Lucy (mobi) (book club reads TXT) 📗

I know it’s not good parenting to hide the truth from them, but the truth is, I’m having a really hard time dealing with the fact that my husband’s left me for a nineteen-year-old, for Christ’s sake. Even harder is watching Bella and Sam being so grown-up about this horrible ordeal. They clearly miss him. He is their father, after all.

Nadia suggested I should talk to her lawyer, check out my options. But I’m not ready for that yet. It sounds so final.

Day 27

I think I’ve been too patient with the builders, Patch in particular. He always has an excuse for why there hasn’t been more progress. ‘I’m sorry to complain,’ I tend to begin most conversations, when in fact I’m seething with fury. The builders have a job to do and they’re being paid well for it. They’ve completely blown out their initial time estimate and I’m over it.

I start writing a whinge list.

1. No feature tiles used under capping in bathroom, which I specifically purchased two months ago. It set the tiler back two weeks because he had to take away the capping, breaking several dozen pre-existing tiles in the process.

2. We still only have one toilet because we surrendered the second one to the builders after I walked in on Joel sitting on the loo upstairs. I still can’t erase the image from my mind. (Since then, Gloria’s taken to calling him Creepy Joel, convinced he’s on the run from Jamaica. The way that woman’s mind works!) Anyway, after that, I relented and agreed that Patch should install a portaloo for the tradesmen. It is still to appear.

3. Builders working with shirts off, nude from the waist up. It’s illegal and contravenes the industrial relations code. Sure, I don’t mind the younger, muscular ones but the over-forties with their flabby guts? I don’t think so. Whenever I mention this to Patch he laughs and asks if I want to see his chest.

4. New fire alarms, purchased weeks ago, are yet to be installed.

I’m staring up at a leaking skylight, ready to write that down too, when Patch walks by.

‘What’s that about?’ I ask him, pointing upwards.

‘The roofer didn’t get to finish the flashing.’

‘I can see that. Water’s still leaking everywhere.’

‘His mother died,’ Patch says, without a flicker of a smile.

I laugh. ‘At least have the decency to tell me the truth.’

‘It’s true, I swear. I didn’t believe it myself until I read the old bird’s death notice in the paper. I’ll get you a copy if you like.’

‘I’m sorry about the roofer’s mother, but could you get someone else to finish the job?’

‘I can, but it’ll cost. Good tradesmen are impossible to find.’

‘Tell me about it. Could you possibly get it fixed before it rains again, please?’

‘Aye, aye, Captain.’

I follow Patch outside. ‘And why can’t the tiler complete the tiling around the outside of the verandah? It’s only half-finished. What about the rest of it?’

‘Ran out of tiles.’

‘What are they?’ I ask, pointing to several soggy cardboard boxes of tessellated tiles stacked in a mud patch near the side fence.

His beady brown eye glares at me.

‘And while we’re talking tiles,’ I go on, unflinchingly, ‘can you tell me why the tiles that lead from the laundry to the storeroom are a different colour than I specified?’

I make him walk back inside with me by pushing him firmly in the back. He thinks it’s amusing.

‘See, they’re plain white, not black and white as we agreed,’ I say. ‘They’ll need to be pulled up and done again with the correct ones.’

‘Good luck telling the tiler that,’ Patch says, and meanders off.

Day 28

The pool’s completely green and I don’t know how to drain it. Even the mozzies are boycotting it. Any moment, I’m expecting a large flock of migrating geese to land, under the delusion they’ve found Nirvana.

‘I’m feth up,’ I tell Gloria when she turns up with curries for dinner. ‘I’m thick of thith houth . . . and efthing.’

‘Have you heard anything?’

‘Of courth not,’ I whisper. ‘He and Alana have dithappeared.’

‘He’s got to resurface eventually.’

‘What’s on your teeth, Mum?’ Bella asks, appearing at the smell of food. ‘You look like Bucky Beaver.’

‘That’th enough, Ithabella,’ I say.

‘She’s right, you know,’ says Gloria, peering at my mouth through her oversized J.Lo reading glasses. ‘And you sound terrible.’

‘They’re thtick-on whitening thtripth.’ Realising the futility of them, I pull the strips off.

‘Thank God. I guess you’re trying,’ Gloria says, ‘but you look seriously ill, girl. I keep telling you, we need to repackage and relaunch you. We need a bright new Lucy Springer - of course, you’ll still be you, darl, only better.

Let me make you a star again. Maybe even get you a hosting gig on one of those lifestyle shows -’

‘I wish you’d stop asking me to auditon for ridiculous celebrity dating and dancing shows,’ I tell her. ‘Do you really think Max has gone . . . forever?’

‘Why are you so opposed to taking dance lessons? Reality dance shows are huge. Huge! Especially in Israel. The sooner you learn the quickstep, the cha cha, and the paso doble . . . No, I don’t think Max has gone forever, unfortunately. He’ll be back.’

Day 29

Patch bounds up to me at seven-thirty-five in the morning to inform me that the concrete slab is being poured today.

‘About time,’ I snap. ‘There’s still a hell of a lot to do.’

He stares at me.

I unfold the notes I’m holding in my right hand and clear my throat before reading aloud my list. ‘Like, start the kitchen, install light fixtures, install and finish new hardwood floor, scrape old paint off ceiling boards, paint ceiling . . .’ I sneak a look at his stunned face.

‘Just give me the list,’ he sighs.

He glances through it, all seven pages, and says, ‘All in hand, Lucy. All under control. I promise the team are devoting themselves to your house until the job’s finished.’

Victory. That’s all I wanted to hear.

‘Are you sure you