The Husband's Secret

Felicity looked mortified. ‘Of course not.’

‘When you put it like that –’ began Will.

‘But what other way is there to put it?’

Will exhaled. He leaned forward. ‘Look,’ he said. ‘We don’t need to work anything out right this second.’ Sometimes Will used a particularly masculine, reasonable but authoritative tone in the office when he wanted things done a certain way. Tess and Felicity gave him absolute hell about it. He was using that tone now, as if it were time to get things under control.

How dare he.

Tess lifted her closed fists and slammed them down so hard on the table that it rattled. She’d never done such a thing before. It felt farcical and absurd and somewhat thrilling. She was pleased to see both Will and Felicity flinch.

‘I’ll tell you what’s going to happen,’ she said, because all at once it was perfectly clear.

It was simple.

Will and Felicity needed to have a proper affair. The sooner the better. This smouldering thing they had going had to run its course. At the moment it was sweet and sexy. They were star-crossed lovers, Romeo and Juliet gazing soulfully at each other over the purple Cough Stop dragon. It needed to get sweaty and sticky and sleazy and eventually, hopefully, God willing, banal and dull. Will loved his son, and once the fog of lust cleared, he’d see that he’d made a ghastly but not irretrievable mistake.

This could all be fixed.

The only way forward was for Tess to leave. Right now.

‘Liam and I will go and stay in Sydney,’ she said. ‘With Mum. She called just a minute ago to say she’s broken her ankle. She needs someone there to help her.’

‘Oh no! How? Is she okay?’ said Felicity.

Tess ignored her. Felicity didn’t get to be the caring niece any more. She was the other woman. Tess was the wife. And she was going to fight this. For Liam’s sake. She would fight it and she would win.

‘We’ll stay with her until her ankle is better.’

‘But, Tess, you can’t take Liam to live in Sydney.’ Will’s bossy tone vanished. He was a Melbourne boy. There had never been any question that they would live anywhere else.

He looked at Tess with a wounded expression, as if he were Liam being unjustly told off for something. Then his brow cleared. ‘What about school?’ he said. ‘He can’t miss school.’

‘He can go to St Angela’s for a term. He needs to get away from Marcus. This will be good for him. A complete change of scenery. He can walk to school like I did.’

‘You wouldn’t be able to get him in,’ said Will frantically. ‘He’s not Catholic!’

‘Who says he’s not Catholic?’ said Tess. ‘He’s baptised in the Catholic Church.’

Felicity opened her mouth and shut it again.

‘I’ll get him in,’ said Tess. She had no idea how hard it would be to get him in. ‘Mum knows people at the church.’

As Tess spoke, images of St Angela’s, the tiny local Catholic school she and Felicity had both attended, filled her head. Playing hopscotch in the shadows of the church spires. The sound of church bells. The sweet rotting smell of forgotten bananas in the bottom of school bags. It was a five-minute walk from Tess’s mother’s home. The school was at the end of a tree-lined cul-de-sac and in summer the trees formed a canopy overhead like a cathedral. It was autumn now, still warm enough to swim in Sydney. The leaves of the liquidambars would be green and gold. Liam would walk through puddles of pale pink rose petals on uneven footpaths.

Some of Tess’s old teachers were still at St Angela’s. Kids who Tess and Felicity had been at school with had grown up and turned into mums and dads who sent their own children there. Tess’s mother mentioned their names sometimes, and Tess could never quite believe they still existed. Like the gorgeous Fitzpatrick boys. Six blond, square-jawed boys who were so similar they looked like they’d been purchased in bulk. They were so good-looking Tess used to blush whenever one of them walked by. One of the altar boys was always a Fitzpatrick. Each of them left St Angela’s in Year 4 and went off to that exclusive Catholic boys school on the harbour. They were wealthy as well as gorgeous. Apparently the eldest Fitzpatrick boy now had three daughters who were all at St Angela’s.

Could she really do it? Take Liam to Sydney and send him to her old primary school? It felt impossible; like she was trying to send him back through time to her childhood. For a moment she felt dizzy again. This wasn’t happening. Of course she couldn’t take Liam out of school. His sea-creature project was due on Friday. He had Little Athletics on Saturday. She had a load of washing ready to go on the line, and a potential new client to see first thing tomorrow morning.

But she saw that Will and Felicity were exchanging glances again, and her heart twisted. She looked at her watch. It was six-thirty pm. From upstairs she could hear the theme music for that unbearable show, The Biggest Loser. Liam must have switched off his DVD and changed it over to normal TV. In a minute he’d flick the channel looking for something with guns.

‘You get nothing for nothing!’ shouted someone from the television set.

Tess hated the empty motivational phrases they used on that show.

‘I’ll get us on a flight tonight,’ she said.

‘Tonight?’ said Will. ‘You can’t take Liam on a flight tonight.’

‘Yes I can. There’ll be a nine pm flight. We’ll make it easily.’