Those Other Women Read online

  ‘No need? The two of you are liars. Garret doesn’t want children. Garret never wanted children.’

  ‘Poppy,’ Karleen began, but Garret finally cut in. ‘Give us a minute, would you, Karls?’ He shifted sideways, letting her hand fall from the back of his neck while reaching down to massage his shin under the table.

  ‘We agreed we’d do this together, as a team.’

  Poppy snorted. A team? Karleen couldn’t stop digging the knife in.

  ‘I know, but I need to talk to Poppy . . . alone.’

  Karleen huffed and left the room. A moment later the front door slammed and Poppy could imagine Karleen standing out on the front porch, arms folded, foot tapping as she waited. Karleen had never been patient.

  At long last, Poppy’s husband held her gaze. His eyes were kind and somehow full of sorrow, without the condescending pity that Karleen’s eyes offered. ‘I feel awful. This isn’t how I meant for it to go.’

  Hundreds of questions swirled through Poppy’s head.

  Oh yes? And how exactly did you expect it would go?

  How did this happen?

  When did things go wrong between us?

  Why now? Why her?

  But the one that came out of her mouth was unexpected.

  ‘Since when do you call her Karls?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t know.’

  ‘She’s always hated nicknames. Aren’t you something special then?’

  Even when they were kids no one was allowed to shorten Karleen’s name. She’d given one of her exes the boot for no other reason than the fact that he wouldn’t stop calling her Kazza.

  Garret reached across the table and took hold of one of her hands between his own. Poppy knew she shouldn’t let him touch her. He didn’t deserve ever to feel the warmth of her skin again. But somehow she couldn’t make her body react, she couldn’t pull away. He stroked her wrist with his thumb.

  ‘I hate seeing you like this. I hate hurting you and I never intended for this to happen. I swear to you I didn’t. Karleen and I falling for one another, it was so far out of the blue, I don’t think anyone could have predicted it. She wasn’t lying when she said it just happened.’

  ‘And what about the other stuff? About you all of a sudden wanting kids now. Is that true too?’

  Garret hesitated and then he nodded. ‘It is. At least, it’s what I think I want.’

  ‘When did that happen? When did you change your mind? Or were you lying all along?’

  ‘I didn’t lie and it’s not that I’ve suddenly changed my mind either. It was more gradual. It’s like this: when we first got together you knew straight out what you wanted and it wasn’t kids. To be honest, I wasn’t fussed either way but I loved you and I was happy to go along with what you wanted.’

  ‘But you —’

  Garret silenced her with a small shake of his head. ‘Let me get this out. I know, I know. I said it was what I wanted too. And I believed I was happy. But over the years, I started to wonder, I started to have doubts.’

  ‘You never said.’

  ‘That’s true and I should have told you, I should have voiced my thoughts, my fears that one day I was going to regret not having children. But I didn’t, because like I said, you’ve always been so sure. Tell me, babe, had I brought it up with you, would you honestly have considered changing your mind?’

  Everything that Poppy wanted to say clamoured to have its turn. Where did she start with something like this? The blowfly returned, landing on the table between them. Poppy fixed her gaze on it and eventually she spoke.

  ‘How am I supposed to answer that? How am I supposed to know what I might have said, what I might have done? When you never even gave me the chance?’

  ‘I didn’t ask because it wouldn’t have been fair for me to put you in that position. Especially when I was still trying to figure it all out for myself. To expect you to reconsider when you made it clear from day one that you never wanted children. Babe, it was a deal-breaker for you, I knew that.’

  Poppy finally wrenched her hand out of Garret’s grip and slammed her palm down on the table, killing the fly. She wiped the remains of the dead insect on her grey suit pants. ‘Stop calling me babe! You don’t get to call me that anymore. And you want to talk about being fair? You didn’t want to put me in that position so instead you cheated on me with my best friend! That’s fucking absurd!’

  ‘I know, but like I said, we didn’t mean for it to happen. We started out just talking. That time we were all meeting for a drink after work at Platinum’s Bar and you were running late. It was awkward at first, usually Karleen and I would need you to be the ice-breaker between us. But she’d just had that terrible blind date with the IT guy. She was feeling down and we both put a fair few drinks away and got chatting. She told me how she was ready to start a family and she was scared she was running out of time —’

  ‘STOP! I don’t want to hear it. You think I need the details? You think I want you to describe how the two of you started staring into one another’s eyes over your margaritas? Let me guess, her knee brushed against yours? Your hand landed on her thigh and you don’t even know how it got there? You started confiding about how your bitch of a wife was going to deprive you of the chance to be a daddy?’

  Something flashed across Garret’s eyes and Poppy knew she was bang on. That arsehole.

  She forged on. ‘And next thing, I show up – completely clueless and ruin the moment for the two of you. But from then on, you’re exchanging secret little glances of longing and before you know it . . . you’re fucking one another. That’s how it went, right?’

  ‘Poppy, don’t do this. Karls and I, we both still love you. It tears us up that we’re hurting you; it was the last thing we wanted, but it was like we didn’t have a choice in the matter.’

  ‘Oh yeah, she sure looked all torn up inside.’

  ‘You know what she’s like, she puts up a front, she’s all business, but it’s only because she’s trying to hold it together.’

  ‘Business? So what, this is just a neat little business transaction to her? We switch roles, she becomes the wife, I become the best friend, the third wheel, and we go on like nothing ever happened? And you think you can sit there and tell me you both still love me? You two make me sick.’

  Garret reached once more for her hand but Poppy lurched backwards, almost falling off the seat. ‘I never want to see either of your faces again.’

  She stood and fled. Karleen didn’t try to stop her when she passed her on the front porch.

  In the car, Poppy drove aimlessly. She didn’t know where to go. Usually if you had a fight with your husband, the person you turned to was your best friend. But obviously Poppy didn’t have that option anymore. Not that she and Garret had really fought much throughout their marriage. Was that another sign she’d missed? Did their lack of arguments equate to a lack of passion?

  She couldn’t bring herself to head over to her parents’ place. They would try their best to comfort her, but ultimately they wouldn’t know the right things to say. The same went for her brother Nolan. He’d be lost for words, and probably would want to punch Garret in the face, which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing. It was a shame she’d never become close with Nolan’s wife Megan, but Poppy had really only ever had the one female friend – Karleen, who had been her friend since primary school when she’d walked up to her in the playground and asked for a turn of her My Little Pony toy.

  ‘You can play with my Cabbage Patch Doll if you want?’

  Boom. Just like that. Friends for life. Well, that’s what Poppy had thought anyway. She thought that’s how it worked. You start with your family, and then you make your friends as a child and they stick with you, and that right there is your safety net. Then you fall in love and you get married and your best friend is your maid of honour.

  Her maid of honour. Her maid of honour had slept with her husband. That back-stabbing bitch.

  Eventually she pulled over on the side of t
he road and simply sat in the car. Hands gripping the steering wheel. Her body shuddering with sobs as she let herself succumb completely to the self-pity, not caring who might walk or drive past and see her broken form.

  Her mind swung from one gut-wrenching moment to the next.

  The moment she’d touched her fingers to the freshly made bed.

  The moment Garret had whispered those words: Poppy, please.

  The moment Karleen had dropped her bombshell: Garret does want kids.

  She still couldn’t really believe it. Not wanting to have children had been something they had agreed upon so early in their relationship. Yes, of course she’d been the instigator, but Garret had never once expressed even the slightest hesitation on the matter.

  ‘Kids are expensive,’ he’d agreed, ‘and they take over your lives.’

  Okay, so his reasons for being on board didn’t exactly stem from the most deep-seated of desires, but regardless, he’d said he was all for it. He’s said that whatever made her happy made him happy. And not having children made Poppy happy.

  She couldn’t really pinpoint the moment when she’d come to that decision for herself. There was no single defining incident. No one driving reason. It was a combination of things. It was the immense relief she felt when she held someone else’s baby and then got to hand it back. It was the pride she felt in knowing her choice was the environmentally responsible one. It was the freedom she knew she had to do what she wanted, when she wanted. Knowing she could travel, knowing she could grow her career, knowing she could spend her money on an expensive outfit without compromising her hypothetical child’s future education.

  And lastly, it was the acute absence of any maternal desire or instinct within. When it came down to it, she simply didn’t want to be a mother. And she knew she never would.

  So in truth, what would have happened if Garret had brought up his change of heart instead of straying? He wasn’t wrong when he’d said that not having children was a deal-breaker for Poppy. But surely he should have given her the chance to at least talk it through. There might not have been any easy solution, but couldn’t they have found a way to work things out?

  Or did she mean she might have been able to talk him round? Change his mind back? And would that have been fair? Either way it didn’t matter, because Garret hadn’t given her the chance. Instead he’d found his own simple solution. Trade his wife in for a different model, a better model. Was Karleen better than Poppy? Simply because she was ready and willing to give Garret the thing his heart suddenly desired?

  A thought occurred to her then. Was Karleen being so cold and hard throughout their confrontation because she believed she was actually doing the right thing? Rescuing Garret from an oppressive wife who was refusing to bless him with a family. It certainly would have made it easier for Karleen to reconcile her part in all of this if she thought that Poppy had somehow tricked Garret into agreeing to forego children. Karleen had always been the prissy do-gooder. Never one to break the rules, and becoming the ‘other woman’ in her best friend’s marriage was one hell of a rule-breaking move. But if she imagined her role as the noble saviour of a man trapped in a loveless marriage, then she’d probably decided it was all for the greater good. Bitch.

  Poppy tortured herself as she tried to replay any and every interaction she’d witnessed between Garret and Karleen over the past few months, and saw the two of them through her new, hyper-aware lens. She saw the time Garret had picked a leaf out of Karleen’s curls when they picnicked at the park. She saw the time Karleen had dropped around with tomato soup for Poppy when she was sick with a bad cold. Poppy had been laid out on the couch in her old terry-towelling dressing gown with a tissue stuck in her nose. Karleen had been wearing a short skirt and her favourite silvery top. She’d disappeared into the kitchen with Garret, and Poppy had thought nothing of it at the time. Now she wondered, had he pushed her up against the fridge and kissed her then and there, while Poppy coughed through an episode of The Blacklist in the other room?

  The image of the two of them kissing made her double over in pain. Who knew heartbreak could hurt so physically?

  Four months! How could this have been going on behind Poppy’s back for four whole months? How could the two people she loved most in the world have betrayed her in this way?

  In one afternoon, she’d lost her husband and her best friend. She pressed her forehead to the steering wheel and let the tears overcome her.

  * * *

  Poppy and Garret’s separation was pretty easy. No kids, no pets, no mortgage. Separate bank accounts, one car each. And their rental lease had been due for renewal. There was a shared savings account they’d each been depositing money into to buy a house one day, and they simply split it down the middle. Admittedly, Poppy earned a little more than Garret, so she’d probably put more money into the account than he had, but she didn’t care. She didn’t want to have any arguments. She didn’t want to delay things any more than she had to. She just wanted to get Garret and Karleen out of her life as quickly as possible.

  Garret got the sofa; Poppy never liked that pattern anyway.

  Poppy got the coffee table – it was an antique from her grandmother.

  Garret got the bed. Poppy got the bedroom furniture.

  Garret got the coffee machine and Poppy got the kettle.

  Garret got the toaster and Poppy took the blender.

  And of course, Garret not only kept his best man from the wedding – his mate from high school – but he also cleaned up with the maid of honour too. How nice for him to collect the set.

  It was an amicable divorce settlement with a nauseating rhythm.

  And ultimately, it was the catalyst for the group.

  PINNED POST

  Poppy Weston – Hi all and a big welcome to any new members. A reminder that this group is still in its infancy and we’re ironing out the main guidelines and trying to keep it quite small and intimate. If you know of someone you think might like to join, please make sure they fit the parameters BEFORE you invite them, as we want to keep this group a secret from the general public. Thanks!

  CHAPTER 2

  If she was asked, Poppy would argue that the news of Karleen’s pregnancy and the timing of the group were completely unrelated. But deep down, she knew it was no coincidence. Of course it hurt, hearing within mere months that her ex was expecting with her best friend. It twisted at her heart and squeezed against her sides. Not because she envied them, but maybe because she felt like they’d proved her wrong. Like somehow, Karleen had triumphed in a race while Poppy never even knew she was meant to be competing. And then there was the realisation that Garret really was gone. That he’d chosen someone else over her, that this wasn’t a horrible, weird blip in their relationship. He was never going to come crawling back, begging for her forgiveness.

  She never would have had the confidence to start up the group had it not been for Annalise.

  Poppy had been working at Cormack Millennial Holdings as head of the research department for the past six years, whereas Annalise had joined a year back as their warehouse manager. Their friendship, however, was brand new – a result of Annalise picking up on Poppy’s heartbreak after Garret and Karleen’s betrayal, and deciding to appoint herself as her ‘best friend and saviour’ – whether Poppy wanted it or not.

  Poppy had been chatting with their marketing manager, Lawrence, in the break room just a few weeks after the separation, when Annalise walked in and lifted herself up onto the benchtop. She drummed the back of her shoes against the lower cupboard doors as though she was a teenage kid hanging out with her mates. The difference in looks between Lawrence and Annalise was almost comical: he was tall and lanky with dark hair cut neatly into a short back and sides. By comparison, she was a petite elfin creature with shocking cherry-coloured locks complemented by sharp blue eyes. Rarest combination, Poppy had once read, red hair and blue eyes, something to do with recessive genes that have to be present in both parents. It was hard t
o look away once Annalise caught your attention.

  ‘It’s still a little while until our season starts,’ Poppy had been saying to Lawrence, ‘but we lost so many players from last year that we need to lock down the team asap and start training early.’

  ‘What’s the sport?’ Annalise asked.

  ‘Soccer,’ said Poppy. ‘I play on a women’s side for Parramatta.’

  ‘And you need more players?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘I can play.’

  Poppy was a little taken aback by her instant enthusiasm. ‘Oh, that would be great,’ she said, ‘but it’s an over thirty-fives team. You’re not that old yet, are you?’

  Annalise gave Poppy a flirty smile and winked. ‘I’m thirty-two,’ she replied, ‘but I can be whatever age you need me to be.’

  Poppy couldn’t help laughing. ‘Um, no you can’t,’ she said. ‘You’ll need ID to register.’

  ‘Not a problem.’

  Poppy shrugged.

  ‘Are you any good?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Screw it,’ she said. ‘If you really are serious, you’re in.’ She hesitated. The corner of her mouth twitched and she returned a flirtatious smile of her own. ‘You better be as good as you think you are.’

  Lawrence had raised his eyebrows over the top of his purple spotted mug. ‘Ooh, look at you two, scheming ways to cheat the system.’

  Just like that, Poppy had a new best friend. And Annalise was sweet. Okay, so Poppy admitted that wouldn’t be how most people would describe her. The woman swore like a drunken sailor. She was tough, she was unforgiving, she was crude and brash. But she was also loyal, protective, funny, and within mere days she was pulling Poppy out of a dark, hollow place.

  Poppy had quickly learned that her new friend wasn’t one to pull any punches. Annalise wasn’t interested in small talk. The first time they went out drinking together, two beers was all it took for Poppy to start tearfully spilling the entire messy story of her separation from Garret. Annalise listened. She said the right things – but she didn’t comfort. It wasn’t about hugs or ice cream or cups of tea. It wasn’t about reassuring Poppy that things would get better or easier over time. It was about telling her to move the fuck on and providing solid, practical solutions. For instance, when Poppy whinged that she was going insane having moved back in with her parents while she searched for somewhere to live, Annalise simply said, ‘Problem solved. The apartment upstairs from me is up for rent. You’ll love it.’