Plum followed her. ‘Dan’s fit. Dave says he’s a rising star in the office.’
Shelly was still jangling from the encounter but she was intent on playing it cool. ‘Well, I dunno if I’d have much in common with a City boy, no offence to you and Dave.’
Plum grinned. ‘You don’t have to marry the guy!’
Famous. Last. Words.
When Dan had showed up he was everything Shelly wanted: gorgeous, confident and on his way to a good career, her ticket to a more comfortable life, and they adored each other. At least, Shelly thought they had. In the early days, Shelly pulled out all the stops. She never wanted to slide into that complacent drudgery she’d seen in other couples. She always made an effort with Dan, never slobbing around in trackies or grotty T-shirts. Even after they were practically living together in Dan’s apartment, Shelly was careful to never let the side down.
As she considered how things had changed, she arranged the dairy-free, wheat-free, refined-sugar-free muffins that their personal cook, Donna, had prepared last night on the dark slate plate she’d selected and added it to the tray. Where other couples seemed loose and comfortable with one another, a kind of formality remained between Dan and Shelly. The small things she’d chosen to ignore about Dan at the beginning – his slight lack of regard for her own ambitions, his ambivalence towards her family – seemed to magnify with the passage of time. After Georgie was born, it was obvious that Dan saw his daughter primarily as Shelly’s responsibility. And he was definitely not too thrilled with the enormous profile SHELLY had earned in the last couple of years.
Of course, he liked the influencer thing when it suited him – he’d loved the trip to Lapland to see Santa last month. Shelly was verging on feeling defiant when a wave of nausea reminded her just how far from having the upper hand she was at that particular moment. It was hard to separate the nausea of early pregnancy from the nausea of panic: the two had merged to provide a constant uneasy feeling that had been the backdrop to all her thoughts since seeing that positive pregnancy test four days ago.
Shelly distributed some Pro-milk into little jugs. She was feeling conflicted about the baby herself. She hadn’t had the easiest of times with Baby Georgie – she suppressed a shudder remembering those terminally long nights pacing the floors with the red-faced screaming little thing, fearful of waking Dan up. That screaming little thing had frightened Shelly and in those early days her antipathy towards the baby had settled deep in a secret, shameful part of her. It wasn’t right to not love your baby, was it?
It had been a bleak and lonely time, not at all what Shelly had thought being a new mum would be, and she’d felt betrayed by what she suspected was all pretence on social media. However, it was a pretence she was soon participating in, posting pics of her baby on Insta. She was too afraid of what it meant that she wasn’t in love with her new life as a one-woman dairy to be honest with anyone about it. Putting pictures on Instagram where everything looked perfect and happy made things feel … not perfect and happy exactly, but safer somehow. And then @ShellyDevine had really taken off for her.
Much later, Shelly had gone to the GP and been prescribed antidepressants for the gnawing fear that the doctor called postnatal depression. Part of Shelly suspected that this longing for a second baby was rooted in wanting a do-over on motherhood, to do the baby thing and get to feel it the way others seemed to. It was shaky logic upon which to pin such a major event, but other people had more than one baby. It wasn’t an outrageous thing to want, was it?
And maybe it would draw them closer, her and Dan. Shelly consulted Donna’s instructions on how to decorate the muffins and sprinkled some cinnamon over them. Dan would come around, she felt. It was all a matter of how she couched the news when she told him. She just needed to find the right way and the right time. She lifted the tray into the flat-lay studio, careful not to make too much noise as Dan was wrapping up his call.
‘Yep, yep,’ he glanced up at her and then turned away, ‘I think we need to push the McLoughlin account 2018 review out to the end of next week. The numbers will look healthier and that gives us a bit more time to put together the new investment opportunities presentation … Grand. See you then.’ Dan hung up and started clearing his files off the huge central table over which hung studio lights and a tripod for shooting overhead shots.
‘Sorry, I’ll get these out of your way, had to get that call done before Damien left the Melbourne office.’ He seemed to be over his earlier strop and was being polite enough. Maybe, Shelly thought, it’d be a good time to broach the Daddy Bears’ Picnic event. It was in three weeks’ time and the PR company running it was a major SHELLY client. They’d brokered deals with premier brands that, in turn, poured major money into the various SHELLY accounts, and it was crucial to show up looking like the family they purported to be on Instagram.
‘I was thinking it’d be nice to do something as a family soon.’ She set the tray down and began arranging the jugs and muffins under the lights. ‘The Lapland trip feels like ages ago.’
‘Yeah.’ Dan had one eye on his emails but seemed to be listening.
‘I was invited to this really cute event in a few weeks’ time. It’s in Shanaghan House – it’s called the Daddy Bears’ Picnic and there’ll be food and games for the kids. Perfect family chill time,’ she added.
‘Is it?’ Dan put his phone down and, leaning his hands on the table, stared across at her. It was hard to read his expression. ‘Is it family chill time? Or is it a work obligation?’
‘Well, it’s a bit of both, I suppose,’ Shelly said slowly, hand-picking her words.
‘I see.’ Dan’s face was impassive and his tone flat. ‘Can I ask you – you’re an actress, right?’
Shelly didn’t like where this conversation was going. ‘You know I’m an actress.’ She folded her arms.
‘Uh-huh, and do you get paid for acting out bullshit storylines? Cos I don’t.’
‘Dan!’ Shelly blinked rapidly to ward off furious tears. She was too scared to point out that actually all the money earned with @ShellyDevine, @DivineDanDevine and @GeorgieDevine went into their joint account. ‘Why do you have to turn every little thing into a fight?’
‘Why do you have to turn everything into a photo op, a bit of sponcon for your Insta?’
‘I don’t do that,’ Shelly said weakly. Goddammit, this had gone way off script.
‘Don’t you?’ Dan slung his bag over his shoulder. ‘Thanks for the invite but I think I’ll spend my quality time with my daughter off-camera. You should think of doing the same.’
He walked out the door, his parting shot still ringing in Shelly’s ears.
4
Mini was poring over her iPad when Ali took the seat opposite her in the little café. They were the only customers at this time of day – it was much more of a lunch spot.
‘Hi, darling,’ she muttered, not looking up. ‘I’ll just be one moment,’ she added, holding up a long, elegant finger that boasted an almost architectural-looking ring; her other hand, Ali noted, was bare. Where was her wedding ring? Mini’s hair was immaculate in her trademark blunt steel-grey bob and her red lipstick was pristine. She wore a white tuxedo shirt-front under a corseted jacket. Despite a cutesie name, Mini always looked severe. An interviewer had once described her look as ‘malevolently chic’, which Mini had loved.
Mini had never looked or acted like any of the mums at school. It was another thing she and Liv had bonded over. Liv’s mum, Myra Anand, was a psychologist, a reiki practitioner and the author of eleven bestselling books on sex, family and relationships – including one in which she graphically detailed Liv’s conception,The Untold Orgasmic Joys of Middle Age. Liv’s older siblings, Lex and Nella, were now in their late thirties – she was an afterthought baby. ‘The menopause ignited something of a sensual fervour in me,’ Myra had written inUntold Orgasmic Joys. It came out the year Liv turned sixteen.
