Free Lisa Heidke by Lucy Springer Gets Even (mobi) Page A

riesling and chatting about rostered sex lives. It’s a bit of a change from the actors’ party the other night, with people doing lines of coke at the bar and popping ecstasy tabs like they were peppermints. I notice there are more fat people here than at that party (or maybe there’s just a higher proportion of weighty people at this particular restaurant). There’s also a lot of conservative navy-blue skirts and sensible flat shoes. Black, of course.
    ‘I’ve told him it’s two nights off, one night on,’ says Lizzie, a buxom brunette whose clothing choices do little to minimise her enormous cantaloupes.
    ‘You actually schedule sex?’ Nadia asks.
    ‘Yep, that way he leaves me alone to read my book in bed two nights out of three. It’s great.’
    Nadia’s intrigued. ‘What about when you want to have sex? Can you ask for it?’
    ‘Please! Enough is enough,’ says Lizzie, her bosom heaving. ‘He’s satisfied, to a point, and I’m willing to go along with it because I get peace and quiet.’
    ‘I read somewhere you should make yourself available for sex with your husband whether you’re in the mood or not,’ says Emma.
    Lizzie snorts. Several women gasp. I wonder whether that was my mistake with Max.
    ‘You don’t actually believe that, do you, Emma?’ asks Lizzie.
    ‘I know it sounds -’
    ‘Archaic?’ Lizzie says helpfully.
    ‘Maybe, but apparently we should adjust to the way our husbands perform and simply trust them -’ Emma continues.
    ‘Like our mothers did?’ Nadia says.
    ‘Men these days feel powerless, emasculated -’
    ‘Please,’ says Lizzie.
    ‘She has a point,’ says Dee. ‘It’s a gender-confused world.
    Men are wimps; women have become she-men. You know, there’s a huge movement of women who want a return to family values.’
    ‘I know,’ agrees Lizzie, twirling her wineglass. ‘It’s all about keeping the family together.’
    ‘Protecting the children,’ adds Emma.
    ‘Save me,’ Nadia whispers to me, as she reaches across my chest for the nearly empty wine bottle.
    ‘Is she serious?’ I ask.
    ‘Absolutely. It’s all part of the Subservient Wives Clubs that are springing up.’
    Clearly, I’m not in the club. I glance at my watch. It’s only 8.40 pm. Everyone takes a sip from their wineglass, contemplating their own suburban lives. No one asks me about Max, and I daren’t ask after anyone else’s husband because it might mean they’ll mention mine. Gazing around the table, I notice there isn’t enough wine, especially if we’re to continue discussing our sex lives, or lack thereof.
    ‘Who’s for more wine?’ asks Emma.
    Relieved I’m not the only one who wants more, I volunteer to walk to the bottle shop with Emma. Once there, we agree to buy four bottles, then settle on six.
    ‘Everything okay?’ Emma asks during our walk back to the restaurant. ‘If there’s anything you need . . .’
    Armed with a full glass of pinot gris, I relax and try to forget about she-men, Max, the house and my flailing career.
    But, of course, I think about Max.
    The last time we had dinner with school parents was at a trivia fundraiser four months ago. Max thought he was so clever, jumping up and shouting out the answers before our team could discuss the question and agree on an answer. To pay him his due, he did get them all right, up until the last one concerning an eighties band. An aficionado of seventies’ and eighties’ music, I knew the answer immediately and put it to the table. Max disagreed, shouting out, ‘Wham!’ Victory was snatched from our grasp when another table won with the right answer: A Flock of Seagulls.
    ‘So tell me,’ says Wendy, who’s sitting at the far end of the table and has barely said a word all night. (Mind you, I wouldn’t want to draw attention to myself either if I lived in leggings that emphasised my eleventh toe.) ‘Is Mr Cutts really an alcoholic?’ Bryan Cutts teaches Year Four maths.
    ‘Absolutely,’ says Lizzie.