Page 60 of The Missus
‘Alanna, did you just touch my…’
Alanna leapt out of bed. ‘I’m so sorry. It was an accident. I wasn’t trying to… Oh shit. Do you want to call the police? Do you feel violated?’
Keira started laughing, but there was nervousness in it. ‘Goddamn, woman. Calm down. It was an accident. I presume you were asleep.’
‘Actually, I just woke up and then I kind of reached out… I think I forgot where I was. I was looking for my phone.’
‘That’s not what I call it,’ Keira said. She got up and put on her robe.
‘Seriously, are you trying to make this funny because you’re actually horrified because I touched… Little Keira.’
‘It’s fine, OK. Just calm down.’ She paused. ‘I’m sorry, did you just sayLittle Keira?’
Alanna looked away, embarrassed.
‘Jesus Christ, what a start to the day. Who needs coffee when your flatmate can just grab your vagina, eh?’
Alanna was mortified. ‘I’m gonna get in the shower. You can think about whether you want to press charges.’
Keira was bug-eyed. ‘Alanna, for someone who works in mental health, you’re fuckingmental, you know that? I’m not calling the… This is ridiculous. You didn’t take my precious flower or whatever. Just calm down, would you? It’s not a big deal.’ She sounded a little angry, though.
Alanna left the bedroom, her face burning with shame. She almost walked into her mother. Sandra was on the phone again. She cancelled the call the second she saw Alanna. Alanna frowned at her mother. ‘Mum, who are you on the phone to?’
Her mother’s face darkened. ‘Nobody. Don’t you have work to go to?’
‘I do, as a matter of fact,’ Alanna said, stepping past her mother and heading into the bathroom.
What the hell was that woman up to? Alanna wasn’t completely sure she wanted to know the details. Her mother’s upper-crust façade was running smack into reality, and it was quite an uncomfortable thing to witness. Once, Alanna might have been curious to see what was under the Chanel and Prada. But she’d given up on knowing her mother a long time ago. What they were to each other could not be fixed.
***
‘I didn’t even ask her to do anything, and she’s screaming at me, like some kind of crazy person,’ Mandy said.
‘You didn’t ask her to do anything?’ Alanna asked.
‘No!’
‘Did you maybe ask her tonotdo something?’ Alanna asked.
‘What the bloody hell does that mean?’
‘Well, what stood out to me from that story is that she was wearing a short-sleeve T-shirt, and when you found out your sister was coming to visit unexpectedly, you asked her to wear long sleeves.’
‘Yes, so what?’
‘Well, I guess I’d like to know why you did that?’
Mandy rolled her eyes. ‘What difference does it make? I asked her to change her top to something a bit nicer.’
Alanna paused. ‘But you’ve mentioned in passing that your daughter had issues. With self-harm.’
Mandy blinked. ‘Oh, I bet you think you’re clever, don’t you? So what if I don’t want the world to see my daughter’s scars? What’s wrong with that?’ Alanna could see Mandy was about to go off. She sat back and waited. She didn’t have to wait long. ‘You know what your fucking problem is? You’re a know-it-all.’
‘Am I?’ Alanna asked.
‘Yes. You haven’t helped meat allwith my husband.’
Alanna didn’t feel that was fair. Mandy had come to see her originally because her husband was having an affair and Mandy didn’t know what to do about it and needed an ear to talk it all through. But Mandy’s problem was that shedidknow. She was just too frightened to do it. And today, she didn’t want to talk about her husband. Instead, she’d come in with a bee in her bonnet about her teenage daughter’s ‘Unnecessary tantrum.’
