Page 58 of A Smart Girl's Guide to Second Chances
I looked down at my left hand, and the ring sitting on it. In a few weeks’ time, the trinity ring would be sitting next to it. I looked up into Alex’s eyes, that were almost the same colour as the sky on this perfect summer’s day.
‘Yes, please,’ I said, my voice resolute. ‘Please stay out of my way.’
‘Okay,’ he said. And without going back into the party or even looking at me again, he walked out the front gate and down the street.
I hid in Lily’s bathroom and tried to pull myself together. When most people had left the party for nap times (the toddlers and Mia), I busied myself cleaning up the living room, stuffing shredded wrapping paper and abandoned paper plates that were smeared with icing into a bin bag. Finally, I stretched my face into a smile and found Matt in the garden, helping Aaron assemble the cherry-red wooden bike we’d bought Arlo.
‘I was looking for you,’ he said, glancing up from the wheel he was screwing on.
‘Sorry I was just... cleaning up some stuff,’ I said.
‘Is everything okay with Alex?’ he asked, and I knew he’d noticed that both of us had left the party, that maybe he’d seen us talking at the front of the house.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I think the party just made him miss his mum. She died when he was pretty young. He was a bit rattled.’ Matt’s eyes softened with sympathy, and I felt a stab of guilt for not being totally forthcoming.
‘My boss called. There’s a bit going on. China’s being China again,’ Matt said. ‘I’m going to have to go up to Sydney. I might have to be there a bit for the next few weeks. I know it isn’t ideal timing with the wedding prep.’
‘Yeah, okay. Sorry things are kicking off,’ I said, trying to sound as supportive as I could. I desperately wanted to go home with Matt and never leave. I wanted to hear his deep, generous laugh as we joked about Mia’s arrival at the party. And pair a burger from our favourite place with popcorn I microwaved and a pink cocktail he invented for movie night, then go to bed a bit too late together and curl up against each other. But we had the rest of our lives for that.
‘I have to fly up this afternoon. They want to get on top of the messaging. I’ll tell you all about it when I can,’ he said.
‘Of course,’ I said, knowing that he would. ‘You just focus on that. I’ve got the wedding under control here.’
After Matt left for the airport, I dropped off the cake stand to Jane. While Jane made us cups of tea (it was impossible to leave their house without accepting a hot drink), I snuck into the living room and stared at the wall behind the piano. If anything, Matt had underplayed the extent to which his older sisters were celebrated. It was a shrine to their achievements and Matt was a footnote. Except Matt was a headline of a person. I felt a rush of protectiveness for him. Did Jane understand the impact a lifetime of treating him like a Labrador puppy had had on him?
Then, even more galvanised, I bought matching satin pyjamas for Stella, Lily and me to wear while we got ready. And pulled together a wedding playlist for the DJ. And knocked out a running sheet for the day.
I wanted to fulfil my promise to Matt to keep the wedding ball rolling while he was flat out with his work emergency. And I also wanted to not think, at all. I’d asked Alex to back off. That was that. Now it was time to focus on what really mattered – our impending nuptials.
By Sunday, having blitzed through wedding errands, I decided to change my RSVP to a conference Miranda had invited me to. The firm was a sponsor and a few of our senior partners werepresenting, so sitting in the front row of their sessions wouldn’t hurt my promotion case.
I arrived at the grand hotel on the edge of the city in time for the women’s networking breakfast event. I slipped on my lanyard and filled my plate with a miniature cinnamon swirl, a miniature yoghurt parfait and a miniature bacon and egg tart (the barometer of corporate luxury being how many petite food options were available).
Our firm’s allocated table was filled with female partners and clients in a rainbow of summery business-casual dresses. The breakfast’s keynote speaker was the founder of a hugely successful makeup brand. The number of women in the corporate world had reached an important tipping point, which meant that we no longer had to pretend to enjoy corporate golf days or boxes at sports matches. Instead we got to listen to successful women wearing Alemais entertain us with insightful and pithy stories.
‘Rebecca!’ Miranda’s face lit up as she ushered me into the seat next to her. ‘I’m on a panel today. What’s your excuse?’
‘I’m mainly here for the gift bag,’ I said with a laugh. I rifled through the enormous tote sitting atop my place setting. ‘And actually... it’s a really good one.’ I pulled out a lipstick, one in a wearable shade.
‘Did you know I was almost this company’s first employee?’ Miranda said, tapping her index finger on her own tube of lipstick, still encased in its trademark lavender packaging.
‘Really?’ I turned to her. How did I not know this? Miranda and I spent so much time together, I thought we’d exhumed every possible topic.
‘My dream was to be a formulator. You know I left Stern for a few years, right?’
I nodded. Though I’d never thought anything of it – lots of people left consulting for a chunk of time, normally becausethe company had picked up the cheque for them to attend a prestigious American business school.
‘I went off to do a PhD – the focus of my research was formulating cosmetics. I became a certified expert on lipsticks. At the end of my doctorate, I got two job offers: one to come back to Stern, and one to join a small Melbourne-based beauty start-up.’
‘And you turned down your dream job?’ I asked, confused.
‘I did. I thought about it for ages,’ she said. ‘But I realised that consulting had, before I’d even realised it, become a great career for me. That I’d fallen in love with this all-consuming job that used every part of my IQ and EQ.’
‘Do you ever think about what might have happened if you’d picked the other job?’
‘Yeah, sometimes. When a client is being demanding or a member of my team particularly hopeless, I wonder if maybe the world of eyeshadow and blush might have been more satisfying,’ she said with a small laugh. ‘But my working theory on careers is that there isn’t a perfect one, that you should aim to find the one that fits best and then seek out whatever bits are missing from other parts of your life. I think the same theory applies to men, actually.’
She stopped to eat a bite-sized pain au chocolat.
