What Alice Forgot - Liane Moriarty [176]
But Elisabeth was too busy to hear it. Busy, busy, busy.
She and Ben had ended up adopting three little boys from Vietnam after Francesca was born.
Two were brothers. The youngest was a severe asthmatic and was constantly in and out of hospital. One was in speech therapy for a stammer. Francesca was into swimming, which required early-morning training sessions. Elisabeth was involved with the Vietnamese expatriate community, a support group for adoptive parents, and of course she was treasurer of her school’s Parents and Friends Committee. She’d also got back into rowing and was as thin as a rake.
She and Ben also had two dogs, a cat, three guinea pigs, and a fish tank. That quiet, neat little house Alice had visited all those years ago when Elisabeth was refusing to get out of the bed was now an absolute madhouse. Alice got a headache after five minutes.
Luckily they were all coming here today for a Mother’s Day lunch, rather than Elisabeth’s crazy house, and Madison, the precious girl, was going to cook.
Sleep, Alice. In a few hours the house will be filled with people.
Mum and Roger would be early. They’d be desperate to show them their photos from their recent holiday to the Latin Dance Convention in Las Vegas. Salsa dancing was still their passion.
As Frannie once said, “They’ve created a whole life around salsa dancing.” Xavier had added, “Not like us. We’ve created a whole life around sex.” Frannie hadn’t spoken to him for a week, she had been so humiliated to hear him speak like that in front of the grandchildren.
Frannie and Xavier would be there today, together with Jess, one of Xavier’s granddaughters, who had moved to Sydney a few years ago and made contact with her grandfather, to his everlasting joy. She was an extremely hip young Web designer who was also the lead singer in a band. Frannie and Xavier enjoyed going along to Jess’s “gigs” and making knowledgeable comments afterward about the “crowd” and the “acoustics.”
Alice worried sometimes that Frannie was overtiring herself, keeping up with all of Xavier’s activities, but there was no denying her happiness.
She shifted in her bed. Sleep. As Frannie would certainly point out, she was quite old enough to take care of herself!
Hurry up and sleep.
She slept, and dreamed of Gina again.
She, Mike, Nick, and Alice were sitting around the dinner table after a long night of eating and drinking.
“I wonder what we’ll all be doing in ten years’ time,” said Gina.
“We’ll be grayer and fatter and wrinklier,” said Nick, who was a bit drunk. “But hopefully the four of us will still be friends sitting around a table like this, talking about our memories.”
“Awwww,” said Gina, raising her glass. “You’re so sweet, Nick.”
“Preferably on a yacht,” said Mike.
Was it a dream or a memory?
“Alice,” said a voice in her ear.
Alice opened her eyes.
Nick’s face was creased with sleep. “Were you dreaming about Gina?” “Did I say her name?”
“Yes. And Mike’s name.”
Thankfully she hadn’t said Dominick’s name. He was still a bit strange about Dominick. Did Nick sometimes dream of that Megan? She looked at him suspiciously.
“What?” he said.
“Nothing.”
“Happy Mother’s Day.”
“Thank you.”
He said, “I’ll go bring us up some coffee in a minute.”
“Okay.”
Nick closed his eyes and fell immediately back asleep.
Alice put her hands behind her head and considered her dream. Dominick had made an appearance because she’d seen him at the IGA yesterday. He was studying a packet of floss as if his life depended upon it. She had a feeling he’d seen her first and wasn’t in the mood for one of their overly hearty, let’s-pretend-this-isn’t-awkward chats and so she’d obligingly darted into the next aisle.
It was so strange to think that she’d seriously considered spending her life with him. (He was married now to one of the other mothers from school; he probably thought the