‘But, like, isn’t it maybe time to get past that?’

  ‘Arden, it was kind of a big deal,’ Abi said. But she was thinking, Don’t start a fight, don’t start a fight.

  ‘Doesn’t Grace always say we can never find peace without forgiveness? She used to tell me that all the time when Alex had done something heinous, like use my earbuds.’

  ‘Well, look, maybe, but we all know …’

  ‘We all know what?’ Arden asked.

  ‘That Grace is a better person than us.’ Abi laughed, trying to make light of a statement that could have been taken in many ways.

  ‘Are you two okay?’ Arden asked. ‘Please tell me you are.’

  Abi’s hug got tighter. ‘We are. We’re fine.’

  She loosened her grip on her daughter and put an arm around her. ‘Let’s get Alex and go find something contraband to eat—like some spaghetti at the pub.’

  ‘Are you going to keep trying to talk me out of going to Elle’s?’ Arden asked, as they walked towards the house.

  ‘No,’ Abi said, ‘but there’s going to be a very long list of conditions.’

  And, she thought, a little more company than you’re expecting.

  • • •

  Later, Abi was lying on her bed, her stomach full of complex carbs and regret. She was typing.

  My Dear GDs,

  I am growing. This last year has been a time of reinvention for me, and if that sounds familiar from a million aspirational blogs, those pale pink memes cluttering up your Instagram feed and every ad for a fad diet on your Facebook page, bear with me.

  I am not growing in a direction of acceptance and joy. No, as I get further into my fifth decade, I am growing in my intolerance of bullshit behaviour, of shitty charlatans, and of fake fame.

  I am growing in anger and righteousness.

  No one told me this would be the case but, as you get older, you have to put up with more (for example, my daughter is naked on the internet, but enough about that), and your ability to just keep smiling through it is actually diminished.

  Women our age should be running the fucking world, because we just wouldn’t put up with its shit.

  BUT—I am also growing in where to put all that fury. I’ve been yelling at you guys for years to fuck the rules, live your life, tell your boss to stick it, do things your way. And I have grown to realise that yelling at everyone around me is not making them or me any happier, any more right or solving everyone’s problems.

  The hardest lesson that parenthood is teaching me right now is to swallow my instinct to lock my daughter in a bunker. I have wanted to do that since she was born. To keep her safe from every fucking thing in the entire world that might hurt, harm, limit or humiliate her.

  But then I have to wrestle with that and ask, What am I protecting her for? What use is she if entirely unblemished but hidden away? Don’t we need our kids—our girls, in particular—to be fucking OUT THERE, fixing things, doing things, building things, solving things, running, jumping, screwing, laughing? Isn’t that what we made them for?

  So, tonight, as I write this, I am growing. But also, I am asking, if I can’t push all this righteous anger onto these people all around me, what do I do with it?

  GDs? What do you do with it?

  Yours in the very opposite of an inspirational meme,

  ABI—THE GD

  Abi closed her laptop and stretched back on the bed. She did have one idea of what to do with this pent-up passion. ‘Gracey!’ she yelled.

  ‘Don’t summon me like that.’ Grace pushed through the door; she must have been right outside. Perfect timing, Abi thought. Although, Grace still seemed pissed. ‘The boys are asleep and I’m not a dog.’

  ‘We need to talk, don’t we?’ Abi reached out an arm for Grace. ‘You look beautiful. Come here.’

  ‘Abi, you can’t flip straight from fight mode to seduction. We’re not teenagers.’

  ‘You make me feel like a teenager,’ said Abi, rolling onto her belly. ‘You always do. Look, I’ve made peace with Arden. Let’s just forget it and get back to being us?’

  ‘I’m happy that you and Arden are better,’ Grace said. ‘But how I’m feeling at the moment—like I’m at the very end of the list of all the people you’re trying to “manage” right now—it’s not very sexy, Abi. And it might take longer than fifteen minutes to fix.’

  ‘Fifteen minutes? We’ve got all night …’

  And then Abi’s phone vibrated. And without thinking she reached for it.

  ‘Finally, it’s Zoe. What has she got to say for herself …?’

  ABI—Arden’s further gone that you think. We have a bigger problem. Call me when you can.

  ‘Well, fuck, what now?’ Abi asked Grace.

  But when she looked up, Grace was gone.

  CHAPTER 24

  FRANCES

  ‘That’s not Elle,’ Frances whispered to the young woman closest to her as they climbed off the white Gurva bus.

  It certainly wasn’t. The person waiting for them wasn’t Ben Bont, either. He was a tall, good-looking, exceptionally buff trainer guy, wearing a sleeveless white tunic just like the driver’s. He had tribal tatts from shoulder to wrist and looked for all the world like a resting Rugby League player.

  ‘Hi, I’m Matt,’ the guy said when all twelve of the people who’d been driven from the airport to the farm were standing in front of him expectantly, their hand luggage at their feet. A small posse of dreadlocked backpackers were unloading the big bags from the trailer—like a gaggle of crunchy Oompa Loompas, Frances thought.

  Where was Elle?

  ‘If you’re wondering where Elle is,’ Matt said, as if hearing her thoughts, ‘you are going to be meeting with our Elle-ness guru a couple of times during your stay, but she isn’t going to be looking after you the whole time you’re here. As I’m sure you can all appreciate, she is a busy woman with a new baby, and she needs to protect her energy for planning the workshops you’ve come here to do, and for presenting the classes where she feels she can add the most value to your Gurva experience.’

  There was an affirmative ripple across the group. ‘It did say that in the fine print,’ whispered the woman next to Frances pointedly. She was tall and blonde, wearing drop-crotch yoga pants, a crop top and a long, soft grey shawl. Imagine flying in a crop top, Frances had thought when she saw her at departures, planes are so cold! The blonde woman seemed to belong to the group of chattering, stretching young hipster women and two guys who clearly all knew each other. Her arms were covered in teeny-tiny triangular and circle tattoos that Frances had been trying to decode all the way from the airport.

  These are Bondi people, thought Frances.

  ‘So, the job of looking after you beautiful gurvis falls to me, and to our incredible retreat team here at Gurva,’ Matt went on.

  He speaks really well for such a boofhead-looking guy, Frances thought. He also smiled a lot more than most tattooed trainers she’d come across in her life.

  ‘I’m going to leave it to these guys,’ Matt motioned to the smiling Oompa Loompas, ‘to get you checked in and take you to your cabins. Get sorted out, enjoy the little organic treats you’ll find waiting there on your deck, and we will see you all this evening at the village hall for a quick tour, dinner and then at the barn, where you’ll meet all the incredible gurus who’ll guide you through Purify and Release retreat.’ There were smiles and nods from the group. ‘And if you fancy a sneaky pretox before your detox, we can push on with a few getting-to-know-you drinks tonight before things get serious tomorrow. Who knows, you might want to loosen up a little bit?’

  A little ‘whoop’ ran through the crowd. Frances fumbled in her pocket for her phone—she needed to check on Denny.

  ‘Excuse me, beautiful,’ Matt cut in, immediately irritating Frances. Of all the people in this group, she was not the one to call ‘beautiful’. ‘No phones outside your cabin. There are dedicated social media times throughout the week when photos are allowed, but generally we encourage you to be in the now while you’re at Gurva.’

  Matt’s perma-smile was getting a bit annoying already, but Frances just said, ‘Sure, fine.’ And put her phone away. Troy would be in no hurry to hear from her anyway.

  • • •

  ‘If you’re absolutely determined to go, I’m going to make sure it doesn’t bankrupt us,’ Troy had finally said after several days of silent avoidance.

  He’d called in a favour from one of Ben Bont’s right-hand men, and a space was miraculously found for Frances on a week that was running even earlier than she’d planned, and at a discounted rate.

  ‘This is IT, Frankie. The last of it. Come back fixed,’ was how Troy had put it, as he booked the flights.

  He didn’t know, of course, that the money saved on the discount was almost entirely negated when, faced with the idea of meeting Elle Campbell in her baggy old work-out clothes, Frances bought a whole new yoga wardrobe on the secret credit card. I’ll worry about that later, she thought.

  ‘I need three nights off,’ she’d told Louisa the unit manager. ‘I know I’ve just started back, but it’s for health reasons. And I can get someone to cover my shifts!’

  To an unimpressed Linley she’d said, ‘This is a once-in–a-lifetime chance for your stressed-out friend to do some self-care. Will you cover my shifts, will you, will you, will you? I’ll love you forever. Will you? Will you?’

  To her nonplussed mother she’d said, ‘Mum, Troy is going to need your help. I know you won’t understand why I need to go, but I need to go. Yes, I know you think I’m a terrible parent.’

  To Denny, she’d whispered, ‘I’m going to come back a better mum. I swear it. You just hold on until I’m home.’

  And in response to a message left on her notes at the hospital from Dr Elliot Darling, she’d typed:

  Apologies, Dr Darling, I can’t help you with your enquiry about Mr Harcott, or any other patients. I am only the night cover and I suggest that you look at the detailed notes left on his and all other patients’ files. Thank you.

  And she had got on a plane for a week off from her life.

  • • •

  Frances hadn’t really known what to expect from Gurva. She’d never been to the north coast before. When she was a kid, family holidays were camping with all the aunts and uncles somewhere an easy drive from Sydney—down at Kiama or up at The Entrance. And back when she and Troy could afford a break they’d gone to Bali; for the honeymoon, they’d splurged on Fiji.

  It was so green up here, and so hot. The ‘hinterland’, as she’d heard it was called, was inland but you could smell the ocean, sense it in the damp air. The cabins for retreaters looked like they’d been lifted from a desert island, complete with thatched rooves and decks that came with a Gurva yoga mat and a ‘meditation’ lounger. She had her hut all to herself; inside, the bed was big and white and spotless. The sight of it made her long for sleep, which would be a holiday in itself. That and a bed she didn’t have to make, food she didn’t have to cook.

  On the bed was a thick matte folder with an introductory letter from Elle—‘Welcome to our home, where I hope some of the magic of the hinterland will seep into your bones … By the end of this week you will understand how this place healed me, how it made me whole again’—a class timetable, a map, booking forms for the spa, a rundown of all the merchandise available for sale at the gift shop, and a full menu of the food they would (and wouldn’t) be eating this week.

  There was also a white cotton robe, and bamboo slippers, and a glass juice-and-water bottle with its own copper straw—‘Bring me with you,’ read a cute little handwritten tag around its neck.

  To Frances it all felt overwhelmingly luxurious, and for the first time in a long while she felt hopeful, excited, positive. And knackered. She pulled on her robe, set an alarm for five-thirty p.m. and curled into the bed’s stiff sheets.

  • • •

  Later, when she looked back at that disastrous first night at Gurva, Frances decided things started to go wrong when she was late to dinner.

  She was so deep in the unfamiliar ocean of uninterrupted sleep that when her phone alarm beeped, she rolled over, turned it off and slept some more.

  It was seven p.m. when she burst into the ‘village hall’ to see all the retreaters—the twelve Bondi people from her flight plus a handful of others she hadn’t seen before—tucking into the vegan buffet. The hall was a big white barn with a stage at one end and an open kitchen area at the other, where some of the Oompa Loompas were busy chopping and steaming. The food was laid out on a white wooden table down one wall. It all looked as though Frances’s Instagram feed had come to life and spread itself out in front of her.

  ‘Did I miss the tour?’ Frances asked the startlingly young-looking girl she’d sat next to at the first empty spot she found, in the middle of one of the long communal tables.

  ‘Yes,’ the girl said, ‘but there’s not much to it—you’ll get the gist. It’s beautiful, but quite a lot of it’s closed off to people on the retreat.’

  ‘Oh,’ Frances said, confused. ‘Aren’t you on the retreat?’

  ‘Oh no, I’m just visiting,’ said the girl. ‘I’m joining in with a few things while I’m here.’

  ‘Are you on your own?’ Frances asked.

  But before the girl could answer, that Matt guy had come into the hall. ‘Hello, again, everyone,’ he said loudly. ‘Hope you’re enjoying the feed.’

  Frances looked around for where she could get a plate. She’d feel like such a dick walking up there so long after everyone else.

  ‘Remember, your detox starts tomorrow, and there’ll be no solids for three days. THREE DAYS, guys. Three days to set you free, three days to wake you up. So, make the most of this vegan feast while you can!’

  A lot of the retreaters cheered. Who were all these people? Frances wasn’t used to going places alone; she’d never had to. The visibility of being a solo traveller was new to her, but also, she hadn’t expected that Elle’s disciples would be these women—so assured, so confident, so celebratory. Out of their Lululemon and into their floaty boho dresses for dinner, they didn’t look like they needed purifying and releasing—they looked like they were ready to party.

  Frances had tried to go back to her conversation with the young girl next to her, but she was already deep in conversation with the woman on her other side. ‘Yes, I’m a vlogger,’ Frances heard the girl saying. ‘I’m hoping I might get a little series out of this trip.’

  Frances self-consciously lifted herself out of her chair and approached the buffet table in search of a plate and some food to put on it.

  ‘You on your own?’ The woman who tapped her elbow looked familiar from the flight: dark and petite with a hairstyle that was shaved underneath and clipped back on top—she was definitely one of the Bondi people.

  Frances nodded. ‘You?’

  ‘Oh no, I’m with these guys,’ said the woman, waving towards the long table. ‘We’re on a hens’. We thought we would probably be on our own at Gurva but I guess they can always squeeze in a few more, right?’ She laughed, tapping Frances on the arm, an indication that she was one of the people being squeezed in. Which was, in fact, true.

  ‘Um, a … hens’?’ Who the hell goes on a juice-cleanse yoga retreat for a hens’ party? Linley and Frances’s sisters-in-law had made her go on a cruise with strippers. No juice had been consumed, at least not without vodka in it.

  ‘You know how it is,’ the woman said, taking a plate from where they were stacked on a shelf below the table—of course! ‘We’re all so sick of partying. It’s been ten years of that kind of girls’ do, it feels so tragic these days. We thought we’d have something for Sal that reflects where we’re at now. She’s a mad Elle fan. Mind you,’ she gave Frances a wink, ‘tonight doesn’t count, right?’

  ‘And those … boys?’ Frances looked at the two men in the Bondi party, who were deep in conversation with the bride and another woman, all laughing uproariously.

  ‘Oh, they’re the happiest of hens, believe me. Bigger girls than the rest of us, really.’ The woman glanced up from stacking her plate with sweet potato wedges to wink at Frances again. ‘Better to line the stomach, am I right?’

  With hindsight, that was the second sign.

  After dinner, Matt rounded up the retreaters and took them to meet the experts in the ‘barn’ he’d mentioned on their arrival. This just turned out to be a bar, where organic vodka was served over giant, singular ice cubes.

  Frances hadn’t had a drink in more than a year. This trip is too important to fuck up with a hangover, she told herself. There’s too much at stake here. But she found herself agreeing to at least hold one of the heavy glasses, so she didn’t look too out of place.

  An older woman was walking around in floaty robes with the smallest gong Frances had ever seen. Matt introduced her as Guru Gwendi, the meditation teacher. He was walking his team between different guests while loud music played and shots began to flow.

  ‘I’m Frances,’ she said to gong lady. ‘I’ve never done meditation and I absolutely can’t wait.’

  Guru Gwendi tapped her teeny gong. ‘So sorry, blessed soul, got to move along, but I sooo look forward to having your sweet face in my class.’

  Next Frances found herself getting the hard sell for microdermabrasion on her face by his-and-hers dermatologists from Byron. ‘It would really wake you up,’ said one.

  ‘It would just get rid of all this—’ And the woman actually rubbed her finger hard in between Frances’s eyebrows, as if erasing her frown wrinkle

  ‘And some of this,’ said her partner, pinching loose skin at Frances’s jawline.

  ‘Oh, thank you, I’ll think about it,’ Frances said.

  By now, the music was too loud for any kind of conversation. She could see that the experts were leaving and some of the young Oompa Loompas were coming in.

  She was feeling sorry for herself and thinking about leaving to go back to her cabin, sit on her deck and call her mum to check on Denny. Somehow, that seemed sadder than staying here.

 

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