The First Year

By Genevieve Gannon

'Genevieve Gannon writes with a fresh and funny narrative voice ... chick lit at its very, very best' Tess Woods, author of Love at First Flight

The first year of marriage is hard no matter what. Throw in jealous exes, high-pressure careers and two wildly different families, and the degree of difficulty goes up a few more notches. Determined to beat the odds, one couple comes up with a plan to keep their romance alive -- but life has other ideas.

Saskia is an up-and-coming jewellery designer, waiting tables at a trendy cafe to keep her fledgling company afloat. Andrew is a corporate lawyer who wants to be known for more than his family's money. They're passionate about their work and each other, but with Andy's job in jeopardy and Saskia's jewellery label taking off, the pressure is taking its toll.

As life pulls them in different directions, the two of them are forced to decide: Just how important is their marriage? And how hard are they willing to work to protect it?

'A clever and entertaining read-into-the-wee-hours-of-morning story about love, creativity and the things that make us tick. Genevieve Gannon writes with passion and wit in a story you'll relate to whether you've struggled through love, art or the wrath of public transport ticket inspectors.' Claire Varley, author of The Bit in Between

'I honestly haven't enjoyed reading something so much in years. Such a great story! Something to really revel in. I related to Saskia so much but Genevieve managed to make Andy equally compelling' Georgina Penney, author of Fly In, Fly Out

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Australia
• Release date: May 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781460708460

Genevieve Gannon

Genevieve Gannon is an award-winning Sydney-based journalist and author of four novels. She is presently the staff writer for nation's biggest women's magazine, The Australian Women's Weekly, where she covers everything from cold-case murders and cults to celebrities and sports stars.She has written in-depth political profiles, comedic personal essays and true crime pieces. Her first foray into professional writing included dating and relationship columns which she published while writing her Masters' thesis on global terrorism and the media. She then moved to Canberra to start her news career covering local issues and politics.Before she joined The Weekly, Genevieve was the chief court reporter for Australian Associated Press in Melbourne, covering some of the most notorious crimes of recent years. Her journalism has appeared in most of Australia's major newspapers and she has recently won the Mumbrella Publish Journalist of the Year.

Book preview

Day 1, Sunday, October 12

‘Every day forever?’ he asked.

‘Every day for one year.’

‘Only a year? But yesterday we said forever.’

Saskia propped herself up on the bank of pillows. Their brocade cases were stiff and glowing white, having been purchased by her mother-in-law only the day before. Except now there were fine black marks where Saskia’s mascara had smeared the cotton in her sleep.

‘I don’t think what we were pledging to do every day ’til death do us part was have sex,’ she said.

Her new husband leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers, tenderly picking a piece of confetti from her hairline. ‘I thought it was implied.’

‘What about gastro?’

‘Gastro?’

‘Vomiting. Night sweats. Bile.’

He furrowed his brow. ‘What has bile got to do with our sex life?’

‘If one of us got gastro we wouldn’t be able to . . . you know. And it’s bound to happen eventually. We couldn’t pledge to do something every day for the rest of our lives when we know there are going to be times when it will be impossible. But a year . . . we could last a whole year without spew and bile.’

‘You are such a lady,’ he said.

‘Hmph.’ The bride pointed her nose in the air and adopted a British accent: ‘Well I never.’

He traced a finger across her collarbone, a smile on his lips. ‘Where did you say you went to finishing school, again?’

Saskia’s eyes widened in mock horror as she picked up a surplus pillow. ‘Up your arse,’ she said, flogging him across the face.

Andy spluttered as he took a mouthful of goose down. There was a small part of him that wished his new wife wouldn’t say things like ‘up your arse’ and ‘shit-a-brick’ and, if he was really honest, fuck. But it was a very small part. Another part, moderate in size, liked that she was bawdy and a little rough. That part of him was relieved she was different to the starched women he knew from university, who hung around the rowing club, their faces crimped at his customary cox/cocks double entendres. The largest part of him, the ruling majority, just wanted to press his face to Saskia’s skin and never let her go.

He pulled her closer and breathed in the smell of expensive moisturiser, her only concession to luxury. It came in a frosted glass jar with a gold lid and sat proudly in the centre of her dressing table, as if just waiting for Indiana Jones to burst in and swap it for a bag of sand. The most potent of the all-natural ingredients was a blend of citrus peel. For the first three months of their relationship Andy had found himself becoming inconveniently aroused every time he was served a glass of orange juice. Which unfortunately, for a lawyer required at many breakfast meetings, was often.

‘I think your father should write a very sternly worded letter to his so-called finishing school of the arse,’ he said.

Saskia sniggered and rolled back into the pillows. He reached out and caught a handful of her hair, which also reminded him of the morning. Her skin may have smelled like oranges but thanks to her questionable practice of using coffee grounds on her scalp (‘It stimulates the follicles!’) her hair smelled like a cappuccino.

He gave a theatrical sigh: ‘Although I suppose we can’t expect too much from a finishing school located in a rectal cavity.’

Laughter brewed in Saskia’s chest. ‘You’re such a snob.’

‘And you are a ragamuffin. Look at this.’ He picked out more confetti tangled in the black forest at the base of her skull. The necklace she’d worn at their wedding was still clipped around her neck and strands of hair were ensnared in it. Flashes of gold caught the sunlight as he nuzzled her with his nose, his lips.

‘In sickness and in health,’ she chirped.

‘Okay.’ He cleared his throat. ‘So, a year.’

Her expression grew serious. ‘They say the first is the hardest.’

‘I thought we’d survived our first year. Well, nearly a year.’

‘The first year of marriage is hard, not the first year of love. That’s the easy part. The honeymoon period.’

‘And what is this expensive holiday we’re taking?’ He drew her to him so that her cheek lay against his chest.

‘That’s part of the honeymoon period too. I think it lingers into the marriage for a bit. I imagine it will all go to crap at about the three-month mark.’

‘I’ll have my secretary put it in the diary.’

‘Which is why we have to do it every day.’

She emphasised the words by pressing her finger into his right pec, watching it turn white where she applied pressure. He was naked to the waist, and below that he was wearing nothing more substantial than a white cotton bed sheet. It had been savagely ironed by his mother the morning before as she scolded the pair for not booking a hotel suite for their wedding night.

‘It’s a sound argument.’ He rolled onto his side and started unlacing the ribbon that held his bride’s corset together. ‘Why are you still wearing this?’

‘I think you were too impatient to remove it last night.’

‘How discourteous of me.’

‘I’m glad. I wanted to get some wear out of it. It took a long time to make.’

‘I can see that.’

He traced a fingertip over the tiny stitches that held the eyelets in place. He could not conceive of how she made them so small, or that somebody who bellows ‘up your arse’ could have the aptitude and patience for such delicate work.

‘You could do this for a living,’ he said. ‘Expand your jewellery line to include clothing.’ He started fiddling with her ribbons. ‘I had better remove it and take a closer look.’

She ignored his efforts to undress her. ‘I figure that if we promise to make each other feel valued every single day our relationship will survive anything because we made it a priority.’

‘By having sex?’

‘It’s symbolic. You can give me daily foot massages if you’d prefer. I thought suggesting sex would make the idea more appealing to you.’

‘It’s certainly worth a try.’ He loosened a loop of ribbon.

‘This is serious Andy.’ She grabbed his finger. ‘This is our marriage we’re talking about.’

‘And I’m demonstrating my support for your idea by getting started right away.’ The ties loosened, he was able to the pull the two stiff halves of the corset apart.

He paused a moment to appreciate her body. She didn’t squirm to cover up the little lumps and puckers of flesh, like other women did. Her skin was pale and perfectly clear, and as she lay back, cradled by the white cotton ranges that encircled them both, the folds of her flesh reminded him of just-poured cream.

Her skin’s one imperfection was a series of miniature bullet holes that ran up her left ear. The punctures left by the piercing gun were as a clear as if someone had drawn a deep dot with a felt-tip pen.

He unlaced the last of the ribbon. It was exciting to be able to unwrap her, like she was a present, and he told her so.

Saskia smiled, satisfied. ‘I wanted something just for us, for the wedding night.’

They both looked at her dress, which had been discarded beside the bed. It was drooping and deflated, but still stiff enough to stand, like a haystack made of tulle and taffeta. If Saskia had worn the type of dress she’d wanted it would have been a puddle of silk and beads. And instead of her mother-in-law’s heirloom veil, which she had carefully removed as soon as the ceremony was over out of fear she’d tear it, she would have worn a headpiece she had made herself.

Andy worked the corset out from under her and slid his fingertip up her stomach until it reached the soft, yielding flesh of her left breast.

‘It’s really beautiful. It’s a lot more like . . .’ His voice trailed off.

‘Like what?’

‘Nothing.’

‘What were you going to say?’

‘It’s just . . . it’s a lot closer to what I expected you to wear. It’s more your style.’

‘You didn’t like how I looked?’ Saskia sat up.

In the clear air of morning it occurred to him the dress was not her usual style, but he also realised he shouldn’t have said anything.

‘You looked like an angel,’ he said quickly and kissed her. ‘You looked not of this earth.’ He kissed her again. ‘I was just surprised you went with that style of dress.’

‘Well, I don’t have a signature wedding-dress style. It’s not something I often wear.’

‘You’ve had some experience.’ Again, he’d spoken without thinking, and felt her flinch at the comment. ‘I didn’t mean — sorry, that was stupid. I was trying to be funny.’ He took her hand and kissed it. ‘That came out all wrong. I was trying to make a joke.’

When she spoke, her voice was soft. ‘You weren’t trying very hard.’ Then she shook her head. ‘Let’s not fight again.’

‘Agreed,’ he said and pulled her back into the nook under his arm.

*

Since Saskia had met Andy her life had been filled with unbridled bliss. But after they announced their engagement a palpable tension had arisen. Saskia traced it back to the day her soon-to-be mother-in-law Millie Colbrook marched her out to Armadale where her old friend had an exclusive bridal shop. Millie had been immediately taken by a frock with puffed-up sleeves that was lurking in the corner of the boutique like the headless ghost of Marie Antoinette.

‘Saskia, look at this,’ she commanded.

The sound of Mrs Colbrook’s voice never failed to transport Saskia back to the high school days she’d spent sitting in the principal’s office where she was a frequent flyer for her various school-yard crimes. Like the time she clocked Connie McKeith over the top of the head with a copy of Great Expectations because Connie called Saskia’s father a jailbird.

‘It’s not the type of thing I’d normally wear,’ Saskia said.

‘No,’ Millie agreed, eyeing Saskia’s op-shop shift-dress with distaste.

Saskia felt the wedding dress fabric between her fingers and tried to think of something polite to say. The outmoded style called to mind a remote workshop buried in Germany’s Black Forest where the machinists relied on curling magazine clippings of Princess Di’s dress for information on the latest trends.

Saskia stoically took the dress into the fitting room because it seemed like the fastest way of ending the excursion.

‘It suits you perfectly,’ Millie pronounced seventeen minutes later, when Saskia had finally managed to get the dress on.

Sas tugged at the sleeve and grimaced at her reflection. It didn’t look as ridiculous as she had expected it to. It made her look refined. Sort of.

‘It’s nice, but I was going to ask my friend Annie to make my dress,’ Saskia said.

As Millie pinched her lips and raised an eyebrow all of the warmth seemed to be sucked out of the room.

‘A homemade dress?’

‘Not homemade, she’s a dressmaker,’ Saskia said. ‘She—’

‘My dear,’ Millie cut in coolly, ‘there are going to be a lot of important family friends at this wedding and they have certain . . . standards.’

‘Standards?’ Saskia said, shocked. ‘Standards!’

She had been prepared to humour her mother-in-law for Andy’s sake, but at that moment she imagined herself defiantly walking down the aisle swathed in a bed sheet from Target, her head held high as she flicked a cape made of hairnets over her shoulder like a Disney villain.

Millie lay her ringed fingers on Saskia’s arm. ‘Saskia,’ she said, ‘you don’t want to embarrass Andy.’

The words cut right through Saskia. The next thing she knew she had signed an order form and was standing on a velvet box in her underwear having her measurements taken.

‘I assure you, this is what everybody is wearing this season,’ Millie purred, victorious.

Saskia covered her light-blue cotton knickers with her hand, wishing she’d worn underwear that hadn’t come in a pack of six from Woollies.

*

‘I picked up the dress,’ Saskia said the morning of the rehearsal dinner. ‘It finally fits.’

Andy grabbed at the flesh on her bottom. ‘You’ve been losing weight. You’re not dieting, are you?’

‘Stress burns up an awful lot of calories. If I ran Weight Watchers, I’d make all the members plan a wedding,’ Saskia said.

She walked into the kitchen to test out the gleaming space-age coffee machine that had arrived from Andy’s family friends in Italy. It was the same brand as the commercial machine in the cafe where Saskia worked, but the household version was temperamental.

‘You’re a mind reader,’ he said, taking a seat at the kitchen table with a fistful of documents.

‘Let’s see if I can get a decent cappuccino out of this thing.’ Saskia concentrated on the jug hovering under the spout. The machine gurgled and slurped. A piece of metal slid off the bottom of the steamer and landed with a ‘plop’ in the hot milk. ‘Oh, shit,’ she said. ‘I mean, shoot. I swore I wouldn’t swear. I’m not giving your mother any reason to criticise me over the next two days. Put that work down and have a rest. Andy?’

‘Huh? What, sorry?’ He looked up from his work.

‘Take a break. I was going to drive to that wedding outlet in Springvale to get the napkin rings Millie wanted but then I thought, fuck it, I mean, fig it, we should enjoy our last hours of freedom.’

‘About that, I think I’m going to have to go back into the office for a few hours.’ Andy was frowning at his paperwork.

‘Aren’t you officially on leave for the wedding?’

‘Yes, but I’ve just been reading through this advice and it’s riddled with errors. We can’t afford to send it out in this state. Not with the way business has been lately.’

‘Didn’t you once tell me they employ other lawyers at the firm besides you?’

He pulled down on his face as if it was a rubber mask he was trying to remove. ‘I know it’s bad timing but we’ve lost a few big clients lately.’

Saskia paused. ‘You didn’t tell me that.’

‘Well, I don’t think it’s too much of a big deal. But it’s important we get this right.’

She dunked her hand into the milk jug, retrieved the fallen knob and tried to screw the attachment back onto the spout.

‘I won’t be late.’ Andy stood and put his arms around her.

She let her head rest against his shoulder for a moment. He turned her around and cupped her face.

‘Your mother was the one who insisted we have this dinner,’ she countered.

Millie had been firing text messages at her all week.

‘Did you pick up the cake boxes?’

‘Have you finalised the seating chart?’

‘Are you sure you want freesias in the bouquets?’

Saskia sighed and rinsed her hands, then went into the laundry where her best dress was drip-drying over the trough. She felt its hem — still wet — and looked at her watch.

‘I know she can be hard to please,’ Andy called. ‘But it doesn’t mean she doesn’t like you. Try not to let it get you so worked up.’

‘I’m trying,’ Saskia said. ‘But if we’re late she’ll blame me.’

‘Sas, I have to get this done. I promise we’ll get there for six o’clock. It’s not a big deal.’

She walked briskly towards their bedroom. ‘It shouldn’t be a big deal,’ she said hotly. ‘If you’d heard what she said about — ow!’ She’d stubbed her toe on a box labelled ‘pots’. ‘Dammit,’ she said, hopping and rubbing the end of her foot.

The lounge room was full of boxes that had been delivered from her old flat. The misshapen packages were the only items in Andy’s former bachelor pad that didn’t look like they came from the pages of Vogue Living. Saskia felt a pang of longing for her careworn sunken red couch and 1940s light fittings.

Andy came over to inspect her foot. ‘Let me take a look at that.’

‘I’m fine.’ Her words came out sharper than she intended as she turned away from him.

‘Sas.’

Andy would never have expected Saskia to care one jot about rehearsal dinners or centrepieces or whether roses or orchids would make better bouquets. Hugh Delahunty had warned him no woman was immune to the insidious madness that comes from planning a wedding.

‘It’s as if all the flowers and the dress swatches give off some chemical gas that turns their brains into yoghurt,’ Hugh had said. Andy had defended her. ‘No way, not Sas.’

But now she was staring at him as if too much time with gardenia arrangements had caused her grey matter to melt.

He reached for her with one hand. ‘You’re being melodramatic.’

‘Melodramatic?’

She thought of the puffy, pompous dress she would be wearing the next day and how she had sacrificed choosing her own gown to please Millie. She was tired of fending off criticism from her future mother-in-law and just wanted a little solidarity from her fiancé.

‘I need some air,’ she said and strode to the front door.

When Andy didn’t come after her she felt rush of anger. If it had been up to her, they would have gathered some close friends for a quick ceremony at the registry, followed by a meal at Jim’s Greek Tavern. Somehow it had turned into a pageant, in which she had to wear the right thing and say the right thing in order to earn her place in the Colbrook family. And the one person she was doing it for didn’t seem to understand. She took a deep, shuddering breath, stepped through the door and slammed it behind her.

Andy stood starring up the passageway for a minute, then calmly went to the coffee machine. Saskia had given up trying to repair the knob, which now sat on the benchtop in a milky puddle. Coffee grounds had spilled onto the marble. He swept them up with his hand and brushed them into the bin. He screwed the end of the spout back on, began brewing more coffee and wondered if he should go after her.

In his experience with women, drama was usually calculated to provoke a response. It gave the man a chance to be gallant and repair things with a grand gesture. But Saskia wasn’t manipulative like that. He appreciated the apprehension she felt around his family, especially his mother. He wished she’d laugh it off the way she did whenever she thought he was being pratty.

He caught the dripping coffee in a cup and drank it black. He decided he’d let her get whatever was bothering her out of her system. He could use the time she was gone to get some work done then they would be able to go straight to the rehearsal dinner. As family members filed in he’d whisper an apology in her ear. She’d squeeze his hand in acceptance and all would be right with the world. Yes, he decided, sitting down at the kitchen table with his second cup of coffee, that would make Saskia happy.

Saskia was barging down their path with her jaw clenched and a look of wild anger on her face. She turned left at the end of their street and walked towards the main road. She didn’t know where she was going. She didn’t even have her keys.

She could go to Randa’s house. Her maid-of-honour had confined herself to her study to get some urgent work done on her thesis before the wedding. My hijab brings all the boys to the yard: a study in modern Muslim women’s sexuality had been a twelve-month labour that had exploded into a whole new project when her honours professor had offered her a place in the doctorate program. But to go to Randa’s flat Saskia would have to go back inside for her car keys, and she just couldn’t look at Andy right now.

A tram was snaking its way down Toorak Road past the stately mansions and heritage apartment blocks. It stopped and opened its doors. Without a thought, Saskia bounded up onto it and felt relief at being swept briskly away from Andy’s house.

As the tram glided along she rested her head against the window. She rode all the way into the CBD, up the creaky corners and through the city’s heart where skyscrapers blotted out the sun. All the while Saskia counted Andy’s offences: his obsession with work; his gusseted family and their standards; his blinkered view of how they treated her while she was doing everything she could think of to make his mother happy. She chewed these thoughts over and over, releasing bitter juices that stewed in her stomach.

An hour later she reached the end of the line. The tram changed tracks and began to roll back into the city, back towards Andy’s.

Soon she would have to put on her dress and her politest smile so that a procession of Colbrook family friends could prod her and slap her flank like a mutt in a dog show. She squirmed in her seat. When Andy caught her off guard like he did earlier, she felt like she didn’t know him, and he became that stranger in a seersucker jacket she’d first spotted across a patio at a New Year’s Eve party.

Saskia had sought out Randa and said, ‘Can we go now? This place is full of self-important clowns. Did you see the arse in the red-and-white candy stripes?’

She hadn’t realised the arse was now standing behind her.

‘Ah,’ he’d said, leaning into the conversation. ‘But aren’t you glad the stripes help you know who to avoid? They’re like hazard lights for social occasions.’

Randa had laughed and Saskia had blushed, speechless for once. The arse was tall. He had rowers’ shoulders and a disarming smile. Looking back, she realised she had begun to fall in love with him in that moment. But at times she feared they had rushed into things.

The reception had been paid for. Relatives from all over the country were camped out in spare rooms or swish hotels. Saskia’s ribcage felt like it was shrinking, squeezing the organs it was supposed to protect. She leaned forward into the brace position and tried to get some more oxygen into her lungs. As she gulped for air a man cleared his throat.

‘Can I see your ticket, ma’am?’

‘Oh.’ Startled, she sat upright. A ticket inspector was looking down at her. Saskia’s hands went to her hip pockets. ‘I – I don’t have my wallet,’ she said, only realising the fact at that moment.

The man frowned and swung into his routine. ‘It is an offence to travel on public transport in Victoria without a valid Myki card—’

‘I have a Myki card . . . I just don’t have my wallet with me.’

The inspector resumed, undeterred. ‘You will be issued with a fine that must be paid within—’

‘But . . .’ Saskia was stuck. She’d been fined many times when she was younger. As a teenager she had taken pride in not paying her fare until she realised the inspectors seemed to relish dolling out fines to pierced teens. From then on she was always careful to make sure she had a ticket. When an inspector approached her she would pretend to be unable to find it, searching her pockets until the officer began to write up her offence. Just as they were about to hand her a fine, she’d whip out her card and smile. ‘Here it is.’

She couldn’t do that today.

‘I’m going to issue you with an infringement notice—’

‘No!’ Saskia said. ‘I’ll get off now.’

‘I still have to fine you. It is an offence—’

‘But I didn’t mean to fare evade.’ Her voice rose. ‘It was an accident.’ It seemed so unfair. First the fight with Andy, and now this. She hadn’t done anything wrong.

‘Calm down.’

This angered her more. ‘No, I will not calm down. It was an innocent mistake. I’m not a criminal.’

Two other inspectors checking tickets noticed the commotion. They moved towards Saskia and the officer, who was once again trying to deliver his speech.

‘You have three weeks to pay the $240 fine —’

‘Two hundred and forty dollars?’

A sense of injustice surged through her. Fines were annoying at the best of times, but with the wedding, she just didn’t have the wiggle room in her bank balance.

‘I’m going to have to take your details,’ the inspector said gruffly. ‘Let’s start with your name.’

Saskia assessed the situation. A man in tweed stood and pulled the cord for the next stop.

‘Ah, I’ll spell it out for you,’ she said. ‘It has unusual spelling.’

The inspector nodded and waited, pen poised. His fellow officers relaxed and returned to their duty. The tram was coming to the next stop.

‘My first name is S-A —’ She stood and casually slid her hands into her pockets. ‘S-Q-U-A . . .’

The inspector’s head was down as he tapped the letters into the small screen.

‘T-O-O,’ Sas said, inching down the corridor. ‘The last letter is N.’ The tram had stopped and people were filing out. ‘It’s, um, Dutch,’ she said. ‘Now I’ll tell you my surname.’

‘Q-E—’

‘Q-E?’ The inspector looked up just in time to see her push past two teenagers and bound down the stairs.

‘Hey, come back here!’

Saskia ran between the tram and the guard rail that shielded alighting passengers from traffic. The tram doors began to close. One of the inspectors lunged forward and jammed himself between the folding doors and forced them open.

‘Get her,’ he yelled.

Saskia shot to the end of the rail where she became hemmed in by other passengers, choked in a group as they waited for the tram to move on. Behind her the inspectors bumbled hurriedly off the tram.

‘Excuse me.’ She tried to push through the pack. But it was no use. The traffic light was red and they were all trapped between the tram and the railing. Saskia hooked her leg over the metal bars and vaulted herself over the top, then dashed across the street, dodging cars as they zoomed towards the city.

The guards followed, but Saskia was fit. She sprinted down the median strip in the middle of the road, watching for a break in traffic so she could cross to the footpath. One car slowed to let her by. The guards gave chase, waving their arms.

‘This is an offence under the Public Transport Act,’ one shouted.

She reached the footpath and broke into a sprint. But she hadn’t counted on the St Kilda Road police complex. Two policemen were standing out the front with cups steaming in their hands. The ticket inspectors, paunchy and slow, saw them too.

‘Get her!’ one shouted.

The policemen looked bemused by the scene unfolding in front of them. One tilted his head back. Saskia saw in his eye a look that said he didn’t like taking orders from mere ticket inspectors. But he put down his coffee and planted his feet as she ran towards him. His partner did the same. Saskia searched for an escape route. To her left was a sheer face of glass-fronted offices. To her right, four lanes of St Kilda Road with cars shooting along it in both directions. Over her shoulder, the ticket officers had slowed to a jog.

‘Stop her,’ one wheezed. ‘She’s in violation.’

Saskia locked eyes with one of the policemen and made to run around their right.

‘Hold it right there,’ he commanded, his knees bent as if bracing for a rugby tackle.

The other moved towards her.

‘Stop!’ He put an arm out, mimicking a barrier. Saskia bashed through it. The force of her body surprised the cop. He made an ‘oof’ sound, stumbled, and spun on his heel.

She staggered forward, slightly winded by the impact. Strong hands clamped both of her shoulders.

‘You shouldn’t have done that. Come with me.’

Saskia tried to shake the hands off but they held her fast. She was taken inside the police station.

Now that the adrenalin was leaving her system she felt wretched and weak. Her fears were coming true. She would be arrested. Andy would realise he had made a mistake. Her wedding would be cancelled and Millie would tell everybody that she’d told them so.

The policeman asked for her name and address. Saskia’s chest felt like it was caving in. After giving her details she said, ‘Are you going to arrest me?’

The door opened and the ticket inspectors came in.

‘As I was saying, Miss Sasquatoon,’ the first inspector said. ‘Under the Victorian Public Transport Act it is unlawful . . .’

Saskia blocked his voice out. He tore a slip of paper from a pad, handed it to her and told her she had three weeks to pay. She stuffed the fine into her pocket and scowled at him.

‘Okay,’ said the policeman. ‘Enough of this circus. You’re free to go. Is there someone you can call to come and pick you up?’

Saskia knew what she had to do. It was after five o’clock.

Twenty minutes later Andy ran through the station door and swept her into his arms. ‘Saskia, Jesus, what happened? I was going mad. I called everyone.’ He took off his jacket and wrapped it around her.

‘Are you okay?’ He kissed her forehead.

‘She had a run-in with some unpleasant ticket inspectors,’ the policeman said.

‘What happened?’ Andy put his other arm protectively around her. ‘What did they do to you? Did they touch you?’

‘Nothing, nothing.’ As Saskia clung to him her eyes darted to the police officer, fearing he’d reveal to her law-abiding fiancé that she’d narrowly avoided a criminal charge. The ticket inspector had told her, in a parting jab, that the officer she’d hit could charge her with assault if he wanted. The policeman had just rolled his eyes.

‘As long as you’re okay.’ Andy studied her face. Her eye makeup was smeared. She looked like she’d done twenty rounds in a ring with a boxing kangaroo.

‘Here.’ He handed her an ironed handkerchief. ‘Duck into the ladies and clean yourself up. Your dress is in the car.’

*

In their large sleigh bed the morning after the wedding, the fight seemed far away. Saskia trailed her fingers across her new husband’s chest. ‘You don’t regret going through with it?’

‘Are you crazy? I found a woman whose first marital decree was to demand a daily romp in the bedlinen. I’m ecstatic.’

She laughed. ‘The arrangement expires at the end of the first year.’

‘Well then,’ he said, kissing her, ‘we’d better get started.’

Day 2, Monday, October 13

‘Sign this, please.’ Andy passed Saskia a napkin from the airport cafe.