pulled curtains, slid screens and expressed a girlish pleasure at the way everything had been configured to pack away so neatly.
‘I can’t believe this!’ she exclaimed. ‘There’s a toilet, a bath . . . even a place to plug in my hair dryer. Come and have a look, Meredith.’ Annie backed out of the narrow bathroom doorway.
Meredith squeezed past and poked her head inside for the briefest of inspections.
‘Well, I’d hardly call it a bath. I’d be extremely lucky to fit my backside in there.’
‘It’s not supposed to be a proper bath,’ Nina called from behind them with some exasperation. ‘Let me in and I’ll show you everything.’ The three women paused as they considered how they would negotiate this tricky manoeuvre. Annie shuffled forward, Meredith flattened herself against the cupboard and Nina eased her way into the small space and began her spiel. ‘It’s got shelves behind this mirror, and plenty of space under the sink for all our stuff. Towel racks. A shower. You can even use the toilet when you’re driving along. I mean, it’s not strictly legal, but it does mean we’re not going to have to stop at some spider-infested dunny by the roadside.’
‘But there’s no window,’ observed Annie, examining the smooth expanse of white extruded plastic in the prefab unit. ‘It must get really . . . humid in here.’ It was exactly the detail a real estate agent would spot.
‘You just open this vent.’ Nina stood on tiptoe and wound open the cunningly concealed hatch at the rear of the shower cubicle.
‘Yeah, that’ll work,’ Annie conceded. In fact privately she also had to admit that the bathroom was considerably larger and better appointed than some of the ensuites she’d recently encountered in brand-new home units.
‘What else could we possibly want?’ Nina added with more than a hint of desperation. ‘There’s a microwave, oven, fridge, freezer, DVD. You just wind up this aerial . . .’ Nina again reached for a knob on the ceiling, turned it and then fiddled with the remote. The TV blared. She lunged for the off-switch.
Annie refolded her arms. ‘Like I said the other day, it’s about time. Two weeks away? Meredith will have to leave the shop, I’ll have to take holidays. It’s crazy! I’ve got so much on. We should just fly.’
Nina leaned one hip against a cupboard and clasped her hands in front of her. She wanted to snatch up the tartan tea towel on the counter and flick them both to their senses. ‘I understand all that,’ she said in her most patient tone, ‘but getting there is half the fun.’
‘Yeah, we could play “Spotto” and sing “Ten Green Bottles”,’ drawled Annie.
Her sarcasm didn’t faze Nina. She was used to these exchanges with her teenage son Jordan. She simply drove around the conversational speed hump. ‘Think of what we’d miss out on if we just flew.’
‘Mosquitoes, sandflies, spiders, snakes, ants . . .’ Annie counted off the bio-hazards of the Australian bush on her fingers.
‘That’s just silly,’ Nina finally snapped. ‘You’re from the country, you can handle all that. Besides, we’ll be travelling in five-star comfort all the way.’
‘I’d hardly call this five-star,’ Meredith sniffed and plonked herself on a synthetic doona cover festooned with bright orange and yellow hibiscus flowers. ‘The décor in here is just . . . appalling.’
Nina saw an opening and jumped at her chance. ‘Look, all this can go,’ she said, indicating the nasty matching citrus-hued cushions and floral bedsheets. ‘You can bring some of your gorgeous stuff in from the shop. Your linens, tableware, crockery. Have it any way you want—give the whole van a makeover.’ Nina saw Meredith’s eyes brighten at the magic word ‘makeover’.
Now, Nina calculated, was the time for the centrepiece of her argument . . . except that the smartphone stowed in Annie’s squashy leather handbag squalled again. Annie dumped the bag on the table and rummaged for the thing.
‘Annie Bailey speaking,’ she smoothly announced, stepping into the bathroom cubicle and closing the door after her.
This time it was Nina who quizzed Meredith with a ‘look’. Being with Annie and her dumb phone was like watching a mother let her toddler with Attention Deficit Disorder ruin story time at a playgroup. Meredith nodded in mute agreement.
Nina reached into a cupboard and produced a tablecloth—an Irish linen one she’d bought specially for the occasion—and spread it over the wood-veneer plywood table. She opened the fridge door with a theatrical flourish and presented a sumptuous antipasto platter—zucchini