Cat shut her mouth quickly. Kara lay back down on her bed and they sat in silence for a few seconds.

Cat tried frantically to think of something cool to say.

“I really hate my br**sts,” she offered finally, lamely.

“What?” Kara snorted.

“The Kettle girls missed out on br**sts. You should hear the jokes boys have made about us over the years. They thought they were so witty. So hilarious.”

“To Lyn, even? Did Lyn get upset?”

“Of course. Once a boy told Lyn she had two mozzie bites instead of tits and she cried for a whole week.”

“Really? Did she?” Kara sat up, invigorated. “I can’t imagine her, young, and getting all upset.”

“And you obviously don’t have any worries in that department.”

“Shut up.” Kara pulled at her T-shirt. “Boys don’t care about br**sts.”

Cat stood up. “No. Of course not. Boys never think twice about br**sts. Come on, you idiot, I’m sweltering in here. Are your legs capable of getting us downstairs?”

“Oh, all right. I’m starved to death, anyway. So what did that boy say again? Two mosquito bites, huh?”

“Don’t ever mention it to her, will you?”

Now Kara looked positively delighted. “I won’t. It might be a traumatic memory.”

“Probably.”

The sounds of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” floated up the stairs, and Kara winced painfully. “Oh no.” She clattered down the stairs, two at a time, yelling out, “Dad! Stop embarrassing yourself! Turn it off!”

Cat followed her, wondering if that mosquito bite thing happened to Lyn, or herself. Oh well. The year she turned thirty she had finally made peace with her br**sts.

Gemma, Nana Kettle, and Frank were sitting around Lyn’s kitchen table shelling prawns and drinking champagne. The three of them all had tinsel bows tied around their heads, which were no doubt Gemma’s creations.

“I wish you’d all go outside on the balcony,” Lyn was saying.

“We’re helping you,” said Gemma.

“You’re not. You’re annoying me.”

Frank stood up and grabbed Cat around the waist, swinging her around.

“There you are! The mother-to-be! Happy Christmas, angel! Sit down and put your feet up. That’s what you do when you’re pregnant. I hope Dan knows that. I hope he’s waiting on you hand and foot. I’ll have to have a word with him.” He sat her down in his chair and began to pull at her protesting feet to put them on the table.

“Not on the food!” warned Nana.

Lyn said, “I’m sure you waited on Mum hand and foot when she was pregnant, Dad.”

The doorbell rang. “That will be Charlie,” Gemma happily popped a peeled prawn into her mouth. “He’s come to let you look at him.”

Lyn said, “Could you please stop eating the prawns!”

“Oh. Isn’t that what they’re for?”

“Why don’t we ask this Charlie fellow to take a look at the air conditioning?” Nana fanned herself with a napkin.

“He’s a locksmith, Nana.”

“I expect he’s handy, though. That’s our problem. None of the men here are at all handy.”

“Gemma!” Maxine came into the kitchen followed by a man and woman. “Your friend is here.”

“Everyone! This is Charlie!” Gemma waved her champagne glass rapturously and threw an arm around his shoulder.

He was a stocky man with a barrel chest, exactly the same height as Gemma. She hadn’t mentioned he was short. Sort of attractive, thought Cat, for a short man. She leaned forward as she shook his hand to check out the famous eyelashes. They looked perfectly ordinary to her.

“And this is my sister,” Charlie said to the room. “Her Vee-dub conked out this morning. So I’m the designated driver to our family lunch.”

Cat turned her attention to the sister. She had long dark hair scraped back off her face and a red T-shirt with a scooped neckline, revealing the cupped together curves of a luscious cle**age. She was beautiful. Model beautiful. She was also familiar.

“Hi.” She smiled. There was a buzzing sensation in Cat’s ears.

“I’m Angela.”

Lyn had appeared from nowhere to rest her hand gently on Cat’s shoulder.

“Hi, Angela,” said Gemma, and as her smile slid away from her face, her champagne glass slid from her hand to shatter on the floor.

I have mosquito bites for br**sts, thought Cat.

CHAPTER 10

Lyn’s Christmas Day started in the gray half-light of 5 A.M. when she woke to see a pair of unblinking brown eyes only inches away from her own. Maddie was standing next to their bed, sucking her thumb, staring at Lyn as if she were hypnotized. It gave Lyn such a fright she banged her elbow on the bedside table.

“Shit!” She sat up straight, cradling her elbow. “How long have you been there? You’re not meant to wake up for three hours yet!”

Maddie carefully unplugged her mouth and began to wail.

Michael woke up, instantly alert and cheery. He lifted his head from his pillow to observe Maddie. “Someone looking for Santa Claus?”

“She’s too young for Santa Claus. She hates him, remember?”

“Merry Christmas to you too.”

“I hurt my elbow.”

“Ah.”

He threw back the quilt and walked around the bed to pick up Maddie. Lyn watched his long skinny brown body in the Mickey Mouse boxer shorts Kara had given him for his fortieth. He had a new haircut—it made his head look smaller, shorn and vulnerable, like a schoolboy who got teased on the bus.

“Mummy hurt her elbow,” he said to Maddie. “Did you hurt your elbow too?”

Maddie stopped crying and nodded her head tragically, pointing her finger at her own elbow.

Michael was delighted. “Did you see that?”

“She’s a little liar,” said Lyn proudly.

Michael climbed back into bed with Maddie in his arms and tucked her in the middle of them.

“She won’t sleep,” said Lyn.

“Your mummy is a pessimist.”

But within minutes the three of them were sound asleep, Lyn and Michael curled on their sides facing Maddie, who lay flat on her back, star-shaped, a thumb-sucking sunbaker.