Read Lisa Heidke for Free Online Page A

says Bella.
    They’re looking at party photos from my time at NIDA. I do look happy. And young. But my hair! A spiral perm à la Mariah Carey. I pick up a photo of Gloria and me at a toga party. God, we were fools.
    ‘These were taken before you were born, when I was at acting school,’ I say. Ah, for those grunge years, when we smoked endless dope, partied hard, wore black clothes, Doc Martens and heavy make-up. I hardly recognise myself - I look so thin. Not gaunt, ugly thin, just clothes-hanger thin with a perfect smile and straight white teeth. I remember religiously cleaning them with bicarbonate of soda every morning and evening. Back then, I was hungry for fame, determined to make it as an actress.
    ‘Who’s this?’ Bella asks, passing me a photo.
    It’s Dom, Gloria and me, all three of us laughing mischievously, arm in arm at the Sandringham Hotel. I’m the redhead between the two dark heads of hair. Dom was so handsome, athletic, and those sparkling blue eyes . . .
    This particular photo was taken the first night we moved into a fabulously dilapidated terrace at the seedy south end of Newtown. It wasn’t until after the pub closed, and we were standing outside our new home utterly pissed, that we realised no one had brought a front-door key. Heavy iron bars protected the downstairs windows and doors, so Gloria and I talked Dom into scaling the front verandah and breaking in through the balcony door to my upstairs bedroom. From day one, I lived there with the knowledge that if it’d been that easy for a pissed student to break in, it’d be a snap for a real-life thug. But I loved that place. It always had a faint smell of marijuana, and the fridge was usually empty except for ice, vodka, beer and cheap chardonnay.
    ‘My friend Dominic,’ I say. ‘Won an art scholarship and left Australia to become a wildly successful sculptor in Europe.’
    ‘Then what?’
    ‘Then I met your dad and lost contact with a lot of these people -’
    ‘Except Gloria?’
    ‘Yes, except Gloria.’
    ‘So you don’t know what happened to him?’ Bella continues, picking up another photo of Dominic, this time shirtless (those abs!) in cut-off jeans (what legs!), reclining in a banana lounge in the sun, as was the fashion at the time. ‘He’s kinda cute looking,’ she says.
    I don’t particularly want to discuss Dom, especially with my daughter. But yes, he was cute. He was also my best friend, even though I did fall in love with him. I only found the courage to jump him the night before he headed off to Europe on a one-way ticket.
    ‘Why now?’ he’d asked as I followed him into his bedroom and began disrobing.
    ‘Because I’ve wanted to since forever.’
    ‘But . . .’ Dom said, as we lay on his bed.
    ‘But what?’
    ‘Luce, I’m leaving the country tomorrow.’
    In the end, we did make love. But the fact that it took me three and a half years and a healthy dose of liquor to have one of the most special nights of my life, only for him to leave the next day, was beyond heartbreaking.
    ‘I don’t have to go,’ Dom had said the next morning.
    ‘Good idea. Reject the scholarship and stay with me,’ I joked, knowing it was too big an opportunity for him to miss.
    ‘I’ll write . . .’
    After Dom left, I’d cried, showered and then cried some more. I didn’t make it to the airport to say goodbye.
    For years, I’d thought back to that night and the following day and wondered: what if? What if Dom had stayed? What if I’d kept in contact with him? What if I’d flown to Europe to meet him?
    But after a while I moved on. Although my life was crap on a personal level, I hit the big time professionally. A year after landing a supporting part in Against Time , I scored the lead role of Sophia. It was a dream come true. I knew I’d made it because every second person wanted me to be their girlfriend - including Max.
    I resisted Max for a long time. But he was persistent and the intensity of his attention was