Chapter 3- Phyllis

Chapter 3 – Phyllis

Phyllis was getting ready to go over to Bill’s house to make some food for him and the girls when she heard her neighbor’s carport door go up. “Oh, shit!” she swore out loud at the prospect of her nosy neighbor Sophie watching her go over there and then jumping on the phone to tell all the bitches who lived in their complex. The snickering and innuendo about Bill hadn’t really passed her by. A lot of these women honestly thought she didn’t know what they said about her.

Phyllis packed up the rest of the food, grabbed some pears and chocolate biscuits for dessert and walked toward her door. Robbie, her youngest son was in front of the TV, watching a cartoon. She called out that she’d be back in a few hours and the kids could have Burger King if they wanted. Dawn, her 15 year old, turned from her computer desk and snapped at her. “What now? Why are you going over there?!”

“Dawn, Heather is in JAIL. Her kids have not seen their mom since she dropped them off on Wednesday morning.”

“Well, so what? Neither have we.”

“Oh, Dawn-ey don’t be mean. Robbie just wants to sit in front of the TV anyway and you’re on the internet all day- what do you need me around for? Daddy will be home from Bahrain in a few hours. I thought Lisa was coming over?”

Dawn seemed to cool a little “She is, will you at least leave me some money for Burger King delivery?”

Phyllis pulled 200 dirhams out of her purse and handed them to Dawn. “Would you please walk over there to get it? Robbie could use the exercise.”

“Ummm, no! Mother, it’s like 200 degrees out!”

Phyllis picked up her bags and went out. She wished she knew what to do with Robbie. She felt slightly guilty for not bringing him but he would shout and run around the house. It would be almost impossible to make Robbie understand that Bill and the kids needed quiet time.

Robbie had a spectrum of social and learning disorders, he wasn’t autistic, but his behaviors had a lot of the traits of autism, particularly for his lack of social awareness. Back home in Canada his teachers had considered him high functioning. He was probably the one person in their family who was suffering from the move to Dubai. While Dawn was enrolled at the prestigious Dubai American Academy and thriving in the difficult International Baccalaureate program; there simply weren’t many schools for kids like Robbie and they were generally 3 to 5 years behind Canada in terms of the services offered. Still, they had found an acceptable school where despite limited facilities, the teachers seemed very dedicated. Robbie was on the waiting list for the best special needs school in the Emirate and at least they felt safe in Dubai.

Phyllis walked confidently down the block and around the corner to Bill’s house. She was proud of her figure and proud of her looks. She wore a double ‘D’ cup bra and had learned years ago to love her breasts and to flaunt her body because it made her feel good to do so, regardless of what people said or thought. Tonight, she wore a simple red crepe sundress with a nipped in waist and deep v-neck which made her feel like Brigitte Bardot or some other 60’s bombshell.

She rang Bill’s buzzer and stood in front of the camera, trying to look confident and reassuring. They buzzed her in without saying anything and she was met at the door by Christine who looked less-than happy to see her.

“Hi Phyllis, Dad’s upstairs- he’ll be down in a minute.”

“Sure. Chris, why don’t you set the table for us? Where’s your sister?”

“She’s at the pool with Cassandra. Dad told her to be back by 6, though.” Christine turned around and headed upstairs, making no move to set the table.

Like most neighborhood developments in Dubai, theirs had a local pool. It wasn’t staffed by lifeguards so Phyllis never went there. She preferred to take Robbie to the hotel pools with their teams of lifeguards used to hauling drunks to safety. She didn’t think she could get Robbie out of the pool by herself if he ran into trouble.

She uncovered her chicken parmesan and began slicing up some broccoli to steam it in the microwave. The parmesan was one of her favorite recipes. She took some pre-breaded chicken breast from the supermarket and added a jar of sauce, some mozzarella cheese and a bit of parmesan then baked the whole thing until it was bubbly. She had almost screamed once at a pot-luck when Sophie’s friend Mel showed up with the same dish. Except, of course, Mel used only free range organic chickens and did all the work herself. Phyllis couldn’t taste the difference. She was infuriated to find out from Sophie that Mel had actually bought the dish ready made from the Waitrose market in the Dubai Mall.

“Hi there.” Bill stood in the doorway of the kitchen. He looked tired, exhausted actually, but happy to see her and Phyllis felt relieved after Christine’s cold expression. While she understood why Christine and Judy didn’t like her very much and didn't really expect them to, it still made her feel insecure in her relationship with Bill.

“Hi friend, how’re you holding up?”

“I’m ok, Phil. It’s hard to believe though. I went there today, you know. It’s not so bad, I was picturing Midnight Run, but it’s clean and she says they are treating her well. She’s sharing a cell with a Russian who’s supposed to be a madam. Heather said she’s nice enough. Get this, the Russian actually pays an Indonesian girl to clean the cell!”

“What happens next?”

“I don’t know, actually. I have to go to Employee Assistance before my trip to Lagos on Sunday. I have a meeting before the briefing for them to help me work out a strategy for taking care of the kids. They said they’ll get me a lawyer if I want. I have to see Visa Services about Maria when I get back too.”

“Does Heather have a lawyer?”

“I don’t know, frankly I don’t care. How could she be so stupid?..” Bill shook his head in disbelief.

“Daddy! I swam 20 laps, full laps not lengths!” Judy burst in with her goggles on her head and a towel wrapped around her hips. “I’m definitely going to make swim team next year!!!”

“That’s great Judy-J. Run up and get changed. Phyllis brought us some supper.”

“Ok, sure.” Judy seemed crestfallen. When Bill turned his back to her to open the fridge, she stuck her tongue out at Phyllis.

Phyllis didn’t react to Judy. It was natural that these girls wouldn’t be happy to see her. They were civil over dinner but she noticed that Christine especially didn’t really eat anything except broccoli and salad. She cut her chicken up into little pieces and pushed them around on her plate. After dinner, the girls went outside to play with the neighborhood kids who began to gather as soon as the sun started to go down. Phyllis and Bill sat in the living room, sipping a Bardolino that Bill insisted was a great wine, but Phyllis thought was too strong and not sweet enough for after dinner.

His living room reminded Phyllis of the very posh Majestic Hotel where the company had put them up when her husband Mike was interviewing. Floor-length draperies of dark green raw silk hid the sliding glass doors, the couches were rich brown leather and absolutely everything in the room was coordinated. The linen lamp shades had a pattern which subtly echoed the green of the draperies, and throw pillows picked up and complemented the cream linen and green. Phyllis thought of her own living room with more than a touch of embarrassment.

It was the same size and shape as Bill’s, but her furniture was a hodge-podge of a few wooden pieces she had brought over from Canada, things she picked up at Ikea, and a couple of thick rugs from DragonMart. These she bought because Robbie liked how they felt on his feet. When they had all moved into this complex she remembered Bill complaining that while he had saved a bundle of money by purchasing their living room from a family that was moving from Dubai; Heather had negated their savings in buying an additional matching couch new for 12,000 dirhams. Phyllis seriously doubted decorating her entire home had cost that much.

“Hey Phil, there is one favor you could do for me.”

“Anything, you know that.”

“Would you let Maria live in your maid’s room? It’s really hard for me to have her here with the kids. She’s off at Safa Park with her friends right now, but I don’t think I want her to work in the house tomorrow. Just for a few days, until I talk with the Visa people. I don’t blame her for what she did, but I don’t want her around either…”

“Of course Bill, why don’t you have her move tomorrow? I’m not using the room for anything since I fired Kavya.” Phyllis had let her maid go almost two months earlier following the loss of her Grandmother's diamond earrings. Earrings which Kavya claimed to know nothing about but which Phyllis had found by dumping her handbag out on the floor.

They continued to talk about the situation, but Bill was clearly concerned more with his and Heather’s legal options than upset about the fact that she was publicly caught with Owen. Three months ago, he had admitted to Phyllis that Heather was probably seeing someone. At that time he was definitely sad, although not really surprised, but now he seemed mostly resigned and primarily concerned with getting custody of the girls and getting Heather out of the country.

Phyllis was especially pleased to discover Bill thought Maria had acted out of a sense of protectiveness toward him and the children. She walked home swinging her empty grocery bag feeling excited and looking forward to Maria moving into her maid’s room.

Chapter 2- Sophie

Sophie sat at her little pine Ikea kitchen table, elated to be the first person awake so she could take her time reading the newspaper on the web, watering the plants and drinking her coffee. Halfway through the first cup, she realized it was Friday, the Islamic holy day and there would at least be no 3Weeks to worry about today. She got up, swirled her waist-length blonde curls into a big sloppy bun and pinned it to the back of her head before heading outside to water her collection of flowering desert plants.

Sophie dreaded running into her own neighbor, Phyllis. A tall black-haired Canadian, Phyllis was famous for ranting at the neighborhood children, complaining about other peoples landscaping choices, and generally making life miserable for everyone unfortunate enough to be on her radar. Sophie’s relationship with Phyllis had been tense ever since Sophie’s daughter had written “Aliens have landed” on the road outside her carport in huge blue chalk letters with giant pink stars and yellow arrows pointing at their door.

Sophie and Gene had tried to reprimand Sue for it but with Freddie and Chris collapsed in laughter on the front stoop, they didn’t get far. Gene’s attempts to hide his guffaws hadn’t helped the situation and Phyllis came screaming around their gate that they were horrible parents who couldn’t be bothered to discipline their children. Sophie had lost her temper with Phyllis that day and a relationship which had been tense, officially turned sour.

Phyllis and Heather’s husband Bill were close. He spent a lot of time eating at her house when Heather was out of town, supposedly looking for work. There were lots of rumors that Phyllis had a thing for Bill and she was just waiting out the collapse of Bill and Heather’s marriage. Sophie didn’t think much of this but Jonah and Gene had come home one night chuckling about what Phyllis had worn to a cocktail party and how she had behaved toward Bill.

Evidently, she arrived at the party with her ample five foot eight-inch frame squeezed into a tiny Ed Hardy t-shirt, her breasts spilling over the neckline, a black micro-mini (with a leather strap running between her legs!) and a pair of thigh-high leather boots to complete the outfit. Sophie could imagine the altogether stunning effect of this costume, especially since Phyllis, like her, was not a slender woman. Gene called the ensemble “Pure porno, like Pam Anderson, only mean.” And both men joked about how she had come up behind Bill and pressed her chest into his back while whispering in his ear.

Sophie shuddered at the idea of these parties, having vowed never to attend one again after a heated exchange with a drunken Frenchwoman over her accusation that all Americans were “bellicose”. At least we don’t have anything going on today she thought as she splashed her plants with water. She desperately wanted a cigarette but was making an effort to quit.

Chris and Sue got up and Sophie was inspired to encourage them to turn on the TV while she paid a little visit to Gene. In front of the wall-width bathroom mirror she pulled off her shorts and t-shirt and shook out her hair. Using it to cover her body in a way she knew Gene loved, she turned to each side. Assessing herself in the mirror, and mostly happy with what she saw, Sophie whispered “not bad for 38.” and walked into their bedroom where Gene was asleep. She slipped into the bed next to him and started gently kissing his forehead… “Hi there, gorgeous!” Gene said groggily.

Around 9, they headed out for the pool club at the Habibti Hotel. They had discussed it for an hour after Sophie woke Gene up, going back and forth about the Heather situation and how bad the gossiping might be. She knew Mel would be there because her kids had tennis lessons, but she wasn’t wild about the crowd on Fridays, lots of airline families, lots of nasty talk, even when there wasn’t a big scandal on.

Eventually, Chris and Sue prevailed on them to go, with Freddie promising he would join them all for dinner that evening and stomping back off to bed. The Habibti, although a bit long-in-the-tooth by Dubai standards, did have an excellent kids club where younger kids could play games and sports and swim all day supervised by a group of smiling Philippinos who were basically paid to be charming and kind no matter what sort of mischief the gaggle of expat kids they were charged with got up to.

Sophie laughed at the memory of a particularly nasty little boy from New Zealand. Two of the workers, Maria and Juan had come to her. “Madam, we are so sorry, but Miss Sue has taken the little boy, Vincent, they locked him in a linen cage behind the playground.” Sophie had spit her drink laughing. Vincent was semi-famous for running amok around the Hababti pool each Friday while his parents enjoyed their brunch. He seemed to like whacking at people with his snorkel. Evidently, Sue and her friends had decided that Vincent should be caged if he was going to ‘behave like an animal’ a direct quote from Sophie. The hotel workers wanted Sophie to talk to his parents, they were terrified they might be fired if they broke the news. Vincent’s parents, to their credit, had taken it in stride and his general behavior on Fridays had improved a lot since then.

Sophie and Gene plunked themselves in slightly tattered beach loungers placed to give them an all-around view of the Kiddie pool with its three waterslides and L-shaped main pool featuring a disco-styled swim-up bar. Sophie felt a little giddy after her tryst with Gene that morning. She had noticed that sex between them had improved a lot with their move from Indiana to Dubai. He seemed to have more energy in spite of his time zone hopping schedule, and thrice weekly yoga at the Dubai Ladies Club had made a huge difference in her overall fitness level and her self confidence. It didn’t hurt that custom-made clothing was easily available and comparable in price to mall shops either.

“Nice swimsuit, is it new? You look amazing.” Gene whispered “Is it illegal to make love to your own wife in public here?” Sophie laughed, “I think public lovemaking is illegal everywhere, darlin’.” She arched her back a bit, knowing that the black and silver bikini top fit perfectly and showed her chest off to great advantage. He groaned and grinned her favorite sweet/ bad boy grin. “Uh oh, British feminist at 12:00…”

Gene was not a fan of Melanie. He couldn’t stand what he saw as a martyr complex and it pissed him off when Mel was unintentionally unkind to Sophie. Silly things like forgetting to introduce his wife to people at the Ladies Club or not inviting Chris and Sue to her own kids parties, seemed snobbish and petty. Sophie blew these things off as cultural differences but Gene was pretty sure Mel was jealous of his wife and just a bit mean too.

“What’s up girl? Where’s Jon?” Gene asked as Mel directed the pool boy to set up three chairs covered with towels for her and the kids. “An umbrella too, if you wouldn’t mind” she pressed a 10 dirham note into the pool boy’s hand “Yes Madam!”

“Oh, and could you send a waiter over, I desperately need a cup of tea!”

“Yes Madam!”

Gene smiled a little at the way Mel casually ordered the pool boys around. After a year in Dubai, Sophie knew most of them by name, knew their family histories, their career ambitions and their problems too. More than once he’d stopped her from giving one of them a 500 dirham tip after hearing a sob story about a sick relative.

Mel smiled her tight smile at Gene as she settled into her lounger “He’s in Milan, I can’t wait till he gets home… this mess with Heather, I hate dealing with it alone.”

“Well, you aren’t really dealing with it are you, Mel?” Gene’s voice was playful but slightly antagonistic.

“Bill rang the bell and got the girls but he wouldn’t even stay for a cup of tea. I’m sure he’s not ready to talk about it.” Mel seemed oblivious to Gene’s jibe.

Sophie chimed in “Will he visit her at the jail? Can he?”

“I assume he can, if I can and suppose he will, what else can he do?”

“Well, I hope he fires Maria, I mean, turning Heather into the Police for adultery? Seriously! It’s Dubai, the prostitution capital of the Middle East!”

“Sophie,” Mel’s tone was slightly stern “this is a Muslim country and what she did IS against the law. Why should Maria watch it go on? Anyway, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Bill knew she was going to call the police.”

“Really? Jesus!” exclaimed Gene.

“Gene, you don’t think he knew something was up? Heather was going to the Spa at the Ladies Club twice a week. Bill certainly wasn’t paying for that!” Mel smirked at her joke.

Gene laughed aloud, remembering an afternoon when Bill had smuggled his own sandwiches into the Habtoor, telling everyone who would listen “I’m not paying 30 dirhams for a freakin’ cheese sandwich!”

They spent the rest of the day swimming, eating and having much the same conversation with a few different groups of pilots, neighbors, and their wives. The general consensus was that Bill probably knew about the Architect, since almost everyone did, and that he and Heather deserved whatever happened to them next.

Around 3, the crowd broke up a bit as families headed home to sleep before dinner. Sophie wasn’t drunk, but the two sea-breezes that made her feel languid by the pool had given her a raging headache as they waited for the valet to bring their Volvo. Still, she was in better shape than Vincent’s mom, who’s tanned and pilates-perfected body was drunkenly slumped into a chair with the valets fanning her while her husband looked disgustedly on. Climbing into the car, Sophie was exhausted, she, Chris and Sue were asleep before Gene swung onto the Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai’s main highway.

Chapter 1- Melanie

Melanie sat on the front steps of her friend Sophie’s villa. Smoking and running her manicured nails through her shoulder-length brown hair, Mel felt utterly washed out, done for the day. She listened as Sophie’s neighbor watered her plants and screeched at her child. Sophie was inside cooking for the kids.

The day had been horribly hot- easily 37 degrees- but at sundown a cool sea breeze had begun to push the heat and haze back toward the desert. The plants that filled Sophie’s carport had perked up noticeably in the last 20 minutes. Mel stubbed out the cigarette on the bottom of her sparkly Pomelo flip flops, stood up, sighed and opened the door.

“Hey Mel” Sophie called “How’d it go, are you alright??” in an exaggerated British accent. This was a joke between them, it rolled out of the mouths of so many people who were wholly uninterested in weather or not anyone around them was ‘alright’.

“I’m ok, just tired.” Mel sat heavily at the small table in the corner of Sophie’s kitchen. “It wasn’t as bad as I’d imagined, she’s doing well, considering…” Mel’s voice trailed off. “I wish I knew what to do. I mean, I know I’m doing what I can. But lord! This is a nightmare.”

“When does Bill get back?” Heather’s husband was a pilot with Discover Airlines, one of the largest and most prestigious carriers in the Middle East.

“Not until tomorrow morning. Jonah’s been trying to get in touch with him, but no luck. He’s in Nigeria. I don’t think cell coverage is all that good… I don’t know if the Airline’s employee assistance people have tried to talk to him, I don’t know what they do in these kinds of situations.

She’s a bit afraid that he’ll do nothing and let the government make an example of her. She didn’t say anything in court, they just read the charges to her and the boyfriend. Her parents have hired a local lawyer anyway, one who speaks Arabic, and seems to be known around the court.”

“Why should Bill do anything to help her? It’s just so stupid. Have you met the boyfriend?” Sophie spat. “He’s a complete asshole, truly.”

They were referring to their friend, Heather who had been seeing an Australian architect and real-estate developer for the last six months. And who now sat in a Dubai jail, charged with adultery and probably facing several months in prison, divorce and deportation. Mel had just returned from the jail and bringing Heather some clothes.

On a tip from her maid to the Police, Heather had been arrested outside of The Legacy Hotel in a gorgeous black and white Carolina Herrera cocktail dress. The maid had clearly called the newspaper immediately after the police. Heather looked absolutely fantastic on the cover of 3Weeks that morning, more a movie star than Dubai housewife. The dress was perfect for her 5’10” curvy frame and her long red hair was gorgeously tousled as she whipped her face around to the camera. The women of their housing complex were abuzz over her appearance as much as over the arrest.

The dress, however, was wholly impractical for wearing under the obligatory, pepto-bismol pink, prison-issue abaya or for Heather’s appearance before the court that afternoon. So Mel had Sophie pick up her kids from school and ventured first to Heather’s villa where she had retrieved some jeans and t-shirts and a simple, modest outfit from Talbot’s that clearly pre-dated Heather & Bill’s move to Dubai. Then she went to the jail to help Heather get situated and dressed for court. Mel had to comb Heather’s hair with her fingers when she realized she had forgotten her hairbrush. This seemed to undo both her and Heather’s composure totally and the two of them ended up crying together for ten minutes.

“I never noticed.” Sophie went on, “But Rebecca says she and the maid hated each other. We’ve got to ask Dulika what the story is.” Dulika was Sophie’s Sri Lankan maid who was forever clucking that “Philippini are not in Dubai to be maids, only to find husbands.”

“Where is she anyway?” asked Mel with some annoyance, she didn’t think it was appropriate that Sophie let her maid go anywhere she wanted to go.

“Oh, I don’t know- off with her sister, I didn’t get the whole story; she’ll clean up the kitchen when she gets back…”

After Sophie and Mel had given the kids their supper, Mel and her boys headed over to Heather’s villa to pick up Christine, aged 13 and Judy who was 11, from the custody of Rebecca, another friend who had volunteered to get them from school that afternoon. Both girls seemed cheerful enough, if a little embarrassed. They carried colorful Vera Bradley overnight bags and wore shorts, pretty embroidered t-shirts and flip flops, the Dubai pre-teen girl’s uniform.

Mel tried to be gentle as she spoke to Christine. “Sweetie, I need to know if Maria is here in the house and if she has keys.” Maria was Heather’s maid. “I don’t think she’s here Mel, but her room is locked. I know she has a key to the gate, but not the front door.” The maid’s rooms had separate entrances from the carport. “My mom didn’t want her to have one. Rebecca told me everything is in Daddy’s safe, Maria’s passport too.”

 “That’s good. Then we won’t worry about it tonight.” It occurred to Mel that everyone might be better off if Maria had her passport, and a bit of money. Maybe she would leave the country. Would it help if there was no witness against Heather?

Mel walked the kids over to her own villa, got them settled in to the TV room watching Kung-Fu Panda- Christine and Judy were actually really gracious about letting the boys watch their favorite movie- and poured herself a huge, cold glass of Italian white wine, a Trebbiano D’Abbruzo that Jonah had brought her back from his last trip to Milan.

Mel couldn’t wait for Jonah to get home. He was back in Italy, and would be gone for another two or three days. Jonah was good in situations like this. He was kind and a calming influence on everyone around him. She knew also that he would return home with a suitcase full of good food and little things they couldn’t always get in Dubai like her favorite brand of Italian olive-oil soap.

Jonah always returned home eager to make love. Sometimes he would bring Mel outrageously sexy lingerie which she would model for him after putting the boys to bed. As a Vice-President for a huge Italian department store, he had access to some gorgeous clothes at a huge discount.  She wanted the fun of his little gifts, the reassurance of him in the house  and in her bed right now.

Her cell phone chirped with a text message from Sophie “Should we get 3Weeks from their door?” 3Weeks was a newspaper published each day in Dubai, it thrived on scandals about the Western expatriates and hard luck stories of abused maids and construction workers who lived and worked in the city. Mel had made sure there were no copies of the paper for Bill to find on his return home.  “Got it, doubt it will help…Phyllis.”