Snapshot Quotes

“Peninsula Freeway, and another off Penzance Beach Road, which wound in a dizzying climb high above sea level. She slowed for an intersection, the light green. She should make a right turn here, but that meant giving way to the oncoming traffic, which was streaming indifferently towards her, and what if some maniac failed to stop before she completed the turn? She tried to swallow. Her mouth was very dry. Someone sounded their horn at her. She continued through the intersection without turning. All those people there last Saturday, as close as bodies can get to one another, yet Janine hadn’t expected, sought or found any kind of togetherness. She knew from past experience that the other couples would look out for each other, the wives watching out for their husbands, always with a smile, a kiss, a comforting or loving caress, ‘Just checking that you’re happy’ kind of thing, and the husbands checking on how their wives were doing, ‘Are you okay? Love you’ kind of thing, even stopping to have sex with them before moving on to another play area. But that wasn’t Robert’s style. He would never so much as say ‘Enjoy yourself’ but go after the single women and younger wives, a glint of grasping need in his eyes, and last Saturday hadn’t been any different. He’d kept her there until three in the morning, long after most of the others had gone home. ‘Mum?’ ‘What?’ ‘Can I have a Happy Meal for lunch?’ ‘We’ll see.’ Beside her, Georgia began to sing. It had taken her husband about three months to wear her down. When he’d first proposed attending one of the parties, late last year, Janine had thought he was joking, but it soon became clear that he wasn’t. She’d felt vaguely discomfited, more from the tawdriness and risk of exposure than realising he probably didn’t want her sexually any more. ‘Why do you want to have sex with other women besides me?’ she’d asked, putting on a bit of a quiver. ‘But”
― Garry Disher, Snapshot