We have a million scripts for surviving an unfaithful husband. The Belle Burden memoir. The Diana revenge dress. The classic suburban makeover: six kilos down, new fringe, couple of good tops. But we have no such thing for surviving an unfaithful best friend.
Like everyone, I’ve been glued to the rival Jules Neale and Tess Crosley tell-alls this week. As background, Jules left her AFL star husband Lachie Neale last year over his alleged affair with her best friend Tess. Yep, bit unseemly to be hooked on strangers’ lives, but one thing about the situation is fascinating.
And it’s not the marriage split. It’s the other break-up, the one between Jules and Tess.
One line from Jules’ podcast interview kills me: “I’m such an idiot.” She’s replaying four months of interactions with her then-best friend, the coffees, the confidences, through the bleak clarity of hindsight.
I wonder how many times she’s asked herself if she unwittingly handed Tess the insider’s blueprint to Lachie. She probably introduced them. Talked over wine about what he loved, what he was insecure about, what he needed to hear. A stranger has to guess their way into a marriage. A best friend arrives holding the keys.
Jules alleges Lachie cheated previously, a transgression she got past. But the thought of him kissing Tess just once was enough to make her call time on the marriage and head west with the kids. Why? Has to be more than just what she said was form. Ending a marriage is excruciating. Jules would have known it meant losing her home, her life, and holding hands with Lachie at graduations and happy crying over grandchildren’s bassinets.
For mine, it’s the best friend betrayal. Lachie stepping out a second time wasn’t just a husband breaking the rules of a marriage. It was two people who knew what was sacred to Jules breaking it together.
Who says the great love of a woman’s life should be our legal love? A best friend is priceless. She knows what it’s like to need an emergency tampon at the zoo, to have five films running simultaneously on the mini projectors in your head, to give birth to people and keep them alive by force of will. She can reference Flowers in the Attic, knows your bra size, that you’re allergic to honey and why you cry at the smell of nans’ handbags. She gets that what you want isn’t roses or jewellery but a weekend to yourself and Hobbytex for your birthday.
Best friends know it drives you bananas when your husband asks if he should hang out the washing or call his mum on her birthday. Could order for you at dinner. They remember when your Mirena was put in, that the second kid refused to wean. They send links to Moroccan interiors tours.
They’re up for sleeping beside us for as long as it takes should we become widows. They don’t disappoint us. They always have our backs.
Which is why there’s no script. When a husband cheats, there’s a word for what he often becomes: ex. There’s no simple word for what Tess is to Jules now.
Female friendship is the relationship we call forever but never protect with vows. There’s no ceremony going in, no settlement coming out, no custody arrangement for mutual friends.
And thus we have two women who were once gatekeepers to each other’s happiness duking it out on duelling podcasts while old mate plays on.
It surely cuts both ways. While Tess seemingly tried to blame Jules for not going quietly (“I thought we sort of made the unanimous decision not to make any comments publicly”) – very uncool, love – she has a BFF-shaped vacuum too.
I’d bet the house that somewhere in the wreckage she’s thought, “Crap, I picked the wrong Neale.”
So, what do you do when your bestie cheats on you? Nobody brings a tub of ice cream with two spoons. There’s no non-fiction genre, no revenge LBD, no glow-up montage. Maybe that’s the real story. We’ve spent centuries building rituals around the loss of a man and none around the loss of the woman who knew us and was precious.
Kate Halfpenny is an author and the founder of Bad Mother Media.
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