Well, yeh. If wishes were horses, my horses would’ve stampeded both of us straight over a cliff already. As it was, I took a seat beside her where she was feeding the baby—could the woman give me one day when I didn’t have to try not to stare at her bare breasts?—picked up a mug of decidedly lukewarm tea, and told Jax, “So. You heard something. Heard that I got suspended. Two weeks, if you’re wondering, and, yeh, Koro knows. Tane knows, and June almost certainly knows, so why shouldn’t you know, too? You’ve got questions about it, so go on and ask me.”
Always better to take the high road. See “calm” and “winning,” above.
Unfortunately, Jax had probably read that same manual. He said, “You were suspended by the Ethics Committee at the hospital for inappropriate behavior with a patient. With Poppy. Sexual behavior, is what I heard, though it wasn’t put down that way for the record.” Which had been fortunate, or I might not have worked again.
“Wait,” Poppy said. “Stop answering Jax and answer me, Matiu. What the bloody hell?” She was sitting up straight, and Isobel stopped with her lunch and made some soft little cooing sounds, which had Poppy putting her onto her shoulder and pulling up her bra and dress. After a minute. Again—not helpful.
“Mummy, you have to put a dollar in the swear jar,” Hamish said. For once, he didn’t sound worried. He sounded delighted. “You should probably put in two dollars, because that’s two bad words.” He told me, “When it gets to be twenty dollars, we get to go to the toy store! We’re at thirteen dollars already since the last time. Now we’ll be at fourteen dollars!”
“I’m going to have to change the rules,” Poppy said, “because my life gets more aggravating every single bl— every single day. Tell me, Matiu. And then tell me why you didn’t tell me, because that’s the worst part of it. You didn’t think I could help? You didn’t think I would help?”
“He probably thought you were fragile, and he was protecting you,” Karen saw fit to contribute. “Jax does it too, and Hemi does it All. The. Frigging. Time. It always drove me nuts, seeing him treat Hope like that, although now that it’s me, sometimes I actually like it, which is worrisome. What’s up with that? And don’t tell me it’s my essential femininity,” she told Jax. “Or I’ll have to wear the Wonder Woman costume again, with the lasso and all. You know how you hate that.”
“Stop it,” Jax said. “This is serious.”
“Too bloody right it’s serious,” Poppy said. She was patting Isobel’s back, a picture of luscious femininity. Until you saw her eyes.
“That’s—” Hamish began again, but Poppy wasn’t listening. She said, “Tell me, Matiu. Now. And I don’t want to hear from you,” she told her brother. “What it has to do with you, I have no idea.”
“I’m your brother,” Jax said, his jaw bunching in the way common to every man in the world who’s about to get into a fight. His limbic system, performing as advertised. “That’s what it has to do with me. You’ve been separated six weeks, and by coincidence, you have a six-week-old baby, too.”
“Seven,” Poppy said. “And so what? You mean I’m irrational? That I’m a fool? If I am, maybe it’s time for me to choose for myself, did you think of that? Instead of just being silly, scatty Poppy, who needs to be looked after, because she can’t quite manage. I’ve built a business. I own a home. I’ve raised children. I’ve ... Wait.” She swiveled back to me. “It wasn’t my turn. It was your turn. Talk.”
“I liked what you said better,” I said. “Keep on saying it.”
“Not helpful, mate,” Jax said.
“Oh,” I said, “I think it is. I’m loving it.”
“I have to admit,” Karen said, “this is very exciting.”
Poppy didn’t listen. She just stared me down, patted her daughter’s back like there’d be a prize for it, and said, “Talk.”
I said, “It’s not exciting. It’s rubbish, actually. Max made a complaint, because of the hospital visit and the, ah, follow-up. At neither point of which you were my patient. So—rubbish.”
“What follow-up?” Karen asked.
I ignored her. I said, “The point is, you weren’t my patient, so even if I had been inappropriate, it wouldn’t have been an ethics lapse, except that, of course, it would have been. I’m meant to know when somebody’s in a vulnerable state. I do know it. I did know it. Which is why, again—rubbish.”
Rock breaks scissors. I was doing it. I was cool. Except that—if I won here, what exactly was I winning?
Did I actually want her not to think I was attracted? I wanted the exact opposite. But how could I say so now?
Well, bugger.
Poppy
I was about to scream. I would have screamed, except that it would’ve scared my kids. Story of my life.
I had a Mum-stare. Every Mum has a Mum-stare, the one you use when you’re too far away to nudge. I fixed Matiu with it and said, “So my soon-to-be-ex-husband reported you to the Ethics Committee of the hospital, the hospital where all you did was help me. And he reported what I have to assume looks like a pretty serious lapse, with pretty serious consequences, since you were suspended, and now that’s on your record, which I’ll bet is the first time ever, because no matter what you think, you’re not nearly as much of a bad boy and heartbreaker and ... and insert-other-words-for-the-Swear-Jar as you think you are, because all you care about is not hurting people, and ...”
I had to take a breath. Isobel was also fast asleep, but I didn’t want to put her down. She was all that was standing between me and the total loss of my temper, and she was a pretty slim reed. I finished up, “And you didn’t think it’d be a good idea to tell me about it. You didn’t think that I’d care, maybe. You didn’t think I’d help. Just who do you think I am? Oh, I forgot. I’m vulnerable. I’m fragile. I’m bloody helpless.”
Oh, no. Hamish. I turned to find him with the dog in his lap, his hand in its fur, and both of them watching me, round-eyed. I said, “Keep track of the swears, love. I’ll settle up later. And I’m not ...” I was starting to say that I wasn’t angry, but that wasn’t going to work. Hamish wasn’t a fool. “I’m not out of control,” I told him. “I’m angry, that’s all.” I should tell him to go inside, except how would that be better? If he was listening, and feeling like he wasn’t supposed to? I’d talk to him about it later. That was the best I could think of.
“But why are you angry at Matiu?” he asked. “He’s nice to us. He came on my first day of school, and he took Livvy and me to the beach even though she was naked. And he held my hand when you were having the baby and I was very scared.” Proving that every single man in my family, every single man related to somebody in my family, including the five-year-old, was completely missing the point.
“Thank you,” Matiu told him, then told me, not looking one bit like a calm, competent doctor, but like a man pushed to the limit instead, “Which is all I’ve tried to do. All I’ve tried to be. Right, then. I’m not meant to protect you? Not meant to even try? So that night when you rang me, at the raveled end of every single rope you had and much too close to a breakdown, and told me Max had taken Isobel, and you couldn’t stand it? I shouldn’t have come over then? I shouldn’t have tried to help in any way I could? And then, when I was holding you, finally getting a chance to touch you, I shouldn’t have stopped? I should have gone on and kissed you, when I knew you weren’t ready for anything like that, physically or emotionally? When I knew you needed a friend, and that was all?”
It was very nearly a roar. It wasn’t Matiu at all, except that it was. And I was all the way gone. All the way redhead-lost. “Why do you get to say what I need?” I asked. Jax looked gobsmacked. Karen looked excited and possibly a little thrilled. Even Vanessa was in the doorway, taking it all in like she was taking notes for later. And I didn’t care. “And you don’t need to say all that to make me feel better, or whatever it is. To make me not feel like a fool. You know as well as I do that Max made it all up to get back at you, because you chucked him out o
f the delivery room and his pride couldn’t take it. Because he lost and he wanted to win. You know and I know that there was nothing in it, that you never did anything, and yet you took this anyway? You didn’t even ask me to help, to call the ... the committee, or whoever it is, and tell them the truth? Stop trying to protect me!”
“Right, then.” Matiu’s jaw, his entire body, were tight with anger, and there was nothing calm about him. If he’d had a tail, he’d have been swishing it. It would have been a little scary, too. “You want to know how I felt? What I’d have done, if I were that wanker—uh, shit. Sorry, Koro. And Hamish.”
“That’s two bad swears,” Hamish said. I should put him in the house, except I couldn’t. “Those are two dollars each.”
“I’d have kissed you, yeh,” Matiu went on. His skin hadn’t reddened. It was too perfect for that. It had just darkened. His golden-brown eyes were flashing, his black brows were lowered, and I wanted to draw him. Or slap him. Or ... what had he just said?
“I’d have done more than that,” he said, “because, yeh, that’s the man I am. Don’t be thinking I’m anything better than that, because it isn’t true. I didn’t want to be your friend. I wanted to be your lover. I still do. You’re not my patient, and it’s not against the rules, but it’s against my rules. I don’t take advantage of vulnerable women. I knew I could, but I didn’t do it then and I’m not doing it now, even though you’re wearing that dress, and those shoes, and you keep feeding your baby in front of me! And if that doesn’t get me a little bloody credit here, then bugger it. I’m done.”
Hamish whispered something. I think it was “six.” Two two-dollar swears, and two one-dollar ones. Hamish’s maths skills were excellent. I noticed that, because I was trying not to notice everything else. I said, “You don’t. You can’t. I have ... I still have a tummy.”
“I. Don’t. Care!” It was nearly a shout, and I jumped. “Why d’you imagine a man wouldn’t be attracted to you, just because your husband was a ...” He was making a mighty effort to control himself. I could see the tug-of-war happening right in front of me. The cool doctor, and the man beneath. I hadn’t been wrong about the tattoo. I hadn’t. And he could definitely, definitely have had a tail.
He continued in a slightly calmer tone. “A piece of rubbish. Whatever he told you, whatever he showed you, it’s not true. You’re beautiful.”
“But I cut my hair,” I said. Stupidly.
“And your hair looks hot as hell,” he said. “I told you. You look free. I’m trying to remind myself you’re not. It’s not working.”
“I am free,” I said. “I’m absolutely free. I’m free, I’m of sound mind, and if I want to kiss somebody, I’ll bloody well kiss him. And if I want to defend somebody who never did kiss me, who never did anything wrong except be my friend, I’d appreciate being given the chance to do it! Give me the number, whoever the chair of that committee is, because I’m calling him today. I’m calling him now.”
“Uh, Poppy,” Karen said. “It’s Saturday.”
I waved an arm. The arm that wasn’t holding my baby. “Then I’ll call him Monday. Whoops, Labour weekend. Right, then. Tuesday. And you.” I turned to Jax. “You can just get out of my business. I mean it. Out. How many times have I rushed over to your ... your encampment, or whatever it is, and told you how to defuse a bomb?”
“Not quite the same,” Jax said, but there could be some smiling happening.
“Exactly the same,” I said. “I trusted you to manage your job, and your life, even when that life was going about as badly as a man’s possibly could. When you got blown up, and you lost your leg, and you were all the way shut down? When Dad kept trying to get you back home, to keep you with them, like you couldn’t handle your own life, your own pain? I didn’t say, “Oh, Jax, you poor broken fella. You’d better go home to Mum and Dad, because you’ll never be able to stand on your own feet again.’ I trusted you to stand on your feet even when you only had one of them. I knew you’d be strong, because you’re my brother, and I know you. That doesn’t mean you don’t hurt. It means you go on anyway. Well, when have I not been strong? When? Is it when I’ve been home all night alone, pregnant, with two kids, because my husband’s with another woman and I know it, and I’m trying to figure out whether I can save my marriage, and whether I even want to try? Is it when I’ve kept on with my work even while my life is falling apart? All right, yes, now I’m not. Now I’m blocked. I am. I’m stuck. But I’m still working at my life. I’m trying. I have a newborn. I have two kids. I’m holding it all together. I’m surviving. I’m ... I’m building. Just like you.” I hoped, anyway.
I didn’t dare look at Matiu. I couldn’t think of all those things he’d said. I’d think about them later. I wasn’t even sure who I was angry at anymore, other than Max. Other than my life, and my stupid decisions that there was no reversing now. I kept trying to grab the ribbons of that life together, to hold them in my hands, and they kept slipping away, like a nightmare where you were trying to get to the airport, and the plane left soon, but your suitcase kept opening and spilling everything out. I’d think I had all my ribbons, and there one of them would go again, fluttering away. I wasn’t going to say that, though.
Surviving when you don’t see how you can, going on when you want to stop—that’s what it means to be an adult, and there’s no amount of money in the world that can shield you from it. I ought to know, because whatever Jax thought, whatever Matiu thought, whatever Max thought, I’d been an adult for a long, long time. And I was still one now.
Jax said, “Then maybe I’d better tell you about Dad.”
23
Impulse Control
Matiu
Poppy wasn’t looking at me. She was looking at her brother. That gave me some time to compose myself, at least. What had I said? What had she said? A lot about independence. Not much about me.
This was why I didn’t do “emotional.” I didn’t work that way. But like it or not, just now, I was emotional. I was more than that. I was lit up inside. Good way, bad way ... It felt bad. It felt much too close to out of control, and all I wanted was to keep going. I wanted to push it, and no amount of reminding myself of Poppy’s vulnerable state and my responsibilities was helping.
“Oh, no,” Poppy said. Again, not to me. To Jax. “What? What did he do?”
“I can tell you what he did,” I said. “Added his voice to the discussion. Added his pressure with the hospital.”
“No,” Poppy said.
“Yes,” Jax said. “And as Mum and Dad have given the hospital millions ...”
Poppy jumped up like she couldn’t possibly have sat another minute. She was still holding Isobel, though, who was asleep. I said, “Give her to me. You may need both hands.” And, somehow, smiled at her. I got a confused look in return, then, to my shock, a laugh. A frustrated one, but it was a laugh.
“You keep surprising me,” she said. “But—wait. I’m still mad as fire at you. Oh—wait. Hamish.”
Hamish was, in fact, still sitting with the dog. Still watching, and still listening. Probably worried. I could help with that, anyway, so I said, “Hamish and I will go inside, eh, mate. With Isobel.” I reached for her, Poppy handed her over, and I got the same flip of the heart as always at the feeling of her impossibly small body curled up tight against my shoulder, her little face pressed into my neck, the way her arms came up even in her sleep so she could grab at my shirt. The grasping reflex, that was all, but my heart didn’t seem to know it. I went on, trying not to show any of that, “We’ll put the baby in her carrier to sleep, mate, since I happen to know that Ari wiggles in his cot like an earthworm, and he’d crawl straight over Isobel. And then we’ll see if Vanessa will give us one of those lamingtons. We’ll be taste testers for tonight, eh.”
“That’s good. You do that, my son.” That was Koro, who’d said exactly nothing thus far, who’d just watched and listened and taken it all in, like all the drama had happened before and would happen again, a
nd he was content to let it play out. A bit like Hamish, really. There was an odd thought. Could you see a personality that way? Longitudinally, so to speak? Why not, though? Poppy had said that kids were born with their own personalities. Her own kids certainly had some defining characteristics. Hamish and Olivia, at least, though Isobel, nonverbal as she was, still felt to me like ... like a person. A gentle girl. A flower, not a rainbow. A rose, not a daisy.
How did I know? Maybe that limbic system again. Maybe I knew more than I thought I did, in all the ways I’d never thought I’d known anything.
Or maybe, of course, I was completely out of my depth.
Karen sighed, stood up, and said, “Clearly, it should be me watching kids, since I’m the only one not involved here. Even though this is the most fascinating thing I’ve heard since ... well, since Jax had his last run-in with his dad, actually. How can the two of you be so awesome, with a dad that hard-headed, and who’s got such a stick up ...” She stopped, possibly wondering how big the Swear Jar might be.
Jax and Poppy spoke together. “Mum.”
“I suspect you’re right,” Karen said, “although Jax is way more intense than he looks, actually. Sadly, though, this time, it really isn’t about me. Come on, Hamish. I’ll take you and Isobel into the house, and Uncle Matiu can stay here and figure out how to defend his honor. And his job.”
Stone Cold Kiwi (New Zealand Ever After Book 2) Page 18