by Rachel Dove
* * *
Harry had never been as upset to see a postman in his life. Annabel jumped away from him, running to the door to answer the intrusion into their moment together.
She kissed me back. She wanted me.
The thought made his heart soar and once she had returned to him, a few little parcels and envelopes in her arms, he went to her again.
‘Wait...’ She stopped him in his tracks. He could see her chest heaving, just like his own. They were both smeared with spots and trails of dove-grey paint, tell-tale signs of where their hands had just been on each other’s bodies. ‘Harry, we can’t.’
He could feel his shoulders sag, and a pang in his heart at her words.
‘Why not? You kissed me back, Annie.’
Her face was stricken and she touched her fingers to her lips. ‘I know. I know I did but I shouldn’t have. I got carried away. I think you should go.’
Harry did not want to leave. He never wanted to leave. ‘No, please, Annie—’
‘It’s Annabel. I think you need to. We can’t be alone.’
‘But you said—’
‘I know what I said, but it’s just lust, Harry. Nostalgia. We’re not those people any more; we have a son. Responsibilities.’ She waggled a parcel in his direction and he saw Aidan’s name on it. He had never hated the postal service before, but he sure did now, for shaking them out of the moment. He’d been so close.
‘What about tomorrow, at work? We’ll be alone in the ambulance. We need to talk; I have to tell you—’
‘I don’t want to hear that yet! You know that!’
‘Why? What are you afraid of? That you’ll have no reason not to be with me any more? To give this a try?’ he shouted back at her, but she jumped at his tone. Damn it. He never wanted to make her feel like that. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout. I don’t want to go.’ He motioned around him at the half-finished room. ‘We need to finish this. Let me go get some lunch; we can talk then.’
She gripped the contents of her arms to her tighter and looked around her at the room. ‘I only have a few hours; my friend’s on school pickup. Aidan will be coming.’
‘That’s fine. I can be gone by then, if that’s what you want. He knows we work together. It’s not that unusual that I would be here, surely?’
She kept her distance from him and although he wanted to grab the post and take her into his arms, he resisted the urge.
‘I don’t regret the kiss. Do you?’
It took her a while to answer, and Harry held his breath for every long second while he watched her process her emotions. Eventually, she slowly shook her head. ‘No, I don’t, but it’s just so complicated, Harry.’
She wanted it too. That made his heart skip a beat.
‘I know, but I’m not going anywhere, Annie. Never again.’
‘How do I know that you mean that? I never thought you’d go in the first place. I couldn’t go through that again if you left, or it didn’t work out. You said it wasn’t working before. That could happen again.’
Harry sighed hard, all the energy leaving him. ‘I know I hurt you when I left, and I didn’t ever expect to do that either, believe me. I was a mess, Annie, but I’m not that person any more. A lot has changed, and knowing about Aidan...’ He couldn’t help but smile at the thought of his little boy. The little boy that they had made out of so much love. His little miracle baby. Made before the cancer ravaged his fertility and took away what he’d thought was his chance of ever becoming a father. ‘He’s amazing, Annie, and I want to be his dad more than anything. I want you, both of you. You just have to let me prove that to you.’ He slowly moved towards her now, and she didn’t back away. Taking the parcels and envelopes from her, he put them to one side and took her hands in his. ‘And I will prove it. That I’m the partner you had before, in work and out. Will you let me?’
* * *
He was saying all the right things. The feel of his hands in hers made her nerve-endings sing, and she was still reeling from that kiss.
God, that kiss. The physical side of things had always been great, and her body was still on fire from getting a taste of him after all this time.
If they hadn’t been interrupted, she was pretty sure that she wouldn’t have put a stop to things. She wanted to let him in, but her previous hurt was in her head the whole time. And then there was Aidan. The poor kid had always believed that his granddad was a friend of mummy’s, and his father was out of the picture. And now Harry was back, he’d met Aidan, he was supposedly here to stay, and it would be so easy. She could just let him in, back into her life and everyone else’s. Give Aidan the father he had always wanted and deserved. She knew what it was like not to have one. Did she really want that for Aidan? Wasn’t it why she had always turned down any offers from suitors over the years? She just couldn’t seem to find the words when it came to saying yes. That airport heartbreak had become a millstone around her neck. Every time she saved a life, did well at work, aced another week of single parenting, that was what always whispered in the back of her mind.
He left you there, without even a backward glance. Everything you did up to that point and beyond, the fact that you weren’t enough was always there.
It was one of the reasons she’d never bothered with dating once she’d had Aidan. Her friends, and even Abe on occasion, had tried to set her up with dates, but she’d never pulled the trigger on any of the prospective new men in her life.
Sometimes, on her worst days, when Aidan was playing up, the chores were never ending and work was full-on, she went back to that day. Sometimes she felt like whatever she did, however independent she was, she would always be that girl who vomited in the middle of the airport lounge after being left high and dry by the man who was supposed to put her before all others. BAE, indeed. One of her so-called ‘friends’ from work had once joked that Harry had took it to mean, Bye, Annabel. End of. She’d never forgotten that.
‘Annie? You there?’ Harry’s voice pulled her back into the room and she broke the physical contact with him and turned away, kneeling by the little stack of deliveries and starting to open them up.
‘Yeah, I’m here. Ham on white for me, please. The old sandwich shop around the corner’s still there. I’ll sort these out.’
She felt him behind her, and his feet didn’t move. She concentrated on opening the next cardboard box as if her life and sanity depended on it. She couldn’t trust herself to look at him, so she did what she always did. She buried it deep in her heart, away from the harsh light of day. Opening parcels and painting she could do. Major life decisions would have to wait till another day.
‘I won’t be long,’ Harry said eventually. She could hear the rejection in his dull tone, and she closed her eyes against the sting of tears that threatened to erupt. The door closed, but when she looked up he was still standing there.
‘Harry?’
‘I had cancer, Annie. That’s why I left. I know you don’t want to hear this, but tough. A few weeks before we were due to go to Dubai, I got diagnosed. Testicular cancer. Aggressive. I didn’t want you to wreck your life, give up on your dreams and nursemaid me instead. I was scared, Annie, and sick, and upset. I wasn’t cheating on you or planning to. I didn’t leave you, not like you thought. I loved you, Annie, so much. I just did what I thought was right. After your mum, I just couldn’t put you through that again. It was bad, but my bosses in Dubai surprised me. They had a research centre over there, specialising in my illness. They offered to still take me, to keep my job on. I needed to earn, and I needed to get out of Dad’s house. You know things were bad between us back then. I felt cornered, so I went. I just couldn’t put you through that in a new country, all on your own. I got better, I got your call, and it gave me the hope I needed to come home, to try to win you back. And, as I keep saying, I’m back for good. Did you hear me, Annie? I didn’t leave you because I w
anted to, okay?’
She nodded, not trusting her voice to even make any coherent sound other than a strangled squeak. Everything he had just unloaded on her was swimming around in her head.
Cancer. He’d had cancer. He’d left her to spare her from going through it all again, and so he did it alone. He was just as alone as she was. More so. She felt her face redden as she played back in her head every time she’d nipped at him since he’d got back.
Harry spoke again, softer this time. He sounded so sad, but she couldn’t get her head to lift to look at him. ‘I’ll go and get lunch, and when I get back we are going to talk about this.’
When the door closed and the sound of his footsteps disappeared, she stared at the wall, her grey matter trying to keep up with the flurry of information. He was sick. That was something she’d never considered on her list of reasons Harry had left. Not even once. Reaching for the phone in her pocket with paint-splattered fingers, she dialled Tom’s number with shaky hands.
‘Hey, girl! How’s the painting coming along? We’re just in the baby shop! I tell you, Lloyd is hammering the old plastic today! Will you tell him that a baby cosy toes is not essential for a pair of newborns? I swear, we need to do a Pinterest intervention at some point.’
Annabel broke down into racking sobs and when she tried to speak it came out as one big wail.
‘Anna Banana, what’s wrong? Lloyd, Annabel’s upset, come here, quick.’ She heard footsteps, the background noise of the busy shop die down, and then Tom and Lloyd’s voices.
‘You’re on speakerphone, we’re hiding in the disabled toilet. What’s wrong?’
Where to start...?
‘I kissed Harry! That’s what’s wrong! He showed up this morning with breakfast, and we were painting and...’
Lloyd, who was usually the calmer of the two, did a little whoop into the handset. ‘Oh, wow, that’s amazing! Why are you upset? I thought tha—Oof! Tom!’
She could hear the phone being wrestled from him, and Tom was the next to speak. ‘Sorry about Mr Excited over here; he’s been sniffing the baby talc. I have to say, though, I saw this coming.’
‘What?’ Annabel retorted crossly. ‘I didn’t. I didn’t see any of this coming, and that’s not all either. He had cancer, Tom. That’s why he left. Not for some leggy blonde or because he didn’t love me. Because he had cancer. He just told me, and then went out for sandwiches!’ She sobbed again. Tom sighed, and she could hear him and Lloyd whispering to each other. ‘Guys, help! I don’t have long; he only went to get lunch. What the hell do I do? I’ve been awful to him since he got back, and he tried to tell me so many times. I’m evil, I didn’t help him. I kept his son from him, I didn’t listen to him. What the hell am I doing, Tom?’
The line was silent for what felt like forever.
‘Tom?’ she sniffed into the phone. ‘You there? Please say you’re there.’
‘Sorry, it’s just the shock. I’m processing. Poor Harry! I guess it makes sense, though, doesn’t it? The Harry who left you wasn’t the Harry we knew. I feel so bad now; I should have tried harder to reach him. He must have been really scared. I can’t believe he just did that on his own. It must have been awful. But you kissed him though, right? So you didn’t send him away after? Annabel, I’ve got to say, the writing was on the wall as soon as we saw him at the airport. You know the truth now; there’s nothing holding you back, is there?’
‘Yeah, and it’s better than the writing on the wall in here. I mean, do they not teach spelling in school any more?’ Lloyd’s voice chipped in. Another muffled struggle, presumably Tom giving his husband another shove.
‘Focus! What I mean is, well...you’ve hardly been happy since he left. I know you think you are, but you’ve never even looked at another man. We’ve tried to set you up with every straight man in a ten-mile radius, and you’ve never been bothered. Aidan’s growing up now; what about you? Do you want to rattle around in that house like Miss Havisham in your retirement? I hated Harry for what he did, but he came back. He obviously went through something life-changing, but he still came back. I know it’s crazy, but he obviously thought he was sparing you from going through what he faced. He knew your mum, what you both went through before you met us. He obviously never wanted to go. That means something, right?’
Annabel wiped her tears away with her free arm and nodded.
‘Right?’ Tom pressed.
‘I’m nodding,’ she retorted sulkily. ‘He’s only been back a short while though; why would he stay now? What’s keeping him here, once the novelty fades? I can’t go through that again. And then there’s Aidan.’
‘Exactly,’ Lloyd spoke up. ‘There is Aidan to think about. Don’t you think he deserves a chance to be part of a family? We support all types of families, obviously, but you’ve done this alone for so long. It takes a village, right? Harry could be part of that village, honey.’
‘He’s Aidan’s real father,’ she blurted out. ‘That changes everything.’
The line went quiet again, and Annabel held the phone away from her face to check that the call hadn’t disconnected. ‘Hello? You still there?’
‘Give us a second. You keep dropping bombshells, and that’s the first time you’ve admitted that to us.’
Now Annabel fell silent.
‘Did she hang up? Call her back! Tom, call her back!’ Lloyd’s high-pitched tone made Annabel chuckle through her tears.
‘I’m here. Nice return fire, by the way. Did you know Harry was Aidan’s father the whole time?’
‘Er...well...’ Tom floundered.
‘Yes, we did. Don’t forget, we know you. The timing made sense, and we scraped you off your bedroom floor when he left. There’s no way that you’d have entertained another man. Then or now. We took you out, remember? There was no man. Aside from the ones you brushed off, and the one you threatened to throat punch for getting handsy.’
Annabel cried again, half laughing, half wailing.
They’d never questioned her or judged her once. She loved them all the more for it.
‘I wish you’d said something.’
‘You never said anything either; you shut us down whenever we got near to asking. We figured you would in time, but you never did. We wanted to respect your wishes. We get it, Annabel. We already hated Harry.’
‘Yeah, I feel sorry for that now; we need to send him a fruit basket or something.’
‘Lloyd, shush! Has Harry met Aidan yet?’ Tom asked.
‘He’s living with Abe, so yeah. Aidan doesn’t know though.’ A thought occurred to her and she felt as if ice water had been poured down her back. ‘Does that mean everyone knows? Oh, no, I can’t do this. He’s working at the station—what am I going to do? I have to end this, now. There’s too much at stake. I can’t risk Aidan getting hurt; he’s had such a tough time lately.’
She could hear footsteps on the path once more, and the whistle that Harry used to do, the one he always did when he was happy. He thought that there was a chance now. Maybe he was just feeling lighter now he’d spoken his truth. She’d done that. She’d messed up, muddied the waters. She needed to undo it.
‘He’s coming, I’ve got to go.’
‘Wait, Annabel! Don’t do what I think you’re going to do. Stop being so scared! He told you why he left! This is what you want! Stop hiding!’
She ripped open the last of the packages at speed, her phone shoved between her chin and her shoulder. She didn’t want him to think she’d been sitting there blubbing since he’d left, even though she had.
‘I can’t do it, Tom, it’s too late. It’s too complicated! I’ll call you later, okay?’ She ended the call, Lloyd and Tom’s protestations ringing in her ears as she shoved the phone back into her back pocket. When Harry walked in a second later, a carrier bag swinging from one arm, she was sitting cross-legged, her face hidden by her hair as she s
tacked up the assortment of bits she’d bought for the house, and for Aidan.
‘Hey,’ he said, shutting the door and coming to sit beside her. ‘I got some doughnuts too, and extra for Aidan after school.’ His smile crumpled when she turned to look at him. ‘Oh, God, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have just dropped all that on you and left. Are you okay?’
Annabel pushed the items to one side, and she reached for the sandwich he was proffering in his hand.
‘I’m okay; it was just a shock.’
‘Not like me, dropping bad news and running off. I’m glad you know, though. I’ve wanted to tell you forever. And the kiss was amazing. Just like before. Better even.’
She reached for his arm, pulling him down to sit next to her. ‘Harry, that kiss was—’
‘One of the three greatest things that has happened to me in the last year. The first being when you called me, and the second finding out you’d had our son.’
He gripped her hand in his and she pulled it away, putting her hands on the top of her knees to stop them doing their own thing and reaching for him. He looked at his empty hand, and then the floor.
‘You still don’t trust me, do you?’
‘Why didn’t you just tell me about the cancer? How bad was it? What treatment did you have?’
‘It was bad enough. Stage two. I had three tumours, I had to have some lymph nodes removed. Intensive treatment. I was a cue ball up top for a while.’ He swallowed hard, pushing his food away. ‘I didn’t tell you because you would have come with me. You’d have travelled to a different country and put your life on hold, and I didn’t want that for you. I was terrified, Annie, and I couldn’t put you through that. Not after all that you went through with your mum. I was there for that; I saw how bad it was.’
Annabel thought of her mother, the pain she’d gone through. She would have been by his side in a heartbeat.