‘Good-looking, funny…’ Molly changed into second gear and the engine let out a groan of protest as they finally moved a couple of hundred metres. ‘Thin, tall, blonde.’ The car in front’s brake lights weren’t working, which made things even more difficult, and they jerked forward in their seats as Molly slammed on her brakes and ground the gears, along with her teeth. ‘Intelligent, witty, sexy, organised…’ Stalling in the middle of the freeway, Molly put on her handbrake and restarted the engine, praying the service on her ancient car had actually achieved something. It had—the car started again and the conversation resumed.
‘Basically, she was everything I’m not.’
‘So you hated her?’ Anne Marie laughed.
‘Sadly, no,’ Molly sighed, nodding her thanks to the police officer who had waved her onto the hard shoulder and past the accident, ‘though not for want of trying. She was also extremely friendly and nice—Oh, do you think we should offer help…?’
But nothing, not even a pile-up on the freeway, was going to stop Anne-Marie. She wound down her window and after a brief chat with the police officer, who said that everything was under control, turned her attention back to the—for Molly—painful subject.
‘You were saying?’
‘That we’re going to be late,’ Molly attempted, and Anne Marie didn’t push, didn’t say anything.
But maybe she did need to talk, maybe what had eaten her up for so long now really did need to be voiced.
‘Luke and I were friends—really good friends. We just hit it off the day we met. I had a bit of a crush on him, well, any female with a pulse did, but he was already going out with Amanda when we met, and I knew I didn’t stand a chance—it was nice to just be friends. Then suddenly they broke up. Out of the blue. I heard that they’d broken up and that she’d gone back to Sydney.’
‘And?’
‘We had a sick kid in one day—I know we have sick kids all the time but…’ Molly’s voice thickened for a moment at the memory. ‘She died. I know it happens, I know we all deal with it, but we were both pretty upset. The next day was my day off, but that evening the phone rang—he’d got my number from the ward book and he rang to see if I was OK.’ Molly frowned. ‘We were friends at work, that was all, so ringing me at home was crossing the line. He asked if maybe I wanted to go out for a drink.’
‘Which you did?’
‘I was more than happy to cross the line.’
‘You got on well?’
‘Wonderfully well.’ Molly sighed. ‘We were only together for three months, but for the entire time, from the first date, we were inseparable. We were already friends and that just got better. It wasn’t just sex, though that was great, and it wasn’t just the romance. I can’t really explain it…’
‘Sounds a bit like love,’ Anne Marie said, and Molly sniffed loudly as she indicated to leave the freeway, because that was exactly how it had felt, at least to her. ‘I was worried at first. I mean, I wanted to know that they’d actually split up, that she wasn’t just in Sydney and they were taking a break, but, no, he told me they were washed up, that there was absolutely no chance of them getting back together. Then one Friday I was on a half-day and he rang and asked if we could meet. I thought it was strange. I mean we never actually formally met, itwas either his place or mine, but we met in this café and he told me he’d made a mistake, that he was moving up to Sydney to be with Amanda and that it was over…’ And even though she could tell Anne Marie almost everything, that bit she couldn’t. Even five years on the words were too painful to repeat to herself, let alone someone else.
‘Do you think she was pregnant? Do you think that’s why he went back to her?’
‘Probably—I don’t know the twins’ birthday, but I’ve done the maths and I guess she must have been.’ The sign for the hospital blurred. Molly turned in, swiping her ID for the staff car park, and even though they were late as she pulled into her usual spot, neither woman made a move to get out. ‘If he’d told me that, I could have understood. If he’d said that he had to make a go of things, I could have taken that.’
‘Could you?’
‘I think so.’ Molly sniffed again. ‘I mean, it would have hurt, but I would have respected why he was ending things. But, Anne Marie, what we had was good, so-o-o good. I utterly, utterly fell for him, held nothing back for myself, and never, not for a second, did I see it coming. When he rang me, when I met him that day, it never even entered my head that he was about to end things. And it wasn’t just that—it was how he ended it. It doesn’t matter.’
‘I think it does.’
‘Not now…’ Molly gave a grim smile. ‘But if I’ve learnt anything from it, it’s that I’ll never trust him again.’
‘Which isn’t a very good basis for a relationship.’
‘We’re not in a relationship, though,’ Molly pointed out.
‘Come off it, Molly. You see each other all the time, you’re sleeping together, you’re both clearly crazy about each other—if that’s not a relationship, then I don’t know what is.’
‘OK, maybe we are in a relationship of sorts, but I know this much—he’ll never have that piece of me again.’
‘What piece?’ Anne Marie frowned.
‘That piece you give of yourself. That piece of yourself that you normally don’t let anyone else see, that piece of yourself that you trust the other person to take care of.’ There was a wistful note to her voice as she recalled all they had shared, all they had once been, but her lips pursed with a bitter tinge of aftertaste, even after all these years.
‘Be careful,’ Anne Marie said, and Molly wished that she hadn’t, wished Anne Marie would tell her she was being stupid, tell her, as she always usually did, to go for it, that it was time to live, time to get out and have some fun.
‘Hey.’ Molly tried to make light of it. ‘Weren’t you just saying the other week that I should get out there, start dating?’
‘And move on from the past,’ Anne Marie elaborated. ‘And, yes, I know Luke’s gorgeous, and I know he clearly likes you, it’s just…well, he didn’t treat you well.’
‘I know.’
‘And you deserve to be treated well.’
‘I know that, too.’
‘Just don’t settle for anything even close to second best. Look, maybe I’m worrying about nothing.’ She relented a touch. ‘Maybe, with losing his wife, he’s been through enough hell to come out a different man.’
It was scary how much Molly wanted to believe that he had, scary that, despite firm words, somewhere deep inside she was wavering, wanting to give him that piece of her she really ought to hold back—and wanting too that piece of Luke that, until she opened up, he wasn’t prepared to give. ‘Come on.’ She heaved her bag from the car floor and opened the door. ‘Or we’ll be really late.’
‘What’s all the noise?’ Molly asked sternly. ‘I told you two to settle down half an hour ago.’
‘Sorry!’ Bernadette didn’t look remotely sorry.
‘Sorry…’ Nathan mumbled. ‘We were watching a movie…’ He started laughing again and so too did Bernadette. Molly stood between their beds and looked up. They both had a television over their beds and had taken to wearing their headphones while watching the same show and shouting ever louder at each other.
‘What are you two watching?’ Molly asked, hoping that, given the lateness of the hour, she hadn’t let them get away with watching something completely inappropriate. But it was one of her favourite comedies too, and Molly couldn’t help but giggle herself as, even without headphones, she easily got the joke.
‘Keep it down,’ Molly warned as she left them to it.
‘We’ve got a direct admission coming in.’ Luke came into the kitchen to find her, where she was rummaging in the hospital fridge, trying to find some juice and sandwiches for one of her post-op patients who had woken up hungry. ‘Carl Adams—an eight-year-old with asthma. That was his GP—he’s seen the child several times over the past week
and can’t get it under control. He’s coming in directly from the GP’s to the ward. He’s been in a few times.’ He must have seen Molly’s slight grimace. ‘He’ll be stuck down there for ever if I send him to A and E. There’s been a big pile-up on the freeway and—’
‘I know all that,’ Molly agreed, ‘but I’ll be down a nurse for a while, because no doubt you’ll want a chest X-ray.’
‘No doubt!’ Luke made no apology.
‘I think I recognise the name,’ Molly said. ‘He was in a few weeks ago, actually. I’ll ring Admissions and have his notes sent up.’
‘I want a drink.’ The spotty, moody face of Aaron Bowden peered round the door and made her jump.
‘Please!’ Luke stared over at his patient, who shouldn’t be in the staff kitchen anyway.
‘Please,’ Aaron mumbled, taking the can of lemonade Molly offered. With Luke still staring, he offered a quick ‘Thanks.’ Then added, ‘Oh, and my television isn’t working.’
‘I’ll ring Maintenance in the morning.’
‘But I was in the middle of watching a film!’
‘It’s eleven o’clock—you should be in bed,’ Molly said, but Aaron just blinked at her and she gave in with a sigh. ‘They’re watching it in Room 2. Go and get your headphones. I’m sure they won’t mind if you join them, but I’m telling you, and you can tell them, that if I have to come in about the noise again, all televisions are going off.’
‘Thanks,’ Aaron mumbled, without prompting this time. ‘By the way…’ His face was as red as his pimples as he turned to Luke. ‘How was that kid—the one who had the fit the other morning?’
‘Doing well.’ Luke smiled. ‘He should be back on the ward tomorrow.’
‘Still big on manners, I see!’ Molly grinned when Aaron had gone.
‘Absolutely!’ Luke nodded. ‘Aaron’s a nice kid under all that hair—he just comes across badly.’
‘He’s a teenager!’
‘A teenager who’s getting himself into all sorts of trouble,’ Luke pointed out. ‘I spoke to him last night. You know, I think he’s really bright.’
‘Aaron?’ Molly frowned, wondering if they were talking about the same patient. ‘He’s failing in everything at school…’
‘Because he’s bored out of his skull, probably. I was taking some blood from him earlier and the news was on—they were talking about interest rate rises or something. I was only half listening, and he came out with a really smart comment. I nearly missed his vein. It was something really observant that you wouldn’t expect a fifteen-year-old to say.’ His eyes widened, along with Molly’s. ‘Especially Aaron. I’m going to see about getting him evaluated. I’ll have to speak to his mum first and…’ Luke grinned ‘…if I have unearthed a child genius, he’s going to need a few manners when he goes for a scholarship interview.’
How could he have just given it all away? For the hundredth, maybe the thousandth time she asked herself. For some quick money? For convenient hours? Had he gone on to do the GP rotation she could have understood—his own patients, following them through, getting to know their families. All of that, Luke would have adored, but a walk-in, walk-out clinic just wasn’t him. A script for antibiotics and a sick certificate for work for a nameless face wasn’t the way Luke practised medicine.
Aaron Bowden was in for burns to his hands and neck—thanks to a stupid home experiment in the garden while he’d flunked school and his mother had been at work. The usual! But Luke had taken time with the young man. Had sat and chatted to him one night when a children’s ward was the last place a teenager wanted to be, when it seemed every baby in the place was awake and all the toddlers were crying for their mums.
Luke had sat in the playroom with him.
Had turned down the chance for a precious couple of hours of sleep to play video games with Aaron and get to know him.
That was the sort of doctor Luke was—the sort of man he was.
And he was also a man who could reduce her to jelly with just a few choice words…
‘Right…’ He drained his glass. ‘I just need to sign a chart for Anne Marie. Call me when the new admission gets here.’
‘Please!’ Molly called to his departing back, but he ignored her. ‘Please!’ she said more loudly, which, as Luke turned round, she realised had been his intention.
Her breath caught in her throat when he turned round and gave her that look—that look that told her and only her exactly what he was thinking—and topped it off with a tiny, knowing wink.
‘Save the begging for later, Molly!’ He grinned at her blush as he twisted her words deliciously. ‘We’re at work, remember?’
‘What are you looking so flustered about?’ Anne Marie asked when Molly came back to the nurses’station where a completely relaxed Luke was signing off the drug charts.
‘I’m just hot,’ Molly said, pointedly taking off her cardigan, then frowning when Luke came back onto the ward. ‘And keep an eye on Room 2—there’s a party going on.’
‘They could use one!’ Anne Marie said. ‘And so could you!’
‘Sorry?’ Molly frowned.
‘When was the last time you went to a party?’ Anne Marie dunked her biscuit in her coffee as Molly pursed her lips. She knew what Anne Marie was up to, but she’d promised not to interfere, and she would have reminded her of that fact except Luke was standing there—Luke, who didn’t actually know that Anne Marie knew. ‘When was the last time you had a fabulous night out somewhere really nice?’ Thankfully a call bell went and Anne Marie, as if butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, stood up. ‘I’ll get it.’
‘That told me.’ Luke gave a half-smile to her departing back. ‘She’s right.’
‘She’s meddling,’ Molly said, ‘which is what she does best. Is everything OK?’
‘Everything’s fine. I was just wondering…’ He nodded his head towards the playroom ‘…if I could have a quick word.’
‘Sure.’ They never brought their relationship to work. Obviously Anne Marie knew, but apart from a quick flirt when they were alone, their relationship was strictly off the ward. Still, as Molly duly headed for the playroom, somehow she knew this wasn’t about work.
‘My mum’s got an appointment at Outpatients this morning—at eight. It’s at the Women’s Hospital.’
‘Is she OK?’
‘She’s having a few tests—nothing too serious, I think.’ He gave a low laugh. ‘And I’m not being evasive. It doesn’t matter to her that I’m a doctor. As she keeps telling me, there are certain things she refuses to discuss with her son—whatever his profession.’
‘Good for her.’ Molly smiled, but there was a worried tinge to it. ‘Are you concerned?’
‘A bit,’ Luke admitted. ‘Still, if she doesn’t want to talk to me about it, I’m not going to push it—for now, at least. She’s going to be dashing to appointments for the next couple of weeks so I’m just letting you know that I might be a bit pushed.’
‘Of course.’ Molly gave a confused frown. ‘You don’t have to worry about upsetting me. I’m not that needy!’
‘You’re not needy at all.’ He gave a wry smile, a look she couldn’t quite interpret flicking over his features, but it faded before Molly could even attempt to read it. ‘The thing is, I’ve cleared it with Rita, and Mum’s going to drop the twins off at seven. I finish at eight, so they’re hopefully going to amuse themselves in the playroom for an hour till I get off.’
‘Great.’ Molly beamed, but she could feel her heartbeat quickening, nervous somehow at the prospect of meeting Luke’s children and desperately trying not to let it show. The children couldn’t come into this, and it was important she keep things light, treat the fact he was bringing his children into work just as she would if it were any one of her colleagues. ‘So what’s the problem?’
‘Problem?’ Luke checked.
‘You said you’d already cleared it with Rita.’
‘I have.’ Luke nodded. ‘I just thought I should let you know—that
you might feel a bit…’ He gave a quick shake of his head. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ As she turned to go he called her back. ‘This weekend—you’re off?’
‘So are you.’ Molly grinned, but it faded when she saw his expression.
‘I don’t think I’m going to be able to see you, Molly. I could maybe ask Mum if she can have the twins on Saturday night, only I seem to be asking her an awful lot, and I haven’t really seen enough of the twins, with doing nights.’
‘No problem.’ Molly’s smile snapped back on.
‘But it’s your birthday on Saturday.’
‘How do you know…?’ Molly frowned, because she deliberately hadn’t told him. Deliberately, because birtdays and flowers and intimate dinners and celebrating milestones weren’t what they were about.
‘Some things you just remember. Look, I will try and arrange something.’
‘There’s really no need,’ Molly said firmly. ‘I’ve been neglecting my friends a bit of late. You enjoy the weekend with the kids.’
‘Well, if you change your mind…’ There was just a hint of emotion on his usually deadpan face. ‘I mean, if you fancy kicking a ball around the park with the kids… then we could get a take-away or something…’
And it would be so, so easy to say yes—she was desperate for her days off and was really looking forward to catching up with her friends on Friday and hitting the shops, yet despite the smile, and despite the fact she’d played it down, it did matter that it was her birthday. It meant that this massive aching abyss wouldn’t be filled till Monday. She wanted to see him, didn’t want to wait till their shift ended on Tuesday morning, or till the kids were safely at kinder on Monday and he could knock at her door. Oh, she wanted him, wanted him in her bed, wanted to be in his, but she wanted more than that too.
It was Luke who broke the endless silence. Luke who drew the wrong conclusion when she didn’t instantly respond. Luke who inadvertently saved her from herself. ‘Am I right in thinking that footy’s not really your thing?’
‘These are the only flat shoes I own.’ Molly clicked together her sensible navy nursing shoes. ‘And I’m catching up with—’
A Doctor, a Nurse Page 6