‘Thanks, Lizzie. It’s looks incredible and I’m starving.’ Anna reached for a chunk of bread and chewed it hungrily.
Lizzie propped her hands on her hips and Joe feared she might be ready to settle in for a conversation.
‘How did the surfing lesson go? Did you get up on the board?’
Anna shared a knowing glance with Joe and tucked her hair behind her ear. ‘No, I didn’t. It was so embarrassing. How do all those little kids make it look so easy? It’s way harder than it looks.’
‘She’s a great student. She’ll get it eventually.’ Joe grabbed some bread and slathered it with some pale pink taramasalata. Surfing was hungry work. So was controlling yourself when you were in very close proximity to the unbelievable Dr Anna Morelli.
‘We’re trying again tomorrow, aren’t we Anna?’ He was playing her. Would she still want to put on a brave face for the others and not admit that she was considering giving up? What had she called it? La bella figura.
Anna’s wide eyes and disappearing smile said it all. ‘We are?’ She almost choked out the words as she chewed.
‘Absolutely. Bright and early.’
Anna took a slug of her wine and rested her elbows on the table, linking her fingers under her chin. ‘You’re not going to give up on me, are you?’
Joe shook his head and tried not to read a double meaning into either her question or his answer. ‘Nope. What kind of a teacher would I be if I did that?’
‘Well,’ Lizzie said with a glance over her shoulder back to the bar. ‘Enjoy. I’ll see you both tonight at Ry and Julia’s. It’s movie night, remember?’
‘See you tonight,’ Anna said.
Before Lizzie left she turned back with a grin on her face. ‘Word of warning about my brother, Anna. You might think you’re having a simple conversation with him but he’ll really be throwing a million questions at you and, before you know it, you’ve told him your whole life story.’ She clicked her tongue. ‘Bloody journalists.’
They watched as Lizzie headed back to her office. Anna popped a cube of feta into her mouth. ‘So, you didn’t answer my question. Are you really going to give up the news and become a bartender?’
The tone in Anna’s voice wasn’t just disbelieving; it was almost disapproving and it irked him.
‘Lizzie’s worked here almost her whole life. You got a problem with jobs like this, smartypants?’
‘No, not at all. I have nothing against good honest work. I just assumed you’d find another job as a journalist.’
‘Those jobs are disappearing from every news market right across the country and, until something good comes along, I’m happy to work here. You see, Dr Morelli, I don’t care what people think about me.’
Anna considered his words. ‘If that doesn’t work out, you could always teach surfing.’
He grinned and lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck. ‘Having failed spectacularly at that today.’
‘You’ve got to chill, Joe. You’ll get there eventually.’ His own words came echoing back to him from the smiling lips of the woman he’d been dreaming about and they suddenly took on a whole new meaning.
‘I really hope so,’ he said.
Anna averted her eyes and picked at the plate, taking a bite out of a piece of sliced salami. ‘It’s actually none of my business what you do, to be honest. I only thought you’d want to get back to doing what you do best. Were you a good journalist?’
‘I used to think so. Hang on,’ Joe paused. ‘Are you saying you’ve never heard of me?’
‘Sorry, no,’ Anna shrugged. She reached for her wine glass and sipped from it. The movement of her full red lips on the glass was almost enough to distract him from the sudden jolt back to earth. All those years he’d believed he was changing the world one headline at a time. Doing important work. But since he’d been sacked the world had gone on spinning around, people had continued on with their lives without his exclusive stories. Life in Middle Point was the same whether he was a journalist or not. He’d always known that today’s newspaper was tomorrow’s chip wrapping but he really felt it now.
‘I was quite successful, you know. I won a Walkley Award three years ago for my series on safety breaches on some of Sydney’s biggest building developments.’
‘What’s a Walkley Award?’ Anna asked through a mouthful of dip.
‘Only Australia’s most respected awards for journalism.’
Anna sighed. ‘Sorry, Joe, I’m sure it’s all very important, but I’m out here in the real world. Dealing with sick people and babies and death and dying and cancer and disability. Those kinds of disasters. That doesn’t leave me much time to pick up tomorrow’s recycling to read about the latest celebrity divorce or starlet’s nipple slip.’
Joe folded his arms and leaned on to the table. He studied the half-empty bottle and decided he needed to order another one. ‘There are some things I really miss about my old life.’
‘What? Having people fawn all over you because you’re some big-time journalist?’ Anna said with a smile.
‘It was kind of nice sometimes, knowing that people read what I wrote, that I made a difference. But of course,’ he narrowed his eyes, ‘it’s not like I was curing cancer or delivering babies.’
‘Exactly,’ she teased.
Anna looked out the window to the view, along the coast that disappeared into the haze. He watched her face soften, her brown eyes concentrate on the view and her words were dreamlike when she spoke. ‘You know what?’
‘What?’
‘There are some things about my old life I don’t miss at all, now that I think about it.’
And then she met his eyes and smiled.
CHAPTER
26
Lizzie was trying really hard not to look across the pub at her brother and the lovely Anna Morelli but it was excruciating not to. From her position behind the bar and partially hidden by one of the drinks fridges, she could see just enough flirting going on to tell her that they wouldn’t have the faintest clue that she was spying on them. They looked just the slightest bit wrapped up in each other.
This was all working out beautifully. Lizzie knew there was something about the pub that wove a special magic on people looking for love. It had brought Ry back to Middle Point and was the scene for his meeting with Julia after fifteen years apart. Almost right where she was standing, just a few footsteps away, was the exact spot she’d first laid eyes on Dan McSwaine. And that was turning out just beautifully, thanks for asking.
Lizzie sighed and felt a warm glow deep inside. She folded her arms in front of her, like a warm hug. Her brother deserved to find someone else after what he’d been through. And so did Anna. Where they the right people for each other? She hoped so. She’d done her part already, throwing them into each other’s path months before, on the night of Ry and Julia’s wedding. She’d schemed to make sure Joe was Anna’s light relief. It was always a sad thing when you had to rescue a broken-hearted woman from a crying jag in the ladies’ loo. Joe had been an almost willing participant in the no-strings-attached dancing with Anna later that night. And Lizzie had a fair idea what had happened after said dancing, too.
But that was her little secret.
Like hell it was. She fished for her phone in the pocket of her tan skirt and punched in Julia’s contact.
‘It’s me,’ she whispered.
‘I know it’s you.’
‘I’m not gossiping, I promise. But my brother and Anna are having a drink together. In the pub.’
Lizzie could hear Julia chuckling down the line. ‘It’s working, isn’t it?’
‘Looks like it. I have skills in this area as evidenced by the work I did to make sure you and Ry had your happy ending.’
‘Hah!’ Julia scoffed. ‘That had nothing to do with you.’
‘As if.’
‘I’m the one with the skills. Who do you think it was that pushed you and Dan together?’
‘You’ve got a point.’ Lizzie tore her
attention away from Joe and Anna and walked down the narrow corridor to the back of the pub and her office. She found the key in her pocket and opened the door, swung it closed behind her.
‘So, Lizzie, are we going to combine our mystical forces and see what we can do for two lonely people with the biggest broken hearts this side of McLaren Vale?’
‘I’m on it,’ Julia replied. ‘Let’s start with tonight. Do we have champagne?’
‘Already on ice.’
‘Chocolate?’
‘Who do you think you’re talking to? Of course there’s chocolate.’
‘Now. To the most important part,’ Julia’s voice grew serious. ‘What movie are we watching?’
‘Leave that to me.’
Later that night, the end titles for the Australian movie Red Dog had just scrolled across the screen and Ry, Julia, Dan, Lizzie, Joe and Anna were silent. The two couples were cuddled up on the sofa; Julia with legs outstretched on a pillow resting on the coffee table, Ry next to her with an arm around her shoulders. Lizzie sat in Dan’s lap, her arms tucked around his waist, her head on his shoulder. Joe was on the floor with his back resting against the seat and way down at the other end, Anna sat clutching a ball of soggy tissues.
There wasn’t a dry eye in the room. The sniffs competed with a few whispered ‘bloody hells’ and ‘oh my Gods’.
Anna couldn’t find any words. Her voice was knotted in a big ball of emotion wedged in her throat. She was thankful for the darkness, both inside the house and outside from the beach. Hopefully no one would be able to see her streaked tears and puffy eyes. She couldn’t believe she’d cried so much – sobbed even – at a film about a dog. She’d never even had a dog when she was a child and was never even wistful when she saw other people’s dogs.
So what was with the crying?
She grabbed another tissue from the box Julia had thoughtfully placed on the low coffee table and tried not to look at anyone else in the room.
Julia was the first to speak. ‘I don’t know if it’s the pregnancy hormones but that was the saddest movie I’ve ever seen.’
‘What’s my excuse?’ Lizzie sniffed. ‘Why do I suddenly want to rush to the pound and adopt every mutt there is?’
‘You’re a big sook, that’s why.’ Anna watched as Dan wiped the tears from Lizzie’s face and then kissed her closed eyes. It was such a simple, intimate gesture and on top of the dead dog ending of the movie, she almost lost it right there and then.
Ry reached over and flicked on the lamp on the small table at the end of the sofa.
‘Bloody hell, that was a work over.’ Ry looked at Anna and saw her tears. When she saw his, she smiled back at him and waved her hand as if to shoosh him. She knew that she wouldn’t get words out of her mouth unless they came on a sob.
How long had it been since she’d cried? She screamed and ranted and cursed the world when she’d found out about Alex’s affairs, that was for sure. He’d accused her of going all Italian on him and she’d certainly lived up to the stereotype. Then she felt all right, for a while. Could even fake a smile or two when she needed to. Had managed weeks of faking it to Grace and her parents.
But she’d held everything else in. The truth. The tears. The honest reality.
And tonight a sweet movie about a red kelpie seemed to expose everything she’d been holding in. She squeezed her eyes shut to quell the stinging but it didn’t work. A sharp pain in Anna’s chest gripped around her lungs, squeezing the air from them in a quick huff. If she breathed out she wasn’t sure she’d be able to breathe in again.
She had to get out of there.
She leapt to her feet and before anyone else in the room realised what was going on, she’d fled through the front door.
Everyone heard the door slam. Conversation stopped. Lizzie and Julia exchanged glances.
‘Is she all right?’ Lizzie whispered.
‘Doesn’t look like it,’ Julia replied.
‘Maybe she really misses her dog,’ Ry added, confused about the whole situation.
Dan released Lizzie from his arms and moved to stand up. ‘I’ll go talk to her.’
‘No, I’ll go.’ Joe was already loping across the living room, his bare feet padding across the floor.
‘Hey wait a minute—’ But before Dan could say anything else, Lizzie was pulling him back.
‘Dan,’ she whispered. ‘Let him go.’
Joe heard the door slam behind him and stood in the middle of the front garden, hurriedly scanning the street. There was no sign of Anna. He stepped over the low wall separating Ry and Julia’s place from Dan’s and pushed the front door open, looking around for any sign of life.
He stopped in Dan’s living room, rested a hand on the orange vinyl sofa, trying not to make a sound. He couldn’t hear a thing and there wasn’t a light on.
Where the hell had she gone?
Anna stumbled across the esplanade and once her eyes had adjusted to the dark, she spotted the wooden walkway that split the dunes and led to the beach. Her eyes were swimming with tears and she could barely see. The stars were hidden by clouds and it was almost pitch black. All there was to guide her was the sound of the beach and the waves, the crush of the water on the sand, the pull and drag of the tide and the night. When the hard pine of the walkway planks gave way to cold, soft sand, she sunk into it and stopped, sucking in the deepest breath she could manage. She could taste the salt and the sea spray was cold on her face and her arms. The sand between her toes felt damp and thick and the wind caught her linen shirt. She needed the blanket of the night to smother her, comfort her, give her the freedom and the solitude to let go.
Anna stumbled along a few metres before dropping to the sand. She pulled her knees up, wrapped her arms around them and dropped her head onto her folded elbows. And then the tears came, racked her frame and scraped her throat. She could no longer bury her deepest regret; the open wound on her heart. A movie about a dog had cracked it wide open.
Her tears weren’t about Alex. They weren’t about her loneliness or regrets about Joe. She’d been letting go of everything; her marriage, la bella figura, being a good girl, her shame. She’d opened her Pandora’s box and everything was finding its way into the open air. There was one secret that was so painful and personal, so profound, that she’d hidden it in the deepest place of all.
She’d wanted to be a mother for so long and that aching desire and hurt wouldn’t stay buried any longer. The whole time she and Alex had been trying to have a baby – the last year they were together – he’d been cheating on her and his betrayal had become doubly crushing under those circumstances. Three times she’d been pregnant but miscarried. Three times she’d let herself believe and hope and plan and then have those dreams shatter. She’d not only had to let go of her marriage, but she had to let go of the idea of ever being a mother. That hurt the most, cut her the deepest. The ache in her heart about being thirty-five and childless hadn’t gone away. If anything it had lodged there, like a persistent cough, rising up to irritate her every now and then, just when she thought it had left. And tonight, sobbing over a beautiful dead dog, was more than she could take. It had all come out in a howl.
Joe heard her before he could see her. Standing on the end of the walkway he could hear Anna crying, louder than the waves and the wind. In the dark he could make out a hunched figure on the sand, where the beach met the dunes, and he went to her, his feet sinking into the sand and a lump in his throat almost too big to swallow.
‘Anna?’ If she’d heard him, she didn’t react. Joe’s heart ached at the sight of her, her back shaking with her sobs, her black hair all around her, over her shoulders and hiding her face, a mask behind which she was hidden from him and from the world.
‘Anna.’ He was surprised as hell to hear the croak in his voice.
She stilled but didn’t look up.
Joe took the few steps he needed to close the gap between them and lowered himself to the sand beside her. And then when her
sobbing started up again, it cut him up. It seemed to be from such a deep place inside her that he was sure it was rattling her bones and rearranging them inside her skin. He hadn’t heard crying like that since … he looked out to the inky ocean and to the infinity of the night.
The sound of it took him back more than a decade. To the death of his mother. He’d flown back to Middle Point from Sydney for her final days before she died of breast cancer and stayed for a few weeks after the funeral. He remembered how much Lizzie had cried, for what seemed like weeks, and how useless he’d felt being of any solace at all. He’d been young, just twenty-three, and emotionally ill-equipped to deal with anything that he and his sister were going through. The cancer had rendered them orphans and Lizzie felt it more deeply than he’d cared to admit to himself. At the time, all those years ago, he’d been cold comfort to his sister.
He was normally good with words, wasn’t that what he did – or rather used to do – for a living? But the words deserted him, washed out to see in the current like the crushed shells and dead sea grasses on the sand. All he could think of to say was her name, like poetry, like the sweetest word he’d ever said.
‘Anna.’ He said it again, gently, close to her and reached his right arm around her. She stiffened but didn’t fight him. Then he felt it, the slow unwinding as her shoulders dropped and it was only then that he urged her closer, into the crook of his arm. Her head dropped onto his chest and then his other arm was about her, holding her up, being her rock in the darkness and the wind and the anonymity of the night that hung all around them like a cloak.
They sat for a long while, until his T-shirt was wet through and her shoulders stopped quaking.
It was a whisper and he barely heard it above the crashing waves.
‘Thank you,’ she said and, finally, Anna’s sobbing eased.
CHAPTER
27
Anna tossed and turned in the perfectly crisp white sheets of the king-size bed in Ry and Julia’s spare room. Her phone told her it was 1 a.m., but she was too restless to sleep. The window was only open an inch but the curtains billowed with the sea breeze. Anna snuggled down, covering herself and trying to ward off the shiver she was feeling, which she knew had nothing to do with the wind and everything to do with Joe Blake.
Our Kind of Love Page 17