‘Hello, may I help you?’ A young woman with a high ponytail bounced up to the counter with a welcoming smile.
‘Yes, I’m looking for Joe Blake.’
‘I’ll just get him for you. Can I say who it is?’
‘Anna Morelli.’
‘I’ll just be a sec.’
Under Anna’s fingers, the wooden counter felt heavy and worn, marked and pitted in places. To her left sat a pile of the latest edition of the paper and she read the front page. There was a story about a win for the local netball team complete with a shot of the happy players holding a trophy. Underneath, was a reminder about drink driving patrols over the coming weekends as the holiday season hit. She flipped the page over and there, on the left hand side of the second page, was Joe’s face. A headshot of him smiling, wearing an open shirt and a grin.
‘Anna?’
She looked up and there he was in the flesh, at the other end of the room, in the dim light, gazing at her as if she were a mirage. If she didn’t know it wasn’t physically possible, she could have sworn her heart had just skipped a beat.
‘Hi Joe.’
He walked towards her, slowly, his shoes sounding heavily on the polished wooden floor. She took in a deep breath, trying not to react to how handsome he still looked, how much the sight of him jangling every nerve ending. He was wearing a white business shirt, crisp and fresh, with a striped navy and white tie, and suit trousers. Navy and slim-fitting, they hugged his thighs in places she’d once touched. Anna realised with a jolt that it was the suit they’d bought together.
‘What are you doing here?’ Joe was right next to her, his blue eyes sparkling with surprise and delight. He was so close she could see the little creases in the corner of his eyes and his long blond eyelashes. When he leaned down to kiss her cheek, she found herself gripping his forearms to steady herself.
She let go of him and clasped her hands together in front of her. ‘Lizzie told me where I’d find you. I’ve just been to Middle Point.’
‘You have?’
For a long moment, Anna looked at him, took in every inch of the man she hadn’t seen in months and had missed so much. The man she’d walked away from. He looked wonderful, better than he ever had. Physically there was a change. The lines around his mouth had disappeared and his eyes looked brighter and bluer than she remembered. Was he standing taller or did it only seem that way because she wasn’t wearing her high heels today?
‘You look beautiful,’ he said quietly.
‘So do you,’ she replied.
Anna opened her mouth to speak and stopped. What she needed to say shouldn’t be said here, surrounded by prying eyes and professional journalists. ‘Listen, are you busy. Can we talk?’
Was that a sigh of relief she saw in the drop of his shoulders? ‘Just let me get my phone.’
Ten minutes later, Anna and Joe were carrying takeaway drinks across busy Warland Reserve. Behind them was the busy commercial centre of Victor Harbor, filled with cars and people, and on the ocean side, the causeway that formed a bridge to Granite Island and its little penguin colony. Joe led Anna towards a wooden bench positioned to admire the outlook.
‘Nice view,’ she said.
‘Who needs a view when I can look at you, Dr Morelli?’
His flirting had always worked on her and her cheeks felt suddenly hot. ‘So, you’re working at the paper.’
Joe raised that one eyebrow and it appeared above the rim of his sunglasses. ‘You really haven’t been searching for me on the internet lately, have you?’
Anan shook her head. ‘I’ve gone cold turkey. I’ve learnt my lesson. I get too angry about what I read.’
‘That’s a shame.’ The sound of Joe’s laughter hit her sweet spot. ‘I quite like it when you get angry.’ Joe nudged Anna’s shoulder and moved a little closer. His shoulder and thigh pressed against her. ‘A lot’s happened over the winter, Anna.’
‘So I see.’
‘You’re looking at the editor of the Southern Gazette.’ Anna heard the pride in his voice, noticed the way he sat taller. This clearly wasn’t second best for him.
His announcement answered the million questions that had been raging in Anna’s head all the while they’d walked down Ocean Street, made small talk in front of the local bookshop, waited for his coffee and her water and sauntered over the view. This was the new Joe.
‘Congratulations. When did all this happen?’
‘I had an interview a few months ago. It was the day I was up in Adelaide and you called me and I came out to the surgery.’
‘Right.’ Anna took a deep breath. She knew exactly which day he was talking about.
‘And it turns out I got the job.’
‘Will it be enough for the former high-flying, award-winning reporter Joe Blake?’
‘I think so. I know so.’
‘I’m glad.’ Anna clenched her fingers together. ‘But why here and not Sydney, or even Adelaide? I know you grew up here, but aren’t you really a big city boy at heart these days?’
Joe looked out over the water to Granite Island, low and flat beyond the waves, its huge granite boulders orange and green in the distance. A smile creased his face. ‘Been there, done that, got sacked.’ He laughed ruefully. ‘It’s hard to see a future in the city when you do what I do. City newspapers are struggling but in towns like this? Papers are the lifeblood of these communities. Everyone reads them because we run stories that really matter. And they more generic the news gets from every other source, the more interested people are in what’s happening in their own backyards.’
‘I saw your front page. The netball and the traffic stuff. I understand what you mean.’
‘You do?’ Joe took off his sunglasses and his blue eyes narrowed in a question. ‘You’re not taking the piss?’
‘No, not at all. That what I do too. I work in the community where people don’t care about the latest Hollywood celebrity or reality TV star or some tit-for-tat bit of politicking. They care about what’s happening where they live. What makes a difference, for better or for worse, to their families and their lives.’
‘Yeah, that’s exactly it.’ Joe shifted an arm and rested it on the back of the bench. They were closer. It felt intimate. Her heart ached at how much she’d missed it.
‘So I guess this means you’re staying in Middle Point?’ Anna said.
‘Yeah. I’m staying.’
‘I’m really happy for you, that you’ve found your place.’
‘Thanks. I am too,’ Joe said.
‘Can I ask you something?’ Anna stared out to the ocean and the island in the distance.
‘Anything.’
The tone of Joe’s voice told her he meant it.
‘Joe, you told me once that families are overrated. I understand why you said that, with your history. I get that. But you had one all along, can’t you see? And it’s back at Middle Point. And since you’ve been back it has wrapped itself around you like a rug, whether you liked it or not. It’s a nice place to be, in the middle of all that love.’
Joe looked at Anna like she was crazy. Maybe she was.
‘Is this why you came down here? To share this big revelation?’
Anna hesitated and then did it anyway. She reached over and took his hand in hers. ‘I was talking to Nonna last week and there was something she said that made me look into my future and really think about what I want when I’m old. I’m more certain than ever about that. But it killed me to think about you, down here, feeling that you are alone. You have so many people who love you. Lizzie and Dan. Harri. Ry and Julia. Their baby. God, that baby is going to adore you. Every kid down on the south coast needs an honorary uncle who can surf, right? Those people are your family, Joe.’
Joe looked down at his hand, entwined with Anna’s, and he pulled her closer to him, put his other hand on her shoulder. It felt so good to see her again, to hold her this close, and Joe couldn’t shake the feeling that she should be his family too.
; His phone vibrated in his pocket and Anna felt it too. She let go of his hand. ‘It’s all right, you should probably get that.’
Joe swiped the keypad and held his phone to his ear, turning away from Anna slightly. ‘What’s up? Sure. Five minutes.’ He slipped his phone into the breast pocket of his shirt.
‘Was that a big scoop?’
‘The manager of our printer’s been on the blower. We go to press tomorrow, so I’d better get back and find out what’s going on.’ Joe stood slowly and, it seemed to Anna, reluctantly. When she followed, the flock of seagulls that had been waiting expectantly on the lawn all around them leapt into the air with wing flaps and squawks.
‘Will you walk back with me to the office?’
Anna shook her head and found a smile for him. ‘I might walk over to Granite Island. I haven’t been over there since I was a kid. I might see me a fairy penguin or two.’
Joe shoved his hands into his pockets. ‘You’ll be sadly disappointed. They only come out at night.’
‘Oh. My timing sucks then, doesn’t it.’ In too many ways to measure. ‘What the hell, I’ll walk over anyway.’
‘It’s been great to see you, Anna.’
‘You too, Joe. Congratulations again on the job. Really. I may have to subscribe to the Southern Gazette.’
His eyebrow quirked and it almost broke her heart. ‘Or you could just come down here more often and pick one up in the flesh.’
The thought of coming back to Middle Point – or anywhere on the entire Fleurieu Peninsula for that matter – was unbearable to Anna. All of the people she knew down here had found their place. And now Joe, the last missing piece of the puzzle, had found his, too. Anna knew where she belonged, and it wasn’t on the beaches of the south coast with the group of people she’d grown to love. They were a family without her. She belonged, now more than ever, with her own people in Adelaide’s north-eastern suburbs and she belonged to her patients. And that hurt like a wound that would never heal, a gaping, aching hurt.
‘Anna?’
Joe was staring at her. Maybe he’d noticed the tears in her eyes or the way she’d wrapped her arms around herself like a protective shield.
‘Reading about all this from a distance will have to do. I have wonderful memories of Middle Point, Joe. Thank you for that.’
And then he kissed her, gentle and soft, before walking away without looking back.
CHAPTER
45
Anna walked across the reserve to the causeway. The sun was out and there was a light breeze. In the distance the Clydesdale horses clip-clopped across to Granite Island, their white tails swishing rhythmically as they pulled the historic tram, laden with passengers.
Anna glanced around at the tourist spot, looking for somewhere to sit alone and cry. She was surrounded by happy people and it was gutting.
Everyone looked blissful, staring into each other’s eyes, laughing and bumping shoulders with each other. They weren’t there to taunt her but it sure felt like it and it made Anna’s eyes burn.
She knew she’d lost so much more than a future with Joe. She’d also lost the way he made her feel, that intoxicating rush that was like an adrenaline high. She’d felt like a woman when she’d been with Joe. She’d felt desire. She’d felt longing. She’d felt like she’d come back to life, limb by limb, every nerve ending slowly awakening as if she was Sleeping Beauty. Being with Joe had meant she’d seen possibilities in herself that she’d never imagined. He’d left his mark on her. She knew she would never be the same without him.
Now that was all gone.
The missing him came in waves but it hadn’t gone away during all these months of self-imposed exile from him. Sometimes it was calm and she could think about Joe and let the thought go with a sad smile. Other times it was like a tsunami, engulfing her, knocking her from her feet.
She missed him. Still. Knew she always would.
And worse, she still loved him.
Anna found her car keys in her huge handbag.
It was time to go home.
CHAPTER
46
On the day that Joe Blake was legally divorced, he celebrated the occasion with an early morning surf. It was a brilliant late November day. The southerlies were whipping up a decent swell and the sun shone down on Middle Point like a million spotlights. The beauty of working in Victor Harbor, only ten kilometres away, was that he could be up at sparrow’s, have a surf and get to the paper at a decent hour. He needed to be out there in the water, with nothing around him but the rush of the waves and the wind in his ears.
Joe didn’t need to be in Sydney for the court decision. Things had been settled amicably, eventually, and the whole business could now be dealt with online. Which suited Joe fine. How do you like divorce in the twenty-first century? he thought with a wry chuckle to himself. There had been a time in Australia when it took seven years to get divorced and black marks on a family’s good name and reputation were printed in the daily newspapers.
Divorce: Mary Elizabeth Smith, of Brighton Road, Brighton, against her dead-shit husband, William Smith, labourer, of Grote Street, Adelaide, on the grounds of cruelty.
The gory and tragic and private reasons were fodder for newspapers and for everyone else’s prurient interest. Cruelty, desertion, adultery, drunkenness. Not everyone looked back on the 1950s with fond nostalgia.
In the twenty-first century you didn’t even have to turn up to court.
Joe sat astride his board, looking back to the Point. What reason would he and Jasmine have had to give if they were in that situation?
Divorce: Joseph Blake and Jasmine Clough, of Bronte, on the grounds they didn’t care enough to fight for their marriage.
He knew that was the real reason. He was distant enough now from it to see the truth – that they’d both dropped the ball, that they’d both stopped caring.
He was free to start over.
Joe felt the swell of a wave underneath him and he effortlessly jumped to his feet. He felt the speed, gave in to it, and rode the wave with a renewed zest for his own life.
It was time to write a new story.
Julia woke with a start. It was still dark and Ry’s quiet breaths in the bed next to her were reassuring as she got her bearings.
‘Chill Julia,’ she whispered. ‘You’re in bed. With your husband. It’s the middle of the night. And you have to go to the loo for the thousandth time.’ She pivoted on her butt and eventually her feet found the floor. As her eyes became accustomed to the middle of the night darkness, Julia pulled in a deep breath to fill the little room she had left in her lungs and pushed herself to standing with a groan.
She looked at Ry, blissfully still sound asleep. ‘Bastard,’ she muttered with a wry smile. She hadn’t had an uninterrupted night sleep since she’d become pregnant and there he was, all restful and gorgeous, splayed over three-quarters of the bed as he usually was, dead to the world.
She shuffled to the ensuite bathroom and sat down on the toilet, doing what every pregnant woman does for the thousandth time that night.
And when she’d finished and reached down to drag her knickers up, her waters broke.
She stared at the watery mess all over her feet and realised the fireworks were about to begin.
‘Ry!’ Her hands flew to her belly.
Where was her husband? ‘Ry!’ This time she heard her panicky voice echo in the bathroom.
‘What’s up?’ When Ry dragged his sleepy eyes open and saw what had happened, he grabbed a towel and flew to her.
‘Oh shit. Oh shit. Is this it?’
Julia nodded furiously. ‘Yes, this is it. Help me get dressed. We have to go to hospital. Now.’
Five minutes later, Julia was panting in the front seat of Ry’s car and wondering how much worse it could get. Ry was driving so slowly he was in danger of being arrested for driving too far under the speed limit. When the first contraction hit, it felt like her torso was twisting in half like a corkscrew. Julia vow
ed never ever to have another child.
‘Are you okay?’ Ry demanded, his eyes not leaving the road once.
‘Oh God … it’s stopped.’ When she could breathe again, Julia grabbed her phone and dialled. ‘Lizzie, it’s me. Yes, the baby’s coming. Ry’s driving me to hospital and the way he’s going, we might get there by the kid’s first birthday. No, don’t come yet. We’ll call you. Can you tell everybody? Okay. I love you too. I will. See you soon.’
Ry glanced in the rear-view mirror and turned up the Foo Fighters on the car stereo.
‘You are kidding me. Turn that down.’
He grinned at his wife. ‘I need something to drown out the sounds of your screaming.’
Julia laughed and then hit him. ‘Lizzie says you’d better get me there before the baby arrives or she’ll kill you.’
‘Understood.’ She may have been in the middle of labour, carrying something that was bigger than a basketball, with sleep-mussed hair and ankles so swollen they had actually disappeared – not that he’d ever tell her that – but she was fierce and magnificent. ‘Hey, I love you, you know.’
He reached out and rested his left hand on the baby bump and Julia’s bottom lip wobbled.
‘I love you too, Ry Blackburn. This is really happening, isn’t it?’
‘I bloody well hope so.’
‘Oh shit. I’d better call Anna.’ She found the number. ‘It’s me. Sorry to wake you. Yeah, it’s all happening. We’re about a half an hour away from—’
Ry had only ever heard a groan of such primal intensity on nature documentaries. It scared the hell out of him. He pulled the car off to the side of the road with a jerk and a skid on the gravel.
‘OH GOD!’ Julia threw her head back and clutched her stomach.
Ry snatched the phone from her hand. ‘Did you hear that? What do I do? Yeah, they’re pretty close together. Okay.’ Ry ended the call and threw the phone in the cup holder.
‘Anna’s calling the hospital to tell them we’re on our way. JJ, listen to me. You’re going to be all right.’
Our Kind of Love Page 30