by Paige Toon
Eventually I made it back to our flat on the second floor of a three-storey terraced house in Dartmouth Park, an area of London that’s not far from Tufnell Park, Highgate and Archway, depending on who’s asking.
The place still reeked of Ned’s antics the night before; he’d barely attempted to clean up his vomit. So I did, seething as I rubbed and scrubbed at the stain.
Like I said, it has been a shit of a day. And it’s only lunchtime.
I sigh heavily as the credits on the television programme begin to roll. What now? I should phone Ned to let him know about my job, or lack thereof, but even the thought of speaking to him annoys me. He hasn’t even called me to apologise.
A moment later, my mobile rings. I bet that’s him, and about time, too.
I dig out my phone from my bag, but it’s not a number I recognise. If it’s those idiots calling about Payment Protection Insurance again, I’ll give them an earful.
‘Hello?’ I say irritably.
‘Amber, it’s Liz,’ my dad’s partner replies in her usual clipped, restrained tone.
My dad and Liz have been together for seventeen years, but have never married. I keep wishing she’ll leave him so he can find someone nicer, because he’ll never be the one to walk away. Dad likes an easy life.
‘Hi, Liz,’ I reply coolly, wondering why she’s ringing me on my mobile when it’s so expensive. Oh, of course, she doesn’t know that I’m now unemployed. That’s going to be fun news to break.
‘I’m calling about your dad,’ she says. I instantly tense up. ‘He’s had a stroke.’
My heart leaps into my throat and my face prickles all over. ‘Is he okay?’
‘We don’t know yet,’ she admits, sounding like she might cry. Liz wouldn’t normally be seen dead crying, so this is bad. ‘I found him on the floor in the bathroom. He couldn’t speak or, at least, I couldn’t understand what he was saying. He sounded drunk, only worse, and I saw that his face looked strange – sort of droopy on one side. He couldn’t move his arm and then I realised the whole right-hand side of his body had just stopped working.’
‘Oh God,’ I murmur.
‘I called an ambulance straight away and they’ve brought us to the Acute Stroke Unit at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. They’ve taken him off to have a CT scan. I wanted to let you know as soon as I could.’
‘Oh God,’ I repeat, unable to find the vocabulary to utter anything else. ‘Is he—’
‘I don’t know, Amber,’ she cuts me off, sounding like the Liz I’m all too familiar with. ‘I don’t know anything yet,’ she adds with frustration. ‘All they’ve told me is that it was very, very lucky that I was there. The faster he’s treated, the more likely it is that the damage will be less. I don’t know what would have happened if I’d gone to the movies with Gina. I had a bit of a sore throat so I stayed at home.’
‘Will you call me—’
‘I’ll call when I know more,’ she interrupts, completing my sentence for me.
‘Should we come home?’ I ask, fear tying knots in my stomach.
‘We’ll talk later,’ she snaps. ‘I’ve got to go! His consultant has just come in.’
‘I’m at the flat,’ I tell her quickly, but she’s already hung up.
I feel so helpless. Dad and Liz live in Adelaide, South Australia, where I grew up, and I’m here in London on the other side of the world.
On autopilot, I take the home phone out of its cradle and dial Ned’s number.
He doesn’t even bother to say hello. ‘What are you doing at home?’ he asks instead, obviously seeing the caller ID.
‘I’ve been made redundant.’
He gasps, but I cut him off before he can speak.
‘But I’m calling because my dad has had a stroke.’
There’s silence at the other end of the line, and then I hear him exhale.
‘Oh baby,’ he says in a low voice.
At the sound of his empathy, I break down.
‘You poor thing,’ he murmurs. ‘Do you want me to come home?’
‘You don’t have to,’ I cry. Please do, though.
‘I’m on my way,’ he says gently. ‘I love you.’
I text Liz to ask her to call me at home when she can before taking my iPad and going to lie down in the bedroom. Ned arrives three quarters of an hour later and I hear him taking off his big winter coat in the hall before coming to find me. He pauses in the doorway, looking all dishevelled in his unironed grey shirt and jeans.
‘Hey,’ he says quietly, smiling sorrowfully at me.
I slide my hand towards him in a small peace offering. He sighs heavily and sits on the bed, taking my hand. ‘What did Liz say exactly?’
I repeat our conversation.
‘What about your job?’ he asks next, so I fill him in about that, too.
‘What an arsehole,’ he mutters about my boss, shaking his head and squeezing my hand.
‘Mmm.’ My expression darkens as I stare at him. My ex-boss is not the only arsehole around here.
Finally he has the grace to apologise.
‘I’m sorry about earlier.’ He looks down at our hands, still entwined.
‘I can’t believe you shouted at me,’ I reply. ‘After throwing up on the sofa—’
‘I know, I know,’ he cuts me off. Ned hates having his nose rubbed in his mistakes.
This argument could go on for days – they certainly have in the past – but there are bigger things to worry about, so I bite my tongue.
‘I’ve been looking at flights back to Australia,’ I tell him miserably, reaching for my iPad. ‘The prices are horrendous, but at least we’re past Christmas.’ It’s the middle of February, which is still summer Down Under, but December and January are the peak times.
‘Do you think you should go?’ he asks.
‘Definitely,’ I reply. ‘I can get on a flight the day after tomorrow.’
‘Really? Okay. I guess in a way it’s good timing. Not good timing,’ he quickly corrects himself when he sees me gape at him. ‘You know what I mean.’ His leg starts jiggling up and down. ‘At least you can stay out there for as long as you’re needed.’
‘Will you come?’ I ask hopefully.
‘Amber, I can’t,’ he replies regretfully. ‘I wish I could, I really do, but I’m so busy at work.’
A dark feeling settles over me.
‘Hey.’ He pats my shoulder. ‘You know I can’t just drop everything. I have to go to New York the week after next—’
‘With Zara?’ I interrupt. That’s his boss.
‘Yes.’ His brow furrows. ‘Don’t be like that,’ he scolds mildly. ‘You know this job is important to me, to us.’
‘I don’t know why you won’t just admit that she fancies you,’ I say hotly.
‘She doesn’t!’ he insists. ‘She only split up with her husband a couple of months ago.’
‘She’s only just got married!’ I exclaim, hating that he’s defending her.
‘She doesn’t fancy me,’ he repeats. ‘I was looking forward to telling you some good news, but…’ His voice trails off and he stares out of the window.
‘What?’ I ask, sitting up straighter.
‘Max and Zara promoted me today. Zara told me last night that they were going to.’
‘What sort of a promotion?’ My voice sounds like it’s coming from somewhere else, rather than from me.
‘Creative Director.’ He shrugs and his cutesy, bashful smile makes an appearance.
‘You’ve only been working there for two years and she’s making you Creative Director?’ Doesn’t fancy him, my arse!
All humour vanishes from his face. ‘It’s almost two and a half years, and maybe I’m better at my job than you give me credit for.’ At that, he walks out of the room.
‘Ned!’ I call out in dismay, hurrying after him. He’s already in the kitchen, loudly making himself a coffee. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I know you’re brilliant. What did they say?’ I prompt.
Ned’s a creative at
a rapidly expanding advertising firm in central London. Last year they were bought out by a New York agency, and his trip there in less than a fortnight will be the first time he’s visited the office.
Max Whitman is the Executive Creative Director and one of the three founding partners of the firm, KDW. Zara is the Managing Director and oversees everyone in the company. She’s only thirty-three. I don’t like her very much, the handful of times I’ve met her.
She’s thin and very tall – a lot taller than me because I’m only five foot four – and she has dead-straight, white-blonde hair that she usually wears scraped back from her face, which is all angles and cheekbones. She’s striking, I’ll give her that, but she couldn’t look more different from me with my petite frame and long auburn locks. Sometimes she wears the same sort of trendy horn-rimmed glasses I used to, but I’ve since had laser-surgery on my eyes. We can both carry off red lipstick, but I’m not sure that constitutes much of a similarity.
Ned goes to get the milk out of the fridge, not looking at me. ‘Tate’s gone to work in the New York office now, so they need a replacement here,’ he says, closing the fridge door with more force than it requires. Tate was Ned’s line manager and one of the firm’s so-called creative geniuses.
‘Does that mean you’ll be answering directly to Max?’ I ask. That constitutes a big step up. Max is the top dog.
‘Yes,’ he replies. ‘Him, and Zara, still, to an extent.’
A wave of pride goes through me as his good news belatedly sinks in. ‘That really is amazing,’ I say, stroking his arm.
‘It’s a lot more money,’ he replies with a grin, leaning back against the counter. ‘I’ll have to do a few more late nights, probably need to buy some suits.’ He glances down at his crumpled attire and shrugs with amusement.
‘Aw, but I love your shabby appearance,’ I say with downturned lips, and though it might sound to an outsider like I’m teasing, he knows that it’s true.
He chuckles and takes me into his arms.
‘Well done,’ I say, hugging him tightly.
‘Thanks, baby,’ he murmurs. His voice is muffled against the top of my head. He’s about six foot tall and towers above me. ‘I’m sorry about your news.’
I feel a wave of nausea at the reminder that Dad’s had a stroke and I’ve been made redundant.
‘Hey,’ Ned says softly, as my eyes well up with tears and I sniff.
At least I’ve saved up enough money to be able to afford the flight back to Australia, and I’ll have three months’ worth of wages to live on.
‘I wish you could come with me,’ I say.
‘I do, too. But maybe it’s for the best that I can’t,’ he adds carefully. ‘You’ll be able to focus on your dad.’
‘Maybe.’
I know he’s psyched about his promotion and would rather be celebrating than commiserating. But maybe that’s unfair.
He smiles and holds me at arm’s length, trying to jolly me up. ‘And you can catch up with Tina and Nell.’
And Ethan, my mind whispers before I attempt to squash the thought.
But it won’t go willingly, and suddenly my head is full of the beautiful dark-haired boy that I fell for all those years ago.
Ethan, Ethan, Ethan…
My first love. Who never loved me back.
Despite all the tears I’ve cried over him, despite all the heartache I’ve endured, I’d still give anything to see him again.
And now I’m going to.
Chapter 2
I was eight when I first realised that I was in love with Ethan Lockwood. He was in my class and had been all along, but I only started to truly see him a year earlier, after he found me crying one day under the pine trees on the other side of the playing field.
Ethan’s best friend had recently moved away and he’d been flitting between different groups of friends, but never really fitting in.
It was the same for me. It had been like that ever since I could remember.
‘Are you okay?’ he had asked, upon finding me snivelling amongst the tree roots, my skirt hem edged with dirt and my glasses blurry from mud smears.
Jean would be angry. ‘Such a grubby girl,’ she often said. I hated her.
I sniffed and shook my head, burying it in my hands.
‘Do you want me to get a teacher?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I mumbled.
He sat down next to me and put his arm around my shoulders.
‘Don’t cry,’ he said, but I was powerless to do anything but, especially now that someone was being kind to me. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘I don’t want to go to Jean’s house after school,’ I choked out.
‘Who’s Jean?’ he asked.
‘The lady who looks after me when my dad’s at work,’ I explained. She was a childminder and I was the second youngest of her four charges.
‘Where’s your mum?’ he asked with confusion.
I was a bit taken aback. I thought everyone knew that I didn’t have a mum. Wasn’t that why nobody wanted to be my best friend, because my dad didn’t wash my clothes often enough or do my hair in pretty plaits? Now that he was at work, he had even less time to look after me, which is why I had to keep going over to Jean’s horrid house.
I almost didn’t want to tell Ethan that my mum was dead but, looking into those green eyes of his, the same colour as the pine trees towering over our heads, I discovered that I couldn’t lie to him.
‘Oh,’ he said with a frown when I told him. ‘Do you want to come and play at my house instead?’
I couldn’t because Jean was collecting me straight from school, and as predicted, she complained about the mess I’d made of my uniform. That night I put it in the wash myself, and then stayed up until late to take it out so it would dry in time. But it was still damp in the morning. I didn’t tell Dad.
‘I had a call this morning,’ he informed me on the way to Jean’s house where I had to eat breakfast every day before school. ‘Who’s Ethan?’
My heart jumped. ‘He’s a boy in my class.’
‘His mother rang asking if you could go over to his house this afternoon. Would you like that?’
‘Yes, please!’ I exclaimed.
‘Okay, I’ll let Jean know. Mrs Lockwood said you can stay for dinner.’
I was so excited that it was easy to ignore the coldness of the damp fabric permeating my skin.
Mrs Lockwood had dark-brown hair like Ethan, but it was long and bundled up into a loose bun on the top of her head. I thought she was as beautiful as a Disney princess, only with a less puffy dress. I liked her very much. She told me to call her by her first name, Ruth.
Ethan’s house was like something out of a fairy tale with a large balcony, white wooden railings and cream-stone walls. I soon discovered that Ethan’s parents owned a small winery and the acres of vibrant green grapevines surrounding the house. We went for a walk and I have vivid memories of seeing glimpses of Ethan’s face through the leaves on the other side of the grapevine row. Even though he wasn’t allowed, he turned the sprinklers on and we laughed our heads off as we ran up the gently undulating hill, getting sprinkled with water. Then I fell over and got so muddy that Ruth was quite cross with Ethan. She was embarrassed about sending me home dirty so she made me wear some of Ethan’s clothes while she washed my dress. I couldn’t believe it when she handed it back to me clean, dry and pressed before I went home – they had a dryer, which was a luxury I hadn’t even heard of.
Ethan and I fast became firm friends. Once, I remember his mum referring to me as his girlfriend, and him correcting her, but sometimes when he smiled at me the dimple in his cheek would make my little heart beat a tiny bit faster. When, in our fourth year, Nelly Holland boldly announced that she was in love with Iain Grey, a thought occurred to me.
I was in love, too. With Ethan.
I never, ever told him.
By the time we went to high school, I’d become a dab hand at washing clothes and doing my ow
n hair, so I no longer looked like such a misfit, plus I’d embraced my short-sightedness and got myself some cool glasses and developed a pretty good sense of fashion. Ethan had brought out my confidence, so I’d made other friends, too. Nelly had become Nell to me, and then Tina moved from Melbourne and we found ourselves bonding as a threesome.
I was heartbroken when Ethan started going out with Ellie Pennell, a gorgeous, popular girl with big brown eyes and brown hair, but I had my friends around to pick me up.
The years passed and Ethan developed a reputation as our high school heart-throb. I forced myself to pursue other boys in turn – boys who I thought would love me back – and eventually Ethan and I drifted apart. But when he began dating beautiful, intelligent Sadie Hoffman at the age of seventeen, I knew he was lost to me.
They went on to get married and they now have two beautiful daughters who look just like him, with the same dark hair and the same dark-green eyes. It pained me to see the girls at my wedding, but not as much as it devastated me to see their father.
But I still said ‘I do’.
I love Ned. I love him desperately. I wouldn’t have walked down the aisle to him if I didn’t, and I know I’m going to miss him while I’m away – I hated saying goodbye.
But I love Ethan, too. I don’t think I’m capable of stopping.
Chapter 3
Heat engulfs me the moment I step off the plane. I had to make two stopovers to get to Adelaide – taking the cheapest flight-path option possible – and now it’s early afternoon, the hottest time of day.
I won’t be needing this, I think, as I stuff my winter coat into the outside pocket of the suitcase I’ve just dragged off the conveyor belt. I’m going to be hot in my jeans and trainers, but it’s only a half-hour taxi ride to Dad and Liz’s. I’ll drop off my suitcase and get changed before going to the hospital. Sleep can wait.
I’m so set on beating the rush for the taxi rank that I don’t even see Liz waiting for me in the Arrivals hall.
‘Amber! Wait!’ Her shouts eventually filter through to my brain and I falter in my steps, causing the person behind me to crash their trolley into my legs. Ouch! What is Liz doing here? I told her not to come.