by Anna Romer
She caught herself, and pressed her lips into one of those smiles that said, I’ve gone and put my foot in it, haven’t I?
‘Coby always wanted kids,’ I said quietly.
‘Tons of them,’ she agreed, widening her eyes. Then she added wistfully, ‘Family equals security for him. Nine years in the foster system will do that to a person.’
‘He’ll make a great dad.’
Nina grasped my hand. ‘Oh Lucy, it’s so good to see your face.’
This time I squeezed back. ‘Yours, too.’
Then she grimaced. ‘I really have to wee. Will you promise me something?’
‘What?’
‘Don’t be a stranger. Come and visit. Please?’
‘Sure.’
‘Hey, Sunday’s curry night at our place – what do you say?’
‘Sounds good. I’ve missed your curries.’
‘Great! Come at six, we’re early eaters. Lucy, it’s amazing to see you. I can’t wait to hear all about your adventures. And all about Adam,’ she added with a gleam in her eye. Dipping towards me, she placed a butterfly-soft kiss on my cheek and then hurried away. Knots of people stepped aside for her, opened their little groups to allow her fleeting access, and then watched her with admiring glances.
A sticky trickle of melting ice cream leaked onto my hand. I headed back to where Dad and I had been standing near the balustrade. As I shuffled around the perimeter of a tightknit group, something made me look across the foyer towards the chandelier. Coby tilted his chin, a cautious acknowledgement. I lifted my hand in a wave, and then hurried back to Dad.
‘You look peaky,’ he said as I delivered his ice cream. ‘How was Nina?’
‘She’s pregnant, actually.’ My words came out stiffer than I’d intended. ‘I guess it must have slipped your mind?’
Dad winced. ‘Sorry about that, kiddo. I was scared you might jet off again if you knew.’
I sighed. ‘It’s okay, Dad. Coby and I were never really an item . . . He thought we were, but it wasn’t that way with us. You know?’
‘I know he had a hell of a time after you went AWOL. Morgan said he stayed in his room for six months brooding to Metallica.’
My cheeks burned. I felt hot and weak again. Tearing the cellophane off my ice cream, I cracked the hard chocolate topping with my teeth and devoured the cold sweetness in a couple of bites. The sugar hit revived me.
‘Nina wants me to visit,’ I told Dad.
‘I think you should. She’s missed you, you know.’
I busied myself crunching through the last of my cone.
Dad’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s with you tonight? You usually wait until the movie starts before you even take off the wrapper.’
Balling the cellophane, I sighed. ‘I was hungry.’
Dad took the rubbish from my fingers, gave me his hanky, and scouted around for a bin. When he came back, he looked at me.
‘You won’t like hearing this, but I have to ask. Are you certain you’re not rushing into this? Marriage, I mean. You’re only twenty-six, you’ve got your whole life ahead of you.’
I frowned at him, mystified. ‘Why the sudden grilling?’
‘You don’t seem quite yourself. And it’s not jetlag. Not getting cold feet, are you?’
‘Why would I? Adam is a really lovely guy.’ I wiped my hands on his hanky and passed it back. ‘He’s got all your books. You’ll like him.’
Dad sighed. ‘I’m sure I will.’
I glanced towards the bright spot near the chandelier. Coby and Nina and their group of friends had moved along. My encounter with Nina had left me feeling as if I’d found something precious that had been lost, and now it was gone again. I twisted the ring on my finger, Adam’s ring, its big square-cut diamond warm from my skin. I was more like Coby than I cared to admit. I understood his hunger for security. More than anything else, I craved a safe harbour, a place to drop anchor and drift quietly through life, knowing I was sheltered from any storms that might blow my way. Adam, with his soft-spoken humour and gentle strength, was my harbour. There was no fiery passion between us, no tempest that might blow me off course, but rather a solid alliance built on loyalty and respect. For me, that was enough.
‘Did I tell you about Morgan?’ Dad said suddenly.
I regarded him warily. ‘Umm . . . no.’
‘He and Gwen finally got divorced.’
A rush of heartbeats, a vaguely giddy sick feeling overtook me. I forced myself to focus on Dad’s face, forced myself to sound natural.
‘What a shame. They were married forever.’
‘Almost two decades,’ Dad agreed. ‘They’re still friends, although Gwen’s living in Canberra now with her new partner. Funny,’ he added wistfully, ‘how things turn out, isn’t it?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Gwen and Morgan were always firm friends, but there was never any real spark between them.’
I wondered if he’d overheard my thoughts, and felt my defences prickle. ‘What’s so bad about that? Sparks are overrated. They don’t last.’
Dad looked at me. ‘You used to light up when Morgan came into the room, you know.’
I shot him a warning glare. ‘I was a kid.’
‘Crazy, isn’t it? Young Coby falling for you, when it was always his father you liked.’
‘Foster father. Besides, I didn’t like him. It was just hero worship.’
Dad scratched his beard and smiled. ‘You and Morgan always had a bond. As a kid, you thought the sun shone out of him. Then when you were older, I seem to remember a crush. These days you’re barely on speaking terms with him. What happened?’
My words came out harsher than I’d intended. ‘I grew up.’
‘Did I tell you he’s been helping Wilma at the historical society? He restored their photo collection, all those old prints from the war. Did a superb job. He blew up copies for the Red Cross auction, they were a huge hit.’
‘Great,’ I murmured.
‘He printed off a snap of your mother, too. Taken that last summer, while she was sitting under the big old tree at . . . Well, you remember it. A pity,’ he added, almost to himself, ‘I haven’t had a chance to get it framed.’
The rawness in his eyes threw me off guard. He was doing his best, I reminded myself. My mother, Karen, had been his soul mate, his great love. Sixteen years had passed since we lost her, but it seemed like no time at all. Dad had fallen into a black depression after she died, his grief an entity in itself, a shadow-creature living right there in the house with us. I spent my early teenage years tiptoeing around him, running and fetching to keep him happy, hiding in my room when rage and despair drove him to seek oblivion in the bottom of a wine cask. Years later, after the breakdown that sent him to Banksia House, Wilma came on the scene and everything changed. We began to rub along as a family. Dad rediscovered his smile, and we found the common ground of his stories and my illustrations. Yet the shadow lingered, mostly ignored, a dark whisper of reproach wedged subtly between us.
I took a deep breath. ‘You were telling me about Morgan.’
Dad nodded. ‘He’s a professor now. A brilliant one, too. Hard to believe he started out as a skinny, half-starved kid who didn’t even finish high school.’
I stayed silent. I’d known Morgan since I was four. Dad met him at university when Morgan was a down-and-out history student, and Dad a disillusioned lecturer. They’d recognised each other as kindred spirits, struck up a friendship, and had remained close over the years, through the hard times, and then as both their lives took turns for the better. Morgan had no family of his own – or so I’d assumed when he started coming home with Dad for the holidays. He never spoke about his past, at least not to me. My mother took him under her wing and he became the son she’d always longed for.
The year I turned eight, Morgan announced he was getting married. My parents were beyond thrilled. They insisted he bring the lucky girl over for dinner. Gwen Larkin was another one of Dad’s st
udents. She was tall and slim, as pale as a moonbeam, a staunch women’s libber with a passion for saving the environment, the underdog, the downtrodden. She was everything I aspired to be, and I might have been as smitten by her as everyone else was, but for one glaring flaw: she was about to marry the man I adored.
Dad looked at me. ‘He’s always had a soft spot for you, Lucy. Now that he’s single, maybe . . .’
I held up my hand, wiggling my fingers so my engagement ring – my very expensive diamond engagement ring – twinkled conspicuously. ‘I’m already spoken for. Besides, Morgan’s too old for me.’
‘Ouch. You young people can be really cruel sometimes.’
I couldn’t hold back a smile. ‘Your choc top’s melting.’
Dad examined his ice cream. Condensation bubbled on the hard chocolate coating and threads of cream snaked over his hand. Taking out his rumpled hanky, he mopped the leaks thoughtfully.
‘I just want you to be happy, kiddo.’
‘I am happy.’
Dad looked dubious. ‘If you could have anything at all, what would it be?’
‘Rub a magic lamp, you mean?’
‘Or wish on a star. Yeah.’
I blinked. That was a no-brainer. I’d wish for what everyone else wished for: a perfect body . . . a million dollars . . . a life that wasn’t a shambles. Gosh, where to begin?
I tucked my diamond ring away from sight. ‘I’ve got everything I need,’ I told my father crisply. ‘What about you? What’s your burning desire?’
He smiled wistfully. ‘To hear my little girl laugh more often. It’s such a pretty laugh. Not to mention how damn cute she sounds when she snorts.’
I frowned. ‘It’s not like you to be sentimental.’
‘I’m just getting the vibe that your life isn’t as rosy as you want everyone to think. I mean, why are you here alone? You’ve half-blinded me with that diamond a dozen times, but the man himself is conspicuous in his absence. What’s really going on, Luce?’
I couldn’t meet his eyes. The air in the old theatre seemed suddenly stale, unbreathable. I gazed towards the stairwell, wanting to be out on the windy street, breathing the damp night air. Wishing I were back at the house, propped in bed with hot cocoa, pondering the mystery of my grandfather’s letter, or losing myself in Dad’s most recent manuscript.
Instead, I flashed back to the time before. Before I ran away to London. Before I stuffed things up so badly I could no longer bear to show my face. Before I severed ties with everyone I loved. I’d been different then, bright-eyed and quicker to smile, not so guarded. Life had seemed straightforward, ripe with opportunity. I’d believed that all you had to do was identify what you wanted and then just reach out and take it. Although, of course, that particular bubble of naivety had quickly popped.
Heat crept into my cheeks. My ears began to burn. I braced myself for Dad to continue prodding.
He must have sensed my defeat, because he said nothing more. A moment later, the gong sounded. The first feature was about to begin. I did a quick scan of the foyer and, satisfied Nina and Coby were nowhere in view, I linked arms with Dad and steered him towards the welcome darkness of the theatre.
Elegant golden curtains slid back from the screen and the film began. As the opening music flooded the auditorium, I settled back in the seat and retreated inside myself to brood over my father’s words.
Gwen and Morgan were always firm friends, but there was never any real spark between them.
The divorce had been a long time coming, I mused. They had always been an on-again, off-again sort of couple. Gwen was stubborn, and Morgan quick to storm off; tension simmered between them even during their good times. They had done their best to keep it amicable for Coby’s sake, but he always seemed to get caught in the crossfire. As Nina said, family was everything to Coby and it had troubled him that his own was so often unstable.
The year I turned twenty-one, Morgan and Gwen separated yet again. Coby had been devastated, and we began spending more time together. Not dating, at least not in my mind – just hanging out, listening to records, or walking for endless hours along the esplanade while Coby talked his parents’ latest split out of his system. We grew closer, much closer than we’d ever been.
The night of my birthday party, Morgan had seemed distant. While I danced away the hours with Nina and Coby and our group of friends, I kept glimpsing him from the corner of my eye – talking to Dad and Wilma or replenishing the cooler, fixing a string of blown fairy lights. After my friends left, I found him alone in the garden. He was sitting in the shadows on an old timber bench, his back resting against the shed wall. His hair was raked about, his face craggy with tiredness, dark circles under his eyes. He must have heard me approach, because he looked around and smiled.
‘Who’s this gorgeous creature?’ he said with a wink. ‘What have you done with my little Lucy?’
When I didn’t say anything, his smile fell away. ‘You okay, sport?’
‘Dad’s going to kill me,’ I blurted.
Morgan cocked an eyebrow. ‘What’ve you done?’
I sat beside him on the bench. I wore my usual jeans, Doc Martens on my feet, my fair hair loose around my shoulders. Nina had helped me choose a short dress to wear as a top, a glittery red sheath with spaghetti straps and a low-cut neckline that made me look shapelier than I was. I let the lacy wrap fall away from my shoulders. It was November, the night warm. The garden was mostly dark, except for the fairy lights that Wilma and I had strung from the trees earlier that day.
In the gloom, I saw – no, not saw exactly, rather, felt – Morgan’s gaze linger on me. A slow, appreciative gaze that set my blood alight. Feather-soft, that gaze took in my bare arms and danced its way across the skimpy neckline. It trailed up my throat and then, as warm as honey, settled for one intoxicating moment on my lips. When his eyes finally met mine, a shadow crossed his face. His jaw tightened. Then he tried to mask the tightness behind a smile.
‘What have you done?’ he asked again, only now his voice was strangely soft.
‘I got a tattoo.’ I lifted my shoulder for him to see. The design inked into my skin was still a little inflamed, but no longer sore. ‘It’s kind of a birthday present to myself. What do you think?’
Morgan looked at my shoulder and whistled. ‘A little mermaid. She looks just like you.’ He smiled, and the garden seemed suddenly very dark, as though even the fairy lights had dimmed. The stars grew dull, the round face of the moon faded to a hazy thumbprint. Morgan, on the other hand, glowed.
‘I love you,’ I whispered. ‘I always have, Morgan. Always will.’
His smile faltered. He tilted his head, as though uncertain he’d heard correctly.
I was possessed, I must have been. The heat he had ignited in me with his lingering, appreciative glance must have short-circuited the logical part of my brain. As though watching from a distance, I saw my hand float towards his face. I saw my fingers gently cup his cheek. I saw myself lean against him, my face turned upwards like a sunflower seeking the light. I watched my younger self with a mix of mortification and dread, as I slid my other arm around his neck and pressed my lips against his mouth—
‘No!’
Jolting back to the dark cinema, I realised I’d spoken aloud. Not just spoken – I’d virtually yelled. My father shot me a startled look, but then must have assumed a tense moment in the film had taken me off guard. He smiled indulgently and settled his attention back on the screen.
I sank into my seat. My cheeks burned. I thought of Coby and Nina, somewhere in the dark theatre, perhaps sitting nearby. They would have recognised my voice, known the shout had come from me. I imagined them casting each other sideways looks in the flickering gloom, Nina digging Coby with her elbow, the two of them laughing a little and rolling their eyes.
I sank lower, resigning myself to sit out the rest of the film in shame. Then, from somewhere behind me, a woman cried, ‘Oh!’
The man on the other side of Dad ju
mped, and then gave a sheepish snort. A few people tittered.
‘Bloody Hitchcock,’ I heard Dad mutter. ‘Nightmares all round, tonight.’
3
A man stepped from the shadows of my front verandah. He wore jeans and an old leather coat, biker boots that thudded on the stairs as he came to greet me, his stride no less confident because of the slight limp.
Climbing from my van, I let the door slam shut.
I had dreaded this moment for nearly five years, yet in a secret corner of my being, I’d been yearning for it too. I found myself drinking in the sight of him, cataloguing the familiar features. The windswept dark hair, the striking face and intense pale eyes. The mouth that was, even now, quirked up in the enigmatic half-smile that, I realised regretfully, still had the power to tie my stomach in knots.
‘Lucy,’ he said, with a hint of accusation.
I stood my ground, watching him warily. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I want to talk.’
I glanced at the house, its windows clamped tight against the night. I took in the straggly hedge enclosing the yard, the deep shadows along the verandah. Finally, I braved Morgan’s eyes – the pale grey of the moon on a stormy night, yet fierce as those of a wolf. ‘I’ve got nothing to say.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ve got plenty.’
‘Morgan, I’m tired. Can we do this another time?’
‘And risk you absconding from my life for another five years?’
‘I didn’t abscond. I went to live in London.’
‘You didn’t even say goodbye.’
I pushed past him, gripping my keys, intending to escape into the house, but he grabbed my arm.
‘A letter would’ve been nice.’
I shook free and continued along the path, only turning back when I reached the verandah. ‘I’m sure Dad filled you in on all my goings-on.’
Morgan gazed after me, his expression lost in the shadows. Behind him, the street lamp burned dull yellow, painting a ragged halo about him. He might have been the villain from a book or movie, a pirate poised on the deck of his vessel, solitary, ever so vaguely heroic. Exactly the way I had conjured him so many times in my imagination.