Maid for the South Pole

by Demelza Carlton

  He breathed an inward sigh of relief as she rose and left, saying something about how she needed to put her findings into a report to give to Ali before she did the evening forecast.

  The Investigator couldn't arrive soon enough to take him away from the temptation that was his roommate.

  TWENTY

  Audra ran the numbers again, but the results hadn't changed. She could have a proper shower come Christmas, and not before. Shelley was much too optimistic, suggesting the lake would melt earlier than that. Pity. She wouldn't mind seeing the guys do synchronised swimming in the lake. Even if she did have to coach them. She'd have to video that for sure. It might prove more popular than Jen's seal, which had almost a thousand views already. A thousand! Though, if Bruce had watched it over and over, maybe other people had, too.

  It didn't matter, anyway. She was building a following, and it was more than the blogs the other graduates had. If she could just keep their interest until the contest closed in March, she'd have that training scholarship in the bag. A PhD might not be such an impossible dream after all.

  Speaking of dreams...why was she so tired? Audra rubbed her eyes, trying to stay awake. It wasn't time for bed yet. The sun still blazed outside, so it couldn't be later than mid-afternoon. It was only an hour or so ago that she'd been laughing with the guys in the dining room over lunch as they argued about dance routines in or out of the water. In the few days since they'd separated into their respective teams, the amateur forecasters had grown quite competitive. If she did end up coaching a synchronised swimming team, she'd have to video it, if only to prove that she was the first swimming instructor to work in Antarctica. She wouldn't have believed it herself, but Antarctica had a way of showing her just how impossible things weren't if you really put your mind to it. It was just a matter of money, time and a couple of crazy ideas.

  Still, she'd done all she needed to for today, so she could relax. Maybe even read a little more of that sexy little romance about a stewardess she'd downloaded onto her ereader app last week. Mobile phone access was patchy at best down here, but her phone's size made it the perfect portable library, especially with the unlimited supply of ebooks she could get via the station's wi-fi network. The internet was an awesome thing.

  Audra glanced at her watch. Her mouth dropped open. Midnight? How was that even possible? It was daylight outside, damn it!

  It took a moment for her tired brain to respond to her outrage. Summer in Antarctica meant a few weeks of midnight sun, and a few weeks of total darkness come winter. She couldn't believe she'd forgotten. No wonder she felt tired. In six hours, she'd be up and formulating the morning forecast.

  Audra smothered a yawn as she shuffled out of the Met office and up to the SAM where she slept.

  At least her roommate would be asleep by now. She could sneak in, snatch a little sleep, and sneak right out again without him even registering her presence.

  He would sleep well tonight, too. Ali had scheduled safety training for the new arrivals yesterday, so he'd have spent the whole day out hiking with a pack loaded full of supplies, building an emergency bivouac to sleep in for the night, before hiking all the way back again today.

  Audra didn't envy him. Safety training was hell, but it was better than dying of exposure if you were caught out in the unpredictable weather.

  Of course, tonight the weather was lovely. Clear and calm like a perfect summer's day, if it weren't midnight with snow on the ground. Audra's boots crunched on the road as she headed for bed. She paused by the LQ building, wondering if she should grab something to eat after having missed dinner again, but sleep's call was far more seductive than anything her stomach had to say.

  Finally, she reached the sanctuary of the SAM. Audra pulled off her boots and stalked the corridors in her socks, not wanting to wake anyone. She pushed open the door to her sleeping quarters, gratified to see that Jean had had the good sense to draw the blockout blinds properly so it was dark enough to sleep.

  She knew the room well enough not to need any light to make it to her bunk, either. Four steps to the ladder, a short climb up the rungs and she could fall into oblivion for a few hours.

  One step. Two...and it all went to shit. She tripped over something bulky in the middle of the floor and cracked her head on the ladder so hard she saw stars.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Halfway through the hike, Jean was tempted to quit. The combination of bone-numbing cold and his slightly out of practice legs made walking nothing short of agony. When he got back to the station, Jean swore to hit the gym. He'd been lax lately and it showed. He'd hurt worse during those months of physiotherapy sessions, though, so he just gritted his teeth and got on with it. The crazy Aussies wouldn't let him return to their island unless he showed them he could hike through the snow, dig himself a burrow and survive the night without proper shelter.

  He could do all that, or he had been able to before the accident. Now, he just needed a little help, in the shape of some pain pills. Just as soon as he could sneak some out of his pack without anyone seeing. The last thing he wanted was to be declared unfit for duty and sent home before he found his penguins. If anyone did see him, he could just say he had a headache, but he hoped it wouldn't come to that.

  Jean found his opportunity when they stopped for a drinks break. Sure, the medication took a while to kick in, but just knowing that the pain would ease as the hike continued instead of getting worse was enough to give him the boost he needed to go on.

  Digging his snow shelter wasn't so bad – until he tried to stand up again. Then he realised his knee had frozen while he'd been kneeling in the snow. He crawled into his little snow cave, trying to massage feeling back into his leg before anyone noticed. This was the only time he'd ever have to do something like this, so he just had to suck it up and endure it. Heard Island was warmer, with barely any snow on the ground near the camp areas, or at least that's what he remembered. Big Ben, the mountain in the middle, was covered in snow year-round, but as the penguins ignored it, he could, too.

  Later that night, as he tried to fight the claustrophobia of his temporary bivouac, which was nothing more than a snow cave lined with a plastic bag, he wished he had a roommate. Sure, it would be a lot more cramped than the room he normally shared, but he wouldn't be alone like he'd been in that lava tube on Heard Island, and Audra would be warm.

  Warm and soft and...oh, no. He slammed the door on that thought before it could sneak inside properly. Audra was not someone he wanted to share a bed with, or anything else. They shared a room out of necessity and the fact that she was a pretty, curvy woman was irrelevant. She didn't like him, and that's how things should stay.

  His traitorous mind filled his dreams with her, both good and bad, so by morning he was even more wrecked than when he'd gone to bed. At least he had plenty of snow to cool his ardour before he had to face his fellow trainees. And a long hike before he had to look Audra in the eye again.

  Yes, he'd gone too long since he last had sex. Years, actually. Jean knew he could have hooked up with someone in any of the cities he'd visited on his way to McMurdo, or even some of the friendly expeditioners he'd met along the way, but casual hook-ups weren't his thing, and they never had been. He'd married Dairine so young because he'd wanted more. So had she. More than he could give her, as it turned out.

  There. Mission accomplished. After thinking about his ex-wife, his libido had officially retired for the day.

  Jean crawled out of his cave and shared breakfast with the other trainees, before they packed up and headed back down to the station.

  By the time they reached Davis, both of Jean's legs were screaming at him. He knew what that meant – he needed the stronger painkillers, the ones that knocked him out for hours which he kept in the bottom of his bag so he could avoid them like the plague. Thank goodness he had tomorrow off – he was going to need it.

  He shared dinner with the other guys, forcing himself to smile and pretend nothing was wrong as he ate food he
barely tasted. Once his plate was empty, he was free.

  Jean grabbed his gear from outside the dining room and hobbled as fast as he could to his sleeping quarters. He dropped the pack the moment he crossed the threshold, kicking the door shut behind him. He pulled off his outer gear and left them where they lay, too tired to bend and pick them up. He staggered to his bed and knelt beside it so he could extract his pills from the hidden pocket in his bag. Jean washed down the tablets with the last of his bottle of water before he clambered onto his bed and lay still. After a moment, he decided the sunlight glaring through the windows was more than he could take, so he heaved himself out of bed and yanked down the blind.

  Blessed darkness, and hopefully a reprieve from pain.

  Jean sank into his mattress. When the drugs tugged at his pain, trying to take it away, he let them take his consciousness with them. Bliss.

  Or at least it was until a screeching harpy smashed his peace into shards.

  "What the fuck are you trying to do? Break my legs?"

  Jean tried to explain that he was the one who'd broken his legs, but they were fine now, not hurting at all, but he wasn't sure the words came out right.

  "So you just thought you'd leave your stuff lying around, not caring if I tripped over it? You expected me to be your personal maid, is that it?" Audra's eyes blazed. Green fire. Could you get green fire? She could. She had blood on her forehead, too, like she'd hit her head.

  Jean scanned the room. He'd left his bag and clothes right in front of the door where they'd trip anyone coming in. He should have put them away before knocking himself out. She didn't deserve to be hurt because of him.

  Mumbling an apology, Jean got out of bed, gritting his teeth as he limped around the room, putting it to rights. His field pack went out into the corridor, and he hung his outer clothing on the hooks where they belonged. He lined his boots up underneath his coat, like he usually did, but he'd forgotten in his haste to stop hurting tonight. Lastly, he shoved his bag back under his bunk, so she wouldn't see the pills he'd taken. They were perfectly legal – he had a prescription for them and everything – but if anyone here knew he was taking them, they'd ship him out for sure. Not going to happen.

  Once again, he apologised to Audra. He mumbled an excuse about being tired after the safety training, which seemed to work.

  She softened the tiniest bit, and nodded.

  "You're bleeding. You should go to sickbay and get someone to look at that," he ventured, pointing at her forehead.

  Audra's hand went to her hairline and came away red. "Yeah. Thanks," she said, sounding as out of it as he felt.

  Jean swallowed. "I'm really sorry." And please don't report me for drug use, he thought but didn't say.

  She didn't respond. Instead, she left.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Christmas morning dawned and Audra wasn't sure whether she was more disappointed at not getting to coach the synchronised swimming boys, or not being allowed a proper shower. She didn't want to be right when it meant that the lake was still frozen over.

  She sighed and hopped out of bed. Jean was still fast asleep, so she dressed and headed for the LQ, where she knew they'd need every pair of hands to help with decorations and gifts.

  Bruce would be playing Santa this year, just as he had last year, but now he sat on the floor amid a pile of gifts that still needed to be wrapped.

  Audra grabbed two coffees from the kitchen and joined him. "Want me to be Mrs Claus again this year?" she asked.

  "You're a godsend, Audra. I can't gift-wrap to save my life." Bruce took the offered coffee and drank deeply.

  "Luckily I've had plenty of practice. Just like last year. Bring me the gifts and write out the label while I wrap." She surveyed the pile. "There's a lot more than last year."

  "More researchers this year. I hope we haven't forgotten anyone in the Secret Santa."

  "Me, too. It's a long trip to the shops for an extra box of chocolates."

  Audra set to work, wrapping gifts that had come by ship from relatives and friends on the mainland, as well as those that expeditioners had bought each other as part of the Secret Santa program. Audra had been told she'd be buying a Secret Santa gift for Bruce, which had been easy. She could see the bottle of flavoured Russian vodka she'd bought for him before she left Melbourne, hiding behind an enormous stuffed seal.

  "Oh, wow, someone loves you," Bruce said.

  Audra looked up. "What do you mean?"

  "Your family sent you a carton of mango beer."

  The moment Audra saw the carton, she shook her head. "No, that wasn't my family. It's from a friend who lives in Broome." Jay, she was certain.

  "A friend who'd like to be a lot more. That stuff's expensive."

  Price wouldn't matter to Jay, but Audra was still surprised that he'd bothered to buy her anything. It was really sweet, even for him.

  "More! Gah, your Secret Santa gift's mango liqueur!" Bruce set the bottle on top of the case. "And...a box of shampoo?"

  Audra laughed. "That's from my family. With the water shortages, I've been using a dry shampoo, but I'm running low, so I emailed my sister and asked her to send a lot more. If I'm lucky, this will do me the whole winter, even if I wash my hair every day."

  She wrapped her own presents, stuck on the gift tags, and moved on to the next item on Bruce's list. She had to pause for a moment to load more tape into the dispenser before she could finish wrestling the seal into its wrapping for Jen.

  The stack under the Christmas tree was looking particularly impressive when Bruce suddenly swore. "Jean's not on the list. There's nothing for him." He eyed Audra. "You're his roommate. You must know him. What does he like?"

  Avoiding her as much as she avoided him, Audra thought but didn't say. She barely knew the man, and if she'd ever felt the need to get to know him, it had evaporated in the heat of her embarrassment at shouting at him after his safety training.

  As she'd watched him limp around the room, putting his things away and apologising, she'd been too tired and too angry to realise why he'd left his gear on the floor. It wasn't until she'd been sitting in sickbay for a while that her brain registered what she'd seen – a man recovering from what she knew had been horrific injuries, having just undergone a gruelling hike and survival training. She'd needed the day off after her first survival training, and she hadn't been injured. It must have been twice as hard for him. Then she'd spotted the empty pill packet in the bin under the desk and wondered just how much pain he was hiding from everyone. He'd passed his medical assessment, but at what cost?

  Now she was torn between her desire to apologise and the need to keep his secret. He evidently hadn't wanted her to know, but now she did, and she wasn't sure she could apologise without blurting out the rest. So, she'd gone back to avoiding him.

  Her gaze landed on the box of beer she'd wrapped for herself. She didn't need them, and she had plenty of gifts, even if she had sent Sam the money for the shampoo. "He likes beer, doesn't he? Give him mine."

  "You can't do that! You already bought your Secret Santa gift. You shouldn't have to get two. Plus, that carton cost way more than you're supposed to spend."

  Audra shrugged. "A six pack, then. You'll have to hide the rest of the carton somewhere until he leaves with the rest of the summer researchers, so he doesn't see it. We'll save it for the dead of winter."

  "If you're sure..."

  She nodded once. "Absolutely." Plus, it would be a sort of oblique apology for her behaviour the other night, without ever having to say the words to his face. Giving him the whole carton was worth that. Besides, it was Christmas.

  "You're a better person than me," Bruce said fervently. "I wouldn't share that with anyone."

  Audra wasn't sure what to say to that, so she just got back to work on her gift-wrapping.

  TWENTY-THREE

  Withdrawal symptoms from his pain meds wouldn't kill him, Jean told himself for what felt like the millionth time. He should never have taken them. Inste
ad, he should have just put up with the pain until it went away on its own. He wouldn't be waking up on Christmas morning with the mother of all hangovers that he'd drunk nothing to deserve.

  Speaking of mothers, he should call his. It was still Christmas Eve there – perfect timing.

  Jean made himself look presentable, then dragged the desk chair into the best light beside the window before he turned on his tablet and tried to video call home.

  His mother must have been sitting at the computer, she answered so quickly.

  "Jean-Pierre? It's so good to see you. See? I told you he'd call," she said, dragging his dad into range of her webcam.

  "Hi Mom, Dad," Jean said. "Yeah, it's really good to see you, too. Last Christmas I was stuck on some rock with no internet access, but this year I'm at one of the Australian research stations, Davis, so it almost feels like civilisation again. Or it would, if it weren't for all the seals and penguins outside." He peered out the window. Yes, he could still see the elephant seals who'd beached themselves at the haul-out area Davis used as a loading dock when the sea ice had melted, like now.

  "I'm so sorry about Dairine, and the baby," Mom said. "I remember her calling me when she first filed for divorce, telling me she'd had to stick your things in boxes in her garage because it hurt her to look at them. She threatened to throw everything in the garbage, but I made her send them here so she wouldn't have to look at them any more. I put them..."

  Jean was still stuck on the first thing she'd said. Baby? "Did she lose the baby?" Jean interrupted. No matter what he felt about Dairine, he wouldn't have wished that on her.

  "You mean you don't know?"

  Jean shook his head. "We're not exactly on talking terms any more. That's one of the reasons she divorced me, and married some other guy who could give her kids when I couldn't."

  "But you did, baby. She was so proud you got her pregnant right before you left for your research trip that she called me every week until she had a miscarriage. She said she told you, but you never replied."