“No.” She rubbed her forehead and tried to think positive thoughts. “I look every day, though. Something will come up. I don’t want to put it off. I don’t like the uncertainty. I’d rather go on and get it done.”
He shifted. “I wish I could tell Connor it’s not on, but I really can’t. It was part of the reason I bought the place, that there’d be room for him.”
“No worries. I get it. I only wish I had a family like that, brothers and sisters and all.”
“Ha,” he said. “After that lovely family dinner tonight, you may wish it a bit less. And what was that about your mum, anyway?”
“She was having Rich over while Zavy was there.”
He stopped in the middle of taking a sip of tea. “Without telling you?”
“Well, yes. And that’s what I said. She was angry, though, and I think she was hurt.”
“Not your fault.”
“No. I did the right thing. It just feels ...” She swallowed. “Bad. It’s my mum. And she hasn’t rung since, and ...” She focused on her breathing. “Well. I did what I had to do.”
He had an arm around her now, and that arm was strong. “You did.”
She glanced at him sidelong, wanting to relax into him, but she couldn’t, not quite yet. “You’ve barely met Rich. You can’t really know whether I’m reasonable.”
“I don’t have to know him any better.” He didn’t look one bit easygoing now. “I know enough.”
“Mm.” She still had work to do tonight, but not right now. Not this minute. For this minute, she was going to sit with her head against Kevin’s shoulder and let him hold her.
“I wasn’t reasonable myself,” he said after a little while, “and that wasn’t your fault either. It was because I’m leaving, and I don’t want to. And that after I come home, I’ll be leaving again barely a week later. Even your dream job can get to you, I guess, and apparently you take it out on somebody else. Besides the fact that once again, my sisters made an inedible meal just when I wanted them to get it right, and they can’t seem to put a dish in the dishwasher to save their lives. Those things, I’m definitely getting narky about. But mainly,” he said with a sigh, “it’s the sex I’m not having.”
He surprised a laugh out of her, and he said, “Yeh. Shocking, but there you are. And I’d rather sleep in my own bed ten meters from you and not have it, apparently, than sleep in a hotel across the Tasman and not have it. Odd, eh.”
She smiled. She had to. “You going to miss me? Going to be lonely?”
“Call it ‘lonelier.’ Call it ‘missing you already,’ and you just may have it right.”
“But you’ll have a whole rugby team with you.” She was teasing now, and she was loving doing it. “Probably sharing a room. All that company?”
“It’s still not my bed, let alone that you’re not in it. It’s too far away, and a rugby team compared with you? Not even close.”
A little figure chose this moment to pop around the end of the couch. Zavy in his Batman pajamas, with Walter in one hand.
“You’re meant to be in bed, mister,” Chloe said, sitting up straight. Thank goodness she hadn’t been lying on the couch with Kevin on top of her, which would have been happening in about three more minutes, “work to do” or no. Unlike her mum, Kevin was capable of apologizing, and it was much too disarming. And all of him was much too ... tempting. The calm and the kindness, and the flashes of something harder. Something fiercer. Something she wanted.
“I heard talking,” Zavy said.
“And you’re still meant to be in bed,” Chloe answered.
“But Kevin is going away,” Zavy said. “He said. He can’t sleep in his bed.”
Oh, geez. She had a feeling that the conversation she’d just had with Kevin was going to be reappearing in Zavy-translation at the absolutely most inopportune time.
“I’m just going for a few days, mate,” Kevin said. “I’ll be back.”
Zavy regarded him steadily for a minute, then said, “If you’re very, very sad, you can have a bear, and then you’re not sad.”
“That’s true,” Kevin said. “Maybe I should get a bear.”
Zavy hesitated, then came around the couch and thrust Walter at him. “You can take Walter to sleep in your bed.”
“Aw, mate,” Kevin said, sitting Walter on his knee, “no. Then you’d be sad, if you didn’t have Walter.”
“No,” Zavy said, “’cause I have Mummy, and she’s very, very close. But you don’t have Mummy.”
“You’re dead right,” Kevin said. “That’s exactly the problem.”
Zavy nodded with decision. “So Walter can sleep in your bed and keep you comp’ny instead.”
Kevin looked at Chloe, who said, “Are you sure, darling?”
“Yes,” Zavy said. “’Cause then Kevin will be happy.”
“Then,” Chloe said, “I think we should put you back to bed now, and if you miss Walter too much after all, you can tell me in the morning, and I can tell Kevin to leave him for you. And if you still want to send him with Kevin, then that’ll be good.”
“OK,” Zavy said.
Chloe got up and said, “Come on, then. Back to bed.”
She was half-afraid Kevin would be gone when she got back, but he wasn’t. He was still on the couch with Walter beside him, a ragged companion. She looked at the two of them and had to laugh. “You don’t actually have to take him, you know.”
“Nah,” he said. “Promised my mate, didn’t I. You can’t break a promise to a mate.”
He got up, kissed her goodbye again, and murmured, softly this time, so they wouldn’t wake Zavy up, “I’ll be back Sunday.”
“Sunday,” she said, rubbing her cheek against his shoulder, “happens to be my day off.”
“Wine,” he said. “Candles. All the good stuff. Maybe a little farther from home, eh. Maybe absolutely as romantic as I can make it. Maybe holding your hand across the table, and kissing you as soon as we get into the car, because we can’t wait, then having to wait all the same for that whole long drive home. Maybe so. And meanwhile ...” He held up the bear. “I’ll have Walter.”
On Tuesday evening, Chloe got a text while she was doing the washing-up.
She looked at it, laughed out loud, and was crouching and telling Zavy, who was helping her clear the table, “Come see this, darling.”
Zavy said, “It’s Walter!”
It was. Walter, Kevin, and Will Tawera, to be exact. Will and Kevin in T-shirts and shorts, all chests and thighs, stretched out on a hotel bed like two slices of bread in the most tempting rugby sandwich a woman could hope for. And Walter in the middle.
The message below the photo said Roomies. Chloe read it to Zavy, and he said, “What’s roomies?”
“Roommates. They’re staying in a hotel, where people stay when they’re away from home, and they’re sharing a room there, because that’s how it works on a rugby team.”
“Because Kevin is far away.”
“Yes. The team is far away in Australia, so far that they had to fly on an airplane to get there. I’ll tell you what.” She pulled Zavy in front of her and said, “We’ll do a thumbs-up like this, see? That means ‘good job,’ and that we miss him, and we’re hoping his training goes well tomorrow.”
She snapped a selfie of the two of them and sent it back to Kevin, and Zavy said, “Walter isn’t lonesome, even though he’s far away, ’cause he’s got comp’ny. And Kevin’s got comp’ny, ’cause he’s got Walter and the other man.”
“Yes,” she said. “Company always helps.” And then she had to breathe a minute, because Kevin texted back, At least the food’s better. But I miss your smile.
That’s too sweet, she texted back. Unfair.
Right, then, she got back straight away. I miss having you wrapped around me on the beach. I miss having you up against the wall. Even though I’ve never been so frustrated in my life.
Better, she sent back over the rush of heat that had gone straight down her body t
o a part of her that had shut itself down and put up a Closed sign quite a while ago. It was open for business now, though, and letting her know it. She added, Got to go. Bath time.
Miss that too. Or I would if I’d seen it. Missing it right now.
For Zavy.
Oh.
On Wednesday, they got a photo of Kevin holding Walter up so he seemed to be standing on top of the white sails of the Opera House. On Thursday, Walter was atop the iron arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge with half a rugby squad around him. And on Friday, Walter got a special treat.
“What are the men doing, Mummy?” Zavy asked. It was his bedtime, and they’d been reading Goodnight, Moon last thing before sleep. And Chloe had brought her phone in because … because she hadn’t heard from Kevin yet today. Which was also why she’d grabbed it the moment she heard the signal from the incoming text.
“Well …” Chloe had to clear her throat. It was a bit dry. “Kevin says they’ve just had the Captain’s Run, which is a special training before their match tomorrow. Now they’re in the changing room, and they’re changing from the special uniforms they wear for training into their regular clothes.”
That was one way to put it. The other was that Walter was once again being held up by Kevin. This time, though, he was surrounded by beautifully built men, half of them shirtless, a fair number of them tattooed with tribal designs on a bronzed arm, a bulky shoulder, a heavily muscled chest. All of them smiling for the camera, for Zavy, and for her.
Kevin was one of the ones without a shirt. He’d never be mistaken for a ballet dancer. And he looked so … strong.
She texted, What bear? I don’t see any bear.
He sent back, Knew I should’ve told those ugly fellas to stay out of my photo, and she laughed out loud, then had to explain it to Zavy. After that, she sat on the bed with her boy and took one photo after another until she got one where she looked soulful and pretty, and Zavy was smiling.
She sent it back to Kevin, and just this once, she set her pride and her reserve firmly to the side and took the leap.
I’ll watch tomorrow, and I’ll love doing it, but that’s not going to be good enough. I can’t wait for Sunday. I can’t wait for you to come home.
No answer, and she finished the book with Zavy and tried not to wonder why, then kissed her son goodnight, went back into the lounge, and opened her laptop.
Quit dreaming, she told herself. Get to work.
She’d even managed to do it when she finally got the text back.
Oh, baby, Kevin had written. Neither can I.
Five minutes later, while she was still buzzing from that, her mum rang.
Her first words were, “I still think you’re overreacting. I want to make that clear.”
Breathe. Strong. You are a mother. “You can think so,” Chloe said. “You don’t have to agree with my reasoning. You just have to agree that you’ll tell me what you do with Zavy and who you see, especially if it’s Rich. But, Mum—you do have to agree to that.”
A sigh from the other end. “Didn’t I just say that?”
“Well, no. You didn’t,” Chloe said, and then she waited.
“I agree to that,” her mother finally said stiffly.
Chloe had to close her eyes and focus. She hadn’t wanted to think about what she’d do if her mother held out. “That’s good,” she managed to say. “Thank you.”
“I’m his grandmother, after all,” her mother said.
“You are. And he loves you and Dad, and so do I.”
“Well, that’s fine, then.” Brisk, now. Too much emotion was never to be encouraged, and passion? Deeply suspect. Self-control was all. “So we’ll see him tomorrow morning as usual?”
Chloe hesitated a moment longer. “Rich hasn’t said anything to you, has he? Because, Mum … it really didn’t go well.”
“No, he hasn’t.” After a minute, her mother added, “I expect you’d better tell me, so I know.”
Chloe made the recital as dispassionate as she could manage, and her mother said, “Sounds like he just doesn’t know what children need.”
“So if you do talk to him,” Chloe said, “explain about naps and food and structure, please, Mum. All those things you did so well.” The olive branch, and besides—she hated to admit it, but her mother had been right about one thing. Rich was more likely to listen to somebody else. “But what I want to know is—why? Why would he suddenly be interested?”
“Why not assume the best? Why not give him credit? Assume that however awkward he is with Zavy now, however short he’s fallen in the past, he’s trying to be a father now.”
“I’d like to,” Chloe said, “but I can’t.”
“Then that’s on you, darling, isn’t it?”
You couldn’t have called it a clear win. But then, winning wasn’t the point. Zavy was the point. He wanted to see his grandparents, and they wanted to see him.
That was why Chloe dropped him off on Saturday morning with happy thoughts of an entire museum devoted to “vee-cles” buzzing in his head. “We’re going to go on a fire engine!” he told Chloe when she was kissing him goodbye. “And it has a train there, and we can ride on the train.”
Her mother was a little cool to Chloe, but then, Chloe felt pretty cool herself. Her father, though, walked her out of the apartment, stood by the lift with her, and said, “It’s hard for your mum to back down.”
“I know,” she said. “But you know … it’s hard for me, too. And, Dad ...” She kept her gaze steady. “I meant what I said. I’m Zavy’s mum. I decide.”
“She knows.”
“Does she?”
He didn’t answer that. “I know, too,” he said instead. “And I’m not golfing this weekend. I’ll be there.”
She had to content herself with that, but at least she had distractions. She taught her classes, looked at three more apartments and put in two more applications for places she didn’t want, then took Noelle grocery shopping.
“No Holly?” she asked when Noelle came out her front door alone.
Noelle made a face. “Gone into the city, and then to a party. She’s usually with her friends on the weekend, or her boyfriend. Tom.”
“Don’t you like him?”
“Nah, he’s all right. I don’t know him very well. It’s just ...”
“Your sister’s different than she used to be, maybe,” Chloe suggested, climbing into her car and waiting for Noelle to get in.
“Since we started Uni, mainly. Especially since we moved. I just don’t know why. Well, I do. It’s the first time we’ve been really separate, and she likes it better that way.”
“Are you doing the same course?” Chloe pulled out of the drive and headed toward the madness that was Lake Road and New World on a Saturday afternoon.
“Not even close. I’m doing Biotechnology, and she’s in Business. And she’s …” Noelle hesitated. “You don’t want to hear this, though.”
“Why not? Here we are in the car. I don’t have anything else pressing to think about just now. I may as well think about this.”
Noelle laughed, which surprised Chloe. “You’re always so … cool and businesslike. I wish I could be like that instead of all …” She waved a hand. “Blown around by everything.”
“Ah.” Chloe turned into the crowded New World carpark and began circling for a spot. “The influence of ballet. Being a dancer’s all contradiction. Working with so much discipline to succeed in a career that’s so … frivolous, some people would say. Training so many hours just so you can entertain people and make it look easy, make it look inevitable. It tends to train your mind as well. Makes you focused, probably more resilient, too, or maybe it’s just that you don’t get to the top unless you are focused and resilient. Unless you can push through the obstacles.”
“Kevin would say that’s exactly like rugby,” Noelle said.
“Could be.” Chloe was still circling, but ahead of her, a mum was putting her little girl into her car seat, so she stopped the c
ar and waited like a Parking Vulture. “Could be it’s like anything, just more … obviously, because it’s physical, it’s public, and it’s so easy to see who’s at the top. Maybe being a surgeon or a biotechnologist is the same. Maybe there’s as much competition for your spot, even as you have to work so closely together, and you feel so close. Could be. I wouldn’t know. Ballet’s all I’ve ever done.”
The mum in the other car finally got her daughter fixed and her groceries in the boot, and Chloe reversed so she could pull her car out. “But Holly’s different than she used to be?”
“Yeh,” Noelle said. “She is. She’s my twin, and when you’re a twin, sometimes you feel almost like the two of you are the same person, like you know each other as well as you know yourself. Now, it’s like there’s a … a blanket hanging between us, like our twinship is gone, and I miss it. I don’t know if it’s that I did better in my results and got a scholarship for Uni and she didn’t, or if she’s … if she doesn’t want to be …”
She trailed off, and Chloe pulled into her just-vacated carpark at last, but didn’t get out of the car. “If she’s what? Part of that ‘cool and businesslike’ bit is looking things in the face.”
“If she’s … embarrassed. Of me.” Noelle’s words came out jerky, hurried, and her face was flushing. “With her friends.”
“Oh, darling,” Chloe said. “I don’t think so.”
“Because I’m …” Noelle’s voice trembled. “People like you … they look at me and think, ‘Sloppy. Undisciplined. Lazy.’ I know you do. You’re probably right. I’ve lost three kg’s since the beginning of the year, but it’s nowhere close to what I need to lose. It’s so slow, and I slip too much. Too many times. All the time. So you’re right, and Holly’s right. I know it.” She reached for the door handle and climbed out of the car fast.
Chloe came around the car and, before Noelle could cross to the store, put a hand on her arm. “You just told me that you did better in your exam results, so how on earth could Holly be calling you undisciplined or lazy? What I’m hearing from her—that sniping? It isn’t embarrassment. It’s jealousy, maybe, that she’s realizing University’s different than school, careers are different than … than popularity, and maybe the spot she thought she had—being first in everything with you—maybe that won’t always be true. Maybe you’re going to be first after all. It’s coming from her, and it’s not even really about you. It’s what I see all the time in my students. What I’ve seen my whole life in ballet. That she’s scared that everything’s so much harder than she thought it would be, so she’s picking at you to try to feel better, trying to come on top of somebody, but it isn’t working, because that never works. And she feels ashamed of herself, and that may fluster her even more, make her pick at you even harder.”
Just Say Yes (Escape to New Zealand Book 10) Page 14