by Trish Morey
‘And I thought, maybe it’s not too late. Maybe we can try again. Maybe we can pick up the pieces and finally move on. Luke,’ she said, coming closer, putting a hand on his arm. ‘Can we move on? Can we try again?’
He looked at the hand on his arm. Felt her warmth and felt his body already hungering for more. But he’d been here before, and look how that had ended. But she was still waiting for his answer and the least he could do was be polite. ‘What do you mean, try again?’
Air hissed between her teeth. ‘Marry me, Luke, and make me the happiest woman in the world?’
He didn’t know what to say. ‘What about your job?’
‘I walked out of the interview. I realised I didn’t want the promotion after all. I realised I wanted something more. Someone more.’
‘So what will you do – if you end up out here, I mean?’
‘I don’t know. Help Fi out in the shop, maybe – because she’s going to need help. I don’t care. I just want to be here. With you. So will you? Marry me?’
She stood there, waiting in the sun with the flies buzzing past and the rumble of a car down the gravel road. Waiting for his answer.
He never for the life of him thought she’d come back. He’d said those words to punish her. And to remind himself of all the reasons he should be happy that she was leaving again. He’d said them to make her wonder, all the long way home. He’d hoped they’d make her sort herself out.
He’d never thought they’d bring her back.
He’d never imagined.
She was everything he’d ever wanted. She was all he’d ever wanted, ever since he’d known what wanting really meant. She was all of that and more.
But now, after being married once before, having been dumped on from a great height more than once before, he wanted other things. Like peace and quiet and a simple life where no one could dump on him ever again.
He sighed, and slapped away a fly that had landed on his shoulder. ‘I don’t know, Pip.’
Her voice was tiny when it came. ‘What?’
‘Strangely enough, I’ve had a gutful of women walking out on me. I’m not sure I want to go through all that again.’
She bit her lip. ‘I appreciate that. I know I’ve got form. But I love you – I do – and I thought, from what you said, that maybe there was a still a chance that you still loved me. That maybe after all these wasted years, we could spend the rest of our lives together. And it would be the rest of our lives, I promise. Luke?’
He threw the rag on the car. ‘Honestly, Pip, I don’t know. You freeze me out for so many years, then you put me in a box that says “just sex”, and now you’re telling me that you love me. I don’t know what to believe.’
‘Luke, listen –’
‘No, Pip, you listen,’ he said, the confusion he’d felt at her arrival boiling over to anger that she thought she could just walk back into his life again and everything would be hunky dory. ‘Do you have any idea what it’s like to see the person you love walk away – and not just once, but twice? Do you have any idea what it’s like to have your heart ripped from your body while you’re still breathing? I don’t think you do. I don’t think you have any concept.’
She swallowed. ‘So that’s your final answer,’ she said. ‘That’s a no, then.’
He nodded. ‘Yeah, I guess that’s about the size of it. You might as well take your poncy car and go back to where you came from.’
‘Okay.’ She pressed her lips tightly together, and if it was supposed to be a smile it fell a mile short of the mark. ‘I’d better get going then.’
He said nothing, so she just nodded and said, ‘Goodbye’ and climbed back into the car. He watched her go, turning left back towards the highway.
At his feet, Turbo watched the departing vehicle and whimpered.
‘Damn straight,’ he said to the dog with a nod. ‘She sure got what was coming to her. And with both barrels.’
Turbo just looked at him and whimpered some more.
‘It was the right thing to do,’ he said, nodding some more, dropping the bonnet of the ute with a crunch and wiping his hands on his pants. ‘Our life is pretty damned fine just the way it is, eh Turbo? Who needs a woman to go messing it up?’
Turbo whined louder, his head to one side as he pawed his master’s leg.
‘You’re not wrong, mate. That’ll teach her to fuck around with the man who loves her.’
He stopped. Blinked. Looked at the dog. Looked over at the road in the direction she’d gone.
I love her.
‘Oh. Fuck!’
He reached into his jeans for the car keys. ‘Turbo,’ he shouted. ‘In!’
They shot out of the driveway and onto the gravel road, spraying dust and stones in their wake, trying to guess which way she’d head when she hit the highway. Right and back to Adelaide and a plane to New York? Or left, to Tracey’s?
‘Which way?’ he said, as he reached the T-junction, peering left and right, searching for some sign of her car.
Turbo barked.
‘Yep,’ he said, turning left. ‘That’s what I thought too.’
She’d been dreaming about their meeting, building it up in her mind through all the long hours of travel, picturing the surprise and the smile on his face. Imagining him sweeping her into his arms because against all the odds, she’d come back.
Imagining him saying yes.
Not once had her fevered mind thrown up the possibility that he’d out and out say no.
Oh, she wasn’t stupid. Expecting him to simply run to her and welcome her with open arms had been in the realms of high fantasy, and she hadn’t expected him to forgive her that quickly. She’d expected conditions to be imposed, demands to be made. That she promise never to leave him again. That she promise to love him forever.
Laughing, smiling conditions, sprinkled in between kisses that tasted like sunshine before he said yes. Because he’d been going to say yes all along.
Never once had she imagined him flatly turning her down.
Oh god, what a nightmare. She’d walked away from her job, and for what? This? She flicked the wipers on, and only when they scraped across the dry windscreen did she realise why she couldn’t see. She pulled off onto the verge and cried her eyes out as her fragile heart, the heart that she’d buried for so long and which now lay newly exposed, shattered into tiny pieces.
Turbo barked, jumping up on all fours, pawing at the dashboard.
‘That’s her all right,’ Luke said, as the red car came into view. But why had she stopped?
He pulled up behind and ran to her door and saw her hunched over her steering wheel and howling, her shoulders shaking as she heaved great shuddering sobs. ‘Pip!’ he said, flinging open the door. She hadn’t heard him coming. She looked up in surprise and after one look at her grief stricken face, his heart broke. He’d seen that face before, that night after her family’s funeral when she’d stumbled across the sodden paddocks to tell him what she’d overheard. And now he’d taken her to that place again. He was gutted.
‘Oh, god, Pip, I’m sorry.’ And he crouched down to cradle her in his arms. ‘I’m so sorry.’
She was still stuck there, held captive by that damned seatbelt and he reached over to unclick it so he could pull her from the car and properly into his arms.
She clung to him as he pulled her up and out, still sobbing and trembling, gasping for air and shaking her head. ‘No. I’m sorry. You’ve done nothing wrong. It was me. I was horrible. I deserved it. It’s all my fault.’
‘Shh,’ he said, rocking her in his arms. ‘I shouldn’t have made you cry. I don’t ever want to make you cry again. I promise never to make you cry again.’
She hiccupped and blubbered as she shook her head against his shoulder.
He put his hands on either side of her damp face and lifted it, pus
hing damp tendrils of hair from her brow. ‘Will you hold me to that?’
She frowned and shook her head, her teeth catching her bottom lip. ‘But . . . but you don’t –’
‘Answer me. Will you hold me to that?’
‘But that would mean –’
‘Yeah, you’re right. I’m so sorry Pip. Maybe if you’d warned me you were coming. Maybe if I’d known in advance and had time to prepare. I’ve spent the best part of the last week telling myself you did the right thing going back to New York City. I’d almost convinced myself that I didn’t . . .’
She sniffed and swallowed and blinked beautiful blue liquid eyes up at him. ‘Didn’t what?’
‘Love you. But I do love you, Pip. I always have, and I always will. You know the worst thing about my crappy marriage to Sharon? The one thing that was never going to make it work, whatever else happened?’
‘No.’
‘She wasn’t you.’ He shook his head as he rubbed her back, still rocking. ‘Everyone was waiting for me to move on. And so I did. I always felt like I was settling. Because I couldn’t have you.’
‘I’m so sorry! I’ve stuffed up so many lives. I’ve made such a mess of everything.’
‘Hey,’ he lifted her chin with the fingers of one hand. ‘Here’s one mess we can fix right now. That question you had. Would you mind popping it again? Because I think I might have been too hasty.’
She took a deep breath, her eyes filling with fresh promise, like when the sun comes out on a rainy day. ‘The big question, you mean?’
‘Yeah,’ he said, grinning. ‘That’s the one.’
She took a moment to wipe away the dampness from her cheeks, to get her breathing under control and push wayward hair behind her ears.
‘I love you, Luke Trenorden,’ she said at last. ‘Will you marry me?’
And his heart suddenly felt so big in his chest it was a wonder it didn’t explode right then and there. ‘Yes, I surely will marry you.’ He kissed her, and she tasted of warmth and hope and new beginnings. She tasted of the woman he loved and she felt like heaven in his arms.
He was in heaven, and he wanted to tell it to the world. Had to tell it to the world.
He lifted his lips from hers, turned his face towards the sky, and howled. Turbo joined in so there were two of them, howling under the harvest sun, with Pip laughing in his arms.
‘I love you, Luke. You and your crazy dog.’ And she pulled his head down to hers and kissed him again.
Epilogue
They were married in February, because they hadn’t wanted to wait and because Fi had said they would have to delay things until after these babies of hers were born if they didn’t do it quickly, since she didn’t want to look like a whale in the photos. It suited them fine that they were joined as man and wife in the gardens at Tracey and Craig’s home, the lawns surrounded by a border of rose bushes lush with deep pink blooms. Tables covered in snowy white tablecloths were scattered about the lawns, while hay bales under big umbrellas served as more informal seating for when guests wanted to sit and escape the sun.
Sally had agreed to give Pip away, walking her down the pergola-covered path, Pip in her champagne-coloured vintage beaded gown with her bouquet of roses. Behind them, Tracey and Fi and Carmen followed them in identical carnelian red gowns. As she approached the man she loved, standing with his back to her in his charcoal suit, Pip had never felt happier.
Until Craig said something to him and tapped him on the shoulder and he turned and saw her coming, and his eyes were filled with so much love that Pip felt her heart swell even more.
She’d never believed it possible that she could feel so happy.
She’d never believed she’d deserved to.
Luke had made her believe it.
Luke had made it possible.
And she smiled. Widely. This one meant for him and him alone. Because he’d saved her. From a half life spent in a shadow world. Oh, how much did she owe this man? How much did she love him?
She was a goddess.
Luke watched her glide towards him, loving the way she’d worn her hair up, but left some bits of it to curl around her long column of throat. He didn’t know much about fashion, but that dress, with its low V-neck, and the way it hugged her curves before falling to the ground in some kind of floaty stuff that swirled around her legs, confirmed it right there. She was nothing short of a goddess, and she was his.
And didn’t that make him proud?
They exchanged their vows and kissed and everyone cheered, because this wedding had been so long wished for and so long in coming and was all the sweeter because of it.
And afterwards they feasted on the best produce that the Yorke Peninsula had to offer, washed down with Clare Valley wines, and Turbo appeared wearing a bow tie and looking like it was all about him.
Everyone, it seemed, was there, including Sheila Ferguson and Jean Cutting, who were more than happy to gang up on him now.
‘What a glorious wedding,’ announced Sheila. ‘Of course, we all knew it would happen sooner or later.’
‘You two were so close as teenagers,’ added Jean. ‘We were all hoping you’d end up as more than friends. Funny how that’s happened, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah,’ he said, because it was easy to just agree with them, and because maybe they were right. ‘It sure is funny how things turn out.’ And he looked around to try to find his new wife.
Pip caught up with Sally after the service, noticing Sam Riordan leaving her side and heading for the drinks table.
‘Thank you so much for giving me away,’ she said. ‘It was so special to me that you were the one to do it.’
‘It was an honour, Pip. You’re the daughters I never had, you and Fi both. I so want for you to be happy.’
The women hugged.
‘I’m so glad you could see your way to forgive me, Pip, for everything.’
And Pip looked into her eyes and held her hands and said, ‘I want you to be happy too.’
Sally shook her head, a frown creasing her brow. ‘I’m not sure what you mean.’
Pip nodded in the direction of the drinks table, where Sam was chatting to the barman as he picked up a beer and a glass of champagne. ‘You’ve been by yourself a long time. Sam seems like a nice man.’
Sally shook her head and laughed a little nervous laugh. ‘Oh no, it’s not like that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I’m happy by myself.’
Pip nodded. ‘I thought I was too.’
‘You?’
She smiled. ‘Me. I was so bound up in guilt over not being with my family that night.’
‘But you can hardly blame yourself for that.’
‘No. And nor can you blame yourself for something Jacob Everett did more than thirty years ago. But all the people in the world can tell you that and all the people in the world can forgive you, and still it makes no difference. Because sometimes, the hardest person to forgive is yourself.’
‘Oh.’ Sally blinked a few times, and looked at Sam as he strode back across the lawns towards them, beaming. ‘He’s asked me to go for a counter lunch at the pub tomorrow. I was going to say no, but . . .’ She blinked up at Pip. ‘Do you think?’
‘Be happy,’ Pip said. ‘You’re allowed.’
And Sally went to meet Sam halfway, the makings of a tentative smile on her face, when Carmen reappeared, sipping on a glass of champagne, her hazel eyes sparkling, her sleek up do looking less sleek than it once had. ‘Where’ve you been?’ Pip asked suspiciously, using her thumb to wipe away a telltale smudge of lipstick from Carmen’s cheek, as Adam adjusted his tie behind and reached for a beer from a passing tray.
‘Nowhere special,’ she said, looking innocent, even as Adam ran a hand down her back and let it linger on the curve of her butt.
Pip smiled
. ‘I knew you’d love that B&B.’
Carmen just smiled and intertwined her hand with Adam’s.
From the speakers came the mellow tones of Norah Jones singing the opening lyrics of ‘The Nearness of You’ and Pip felt a wave of liquid heat roll down her spine. ‘Excuse me, everyone,’ Luke said as he sought her out, offering her his forearm, ‘Mrs Trenorden, I do believe they’re playing our song.’
She nodded as she took his arm, and smiled as his blue eyes smiled down at her, so full of love that she felt her own heart swell with it. ‘Mr Trenorden, I do believe you’re right.’ She let him lead her to the small dance floor set up near one of the borders of flowering rose bushes, and he took her into his arms and held her achingly close and they swayed as Norah sung for them.
She breathed him in as they moved, drank in the scent of skin and his lemon soap and the smell of Luke so deep that it filled her, drank in the feel of his big hand around hers, his arm snug around her back and his hard body against hers and knew she could never have too much of this man.
He was the rock who’d always been there for her.
He’d shown her forgiveness and he’d given her his love.
He’d brought her home.
And she would never leave this place without him by her side again.
‘They were wrong you know,’ she said, against his shoulder.
‘Who were?’
‘Those people. The ones who say you can’t have everything.’
He dipped his head and kissed her hair. ‘How do you figure that?’
‘Because between you and all the stars in the sky, I’ve got everything I’ll ever need.’
He squeezed her tightly to him, and as Norah sang her last sweet line, and the piano’s final few chords trailed slowly away, Pip lifted her head from his shoulder and looked up at him. ‘I love you, Luke Trenorden.’
His blue eyes whorled with warmth and love before he answered her with a kiss.