Eddie shook his head and smiled, perching on the arm of Liz’s chair. ‘So when are they going to let you out of here, Em?’
‘In a day or two, apparently.’
‘And then what? Will you have to have more treatment?’
Emma looked at Liz. ‘Ask the doctor.’
‘Well,’ Liz began carefully, ‘they might know something in a couple of days, but the full pathology report will take about a week.’
‘And?’ Eddie prompted her.
‘Hopefully it will show no spread to the lymph nodes and she won’t need any further treatment right now. We’ll just have to keep a close eye on her after that, regular follow-ups, that kind of thing.’
Eddie frowned. ‘And if there is cancer in the lymph nodes?’
‘They’ll take them out,’ Liz said, making it sound simple. ‘And there’s various options after that – they might prescribe ray treatment, for example.’ She didn’t want to say more now. Because if cancerous lymph nodes were found, that would be a fairly strong indication it had spread further, and Liz didn’t even want to entertain that idea. It was better for everyone to stay positive.
‘Okay, well I for one have got big plans for you, Emma, when this is all over,’ said Eddie.
She looked at him, waiting.
‘I am going to take you for a tandem glide.’
She groaned along with her sisters.
‘I’m not going to take no for an answer,’ he maintained. ‘In fact, I’m determined to talk you all into it.’
‘You can talk till you’re blue in the face,’ said Liz.
Evie was shaking her head. ‘Not going to happen, Ed.’
‘I already told you no way,’ added Ellen.
‘Oh, you’re all such fraidy cats,’ Eddie dismissed. ‘What do I keep telling you? You have to face your fears. It’ll make you stronger.’
The girls exchanged a knowing smile between them.
‘What’s going on?’ he said.
‘You have no idea, little brother,’ said Emma. She winced as she propped herself up on her elbows. ‘In this room right now are four of the strongest women you’re ever likely to come across.’
‘Oh yeah?’ he said dubiously.
‘Oh yeah,’ she nodded. ‘Look around you. I’m not going to give away names, but between us, we’re fighting cancer, saving lives, raising kids, dumping men and being dumped by men, visiting swingers’ clubs, and having a great deal of very hot sex.’
Eddie was gobsmacked. And clearly uncomfortable.
‘Whereas you, little brother,’ Emma went on, ‘are too frightened to even introduce us to your girlfriend. From where I sit, or should I say lie, I don’t think this hang-gliding caper is making you very brave at all.’
Wednesday
Emma noticed Liz glance at her watch again.
‘You know,’ she said, ‘if you have to be somewhere, Liz, it’s fine. Same goes for all of you,’ she added, looking at Evie and Ellen. ‘Mum and Dad will be here soon anyway. You really don’t have to keep up the constant vigil.’
She was sitting up today. With the pillows propped behind her in a particular arrangement Emma found she could be quite comfortable, for short periods at least.
‘I’ve got nowhere I have to be,’ said Ellen, flipping through a magazine from the stack that had been brought over from Emma’s place. ‘I have to admit, I’m kind of enjoying taking a break from school,’ she added. ‘In fact, I’m thinking of making it more permanent.’
‘What, you’re going to quit?’ Evie asked her.
‘Hey, I never asked,’ said Emma. ‘Did you hear from the private school?’
Ellen nodded. ‘I didn’t get the job.’
‘You applied for a job at a private school?’ said Evie, wide-eyed. ‘Did Mum and Dad know about that?’
‘No, they didn’t, and now they don’t have to,’ she warned. ‘Anyway, I think it was for the best, I’m actually feeling a little burnt out. Maybe I need a break.’
‘What will you do?’ asked Liz.
‘I have no idea. But I have some long service leave owing. I might take some time off to figure it out.’
‘Hm,’ Evie mused. ‘I’m starting to think I need to get a job, but I don’t know who would employ me.’
‘Don’t be so hard on yourself,’ said Ellen. ‘You might not have worked for a while, Evie, but your qualifications are still good.’
‘Yeah, in childcare,’ she said. ‘But I think I’ve had enough of that. It might be time for a change.’
‘I know how you feel,’ Liz muttered.
There was a knock on the door. It was chocked halfway open, and they all looked around as Blake stepped out from behind the door.
Emma’s heart dropped into her stomach. ‘What are you doing here?’ she managed to say.
He looked uncharacteristically nervous. Emma had rarely ever seen him nervous. He was one of the most unflappable people she knew.
‘I . . . ah . . . I wanted to see you,’ he said. ‘I was hoping we could talk.’
Her heart was beating so hard it was throbbing in her ears, and her legs felt twitchy. Part of her wanted to hear what he had to say for himself, but the other part didn’t want to give him the time of day. And she felt angry just looking at him; but on the other hand, she was so glad to see his face . . . Emma had so many conflicting emotions running through her she couldn’t think straight.
‘Okay,’ she said finally. ‘Go ahead, what do you want to say?’
Blake glanced across at her sisters, all lined up in a row on the other side of the bed, like a guard of honour.
‘Um, do you think . . .?’ he said. ‘Well, do you think I could see you on your own?’
‘No,’ all four of them said as one.
‘Anything you have to say to me,’ said Emma, regaining at least some of her composure, ‘you can say in front of my sisters.’
‘Oh, okay then,’ he said. He took a couple of tentative steps into the room. ‘How are you feeling?’ he began.
Emma sighed. ‘It’s a bit late in the day to be acting concerned, Blake.’
‘I never stopped being concerned,’ he said sincerely. ‘I know you probably find that hard to understand.’
‘To say the least.’
He took a breath, and another step closer. ‘I’m so sorry, Em, so sorry for hurting you, but I’m not sorry that I did what I did. It was the only way.’
She frowned. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘If I didn’t walk out, you would never have gone ahead with the tests, or the treatment. You would have stuck to your guns about the wedding, kept making excuses. I know you too well.’
‘Oh come on, Blake,’ she said, ‘be honest. You were looking for a way to get out of the wedding. And you got it. It’s all off now, Evie’s cancelled everything. But don’t think for a minute you’re going to get out of paying your share.’
‘I don’t care about that, I don’t care what it costs.’
‘That’s all you cared about.’
‘No, Emma, all I cared about was you getting well,’ he said, his voice becoming more insistent. ‘It’s true, the wedding was getting out of hand, and no, it didn’t matter to me the way it mattered to you.’ He paused. ‘But it paled into . . . into such utter insignificance compared to the thought of anything happening to you.’
Emma just stared at him.
‘The only thing I could do was to walk out on you,’ he went on. ‘You should have heard yourself – you were being so stubborn, so irrational, you just weren’t making any sense.’
She glanced at her sisters. They all looked sheepish, avoiding her gaze.
‘I didn’t know what else to do,’ said Blake.
‘Well, you didn’t have to do that,’ she said. ‘Do you have any idea how much you hurt me?’
Blake sighed heavily. ‘I do, and I’m sorry, but I was prepared to piss you off forever,’ he said, ‘even if you never wanted to have anything to do with me again. That was pref
erable to . . .’ His voice faltered then. He cleared his throat. ‘I just couldn’t go through with the wedding, Emma, and I could never have gone away for weeks on a honeymoon, knowing that every day . . . So I left. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done because I was so worried about you, but I knew it was the only way.’
Emma was trying to steel herself. She couldn’t forget how she had felt the night he walked out. Every doubt she’d ever had over all their years together had come to the surface, and for the first time in her life she’d understood why they called it being heart-broken. Her heart had broken. And she didn’t know if she could get past that.
‘If you cared so much,’ she said eventually, ‘if you were so worried, why didn’t you call, or check how I was?’
He glanced at Liz. ‘I’ve been in touch with Liz several times a day most days.’
They all looked at her, and she nodded.
‘Why didn’t you tell me, Liz?’ Emma said.
‘I asked her not to,’ Blake answered for her. ‘Not until you’d had whatever treatment you needed to have. So there was absolutely no chance you’d back out and not go through with it.’
Emma sat there, silent. She hadn’t expected any of this, she didn’t know what she was supposed to think.
‘I asked Liz to let me know before you get the next round of results,’ Blake went on, ‘so I can be here for you, whatever happens.’
There was a knock on the door and a nurse stepped in wheeling a trolley.
‘Excuse me, Ms Beckett,’ she said. ‘You have to take your meds.’
‘Can we do this later?’ said Emma. ‘It’s not a good time right now.’
‘Well, sorry, but it’s the right time.’
‘Okay, just leave them here.’
‘I’m supposed to stay to watch you take them.’
Emma groaned.
Blake turned to the nurse. ‘What if you give them to me?’ he said. ‘I’ll make sure she takes them.’
‘Well, we’re not supposed to . . .’ she hesitated.
Liz raised her hand. ‘I’m Dr Beckett. I’ll supervise.’
The nurse nodded then. ‘Okay, I guess that will be all right.’ She made a tick on her clipboard and then handed the little paper cup to Blake and left the room. He turned back and picked up the jug on Emma’s bedside cabinet, pouring her a glass of water. ‘Here, you should take these now.’
She ignored that. ‘Look Blake, I don’t know where we’re supposed to go to from here.’
He held the little cup out to her.
‘The wedding’s been cancelled. The whole thing’s off, you got your way.’
‘Take your meds, Emma.’
‘Are we supposed to go back to the way it was?’ she demanded. ‘Because I don’t see how that’s going to work.’
‘Just take your meds,’ he persisted, holding the cup out.
‘Oh for crying out loud,’ she said, snatching the cup from him and tossing it back into her mouth. She gagged. What was that? It wasn’t a pill. She held her hand out in front of her and let it drop from her mouth into her palm. Emma’s heart stopped. It was a ring. A simple platinum ring. She stared at it as tears sprang into her eyes.
‘Remember?’ Blake said quietly. ‘It was my job to organise the wedding rings. I went to pick them up the other day. I want to marry you, Em. More than ever. We can have any kind of wedding you want, I don’t care what it costs . . . just please say you’ll still marry me.’
Emma looked up at him then, and the tears fell over her lashes and rolled down her cheeks. He brought his hand to her face and wiped a tear away with his thumb. ‘Don’t you know by now I couldn’t live without you?’ he said. ‘I just wanted to make sure I didn’t have to.’
Liz gave her sisters a pointed look, and all three of them stood up and quietly filed out of the room. She glanced back when she got to the door, Blake was leaning over Emma, and they were kissing.
‘Oh my God!’ Evie said once they were outside, tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘That was so beautiful.’
Ellen brushed a tear away herself, and then gave Liz a gentle thump on the arm. ‘Why didn’t you tell us?’
‘I couldn’t,’ said Liz. ‘He actually made me swear on Emma’s life. The poor guy was beside himself.’
‘Well, what do you know?’ said Ellen, shaking her head. ‘He really does love her, doesn’t he?’
Evie let out a sob.
‘He really does,’ Liz agreed.
‘Girls!’
They turned to see their mother marching up the corridor towards them, their dad following in her wake.
‘What are you all doing out here?’ She stopped when she saw their tear-streaked faces. ‘Oh my God, what’s happened?’ she said, aghast. ‘There hasn’t been bad news, has there?’
Liz took her arm. ‘No, Mum, don’t worry. No bad news, it’s all good,’ she assured her. ‘In fact, it couldn’t be better.’
Thursday
Evie knew she had been avoiding dealing with Craig and the whole sorry mess of their marriage. But, like going to the dentist, she suspected the treatment was going to be almost as bad as the pain she was already experiencing. She really didn’t want to dredge it all up, but she knew she had to: it was not going to go away. Of course Emma’s plight had taken precedence over everything else, but when Blake had walked into that hospital room yesterday, and said those things to Emma, Evie had realised that she had a right to expect more for herself, even to demand it.
Emma had left the hospital today, and she and Blake were going home to wait for the results. She had someone to look after her now, and besides, the two of them needed time together alone. So Evie had no further excuse, she could not put off the inevitable any longer. She gave Craig notice when he got home that they were going to talk tonight, and she bathed and fed the kids early and put them to bed. He was sitting dutifully at the kitchen table when she came back downstairs, a beer in front of him.
‘Did you want anything to drink, love?’ he said when she walked around to sit on the chair opposite him.
Evie shook her head. ‘So Craig, I suppose you realise that things can’t keep going the way they are,’ she began.
He shrugged. ‘I get you don’t want to go to the place any more. I’m okay with that.’
She sighed inwardly. ‘Well, that’s big of you, but it’s not enough.’ She took a breath. ‘You didn’t value me, Craig. I’m the best thing in your life, and you didn’t value me. And worse than that, I stopped valuing myself.’
He frowned, listening to her.
‘I don’t mean to blame it all on you,’ she said. ‘See, I thought my primary role in the family was to keep everyone else happy. But it turns out I wasn’t even doing that right. Tayla’s the unhappiest little girl I know, and I don’t know why. Maybe she sees her future in me and that’s what makes her so angry with me.’
‘I think you might be reading a bit much into that, hun,’ said Craig. ‘She seems pretty typical to me. My sister was a real little bitch at that age.’
‘I’m not so sure her behaviour is typical,’ said Evie. ‘And if it is, then I’m not so sure it’s okay.’
‘What’s this got to do with us?’ he asked.
‘What I’m trying to say is that things aren’t right in this family, Craig,’ said Evie. ‘And I do partly blame myself. Maybe I can even understand on some level why you were craving for something more, but it wasn’t the solution to look outside for it.’
He was staring gloomily at his beer bottle. ‘Okay, I said we didn’t have to go there again. Can’t we drop it now, just move on?’
‘No, Craig, we can’t move on that easily. We won’t move on, we’ll go back to all the same old habits, not really talking to each other, the television on all the time, while I run around doing everything.’
‘So you want me to help out more? Fine, just tell me what I have to do.’
‘It’s not that simple, Craig.’
‘Ah jeez, Ev, why do you have to make a
federal case out of this? It’s over, it’s not going to happen again. And I’ll give you a hand with the kids . . . What else do you want?’
So much more than this, but it was no use trying to discuss it any further. It wasn’t up for discussion anyway.
‘I think we need some time apart,’ said Evie.
‘And how are we going to manage that?’ he retorted. ‘I know, I’ll go down to the Grand Prix next month, if you like,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘That’ll give us some time apart.’
Evie glared at him. ‘I was thinking of something longer term, Craig.’
He looked at her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, you could go to a hotel,’ said Evie, ‘but that wouldn’t be very nice for the kids when they stay, and it would get too expensive anyway. There’s always caravan parks, but there aren’t any around here, and again, I don’t think that’s the best environment for the kids. Realistically, I don’t see how we could afford two places right now. But I am planning to go back to work, so once I’m established, and depending on how things go between us, well, we can look at our options then. So the only alternative at the moment is for you to go and stay at your mother’s.’
While she spoke, Craig’s face morphed from confused to perplexed to stunned. ‘You’re kidding me, aren’t you?’
‘I realise it’s going to cramp your style, Craig, you won’t be able to spend nights looking at porn, for one thing.’
Stunned didn’t even begin to describe the expression on his face now.
‘I don’t look at porn,’ he said.
‘Don’t lie, Craig. I saw it on the history on the computer.’
‘You’ve been spying on me?’
‘No,’ Evie insisted. ‘I looked up “swingers’ clubs” when you first brought it up, and when I went to clear the history, that’s when I found it.’
‘So now you think I’m some kind of pervert?’ said Craig. ‘Okay, I admit it, I’ve looked, I was curious, but I’m not addicted or anything. The guys at work are always on it, I’m not like that.’
Evie was relieved to hear that, but it didn’t change anything. It was not really the issue at heart here.
‘What’s this about anyway?’ said Craig. ‘It’s got to do with that bloke, Steve, hasn’t it? I know you’ve been in touch with him.’
The Right Time Page 37