The Marry-Me Wish

by Alison Roberts

  ‘I could come home with you, Annie,’ Mac offered.

  David could feel a muscle in his jaw begin to ache from tension but again Anne shook her head.

  ‘You stay with Jules. With your family. They need you.’

  Julia was chewing her bottom lip. ‘This is wrong,’ she said with a wobble in her voice. ‘We need you, too, Annie. We want to look after you.’

  David could see the shine of tears in Anne’s eyes. So she wasn’t being as hard hearted as he thought. Again, he had to fight an urge to step closer.

  ‘I know, hon,’ she said to Julia. ‘But I’ll be fine, honestly. We made a plan, remember?’

  Julia nodded, dislodging unshed tears. ‘But…’

  ‘I’ll visit tomorrow.’

  They were getting ready to start moving the bed. Mac climbed off. Julia turned her head so that she could still see Anne. ‘Call me?’

  ‘I will. First thing in the morning when I’m home.’

  David found Emily by his side. ‘Perhaps Anne could stay down here for observation?’

  ‘Sure.’ He would be going home soon enough. As Anne had said herself, the delivery had been uncomplicated. Any registrar could monitor her condition until she was discharged in a few hours. He didn’t have to go anywhere near her.

  Except he couldn’t stay away.

  An hour later her found Anne asleep in the side room but with a second check in another hour or so, he found her awake.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘Kind of like I’ve been run over by a bus.’

  ‘I’m not surprised.’ David stood at the end of her bed. The silence grew and became awkward. There was so much he could have said. Wanted to say. Impossible to know how to start. He needed to apologise but there was a barrier there created by hurt. He wanted to ask why but was so sure he wouldn’t like the answer that even that tiny word stuck in his throat.

  Finally, he picked up the observation chart. ‘Your blood pressure’s fine,’ he told her. ‘Everything’s looking good.’

  ‘I could go home then.’ Her voice was flat.

  ‘Soon. I…guess you’ll be taking some time off?’

  Anne gave a small huff of sound. ‘Three months. I was due a sabbatical but the first few weeks were supposed to be resting in late pregnancy.’

  ‘You’ll still need to rest and recuperate.’

  ‘That was the plan for the second month. Then I’m negotiating to spend a month in an overseas unit that specialises in paediatric chest trauma.’

  ‘Oh…’ David had a three-month locum. By the time Anne returned for work, he’d be gone.

  It should be a relief.

  ‘Maybe I can bring it forward,’ Anne said.

  Which would take her out of the country. He wouldn’t see her again. Possibly ever.

  ‘Maybe we could…meet up before you go,’ he heard himself saying aloud. ‘We haven’t had much of a chance to…talk or anything.’

  ‘No.’ Another tiny huff at the understatement. Anne closed her eyes again but not before he’d seen a flash of agreement. Even…what, hope?

  ‘I’m really tired right now,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll leave you to rest, then.’ He couldn’t push her, however much he’d like to find out what she’d been thinking before she’d closed her eyes. She had to be totally exhausted, both physically and emotionally. He understood that. He knew this wasn’t the time to talk but David still hesitated. Opened his mouth to say something else.

  As though sensing his intention, Anne turned her head to face away from him. There was nothing for it but to respect the dismissal and leave.

  Anne kept her eyes tightly closed.

  She wanted to talk to David. Of course she did. He deserved an explanation. An apology even, but she couldn’t find the words right now. Not while she was feeling like this. As though she had lost something infinitely precious.

  Something she would never be able to find again.

  It didn’t seem to matter how tightly she kept her eyes squeezed shut.

  Her tears still managed to escape.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  SHE couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  The way he’d looked, standing at the end of her bed the other night. The light may have been subdued but there had been no mistaking the look of pain on his features.

  She’d seen that look before. More than once in those difficult, final weeks of their relationship, when the distance between them had become an unbridgeable gulf. The unspoken messages were so eloquent.

  I don’t want this.

  It’s unbearable.

  Why has it come to this?

  How did it all go so terribly wrong?

  Can we fix it?

  No…

  The lines etched on David’s face may have been personal but his body language and actions had been nothing but professional. The way he’d stood with the length of the bed between them. The way he’d reached to pick up her chart instead of touching her.

  ‘Everything’s looking good,’ he’d said.

  Couldn’t he see that she was desperately unhappy? That it was beginning to seem like a huge mistake, being a human incubator for someone else? It had become such a huge part of her life, being so intimately connected to the two tiny beings growing inside her.

  She would never forget feeling those first movements. So subtle they had felt like nothing more than a stream of tiny bubbles. Being so aware of the strength increasing as the weeks went on. Strong movements then, that had often startled her. An uncomfortable prod from an elbow or a kick that could make the skin on her stomach bulge and make her laugh in a mixture of amazement and amusement.

  And the hiccups that had felt like a clock ticking inside her. The soft flutters that could only be felt from deep within and she would imagine her babies sleeping. A leg brushing against another limb perhaps or a reach to hold hands as she’d seen ultrasound pictures of twins doing in the womb.

  Whoa! Her babies?

  Anne sighed deeply and dragged herself up from the armchair she’d been sitting in for hours now. A still unopened medical journal slid from her lap to the floor.

  That was the problem in a nutshell, wasn’t it? They had never been her babies. Julia’s eggs. Mac’s sperm. Yes, she’d had custody of the precious little lives for eight months but they’d never been hers. She’d known that all along. She’d thought she was more than prepared for how it would feel to hand them over. She’d never for a moment expected it to feel as though something was being ripped away from her soul.

  For it to have been so hard.

  Tears were slipping down her face and she scrubbed at them angrily. What had Jules said that day? That she never cried. Well, she’d made up for it in the last few days, that’s for sure, and today was the worst yet. She was like a tap in dire need of a plumber’s attention today.

  So many sad thoughts that she couldn’t shake off. Of babies she ached to hold. Of David’s face as he’d stood there at the end of her bed. Of how much she’d missed him over the last year and of how unbridgeable that gap between them was. Especially now.

  How ironic that he should have been there when the babies were born.

  How unfair!

  Intending to go into the kitchen to make a cup of tea, Anne had to pause before she got more than a step or two. She had to reach out and grasp the back of the armchair as a wave of dizziness threatened to make her knees buckle.

  Oh…God!

  Blindly, thanks to a fresh spurt of tears, she felt her way back to a sitting position and then buried her face in her hands with a groan of despair.

  What was wrong with her? She was a doctor, for heaven’s sake. She should be able to figure out what was happening here and then do something about it.

  What was the main problem?

  Her breasts hurt. They were as hard as rocks and aching so much she couldn’t bear to wear a bra despite knowing that the support might help. She had taken some anti-inflammatories and had tried an ice-pack earl
ier today but neither remedy had helped much. Maybe she should try that old wives’ treatment of cabbage leaves or something. Another dose of drugs, anyway.

  What else? She felt hot, which could be because her armchair was in front of a window in direct sunlight she hadn’t been aware of. She also felt faintly nauseated but when had she last had something to eat? It was probably lunchtime by now. A glance at her watch startled her. It was well into the afternoon. Where had all those hours gone? Hard to feel hungry when her belly hurt as though she was in the middle of a particularly heavy period. This amount of discomfort had also been unexpected but her postnatal bleeding hadn’t been heavy enough to be a concern.

  The main problem was something that was simply making everything else seem worse. The fact that she was alone. That it was day three after giving birth and, while she might have been prepared for the so called ‘baby blues’, she hadn’t realised how hard it would be to deal with them alone.

  She could ring Julia but she’d probably burst into tears on the phone and that would worry her sister. What if she heard the babies crying in the background and was unable to get any words out at all? Julia would dispatch Mac to find out what was wrong and he would probably insist on staying or taking her home with him so that she could have company and be looked after.

  And that wasn’t part of the plan they had stuck to so well so far.

  She had gone to visit after her discharge from the emergency department. She had been able to admire the sleeping infants and be as delighted as Julia and Mac that the feeding was going well and they would all be able to go home later that day. She hadn’t touched the babies because she needed to create some distance. Not for ever. Just for as long as it took for her hormones to settle down a bit.

  And that was all this was all about. Baby blues. Hormones. It was a form of depression and the best treatment was distraction. Physical exercise.

  Pleased with her clinical assessment, Anne tried to stand up again. This time her head felt fine. She’d just been sitting still for too long. She hadn’t been eating enough. What she needed to do was get a grip and ride this out and in a day or two she would be feeling much better. What on earth had she been thinking, letting herself just sit around latching onto sad things to dwell on?

  She had so much to look forward to, didn’t she? Being an aunt to the two most beautiful babies in the universe. Time away from work to do something that she would love—like spending time in a clinical facility that was achieving results she admired tremendously. And right now she could go out and enjoy this gorgeous day. It wasn’t too late to feel the warmth of sun on her skin. To get a bit of fresh air and escape four walls that were closing both her body and mind into an unfamiliar, and very unwelcome, prison.

  Good call, she congratulated herself a short time later. She felt better already, even if the bright light was hurting eyes that had been bathed in far too much salty fluid today.

  Planning a route for this gentle walk was too hard. Her brain was crying out for a rest. An escape from sad thoughts and decision-making. With a sigh of relief, Anne surrendered to just following her feet, content to enjoy the warmth and the colours in the pockets of the inner-city gardens she passed. For the first time in her life, she actually had the chance to stop and smell the roses.

  That had to be another good thing, surely?

  He couldn’t stop thinking about her.

  The way she’d been lying, alone on that hospital bed, radiating unhappiness.

  He’d been contributing to that misery, hadn’t he? The feeling of distance between them was all too familiar. He’d pushed and pushed to try and get what he’d wanted in the past and all he’d achieved had been to push her so far away he’d lost her.

  With an outward breath verging on a sigh, David tapped a finger on the X-ray image on the screen.

  ‘Right there, see? Probably a stress fracture. Not major but it’ll be causing the pain. She needs to go to the bone shop and get a cast on.’

  ‘She won’t be happy. She’s training for a triathalon.’

  David grimaced, unconsciously rolling his head to try and ease the ache between his shoulder blades. ‘Try telling her that exercise is overrated.’

  His junior colleague grinned. ‘You still suffering, then?’

  ‘I think it’s getting worse. I’m seizing up.’

  ‘Keep moving, then,’ the registrar advised cheekily, trying to stifle his amusement. ‘It’s the best cure for soft-tissue injuries.’

  ‘No. The best cure is prevention.’ David straightened his back with a groan. ‘Which is why I’m going to find a landscaping firm to come and tame that jungle that used to be my garden. Know anyone with a bulldozer?’

  ‘Talk to Di on the front desk. I think her son is some kind of gardener.’

  ‘I’ll do that. Thanks. Was there anything else you needed to talk to me about?’

  ‘No. Sorry to hold you up. It’s past home time for you, isn’t it?’

  ‘Sure is.’ David took a final glance around the department. He eyed a telephone on the triage desk and once again the thought of Anne crossed his mind.

  It wouldn’t hurt to call, would it? Just to see how she was doing?

  No. He turned towards the reception area instead, intent on tracking down the woman who might have an expert gardener for a son. Anne wouldn’t want to talk to him. Not yet, anyway. In a week or two, maybe, when she had recovered a bit more from the birth.

  The desire to talk to her was getting stronger every day, along with a faint hope that they could possibly salvage some kind of friendship from the ruins of the relationship they’d had. One that would give him a new base from which to move forward. One that wasn’t built on anger and hurt and loss.

  He could afford to wait. His two days off had made him realise what an enormous job it was going to be trying to get his property in shape to do well on the market. The garden was impenetrable in places and while he’d actually enjoyed wielding a pickaxe and clippers, despite the aftereffects on his body, he hadn’t made much progress.

  And the garden was only part of what needed to be done. Trying to distract himself from thinking about Anne when he wasn’t sweating outside had led him to wandering around the big house, cataloging tasks that needed attention inside. Plumbing needed work. There was dry rot in some of the windowsills. The paint and wallpaper were tired to the point of being shabby but if they were improved the carpets and curtains would look infinitely worse. He needed a team of interior decorators as well as some landscaping experts.

  Maybe Di would have some more useful contacts.

  Twenty minutes later, David emerged into the late afternoon sunshine, armed with a host of suggestions and phone numbers gleaned from the Yellow Pages and Di’s advice. Feeling far more positive, he decided to leave his car in the parking building and walk home. That registrar was quite right. Keeping his sore muscles moving was the best thing he could do for them.

  It was a pleasant walk. The small river that wound through the central city had wide grassed banks and huge, ancient chestnut trees dotted at regular intervals. Park benches had been sited beneath many of the trees and there were a lot of people out enjoying the late afternoon warmth. A man reading a newspaper. A couple with young children who were feeding stale crusts to an expanding group of enthusiastic ducks. A woman, sitting alone with her head drooping, as though she was being lulled to sleep by the peaceful surroundings.

  Something made David take another look at the lone woman as he came closer. And his heart missed a beat.

  ‘Anne.’

  She looked dreadful. As white as a sheet, and she seemed to be shivering despite the warmth of the day. She also seemed to be having trouble focusing on his face. Or maybe she didn’t want to look at him. She was looking down again now, her eyes drifting shut. He couldn’t walk away, however. No way.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I…I came out for a walk.’ Good grief, were her words a little slurred? ‘Such a nice day…�
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  ‘But you’re a long way from home. You’re almost at the hospital.’

  ‘Am I?’ She looked up and blinked in bewilderment. ‘I hadn’t noticed.’

  ‘Anne…’ David crouched in front of her and touched her knee. ‘Are you all right?’

  She was looking at him now, her eyes wide. Startled, almost.

  ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t think I am.’

  David swallowed. Hard. ‘What’s happening?’

  Anne drew in a long, shaky breath. ‘Things hurt,’ she admitted.

  ‘What things?’

  ‘Um…my tummy.’ The huff of laughter was pure embarrassment. ‘My…ah…boobs.’

  David couldn’t help the quirk of his lips but it was a poignant twist. If he’d needed any indication that Anne was not herself right now, this total lack of medical terminology did the trick.

  ‘Anything else?’

  Anne nodded but said nothing. David waited, holding the eye contact. Encouraging her to tell him what was going on. She didn’t look away. She was hanging onto his gaze as though it was a lifeline, in fact.

  ‘What else, Annie?’ he prompted gently.

  ‘I…I’ve missed you,’ Anne said. And burst into tears.

  Oh…Lord! What could he do but ease himself onto the bench beside her and take her into his arms? Hold her until the sobs—that were as uncharacteristic as her layman’s anatomy—finally dwindled into a kind of ripple he could feel but no longer hear. And he had to try very hard not to put any undue significance on the words she had just uttered. She had missed him? As much as he’d missed her? Enough to make compromise an acceptable alternative?

  ‘Sorry,’ Anne muttered. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, David.’

  ‘It’s okay. It’s fine.’ He didn’t want her to be sorry because it might mean she wanted to take back what she’d said.

  ‘No. No, it’s not. I’m…’ Anne was pushing at him. He had to fight the urge to tighten his hold. He had to let her go.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ She was scrubbing at her face. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’