‘Now, what was it you wanted to talk to me about?’ Liv kept her tone businesslike. ‘I have to get back inside.’
‘It’s about this weekend, actually,’ he said.
His weekend with the boys. ‘What about it?’
‘You know how I’ve got to find a place, seeing as you’re not letting me stay here . . .’
Liv was unmoved. ‘That’s right.’
‘Well, all the inspections are on Saturdays, so . . .’
‘So?’
‘I don’t see how I can have the boys.’
‘I do,’ said Liv. ‘Take them with you. They’ll probably enjoy it.’ For a while.
‘But they’ve got cricket.’
Liv shrugged. ‘They’ll just have to miss it then, I guess.’
‘I don’t think that’s sending the right message, letting down their teammates . . .’
‘Whatever you think. It’s up to you, they’re your responsibility on the day.’
‘What I think is that you should have them. I’ve done the same for you often enough when you go on tour.’
‘Rick, you know very well that I’ve always made the time up to you in advance. I don’t owe you.’
‘Fine, then I’ll owe you, and I’ll make it up to you after,’ he said, his tone smarmy.
Liv gave him a look of feigned regret. ‘Gosh, Rick, I’d help if I could, but I can’t this weekend, I’ve got plans.’
‘With your boyfriend?’ God, his fourteen-year-old sons sounded more mature.
‘Not that it’s any of your business, but yes, as a matter of fact.’ She enjoyed watching the smarm dissolve into uncertainty. ‘I have to go now. I’ll get Lachie to call you about cricket, you can work it out with him.’
With that she turned and walked back into the house, closing the door behind her.
Friday afternoon
‘Madeleine Pepper,’ she said automatically, picking up her phone without looking at it. She was staring at the computer screen in a daze. Genevieve had sent her a link to the place where they were booked in for a cake tasting. Madeleine didn’t even know that was a thing, but apparently it was, and so Genevieve had taken over, and found some hip designer bakery that she wished had been around when she got married.
‘Hello, Madeleine Pepper, it’s Aiden Carmichael.’
‘Aiden!’ she said, holding out her phone to look at the screen as if she’d see him there. She put it back to her ear. ‘Where are you?’
She and Henry hadn’t heard from him all week – not that they’d expected to, he would have been well out of mobile range most of the time. Then yesterday he’d sent Madeleine a text: Starting the long trek back, will make it to Sydney tomorrow, all going well. Call you then. xa
‘I’m heading into the city,’ he was saying now.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I grabbed a taxi at the airport, I thought it was easier to come to you.’
‘You shouldn’t have,’ she admonished him. ‘If you’d told me when your flight was due in I would have been happy to pick you up from the airport.’
‘It’s fine, I’m on my way. What’s the address of your building?’
Madeleine gave it to him, and Aiden relayed it to the taxi driver.
‘I’m just finishing up here,’ she said. ‘I’ll meet you on the street, we can get down to the basement garage from there.’
‘Listen, my sweet, I’ve travelled several thousand miles in the last twenty-four hours, and I would like to pause to rest at a watering hole before we begin the final leg to Mordor, if it’s all the same to you.’
She smiled. ‘Of course.’
‘I’ll call you when I get there.’
Madeleine hung up the phone and closed the cake webpage, before shutting down her computer. She felt excited for the first time all week. She had managed to lift herself a little out of the rut she’d been in on Monday, but Henry had been chained to his desk, so it had remained quiet on the home front, and there had still been no sex. Madeleine knew things would brighten up again with Aiden around.
Twenty minutes later she was beginning to wonder where he had got to, when her phone rang. This time she checked the screen as she picked up her bag and started out of the office. ‘Hi, was the traffic bad?’ she asked.
‘Not overly,’ said Aiden. ‘But I’m already at the helm.’
‘What? Are we sailing home?’
‘Ha. No, it’s a bar. I asked the taxi driver where was the closest place with a view, and he dropped me here.’
‘I know it. I’ll see you there soon.’
When Madeleine walked into the Helm, she saw Aiden waving to her from a table right over by the wall, looking out across Darling Harbour. He jumped off his stool as she approached, and scooped her up in one of his signature hugs. ‘Hey, Maddie,’ he said. ‘It’s so good to see your face.’
‘Yours too.’
‘Let me get you a drink,’ he said.
But she waved him off. He still had more than half a glass of beer, and she should avoid drinking with the long drive ahead of her. ‘I’ve just finished a coffee,’ she said. ‘I’m right for now.’
‘If you say so.’ He took her hand to help her up onto the stool beside him. ‘When the taxi driver said “harbour” I thought I’d be able to see your bridge and your opera house.’
‘Not from Darling Harbour,’ said Madeleine. ‘Would you prefer to go down to the real thing? Though it’s a bit of a hike from here.’
‘No thanks, I don’t want to move. Besides, this will do very nicely.’
‘So how was your trip?’ Madeleine asked.
‘Exhausting,’ he said. ‘I’ve never travelled so far and stayed in the same state before.’
‘You should try Western Australia.’
‘I think I’ve had enough outback for now.’
Madeleine gave him a sympathetic smile. ‘So do you think you’re going to be able to do something for the communities you visited?’
‘They put together some good proposals,’ he said. ‘I’ll certainly be recommending that we fund what we can. We have the money, but I don’t know if it’s going to help all that much.’
‘Why do you say that?’
Aiden took a swig of his beer. ‘Your government has really screwed around with those poor people. I thought we did badly with our Native Americans, but I think you guys might have outdone us.’
‘Wow, that’s depressing.’
‘Sorry, I shouldn’t come out here like a loudmouth Yank criticising your government. I’m not taking sides – left and right, they’ve both been as bad as one another.’
‘No, I agree,’ said Madeleine. ‘But it’s not just the government, it’s all of us. Out of sight, out of mind. Whenever I think about the plight of Aboriginal people, I just feel guilty. The issues seem so overwhelming.’
‘They are,’ said Aiden. ‘That’s what I meant before. We can throw all the money we like at the problems, but it’s such a mess I don’t know what could possibly make it right, except going back in time to undo everything that’s been done to them since the white man came.’
Madeleine leant her chin in her hand, thinking. ‘Have you heard of The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith?’
‘No, what is it?’
‘It’s a novel, but it’s based on real incidents. We had to read it in school. It’s by Thomas Keneally.’
‘I have heard of him.’
‘So Jimmie Blacksmith was a half-caste, and he was taken in by a minister and his wife. There was this line, where the minister was encouraging Jimmie to marry a white girl, because their children would be only a quarter Aboriginal, and then their children would be hardly black at all – it was something like that, but I’m sure I’m remembering that phrase right, “hardly black at all”. It’s always stayed with me, the sheer arrogance of it, that actually breeding out an entire race was a good thing. And then around the same time, I was at an old aunty’s place, and Evonne Goolagong was mentioned on the news, she’d won some kind
of special achievement award. She was a hugely successful Aboriginal tennis player back in the seventies.’
‘Yep, heard of her,’ said Aiden. ‘My parents were big tennis fans, and that’s not a name you easily forget.’
‘Well, anyway,’ Madeleine continued, ‘she married a white guy, and my aunty was saying how good it was that her children were only half black, because their children would only be a quarter black, and that was hardly black at all. She actually said the same words. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It’s like nothing ever changes.’
Aiden shook his head. ‘I know, seems that way sometimes.’
‘It’s not like I have any right to point the finger,’ she said. ‘I don’t do enough, I don’t do anything. Sometimes I look at my job and I’m embarrassed, it’s just so frivolous in the big scheme of things.’
‘Don’t talk like that. Supporting and promoting the arts isn’t frivolous.’
Madeleine looked at him doubtfully. ‘It’s not exactly saving the world, like what you do.’
‘I wish you’d stop saying things like that,’ he said, a little tightly. ‘I’m not saving anyone, I’m not a hero. I don’t even do anything particularly virtuous. I get invited to these places, shown around, I tick a few boxes on a report, and the obscenely wealthy company I work for drops some money that it won’t even miss. I get paid well, and I get to go home afterwards, not like the people on the ground doing the actual work. Anyone could do what I do.’
Madeleine would have argued with him, but he didn’t sound like he was being falsely modest; if anything he sounded irritated. ‘Okay, but I still think what I do is a little frivolous,’ she said. ‘My father wanted me to be a teacher, like him. Now there’s a noble profession.’
‘Stop being so hard on yourself,’ said Aiden. ‘You wanna talk frivolous, the man you’re going to marry writes children’s books.’
Madeleine raised an eyebrow. ‘You of all people should know how amazing Henry’s books are . . . And besides, books are incredibly important for children.’
‘Yeah, I guess . . . but don’t we have enough already?’
She was starting to feel quite indignant. ‘There can never be enough children’s books!’
Aiden drained his beer and put the empty glass down on the table. ‘Well said.’
‘What?’
His face broke into a wide grin. ‘Had you going then, didn’t I?’
Madeleine elbowed him. ‘Aiden Carmichael, in these parts, you’re what we call a stirrer.’
‘I had to lift the mood, it was all getting too depressing and serious.’
A young woman in a tight singlet top and even tighter shorts leant across the table to pick up Aiden’s empty glass, flashing him a smile, along with some generous cleavage. He seemed to appreciate it. Madeleine shook her head as the girl walked away.
‘What?’ he said, playing innocent. ‘Just enjoying the local attractions. Are you ready for a drink yet?’
She pulled a face. ‘I shouldn’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘I have to drive.’
‘What kind of drink-driving laws do you have in this country? Surely you can have one?’
‘Yeah, but . . .’ Madeleine hesitated.
‘But what?’ said Aiden. ‘Come on, don’t make me drink alone.’
‘Okay,’ she surrendered, ‘I’ll have one. But only one.’
‘One, I promise.’
Aiden went to line up at the bar, and Madeleine leant her elbows on the table, propping her chin in her hands and gazing at the sky, splashed with vivid streaks of orange and purple as the sun sank low beyond the western suburbs. She wondered why Aiden was so down on himself and the job he did, and recalled his frustration the other night as well. She supposed the job must take its toll after a while, but it didn’t seem right that he was downplaying his role like that. Maybe he wasn’t irreplaceable, but that didn’t mean what he did wasn’t valuable and important. Madeleine was so lost in thought that she didn’t realise Aiden had returned to the table until he placed a glass down in front of her. An empty one. She looked around as he lifted a bottle of champagne out of an ice bucket.
‘Aiden! What did I say?’
‘I know, I only got one bottle.’
‘Oh, come on,’ said Madeleine. ‘You knew what I meant. I have to drive!’
‘One bottle between us is only a couple of glasses each,’ he said.
‘More like three and a half.’
‘You really are a pedant.’
‘Well, it doesn’t matter, I’m still only having one glass,’ Madeleine stressed. ‘You’ll just have to drink the rest.’
‘Okay with me,’ he said, pouring the champagne. ‘All the communities we visited up there were dry, and I don’t think I’ve ever needed a drink more.’ He returned the bottle to the bucket and lifted his glass in a toast. ‘What shall we drink to?’
‘Not getting drunk.’
‘You can’t drink to that. Come on, something positive.’
She thought about it. ‘Okay. To making the world a better place.’
‘So now you’ve gone from the sublime to the ridiculous.’
‘All right, what do you suggest then?’
He paused for a moment. ‘How about we drink to friendship?’
Madeleine smiled. ‘To friendship.’
They clinked glasses and drank. It was good stuff, cold and crisp and delicious; it tingled on her tongue and flowed down her throat like liquid silk. Madeleine took another mouthful, and another, and then she realised that her glass was already half empty. She had to slow down. She set it back on the table, sliding it a little away from her.
‘Do you have any more big trips planned while you’re here?’ she asked Aiden.
He shook his head. ‘I’ve got some meetings in Sydney, and I might have to go down to Canberra, but that’s not very far, I understand?’
‘No, half an hour by plane,’ she said. ‘You can use the apartment as much as you like. But I hope you’ll still join us in Mordor too – you bring a bit of life to the place.’
He smiled. ‘That nickname seems to have stuck.’
‘We better keep it between you and me though,’ said Madeleine. ‘Henry might be offended, he loves that place.’
Aiden took a swig of champagne and set the glass down on the table. ‘You know what’s been so surprising about seeing Henry again after all these years?’
Madeleine shook her head.
‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘There are no surprises – except for you. But Henry hasn’t changed one bit.’
She wasn’t sure he meant that as a good thing. ‘How do you mean?’ she asked.
‘He’s still the same quiet, reserved guy,’ said Aiden. ‘Still happiest in his own company . . . and yours, obviously,’ he added quickly.
‘He’s not that quiet around you. You should see him the rest of the time.’
Aiden raised an eyebrow. ‘Still, you wouldn’t exactly call him a party animal,’ he said. ‘You know, when Henry told me he was moving to Australia, I thought, wow, that’s huge, I was really happy for him. We haven’t had a lot to do with each other over recent years, but we always caught up when I went home to visit my folks. I used to worry about him, especially after he got that place up in the Hamptons. My uncle had all kinds of trouble getting him to meet his publicity obligations. I mean, if you’re a literary writer, fine, you can be a little reclusive, but not when you’re a children’s book author.’
Madeleine didn’t say anything, she just picked up her glass and gulped, stopping short of draining it entirely. It was the word reclusive that rankled.
‘But hey,’ Aiden went on, ‘suddenly he was up and heading over to the other side of the world, for a woman, no less. I knew you had to be something special, and in those five minutes at the airport, I was convinced of it.’
‘You are an incorrigible flatterer,’ said Madeleine. Not that she could say she minded, exactly.
‘I’m only telling
it like it is,’ he said. ‘When I met you, it was strange, I felt like I already knew you.’
‘I felt the same way,’ she said quietly.
Aiden smiled at her. ‘Anyway, then we drove up to the house, and I couldn’t believe how far it was. I thought about you, having to drive all the way from the city that evening, and every evening. It seemed to me that Henry had just re-created here what he had back home, except that now he had you for company. Which is great for him, but . . . I don’t know.’ He paused, looking at her, but she didn’t say anything. ‘Sorry, I’m making you uncomfortable again.’
She shook her head. ‘I told you, Henry needs quiet to work.’
‘But what about your work? I gather this apartment of yours is much more convenient. Why is Henry so against you keeping it?’
‘He’s not . . . but, you know, it’s a bit extravagant for occasional use.’
Aiden grunted. ‘He can afford it – don’t forget, he kept an apartment in New York.’
That thought had crossed Madeleine’s mind before too, but she didn’t have the right to tell Henry how to spend his money.
‘He keeps the reins pretty tight, doesn’t he?’ Aiden said carefully.
‘No, no, he doesn’t. He’s not like that.’ Though she wondered who she was trying to convince.
Aiden lifted the bottle out of the ice bucket but she covered her glass. ‘Not for me.’
‘Oh, why not?’ He gave her a nudge.
‘I have to drive, remember?’
He let out a heavy sigh, rubbing his eyes. ‘To be honest, Maddie, I don’t know if I’m up to that long drive back. Can’t we just stay here in the city?’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I can take you to the apartment if you like, and then Henry and I can pick you up tomorrow on our way to lunch.’
Aiden frowned, filling his own glass. ‘Where does your sister live?’
‘In Strathfield.’
‘Which could be on Mars for all I know.’
‘Sorry,’ Madeleine said. ‘It’s not far, a few suburbs west of the city.’
‘So it’s not on the way to Mordor from here?’
‘Oh no, it’s in the other direction.’
The Best Man Page 16