by Fiona Lowe
His heart thumped hard against his ribs and a glimmer of hope slowly unfolded deep inside him. Mia hadn’t left him to hurt him. She’d left him to protect him.
Well, he wouldn’t let her.
Decision spurred him on. He ran out of the park and back to the main road, looking for a taxi. Empty blacktop greeted him. He pulled out his phone and dialled a cab. He had to find her.
His brain had jerked from chaos to order as he ran through a plan. Just about every flight out of Darwin left after midnight and he had a really strong feeling she’d be heading south tonight. But she wasn’t going anywhere if he had anything to do with it. He had twelve hours to find her. And if he failed in that time he’d lie in front of the plane if need be.
A cab came around the corner and pulled up beside him.
The driver leaned over and opened the door. ‘Where to, mate?’
‘The airport hotel.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MIA lay on the bed, waiting for the air-conditioner to have an impact on the steaming air and cool the sauna that was her room. Now that the first part of her journey had been completed, her legs had turned to jelly.
The hotel staff had been very solicitous and made sure the phone, TV remote and water were within reach. They’d promised to bring her an early lunch so she could get a good rest this afternoon before her flight. Not that she had much of an appetite.
The clock showed twelve-thirty on the liquid display. Two hours since she’d left the hospital. Ninety minutes since Flynn would have arrived to collect her. She bit her lip and blinked rapidly, hating what she’d done but knowing she’d had scant choice.
If she’d waited and told him her plan, he wouldn’t have let her leave. He didn’t deserve the pain and hurt she’d just inflicted on him by disappearing, but more importantly he didn’t deserve to lose a chunk of his life caring for her in a vegetative state.
Short-term pain for long-term gain, wasn’t that what ‘they’ said? She prayed he would be OK. That he would find the love of a good woman, that…. Tears spilled down her cheeks. Why did life have to be this hard? She reached for a tissue and blew her nose.
She would not feel sorry for herself. She had a plan and working on that would keep her busy. She’d fly to Perth, find a menial job where she wasn’t a danger to anyone and then investigate nursing homes. She’d find the best one for when she could no longer care for herself.
A knock sounded on her door. Lunch. She wearily swung her legs off the bed, holding her slinged arm close to her chest to avoid any jerking. ‘Coming.’
She slid the chain back across its chase, turned the handle and opened the door. Silver spots shimmered in front of her eyes and she gripped the architrave for support.
‘Hello, Mia.’
Flynn stood in the corridor, his face drawn, his clothing crumpled and his black hair spiked from being trammelled by fingers. His eyes flashed with a combination of fear and relief but when he spoke his voice only contained steely determination. ‘I’ve come to talk to you. Don’t even think of suggesting that I don’t need to.’
His dishevelled look told her of the hell she’d put him through and her heart spasmed as her knees sagged beneath her. ‘You weren’t supposed to find me.’
‘Well, I did.’ His strong arms reached around her waist, supporting her. ‘Come on, you need to be lying down.’ The gruff words belied his tender touch as he guided her back to the bed.
Mia wanted to lean into him, wanted him to cradle her against his chest, but that would just make things worse. Make things harder than they already were.
The moment her bottom hit the mattress, Flynn stepped back and sat down in a chair a good metre away from her. ‘Do you want to tell me why you’re here?’
She drew in a long, deep breath. ‘I’m on a late flight.’
‘I gathered that. Can you tell me why?’
She closed her eyes for a moment, avoiding his penetrating gaze which threatened to undo her resolve. ‘Remember when I told you I live day to day? Well, today I decided that while Kirra has been fun, it’s time to go south.’
He crossed his arms across his broad chest and his cheeks sucked in as tension shot across his face. ‘I don’t believe you.’
Her heart started to hammer hard against her ribs. ‘That’s your prerogative.’
He leaned forward, his expression incisive. ‘The Mia I’ve come to love wouldn’t abandon her patients or Kirra on a whim.’
Her chest tightened. She’d been right. He really did love her. But she wouldn’t let him. She needed to make him want to walk away from her. The fire of pain burned in her chest, vaporising her breath, and she gasped for air. ‘Perhaps you don’t know me as well as you think you do.’
His expression softened, love and affection radiating from him. ‘I know you better than any woman I have ever loved. I know you better than you know yourself.’
‘You don’t.’ The words rushed out in a feeble defence.
‘I do.’ His hands fell to his knees palms facing up. ‘And I know you love me.’
The truth pummelled her like breakers over a reef but she had to make him leave. ‘You’ve got tickets on yourself. We were having a no-strings-attached affair, which you agreed to. Now it’s over.’
‘Look me in the eye and tell me you don’t love me.’
His deep voice vibrated around her and she tried not to lose herself in warm hazel eyes. She dredged up the words to form the biggest lie of her life, but the denial wouldn’t come. ‘I’m going somewhere a lot cooler.’
‘To die alone?’
Her heart stalled. He knew. How did he know? Panic surged in ever-increasing waves as words failed her completely.
‘I know, Mia. Or at least I think I’ve worked it out. You believe you have an inherited disease like Huntington’s.’
His words fell on her like an ice storm, jagged and sharp, giving her nowhere to hide. She swallowed and then looked straight at his empathetic face, and could no longer deny him the truth. ‘Frontotemporal dementia.’
‘Pick’s disease.’ He kept his gaze hooked with hers. ‘How do you know you have it?’
‘Because it killed my mother and my grandfather.’ The words jetted out like water from a fire hose, released by his question. ‘She started getting sick at forty. At first we thought she was bipolar with her impulsive shopping trips. But then she started doing things that are not associated with that disorder. She’d swear in social situations, using language I didn’t even know she knew. She had always been Miss Manners but she began telling people exactly what she thought, no matter how hurtful. But the night she danced topless at the church Christmas party we knew something terrible was happening.’
‘Did she have an MRI?’ Flynn spoke quietly, his voice gently prompting.
She nodded slowly, remembering the day of the scan. ‘Yes, and it showed atrophy of the brain that was consistent with her other symptoms.’ Her breath shuddered out of her lungs. ‘At that point a diagnosis of bipolar would have been a blessing.’
She hadn’t told anyone about her mother but now she needed to. She needed Flynn to understand the true horror of the disease. ‘Mum would listen to the same music over and over, hoard every newspaper that came into the house and have food jags. For weeks she would only eat carrots. She’d always been fastidious about her clothes and make-up but slowly she lost interest in herself and her personal hygiene slipped. That was when Michael and I decided she needed full-time care.’
‘And you gave up your job to care for her?’
The anguish on his face reinforced her decision to head south. No one deserved to watch someone they love die a living death as they gradually lost everything that made them who they were. She plucked at the sheet beneath her, her fingers making little triangular shapes.
‘Michael and I shared the care for a while but he…’ She took a steadying breath. ‘He couldn’t handle it and left for Melbourne.’ She dashed an errant tear off her face. ‘Now do you understand? I’
ve lived through this disease, every step of the way, with my mother and I won’t let it destroy your life as well as mine.’
His eyes sparked with strength of purpose. ‘It won’t destroy my life. It would be an honour and privilege to care for you.’ He ran his hand through his hair. ‘Hasn’t your time on Kirra taught you that a community cares for each other no matter what? Hell, the Kirri people are no strangers to hardship and if you do get sick then together we’ll take care of you.’
‘If I get sick?’ His statement stunned her. ‘Two days ago I threw myself into the path of a crocodile. I think that counts as impulsive and the early signs of the disease, don’t you?’
He shook his head. ‘Wanting to rescue people is part of who you are. It’s why you’re a nurse, why you cared for your mother, why you tried to get me to consider meeting other women.’
She shook her head furiously. ‘No. No, it’s not. You once said to me that impulse is action without thought and that the brain processes instinct differently. Well, it’s obvious my brain can no longer tell the difference.’
He leaned forward. ‘If you believe you’re going to die sooner than later then it’s normal human behaviour to take more risks.’
‘If I believe I am going to die?’ Her voice rose. ‘This isn’t a fairy-tale, Flynn. I have an autosomal dominant inherited disease. My mother isn’t the only member of the family to die. Her father died of dementia and after her death Michael and I discovered she’d had a child three years before Michael was born and he died at four. My parents had never mentioned him.’
A frown wrinkled his high forehead. ‘And you know for sure he died of FTD?’
She threw her hands up. ‘Why would they never tell us about his existence if he’d died of something else? They must have been protecting us from the horrors ahead.’
‘How old was your grandfather when he developed the disease?’ He moved from his chair and sat down on the bed beside her, the mattress tilting her towards him.
She held herself stiffly, trying not to fall against him. ‘I’m not certain. He and mum weren’t that close but he died at seventy.’
He hesitated, as if he was forming a question in his mind. ‘Did you and Michael have genetic testing once your mother was diagnosed?’
Her mother’s doctor’s voice boomed in her head, bringing back difficult memories. ‘We were told that gene testing isn’t recommended for us because they didn’t consider we had a clear enough family history through generations.’
Flynn nodded his understanding. ‘Even with family history, only six per cent of people have the predictive test because there are so many ethical concerns that it makes your head spin.’
She moistened her lips, remembering all too well that very scenario. ‘Michael couldn’t cope with any of it. He decided he was going to have the test but he suicided the night before he was to meet the genetic counsellor.’
Flynn slid his palm underneath her hand, letting it rest passively against hers, and yet it held her hand in place with such an amazing pull of energy that she couldn’t lift her hand.
His voice spun around her as gentle as the touch of fleece. ‘Even though your grandfather died of dementia too, it may have been a completely different type, especially as he was older. FTD isn’t always inherited and your mother may have had a sporadic form. In that case, the predictive test wasn’t going to be helpful for you.’
Her throat moved convulsively. ‘But the time for me to have the test has passed anyway. I don’t need a predictive test. I have the impulsive symptoms of the actual disease.’ She gave a derisive cry. ‘Did you know the only book I have read since mum died is Emma?’
‘Because you love Jane Austen and reading it is a panacea. It calms you and makes you feel good.’ His free hand came up to cradle her cheek. ‘You’ve had a hellish time and I think you’ve interpreted the normal signs of stress and grief—the note taking, rereading books—as symptoms. I don’t think you have early signs of FTD.’
She wanted to believe him and throw herself into his love and care, but that would only spin his world into a nightmare. She turned her head away from his touch and brought her free hand up to fiddle with the edge of her collar. ‘And I think that you want too much to believe that I’m not sick so we can have a future together.’
For the first time his voice held a plea. ‘Don’t you want that?’
She turned her head back to see a tiny crack in his controlled demeanour, and pain shredded her heart. ‘Of course I want that. I’d give anything to grow old with you and be surrounded by our grandchildren, but hope isn’t enough to get us over the line.’
‘“A woman who loves you stays with you.”’ Desperation clung to the words.
He was quoting her, using her own words against her. ‘That’s dirty pool, Flynn. I love you. I love you more than I have ever loved anyone, but I can’t give you the children or the life that you deserve.’ Her voice cracked as she made herself speak the words she most feared. ‘Which is why I’m getting on that plane and leaving you.’
Flynn felt the last vestiges of his composure start to unravel. He’d resisted the overwhelming urge to haul her into his arms and never let her go. He’d tried to be the rational one, tried to get her to see that belief wasn’t enough to make an irrefutable verdict.
He refused to lose her by letting her run away, but she was convinced she had FTD. He acknowledged there was a possibility but he was a scientist and he didn’t deal in speculation. The only way to find out was to get a real diagnosis. ‘I want you to have an MRI today.’
Her jaw tightened and she vehemently shook her head. ‘There’s no point having it today. I’ll organise it when I’m settled down south.’
Desperation forced him to bargain. ‘If you love me then you’ll come back to Royal Darwin with me right now and have it today.’
A flash of dread flared in her eyes as a tremor shook her body. ‘Only if you promise me that when they find frontal and temporal changes in my brain you’ll respect my wishes. Let me get on that plane and not follow me.’ She gripped his arm. ‘Promise me you’ll stop hiding and go out into the world and find the happiness you deserve.’
Every part of him rebelled at agreeing to her wishes. He wanted to keep her close to him, no matter the outcome. Life with Mia, even if they only had a few years together, was infinitely better than life without her.
But that wasn’t the choice she was offering.
He had no real choice.
He didn’t know the odds but for once he took a gamble and prayed the dice would fall in his favour.
* * *
Flynn had spent an hour on the phone and pulled in every favour he’d ever been owed. He’d managed to get both the consultant neurologist and radiologist as well as the radiographer all in the same place at the same time. And as much of a miracle as that was, even more so was that Mia hadn’t fled.
She’d sat pale and silent, with white earpieces in place, listening to music. She hadn’t spoken a word from the moment he’d triumphantly told her the scan would be at three p.m.
Now he paced back and forth in the small control room, watching through the glass as Mia, clutching the back of a standard hospital gown, was assisted up onto the ‘bed’ of the magnetic resonance imaging machine.
Callum Kelly, the radiographer, spoke gently in his soft Irish brogue. ‘We’re ready to start.’
‘You’ll need to wait outside, Flynn.’ Doug Sanderson, the neurologist, clapped his brawny hand onto Flynn’s shoulder, his smile tinged with the understanding of how difficult Flynn would find that request.
Right up to that moment Flynn had been confident that the MRI would bear out his strong feeling that Mia didn’t have FTD. But as the bed started to move Mia slowly into the chamber of the machine, gut-wrenching dread poured through him, chilling him to his marrow. The unknown was ten times worse than the known.
She’s here with you now but you’ll lose her if she has the disease.
Perhaps the known w
as worse.
He walked toward the door and then spun back, grabbing the microphone that connected the control room to the machine, enabling the radiographer to communicate with the patient. Not caring a damn who else was in the room with him, he gripped it hard and flicked it on, raising it to his lips. ‘Mia, I’m just outside, sweetheart. Remember, no matter what, I love you and I always will.’
* * *
Mia heard Flynn’s voice and swallowed a sob. This amazing man had come into her life at the wrong time for both of them. Not that there would ever have been a right time for her. Although perhaps if she’d met him a few years ago, when she’d been unaware of the impact FTD had on her family, they would have had more time.
But then she would have died, leaving children and the huge possibility of having passed on the faulty gene. She never wanted anyone to experience the ravages of the disease or suffer the impact of watching a loved one fade away.
Flynn was in denial, which was why she’d agreed to the scan. She’d didn’t need a scan to know the truth. She’d faced up to her future and accepted it. Now he needed to accept it as well, and the scan would be the proof he required.
‘Mia?’ The radiographer’s voice came out of the speaker behind her head. ‘How are you doing? How’s your arm?’
‘OK, thanks, Callum.’ She blew out long slow breaths and kept her eyes closed, not wanting to open them and feel the claustrophobic presence of the machine that surrounded her. She’d had an individual meeting with the two doctors and the radiologist before the procedure. Doug Sanderson had asked a lot of questions about her family and her symptoms and she’d been exhausted at the end of it. Callum had been very sweet, checking with her twice that she didn’t have a pacemaker or an aneurysm clip that would be damaged by exposure to the magnetic field.
‘We’ve got your favourite CD to put on and the nurse has given you the buzzer. Press it if you need us to stop at any time.’
She nodded, enjoying the soothing lilt of Callum’s voice but then realising he couldn’t see her and she had to reply. ‘Yes, I’m holding it in my good hand.’