The Pregnant Midwife

by Fiona McArthur

  The army helicopter swept in from the left at about five hundred feet and Hunter snapped off the cap of the flare to ignite it. Pungent orange smoke poured from the stick and he held it arm’s length and moved out towards the wreckage.

  He didn’t think the personnel on the Chinook could actually see him through the canopy but hopefully they’d see the smoke.

  The thump of the rotors vibrated around him and by the time the helicopter hovered over the break in the canopy the wind generated by the rotors was shaking the treetops. Suddenly two ropes unwound from the side door of the Chinook and two men in camouflage snaked down the ropes and landed lightly twenty metres away. They ran towards him, speaking into their microphones as they ran.

  ‘Dr Morgan?’

  Hunter threw a thankful prayer skyward at God and the helicopter pilot hovering above and nodded. ‘There’s an injured man in a cave. Follow me.’

  Hunter wouldn’t feel rescued until Keith and Kirsten were safely aboard the helicopter. She was still pale and occasionally shivered against him as they watched Keith being winched into the aircraft. He wasn’t letting her out of his sight and knew he wouldn’t rest until she’d been properly assessed at the hospital. He tried to block out what they’d been doing such a short time ago knowing he loved her—but he wasn’t sure how much he could offer. Now wasn’t the time to pursue that.

  Finally the last soldier had been winched back up into the Chinook and within fifteen minutes they were transported to Port Macquarie Base Hospital where Kirsten was reunited with her sisters.

  Keith’s wife met them as they stretchered her husband into Emergency. Aware of her distress, Hunter stayed with her to help explain what they’d do for her husband. All the time half of his mind wondered where Kirsten was, even though he knew Abbey and Bella were with her.

  When Keith was finally settled into Intensive Care, critical but stable, Hunter left Anna to find Kirsten. He was almost too late.

  In Kirsten’s room, he barely registered the two other women in the room as his eyes were drawn to Kirsten, the woman he loved, sitting fully dressed in clean clothes on the edge of the bed. She’d showered, her hair was tied back in a damp ponytail and her small hands were heavily bandaged.

  After being given warmed intravenous fluids, Kirsten had been pronounced stable, but she refused to stay at the base hospital, opting instead for her sisters’ care.

  It was all out of his hands and he fought the outrage her discharge left him with because what could he do? She had family, two brother-in-law doctors and two strong-willed midwife sisters, who were keen to take her home, and he was a nobody.

  ‘Hello, Hunter,’ she said, and he could tell she was confused about where she stood with him. He wished he could help her but he felt the same. ‘These are my sisters, Abbey and Bella,’ she said. ‘I’m going home with them now.’

  He vaguely noticed the family resemblance, but his attention was focussed on Kirsten. ‘Are you well enough to go home?’ The last thing he wanted was to leave her, but she needed more than he could give her at this moment. The previous twenty-four hours had been traumatic for all of them.

  He needed time to come to terms with the past before he could look to the future.

  ‘I’ll be well cared for.’ She smiled wearily and then looked him up and down. ‘What about you?’

  He shook his head at her concern. How could she think of him when she’d been through so much? ‘I’ve a few things to sort out. I need to visit my father and I have my own ghosts to lay. Your family is the best place for you.’ He stepped across to the bed and kissed her cold cheek. ‘The next time I see you, we need to talk.’

  She frowned at his ambiguous comment. Talk as in future or talk as in regret? She hadn’t realised his father was still alive and she had no idea what ghosts he was talking about. She was too tired, physically and emotionally, to guess, and damn him for kissing her cheek. ‘Goodbye, Hunter.’

  ‘Au revoir, Kirsten.’

  He watched her leave the room with her sisters, and it felt as if a part of him was torn in two. But leaving her was the most sensible thing. He needed time away from Kirsten to collect his thoughts. How had he reached the stage where even being away from her for a few days would seem a lifetime? Twenty-four hours ago they had barely been on speaking terms, but in that time he’d thought he’d lost her for ever—twice. It was too much, too soon, and this was his last chance for the woman he loved. The happiness of both of them depended on him. She’d come back to MIRA and to him—she had to—and this time he’d get it right.

  When Kirsten woke up the next morning her sisters were sitting beside the bed. Her first thought was that she had forty-eight hours, maximum, to take the morning-after pill. Her second thought was she felt too miserably unwell to worry about it today.

  Abbey was reading, and Bella was sewing a rip in Kirsten’s jacket.

  Bella noticed Kirsten was awake first and she smiled. ‘Good morning, sleepyhead.’

  Abbey put down the book and leaned over to give the invalid a kiss and then tilted her head. ‘I thought you’d grown out of giving us heart failure with your adventures.’

  ‘I like to keep you guessing,’ Kirsten’s voice was hoarse and it hurt to yawn. Thank goodness she was home, she thought. Her head felt woolly with the beginnings of a thumping cold. She coughed and her throat spasmed and she lay back on the pillows. Great! Just what she needed. Then she wondered how Hunter was.

  She hoped her sisters wouldn’t jump to conclusions, but Abbey knew everything anyway so there was no point trying to hide.

  ‘How’s Keith, and have you heard from Hunter?’ she croaked.

  Typically, Abbey knew. ‘Keith is fine. He has a broken ankle and a haemoglobin of five so is up for more blood transfusions today. Your Dr Morgan flew back to Sydney last night. He rang to ask how you were and I said you were sleeping.’

  Both sisters looked at her expectantly and Kirsten couldn’t help the heat of colour that brushed her cheeks. ‘What?’

  Abbey and Bella exchanged looks and then Abbey smiled and changed the subject. ‘Hopefully you’ll miss out on pneumonia, but you’re brewing a decent head cold and you’re confined to bed today.’

  ‘After your wash, we’ll bring up breakfast,’ Bella said. ‘Vivie has left Aunt Sophie in charge of her son to come over to make it for you.’

  The girls’ aunt lived next door with Scott’s son, Blake, and his new wife Vivie, and Kirsten glanced out the window at the big house across the yard with a tired smile. Vivie was the best cook in the family.

  Normally she would have got up anyway but the thought of hiding in her room for a while was strangely attractive and probably had more to do with realising that Hunter could just fly back to Sydney without a backward glance. She ached all over and her hands hurt. She winced and felt like a baby with mittens.

  ‘I need a long bath with some of your calming oils, Bella. But I don’t know if I can wait for breakfast for all of that.’

  Abbey lifted a Thermos of hot chocolate from the floor and poured Kirsten a cup. ‘Drink this, follow your plan, I’ll redress your hands and then we’ll bring you a tray in forty-five minutes.’

  Kirsten smiled tiredly at her big sister. ‘It’s great to be home.’

  Abbey hugged her gently. ‘You have no idea how pleased we are to see you.’ Then she turned away to hide the tears in her eyes.

  ‘I’ll run the bath.’ Bella followed Abbey out of the door and her voice wobbled. It was then that Kirsten realised how hard it must have been for those waiting to hear if any of them were alive.

  She stared sadly at the door and wondered if Hunter had anyone waiting to hear that he had made it safely through the ordeal. Obviously she now knew he had at least his father alive, but how strange that she’d had the impression his father was dead from something Hunter had said in Dubai. Obviously some form of estrangement. Kirsten knew at first hand how Hunter could freeze people out if he felt he’d been let down, and she felt a kindred
sympathy for Hunter’s father.

  Thoughts of Hunter’s relatives were the tip of the iceberg as far as Hunter was concerned. She really knew nothing about the man. In the cave, things had changed, ground had shifted and new rules had come into play. It was frightening to know those changes had only happened because of the circumstances. Even more frightening was the fact that she didn’t want them to go away and she didn’t know whether Hunter wished they’d never happened.

  She loved Hunter and always would. But that didn’t mean they were destined to be together. She was still willing to risk her pride and her heart but she needed some encouragement from Hunter apart from those magic moments in the cave. She would give him one more chance and if he let her down again, she would learn to live in Gladstone.

  After Kirsten’s bath, Abbey winced at her sister’s wounds as she changed the dressings. ‘You’ll be lucky to be able to go back to work in three weeks, the way you’ve torn your hands.’ Her sister gently rubbed in some salve that seemed to draw the sting from the deep gouges as soon as it touched it.

  ‘What’s in that?’ Kirsten asked, and Abbey shrugged.

  ‘It’s Bella’s concoction, and I can smell the lavender, but I’m not sure of the rest. I’ve found it very effective.’

  She placed the last piece of tape on the bandages, and even though they were less bulky, Kirsten knew she would still be awkward with the dressings.

  ‘I hope you’re going to cut my food for me.’

  Abbey smiled at her. ‘We’ll look after you.’ Abbey paused as if unsure how Kirsten would react to her next statement. ‘Everyone would understand if you didn’t want to go back to MIRA after the crash. You could stay here after you’re healed, and not go back to Sydney.’

  To not take the risk, to accept the inevitable without having to stare Hunter in the face…The coward in her admitted the idea was attractive but Kirsten shook her head. ‘I have unfinished business in Sydney.’

  Abbey nodded. ‘I thought you might.’ Abbey understood. She always did.

  ‘It may not work out, Abbey. I’ve been mistaken before with this man. Things weren’t real in the emotion of the crash.’

  ‘I’m aware of that. But you’ve changed, and I don’t think it’s just the hell you’ve been through. You know you can talk to me when you’re ready. You’ve been given a few weeks off. Rest, recover and let him stew.’

  Hunter wasn’t stewing, he was laying the framework for a new life, as well as laying ghosts that had haunted him for longer than he’d known Kirsten. Maybe his emotional denial of his father’s existence had helped create the isolated man he had become? After his mother had left and his father had shut him out, Hunter had begun to create his own barriers to emotional damage, with the foundation stone laid by avoiding anyone who could hurt him. He felt surreal, back in Sydney after the crash—suspended somewhere between the isolated rainforest at Banda Banda and the solicitous enquiries from MIRA and the NICU, and the nagging hole where Kirsten should be. He spent the first few days working up to tackle his past and finally he was ready.

  Kirsten slept the first few days, while her hands healed more slowly than she’d expected. The lingering head cold left her feeling weak and tearful for most of the week. Or that’s what she told herself was making her feel weak and tearful. Hunter left a get-well message with Abbey and sent some roses with an impersonal note the day after he left, he rang twice while she was sleeping but she heard nothing more. He would ring again soon.

  The second week Abbey kept her busy, visiting friends and helping out with the baby, and Kirsten soaked in the serenity of a loving home, a delightful nephew and the warmth of her family around her. Her feeling of disquiet grew. Hunter had said he had things to do but surely he could have rung at least once more?

  At the end of the first week, Hunter paused outside the stately house and resolutely walked up the stairs to ring the bell.

  ‘Hello, Father,’ he said. Hunter shook the old man’s hand and he thought how strange it was to follow the tall figure into his childhood home, something he hadn’t done for twenty years. Not that he’d spent much of his growing years under the roof. Consigned to boarding schools after his mother had left, Hunter had never breached the walls his father had erected between them until his own bitterness had grown to sour their relationship permanently.

  When they were seated, his father looked so frail in the big winged-chair that Hunter was shocked at the passage of years.

  ‘It’s good to see you, son. They said you were missing, and I was worried until they rang again.’ The old man sighed at the memory and this time Hunter could see the love and concern shining from his father’s eyes. Hunter was afraid it had been there all along but he hadn’t been able to see it through his own hurt.

  He leaned forward and took the frail hand in his and squeezed it. ‘We managed to walk away from the wreck. I wondered if I could stay for a few days? Catch up and spend some time together? That experience made me realise I should see you more often.’

  His father lifted his shoulder in a painful shrug. ‘You’re welcome any time. Though why you want to is beyond me. You were right when you accused me of shutting you out. When I finally realised what I’d done to you, it was too late.’

  Hunter shook his head and smiled. ‘We both should have known better, but maybe we’re just too alike to see it.’ Hunter took a deep breath and began to let go of the built-up disappointment of years, but it would take time. ‘I need to spend time with you.’

  The old man’s eyes shone suspiciously brightly before he turned away to look across the room. ‘I’d like that,’ he said gruffly, and then pulled his hand free and gestured to a small table in an alcove. ‘Now, enough of this sap and give me a game of chess. I haven’t had a good game since my best friend died.’ He grinned up as his son towered over him to shift the table. ‘You may have grown but I bet you still can’t beat me at that.’

  Two nights later his father brought up the subject Hunter had been avoiding. ‘Your mother has married again.’

  Hunter blinked. ‘For the fourth time?’

  His father’s eyes twinkled and Hunter felt his own mouth curve. ‘This one’s even younger. She was always a difficult woman to please so I don’t feel like a failure.’

  Hunter looked at the old man he’d come to know more in the last few days than he had in the last thirty-five years. ‘So how does that make you feel?’

  His father shrugged. ‘Sad for her and nothing for me. I got over your mother leaving a hell of a lot quicker than you did.’

  Hunter remembered the desolation he’d been left with. ‘I used to wish she were dead.’ He glanced up. ‘Which left me feeling guilty as well as miserable. Terrible, but at least she would have had a reason not to write to me, or send me a card for my birthday, or even pretend that she sometimes thought about me.’ He shook his head. ‘Pathetic, I know.’

  ‘If you hadn’t cared you would have been like her. Thank God you cared.’ The old man sighed. ‘I pushed her to give me an heir. And she never forgave me. Said it ruined her body, which wasn’t true, because it was then she was at her most beautiful.’ His father sighed. ‘I should never have married her…’ He looked under shaggy brows at his son. ‘Just like you should never have married Portia.’

  Hunter held up his hands. ‘Like father, like son.’ They both smiled ruefully.

  By the time he left a few days later, Hunter knew he and his father would savour the time they had left together. A strong bond had been forged and he was very thankful he’d had the chance. He dreamed of Kirsten and the chance of his own family and how much his father would love being included.

  Just one more ghost.

  To say Portia was surprised to see him was an understatement. She opened the door of what had once been his home but was now Portia’s fashionable house. After the second ring, his ex-wife answered the door and he could tell that she’d been drinking. It was just after lunch. Funny how he’d forgotten that she often drank too mu
ch.

  ‘Well, well,’ she said, and gestured him in with a grand sweep of her arm. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure of your company, dear man?’

  ‘Hello, Portia.’ Hunter ignored her question and followed her. The entry was still grand, with black and white tiles and marble furniture, and he suppressed a shiver at the coldness of the room as he crossed behind her into the formal lounge.

  She stopped in front of a huge oil painting of herself and turned to face him. The comparison wasn’t kind. ‘I’m a widow now. Are you interested, Hunter?’ She smiled and a glimpse of the young woman he’d fallen in love with shone briefly from her eyes but faded away with her smile.

  ‘I’ve just come to make my peace,’ he said, and realised that he felt nothing, not even dislike for the woman in front of him. If she hadn’t been unfaithful, would he be living in this cold and ostentatious house with the wrong woman? It was a scary thought that he owed Portia a debt for letting him go. What he could have with Kirsten would be so different.

  She tilted her head and this time her smile was more genuine. ‘You’ve fallen in love. I’m pleased for you because you weren’t destined to be happy with me, Hunter. I never was a one-man woman, though I gave you my best shot.’

  She poured herself a drink and then waved the bottle to offer him one. Hunter shook his head and jingled his keys. Suddenly he felt a hundred years younger and he needed to get out and shake the outdated negatives from his brain and focus on the positives for his future.

  He had to talk to Kirsten, but it had to be face to face. To wait another week would be agony but this time he would do it right.

  By the end of the third week Kirsten was ready to kill Hunter for not ringing. What did his silence mean? It was time to test her future with Hunter or lay other plans. His lack of contact didn’t bode well but she was still willing to risk telling him she loved him. Willing to try to start again even with the chance their relationship could be short term.

  Maggie rang from Sydney twice and each time when Kirsten heard the long-distance pips on the line she thought it was Hunter. She reconfirmed her return date and assured Maggie she was well. With subtle prompting by Kirsten, Maggie mentioned that Hunter was back at work and looked well and that Keith was progressing steadily.