Her weariness was pierced with a slim shard of anger. Who was the woman who held such sway over Matthew's heart that three years after her death he still couldn't say goodbye? She had no way of knowing, because there was nothing of Jeannie Haley left in the house.
Soon there would be nothing left of her, either.
She had never really unpacked, living out of a suitcase for the last week, although Matthew had offered to give her space in his dresser. Now she gathered up the few articles she had left in the bathroom and took them back in the bedroom to pack. She found the shoes she had worn yesterday and put them in the suitcase, along with a magazine she'd been reading and her hairbrush.
In the bedroom she'd used as a study she gathered up her diskettes and a handful of reference books and took them back to pack them. Then she closed the suitcase and flipped the locks to carry it downstairs. She made another trip for the computer and one more for the lockbox that held Jody's baby pictures and other precious mementos.
She had packed the car before she remembered the two boxes in the attic. Matthew had made a trip to the house immediately after they had toured the wreckage and gathered and boxed everything that seemed valuable. He had done it without telling her, and she had been grateful for his thoughtfulness. But now those boxes were in the attic, and unless she removed them and took them home, Matthew would have to do it.
She wanted to give him no excuses to come after her. If he did come, it had to be because he wanted to. Not because he was worried about her, not because he felt responsible for things she had left.
The steps to the attic were narrow and steep. As she climbed them she wondered why he had stored the boxes here instead of in a spare bedroom. The only answer she could think of seemed too optimistic. He had expected, or hoped, she would stay.
If that were true, why hadn't he asked her to? He had offered his home as a refuge, but he hadn't asked her to live with him. The two were very different.
In the attic she was momentarily confused by the number of neatly stacked boxes lining the walls. On closer examination she saw that they were covered with heavy dust, while hers were closer to the center and dust free. Her boxes were heavy, but not unmanageable, and she had carried them one at a time to the doorway before curiosity overwhelmed her.
What was stored in the boxes lining the low walls? What was so important that it occupied so much of the attic's space, yet so unimportant that it hadn't been touched in what appeared to be years?
She had no right to find out. Matthew had given her no rights in his life. She was a guest, both in his home and in his heart.
But "guest" wasn't the status she wanted. She wanted more.
What was stored in the boxes? A suspicion began to form. What would a man pack away so meticulously, then never return to examine? Matthew wasn't a collector, a pack rat; the sparseness of his furnishings and the absence of any personal memorabilia attested to that. What would he have stored here except memories?
The dust was three years thick.
Suddenly, finding out about Matthew's family was vital. How could she fight for him if she didn't understand?
Fight for Matthew. She thought about what those words meant. She had never been a fighter, but slowly, through the years, she had learned to stand up for what she was entitled to.
In the early days of her marriage she had taken Charles's abuse; she had been sure, on the most basic level, that something she had done had caused it. Her parents had taught her to be responsible, until she had grown to believe she was responsible for everything that happened around her. Responsible for Charles's anger, his violence, his sadism. Responsible for trying to make the marriage work, and when she had matured enough to realize it never would, responsible for trying to end it.
It was then that she had begun to stand up for herself. The process had been slow but steady. There had been no one but Ron to help, no one to applaud. She had simply had to stand up or lie down forever.
What had she learned? That things would take care of themselves if given time? Or that she had to take care of things herself? In the most important sense she had finally learned to be responsible, not just to feel that way.
She stooped to accommodate the sloping roof and made her way to the nearest pile of boxes. The tops were carefully overlapped to seal them, but there was no tape, no string and no labels.
She had no right to violate Matthew's privacy. She opened the top box anyway, because she had decided she was going to fight. She would not lose Matthew to ghosts.
Dust clouded the air, and her weakened lungs were racked by a spasm of coughing. The dust settled slowly, and the coughing stopped. She stared into a box of trophies before picking up the two on the top.
"Todd Haley. Junior Park Ranger," she read. The first trophy was a brass plated kangaroo. The second was a traditional loving cup. Todd had apparently been on a tennis team.
Tears filled her eyes. She hadn't expected to cry. She was fighting for Matthew, but she held a little boy's triumphs in her hands, a little boy who would never triumph again. How had Matthew lived through the agony of his son's death?
She rummaged carefully through the remainder of the box. There were more trophies and a pile of certificates and progress reports from school. He had been a bright child, and his teachers had praised his attitude. He had been a son to be proud of.
She remembered that he had talked to animals, just like Jody.
The last trophy was carefully wrapped in what looked like a tattered baby blanket. She unwrapped it slowly, knowing instinctively that the blanket had once been Todd's most precious possession. The trophy itself was simple, another loving cup. Inscribed on it were the words, Todd Haley. World's Best Son.
She cried in earnest now, the cup against her heart.
It was minutes before she could bear to wrap the trophy once more and return it to the box. She wasn't sure she could go on with her search, but, more than ever, she knew she needed to. What she was learning about Matthew's family was important, but perhaps what she was learning about his grief was even more so.
The next box was filled with toys. There was a train set, a miniature village, a football, a stamp collecting kit. The next box held more of the same, and so did the last box in the stack. Todd had been a child who liked a variety of things to do. His stamp album was almost half filled with neatly pasted stamps, all labeled with his carefully crafted script. The football looked as if it had been the center of myriad exuberant games.
The next stack of boxes was Todd's, too. One was full of stuffed animals, a well-loved koala gracing the very top. Another held books. He had been partial to the Hardy Boys and British children's classics. There were several books about a girl named Dot that were distinctly Australian. The third box held fading artwork, pictures that ranged from finger paintings to more complicated watercolors. There were ashtrays made from modeling clay and a well-done wooden carving of a possum.
He had lived and grown and thrived here in Flinders Chase. He had played and worked and done his homework. He had been loved by his parents and loved them in return.
When Alexis had closed the last box in the stack, she knew Todd Haley. And she loved him, too.
The next stack was separated by several yards. Alexis approached it with uneasiness. It had been one thing to find out about Todd; it was another to find out about Jeannie.
This was the woman who Matthew had loved, who still held him as surely as if she were alive and her arms enclosed him. Alexis hesitated at the first box, but she was fighting for Matthew. Her hands were unsteady as she pulled the flaps open.
Photograph albums. Four of them. Dust had seeped through the box, and she had to wipe the top one clean before she opened it.
The title page showed a smiling bride and groom in formal wedding clothes. The groom was unmistakably a younger Matthew. The bride had to be Jeannie.
She was tall and slender, not really pretty, because her features were too strong for classic beauty, but vibrant and
very much alive. Her dark hair was chin length, thick and curly around a square face, and her eyes shone with love for the man beside her.
Matthew's eyes shone with love, too. In many ways his face had remained unchanged through the years, but the Matthew in the picture had never known sorrow. He hadn't learned to hide his feelings, to gaze with chilling blankness at those around him. There were no lines carved around his eyes and mouth, no tension in the way he held his body. He was a man about to begin a new life, and he was clearly eager to be alone with his bride.
Alexis turned the page. There were more photographs. Matthew and Jeannie, hands clasped, cutting their wedding cake. Jeannie alone, her face softened for that moment into radiance. Matthew with friends. Both of them with people who were obviously family.
She turned the page again, then again. The next photographs were labeled. They had gone to Fiji on their honeymoon, and there were pictures to document it. They looked happy, relaxed and totally wrapped up in each other. Alexis skimmed the photos quickly, feeling as though she were trespassing on something she shouldn't share.
There were miscellaneous photographs after that, pictures of houses and people she couldn't identify, and places they had been.
The next photograph album held the pictures of Todd.
Unquestionably they had wanted their son. In all the photographs both Jeannie and Matthew looked as if they had just been handed a miracle wrapped up in rainbows. There were countless photos of Todd as he developed from infant into toddler, his loving parents attending each step of his progress with smiles and encouragement.
The third album was devoted to his preschool days, and there were more family portraits. They had been at the Chase by then, and interspersed with shots of Todd climbing trees and chasing kangaroos were shots of the house where Alexis now sat in the attic.
The fourth and final album was Todd's school years. He was a handsome sturdy boy, resembling his mother more than his father, but Alexis could see Matthew in Todd's eyes. There were pictures of the whole family, too. Jeannie's hair was shorter, but her smile had grown wider. Matthew looked like a man content.
And then the photographs stopped.
She felt a shudder of loss. Everything had ended so suddenly for the Haleys. One moment there had been family and love, the next a dark, anguished void.
She understood Matthew's grief better.
Alexis replaced the albums and refolded the flaps on the box. She didn't have to see any more to know what he had suffered and why Jeannie and Todd still had such a hold on him. He had packed them away, both here and in his heart. Until he could take them out once more and openly feel the love he would always have for them, he would never be able to give his love to anyone else.
She started to stand, defeated. She wasn't fighting Jeannie and Todd. She already cared for them both because they were part of Matthew. She knew instinctively that Jeannie would be appalled at Matthew's continuing grief. She had been a vital, enthusiastic woman, and she would not have wanted Matthew to suffer endlessly. She would have wanted him to love again.
She wasn't fighting Jeannie and Todd; she was fighting Matthew. Until he faced his past—
A new thought, half formed, began to tug at her. Matthew would not talk about his past; he could hardly bear to utter Jeannie and Todd's names. But his past was here, waiting to be rediscovered. Below her was a house devoid of any hint of his previous life and any particle of warmth. But the attic held all the warmth he needed to have breathed back into him.
If she had the courage to do it.
Alexis settled back on the floor. Her hands were shaking harder as she drew the next box to her, but by the time she had finished going through all the boxes in the attic, her hands were steady once more. And, strangely enough, she had the undeniable feeling that the spirit of a warmhearted, dark-haired woman was giving her the courage she needed.
* * *
AT LUNCHTIME MATTHEW was surprised to see Alexis's car still parked at his house. He had expected her to be gone; she had made it clear yesterday that she would be leaving.
He didn't know what he should feel; he only knew what he felt. Gratitude that she was still there. Fear. Shame that he was afraid.
He knew one other thing. Before Alexis had come into his life he had let himself feel nothing.
He paused on the front doorstep, realizing immediately that something was different. It took him seconds to figure out what it was and seconds longer to understand that Alexis had breached his privacy.
Under his feet was the reed doormat that Jeannie had bought on their honeymoon trip to Fiji. It was worn where years of muddy feet had been relentlessly wiped against it, but the inscription was still clear enough to read. Peace to Those Who Enter Here.
He felt something akin to nausea wash through him. The last time he had seen the mat, it had been at the bottom of a box of household goods he had packed away after Jeannie's death.
His hand gripped the doorknob, and he threw the door open. "Alexis!"
There was no answer. He strode into the hallway. The walls that had been bare were now covered with framed photographs. He could not avert his eyes because they were everywhere: Jeannie in her wedding dress; Todd at his first cricket game; their first Christmas as a family; Matthew himself with one arm draped around an emu's neck.
"Alexis!"
She wasn't in the parlor, but mementos of his marriage were. There was the ashtray that Todd had proudly made in his second year of school, although no one in the family had smoked. There was the possum Todd had carved in Scouts, a watercolor of Remarkable Rocks that Jeannie had painted, their wedding photograph album on the table beside his favorite chair.
In the dining room he found his wedding china in the cabinet that had held nothing for three years except simple crockery. In the kitchen he gazed at walls crowded with the tiles and tea towels Jeannie had collected everywhere she'd gone. He gazed at the familiar blue enamel kettle and red enamel canisters. He gazed through blurry eyes at the red and blue plaid rug that lay in front of the sink, just where Jeannie had always placed it.
Bile rose in his throat, and he forced it down. He didn't even call Alexis's name; he just started back through the hall to the stairs.
He bypassed the two spare bedrooms and went immediately to his own. He threw the door open, remaining on the threshold. Alexis sat quietly, waiting for him on the hand crocheted coverlet that had been a Christmas gift from Jeannie's Scots grandmother.
"Get out."
She had expected anything, even this. She stood, carefully brushing her skirt over her knees. "You had a beautiful family, Matthew."
"My family is none of your bloody business!"
She nodded sadly. "I know. But I made them my business anyway."
"What gave you the right?"
"Loving you." She lifted her chin. She was not cowed by his anger. "I'm not the first to love you. Jeannie loved you, and Todd loved you, too. You had them for just a short time, but they can live in your memories still, if you'll let them."
"Get out. I didn't ask you into my life."
She nodded gravely. "You'll shut me out, just as you've shut them out. Then you'll have nothing and no one, Matthew. Is that what you want?"
"I want you to leave."
"I'm packed." She walked toward him. "It's funny. Now I think I know Jeannie better than you did. She was a woman who would be appalled at your guilt and your suffering. You've wallowed in it for three years, when you could have been warmed by what you once had."
He raised his hands to her shoulders and shook her. "What do you know about suffering?" he demanded through clenched teeth. "What do you know about loss?"
Her head fell back, but even in his rage she wasn't afraid of him. He hadn't hurt her, and she knew he wouldn't. The only bruises he would leave would be on her soul.
"More than enough about both," she said when his hands dropped to his sides. "I would give my blood and bones to have been loved for even one day the way you were."
All signs of anger disappeared. He became the Matthew she had first met, the man with nothing inside him. She spoke again before he could. "I'm leaving."
He stepped aside, encouraging her. She paused on the threshold and her hand dropped to the nightstand beside his bed. On it she had placed a framed photograph of Matthew, Jeannie and Todd. She suspected it was the last one that had been taken before the crash.
She touched it tenderly. "If you're ever able to tell them goodbye, tell them I said goodbye, too. And tell them that I've mourned for them today." She lifted her eyes to Matthew's. "I'll mourn for you, too."
His eyes didn't flicker, and he didn't move.
"Goodbye, dear one," she whispered. Then she turned and started down the stairs.
Chapter 16
THE WIND OFF Hanson Bay held the chill of ice capped mountain ranges two thousand miles away. With a cup of fresh coffee to warm her, Alexis sat on the makeshift steps where her porch had once been and watched twilight thicken into night. On the beach below, surf lapped in a hypnotic rhythm against the shore. The only other sound disturbing the deep evening stillness was the occasional soft grunt of the koala roosting in the gum tree closest to the house. He had been there to greet her when she had returned from Matthew's, shaken and drained. Somehow his presence had made it possible to go into the house and unpack.
When she decided to come outside instead she had been in the midst of preparing a dinner she didn’t want. The steps were uneven and rough, but the moon was rising, threatening a sunshine brightness, and she didn't want it to rise without her. She missed the front porch, but Peter was going to have it replaced. In time the house would look much as it had before the fire.
Only nothing would really be the same.
Nothing would be the same in her life, either. She had gambled for Matthew's love, and she had lost. In the process she had caused them both untold pain. Strangely, she had no regrets. She had done what she had to do. They could not have remained occasional lovers. Now they wouldn't be friends, but perhaps that was more honest. And kinder.
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