Single dad outback wife, p.17
Single Dad, Outback Wife, page 17
‘It’s nice here,’ he said.
She nodded. ‘The aboriginals believe that burial ground is sacred. This ground is sacred to me.’
Andrew knew they were talking about more than just a set of graves. ‘I can see why,’ he said carefully. ‘There’s a lot of history here. A lot of heritage.’
She nodded. ‘Yes, there is. This is my ancestral home.’
Andrew was hearing the subtext loud and clear. ‘Isn’t home where the heart is?’ he asked.
‘My heart is here,’ she countered, kicking at the ground with her dusty boots. ‘Its dirt runs through my veins. I was born at the homestead. My mother is buried here.’
Andrew felt his heartbeat slow and boom in his chest. ‘I’m not asking you to leave and never come back,’ he said quietly.
‘I stood here six years ago while they put my mother in the ground and I swore on her grave that I would never leave Byron again.’
‘Not even for love?’ he asked.
She snorted and broke away from him, wandering a few feet away, her back to him, her head spinning. ‘Especially not for that.’
‘I’m not Joel,’ he said quietly.
She sighed and turned to face him. ‘I know that. I’ve known that for ages and if I hadn’t I certainly would have known it last night. Joel would never have stayed overnight in anything less than five stars.’
Fool. ‘Why settle for five when you can have five billion?’ He shrugged.
She gave a weak laugh. ‘You could have that every night. If you didn’t go back…’
He looked at her. She was beautiful. And she was asking him to stay. ‘I…have to…’
‘Because of Cory?’
‘Yes. And Ariel.’ His eyes begged her to understand. ‘I promised her I’d make a difference.’
‘You are making a difference…out here.’
‘With ROP.’
‘You were five, Andrew. You think Ariel would want you to do something you’re not happy with?’ she asked gently. Georgina may not have known Andrew’s sister but she did know that John would never want her to do something for him that she didn’t want to do.
‘Of course she wouldn’t. But it’s more complicated than that. I’m the one who hogged all the room in the womb and inhibited her growth. I’m the one who came out bawling and was home from hospital two days later. I’m the one who could see. I’m the one who’s still alive. I know it’s not rational but I have to try and make amends for that. She was my twin. It gets me here,’ he said, clenching a fist over his heart.
Georgina could see how deeply his guilt ran. And he was right, it didn’t sound rational, but, then, human feelings often weren’t. He would rather pass up a chance at a new life for him and Cory than betray a thirty-year-old commitment to his sister.
‘You love this job, I know you do. How long has it been since you had this kind of job satisfaction in Sydney? Life’s too short, Andrew.’
He strode towards her, feeling almost suffocated by the gap between them. He wanted last night back. There had been no gap last night. He stopped before her and gently pushed a curl out of her eye. ‘You don’t know what you’re asking me. You’re asking me to give up everything that’s important to me.’
She felt the warmth of his palm as he cupped her cheek and laid her hand against his. ‘But it’s OK for you to ask me?’
‘I think I’m a little more anchored then you are.’
She shut her eyes and bit back a scream, answering much more calmly than she felt. ‘Yeah…Joel never got it either.’
Andrew dropped his hand and cursed himself, dragging her against him. He’d just dismissed everything she’d been trying to tell him by showing him the graveyard. ‘I’m sorry, that was a stupid thing to say. I know the ties that bind don’t always have to be tangible.’
She felt better for his apology. She knew he was kicking himself for his statement. She relaxed in his arms and leaned into his strength. Despite everything, all the reasons why she shouldn’t, she had fallen in love with him.
‘OK, so that won’t work. We’ll compromise. We’ll commute,’ he said, easing back a little from the embrace.
Georgina felt her heart sink. A long-distance relationship. She’d been down that track before. OK, it had been a giddy, fanciful relationship, not remotely grounded in the reality of their situations and with one of them nowhere near as committed to it, but its damage had stayed with her for a very long time.
She looked into his face. He was so convinced. ‘It won’t work,’ she said quietly.
‘It will if we make it work,’ he said eagerly.
‘Travelling here and back from Sydney is two days in itself, Andrew. And you can’t drag Cory backwards and forwards all the time. Which would mean I would have to commute and I’ve been there and done that before. It will wear thin really quickly. Then we’ll argue. And the whole relationship will become about what we can’t do, can’t have, instead of what we do. You’ll start to resent it. Then you’ll start to resent me.’
‘Don’t say that. I could never resent you,’ he said, cupping her face in his hands. ‘That thing I said last night? I don’t just think it, I know it. I love you, Georgina. Please, help me work this out.’
Georgina felt hot tears well in her eyes. Here in the place she loved more than anything on earth, she’d heard the words every woman wanted to hear. If it hadn’t been so impossible, it would have been perfect. She covered his hands with her own. ‘For what it’s worth, I love you, too.’
She gently pried his hands off her face and eased away from him, walking over to the iron fence, her mother’s grave blurring before her eyes. ‘But I won’t do the city-country thing again, Andrew. I know you have commitments that you can’t break and I wouldn’t ask you to because I know they make you the wonderful, compassionate man that you are, and I love you for it. But I’m committed here, too. Not just to Byron but to my family and the prof and continuing the service that he started. Don’t ask me to give them up.’
God, this couldn’t be happening. She loved him, too? ‘What are we going to do?’ he asked miserably.
She shrugged. ‘Get through this week and then chalk it up to experience. Be adults. You go back to your commitments and I’ll stay here with mine.’
‘This really sucks,’ he said.
She nodded. ‘Yes. It does.’
He walked towards her and stood behind her, placing a hand on her shoulder. Just being this near to her was enough to make him want her. ‘You really love me?’ he asked.
‘Really,’ she said, turning in his arms, standing on tiptoe to give his mouth a slow, bitter-sweet kiss.
‘I don’t want to never be able to do that again,’ he said, his voice rough with longing, his thumb rubbing along her bottom lip, which was moist from his kiss.
She sighed and slumped her forehead against his chest. They had to stop this. It wasn’t getting them anywhere. Get a grip, Georgie girl!
She roused herself. ‘Come on. We have to get back.’
He let her go and they walked silently back to the vehicle. Two of the most miserable in love people in existence.
Later that afternoon, Andrew was sitting on the front verandah in a squatter’s chair, feigning interest in some medical journals he’d brought with him. They had some interesting articles on the latest ROP research, and he desperately needed to reconnect with his commitment to the cause.
Georgina was with Mabel and the boys, who were picking vegetables from the garden. Edmund was out on farm business and John was tinkering with something in one of the machinery sheds. The prof was dozing in front of the television.
It was an idyllic outback afternoon. Until Charlie came screaming up the stairs.
‘Cory’s been bitten by a snake,’ Charlie said to Andrew, his eight-year-old voice shrill and shaky.
Charlie’s terrified announcement slammed into him. Fear clawed at his gut. He felt as if the whole world had stopped turning. Like his heart had stopped beating. Cory? No.
‘Where?’ Andrew asked, his voice calm despite the maelstrom of emotions lashing his insides.
‘In the garden,’ he said.
‘Go wake the prof,’ he said to Charlie, squeezing his shoulders firmly, trying not to panic the boy who already looked distressed enough. ‘Tell him to bring the first-aid kit.’
He watched a wide-eyed Charlie go and then he sprinted down the stairs, trying to be calm and think like a doctor, not a terrified uncle who’d already failed his nephew too many times. Dear God, please, let him be OK. The thought that he had put Cory at risk to satisfy his own career needs was too much to bear after all they’d been through.
Andrew ran. He could see Georgina in the distance, sitting on the ground, nursing Cory, surrounded by green lettuces, and headed straight for them. He was on the incident in under a minute.
‘It’s OK,’ said Mabel, who was standing nearby, prodding at the dead snake on the ground, ‘it was only a carpet python.’
Andrew looked down at the decapitated creature. Mabel had removed its head from its body with the aid of a shovel.
‘It’s harmless,’ she reassured him.
Andrew looked at Georgina, who nodded as she rocked Cory back and forth. His relief was tempered by the stricken glaze in Cory’s eyes and the very real possibility that the snake could have been poisonous. Deadly even. What would he have done then? How could he have lived with himself, knowing he’d failed Cory? Failed Ariel?
‘Did you hear that, mate?’ he said, sinking to the ground opposite his nephew, his knees almost touching Georgina’s. ‘It’s harmless.’
Cory looked really scared. He turned wide blue eyes on Andrew. ‘Am I going to die, Uncle Andy? Like Mummy?’
‘Of course not, mate,’ he said, injecting some lightness into his tone, his heart hammering madly in his chest. ‘It’s going to be OK. Didn’t you hear Mabel? It’s not poisonous—isn’t that right, Mabel?’ Andrew asked.
Mabel nodded. ‘Absolutely,’ she said cheerily. ‘That’s what I’ve been telling him. I’ve lived in the bush for ever, I know my snakes. Been bitten by carpet pythons aplenty.’
Andrew had absolute faith in Mabel’s confidence. ‘See, you’re going to be just fine, I promise, mate.’ Andrew smiled. Cory was sitting sideways in Georgina’s lap, his cheek to her chest. Andrew’s heart melted. He wanted to haul Cory into his embrace and wrap him up safely in his arms. But he looked so fragile at the moment that he didn’t want to spook him and he knew that Cory felt secure with Georgina.
Andrew cleared his throat. ‘Cory?’
His nephew turned and looked at him. ‘I miss Mummy, Uncle Andy,’ he said, and crawled off Georgina’s lap straight into Andrew’s, his skinny little arms wrapping themselves tight like sticky tentacles around Andrew’s neck. His little shoulders were shaking as he broke down and sobbed.
Andrew was stunned for a moment. This was it, this was the moment he’d been waiting for. Cory had finally initiated physical contact. Andrew felt his own eyes moisten with tears as he wrapped his arms around his nephew and stared at Georgina, stunned. ‘I miss her too, mate.’
Georgina smiled at the man she loved, despite the emptiness of her own arms. He was so obviously moved by his nephew’s display of affection and trust. She could see the shimmer of tears in his blue eyes and felt like crying herself.
A man who cried out here was often scoffed at as being less than manly, but Georgina had never seen anything more masculine in her life. She gave Andrew’s arm a quick squeeze and roused herself. They were a family of two and she was too involved with them already.
Andrew felt Georgina withdraw and placed a stilling hand on her arm. He knew he wouldn’t have got to this stage with Cory if it hadn’t been for her. They were going to be all right. He and Cory were going to be OK. It was the first time he’d felt it since his sister’s death and he had Georgina to thank for it. Georgina, who he loved. Georgina, who he wanted to share this moment with.
He put his arm around her shoulders and was grateful when she accepted his embrace. He pulled her in close, huddling the three of them together. No matter what happened after today, at this moment the three of them were as connected as humanly possible.
And it felt so right.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE remaining week was hard but Andrew made every last minute count. Much to his surprise, Cory had recovered quickly from the snakebite episode, much quicker than himself, and Andrew had been encouraged by this as further evidence of his nephew’s recovering state.
Things fell back into their usual pattern and Andrew revelled in that. Soon enough he’d be back in the city, looking down the barrel of a career in private practice, but he wasn’t there yet. He committed the outback scenery to memory. He threw himself with gusto into the work. Every giggle from a shy toddler, every gasp of awe from an elder who could see again he filed away.
They saw three different batches of patients in the last week so they were busy, busy, busy and the time flew by quickly. Interestingly, one of their previous patients dropped in for a follow-up examination. Bobby had been back at Tulla for a week when Jim made a special side trip to bring the lad to Byron.
Andrew couldn’t believe how lucky the aspiring cricketer had been. He hadn’t ruptured his globe. He hadn’t even fractured anything. He did have a severe hyphaema but most of the blood had resolved by the time Andrew looked at it and his vision was remarkably good. He would probably always have some deficit and was going to need close follow-up over the next couple of years. The eye service would see to that and Andrew felt a nagging disappointment that he wouldn’t be the one doing it. Continuity was one of the things he was going to miss about being there.
But it was just as well he was leaving. Being near Georgina, loving her and knowing that it wouldn’t work, was torture. But being here with her at Byron among her family and her work colleagues, he realised what he’d asked of her that day by the river. How unfair he’d been. She belonged out here. These people were her commitment. Her community. Her family.
He understood that better than he ever had now that he’d made the final breakthrough with Cory. Cory was his family and if you loved someone, you didn’t ask them to give that up.
And then the week was over and it was time to pack up and return to Sydney. Mabel, with the help of the boys, had cooked an enormous farewell feast.
‘You didn’t have to do this,’ he protested, as the table groaned with the most delicious-smelling food.
‘Nonsense,’ Mabel said dismissively, and winked at Cory. ‘Can’t send one of my favourite boys off without a party, can I, now?’ And Cory beamed.
Andrew took a quick mental snapshot of the scene. The prof and Mabel. Charlie and Cory. Jim and Megan. John and Edmund. And Georgina. All sitting around, laughing and joking and eating. He could feel the portal closing. The brief bubble in time was about to break off and float away and he didn’t want to forget this, not ever.
Andrew ushered two tired and loudly protesting little boys to bed as everyone else retired to the front verandah for port and cheese. It took a while to settle the boys as they both bombarded him with the same questions they’d bombarded him with every night the last week. How come they had to leave?
Andrew would have thought that Cory would have been totally put off an outback life after his run-in with the snake. But once the initial shock of being bitten had worn off he’d taken it in his stride. In fact, he had turned it into art—snake paintings were now his favourite subject.
The air was cool when Andrew finally made it back out, only to find that every one else had retired for the night except Georgina. A slight breeze rustled through the trees and wafted a bushy eucalyptus smell their way. It was a full moon, the yard bathed in a milky glow.
She offered him a drink and he took it from her. He could think of nothing better on his last night than spending it with the woman he loved, no matter how bitter-sweet it was.
‘They asleep?’ she asked, lounging against the railing.
‘Finally.’ He grimaced. He sipped at his port, the fiery liquid sliding smoothly down his throat. ‘Cory’s upset. He doesn’t want to go.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘Charlie doesn’t want him to go either.’ She sipped her own drink. ‘So make him happy. Stay.’
Andrew shut his eyes and sighed. ‘I can’t. Cory might not like it but I’m doing this for him. Ariel trusted me to do what was best for Cory. He’s had a great time out here and, if nothing else, working out here has shown me how under-serviced the bush is. Please, try and understand, Georgina. I want Cory to have the best of everything. For goodness’ sake, you can’t even talk on a phone out here on a cloudy day. And if I’m going to provide him with the best then I need a job that pays well, and as much as I have loved working with the Outback Eye Service, I want to be more financially secure than that.’
‘You’re wrong,’ she said, gripping the railing and blinking the tears from her eyes. He was trying so hard to do right by his nephew he was forgetting the most important thing. ‘Stop thinking about what’s best for Cory financially or materially. Don’t worry about which grammar school you’re going to send him to and what political party he’ll join. He’s an eight-year-old boy—think about what he needs in here…’ she tapped Andrew’s chest ‘…to make him happy. All he really needs is you. None of that other stuff matters as long as he’s got you.’
For now maybe, but what about later, when he’s a teenager? ‘It’s dangerous out here, Georgina,’ he said. ‘What if that snake had been poisonous the other day?’ The thought had brought him out in a cold sweat ever since.
‘It wasn’t,’ she said calmly.
‘Don’t be obtuse.’ His frustration at their no-win situation boiled over.
She sighed heavily. ‘You think living in Sydney is going to protect him from every single thing that can befall him? There are as many dangers in the city as there are out here. They’re just different.’
‘Of course, but an ambulance is ten minutes away and there’s a choice of excellent hospitals. Out here…’ he shook his head ‘…medical help is sporadic at best.’
