Safe haven at wagtail ri.., p.17
Safe Haven at Wagtail Ridge, page 17
‘They sent me about a dozen copies,’ Bree continued, obviously unaware of the emotions raging through Carol. ‘So I brought one over for you, Anna. And you should have one too, Carol. Val said that Justin and Ben are your sons?’
Carol stammered something that could have been interpreted as a thank you and took the calendar from Bree’s outstretched hand.
‘I want to give them to the guys too,’ Bree explained. ‘I hear they’ve gone back to their base in Tamworth. Do either of you know their postal address? I could post these to them.’
‘No. Sorry,’ Carol managed to say.
Anna simply shook her head.
‘Okay. They’ll probably get copies anyway because they were models. Jo sent me some copies of our final couple of photos, all together.’ She reached back into the envelope. ‘Here are your copies, Anna. I’m sorry, Carol, but she only sent enough for the people in the photos.’
Carol held up one hand and shook her head to indicate that didn’t matter.
Bree barely paused for a breath. ‘Well, I’m going to dash. I can’t wait to take these into town to show Rose and the knitting club members. We should get some to sell in the shop. Talk soon.’ She bounced back into her car and drove away, leaving behind two women who looked a little stunned.
‘I should go, too,’ Carol said.
‘Yeah. But what did you come over for? Sorry, we got distracted.’
Carol shook her head. She had the answer she’d wanted. Anna didn’t know where her sons lived either. ‘It was nothing. I’ll see you later.’
***
Anna watched Carol’s car turn onto the road, but her mind was a million miles away. She took a deep breath and looked down at the photos in her hands. There she was, standing next to Justin, her head tilted in the way she’d learned so painfully over the past few years. The way that hid the left side of her face. Her eyes passed over that part of the image to linger on Justin. The photographer had caught him laughing at something she had said. He was looking at her with that look she had never expected to see again. The look that said he saw her, not the scar. She tucked the photo carefully inside the calendar to protect it.
Justin and Ben looked back at her from the cover. They were wearing their uniforms—or some of their uniforms: both had removed their shirts and their braces hung loose. Two muscular bodies gleaming with sweat or some other photographer’s device. They were handsome, identical men. But not to her. Justin was easily distinguishable from his brother to her eyes. Her heart skipped and ached for something she would never have.
It wasn’t just the handsome face or the muscular body or the come-to-bed eyes. When she closed her eyes, she could see the way he moved with strength and confidence. She could hear his low laugh, joyful and oh so sexy. But while those things stirred her body, they weren’t what stirred her heart. It was the way he looked at her that had taken her battered heart and made it beat again.
She looked at Ben. They might be identical twins, but he was so different. He lacked Justin’s kindness and understanding. There was obviously something he struggled with. She understood struggle. She’d struggled with looking in the mirror every single day for more than three years. For that reason, she had already forgiven his rudeness to her. She wasn’t good enough for Justin, but one day Justin would meet someone who was. Someone he wanted to be with. He’d never let his brother down, and as long as his brother needed him, Justin would always put himself last. Which meant Ben was spoiling any chance Justin had of happiness. And for that, Anna would not forgive him.
She barely noticed the door of the surgery open until a voice called her name.
She shook her head to clear it. ‘Do I have a patient?’
‘Not exactly,’ her receptionist, Liz, replied. ‘I’ve got a little girl on the phone wanting to know when she can come and see Olaf. And when can he come home.’
Anna let the hand holding the calendar fall to her side. ‘On my way.’ Telling a little girl that her beloved dog was going to be fine was one of the best parts of her job.
After she’d finished the call, she looked at the clock and the empty waiting room. ‘I’ve got it from here,’ she told Liz. ‘You may as well head home.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yeah.’
When she was alone at the desk, Anna opened a search page. She typed in a name and a familiar blue and white site appeared. She gently touched the side of her face as she heard again the words she’d heard in that restaurant. And on the street when buying groceries. Words she’d heard far too often and everywhere she went.
‘Terrible …’
‘Poor woman …’
‘You’d think she would do something …’
‘… plastic surgery …’
She didn’t want to hear those words again. To feel the pain and shame she felt every single time. She had learned to live with the way she looked, but the world still judged. Maybe it was time to do something about her face. She didn’t know exactly what could be done and she wasn’t sure she wanted to relive the experience of hospital and surgery and recovery, but it couldn’t hurt to find out what her options were.
She picked up her phone and dialled the number on the screen.
CHAPTER
27
Anna walked into an office that was painted a calming shade of pale blue. The receptionist behind the desk greeted her with a welcoming smile and did not blink nor in any way register her scarred face. This was the office of a plastic surgeon. Of course the receptionist would be used to seeing disfigured faces.
‘Good morning,’ Anna said.
‘Good morning.’
Anna was the only person in the waiting room. She sat filling in forms, then picked up a magazine she failed to read as she waited. She’d left Wagtail Ridge early and despite the long drive to Newcastle, she was ridiculously early for this appointment. But getting underway quickly had been important. If she’d stayed around the clinic, she would certainly have found some reason to cancel. It had taken all her courage to call the surgery in the first place. She wasn’t giving herself any excuse to back away.
The glass doors to the waiting room opened and another woman came in. Anna looked up to see a tall woman, model thin and quite beautiful. The woman blinked when she saw Anna’s face and looked away, reminding Anna of just why she was here. Not that she needed it.
What did this woman need with a plastic surgeon? She was gorgeous. No one would ever stare at her with pity. No child in the street would ever point at her in shock. She was probably here for a bit of Botox. Anna started to feel unreasonably annoyed at the woman, but then she caught herself. Some scars don’t show. She had scars on her body that were just as bad as the one on her face, but no one ever saw them. This woman might too. And even if she was here for cosmetic surgery, that was her choice. Anna had no right to criticise. But looking at that woman reminded her that she had been beautiful once. She’d thought she was past the regret, but she wasn’t. Not really. She might never be.
A nurse entered the room. ‘Ms Prentiss?’
‘Yes?’
‘This way please.’
Anna followed the nurse into a consulting room.
‘Please take a seat. The doctor will be with you in a moment.’
‘Thank you.’
The room was uncluttered and clinical. Just two seats opposite a bare wooden desk with a computer on it. She sat down and looked around. Another door was set into the wall opposite the desk. A couple of pictures, soothing landscapes, hung on the walls. The room was deathly silent. No comforting background music. No sounds of another person so much as breathing. Not even the sound of the air conditioning humming. It was all very detached and unemotional. If they had expected this would calm their patients, they were wrong. At least as far as Anna was concerned. Every muscle in her body was quivering with tension. There was nothing to hold her here except her own decision. She could change her mind right now and walk away.
The door opened and a man walked in. ‘Sorry to keep you waiting, Ms Prentiss. I’m Dr Wilson.’
In his fifties, with greying hair and an intelligent and kind face, Dr Wilson looked exactly like his photo on the website. He looked like someone she could trust.
‘No problem at all, doctor.’
Smiling, he took a seat behind his desk. In no way had he reacted to the scars on her face. She imagined he had seen worse. At least, she hoped he had.
‘I understand you are looking for scar revision on your face. Is that correct?’
‘I want to know if there is anything I can do to reduce the scarring on my face. And maybe other parts of my body.’
He nodded. ‘We refer to that as scar revision. Can you tell me what has prompted the decision? Are the scars causing you any physical issues?’
‘The skin on my face is tight. It pulls a bit when I smile or laugh. It doesn’t hurt as such, although it does itch sometimes. I just …’ She took a deep breath and confessed, ‘I don’t want small children to turn away when they see me. I don’t want people to look at me with pity or shock, although I’m not really sure which is worse. I want to feel comfortable with my face. The way I used to be.’
‘You want to feel beautiful again?’
She hung her head, feeling ashamed. ‘Yes. I know that sounds vain and shallow …’
‘No, it doesn’t. Not at all,’ Dr Wilson rushed to reassure her. ‘We all need to be able to look at ourselves in a mirror and like what we see.’
‘I’d be happy just to look at myself in the mirror and not feel disgusted.’ Her bitterness poured out into her words.
‘I understand. I have to tell you right now, Ms Prentiss, that nothing will ever remove that scar entirely. I would be lying if I said I could. However, I can certainly improve the look of it. Maybe get it to a place where you can hide it with clever makeup. But I can’t remove it. Nor can I repair any nerve damage. And it’s likely you will always feel that skin pulling across the scar.’
Anna closed her eyes to let the words sink in, although they were exactly what she had expected to hear. When she looked back at the doctor, she nodded. ‘I was told that years ago. After it first happened. They said … they said it was the best they could do given the circumstances.’
A light frown creased Dr Wilson’s forehead, but only briefly. ‘With a traumatic injury like this,’ he replied, ‘it’s often the case that improvements can be made a year or more later, when the injury is fully healed.’
‘I know. I googled.’
‘Ah. Dr Google. Well, I hope my advice will be better than his.’ Dr Wilson almost smiled. ‘Do you have scars elsewhere on your body?’
Anna hadn’t expected that question, but there was no point in avoiding it. ‘Yes. On my shoulder.’
‘Do you wish to reduce those, too, if possible?’
Did she? The scars on her body were smaller. They caused her no discomfort at all and were easily hidden under her clothes. No one ever saw them. No one had seen them since she left the hospital three years ago. All her time had been spent first in physical recovery, then getting her life back on track—getting more experience of work and eventually, with her parents’ help, buying the small clinic in a country town. Her emotional recovery had seemed small and unimportant. Her work was mostly with horses and small animals. She didn’t treat cattle, but that was no great hardship. And she might just have overcome that hurdle a few days ago on the side of the road near Wagtail Ridge. With Justin’s help.
Justin.
The last man she’d dated had vanished soon after she left the hospital. Not that she blamed him, looking the way she did, with the scars still fresh. In a way, she’d been glad he left. She had been so focused on healing, she hadn’t had emotional space for him. And certainly not for the way he’d avoided looking at her face every time they were together. He had never seen the scars on her body and nor had anyone else. But that didn’t mean she would be alone for the rest of her life. She flexed her shoulder, feeling the slight pull of the skin across the muscles and down towards her breast. She tried to imagine being happy to wear a sleeveless top. Or a dress with tiny straps. She could go swimming without feeling self-conscious. And perhaps, one day, some man …
‘Maybe,’ she said.
Dr Wilson nodded. ‘I think the next thing is for me to take a closer look at the scars.’ He got up from behind his desk, opened the door on the other side of the room then stepped back. ‘If you’d go through here, please. Remove whatever clothing is necessary for me to look at all the scars. My nurse will join you in a moment.’
Anna stepped through into the examination room, but as the door closed behind her, leaving her alone, she began to panic. It was the smell that did it. Or rather, the not-smell. The not-smell of sterility. There was not even the aroma of disinfectant or cleaners. She stood there, her heart pounding, the memories flooding back.
They’d told her she wouldn’t remember the pain. Not really. But they’d been wrong. The pain she felt now robbed her of breath. Maybe it wasn’t real physical pain, but it seemed very real to her. The agony in her face and body. And in her heart as well. She’d been pretty. That was truth, not vanity. But the pain of knowing she would never be pretty again had almost equalled the pain of torn flesh. And despite the passage of time, it still did.
She fell back against the wall, wrapped her arms around her body and tried not to scream.
The nursed gasped when she opened the door and found her like that. She moved to Anna’s side and placed an arm around her.
‘Are you all right? Shall I call the doctor?’
Anna shook her head. Slowly, she straightened her back and let her arms fall. Her heart was pounding still and her breathing was sharp. ‘I—Just a flashback, I guess.’
‘Come and sit while you get your breath.’
Anna allowed the nurse to guide her to the bed and she sat on it. Gradually, her breathing returned to normal.
‘A bit of a panic attack,’ the nurse offered as she passed her a glass of water. ‘We’ll wait until you’re feeling better.’
The water helped. After a few minutes, Anna got to her feet to remove her top.
‘Are you sure you’re okay? We can always reschedule for another day.’
Anna shook her head. ‘I’m ready. I want to get this done.’ She pulled her top over her head, pleased that the nurse said nothing when she saw the scars across Anna’s chest. Nor did the doctor when he returned. Their professional detachment made it a little easier for Anna to bear.
***
When the appointment was done, Anna drove back to Wagtail Ridge. When she got there, she unlocked the doors to the clinic and went inside. She had no in-patients. Her staff had locked up and gone home. But instinct brought her here, because it was the place she felt safe. A place she felt as if her life was nearly what she had wanted it to be. Nearly, but not entirely.
She tidied some cupboards that didn’t need tidying as the doctor’s words echoed through her head for the hundredth time.
Some improvement, but I cannot undo or cover the damage that was done … surgery. Several surgeries, to be honest … many weeks of healing … risk of more nerve damage … more movement in the skin …
She slammed the glass cupboard door shut, not caring if it broke. The glass stayed whole, and as she stared at it, she saw her face reflected back at her. Even in this poor mirror, the scars were visible.
Was it worth the pain and the risk to have the plastic surgery? What would she gain? Would she become the person she used to be? That pretty carefree girl who didn’t duck her head every time someone looked at her? Did she even want to be that person again? She thought of the things she had achieved. The clinic she ran. The clients she loved. The community who had accepted her so freely. The accident and the scars had helped make her who she was. Did she really want to be someone else?
CHAPTER
28
It was good to be back in Tamworth. Ben felt at home here, and not only because he and Justin had an actual house and their own bedrooms. At the RFS station, Ben was surrounded by friends and colleagues. People he knew and who knew him. If they went to the pub at night, he didn’t have to show off, drink a lot and try to convince them he was as good as his brother. He didn’t have to watch Justin turn his back because of some woman. And he didn’t have to live each minute in fear that their mother would suddenly appear and expect something of him. He had nothing to give her. Now that he was home, and in the cold hard light of day, he knew he was being irrational and stupid. But that didn’t make it any different. Too much time had passed and there was no going back.
He was sorting gear on one of the trucks behind the station when he heard a call from inside. He wandered into the building to be greeted by a wolf whistle.
‘Here he is. The cover boy himself.’ One of the guys swaggered across the room, swaying his hips like Marilyn Monroe.
‘Oh, can I have your autograph please?’
‘Catch me, I’m coming over all faint,’ added another, swooning comically with a hand raised to his forehead.
‘What’s going on?’
‘This just came.’ Justin appeared next to him and handed him a large brown envelope that was already open. ‘There’s one for each of us and apparently it’s already in the shops.’
Ben slid the glossy calendar out of the envelope and stared down at the cover image. It was quite something.
‘Sorry, big brother,’ he said with a smirk. ‘I didn’t mean to make you look so ordinary.’
Amid the laughter of their colleagues, Justin threw his arms around Ben’s shoulders and the two of them wrestled for a couple of minutes before breaking apart. They wandered into the kitchen, where a new pot of coffee was being made. Suitably equipped with caffeine, Ben sat at the table to take a closer look at the calendar. It felt a bit strange to think people all over the state, maybe all over the country, would be looking at one—no, two—pictures of him, shirtless. As well as the cover image that featured both twins, each had their own month. Ben was Mr July and Justin was November’s feature image. The rest of the year was filled with men from other bases; Ben had met a couple of them at joint operations.
Carol stammered something that could have been interpreted as a thank you and took the calendar from Bree’s outstretched hand.
‘I want to give them to the guys too,’ Bree explained. ‘I hear they’ve gone back to their base in Tamworth. Do either of you know their postal address? I could post these to them.’
‘No. Sorry,’ Carol managed to say.
Anna simply shook her head.
‘Okay. They’ll probably get copies anyway because they were models. Jo sent me some copies of our final couple of photos, all together.’ She reached back into the envelope. ‘Here are your copies, Anna. I’m sorry, Carol, but she only sent enough for the people in the photos.’
Carol held up one hand and shook her head to indicate that didn’t matter.
Bree barely paused for a breath. ‘Well, I’m going to dash. I can’t wait to take these into town to show Rose and the knitting club members. We should get some to sell in the shop. Talk soon.’ She bounced back into her car and drove away, leaving behind two women who looked a little stunned.
‘I should go, too,’ Carol said.
‘Yeah. But what did you come over for? Sorry, we got distracted.’
Carol shook her head. She had the answer she’d wanted. Anna didn’t know where her sons lived either. ‘It was nothing. I’ll see you later.’
***
Anna watched Carol’s car turn onto the road, but her mind was a million miles away. She took a deep breath and looked down at the photos in her hands. There she was, standing next to Justin, her head tilted in the way she’d learned so painfully over the past few years. The way that hid the left side of her face. Her eyes passed over that part of the image to linger on Justin. The photographer had caught him laughing at something she had said. He was looking at her with that look she had never expected to see again. The look that said he saw her, not the scar. She tucked the photo carefully inside the calendar to protect it.
Justin and Ben looked back at her from the cover. They were wearing their uniforms—or some of their uniforms: both had removed their shirts and their braces hung loose. Two muscular bodies gleaming with sweat or some other photographer’s device. They were handsome, identical men. But not to her. Justin was easily distinguishable from his brother to her eyes. Her heart skipped and ached for something she would never have.
It wasn’t just the handsome face or the muscular body or the come-to-bed eyes. When she closed her eyes, she could see the way he moved with strength and confidence. She could hear his low laugh, joyful and oh so sexy. But while those things stirred her body, they weren’t what stirred her heart. It was the way he looked at her that had taken her battered heart and made it beat again.
She looked at Ben. They might be identical twins, but he was so different. He lacked Justin’s kindness and understanding. There was obviously something he struggled with. She understood struggle. She’d struggled with looking in the mirror every single day for more than three years. For that reason, she had already forgiven his rudeness to her. She wasn’t good enough for Justin, but one day Justin would meet someone who was. Someone he wanted to be with. He’d never let his brother down, and as long as his brother needed him, Justin would always put himself last. Which meant Ben was spoiling any chance Justin had of happiness. And for that, Anna would not forgive him.
She barely noticed the door of the surgery open until a voice called her name.
She shook her head to clear it. ‘Do I have a patient?’
‘Not exactly,’ her receptionist, Liz, replied. ‘I’ve got a little girl on the phone wanting to know when she can come and see Olaf. And when can he come home.’
Anna let the hand holding the calendar fall to her side. ‘On my way.’ Telling a little girl that her beloved dog was going to be fine was one of the best parts of her job.
After she’d finished the call, she looked at the clock and the empty waiting room. ‘I’ve got it from here,’ she told Liz. ‘You may as well head home.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yeah.’
When she was alone at the desk, Anna opened a search page. She typed in a name and a familiar blue and white site appeared. She gently touched the side of her face as she heard again the words she’d heard in that restaurant. And on the street when buying groceries. Words she’d heard far too often and everywhere she went.
‘Terrible …’
‘Poor woman …’
‘You’d think she would do something …’
‘… plastic surgery …’
She didn’t want to hear those words again. To feel the pain and shame she felt every single time. She had learned to live with the way she looked, but the world still judged. Maybe it was time to do something about her face. She didn’t know exactly what could be done and she wasn’t sure she wanted to relive the experience of hospital and surgery and recovery, but it couldn’t hurt to find out what her options were.
She picked up her phone and dialled the number on the screen.
CHAPTER
27
Anna walked into an office that was painted a calming shade of pale blue. The receptionist behind the desk greeted her with a welcoming smile and did not blink nor in any way register her scarred face. This was the office of a plastic surgeon. Of course the receptionist would be used to seeing disfigured faces.
‘Good morning,’ Anna said.
‘Good morning.’
Anna was the only person in the waiting room. She sat filling in forms, then picked up a magazine she failed to read as she waited. She’d left Wagtail Ridge early and despite the long drive to Newcastle, she was ridiculously early for this appointment. But getting underway quickly had been important. If she’d stayed around the clinic, she would certainly have found some reason to cancel. It had taken all her courage to call the surgery in the first place. She wasn’t giving herself any excuse to back away.
The glass doors to the waiting room opened and another woman came in. Anna looked up to see a tall woman, model thin and quite beautiful. The woman blinked when she saw Anna’s face and looked away, reminding Anna of just why she was here. Not that she needed it.
What did this woman need with a plastic surgeon? She was gorgeous. No one would ever stare at her with pity. No child in the street would ever point at her in shock. She was probably here for a bit of Botox. Anna started to feel unreasonably annoyed at the woman, but then she caught herself. Some scars don’t show. She had scars on her body that were just as bad as the one on her face, but no one ever saw them. This woman might too. And even if she was here for cosmetic surgery, that was her choice. Anna had no right to criticise. But looking at that woman reminded her that she had been beautiful once. She’d thought she was past the regret, but she wasn’t. Not really. She might never be.
A nurse entered the room. ‘Ms Prentiss?’
‘Yes?’
‘This way please.’
Anna followed the nurse into a consulting room.
‘Please take a seat. The doctor will be with you in a moment.’
‘Thank you.’
The room was uncluttered and clinical. Just two seats opposite a bare wooden desk with a computer on it. She sat down and looked around. Another door was set into the wall opposite the desk. A couple of pictures, soothing landscapes, hung on the walls. The room was deathly silent. No comforting background music. No sounds of another person so much as breathing. Not even the sound of the air conditioning humming. It was all very detached and unemotional. If they had expected this would calm their patients, they were wrong. At least as far as Anna was concerned. Every muscle in her body was quivering with tension. There was nothing to hold her here except her own decision. She could change her mind right now and walk away.
The door opened and a man walked in. ‘Sorry to keep you waiting, Ms Prentiss. I’m Dr Wilson.’
In his fifties, with greying hair and an intelligent and kind face, Dr Wilson looked exactly like his photo on the website. He looked like someone she could trust.
‘No problem at all, doctor.’
Smiling, he took a seat behind his desk. In no way had he reacted to the scars on her face. She imagined he had seen worse. At least, she hoped he had.
‘I understand you are looking for scar revision on your face. Is that correct?’
‘I want to know if there is anything I can do to reduce the scarring on my face. And maybe other parts of my body.’
He nodded. ‘We refer to that as scar revision. Can you tell me what has prompted the decision? Are the scars causing you any physical issues?’
‘The skin on my face is tight. It pulls a bit when I smile or laugh. It doesn’t hurt as such, although it does itch sometimes. I just …’ She took a deep breath and confessed, ‘I don’t want small children to turn away when they see me. I don’t want people to look at me with pity or shock, although I’m not really sure which is worse. I want to feel comfortable with my face. The way I used to be.’
‘You want to feel beautiful again?’
She hung her head, feeling ashamed. ‘Yes. I know that sounds vain and shallow …’
‘No, it doesn’t. Not at all,’ Dr Wilson rushed to reassure her. ‘We all need to be able to look at ourselves in a mirror and like what we see.’
‘I’d be happy just to look at myself in the mirror and not feel disgusted.’ Her bitterness poured out into her words.
‘I understand. I have to tell you right now, Ms Prentiss, that nothing will ever remove that scar entirely. I would be lying if I said I could. However, I can certainly improve the look of it. Maybe get it to a place where you can hide it with clever makeup. But I can’t remove it. Nor can I repair any nerve damage. And it’s likely you will always feel that skin pulling across the scar.’
Anna closed her eyes to let the words sink in, although they were exactly what she had expected to hear. When she looked back at the doctor, she nodded. ‘I was told that years ago. After it first happened. They said … they said it was the best they could do given the circumstances.’
A light frown creased Dr Wilson’s forehead, but only briefly. ‘With a traumatic injury like this,’ he replied, ‘it’s often the case that improvements can be made a year or more later, when the injury is fully healed.’
‘I know. I googled.’
‘Ah. Dr Google. Well, I hope my advice will be better than his.’ Dr Wilson almost smiled. ‘Do you have scars elsewhere on your body?’
Anna hadn’t expected that question, but there was no point in avoiding it. ‘Yes. On my shoulder.’
‘Do you wish to reduce those, too, if possible?’
Did she? The scars on her body were smaller. They caused her no discomfort at all and were easily hidden under her clothes. No one ever saw them. No one had seen them since she left the hospital three years ago. All her time had been spent first in physical recovery, then getting her life back on track—getting more experience of work and eventually, with her parents’ help, buying the small clinic in a country town. Her emotional recovery had seemed small and unimportant. Her work was mostly with horses and small animals. She didn’t treat cattle, but that was no great hardship. And she might just have overcome that hurdle a few days ago on the side of the road near Wagtail Ridge. With Justin’s help.
Justin.
The last man she’d dated had vanished soon after she left the hospital. Not that she blamed him, looking the way she did, with the scars still fresh. In a way, she’d been glad he left. She had been so focused on healing, she hadn’t had emotional space for him. And certainly not for the way he’d avoided looking at her face every time they were together. He had never seen the scars on her body and nor had anyone else. But that didn’t mean she would be alone for the rest of her life. She flexed her shoulder, feeling the slight pull of the skin across the muscles and down towards her breast. She tried to imagine being happy to wear a sleeveless top. Or a dress with tiny straps. She could go swimming without feeling self-conscious. And perhaps, one day, some man …
‘Maybe,’ she said.
Dr Wilson nodded. ‘I think the next thing is for me to take a closer look at the scars.’ He got up from behind his desk, opened the door on the other side of the room then stepped back. ‘If you’d go through here, please. Remove whatever clothing is necessary for me to look at all the scars. My nurse will join you in a moment.’
Anna stepped through into the examination room, but as the door closed behind her, leaving her alone, she began to panic. It was the smell that did it. Or rather, the not-smell. The not-smell of sterility. There was not even the aroma of disinfectant or cleaners. She stood there, her heart pounding, the memories flooding back.
They’d told her she wouldn’t remember the pain. Not really. But they’d been wrong. The pain she felt now robbed her of breath. Maybe it wasn’t real physical pain, but it seemed very real to her. The agony in her face and body. And in her heart as well. She’d been pretty. That was truth, not vanity. But the pain of knowing she would never be pretty again had almost equalled the pain of torn flesh. And despite the passage of time, it still did.
She fell back against the wall, wrapped her arms around her body and tried not to scream.
The nursed gasped when she opened the door and found her like that. She moved to Anna’s side and placed an arm around her.
‘Are you all right? Shall I call the doctor?’
Anna shook her head. Slowly, she straightened her back and let her arms fall. Her heart was pounding still and her breathing was sharp. ‘I—Just a flashback, I guess.’
‘Come and sit while you get your breath.’
Anna allowed the nurse to guide her to the bed and she sat on it. Gradually, her breathing returned to normal.
‘A bit of a panic attack,’ the nurse offered as she passed her a glass of water. ‘We’ll wait until you’re feeling better.’
The water helped. After a few minutes, Anna got to her feet to remove her top.
‘Are you sure you’re okay? We can always reschedule for another day.’
Anna shook her head. ‘I’m ready. I want to get this done.’ She pulled her top over her head, pleased that the nurse said nothing when she saw the scars across Anna’s chest. Nor did the doctor when he returned. Their professional detachment made it a little easier for Anna to bear.
***
When the appointment was done, Anna drove back to Wagtail Ridge. When she got there, she unlocked the doors to the clinic and went inside. She had no in-patients. Her staff had locked up and gone home. But instinct brought her here, because it was the place she felt safe. A place she felt as if her life was nearly what she had wanted it to be. Nearly, but not entirely.
She tidied some cupboards that didn’t need tidying as the doctor’s words echoed through her head for the hundredth time.
Some improvement, but I cannot undo or cover the damage that was done … surgery. Several surgeries, to be honest … many weeks of healing … risk of more nerve damage … more movement in the skin …
She slammed the glass cupboard door shut, not caring if it broke. The glass stayed whole, and as she stared at it, she saw her face reflected back at her. Even in this poor mirror, the scars were visible.
Was it worth the pain and the risk to have the plastic surgery? What would she gain? Would she become the person she used to be? That pretty carefree girl who didn’t duck her head every time someone looked at her? Did she even want to be that person again? She thought of the things she had achieved. The clinic she ran. The clients she loved. The community who had accepted her so freely. The accident and the scars had helped make her who she was. Did she really want to be someone else?
CHAPTER
28
It was good to be back in Tamworth. Ben felt at home here, and not only because he and Justin had an actual house and their own bedrooms. At the RFS station, Ben was surrounded by friends and colleagues. People he knew and who knew him. If they went to the pub at night, he didn’t have to show off, drink a lot and try to convince them he was as good as his brother. He didn’t have to watch Justin turn his back because of some woman. And he didn’t have to live each minute in fear that their mother would suddenly appear and expect something of him. He had nothing to give her. Now that he was home, and in the cold hard light of day, he knew he was being irrational and stupid. But that didn’t make it any different. Too much time had passed and there was no going back.
He was sorting gear on one of the trucks behind the station when he heard a call from inside. He wandered into the building to be greeted by a wolf whistle.
‘Here he is. The cover boy himself.’ One of the guys swaggered across the room, swaying his hips like Marilyn Monroe.
‘Oh, can I have your autograph please?’
‘Catch me, I’m coming over all faint,’ added another, swooning comically with a hand raised to his forehead.
‘What’s going on?’
‘This just came.’ Justin appeared next to him and handed him a large brown envelope that was already open. ‘There’s one for each of us and apparently it’s already in the shops.’
Ben slid the glossy calendar out of the envelope and stared down at the cover image. It was quite something.
‘Sorry, big brother,’ he said with a smirk. ‘I didn’t mean to make you look so ordinary.’
Amid the laughter of their colleagues, Justin threw his arms around Ben’s shoulders and the two of them wrestled for a couple of minutes before breaking apart. They wandered into the kitchen, where a new pot of coffee was being made. Suitably equipped with caffeine, Ben sat at the table to take a closer look at the calendar. It felt a bit strange to think people all over the state, maybe all over the country, would be looking at one—no, two—pictures of him, shirtless. As well as the cover image that featured both twins, each had their own month. Ben was Mr July and Justin was November’s feature image. The rest of the year was filled with men from other bases; Ben had met a couple of them at joint operations.
