by Shona Husk
‘I’m sure the family will pull together.’
She glanced at him. ‘It was only Mike and his mum. He’s … he’s an orphan.’
Her father frowned. ‘What happened to the rest of his family?’
‘In England. He doesn’t know where his father is. Hasn’t seen him in twenty years.’
‘So you’ve been with him all day?’ He asked as if expecting her to change her story.
‘I told you it was the funeral today and that I probably wouldn’t be at the family dinner.’ She didn’t need his permission to live her life. Ava closed the car door. ‘I’m tired.’ And a little sore.
‘We missed you.’
‘I’ll be there next time.’ She couldn’t wait for that, but she knew that she’d go because of Mum and Rose.
He put his hands in his pockets. ‘I never meant to push you out of home.’
Ava sighed. ‘You didn’t do the pushing.’
‘I let it happen. I thought my mother knew best. I didn’t want you to be hurt the way she was. I remember my father leaving …’ He shook his head. ‘I’m sure Mike can relate.’
She nodded. ‘Probably. Families break up. It happens.’
‘I know. Your mother has been reminding me of the freedoms we had—her parents were less than strict. Too liberal, in my mother’s words.’
Ava knew that already. Her mother hadn’t made a secret of that and she had often clashed with her mother-in-law about Ava and Rose. They had tried to be good to stop the arguments, but the more they behaved the more that had been expected, until they could barely breathe.
‘Why don’t you bring him next week?’
‘What?’ She didn’t want to inflict her family on anyone, least of all Mike at the moment. That might be enough to break him. She could see how strung out he was, and knew he’d used sex to forget for a little while.
‘I have spoken to my mother. She will respect your choices … or at least not say anything.’ Oh, to be a fly on the wall for that conversation. But it must have taken a lot for her father to go into battle for her. What had Mum said to him? She shouldn’t have judged him so harshly.
‘And you?’
‘I want you to be happy.’
Was she? It was hard to be happy when Mike was hurting, when she’d thought she was losing him in the week before the funeral. She still wasn’t sure where they were exactly, but she had to trust they would get through it. ‘I’ll ask him … but he may not be ready. Maybe make it the week after?’
Her father nodded. ‘That would be good. I look forward to meeting him.’ He hesitated then turned around.
Ava took a few quick steps to catch up. ‘Dad?’ He turned and she gave him a hug. ‘Thank you.’
He smiled and she realised how distant they had become over the last few years. ‘I’ll make sure I’m there next week.’
‘I’d get suspicious if someone died every week.’
Chapter 17
Mike had woken up at first light. His bed still smelled like Ava and for a few moments he wanted to stay in those memories. He wished she was with him. But the king-sized bed was empty, though his mind was full of the memory. They’d gone slow. It had been good. He hoped it had been good.
He hoped that she wasn’t regretting it. She’d waited this long. Why last night?
She’d left pretty fast once Gemma and Kirsten had arrived.
He scrabbled around for his phone and typed Ava a message. Too early? Better early than late and his track record was poor.
I’m glad u came round last night. Miss u this morning. Luv M.
He’d then stayed in bed for as long as he could, putting off doing anything else … he’d lasted about half an hour. He was awake so he should do something. In the end he’d gone for a ride as a distraction. It had been pretty aimless but it had killed a couple of hours—he hadn’t broken any speed records, but he hadn’t been trying. However, it was nice to be moving.
When he got home Ed’s car was in the driveway.
His stomach sunk. This would be the reckoning from yesterday. He hadn’t even had breakfast yet. He opened up the garage and parked his bike. Really glad he’d worn an old pair of shorts instead of bike pants.
The kitchen smelled like coffee as he walked into the house. His stomach growled. Gemma and Ed were at the table talking. Mike was sure that his ears were burning.
‘I need to eat.’ And get ready to sit down and have some kind of discussion. If it had been anything non-serious, Ed would’ve raised it one afternoon at his place. But he’d come here.
Gemma living here might have solved his financial issue but it was complicating things—he couldn’t say that he hadn’t been warned about that. He poured a bowl of muesli, made a coffee and checked his phone.
Maybe next time I’ll stay ;) You’ve been invited to a family dinner.
Jumping into bed didn’t equal meet the family, not in his books anyway. Ava got off lightly. She’d met his family. For a moment he wasn’t sure he’d be able to breathe again, but he did and it hurt less.
‘What are you doing in there?’ Ed called.
‘Making breakfast. You came to my house. You don’t get to rush me.’ It would’ve been nice to have a shower, but that wasn’t going to happen either. He replied to Ava.
Should I be worried?
Yes. You are the first boyfriend I’ve taken home.
Read between the lines, she hadn’t told her family about the others.
OK. Give me a date & time. I’ll pick u up.
She sent through the details. He had nearly two weeks before having to pretend that he hadn’t done all the wrong things with their eldest daughter.
‘I can hear your phone buzzing,’ Ed said.
Mike picked up his coffee and bowl and made his way into the dining room. A few unused paper napkins still sat on the table. ‘I was saying good morning to my girlfriend.’
Ed gave him a look that was somewhere between shock and disbelief. ‘I didn’t know you had one.’
‘I didn’t tell you, that’s why.’ And it was none of Ed’s business.
Ed glanced at Gemma. She shrugged.
‘I met her last night. She seems nice.’ Gemma smiled.
Last night she’d been asking why he hadn’t introduced them at the funeral. It hadn’t been at the top of his list and he hadn’t really spoken to Ava yesterday … they hadn’t done a whole lot of talking last night either.
‘Good for you.’ But Ed still looked puzzled, as if he couldn’t quite work out how it had happened. Yeah well, that made two of them, but when something was going well he wasn’t dumb enough to stop and ask why.
Mike started eating. He hadn’t noticed how hungry he was, or maybe it was just giving him something to do. Either way, conversation was hard to come by. Were they waiting for Dan?
Ed looked at his cup. ‘I realised yesterday that we might have a problem.’
Mike swallowed what he’d been chewing. ‘I’m going to apologise to Dan. I …’ Dan had been out of line but Mike had taken it further than it should’ve gone. ‘I don’t know. It all boiled up.’
‘You’re not the one with the problem. Dan is.’ Ed leaned back in his seat. ‘We’ve all been ignoring it, hoping he’d snap out of it.’
Gemma shook her head. ‘It’s getting worse. And I know you’ve had other things to deal with. But while you were busy, Ed and I have been propping up Dan.’
Ed tapped the dining table with one fingernail. ‘It wasn’t you that slowed us down in the studio.’
Mike took a moment to catch up with what they were saying. ‘Dan was drinking while we were recording?’
Gemma and Ed nodded.
All the times he and Dan had gone out and run amok. He’d thought it was just blowing off steam. That’s what he’d been doing. Drinking and getting laid to forget, even though at the time he’d known it wasn’t helping, and it had never felt good the morning after. He had zero regrets about sleeping with Ava and would do it again in a heartbeat.
�
�It got worse after he and Lisa split. I’d spoken to him and thought it was going okay.’ Gemma rubbed the handle of her coffee cup as though there was a dirty mark that needed scraping off.
‘I tried too, but it made it worse. I think he started hiding it around Christmas.’ Ed looked at Mike. ‘About the same time you started checking out.’
Shit. Over the last few months he’d gone out with Dan plenty of times. ‘I should’ve paid more attention.’ But he had noticed the mess in the flat and the empty cans in the car.
Once again he’d avoided the issue by pretending it didn’t exist.
‘No one blames you … you had your own stuff to deal with.’ Ed had that worried look again. ‘We can take some time to chill now. I’m out of here in in a few days but when I get back from Bali, we’re going to have to do something about Dan.’
‘What?’ Dan was an adult and capable of making his own choices … that they happened to be bad was beside the point.
Gemma grimaced. ‘For a start I need to tell you two what he told me. I know he told me in confidence, but I think we’re past that point.’
‘You don’t have to, Gem.’ But Mike was the only one who spoke. Ed was nodding.
This was bad.
‘Lisa was pregnant. She told him to quit, come home and get a real job. You know how well Dan responds to being told what to do … he stayed with us. She’s no longer pregnant but she’s real friendly with his family.’ Gemma brushed the end of her nose. Lisa thought herself just a little better than everyone Dan hung out with. That hadn’t exactly been a state secret.
‘She gave him an ultimatum and then when he didn’t obey, she terminated?’ Man, that was cold. He’d never really liked her but he hadn’t thought that she was that icy or demanding. What would he do if Ava got pregnant?
He’d have to marry her. He wouldn’t quit the band, even if he had to work a second job as a sparky to put food on the table.
‘It looks that way … who knows?’ Ed raised his eyebrows. ‘I don’t trust Dan at the moment and I trust Lisa less.’
‘That’s what Dan believed happened,’ Gemma clarified. ‘So in his mind he lost a girlfriend and a baby.’
‘I think we have to assume he’s telling the truth about what happened. She had to know that it would gut him.’ Mike didn’t want to start doubting what Dan said. He took a drink of his cooling coffee.
‘I don’t think she expected him to say no. She probably thought he’d skip home like a well-trained puppy.’ There was a trace of bitterness in Gemma’s voice. Many, including Lisa, blamed Gemma for the break-up.
‘I’ve seen my flat. He isn’t housebroken.’ No one laughed. There hadn’t been much of that lately. ‘I’ll catch up with him while you’re away.’ Maybe a few quiet beers and he’d be able to pry the truth out and have a conversation. He would go there instead of turning away. His mother would’ve never turned away. She’d have rolled up her sleeves and gotten on with it.
‘Thank, mate.’ Ed smiled and pulled out his phone. ‘I know you probably haven’t looked. But it was already posted, so I put up a quick message up on your behalf.’ Ed handed over his phone. There were hundreds of messages of support and condolences. He hadn’t realised that many people knew who he was. ‘There’s more in the band email too.’
Mike was stunned.
‘I think you should make a little video statement. Thank you etcetera … maybe get people to donate to a charity?’
Mike nodded. ‘Yeah I will. Thank you for doing that.’
‘We’d been tagged by some of your mother’s friends so it was public anyway … is there anyone she didn’t tell that you’re a not-quite-famous rock star?’
He frowned. She always told everyone as though she could encourage people to buy their music. She’d never laughed or told them they were crap.
But there was one person she hadn’t told.
One person she’d let him tell. Ava.
Chapter 18
Ava was waiting out the front when Mike came to pick her up. He was actually going to brave her family. Over the last two weeks she’d slept over a couple of times. It was definitely getting better, and he’d stopped worrying he was going to break her.
‘Thank you for doing this.’
‘It’s okay. Had to meet the parents eventually.’
It wasn’t her parents she was worried about.
‘It will be fine. Let’s just stick to the story that I’m an electrician. That might be easier.’ He nodded and glanced at her.
‘Well, it’s not a lie.’ He was still working as a sparky, and putting money aside for the inevitable tour.
‘Just not the whole truth.’
‘They do not need to know the whole truth.’ She gave him her best glare, which wasn’t very menacing, not like Rose. That was not going to be mentioned over dinner.
‘They will not hear it from my lips. I wouldn’t know what they were talking about.’
Ava shook her head. ‘You don’t look innocent and you can’t lie.’
‘Oh. In that case I will sit down and shut up.’ He smiled at her. ‘You know I love you, right?’
She blinked. He loved her. He’d never actually said it, put it at the end of text messages, yes. She’d thought about saying it. But it had never seemed the right time. Was there such a thing as the right time? She was almost sure it didn’t exist. You just had to make the most of the time that you did have.
‘I love you too.’ She twisted in the passenger seat, knowing that they were only minutes from her parents’ house. ‘I’ve started taking the pill.’
His head turned. ‘You mean no more condoms?’
She nodded. ‘In another week. Thought you should know before you meet my family.’
‘Right. Is that like bribery?’
‘More like a reward … if you survive.’ She wasn’t sure that they would.
‘Baby, I would crawl through hell.’
She placed her hand on his arm. ‘I think you’ve already done that this year.’
He turned into the driveway and parked. Then he leaned over and kissed her hard. ‘So you know how much I love you. I don’t think I would’ve survived without you. This will be a cakewalk.’
She hoped he was right. Even if it wasn’t, they were doing it together.
Thanks for reading Out of Time. I hope you enjoyed it.
If you’d like to know more about me, my books, or to connect with me online, you can visit my webpage www.shonahusk.com, join my newsletter http://mad.ly/signups/119074/join, follow me on twitter @ShonaHusk, or like my Facebook page www.facebook.com/shonahusk.
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You’ve just read a book in my Face the Music series. The other books in this series are Out of Rhythm, Out of Place and Out of Chances.
If you liked this book, here are my other books Secret Confessions: Sydney Housewives—Meagan.
This book was published by Escape Publishing. If you’d like to sample some more great books from my fellow Escape Artists, please turn the page.
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