by C. J. Duggan
“Sa-weeet.” Adam smiled.
“But don’t go saying anything, all right? I mean it, not even to Tess or Sean or anyone.” Chris looked at me pointedly when he mentioned Sean and my mood instantly darkened.
“Where is Sean, anyway?” asked Adam. “I haven’t seen him around.”
“Pfft, how should I know? I’m not his keeper.”
Chapter Fifty-Two
Days went by and there was still no word from Sean.
Chris said he was pretty tied up with work, heading to the city a couple of times through the week. Somehow it did little to appease me. Every time I thought back to our last heated exchange, anytime I wanted to sulk about it, I snapped myself out of it. I didn’t want people to think I was the sullen, spoilt brat he’d called me. Even my parents had been surprised by my civilised behavior, though, to be honest, my worry over Sean’s absence overrode my concerns for the hotel.
***
Shuffling into the main bar mid-morning, I paused mid-stride as I spotted a gift box on the bar.
“Ooh, what’s that?” I asked Chris, eying it sceptically.
“Sean dropped it off this morning,” he said, unenthusiastically. He pushed it towards me. “It’s for you. I don’t know what’s going on with you two, but it’s probably not a good idea to worry your mum and dad over your love life right now,” he added.
My heart spiked in delight, but I quickly stamped it back down. I was thrilled, but still mad at him. “Ha!” I said. “What love life?”
Chris cocked his brow at the white gift box tied meticulously with a turquoise, silk bow.
“Good point, I’ll get rid of it,” I said.
I carried the box into the kitchen, hearing a chorus of upbeat chatter. Jenny McGee rolled out pastry beside a production line made up of Melba, Tess and Ellie peeling and chopping vegetables.
“Oooh, what’ve you got there?” crooned Ellie.
“Just a little something.” I frowned, placing the box on the counter.
“From a secret admirer?” asked Jenny.
“Not exactly,” I said, picking up a carrot stick and munching on it thoughtfully.
“Well, what does the card say?” Tess pointed at the box.
I frowned. “There is no card.”
“Uh, yeah there is.” Tess wiped her hands on a tea towel, picked up the box and pulled out a business-card-sized card tucked underneath the turquoise silk.
How could I have missed that?
“Ahhh!” I jumped from my position about to grab it from Tess, when it was quickly plucked from her hands by Ellie.
“Oooh, writing.” She smiled.
“Ellie!”
She held her hand up, her brows rising as she read the note. “Oh.” Ellie’s blue eyes widened in surprise.
“What?” I frowned.
It was enough to have Jenny and Tess clambering to see what was on it. Even Melba peered over their shoulders.
I threw my arms in the air. “I give up.”
A look of astonishment lit all of their faces.
“Well, what does it say?”
Tess cleared her throat. “He has such tiny handwriting.” She squinted.
“I said I would let you know what I wanted. – Sean.”
I glowered at the box.
“Whatever the hell that means, this is huge!” said Ellie.
“Yeah, such a poet,” I said sarcastically.
Ellie laughed. “No, Amy, you don’t get it. In Sean terms, this is massive.”
I looked blankly at their expectant faces.
Tess rolled her eyes. “Sean Murphy doesn’t chase girls and he sure as hell doesn’t send gifts in pretty little boxes with silky bows.”
Ellie nodded. “What’s going on between you two, anyway?”
“Trust me, it’s a long, uninteresting story.”
“Well, let’s see how uninteresting,” said Jenny, looking pointedly at the box on the counter.
“Yesss! Let’s open it.” Ellie clapped excitedly.
Tess started unravelling the folds of the bow. “Okay, place your bets, ladies; I call chocolate.”
“Earrings,” Ellie threw in.
“Perfume,” said Jenny.
I leaned forward, allowing myself to get carried away with their excitement.
“And the winner is …” announced Tess. She flipped the box open and her smile slowly fell away. “Oh.”
The others almost crushed Tess as they peered into the box, the same looks spreading across their faces as their eyes looked sheepishly up towards me, causing butterflies in the pit of my stomach.
“What? What is it?”
Tess smiled sadly. “It’s, umm …”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Tess!” I snatched the box out of her hands and peered inside.
My audience nervously watched on, on standby to console me as soon as it registered what was in the box.
So when a goofy grin spread across my face and I started to laugh hysterically, they gave one another puzzled, sidelong looks. They must have thought I had lost the plot.
“Amy, are you all right?” Tess asked cautiously.
I shook my head. Reaching into the box, I held up … a Rubik’s Cube. All twisted in a multitude of colours.
“It’s not much of a gift, is it, honey?” Jenny said gently.
“Yeah,” Ellie added. “The boy clearly doesn’t know how to buy for a woman.”
I sighed. “It’s perfect.”
“Really?” frowned Ellie.
It really was, all twisted and messed up.
Just like us.
Chapter Fifty-Three
My parents wanted to keep things normal – as normal as anything could be under the circumstances.
So when Dad announced we were going to have a disco the weekend before the auction, well, I kind of thought he might have been taking the piss.
He wasn’t.
I realised as much when I looked at Mum across the dining table and was met with an earnest smile.
“Really?” I frowned.
“Well, weren’t you going to plan something for the weekend, anyway?” Dad asked, cutting into his steak.
“Yeah, but that was before.” I tried not to cringe.
“How about we give ourselves permission, for one night, to just try to forget all the bad stuff,” Dad said.
I traced the line of peas on my plate, recalling the last time I had attempted to make myself forget. I had ended up in Sean Murphy’s bed. And though it had been a beautiful beginning … it hadn’t ended so well.
I would have thought a disco so close to the auction wasn’t a great idea, but my parents were adamant: it was what they wanted. I didn’t know if it was a way of masking it as some kind of goodbye party, or they were trying to cheer me up. If that was the case, it kind of had the opposite effect. Come Saturday, the whole place was chaos, getting the beer garden ready for what would be our last Henderson gathering at the Onslow before it was bought by some blow-in from the city and turned into a B & fracking B. It was my deepest hope that the McGees would put in a bid. According to Chris they had gone to their bank manager and crunched some numbers so that was a promising sign.
I forced myself not to think about it, but every time I descended the hotel stairs or perched myself on a bar stool I couldn’t help but feel I was counting down to a time when I would never be able to do this again.
***
Before I was even awake, my mobile beeped twice, alerting me to a message. Thinking it most likely Tammy, I rolled over in my bed to grab it from my bedside to check, when my heart just about stopped.
Sean.
Amidst the insanity of the weeks that had followed from that night, I hadn’t seen Sean much. I hadn’t seen him much at all. He had landed a massive building project in Maitland that had him working away until the weekends. I managed to convince myself that it was just bad timing. I had so much going on at the Onslow and he was working away, so the fact that nothing had progressed from that night
was just because of the circumstances.
That’s what I tried to tell myself, anyway; I had convinced myself that it had been a bad day. I had been after an escape, just one night. After all, I’d sought him out, pushed him. It had been a one-off, obviously. Sean had made no promises, or declarations of undying love … the thought of which always brought me back to the day after, when he had wanted to tell me something. I had feared him giving me the friendship spiel so much I had legged it quick smart. Looking back now, I wish I had listened, instead of now waiting, hoping to hear from him or see him. Missing him. If I had heard him out at the time, at least now I would know one way or another. My life was in limbo in all aspects. No wonder I couldn’t sleep. And the more I didn’t hear from him the angrier I was at him. I did miss him, but it didn’t mean that I would be falling over him come weekends, or be pathetic and overly grateful whenever he felt like sending a random text. I had some pride.
1 New Message:
Sean: Unravelled the cube???
My brows narrowed. That was it? Three words? I hit reply, smiling evilly to myself.
To: Sean.
I’m sorry do I know you???
It took twenty seconds for my phone to beep again.
1 New Message:
Sean: So that’s a no then?
I went to reply but thought better of it. Instead, I put my phone on silent and tossed it back on my side table.
Yep! I was still mad at him.
***
At Saturday night’s disco, I watched as my parents faked their way through the night with an award-winning performance of upbeat gaiety. Seriously, they almost had even me convinced life was good.
They talked of exciting new chapters in their lives and how much they were looking forward to it. I thought it best to keep my distance from them and their friends as I was in danger of giving up the jig – one look at me and anyone could have told life wasn’t a bed of roses.
I sidestepped along the edge of the dance floor, watching my parents from across the garden, concentrating on the cracks that I expected to see in their cheerful facade. In a moment’s pause, my mum turned to Dad and looked at him, really looked at him. Although I would usually cringe and roll my eyes at their moments of wedded bliss, I saw something tender exchange between them. Dad had his arm around the back of Mum’s seat and he leaned in to whisper something in her ear. She laughed, like really laughed and it was for the first time in, well … forever that I had seen them look so happy. Together. I was never so grateful that they had each other, that they had reconnected. It made me feel like anything we could face we could do together, as a family. I smiled, turning to make my way towards the bar when I slammed into someone.
Sean.
My knee-jerk reaction was to whack him as hard as I could. “Ow! Look where you’re going!” I cried.
“Not the face!” Sean held his hands up protectively.
“Relax – punching you in the face would hurt me more than it would you, I’m sure,” I said, shaking my hand and wincing. Hitting Sean was like hitting granite.
“No doubt. I am blessed with a ludicrously chiselled jaw line.”
“Ludicrously chiselled?” I scoffed.
“Sure, check it out!”
Sean reached for my hand and brought it up to his face. My fingers traced his freshly shaven jaw, something I didn’t usually see. I took a good look at him: he was freshly shaven, wearing a short-sleeved dress shirt and navy jeans. He looked ludicrously good.
“You feel it?” he said, a small glimmer of amusement in his eyes.
I felt my traitorous heart pound against my ribcage as my fingers traced a line down his jaw. I snapped out of my trance. We were in a public beer garden. I pulled my hand away and cleared my throat, trying not to look too embarrassed.
“It’s not that ludicrous.” I said quietly.
Sean was still looking at me, I could feel it, but before he could say anything, Tammy let out a loud squeal in the distance.
“Oh my God, I love this song! Amy … Come on!”
She disentangled herself from the crowd and grabbed my hand.
“Come on, let’s go!”
She hauled me through the throng of partiers, whether I liked it or not, although it was a welcome save from the possible awkwardness I had under the surface that bubbled up at the very thought of talking to Sean.
It didn’t take long to let the music override us – everything else just swept away. I couldn’t help but look over, keep track of Sean’s movements. It was fine; he had made his way towards a table to sit with the Onslow Boys. Their heads bowed every now and then in conversation, Toby moved to refill glasses; Ringer arrived and slapped their backs and joined the fray. But one thing I was adamantly aware of was Sean’s searing gaze as he sipped on his beer, the disco lights flickering across his smug face. Maybe he was just looking at the dance floor, but either way I felt eyes on me.
I was keenly aware of my body, my movements, making every dance move less high school social, more city nightclub, putting more effort into it as Tammy did. I swayed my hips, hands over my head, moving to the music.
Let him watch.
There was always a part of every girl that the same. Although we complained about the boys who chose not to take to the dance floor with us, we all secretly loved the fact that they all stood around the edges and watched. There was something so male, so sexy about the ones who thought themselves too cool to join in.
And then, of course, there were the ones who did join in. They weren’t uncool. Well, some were, but there were the boys that took to the dance floor and melted right in with their own quirky, at times lame, dance moves that added to the fun. Right now, it proved to be Ringer and Stan as they sidled up next to Tammy and me, busting a move. We gradually formed a little circle of the four of us, taking turns in the middle for a dance-off. But unlike most dance-offs this was to outdo each other by attempting the daggiest, worst dance moves we could think of. Ringer mimicked a sprinkler move, and then I mocked him by miming starting up a whipper snipper before trimming the hedges. Tammy did the classic Saturday Night Fever diagonal point, but Stan took the title with the worst impersonation of the robot I had ever seen. We were all hunched over, laughing so hard I had to hold Tammy upright. Stan broke into a horrifically bad shuffle-step-shuffle moon walk.
Ringer, Tammy, and I bowed to the winner of terrible moves, yelling, “We’re not worthy!”
The lights dimmed and the music changed pace. I went to walk off the dance floor to avoid all the loved-up slow dancers and catch my breath, when someone gently grabbed my elbow.
Sean.
Tammy grabbed Stan. “Come on, Stan, buy me a drink, I’m dying here.” Tammy pushed him past me, whispering, “Talk to Sean.”
The problem being it was the loudest whisper in the southern hemisphere and Sean smirked.
Kill me now!
He grabbed my hand and turned me into a spin. “You heard her –‘talk to Sean.’
The DJ was playing 10CC’s “I’m Not In Love.” While most couples were head to chest, romantically shuffling and swaying to the music, Sean’s eyes bore into mine, bristling with an underlying tension.
His lips twitched “Nice dance moves earlier.”
“As if we were being serious.”
“Sure.”
I lifted my chin defiantly. “Well, I have no regrets.”
He leaned down; I could feel his lips brush against my ear. “Neither do I.”
Sean’s voice was low and sexy. We weren’t talking about bad dance moves anymore.
I tried not to think too much about how good it felt to be in his arms, or how my heart betrayed my mind with its insistent pounding. I battled so hard against my feelings, but looking up into his familiar blue eyes, all my mid-week convictions that I felt nothing for Sean Murphy came crashing down. I wracked my brain for small talk, half hoping that Sean would strike up a conversation first, but as I looked up at him, unlike me, he seemed completely comfortab
le, like words weren’t necessary.
Sean’s hand slid down gently, cupping my lower back, the heat of him pressed against me. The multi-coloured flickers of the disco lights flashed across his handsome face. He smelled so good, my defences came down and I melted into him, just a little.
I closed my eyes, willing myself the strength to walk away; the song was coming to an end. Sean saved me from making that decision.
Letting go of me, he backed away with a long, lingering look, before melting into the sea of bodies and leaving me breathless and alone on the dance floor.
Chapter Fifty-Four
“Amy, have you even been listening to a thing I have said?”
I double-blinked. Tess cast a frown to an amused-looking Toby.
“Sorry, I just have so much going through my mind at the moment.” I grimaced.
“The auction?” Toby asked.
Oh yeah, the auction. I’d forgotten about that.
If I were to be honest, it was the first time I had thought of it all night and I felt a little bit guilty over the fact. My eyes trailed over the crowd. I spotted Chris standing with a group, animatedly retelling a story with wild hand gestures that had his audience captivated. Adam and Ellie were burning up the dance floor as ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ blared from the speakers. They were so into their own outrageous Kate Bush-esque moves they had pretty much cleared the dance floor.
Tess and Toby followed my line of vision. Toby shook his head. “They’re going to end up taking someone’s eye out.”
“Truly terrifying,” Tess agreed.
My attention was swayed by my mother’s unmistakable burst of laughter. She sat at a table with all my parents’ friends holding their glasses up in a toast. To the naked eye it looked like all the Hendersons were having the time of their lives. The auction seemed like the furthest thing from any of our minds. Sure, it had just popped into mine, but I couldn’t help but feel a little miffed. Was I the only one really affected by what was happening? Happening eleven a.m. Monday morning? This really was the last event we would host.
I need a drink!
I zigzagged through the crush of bodies and made my way towards the beer garden bar. Max was flat out attending to the drunken hordes. I wedged myself into a space at the end of the bar, thinking that he would get to me when he was ready.
