“Awesome,” Josie said. “Full of life.”
“I made heaps of mistakes,” the boy said. “In the beginning especially. Did you see?”
“I saw one or two,” Josie said, “but that was all. I missed a bit in there, though.”
“I know,” the boy said. “About the beginning. I was nervous.”
“Practice it again,” Josie said. “You’ll get it. This is Charlie,” she told the others. “Charlie, this is Marko Sendoa, one of Hugh’s teammates, and his friend Nyree, isn’t it? And Tom Koru-Mansworth, and Marko’s cousin Ella. Have I got everybody’s name right?”
“Pleased to meet you,” Charlie said, shaking hands with Marko and Tom. “I’m going to go practice it again, Josie.”
“Do this next one in your room, darling,” Josie said, “as things are getting a wee bit busy out here. And then come show me that tricky bit again.”
Charlie headed off, more or less following his sister. Josie laughed and said, “Wait until you see our bring-a-plate dinners, Marko. We’re posh as, aren’t we? Never mind. Ella, I’m sorry. I didn’t show you the toilet well enough. It’s just through that door. I’m folding washing, too, so I hope you don’t mind seeing everybody’s undies.”
“I don’t have to use the toilet, actually,” Ella said, sinking into a chair at the kitchen table. “I came to talk to you.”
Josie sat down herself, the smile still on her lips. “Oh? How can I help? Cup of tea?”
Nyree sat down beside Ella. Hugh, possibly alerted by something in his wife’s face, had come to sit next to Josie, and Nyree saw him take her hand under the table.
She was still about three stops back. Josie Pae Ata and Hugh Latimer were on the waiting-for-adoption list? But surely they’d be any pregnant teenager’s first choice. An All Black and a film star? It stood to reason. Besides—how would they have time for twins?
Tom and Marko were still standing, but Nyree couldn’t worry about them. Not now.
Ella said haltingly, “So I’m, like, pregnant.”
“Yes,” Josie said, the smile intact. “So you said. Congratulations.”
“Oh,” Ella said, and glanced at Marko. “Uh… I guess… Marko said… And, well… you’re on the list.”
Josie had let go of Hugh’s hand and started folding her sheet again. Now, her hands stilled, and the smile vanished. “Pardon?”
“Uh…” Ella said. “I thought you wanted to adopt. A baby. I saw you, at least. On the list. But maybe you changed your mind.”
Something was happening to Josie’s gorgeous face. It was crumpling, and the hands on the sheet were shaking. Hugh took it from her, dropped it into the washing basket, and told Ella, “I didn’t tell Josie about you, that you were putting the baby up for adoption. That’s why she doesn’t know. It breaks her heart, you see. Hoping.”
“Oh,” Ella said, and then, shyly, “I wondered… Marko wondered… if you’d be interested. I thought you were too posh,” she hurried on, since Josie wasn’t answering. “And, you know, you never looked at me, both times I saw you. When I met you. You didn’t want me to go with you to carry drinks, so I thought…”
“I was…” Josie stopped, then started again. “I was… It hurts. Because I can’t, and other people… can. Sometimes I can’t… pretend anymore. Especially with the wives. They keep having babies, and I want to be happy for them, but… I can’t. And we put our names down, and I know it hasn’t even been six months, and it could be years, but…” She had a hand pressed to her lips, and her face was naked. Hope, and fear, too, like the hope was too much to bear.
She didn’t seem like she was going to say anything else, and after a minute, Ella said, “I thought you must think being pregnant was gross or something. Like, maybe you wanted somebody to do it for you, so you could stay beautiful. So your skin didn’t get stretched out, because it does. I’ve got all these marks already, and I’m only twenty-two weeks.”
“No,” Josie said. “No.” She had her arms wrapped around herself now. Not acting, Nyree could swear. Doing nothing but holding herself together. “I can’t. Hugh can, but I… can’t. I had cancer, and I can’t. That’s why. Are you… might you…” She stopped again. Her mouth worked, but nothing came out.
“I’m having these twins,” Ella said. She hurried on, the color flooding her cheeks as the words poured out. “And my grandmother’s Aborigine, so you know, and the baby’s dad is half Samoan, and the part of me that isn’t Aborigine is part Basque, so the babies will be a mix of things, not just Pakeha like some people want. I’m pretty intelligent, I guess, and the baby’s dad is, too, but my dad used to hit my mum, so I have bad genes from that half, maybe. And my mum’s a drama queen, but I’m not. So whatever you think, but that’s the truth, and I need somebody who’s OK with all that, and who wants both of them, obviously. They’re my babies, you know? I mean, they are now. So I have to be sure.”
Josie was crying. Not prettily. Her beautiful face was a mess, and her eyes and nose were both running. “I’m sorry,” she got out through the tears. “I’m sorry. I can’t… Please. I can’t think of what to say. Please. Please… pick me.”
Nyree was having trouble seeing, and she had an arm around Ella, as much to support herself as anything else. Hugh wasn’t looking one bit steady himself as he took his wife in his arms and said, “Shh, baby. It’s all good. Sweetheart. Calm down, now. We need to talk to her. You need to tell her.”
“Mate,” Marko said, a grin spreading over his face. “I think she just did.”
Marko had gone with his gut, and it had worked. At least, he was pretty sure it had. There was a fair amount of crying to get through first.
Also Hugh’s sister Amelia, who’d come out of her bedroom in response to all the noise. “What?” she’d said when she’d finally understood. “That’s cool, but how could we have two babies here?”
Hugh was still holding Josie. Who, at the moment, was bursting into tears once more and hugging Ella. He said, “We move, that’s all, once they’re a bit older.”
“How?” Amelia said, crossing her arms and looking like a teenaged Napoleon. “Auntie Kyree and Uncle Tane live next door. How could we move everybody? We aren’t going to find two houses next door to each other, Hugh.”
Hugh explained to the others, “Josie’s aunt and uncle, moved up from Katikati to help with the kids. They live in Josie’s old place.” He motioned with his head, since his arms were full. “Next door, eh, like Amelia said. So somebody’s always here for the kids.”
“Oh,” Ella said. “See—I knew it was right. I knew it. Like—family. Like my Amona was always there when I went to your house, Marko.”
“Exactly like family,” Hugh said firmly. “And the answer,” he told his sister, “is that we do whatever we have to do. Sell both places and get a bigger house, most likely. One with an extra unit downstairs, probably.”
“Except that Charlie and I go to school here,” Amelia said.
“Yeh,” Hugh said. “Pity that there’s never been a house on the market on the North Shore. It’s going to work out, no worries. Whatever we have to do, we’ll do. That’s what I’m here for. To make it happen.”
Josie blew her beautiful nose and said with a watery smile, “I love rugby players.”
Hugh laughed, cuddled her closer, if that were possible, and said, “Hold that thought. You’re going to be a mum, sweetheart. Two times over.”
Josie laughed, too, and said, “I don’t…” She waved a helpless hand. “I guess… I need to know when. I need to know… so much. I can’t… I can’t think.”
“Early September, probably.” Ella was recovering her confidence now, actually seeming excited, and relieved, too. Tom had come to sit beside her, was holding her hand. It was good, surely, to have both of them on the same page for this. “It’s hard to know for sure, because… twins. They usually come early, I guess, but the doctor says I’m doing well so far, and I’m strong, you know, plus having a kind that are more… more stable. No
contractions or anything so far, not early like they can do. Oh! And they’re boys. Identical boys. I guess I should’ve said that.” She looked apprehensive, suddenly. “They’re in two amniotic sacs, so that’s good, and one’s a bit bigger than the other, and he’s, like, way busy. He’s down here at the bottom,” she said, putting a hand on her belly. “Baby A. The other one, Baby B, he’s quieter, like he’s thinking, or he just doesn’t need to move around as much. But he’s healthy,” she hurried on. “He’s not much smaller, just a bit. So… what do you think? Do you still think… yes?”
Josie looked like somebody had opened up Heaven and given her wings. Eyes shining, mouth trembling. Hugh looked at her, smiled, and told Ella, “I think we’ll take it. I think we’re more grateful than we can say. I think you can go home tonight and know you’ve made somebody happier than she’s ever dreamt she’d be, and that you’re giving a gift there aren’t words enough to thank you for. I think you should know that we feel…” He hesitated.
“Blessed,” Josie said. Her eyes welled up again, and, yes, there were more tears in there after all. “Blessed.”
The first day of September, and another match about to begin at Eden Park. Rainy this time, and windy, too. Winter in New Zealand, and the kind of conditions that reminded you there was a reason they called it a test match.
The All Blacks were playing the Wallabies, and the stands were full for this first match of the four-nation Rugby Championship. Marko had pulled on the black jersey this afternoon for the fourth time this season, and as always, it had felt like an occasion.
You never took it for granted. Not once. He was about to run out for his country for the seventy-first time in an All Blacks jersey, and it felt very nearly like the first. He’d get the same shiver down his back, the same hair standing up on his arms when he stood with his teammates and sang the anthem, the same rush of his blood when they formed up in the black wedge and Liam Mahaka shouted out the first words of the haka. The same, and new every time, because no match was the same as another.
It was never easy. It was always fast, brutal, and hard. And you’d give anything to be part of it. Almost anything. There were things more important than rugby, which was why he and Hugh would both be on the ground when the squad got on the plane in four days for Buenos Aires. Ella was thirty-six and a half weeks gone, and you couldn’t schedule babies.
Tonight, though, he was here, and so was Hugh. And it was on.
Beside Nyree, Ella shifted like she was trying to get more comfortable. It wasn’t that she looked heavy, exactly. It was that she was all belly, and what a belly it was.
On Ella’s other side, Josie asked, “All right?” At the words, Tom leaned forward from beyond her.
On Nyree’s other side, Ella’s mum said, “I told you it would be too much. All these stairs. And all that walking in the rain, too.”
“Oh,” Olivia said from beyond Jakinda, “I think they’re good for her, don’t you? It takes strength to carry that weight. Besides, she wouldn’t have wanted to miss this.”
Nobody, in fact, was missing this, or so it seemed to Nyree. Her mum and stepfather were a couple rows back, her mum watching Kane and her stepfather watching everybody. Both of Marko’s parents, and his aunt as well. Josie, of course, and Tom, too, no doubt longing with every fiber of his nineteen-year-old self to be out there in the black jersey, and the rest of the wives and girlfriends and kids, mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers, until you wondered if there would be room for anybody else in the stadium. Which, rain, wind, and all, was sold out, the All Blacks’ sibling-rivalry matchup against Australia guaranteeing it. Nyree was just glad they were in the dry seats. The players would get wet, but they wouldn’t care.
Ella said, irritably for her, “Don’t fuss, Mum. I’m huge as, that’s all. Plus, Wild Baby’s doing his thing.”
“I thought they said the babies would run out of room,” Josie said, “and not be able to move so much.”
“I wish they’d tell him that.” Ella grabbed Josie’s hand and put it on the bottom curve of her impressive abdomen, over on the right. “He’s got his head pressing down on me, and he’s shoving. All right, I can finally breathe some, but being a hundred percent effaced is gross. I think they should just tell you that you’ll feel like you have to poo all the time, but you can’t. That would be, like, job done, you’ve got it. And I don’t care what Marko says about how you can’t tell, I think Wild Baby’s going to play rugby. Meanwhile, Zen Baby’s just squirming a tiny bit. Like, ‘Yo, bro, I’ll be over here taking my nap.’ He’s like a koala.”
Nyree laughed and put an arm around Ella, and the girl glared at her and said, “You try it, if you think I’m whinging. Sorry, Josie, I know you want to do it and all, but it’s still gross.”
Josie said, “Never mind, love. You can whinge as much as you like. I know it’s hard.”
“See?” Ella told Nyree. “You’re meant to be encouraging, not laugh at me.”
She was smiling, though, so Nyree laughed again and said, “Nah. One sympathetic person’s enough. I’m the mate that jollies you out of it. We’ll see if the All Blacks can distract you. Any moment, eh.” And indeed, the music was swelling, the Wallabies were trotting onto the field, and the crowd was rising, beginning to wave their black flags.
“What was Marko’s card of the day?” Ella asked Nyree, heaving herself to her feet with an impressive effort. “I forgot to ask.”
“The Magician,” Nyree said over the rising roar of the crowd. “Manifest your desires.”
She’d have said, before this year, that she’d seen too many All Blacks matches in her life. On TV, and even in person. She’d never felt them in her blood, though, the way she did this season. During the June series, of course, and even more tonight, because the Wallabies had an edge to them. Tonight, it was on.
When Marko ran out, it was something new. When the chant of the haka came over the loudspeakers, when she saw his hard face on the big screen, looking like nothing anyone would want to come up against, she got a thrill down her spine worthy of her Maori ancestors. And when he sent a hulking Wallabies forward backward with the force of his tackle in the first minute, she stood and screamed like it was three hundred years ago. Like he was fighting, and he was winning. Like he was her man.
Ella went to the toilet twice during the first half alone. When she came back the second time just as everybody else was surging toward the exit doors in search of a halftime beer, Nyree helped her edge her way past and asked, “All right?”
“Yeh,” Ella said, sinking into her seat. “You don’t want to know. Gross again. Ugh. Tummy.” This last under her breath, since Tom was listening.
Nyree had worried, when she’d been sixteen, about what she’d do with her retainer when she finally kissed a boy. She hadn’t had to contemplate him learning about her pregnancy bowel habits. Horrors.
“Any contractions?” she asked Ella. “You know they said in the classes that they might not be strong to start.”
“Nah.” Ella shifted position. “My back aches, that’s all, same as usual.”
“If anything starts,” Josie said, “tell us. If you even think anything’s starting.”
“What’s starting?” Jakinda asked, already standing up.
“Nothing’s starting,” Ella said. “I’d know if something was starting. I’m being distracted by manly blokes, which is good. Trying to be less of a pill, too.”
“Aw, darling,” Josie said, “not a pill. Never.”
Ella looked expectantly at Nyree, and she laughed and said, “Maybe a bit.” Which made Ella laugh as well, so that was good.
Five more minutes, and the teams were running out onto the field again, and Nyree forgot to worry. The score was tied at seven all, and the rain and wind had increased to the point that there was nearly a fog on the field. The rain was driving almost horizontally, the players’ hair was slicked to their skulls, and every tackle was an icy bath. The Wallabies’ uniforms were streaked with
mud, and Marko’s arms and legs were smeared with it, showing how many times he’d hit the turf. And still the crowd stayed in their seats, dressed in their anoraks and transparent ponchos and hoods, shouted out their encouragement, and dripped.
Back and forth. The Wallabies kicked a penalty from out in front—barely. Ten to seven, and gold-clad supporters standing up, raising their beers, and cheering.
Ten minutes more, seventy minutes in, and three All Blacks scrum resets near their own tryline, during which the turf was gouged out from under the players’ boots, men slipped onto their faces, and the crowd grew restless. The players kicked the turf back into position, the ref set the scrum for a fourth time, and this time, it held. The ball came back to the Number Eight, and he scooped it up somehow and passed it to Nate Torrance, and Nate handed it off to Will Tawera, his Number Ten.
“Try time,” Josie shouted. “Come on, boys!” As if he’d heard her, Will sent a little grubber kick past the defense, and everybody went after it, with Will himself in the lead.
A scramble, a blow of the whistle, the ref’s arm in the air, and Nyree couldn’t see. “What?” she asked Ella. “What was it?”
Ella didn’t answer. Josie did, through the palms she’d pressed together at her mouth. Tom wasn’t saying anything. He was just watching. “High tackle,” Josie said. “Could be a yellow.” Somebody sent off to the sin bin, and the All Blacks would not only be down three points, or six once a penalty was kicked, they’d be down to fourteen men for the remainder of the match.
An endless wait, then, as players jumped up and down to stay warm and the television match official, warm and dry in his booth, ran the footage again and again. And the crowd watched the scene on the big screens and held their breath.
Just Say [Hell] No Page 34
