by Daphne Clair
Harry was Mrs. Robinson’s husband, the gardener and handyman Zito had kept on when they first moved into the house. Today they’d seemed glad to see her again, and fairly successful at hiding their curiosity about her return.
Left alone, she kicked off her shoes and padded to the bathroom—spotless as usual, with fresh, fluffy towels immaculately folded over the rails. Mrs. Robinson and the part-time weekly help were extremely efficient. And thoughtful. A new jar of Roxane’s favourite bath oil sat on a glass shelf, and a fresh cake of matching soap nestled in the recess of the shower.
Foolish tears threatened. Her mother had told her that a tendency to cry easily went with the hormonal turbulence of pregnancy. She dashed cold water over her face and gave herself a shame-faced grimace in the mirror. ‘You’re a walking cliché,’ she told herself. A hand on her stomach, she said sternly, ‘You, my inconvenient little bundle, have a lot to answer for.’
It should have been easy to feel grateful to Zito in the ensuing weeks. His family, excited to have her back among them, came visiting separately and collectively. She was touched at their loudly expressed delight in the coming baby, and their willingness to accept her return without reservations or recriminations.
Their assumption that it was permanent caused her some unease, but to her surprise Zito said swiftly, ‘That’s something Roxane and I will talk about later. Right now our main concern is to make sure she gives birth safely to a healthy child.’
He took her to a gynaecologist he’d been told was Melbourne’s best, and insisted she rest undisturbed every afternoon, even when her in-laws were there. But he yielded to her when she said that a visit from Serena wouldn’t stop her resting.
His youngest sister came bouncing into the room, sprawled on the other bed with chin in hand and said, ‘Zito’s busy keeping the rest of the family at bay. Now you can tell me all about it. Just what have you and my big brother been up to?’
‘You’re a married woman now,’ Roxane teased. ‘I thought you knew all about it.’
‘You know what I mean! What made you leave, and how did he make you come back?’
‘I left,’ Roxane said, ‘because your brother was so determined that I needed looking after—and I came back for the same reason.’
Serena looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Being the eldest, you know, Zito has a huge sense of responsibility.’
‘I know.’
‘He was always being told it was his job to look out for us girls, even when he was just a kid himself.’ Serena looked down, picking at the brand-new bedspread under her fingers. ‘Nonno and my dad still hold to the old patriarchal view of family, you know. They lay down the law and expect their women and children to follow it. For their own good, of course, but I’m glad Norrie isn’t like that.’
‘You’re lucky,’ Roxane said. ‘You and Norrie are happy, aren’t you?’
‘Blissfully. Except when we’re fighting.’ Serena grinned at her, then sobered, her brow wrinkling in puzzlement. ‘I don’t remember you and Zito ever arguing. It was such a shock when you up and went like that.’
‘Maybe we should have argued,’ Roxane said. Brought up in a household where quarrels were avoided, she’d scarcely known how. She recalled a few spirited exchanges between Serena and her other sisters, who were really the best of friends, but Zito had seemed less volatile than most of his family, not given to explosive bouts of temper, and no more inclined than Roxane to engage in trivial arguments.
And yet, hadn’t it been simply the accumulated weight of trivial incidents that had led her to destroy her marriage?
She couldn’t even think of any one single moment that had triggered her decision—only a growing sense of paralysis that had overtaken her, until one day she had found herself staring into space, feeling depressed and restless and frightened, and coming to the horrifying, blinding but inevitable realisation that if she didn’t get out at that very moment, she never would.
With Zito talking about babies, there was only one way out of the tender trap he’d made for her. She supposed it was the thought of imminent pregnancy that had given her the final impetus.
‘So…are you arguing now?’ Serena asked.
‘Right now,’ Roxane confessed, ‘I don’t even care that I never get to make a decision of my own. But I won’t be pregnant forever.’
Sometimes it seemed to be taking forever. Roxane grew bigger, and the baby’s movements were unmistakable now. She exercised gently and went to antenatal classes that Zito attended religiously with her. She listened to her mother’s experienced advice, and did as she was told by the gynaecologist. And by Zito, who had absorbed every scrap of information and instruction and ensured that she obeyed them to the letter.
They ate at the same table, slept in the same room, and almost every day took an undemanding walk with her hand tucked into his arm.
They listened to music or watched TV, swapped books and discussed what was in the newspaper politely and without dissension. His mother took her shopping for baby clothes, mindful of Zito’s admonition that Roxane mustn’t get tired.
Zito was watchful and considerate and patient—and strangely aloof.
While she lived in a cocoon of pampering and preparation she was aware that Zito was keeping an emotional distance between them. Her own emotions were dangerously close to the surface these days, but it seemed that he was burying his deeper and deeper.
Her ultrasound test had disclosed that the baby was a boy. Armed with suggestions from both families, Roxane and Zito began sifting through possible names, giving them something more personal to talk about, for which Roxane at least, was grateful.
When Zito suggested it was time to furnish a nursery, a familiar wariness crept over her. ‘It won’t need much,’ she said. ‘A bassinet of course, maybe a changing table.’
‘What kind of bassinet?’
‘Your mother and I saw one we both liked—white cane, with primrose yellow trimmings. We could put it up in one of the spare rooms, and the changing table. I like the ones with drawers.’
‘Why not in our room?’
‘I thought I’d move out when the baby’s born.’ Roxane drew a careful breath. ‘I’ll be feeding it in the middle of the night.’
‘Then I’ll watch,’ Zito said softly. His gaze lingered on the new fullness of her breasts above the curve of her pregnant figure.
Extraordinarily, she felt the centres peak and tingle, and heat swept over her. Zito was a good six feet away, relaxing in a dark red leather armchair in the downstairs sitting room, while Roxane had her feet up on the matching sofa. But if he’d stripped her and touched her she couldn’t have been more aroused.
‘D-don’t!’ she stammered involuntarily.
Zito lifted his brows.
‘Don’t say things like that,’ Roxane said feebly. ‘It’s…inappropriate.’
Zito laughed. ‘Inappropriate?’
‘You know what I mean.’
The laughter died. He stood up, looked at her for a second, then unexpectedly came to the sofa and crouched at her side, his hand resting possessively on the swell of her stomach. ‘You think it’s inappropriate for me to see my son at his mother’s breast?’
‘You make it sound so…so…’
‘Sexual?’ Zito asked bluntly. ‘What’s so terrible about that?’
‘You and I aren’t—we’re not that intimate any more.’
‘Your choice,’ he said, and his hand moved caressingly over her rounded belly, skimming upward to her breasts. ‘Not mine, Roxane. Never mine.’
Then both his hands were cupping her face and turning it to him, and his mouth came down on hers, in a seeking, masterly, frankly sensual kiss.
Roxane’s hands curled tightly in her lap as she resisted the urge to fling her arms about his neck and never let go. Her lips parted under the gently insistent pressure of his. Her body tautened and then relaxed, washed by a languorous, delicious warmth.
The gynaecologist had said that sex was fine as
long as they took some care. Roxane hadn’t told her that sex was out of the question.
Even as the thought intruded, Zito took his mouth from hers and gave her a strangely triumphant smile. ‘If you change your mind,’ he said, ‘let me know.’
Through a haze of confused emotion, Roxane recognised danger. When all else failed, he still believed he could use her own weakness to influence her, manipulate her. Once he got her back into his bed he’d have the upper hand, be able to bend her easily to his will.
She couldn’t—wouldn’t let it happen all over again.
‘I won’t change my mind,’ she said clearly. ‘And I’d prefer to move into another room after the baby’s born.’
For a moment their eyes clashed. She could see the surprised chagrin in his. But he said quietly, ‘Whatever you want.’
‘Thank you.’ He’d left her with nothing more to say.
‘But I’d like it if you didn’t,’ he added.
‘You’d regret it. Being woken in the middle of the night—’
‘No.’
She saw the darkening of his eyes as they rested on her, first skimming her face and then going to where she sheltered their child inside her. For a moment there was a stark hunger in his eyes that took her breath away.
‘You—you never really wanted a baby,’ she blurted out, astonished. He hadn’t suggested it until his mother had pointed out Roxane was getting restless.
Zito returned his gaze to her face. ‘I wanted this one. Desperately. Why else would I have decided to—’
His abrupt stop there left her hanging for a second or two before enlightenment dawned in an explosive burst.
‘What do you mean?’ she asked, fearful of the answer.
But he didn’t give her one, instead turning his shoulder to her as if about to leave the room. Increasingly sure she was right, and filled with horrified fury, Roxane said more loudly, imperiously, ‘What do you mean, Zito?’
He looked away from her almost guiltily, glancing randomly across the room at the window. ‘I figured,’ he said remotely, ‘it was a thousand-to-one chance. A chance I was willing to take.’
Roxane gaped at him. Her heart began to thud, suffocatingly. She thought her head might explode, there was a peculiar thrumming at her temples. ‘That you decided to take!’ she repeated. ‘You didn’t ask me if I was willing!’
Blood roared in her ears until she could scarcely hear her own voice. ‘Because that’s what you wanted? You wanted to get me pregnant!’ It hadn’t been a passing thought, overruled by the heat of the moment, but a deliberate action.
He brought his gaze back to her. ‘I hoped,’ he said. ‘All I had was hope.’
‘For what? That I’d have to come running back to you?’ That it would send her to him for help, perhaps make her want to stay because he could make life so much easier for her and her child. He’d planned it all. She moistened her lips, choked out the words. ‘You deliberately trapped me!’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ROXANE’S breathing was fast and shallow; she was dizzy. ‘Did you have that in mind from the first—when you followed me to the cottage?’
Zito’s eyes went black. ‘All I had in mind was not losing you again. That was the only thing I thought about for those two days.’ Again a fleeting guilt shadowed his face. ‘On Sunday night when we made love I realised you might become pregnant.’ He looked away, then back at her, as if trying to make her understand. ‘And yes, I wanted it. I thought—hoped—it was what you wanted too. A pledge of a new beginning.’
Just as Roxane had persuaded herself that at last he had begun to understand why she’d had to distance herself from his overwhelming presence. Deep down, was it possible she also had wanted that ultimate proof of their love, of its permanence and promise—Zito’s child?
Zito said, ‘I rationalised to myself that you knew what you were doing. In the light of day I knew that not discussing it was—unfair.’
Briefly he shut his eyes and his shoulders hunched. ‘I thought maybe it wouldn’t matter, after the way you’d loved me the night before. Even after you flew at me for taking over, telling your boss you couldn’t come in, I had a forlorn hope you’d get over it and realise I was right.’
‘Even if you were, you shouldn’t have—’
‘I know,’ he cut in. ‘I know. When you made your way down those stairs and defied me so coolly, made it crystal clear your job and your much-vaunted independence were more important than me—than us, my illusions about what we’d shared the night before died.’
‘So you gave up.’ She still found that hard to believe.
His mouth tightened. ‘Not at once. I was fully determined to wait until you came home and have it out then. But…while I was waiting I looked around the home you’d made for yourself, and remembered how proud you were of what you’d put into it, and of your professional success. You had new friends, new interests, even a new country. You’d walked away from everything I could give you and built yourself a life that had no room for me.’ He looked up, away from her, inspecting the ceiling for a moment as though it held something of great interest. Then he sighed. ‘I came round to realising I had to accept that was what you wanted, and if you were pregnant…wait for you to tell me.’
‘How did you know I would?’
‘You wouldn’t keep that from me. When you hadn’t called after eight weeks I was both greatly relieved and horribly disappointed.’
And then he’d found out she was pregnant after all.
Roxane said, acid in her voice, ‘I could have had an abortion, you know.’
He paled, then shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I know you would never do that.’
How strange that he knew her so well in some ways, and yet had been so obtuse in others.
The following day three large boxes were delivered to the house, addressed to Roxane. The first contained the primrose-trimmed cane bassinet, complete with mattress—Zito must have asked his mother where to find it. The second box was filled with a variety of baby sheets and blankets in shades of yellow and white, and the other revealed a sturdy primrose-painted changing table with shelves and drawers.
Mr. and Mrs. Robinson helped her set them up in a spare bedroom opposite the master suite. Harry fixed a hook in the ceiling and hung a clown mobile that Roxane’s mother had bought for the coming baby. When Zito came home Roxane was standing beside the bassinet with a hand-embroidered baby quilt that his own mother had given her just a week ago. Zito’s grandmother had made it before he was born.
She looked up over her shoulder when she heard his footsteps in the passageway, and saw him stop in the doorway, jacketless and with his collar open.
She turned and carefully placed the quilt inside the bassinet, tucking it into the sides.
As she straightened, Zito’s arms came about her from behind, and she felt his breath stir her hair. She stood very still, prepared for anger, for argument, but he just held her, his hands lightly spread on her belly, his strong body warming her.
Gradually she let herself relax, and without thinking she rested her head back against his shoulder.
‘You’ve been busy,’ he said at last. ‘I hope you haven’t been overdoing it.’
‘The Robinsons did all the hard work. They’re almost as bad as you at coddling me.’
‘Bad?’
‘I’m not made of glass.’
His arms tightened fractionally. ‘Hardly.’
‘You needn’t rub it in.’
‘Rub what in?’
‘That I’ve grown big and clumsy.’
He turned her round, stepping back a little to survey her. ‘Pregnant and beautiful,’ he said.
‘It’s kind of you—’
Zito shook his head vehemently. ‘You’re more beautiful now than you’ve ever been—and you always were the loveliest thing I’d ever seen in my life.’
‘Zito—’ She was shaken, distressed and yet stirred to a kind of sad pride that he still thought so, because the
sincerity in his voice was undeniable. ‘One day I’ll be old.’
His eyes crinkled. ‘So will I. And I’ll still think the same.’
He spoke as though they would grow old together.
‘Zito?’
He caught her hands, holding them loosely. ‘Yes, my beautiful wife?’
That gave Roxane her cue. She knew she’d been avoiding this, knew he had too. She braced herself. ‘Aren’t you…aren’t you taking a lot for granted?’
His eyes narrowed. The grip on her hands momentarily became almost painful, then he dropped them. ‘For instance?’
Roxane said baldly, ‘I haven’t promised to stay after the baby’s born.’
He couldn’t quite hide the shock in his eyes. His face had gone an odd, pasty colour. ‘You’d leave your child?’
‘No!’ Her own eyes widened at that. ‘Of course not.’
Zito said loudly, ‘I won’t allow you to take away my son.’
After a moment of blank disbelief, rage such as she had never known surged through her body until she was shaking with it. She’d thought he was trying to change. The delivery of the baby furniture while Zito was at work seemed to have been a silent message, leaving it to her to decide which room they should be placed in.
But now his true colours were showing again. Disappointment added to her fury. ‘You can’t stop me!’ she fired at him.
‘Can’t I?’ He turned away from her, jamming his hands into his pockets, taking a few swift strides to turn in the doorway as if he’d keep her trapped in the room if necessary. ‘If I sued for custody, do you think you’d win?’
Oh, God. Her heart went into a sickening dive.
He’d hire the most high-powered lawyers in Australia, and they’d prove he could afford the best child-care and education.
She couldn’t deny that he’d be a loving father, and maybe the court would believe his large, close family could take the place of a deserting wife and solo mother who’d had to give up her job and didn’t know where the next mortgage payment was coming from.
