“Ivy’s told me a bit about her. She sounds like she was a wonderful lady. I’m sorry for your loss.”
He saw Leo’s eyes well up, and his voice had a wobbly timbre to it when he answered.
“Thank you. She was wonderful alright. I miss her terribly. We all do.”
And they sat in silence for a minute or two, one missing the woman he had lost and the other missing the woman he had only just gained, even though she was only metres away.
“You love her don’t you,” Leo asked, as accurately reading the mood as if he’d licked a finger and stuck it in the air and felt the love in the breeze.
“I do.”
Leo nodded, satisfied. He wasn’t a man who tolerated bullshit, never had. He told it straight and appreciated the same in return.
“Good,” he said, “that’s good. She’s a special one, Ivy. I can see you recognise that. She’s a gentle soul, sensitive. She’s not like other girls.”
“I’m beginning to realise that.”
“You hurt her and you’ll have me to answer to.”
“Yes sir. I wouldn’t dream of it sir.”
“Good. I may look old but don’t let appearances fool you.”
“No sir, I won’t. You scare the living daylights out of me.”
“Good.” Leo leant back in his seat, satisfied.
“I heard that granddad,” said Ivy, coming through the screen door with a plate piled high with buttered toast.
“What? Just a friendly conversation.”
Pat followed Ivy out the door with a platter of sausages and some kind of bubble and squeak mixture; mashed potato, pumpkin and kumara, with added peas, herbs and cheese, fried till it had a crispy golden crust. She placed it on the table and then went back inside, re-emerging a minute later with another platter, this one bearing fried tomatoes, eggs, mushrooms and a bowl of heated Watties baked beans.
“Voila,” she announced, “I hope you’re all hungry.”
“Something smells good,” they heard a voice say, and then June appeared from inside the house followed closely by Craig.
“Impeccable timing as always,” Ivy said, “just in time to miss out on the actual cooking.”
“Plenty of time to do dishes though,” her mum said.
“No can do,” June shook her head, pulling over a large bean bag from the corner and grabbing a plate. “I just got my nails done for the wedding, see,” and she thrust out a hand of neat little acrylic French tips for Ivy and Pat to admire, which they dutifully did.
“Bit early isn’t it?” Pat said, “you still have a month to go. What if you break one?”
“Then they fix it. Easily done. I wanted them done now so I can get used to them.”
While they were talking Craig leaned over and held out a hand to Walt.
“Hey,” he said, “you must be the famous Walt.”
“Well some might say infamous but sure, that’s me.” Walt shook Craig’s hand and both instantly knew they would get on.
“You’ve caused quite a stir,” Craig said, grabbing his own plate and starting to pile it high with food. “Pat called even before the sun was up to fill us in on your sleeping arrangements.”
“Craig, don’t be so embarrassing,” Ivy blushed.
“Me? Your mother’s the one who took a bulletin out in the paper.”
“You’d think I’d never had a date before.”
Her family exchanged glances, “We know you’ve had dates,” her mum said, “but this is clearly something a little more than that, isn’t it?”
Ivy had no answer for her, not because she was unsure of her feelings, because she had never been surer about anything before, but because her very limited experience in the world of romance had at least taught her you don’t rush things like proclamations of love, not unless you want to send the man concerned running for the hills. But she needn’t have worried. Whatever had been turned on inside her own heart was mirrored in Walt’s and he reached over and took her hand and smiled and announced to her family without an ounce of embarrassment or uncertainty,
“Yes, it’s more than that.”
And they smiled at each other and itched to be alone again.
“Well, I hate to ruin the moment lovebirds, but I have an announcement,” Craig said, and turned to his wife to be. “June, my love, I heard you were planning on a beach theme for your hen’s party.”
She regarded him warily, “Yes, and -?”
“Well I thought to myself, how neat would it be if you had it somewhere a little more, say, tropical -”
“And?”
“ - so I said to myself, I said, Craig, you handsome devil you, how can you give the woman you love a party to end all parties to farewell her single life –”
June started to wiggle on the bean bag, clapping her hands together. “Tell me!”
“- and then I remembered, because I know you so well, how much you always wanted to go to Bali and so I –”
June squealed and jumped out of the bean bag and on to Craig’s lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and plastering his face in kisses. Then she jumped to her feet and did a little hula dance around the others.
“I’m going to Bali, I’m going to Bali,” she sang.
“I haven’t finished my darling,” Craig said and she stopped. When he had her attention he carried on. “Obviously you can’t go by yourself because that would be just sad, so I bought tickets for your mum and Ivy as well. I also spoke to April and the other girls in the bridal party, and strangely they didn’t take much persuading, so you’re all going,” and then he sat back with the smug look of someone who knew he’d just earned himself a record number of relationship brownie points, to be cashed in at later convenient dates.
In the commotion that followed the announcement, with June and Pat excitedly celebrating, Ivy sat stone still in her chair. She knew she should be excited alongside them, and forty eight hours ago she would have been, but now the only thought she had was, how could she leave Walt? Which was silly she knew because it wouldn’t be for very long, and she’d always pitied the sort of girls who ran their lives around the man in it, so she lifted her chin and widened her lips into a smile and she pretended to be as happy as her mother and sister.
And Walt, who had sensed the announcement that was coming as soon as Craig mentioned the words, “Hen’s party’ and ‘tropical’ in the same sentence, felt guilty at the resentment he immediately felt towards Craig for planning something which would take Ivy away from him. But he knew it was silly to feel like that, and not very fair, so he leaned back casually and crossed his legs and smiled indulgently at the excited women.
And neither of them knew that in that instant another button had been pushed, the wheel had been turned, and the course had been altered yet again.
Chapter seven
Two days after the breakfast announcement, and approximately seventy two hours after they had first met, Walt took Ivy home to meet his parents.
It was the first time he had ever done such a thing, and his mother spent the entire afternoon prior expressing an inordinate level of excitement, much to the annoyance of Walt’s father.
“She’s not the Queen, Meredith, you don’t have to iron the table cloth for gods sakes,” he said as Walt’s mother ironed not only the table cloth, but the napkins, the hand towel from the bathroom and even, in her keenness to impress, the end of the scented toilet roll, although this ended badly and resulted in a smoke alarm being battered with the broom and a lingering smell of burnt lavender in the air. She had to settle for folding it into a neat little point instead.
“She may not be the Queen, Paul, but she’s the reason our boy has a spring in his step and a sparkle in his eyes. Anyway, even without all that, she’s the first girl he’s ever invited home for dinner and that means something, you mark my words. There’s something special about this one.”
“He’s too young to give us grandchildren, Meredith, so get that idea right out of your head.”
“He’s older than we were when we had Aidan,” she pointed out, “but don’t be so ridiculous. The thought hadn’t even crossed my mind. I’m far too young to be a grandmother,” she lied, and then went back to fantasising about the booties and bonnets she would knit.
When Ivy and Walt arrived at the heavy oak door, Ivy hesitated, nervous and anxious that they should like her.
“What if they don’t like me?” she asked him for the third time since he had picked her up.
“Relax,” he answered, also for the third time. “They’ll love you. How could they not? You are, after all, pretty loveable.”
She blushed, still not accustomed to his almost constant stream of compliments. She used her hands to smooth out a crease on the front of her dress.
“Do I look ok?”
He stepped back and pretended to study her, even though he could have closed his eyes and recited exactly what she was wearing down to the shade of lip gloss (a cross between pink and red with the tinniest hint of orange, like the colour of sunrise). She had on a black dress with a small white rounded collar and a trail of decorative white buttons down the front. The skirt was full but the waist was nipped, giving her a feminine profile reminiscent of a ballerina. A small black shrug around her shoulders, black tights and flat shoes completed the picture. Her hair was loose and curly and her make-up subtle. She couldn’t have looked more perfect as far as Walt was concerned.
“You’ll do,” he said.
But his eyes gave away how he really felt and she was soothed and comforted. She straightened her shoulders and said,
“Ok, let’s do this.”
“You do realise that it wouldn’t matter if they couldn’t stand you?”
“Do you think that’s a possibility?”
“Of course not.”
“I want them to like me.”
“They will.”
And they did.
His mother thought Ivy was like a petite little fairy; small and dainty yet ethereal and sparkly. Walt’s father thought she was a bit shy, and could do with a few more meals perhaps, but she was polite and could hold her own in a conversation and she made his boy happy, so she was ok with him.
Meredith was a bit puzzled by the small Winnie the Pooh stuffed toy Ivy gave her but she did an almost excellent job at trying to hide it.
“Oh, how wonderful,” she said, taking it and inspecting it as if looking for a clue to as to why she had been gifted it.
Ivy noticed the fleeting confusion and was worried, “I thought Winnie the Pooh was Disney?” she whispered to Walt, who said “Oh right, about that,” and gave her a bashful look. He’d completely forgotten about the small fib he’d told to entertain her when they first met.
‘What?”
“I’ll explain later,” he said and when dinner was finished and enjoyed and the dishes cleaned up and they had retired to the lounge to drink tea he confessed about the lie he’d told in order to meet her and Ivy was mortified, but his mother was used to this sort of stuff and just laughed.
“Well if I was a rampant Disney fan then this would have been the perfect gift,” she said, holding the little bear up and pretending to tickle its stuffed tummy.
“You see what you’re getting yourself in for,” Paul said to Ivy, “he’s quite the joker.”
“I can think of worse personality traits.”
“Quite right.”
After the tea was consumed and the fire in the hearth had long since turned to embers Ivy yawned, because she was unable to stop it and Meredith stood and said, “We’ve kept you long enough. It’s been an absolute pleasure to meet you my dear.”
“I’m sorry,” Ivy said, embarrassed, “that was really rude of me.”
“It’s my fault,” Walt defended her, pulling her to her feet and wrapping his arms around her, even though she stiffened slightly, embarrassed at the display of affection in front of his parents. “I’ve been keeping her awake -”
“Walt!”
“– Ivy, one of these days you’ve really got to start letting me finish my sentences. What I was going to say, was that obviously you’ve been thinking about me all night long.”
“Oh.”
“I like how your mind goes straight to the gutter though,” he teased, but quieter so only she could hear.
“If you’re not careful I’ll kick you to the gutter,” she muttered back.
They bid their goodbyes to his parents, thanking them for the meal and the pleasant company. Outside, emboldened by one glass of Shiraz and giddy with relief that the night had gone well, Ivy turned in lazy circles down the front path, arms outstretched, face turned upwards and bathed in starlight. Watching her, Walt could barely remember a time when he hadn’t had her in his life. She was as much a part of him now as his right arm was, or left foot. Although, even without those body parts he knew he could still function, whereas if Ivy were to leave his life, well, the thought was unbearable and so he shook it from his mind aggressively, wanting all trace of it gone. He caught up to her by the letterbox and reached out for her but she darted away, laughing and thus started a game of chase which culminated in him catching her next door on the lawn of the very house where they’d first met, Maria’s. She was breathless, both from the game and because of the expression in Walt’s eyes. She had never seen such naked longing and it excited and scared her in equal measures.
She leaned back against the garage and he put his hands on her waist and leaned in towards her until his breath was warm on her face like the warmest summer breeze.
‘May I?” he whispered.
And she opened her mouth to tell him yes, but the word got stuck somewhere on the way out so she simply nodded instead.
There were no fireworks, or violins. The earth didn’t heave and shift on its axis.
Instead there was a sense of coming home. Déjà vu with a kiss so familiar yet so new, as if they’d already experienced it a million times over instead of just then and for the very first time.
They might have stayed right there in that same position until dawn if a security light over the front porch hadn’t come on and they hadn’t heard footsteps echo from inside the house.
“Quick,” Walt said, and holding her hand he ducked stealthily across the driveway and out until they were absorbed into the shadows of the street. Laughing they ran, enjoying the tranquillity of the night and the feeling that there were just the two of them awake in the whole wide world right at that moment. And they kept laughing until they reached the crossroads where they could either turn left, and head up the hill towards her house, or right, across the bridge and down into the village towards his. Walt started to turn left but a tug on his hand stopped him. He looked at Ivy questioningly, and saw a new determinedness in her eyes. She shook her head and pulled him lightly towards the right instead.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
She nodded.
Then he couldn’t wait to get home so they walked first, very quickly, and then somehow that turned into a quick jog and then a light run and then they were there, at his door, and they had to stop to collect their breath. Before he opened the door he stopped and asked her again, “are you sure this is what you want?”
And she reassured him, “yes”, and that was that.
If you asked Walt the next day how his night had been he would have told you that the night before had been a rebirth for him, a goodbye to the Walt who had made love before but who had no clue that what he’d felt in the past was a mere fraction of what was possible, and hello to the new Walt, a man who now understood that when love and passion go hand in hand, one little kiss here, or the lightest touch there, could bring him to a sense of euphoria the likes of which many used drugs to achieve.
As for Ivy, she would tell you that never in a million years had she suspected it would feel like it had, but also that she knew it had only felt that way because it was with Walt, and that his eyes and his touch had awakened something in her she hadn’t even known was hibernating. Now she und
erstood for the first time her body’s purpose, and every single fibre in her body tingled so when she walked she felt like a jangled bunch of pleasurable nerve endings.
They made love like they were the first people to invent it, explorers in a new art form, tentative at first then wholeheartedly embracing it. Ivy surprised herself with her fearlessness; Walt surprised himself with his willpower, holding back out of a misguided fear of scaring her, till she got frustrated and scolded him. After that they were on the same page and hours passed like minutes until before they knew it the sun was peeking over the windowsill and painting the walls of the room pale lemon and rose and they finally drifted off to sleep, wrapped together like they would never let each other go.
Chapter eight
“Say you won’t go.”
“I won’t go.”
“You don’t mean it.”
“I do. If you really want me to stay, I’ll stay.”
“Now you’ve gone and made me feel horrible. You know I can’t ask you to do that. Your sister would kill me for a start.”
“She probably would.”
“When will you be back?”
“You know the answer to that already.”
“Tell me again.”
Ivy finished folding a skirt neatly and added it to the growing pile of things to fit in her suitcase. Luckily she was a light packer, as her mother had already asked her to squeeze some of her clothes in if possible. Pat’s own bag was overloaded and no matter how many times she tried to weed some items out she still couldn’t bear to leave anything behind. It was her first ever trip overseas and she was excited.
Ivy stopped packing and joined Walt where he was lounging in the window seat, curling into his lap and snuggling her face deep into the crook of his neck.
“Tuesday,” she said. “I’ll be back on Tuesday. That’s five days from now. Do you think you can cope with that?”
He put his arms around her and pulled her in tight, inhaling the apple scent of her hair and wishing he could just keep her there forever.
When Stars Collide Page 4
