Hers For One Night Only?

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘Don’t worry about it’ Bridgette settled for, and managed a goodbye and then clicked off the phone. Then she couldn’t help it—she shot out a little of the frustration that her parents so easily provoked. ‘Why can’t he go to the dentist by himself?’ Bridgette asked as Dominic simply grinned at her exasperation. ‘They go shopping together, they do the housework together… I mean, are they joined at the hip? Honestly, they don’t do anything by themselves.’

  ‘Breathe.’ Dominic grinned and she did as the doctor recommended, but it didn’t help and she stamped her feet for a moment and let out a brief ‘Aagggh!’

  ‘Better?’ Dominic asked.

  ‘A bit.’

  Actually, she did feel a bit better. It was nice to have a little moan, to complain, to let some of her exasperation out. Her parents had always been the same—everything revolved around dinner, everything in the house was geared towards six p.m. They were so inflexible, right down to the brand of toothpaste they used, and that was fine, that was how it was, that was how they were, but right now Bridgette needed more hands and their four seemed to make a poor two.

  ‘Have you got no one else who can help?’ Dominic asked.

  ‘I miss Jasmine for things like this,’ Bridgette admitted. It was nice that they were finally talking but of course now that they were, Rita buzzed and told her Jessica was in transition and it was time for her to go back.

  ‘You might be out by four,’ he said, and she shook her head, because Jessica was a first-time mum.

  ‘I doubt it.’

  Dominic’s phone was ringing as she left, and when he saw that it was his father, he chose not to answer it. Stupid, really, because his father would just ring again in an hour, Dominic thought, and every hour after that, till he could tick it off his to-do list.

  He finally took the call at three.

  ‘Hi.’

  Dominic rolled his eyes as his father wished him a happy birthday. ‘Thanks.’ Dominic was being honest when he said that he couldn’t talk for long, because he was summoned urgently and headed down to Theatre when paged for a child who was having an allergic reaction in Recovery. There was that theatre nurse, her blue eyes waiting, when he and the anaesthetist had finished discussing the child’s care.

  ‘Long shift?’ Dominic asked when she yawned, because on certain occasions he did make conversation.

  And today was a certain occasion.

  It was, after all, his birthday.

  ‘It’s been busy.’ She nodded.

  ‘Back again in the morning?’

  ‘Yes…though I shouldn’t moan. My husband’s away so I can just go home and sleep.’

  He was always away, Dominic thought.

  ‘What does he do?’ He broke one of their rules and he watched her cheeks go pink. There were colleagues around, and they were seemingly just chatting, so of course she had to answer.

  ‘He drives a coach,’ Blue Eyes said. ‘Overnight, Melbourne to Sydney.’

  He gave a nod and walked off, felt a bit sick in the guts really, which wasn’t like him, but he thought of the poor bloke driving up and down the freeway as Dominic bonked his wife. No questions asked, no real conversation.

  Maybe he was growing up, Dominic thought. He hadn’t been with anyone in weeks, not since Bridgette, in fact, though he rapidly shoved that thought out of

  his mind.

  Well, why wouldn’t he be growing up? It was his birthday, after all.

  And birthdays were supposed to be enjoyed.

  * * *

  Never doubt the power of a woman in labour—Bridgette should really have known better. Jessica was amazing, focused and gritty, and the birth was wonderful, so wonderful that she was still high on adrenaline as she sped down the corridor to daycare.

  ‘Bridgette.’ He was walking towards her and this time he nodded and said her name—progress indeed!

  ‘Dominic.’ She grinned and nodded back at him, ready to keep walking, except he stopped in front of her.

  ‘I was wondering,’ Dominic said. ‘Would you like to come out tonight? You’re right, this is awkward, and I’d really like to clear the air.’

  This she hadn’t been expecting. ‘The air is already clear, Dominic.’ Except it wasn’t, so Bridgette was a little more honest. ‘You were right. Harry is the reason that I didn’t want you to come in that first night. My computer didn’t have a virus.’ She gave a guilty grin. ‘Well, it wasn’t Harry exactly, more the cot and the stroller and the rather blatant clues that were littered around my flat at the time.’ And with Bridgette, he did ask questions, and got some answers. ‘I look after my nephew a lot. My sister’s really young.’ He didn’t look away, his eyes never left her face, and she rather wished that they would. ‘So!’ She gave him a smile as his pager went off and Dominic glanced down at it and then switched it off. ‘That’s a little bit what my life is like when Harry’s with my sister—I’m permanently on call.’ Yes, the air had been cleared, and now they could both move on; she truly wasn’t expecting what came next.

  ‘Bridgette, would you like to come out tonight?’

  She turned around slowly and he looked the same as he had before—completely unreadable. She didn’t want a charity dinner, didn’t want him taking her out because he’d already asked her. To make things easier for them both she gave him a small smile, shook her head and politely declined. ‘That’s really nice of you, thanks, but I have to say no—it’s hard to get a

  babysitter.’ There, she’d given him the out. It was over and done with, and she awaited his polite smile back—it didn’t come. Instead he looked at his watch.

  ‘How long does a dental check-up take?’ He even smiled. ‘Can you try?’ He pulled out a card and wrote his mobile-phone number on it and handed it to her. Maybe he read her too well because instead of saying that he would wait to hear if she could make arrangements, he lobbed the ball firmly back into her court. ‘I’ll pick you up at seven, unless I hear otherwise. Ring me if you can’t get a babysitter.’

  It was utterly and completely unexpected. She had thought he would run a mile—she’d given him an out, after all.

  She wanted him to take it.

  Bridgette really did. She just wasn’t ready to get back out there and certainly not with Dominic. Still, maybe tonight he would just tell her how impossible it all was; maybe she would receive a long lecture on how they found each other attractive and all that, but how unsuitable they were—yet, remembering just how good they had been, it was very hard to say no.

  ‘Hi, Mum.’ It was the second time that day she’d asked her mum for help. ‘Is there any chance you and Dad could babysit tonight?’

  ‘You mean have our grandson over?’ Betty laughed. ‘We’d love to.’ As Bridgette blinked in surprise, as she paused just a fraction, her mother filled the gap. ‘Though we do have a couple of friends coming over tonight. Old friends of your dad’s—remember Eric and Lorna?’ Bridgette felt her jaw tense. Her parents insisted they were accommodating, but it was always on their terms—when it suited them. ‘Could we maybe do it tomorrow?’

  ‘I’ve got an invitation to go out tonight, Mum. I’d really like to go.’

  ‘But we’ve got people over tonight. Tomorrow we can come over to you and stay. It might be easier on Harry.’ Yes, it might be easier on Harry, but it certainly wouldn’t be easier on her—or Dominic. He was already taking a leap of faith in asking her out. Though he wasn’t asking her out, she reminded herself—he simply wanted to clear the air. Still, no doubt he was used to having the door opened by a groomed, glossy beauty who invited him in for a drink as she applied a final layer of lip gloss—somehow she couldn’t imagine inflicting her mother and father and Harry on the guy.

  ‘Mum, I haven’t had a night out in weeks.’ She hadn’t, not since that night with Dominic. ‘I’m sorry for the short noti
ce. If you can have Harry, that would be great. If not…’ If not, then it simply wasn’t meant to be, Bridgette decided. If she couldn’t get away for one single night without planning it days in advance, she might just as well text Dominic now with the whole truth.

  It would be quite a relief to, actually, but after a moment’s silence came her mother’s rather martyred response. ‘Well, make sure you bring a decent change of clothes for him. I want Harry looking smart. I’ve got Eric and Lorna coming over,’ she repeated. ‘Have you had his hair cut yet?’ Bridgette looked at the mop of blond curls that danced in the afternoon sun as Harry built his bricks and wondered why her mother assumed that Harry’s hair was Bridgette’s responsibility. His mop of unruly hair was a slight bone of contention between them—Courtney would never think to get a haircut for her son and though at first it had irritated Bridgette, more and more his wild curls suited him. Bridgette was now reluctant to get them cut—she certainly wasn’t going to rush out and get a haircut just to appease her parents’ guests and, anyway, there wasn’t time. ‘No, Courtney hasn’t had his hair cut, but he’s looking beautiful and I’ve got a gorgeous outfit for him.’

  And with Harry dropped off and the quickest bath in history taken, the flat had to be hastily tidied, not that she had any intention of Dominic coming in. She’d be ready and dressed at the door, Bridgette decided, so she had about sixteen minutes to work out a not-so-gorgeous outfit for herself.

  There was a grey shift dress at the back of her wardrobe and she had to find her ballet pumps but first she had a quick whiz with hair tongs and her magical blusher.

  ‘Please be late,’ she begged as she remembered her screensaver was of them. Her computer was in the spare bedroom, but in case of earthquake and it was the room they ended up in, she had to change it.

  ‘Please be late,’ she said again as she stashed dishes in the cupboard beneath the sink and shovelled piles of building bricks into the corner.

  ‘Please be late,’ she said as she opened her bedroom door to get her pumps and was distracted by the shelves she’d been meaning to build and the million-thread-count sheets she’d bought in a sale and had been saving for when the room was painted.

  But the bedroom was too untidy to even contemplate bringing him in and, no, her prayers weren’t answered.

  Bang on seven, she heard the doorbell.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘READY!’ Bridgette beamed as she opened the front door and stepped out, because there was no way he was coming in.

  ‘Shoes?’ Dominic helpfully suggested just after she closed the door.

  ‘Oh. Yes.’ Which meant she had to rummage in her bag for her keys as he stood there. ‘They must be in here.’

  ‘Can’t the babysitter let you in?’

  ‘He’s at my parents’,’ she said as she rummaged.

  ‘Have you locked yourself out?’

  ‘No, no,’ Bridgette said cheerfully. ‘I do this all the time—here they are.’ She produced them with a ‘ta ra!’ and she let herself in, which of course meant that she had to let him in too—well, she couldn’t really leave him on the doorstep.

  ‘Go through,’ she said, because she didn’t even want him to get a glimpse of the chaos in the bedroom. ‘I’ll just be a moment.’ Except he didn’t go through. He stood in the hallway as she slipped through the smallest crack in the door and then scrambled to find her shoes. She must get more organised. Bridgette knew that, dreamt of the day when she finally had some sort of routine. She’d had a loose one once, before Harry was born, but now the whole flat seemed to have gone to pot.

  There they were, under the bed. She grabbed her pumps and sort of limbo-danced around the door so that he wouldn’t see inside. ‘Sorry about that,’ she said. ‘Just been a bit of a mad rush.’

  ‘Look, if you’re too tired to go out for dinner…’

  She gave him a strange look. ‘I’m starving,’ Bridgette said. ‘How could anyone be too tired to eat dinner?’

  ‘I meant…’

  ‘So we’re not going out dancing, then,’ she teased. ‘You’re not going to teach me the flamenco.’ She was leaning against the wall and putting on her ballet pumps, hardly a provocative move, except it was to him.

  ‘Impressed with my Spanish, were you?’

  ‘No Flamenco Medico?’ She pouted and raised her arm and gave a stamp of her foot. Dominic stood there, his black eyes watching and sudden tension in his throat.

  ‘Any chance of a drink?’

  ‘Sure!’ She beamed and headed to the kitchen and opened the fridge. ‘I’ve got…’ She stared at a jug of cordial, kicked herself for not grabbing some beer or wine, or olives and vermouth to make cocktails, she frantically thought.

  ‘I meant water.’

  ‘Oh, I think I’ve got some somewhere.’ She grinned and turned on the tap. ‘Oh, yes, here it is.’ Was that a reluctant smile on the edge of his lips? ‘Here you go.’ She handed him the glass as his phone rang, and because of his job he had no choice but to check it. Bridgette’s smile was a wry one as ‘Arabella’ flashed up on the screen.

  ‘She’s hitting the bottle early tonight.’

  He laughed. ‘It’s my birthday.’

  ‘Oh!’ It was all she could think of to say and then her brain sort of slid back into functioning. ‘Happy birthday,’ she said. ‘I’ve got candles but no cake.’

  Then the phone rang again and they stood there.

  And she was annoyed at his ex, annoyed that he was standing there in her kitchen, and her eyes told him so. ‘You really did break her heart, didn’t you?’

  ‘Long story,’ he said. He didn’t want to talk about it, hadn’t ever spoken about it, and really he’d rather not now.

  ‘Short version?’

  ‘Come on,’ he said, ‘the table’s booked.’

  ‘You know what?’ Bridgette said. ‘I’m not very hungry.’

  ‘You just said you were starving.’

  ‘Not enough to sit through five hundred phone calls from your ex.’

  ‘Okay, okay.’ He offered a major concession. ‘I’ll turn it off.’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not doing it any more, putting up with crap.’ She was talking about Paul, but she was talking about him too, or rather she was talking about herself—she would not put herself through it again. ‘Even if you turn it off, I’ll know she’s ringing. What’s that saying? If a tree falls in a forest, does it make a noise?’

  ‘What?’ He was irritated, annoyed, but certainly not with her. ‘I’ve said I’ll turn it off, Bridgette. She doesn’t usually ring—I never thought when I asked you to come out that it was my birthday. I don’t get sentimental, I don’t sit remembering last year, blah blah blah.’

  ‘Blah blah blah…’ Bridgette said, her voice rising, irritated and annoyed, and certainly it was with him. ‘That’s all she was, blah blah blah.’ The night was over before it had even started. She really should have left it at one night with him. ‘What is it with men?’ She stormed past him, completely ready to show him the door, and it was almost a shout that halted her.

  ‘She didn’t want my brother and his friends at our engagement party.’

  They both stood, in a sort of stunned silence, he for saying it, she that he had.

  ‘He’s got Down’s,’ Dominic said, and she was glad that she knew already. ‘He lives in sheltered housing. When I’m there I go over every week and sometimes she came with me. She was great…or I thought she was, then when we were planning the engagement, my dad suggested it might be better if Chris didn’t come, Chris and his friends, that we have a separate party for them, and she agreed. “It might be a bit awkward.”’ He put on a very plummy voice. ‘“You know, for the other guests. You know how he loves to dance.”’

  And Bridgette stood there and didn’t know what to say.r />
  ‘I couldn’t get past it,’ Dominic said, and he’d never discussed this with another person, but now that he’d started, it was as if he couldn’t stop. Months of seething anger and hurt for his brother all tumbling out. ‘My dad wanted nothing to do with him when he was born, he has nothing to do with him now, and it turned out Arabella didn’t want him around either—well, not in the way I thought she would.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ It was all she could say and she could hear the bitterness in his response.

  ‘She keeps saying sorry too—that she didn’t mean it and if we can just go back of course he can come to our party. She claims that she said what she did because she was just trying to get on with my dad, except I heard it and I know that it was meant.’ He shook his head. ‘You think you know someone…’

  And when the phone rang again she decided that she did know what to say, after all.

  ‘Give it to me,’ she said, and she answered it and gave him a wink and a smile as she spoke. ‘Sorry, Dominic’s in bed…’ She looked at him, saw him groan out a laugh as she answered Arabella’s question. ‘So what if it’s early? I never said that he was asleep.’ And she put down the phone but didn’t turn it off. Instead she put her hand to her mouth and started kissing it, making breathy noises. Then she jumped up onto the bench, her bottom knocking over a glass.

  ‘Dominic!’ she shrieked.

  ‘Bridgette!’ He was folded over laughing as he turned off the phone. ‘You’re wicked.’

  ‘I can be,’ she said.

  And he looked at her sitting on the bench all dishevelled and sexy, and thought of the noises she had made and what she had done, and just how far they had come since that night. Her words were like a red rag to a bull—he sort of charged her, right there in the kitchen.

  Ferocious was his kiss as he pushed her further up the bench, and frantic was her response as she dragged herself back.