Her Great Expectations

by Joan Kilby

  Reluctantly he accepted it, then immediately rolled it into a cylinder. “And if the next test gives the same result?”

  “It will indicate you have type 2 diabetes. It’s not the end of the world,” she added quickly as his expression turned dark. “Diet and exercise are critical to managing the condition. Medication can improve the efficiency of your own insulin—”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “You will go for the follow-up test, won’t you?” Sienna pressed. “As I’ve just told the group, if diabetes goes untreated there can be serious complications.”

  “I’ll get the blood test,” Steve said, but without enthusiasm. “Does Jack know about the first one?”

  “Not unless you mentioned it to him. Have you told your wife?”

  “Nah. She’s gone walkabout,” he muttered. “A bloody meditation retreat.”

  Searching his troubled face, she said gently, “Steve, why are you keeping this from your family?”

  “I explained already,” he said, frowning. “I don’t want people fussing over me.”

  Or stopping him from eating sweets, was Sienna’s guess. “Make sure you take care of yourself. Are you walking?”

  “Smedley gets me out every day.” He bent and scratched behind the dog’s ears. “Come on, pup. You need to go outside before we get back to work.”

  Sienna returned to the lounge area to finish packing up her display. As she was stuffing rolled posters into a cardboard tube she saw Steve detour into the kitchen, drop the cucumber sticks into the rubbish bin and tuck a couple of cookies into his pocket. Her heart sank as he left the shed. Then she shrugged. She wasn’t the food police.

  The other men had drifted back to work. Jack was last to go, grabbing a carrot stick and a cookie. “You hit the health message pretty hard,” he said. “I think the guys are a bit shell-shocked. Food is also about enjoyment. Maybe the next time you give that talk, you might think about finding a way to make healthy food fun.”

  “I’m speaking to adults, not children.” Sienna slid a sheaf of extra pamphlets into her briefcase. Jack looked good in his polo shirt and snug jeans but she kept her mind on business. “Does Ralph’s wife bring cakes and cookies every day?”

  “Pretty much. The guys really look forward to it.”

  Sienna hesitated. She couldn’t betray doctor-patient confidentiality, but she had a moral duty to convey her concern. “Your dad would be wise to cut back on sweets. He’s overweight, especially around the middle.”

  “He likes them.” Jack’s chin came up. “Doesn’t everyone?”

  Sienna noticed Steve, back from taking Smedley outside, watching them from across the room and decided not to pursue the matter. It was up to him to take responsibility for his health.

  “All things in moderation. So, you got the shed up and running,” she commented to Jack. “Are you enjoying it?”

  He scowled in feigned exasperation. “Ralph puts his tools down all over the place and then forgets where. Bob needles Paul continuously. My dad’s wood shavings are getting into my electronics.”

  In other words, he loved it. And she found the aura of purposeful energy that surrounded him very attractive.

  “Remember, it’s temporary,” he warned. “Don’t get any ideas.”

  “No ideas whatsoever.” Sienna lifted her palms, careful not to say I told you so. “Do you mind if I take a look at what the guys are doing before I go?”

  “Go ahead. I’d better go see what Oliver’s up to.”

  Sienna left her posters, easel and briefcase in the sitting area and walked across to the workbench where Bob was making kites.

  “Very impressive,” Sienna said, watching Bob’s stumpy fingers notch together the diamond-shaped fiberglass frame he’d constructed. Finished kites hung from the pegboard behind the bench. The colorful sails were made of ripstop nylon and appliquéd with butterflies and birds.

  “My wife makes the sails at home,” Bob said. “She’s got a commercial sewing machine and a friend who sells her the fabric wholesale.”

  “You two could go into business,” Sienna said.

  “Nah, you couldn’t make a living out of it.”

  As Sienna moved away, her gaze sought out Jack and Oliver. Their heads were bent together as Jack showed Olly how to attach wires to the dogbot. Olly was nodding, the way he did when he listened hard. Jack glanced up, saw Sienna watching them. She looked away, annoyed at herself for getting caught staring.

  Amid a liberal sprinkling of sawdust was a pile of rough wood blocks and a couple of wooden toy cars and boats. The layer of wood shavings carpeting the concrete floor rustled as she approached.

  “Those aren’t finished,” Ralph said as she picked up a toy car. “I’ve got to give them a coat of paint.”

  “The wheels even turn,” Sienna said, spinning a front tire. “I love the headlights and outlines of the doors.”

  At the end of the workbench Jack had his head down, working steadily. If he was aware of her coming closer, he wasn’t letting on.

  She moved on to where Steve was fitting the rockers onto a wooden horse while Jason sanded the body of another beast. A finished palomino with a painted golden body and white mane and tail stood to one side.

  “Hey, Steve, Jason,” Sienna said. “What a pretty horse.”

  Steve hiked his pants up his bulging belly and proudly touched the palomino’s head to set the rockers in motion. “Jason got us real horsehair from his cousin’s stables. ’Course, I know he’s just hanging around the stable to chat up the girls who come to ride. Isn’t that right, Jase?”

  The boy flushed bright red and ducked his head, his hand flashing as he scrubbed faster with his sandpaper.

  Sienna laughed softly. This time when her gaze rose she found Jack watching her. She recalled how he’d tweaked her braid. Her cheeks turned warm. Deliberately she moved away from the bench even though Olly had talked of nothing but dogbots all week. Instead she veered across the room to see what Paul was doing with the bikes.

  Two used children’s bikes were leaning against the wall. A third was upside down on top of a canvas tarp with the front wheel lying on the floor. Paul was hunkered down beside it, nuts, bolts and small tools organized tidily along the perimeter of the tarp.

  She ran her fingers through the white plastic streamers on the handles of a pink-and-purple girl’s bike. “I had a bicycle just like this when I was five years old.”

  Paul rose and stretched out his lower back. “You should have seen the rusted mess that was when it came in. I had to take it completely apart and spray paint every piece separately.”

  “You guys have accomplished so much already,” she marveled. “I can’t wait to see what you come up with by Trivia Night.”

  Paul shrugged. “We’ve got three weeks to find out.”

  Three weeks until she had to see Jack again socially.

  She hovered at the edge of Paul’s workspace. From the back, Jack’s broad back was bent slightly as he worked, his triceps flexing below the short sleeves of his polo shirt. He stood with one hip cocked, the denim pulled snugly over his butt. Olly glanced up at him every minute or so to ask a question or get confirmation that he was assembling his robot correctly. Jack was so different from Anthony, who could perform delicate heart surgery but wouldn’t know how to change a washer on a tap.

  Paul stepped around her to get something and cast a curious glance her way. Realizing she was still standing there, she took a breath and set out across the room. Her son saw her coming and made space for her between him and his new hero.

  “Look at this,” Oliver said, proudly placing his dogbot upright.

  The toy was six inches high with a square flat body of transparent yellow plastic. It had four plastic legs attached to wheels, a black whipcord tail, a head with a steel bolt for a muzzle and pricked ears made of swiveling steel washers.

  Oliver picked up a remote control and switched it on. The dogbot’s head turned. Sienna smiled as Olly supplied the bark. He p
ressed a toggle switch and the dogbot rolled forward. “We’re trying to find a way to make the tail wag.”

  “Your son put that together,” Jack said. “He’s got real talent.”

  “It’s great, Olly.” Sienna was surprised but not necessarily thrilled. She was always proud of Oliver, but lately this…talent…was distracting him from his studies.

  Her ambivalence must have shown. “Something wrong?” Jack asked.

  “Olly’s been spending every afternoon here.”

  “Jack needs my help,” Oliver piped up.

  Sienna looked at Jack.

  “That’s right.” Jack gazed down at Oliver and smiled.

  A surge of possessiveness rushed through her. Oliver was besotted with his new friend. Jack had altogether too much influence on her son.

  Get a grip. They were only making toys. It wasn’t as if he had any real influence on Oliver.

  She nodded at the black metal box shrouded in plastic pushed to the back of the workbench on the other side of Jack. “What’s that?”

  “That? Oh, nothing.” There was a shimmer of tension in his voice. He leaned over to sort through a container of screws and bolts, blocking her view.

  She nodded and backed off. Oliver wasn’t as experienced at picking up clues or else his curiosity overrode politeness. He peered around Jack to get a closer look. “It looks like some kind of electronic instrument.”

  “It’s just a thing I built for small aircraft,” he said dismissively. “It doesn’t work.”

  “What kind of a thing?” Oliver persisted.

  “Don’t bother him with so many questions,” Sienna said. Although she had to admit she was curious, too. If it was nothing, why was he taking such pains to hide it?

  “He doesn’t mind, do you, Jack?” Oliver said.

  “It’s a global positioning system.” He was clearly making an effort, not entirely successful, not to be irritated with the boy.

  “A GPS? Cool!” Oliver put down his dogbot to scurry over.

  “It’s broken,” Jack repeated. “Nothing to look at.”

  Oliver lifted a corner of the plastic. The casing was dented so badly that the components inside must have been damaged, too. The screen on the front was cracked and the control panel stripped clean away.

  “It’s broken, all right.” Oliver touched a piece of the screen that was sticking out and accidentally chipped it off.

  “Don’t do that,” Jack said sharply.

  Oliver dropped his hand, startled. “Sorry.”

  “When you say you built it, do you mean you invented it?” Sienna asked.

  “I took an existing global positioning system and adapted it to cope with the requirements of small aircraft in Australia,” he explained, his words hurried and impatient. “So, yes, you could say I invented it.”

  What he was saying sank in.

  “You invented a GPS for aircraft.” Her voice was flat. Gesturing to the dogbots, she demanded, “Why are you making toys when you’re capable of creating sophisticated equipment?”

  “The physical damage isn’t the only problem. It’s got programming bugs.” He jerked the plastic cover back over the GPS. “I don’t know why I haven’t thrown it out.”

  “Couldn’t you could work out the bugs?” Oliver asked.

  “Not interested.” Jack went back to the workbench and started wiring a battery to the underside of the yellow plastic dogbot body. A muscle ticked in his jaw as he focused intently on his task.

  All of a sudden Sienna recalled how Jack had lost his wife. She put a hand on Oliver’s shoulder, warning him not to ask any more questions. She glanced at the shrouded plastic and her skin prickled. Had this GPS been in the plane crash that killed her?

  “I’d better go,” she said awkwardly.

  Jack put down the dogbot. “I’ll carry your stand for you.”

  “I can manage…” she began, but he was already striding back to the kitchen area.

  “Did I do something wrong, Mum?” Oliver asked.

  “Don’t worry about it. Just lay off the GPS, okay? And be home in time for dinner. I’ll see you later.” She ruffled his hair and let out a sigh. Then she headed across to the coffee area where Jack was gathering up her things.

  Jack grabbed her briefcase, tucked her easel stand under his arm and without a word carried them out to her car. Sienna followed. She got into the driver’s seat and rolled down the window. “Sorry about that back there. Oliver doesn’t know…”

  Jack propped his hands on the roof and leaned in. “Just what is it that you think you know?”

  Sienna licked her lips, which were suddenly dry. “Your wife died in a plane crash. You were the pilot.”

  His features twisted. He straightened, slapped the roof. “See you around.”

  So it was true, Sienna thought. Jack was still hung up on his late wife.

  “YOU’LL NEED A WARM HAT, gloves, ski jacket and pants—”

  “I don’t need ski pants,” Olly said. “I’ll wear jeans.”

  “Do you know how cold denim gets when it’s wet?” Sienna stopped in the middle of the mall and peered through the throng of shoppers. “Where is that outdoors shop? I thought it was right next to Target.”

  “Sienna!” a woman’s voice called from behind them.

  Sienna gazed blankly out at a sea of unfamiliar faces. Then she spotted Lexie’s blond curly head bobbing through the crowd. “Hey, Lexie.”

  Lexie waved at Sienna with a paint-stained hand. Over her other arm was a bag bearing the logo of an artists’ supply shop. “I’m so glad I ran into you. I asked Jack for your phone number but he didn’t have it. Do you remember I wanted to paint your portrait for the Archibald Prize? I was serious.” She pressed her hands together. “Please, will you do it? It won’t take more than a few sittings if I take photos, too. We could get started this weekend. Today, if it suits you.”

  “Oh, but I…” Sienna began, flustered. “Oliver, this is Lexie, Jack’s sister. Lexie, this is Oliver, my son. He’s going to New Zealand on a skiing trip in a few weeks. We’re getting him outfitted this afternoon. Tonight I’m going out.”

  “You never told me that,” Oliver said. “Is it a date?”

  Hearing the heightened interest in his voice, she stared at him. Since when was he interested in her social life? “I’m going to dinner and a movie with Natalie, one of the other doctors at the clinic.”

  “Could you sit for me tomorrow?” Lexie asked hopefully.

  “Well,” Sienna began, racking her brains for an excuse. Sitting for her portrait seemed so vain. “I usually spend Sundays with Oliver.”

  “I’m working on a school project with Jason,” Olly said.

  In that case she had nothing to do tomorrow except wrestle with the weeds in her backyard. It wasn’t about her, she decided; it was about Lexie’s painting. “Okay, I can sit.”

  “Wonderful!” Lexie bounced on the toes of her ballet flats. Then she rummaged in her leather shoulder bag and found a scrap of paper and a pen. “Here’s my address. Come around two o’clock. That’s when the light hits my studio.” She handed Sienna the paper. “Thank you! Thank you!”

  “That’s all right.” Sienna smiled at Lexie’s infectious enthusiasm. Getting to know her would be fun.

  Lexie hurried off, and Sienna and Oliver resumed threading their way through the mall. In a few moments they came to the outdoor shop.

  They searched the racks of ski jackets for something they could agree on. Oliver wanted a flashy, trendy jacket; Sienna insisted on one that would keep him warm and dry.

  “How about this one?” She held up a dark brown coat.

  “Ew, no.”

  Sienna stifled a sigh and kept flicking through the hangers. “You know you have to finish all your homework and assignments before you go, don’t you?”

  Oliver slipped on a bright green jacket with purple stripes on the upper arms. “This one’s cool.”

  “And there’s that math test.” Sienna eyed the ja
cket critically as she fingered the thinly quilted down. “You’d freeze in this thing.”

  “I have to finish the dogbots. Jack wants to make twenty for the Trivia Night.”

  “The dogbots are his responsibility. Your job is to do your homework.”

  Jack this, Jack that. His name was all Sienna heard out of Oliver these days. She was trying to forget the man. “Why were you so interested in what I’m doing tonight?” she asked with studied casualness.

  “I thought you and Jack might go out,” he said with the ingenuousness of youth. “He’s cool.”

  Sienna hoped he wasn’t discussing her with her son. She held up a navy jacket. “How about this?”

  “I want this one,” he insisted, holding up the fluorescent-green coat. “Dad sent me the money. It’s not like you’re even paying for it.”

  “I’m still your mother and I’m sure your dad would want me to make sure you’ve got good-quality clothing, not junk that will fall apart or won’t keep you warm.”

  “I’d roast in the one you chose,” Oliver pointed out. “I don’t get as cold as you do.” It was a medical fact that young people had higher metabolisms. But Sienna wasn’t wearing her white coat today. “Just try it on, okay? Put on the pants, too. You want to be sure they’re long enough.”

  “Oh, all right.” Oliver took the hanger and trudged off to the fitting rooms.

  She browsed through the shop, picking up a pair of ski gloves she thought he might like, then wandered back. A man in a jacket and pants just like the ones Olly had gone to try on was checking himself in the mirror outside the fitting room. Sienna was just thinking how good the outfit looked when he turned around.

  The man was her son.

  Her hand went to her heart. “Olly, you scared me!”

  “Huh?”

  “I…” She recovered and managed a smile. “I didn’t expect you to look so grown up. I thought you were a man.”

  He frowned importantly into the mirror. “I am a man.” His voice cracked as he said it, though. He gave her a sheepish grin and she had to laugh.

  “Go take those off and we’ll pay for them,” Sienna said.

  Oliver’s smile faded. “What about the green outfit?”