‘He must be in there!’ I cry, attracting curious stares from other passengers on the bus. We’re not far from Queenstown now – I can see a glimpse of Lake Wakatipu in the distance.
‘I think the alarm’s on,’ Hayley says. ‘I can see the light flashing.’
The icy fingers of dread that had wrapped themselves around my airways ease off a little.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Well, the only way to find out is to try and break in, and I don’t really fancy being arrested at this time on a Sunday morning – or ever, for that matter. Oh, hang on, Mrs Gilbert is coming.’
Our nosy-but-nice neighbour must have heard the commotion. I can just imagine her padding importantly down the drive in her pink slippers, her Highland terrier Boris taking the opportunity to lift his leg on David’s rose bushes.
‘I’d better speak to her,’ I allow, and Hayley passes me over.
‘Hello, Genie darling – is that really you? I thought you were in New Zealand?’
‘I am,’ I say. ‘They do have phone reception here, though.’
‘Yes, of course they do, silly me.’
‘Sorry to have woken you up so early,’ I begin, ‘but I’m trying to find my dad. Have you seen him this week?’
‘Yes, dear, he popped over yesterday morning to give me his spare key.’
‘Why?’ I demand, aware that I’m perhaps not being as polite as I could be.
‘Well, he always leaves me a key when he goes on holiday,’ says Mrs Gilbert. ‘Didn’t you know he was going away?’
Obviously not.
‘I don’t think so,’ I reply warily, second-guessing my own memory. Did David mention that he was going somewhere? Where would he even go at this time of year – to a friend’s?
‘Is everything OK?’ asks Mrs Gilbert.
‘Yes, of course – thank you,’ I say, wracking my brain for any further clues as she mutters something about time zones.
‘There you go,’ Hayley declares. ‘Problem solved. Can I go back to bed now?’
‘David didn’t tell me he was going away,’ I grumble, standing up as the bus groans to a halt on Shotover Street. It’s odd how much coming back to Queenstown feels like arriving home.
‘Perhaps it was a last-minute thing?’ suggests Hayley, who is now back in her car. I can hear the swish of windscreen wipers.
‘God, I’m sorry I dragged you out of bed. I just panicked when I couldn’t get hold of him.’
‘It’s fine,’ Hayley hushes. ‘Don’t worry about it. You would do the same for me.’
‘I wonder where he’s gone?’ I say, leaning against the wall beside the NZone Skydive Centre, where two girls with Thailand tans and braided hair are daring each other to go inside. Anna and I had a conversation about skydiving once, and she made me promise that if I ever did it, I wouldn’t tell her until afterwards, when I was safely back on the ground.
‘Somewhere sunny, if he’s got any sense,’ muses Hayley. ‘It’s vile weather here.’
I look up towards where the sun has just emerged from behind a small, tufty cloud, and decide not to rub my friend’s nose in the fact that it’s glorious where I am.
‘David hates the sun,’ I say insistently. ‘He has the same complexion as me – we’re not made for it. And anyway,’ I add, thinking, ‘he wouldn’t just swan off without telling me – he knows that I worry since—’
It is then that an exceptionally horrible thought occurs to me. Maybe David really is angry with me after what I admitted to him on Christmas Eve. At the time, he had reassured and comforted, but perhaps upon reflection, he has realised that what I did that winter morning was as reprehensible as I had always feared, and now he doesn’t want to see or speak to me, because he can’t bear to.
‘David would never do anything to deliberately upset or worry you,’ Hayley says then, as if I had blurted out the words instead of merely thinking them. ‘There must be a good reason.’
‘There will be an explanation,’ I decide, reassuring myself more than her. ‘You should go – this call will be costing you a fortune.’
It’s only when we have said our goodbyes and I’m walking distractedly back up the hill towards the apartment that I remember the man’s voice I heard. Lucky Hayley, I think, despising my envy almost as soon as it manifests as a scowl on my face. I am happy for my friend, and even more so for whoever she woke up with this morning, because he is a very fortunate man. It’s just that it has been such a long time since I have been close to anyone in that way – and when Kit comforted me on the pier in Oamaru, it only served to make me realise how long. I had felt a yearning in that moment, even though I was flooded with mournfulness, and the same stirring of desire had been there amongst the eerie lights of the portal, too, when Kit stood so close behind me. When we sat on that balcony, sharing stories of our lives in between sips of whisky, that longing intensified yet more, until I had no choice but to excuse myself and go to bed. It was either that, or risk giving in to the need that the alcohol was coaxing out of me. Because that was surely all it was – that is all it can ever be.
I know it makes no sense to hanker after that which you cannot have – it’s all I have done for the past year, and even before that. I guess I have always been craving a missing something, or someone. Tonight, however, as I pull the covers up around my chin and wait for sleep to sneak in and rescue me, not only from my own confusion but from my increasing concern about David’s whereabouts, there is only one person whose arms I would like to be wrapped around me.
37
Bonnie
For the first few moments after he opened the door to find Bonnie standing there, the professor just stared at her. Bonnie took in the absence of hair, the lines around the kind eyes, the bags underneath them. Here was a man who had been through a terrible ordeal, but even if she hadn’t known as much, Bonnie would have guessed it as soon as she saw him.
‘Bonnie,’ he said at last, letting go of the breath he had been holding in. ‘It’s …’
He paused, visibly overcome by a surge of feeling so potent that Bonnie felt herself move forwards to comfort him. It was how their friendship had begun, all those years ago. The professor had been upset, and she had supported him. It was the thing that bonded them together.
‘Sorry,’ she said, hanging her head. ‘I should have called first, I know, but I was afraid that you would tell me not to come. I only just found out about Anna, and, oh bloody hell, Dave, I’m so, so sorry. I can’t believe it.’
David nodded, just once, his bottom lip tucked behind his teeth as he fought tears.
‘I can’t either sometimes,’ he said with a sigh, looking past her and along the driveway. There had been a frost that morning, and the front lawn still glittered beneath a tepid sun. Bonnie could see her breath in the air between herself and David, and shivered.
‘Those days are the worst, in a way,’ he said absently. ‘I wake up and, for a blissful minute, I forget that Annabel’s gone – sometimes I even reach out for her. But then reality lands on me again, and …’ He trailed off, his expression articulating far more than any words could ever have done.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Bonnie said again, feeling as if she was being no help at all. ‘I wish I’d known sooner. If I had, I would have—’
‘Don’t worry.’ David pushed his spectacles up on his nose. ‘There was nothing anyone could have done. It is what it is.’
‘I would have come sooner if I’d known,’ protested Bonnie, although even as she said it, she wondered how true it really was. Would learning of Anna’s death have been enough of a reason to persuade her to get on a plane? She liked to believe that it would have. And as soon as she had read the first few lines of the article about Anna’s accident in Tracey’s kitchen, all she could think was that she had to get here as quickly as possible. She had been packed and in a taxi to the train station inside ten minutes.
‘Please come in,’ David said then. ‘Sorry, forgetting my manners. Must be the sho
ck of seeing you again after so many years. You look well, by the way. Did I say that already?’
He had taken a step back and opened the front door a fraction more, revealing a wide tiled hallway and a side table piled high with unopened post.
Bonnie hesitated.
‘Is Evangeline …?’ she began, but David shook his head.
‘She’s not here, and you won’t believe it when I tell you where she actually is.’
Bonnie was about to ask what he meant, when her phone beeped with a message. Recognising the tone as the one she had allocated to Kit, she fished it out of her handbag, apologising to David as she followed him inside.
‘Mission Penguin a big success,’ she read, then gasped as she took in the photo that Kit had sent along with it. There was Tui, smiling broadly beside a large statue of a penguin, one hand waving up towards whoever was taking the photo, and the other clamped firmly in the hand of— No, it couldn’t be! The young woman had chin-length thick dark hair and a neat, rounded chin. She was gazing down at her half-sister with nothing but adoration in her eyes. Evangeline was in New Zealand.
Bonnie came to an abrupt standstill in the hallway, her hand over her mouth.
‘Everything OK?’ David came back towards her.
Unable to speak, Bonnie simply handed him the phone.
‘Oh, gosh!’ he exclaimed, pushing his glasses up from where they had slipped down his nose. ‘Is that Genie? It is! Oh, she looks well. She’s cut all her hair off. And who’s that with her?’
‘My daughter,’ Bonnie croaked. ‘Tui.’
‘Aha.’ David looked again. ‘Yes, Genie did mention that she’d met her. They seem to be getting on rather well, don’t they?’
How could he be so calm about this? Bonnie was struck dumb. But then she remembered, David Nash always had been difficult to shock. He was practical-minded – a man with solutions rather than problems. And he’d presumably had advance warning. Evangeline must have been in touch with him regularly, filling him in on Bonnie’s life back in New Zealand. But did this photo mean that Tui was aware she had a sister? No, it couldn’t – Kit would have called her if that was the case – or Simon. Evangeline must have become friends with Tui and Kit without coming clean about who she was. And who could blame her? Certainly not Bonnie – the queen of omitting truth.
‘Genie really does look well,’ David remarked contentedly, handing Bonnie her phone back.
‘I thought she was called Evangeline,’ murmured Bonnie, who thought she might fall over if she didn’t find a chair to sit on soon. David, perhaps sensing this, led her into a very modern kitchen and pulled out a stool.
‘Oh, she is,’ he said cheerfully. ‘But we call her Genie for short. She always felt like she made a wish come true for me and for Anna, so it made sense. Now, would you like coffee or tea? I can make a pot of either.’
He was reaching for the kettle as if all this were completely normal, as if women he hadn’t seen for almost thirty years regularly showed up at his front door in search of the children they’d given him.
‘Tea,’ she managed, easing herself into a sitting position and gazing again at the photo of her two daughters. How could this be happening? How could Evangeline be there in New Zealand, casually hunting for penguins with Tui and Kit, while she, Bonnie, was here? Evangeline had gone to find her at exactly the same time as Bonnie had sought her out – it was enough to make her head spin.
David filled the silence by putting the water on to boil, readying two mugs and fetching the milk from the fridge. Bonnie watched him with unseeing eyes, envious of him for having tasks to complete while all she could do was sit there, trying to make sense of everything.
‘How long has Genie been in New Zealand?’ she asked, and David frowned mid-stir, then referred to the calendar pinned up by the back door.
‘She flew out on the eleventh,’ he said, blowing air into his cheeks. ‘Gosh, that was quite a while ago, wasn’t it?’
‘That’s the same day I flew here,’ Bonnie replied numbly.
‘I assumed it must have been.’ David put a steaming mug down in front of her. Bonnie had been shivering pretty much non-stop since she found out about Anna, and now she wrapped both her hands around the cup in an attempt to extract some much-needed warmth.
‘Genie went to find you the day after she arrived,’ David explained, levering himself on to the stool opposite her own. ‘Someone told her you’d come here, but she decided to stay and wait for you to return.’
‘What a bloody mess.’ Bonnie was shaking her head now in disbelief. ‘I mean, what are the chances that, after all this time, we try to find each other at exactly the same bloody time?’
‘Where have you been since you arrived?’ David enquired.
‘I came to see Evangeline,’ Bonnie said. ‘But when I landed, I couldn’t make myself come here. I was terrified, and I needed some more time to get my thoughts in order, so I went to stay with Tracey.’
‘Sunrise Tracey?’ he exclaimed, and Bonnie smiled for the first time.
‘The very same.’
‘Gosh! How is she?’
Bonnie filled him in, explaining how she had come to learn about Anna’s accident.
‘Of course.’ David sipped his tea. ‘Tracey never knew my surname, did she? She used to call me “The Professor”.’
‘I can’t even begin to imagine how awful it’s been for you,’ she said in a small voice. ‘For both of you.’ Bonnie fiddled with the cuffs of her thick winter coat, which she had yet to remove. Despite the artificial heat in the kitchen, she still felt chilled right through to her bones.
‘Genie took it very badly,’ David said, rubbing at his eyes so rigorously that his glasses fell right off. ‘It was my idea that she fly over and try to find you – I thought that perhaps it would help. I should have written or called, but like you, I was afraid that you would refuse to see her. We never wanted to close that door completely, and I’m ashamed that Anna and I allowed it to happen. Annabel was so bowled over by love for Evangeline, and she used to worry herself into a fury imagining that you would come back one day to claim her. In the end, I guess it became easier to distance ourselves. But Genie always knew that she had a mum somewhere – we never lied to her about the adoption.’
‘Did she never ask to see her original birth certificate?’ Bonnie asked, because she knew that if it were her, she would have peered under every pebble in the world until she found out the truth.
‘Quite the opposite,’ David admitted, staring resolutely down at his moccasin-style slippers. ‘We told her there were no adoption papers because you were a friend of a friend, and that it was easier to simply put Anna’s name down as her mother and my name as her father to avoid the headache and expense of going through official channels.’
‘And she believed you?’
David shrugged. ‘I guess she did – she asked me once about who her real father was, but I simply told her we didn’t know.’
Bonnie took a sip of her tea, unable suddenly to look at him.
‘And you never heard from … you know who?’
David shook his head. ‘No – not a peep. But then, none of us expected that he would get in touch, not after what he did.’
‘So, why now?’ Bonnie couldn’t help but ask. ‘Why does Genie want to know me now?’
‘Anna dying left a hole that was far too large for me to fill,’ he said. ‘In the past, Genie had been quite dismissive about the idea of seeking you out, but now I’m wondering if that was more to do with Anna than Genie herself. She was fiercely loyal to Anna,’ he explained. ‘She would have known that expressing an interest in locating you would have hurt her mum, so she talked herself out of it.’
‘I suppose that makes sense,’ Bonnie allowed. ‘You never want to let your parents down, do you? It’s why I never told my own about Evangeline – I foolishly convinced myself that it would devastate them, when in fact, the opposite was probably true.’
David looked ashen.
<
br /> ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said. ‘I should have supported you better back then – offered to tell your mother and father myself.’
‘No.’ Bonnie was adamant. ‘It wouldn’t have made any difference. I was damn stubborn, and I wanted Evangeline to have the best chance at happiness. That was you and Anna. And she has been happy, hasn’t she? My girl?’
Bonnie’s voice had cracked as she said the last, and David waited a moment or two before replying.
‘I think we made her happy,’ he confirmed, nodding as if to reassure himself. ‘But she is definitely not happy now. The thing is, Genie blames herself for the accident – which is ridiculous, of course – but she can’t seem to move past it. Until she went out to New Zealand, she had barely left the house in a year. She gave up her job – a job she loved – and only saw a handful of her friends. It’s been terrible for her.’
Bonnie was about to offer more comfort, when David surprised her by smiling.
‘That’s why it was so nice to see that photo just now,’ he went on. ‘She looks like her old self again – and happier than I can recall her being in a very long time.’
‘Tui has that effect on people,’ Bonnie told him, smiling now herself as she pictured her rambunctious daughter. ‘It’s impossible to feel sad around her for long.’
‘She sounds like her mum,’ David said quietly. ‘You always had that same effect on me, if I remember rightly. Before Anna came back, I leant on you so much. I never forgot that.’
‘I can barely remember what I was like then,’ Bonnie told him honestly. ‘I have been trying to, over the past few weeks.’
Reaching into her bag, she produced a sheaf of lined paper and held it up. ‘I started writing down the story of everything that happened back then, to give to Evangeline.’
‘Everything that happened?’
David was staring at her, his gaze intent.
‘I haven’t got to the end of the story yet,’ she said carefully. ‘So no, not everything.’
‘Have you had any breakfast?’ he asked.
Startled by the abrupt change of subject, Bonnie stammered an incoherent reply.
One Winter Morning Page 21
