by Jennie Jones
He stepped forwards, his arms out. Surprise crossed her face when she realised what he was about to do. He didn’t give her a chance to speak, or to step back. He took her in his arms for a hug.
Christ, she was small. Or maybe he was just big. ‘Thank you for everything you’ve done for me.’
It was as though the strong woman he knew, the one who’d brought him up—body and soul—had suddenly turned frail and unsure. He didn’t let her go. Partly because he wasn’t sure if she could stand on her own legs, partly to give her time to adjust to this new kind of communication between them, and partly because he wanted to hug her harder. Thank her more profusely. Tell her he’d always look after her. Always. But he couldn’t speak, and it appeared that neither could she.
It was certainly not a good moment to crack a joke.
Then she raised her arms and put them around Tom. Her fingers pressed into the muscle on his back. ‘Always loved you, Tom. Always will.’
Talk about new experiences. This one beat them all. ‘You too, Imelda. Always.’
She patted his back. One slap that told him she’d regained herself and it was probably time he did the same thing.
‘Right.’ He wanted to clear his throat, swipe a hand over his head and moisten his dried mouth but resisted the urge. It would do nothing more than show the insecurity he was feeling; which Imelda already knew was there.
He released her when she made the first move. He stepped back, not able to look her in the eye, but missing the physical communication they’d never had before.
‘Okay. Best go pick up the kid.’
‘Yes. You’d best do that, Tom Wade.’
***
He left the house with a pain in his gut and the start of a rainbow in his chest. Jesus, what the woman had had to deal with. Beyond his imagining. Him? He’d have left. His mother? She’d had as little choice as her own mother, but she had attempted to break free. While Imelda stayed put, holding it all together.
The thought of all the grief his grandmother had known knotted his gut. The rainbow of hope that had been in his chest disappeared. It won’t happen to Adele. It wasn’t the same era and she had more chances to use her brains and her skills. She’d got this far, and now she’d found a home for herself and for Ali. She’d cope, and she’d give it all her heart.
He couldn’t let Adele haunt him. If there was a chance—which there wasn’t—that he could offer to take Adele and Ali with him, she’d refuse anyway. She’d kick-started a new life here and she was making headway. And what did Tom have? No business and a small, newly rented unit in the city. No time to cater to a family. Not for at least ten years. What good was that to Adele?
Adele had friends, and people who cared. She’d be all right. She’d be looked after, if some trouble came her way. And Imelda would tell him if that happened. Then Tom would come marching back into town, ready to fight for her—if she hadn’t already moved on and met some other guy. Some lucky bastard.
He had to leave. Soon. That’s what you’ve decided, he told himself. So get on with it. End of story. End it now.
Chapter Thirteen
‘Okay, Cath, no problem.’ Adele wrote the details of the new rosters Cath wanted organised onto a pad next to the telephone.
‘Thanks, Adele. You’re not in until next week, and I knew I’d forget unless I rang you. If I leave it on a notepad, I’ll probably lose that too.’
Adele smiled. Cath was the most organised woman she knew, but she had a tendency towards messy desks.
‘Are you picking up Ali?’
Adele glanced at her watch. ‘No. Tom is.’
‘Okay. Thanks again. See you next week if not before.’
Adele replaced the telephone. Since Tom had left her house to visit Imelda, she’d showered, dried her hair, got dressed and pulled ingredients out of the fridge and the pantry to make a start on the lasagne she intended to cook for dinner.
She squeezed her eyes closed, bowing her head and pinching the tip of her thumb between her teeth. Silly, silly woman. She hadn’t been able to help what she’d felt, both mentally and physically, while with Tom. While in Tom’s arms. But she’d given herself away, she was sure of it. She’d shown him her love and it had scared him.
***
Tom’s mobile rang as he reached the end of Thompson Street. He pulled it from his back pocket and steadied himself when he saw the caller ID. His lawyer. What the hell next?
He turned his back to the high street. ‘Yeah?’
‘Scott’s had some sort of meltdown.’
‘Oh, Jesus.’ He covered his eyes with his hand and tried to breathe normally. He had visions of his friend strapped to the bed. Drugged to the eyeballs. ‘What happened?’
‘Tom—it’s good.’
‘What the hell are you saying?’ Tom turned, anger rising in his chest. ‘The man’s been through a nightmare, mate, I sure hope it doesn’t happen to you anytime soon.’
‘Tom, calm down. He’s talking. Scott is talking. He admitted responsibility for the accident.’
Tension fell from Tom’s shoulders. The whole kit and caboodle of anger at everything and everyone; the fear of not knowing if he would ever be deemed professionally responsible enough to build another business; the guilt he’d carried with him for what he hadn’t been able to do for his employees; and the pain of anxiety. But relief was short-lived. If his mate was talking, if he’d admitted liability, that meant Tom could start again—but at such a high cost.
‘Will he see me?’ Regardless of the answer, Tom would go to the hospital in Canberra.
‘You’ve got to get to him, Tom, in case he clams up again. You need to be there to ensure he wants to commit to this.’
‘I’m going to go and see him—but what’s with the commitment issue?’
‘I strongly advise you to think again.’
‘About what?’ Tom grunted a laugh. ‘Giving money to my mate?’
‘He’s covered by worker’s comp.’
‘Look—and listen up, once and for all—the worker’s comp negotiations are going to be tough and you damned well know it. It’s going to take years and there’s no guarantee things will go Scott’s way. I’m not letting him hang out in some dump of a rehabilitation flat—if he even gets that much.’
His lawyer didn’t answer.
Tom lifted his face to the sky. ‘Look,’ he said again, pulling rationality from deep within him. ‘It’s going to be a long haul but once I’m on my feet again I’ll always use your firm. There’ll be a lot of work coming your way from me in the next decade, so just try to understand where I’m coming from, would you? I need your guidance.’
‘Tom—I won’t be there in your future to guide you!’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you won’t be able to afford me! You’ve lost everything, Tom. Everything.’
‘I know that,’ he all but yelled. ‘But I’m going to get it back. What is it you people don’t understand about commitment and seeing things through? I’ll tell you what it is—you’ve got no staying power, mate. No compunction to see the good where there’s been bad. And furthermore, guess what? You’re fired.’
***
Tom waited outside the school, the grimace on his face set hard and fast. He pushed his hands into his jeans pockets, clenching them into fists. He had about thirty seconds to rid himself of disbelief at what the world did to people—or was it what people did to the world? Or at least bring himself into line and hide all this angst from Ali.
She skipped down the steps, a wide smile on her face. She didn’t even acknowledge Cath, who was standing at the door saying farewells to her children.
‘I’ve got a buddy,’ she said as she reached Tom.
‘You’ve what?’ He was so shocked, he couldn’t take the look of surprise off his face.
‘Her name is Lisa Barlow. She does some very good paintings.’
‘Holy—’ Fortunately, he managed not to finish the exclamation out loud.
She grabbed his hand, settled the strap of her school bag more firmly on her shoulder and started walking.
She said nothing more until they reached the end of Union Street.
‘Do you think Katrina will mind?’
Something grabbed hold of him. His intelligence. His gut feeling. His compunction and his energy. Everything that made him who he was. He stopped walking, tugging at Ali’s hand to halt her too. The time was right. She’d opened the conversation, and she’d asked his opinion. And as he’d recently thrown a verbal and mental punch at the world or the people in it who couldn’t see good from bad, he felt the time was right for him too, not just Ali. ‘Why would she mind?’ he asked, focusing intently on Ali and her issues and forgetting his own.
She coloured up, but Tom kept his eyes on her. He had a frown on his face, but it didn’t feel like his forbidding frown, more like a concerned father’s frown.
‘I promised I wouldn’t talk to anyone.’
‘Why not?’ A couple of cars went by, then a truck and a motorcycle, but he and Ali seemed to be standing in a warp on the corner of Union Street and High Street. Noise happening around them, people going about their business, but their focus was on each other. Solely on the thread of truth between them. Tom being fatherly, and reasonably harsh, but only so much that she understood this was important, and Ali being a little girl. A little girl who’d got lost because someone had told her she ought to do something that she knew she didn’t have to do. God damn it. Why had this happened to this kid? ‘Ali?’ he asked in a tone that reminded her he wanted an answer.
‘Because it would prove to the whole world that she was my best friend forever and ever.’
‘And did you want to do it?’
‘No.’
For crying out loud. Pressure, nothing more than pressure, but it didn’t take much to coerce a child. ‘Why do you think Katrina asked you to do it?’
‘She’s not a baddy,’ Ali said, shaking her head to deny that her friend had done something wrong.
Tom nodded, giving her a slight smile. ‘It takes a lot to be a baddy, Ali. Maybe she was worried about something, eh?’
‘She said nobody liked her. She said her mum and dad didn’t talk to each other and that her dad sweared a lot at her.’
Jesus. There were a lot of people in this world that needed a damn good talking to and currently, he felt like he could take them all on. Did people not see what harm they did to their children? To other children? To his little Ali.
‘She said if I promised to not talk to anyone it would mean we’d always be friends.’
Tom couldn’t see any logic in that, not even from a child’s viewpoint. ‘Did Katrina stop talking too?’
She paled a little. ‘I promised. So I didn’t talk. Even to Katrina and she was still in school but she talked to other people. Just not to me.’
Tom inhaled, the hurts inside him all for Ali.
‘Did she ever stop talking?’ he asked.
‘She said she would. But I don’t know…’
He wanted to shake his head. Hang his head. Take a breath—anything to give him time to understand. But no matter what, Katrina was a kid too, and by the sound of things, a troubled kid.
‘Maybe we could find out if she’s talking, and see if she’s okay now.’
‘She might be angry if she finds out I’m talking.’
Tom’s heart bled for her. He bent and scooped her up, school bag and all. She looked shocked, but she put her hands onto his shoulders and wound her thin legs around his waist.
‘Ali, sweetheart, listen to me.’ She was no bigger than a five- or six-year old. But she’d had heart enough to try and do something for the kid who’d been her friend. ‘Sometimes the people we think are our friends ask us to do impossible things. We don’t have to do them, just because they want us to. We can make up our own minds. That’s called growing up, kid. You understand what I’m saying?’
She nodded. ‘Think so.’ Her eyes were wide, and it looked like guilt was plaguing her.
‘So tell me what I’m saying,’ he said. ‘Don’t show me, tell me.’
‘I never not talked to mum,’ she said, her focus intent on him. ‘And I like talking to you.’
‘Why didn’t you not talk to your mum?’
‘Because she would have been upset.’
Tom nodded. ‘Spot on, kiddo. But she has been worried. And that’s not your fault,’ he added, lowering his chin as he peered into her big brown eyes. ‘Sometimes we make mistakes, and maybe Katrina made a big mistake when she told you not to talk to anyone, but I bet Katrina is figuring that out for herself about now. Just like you’re figuring things out for yourself.’
‘I don’t want to not talk anymore. I want to talk to Lisa Barlow.’
‘Good work, Ali. Damn, I’m proud of you. And don’t tell your mum or Imelda that I said “damn”.’
The first weak but emerging smile formed on her face, but it faded quickly. ‘How can you be proud?’ she asked. ‘I did something wrong. Didn’t I?’ The last was a question that Tom understood had been filling her with shame, but she didn’t know how to ease herself out of this mess. Maybe that’s why she’d taken to Tom—because he was new. A new person who didn’t know about her being beholden to another. Thank God he’d been around.
‘Not wrong, Ali Devereux, but it might have been a mistake. And we all make mistakes but the best people, the ones who grow up strong and happy, are the ones who make mistakes but learn from them anyway.’
‘Have you made a mistake, Tom?’
‘Shit, yeah. Plenty. And I’ve no doubt I’ll make more. And don’t tell them I said “shit”.’
She shook her head, her face all serious. ‘I won’t. I promise.’
He grinned. ‘You don’t have to promise, Ali. Not to me. You can do what you think is best. If you want to run home now and tell your mum that I swore twice in front of you, then you go ahead and do that. Nobody is going to make you do what you don’t want to do. Except stuff like clean your teeth and go to school—I’m sorry to tell you that you haven’t got a hope in hell of getting out of that kind of stuff.’
‘Three swearwords.’
‘Yeah.’ Tom shrugged. ‘You know, kid, there are some promises friends make that are good ones. Like watching out for each other, and being there for each other and respecting each other—that’s a big one. So I’m going to make one with you now. I’m not going to swear in front of you again, Ali, and that’s a definite promise.’
‘Lisa asked if I could play at her house. I want to ask Mum if I can.’
The rapid change of subject told Tom that the kid was already working through her problem, almost as though the problem had passed and was now trailing in the wake of other opportunities. As though she could see her own rainbow and wanted to walk towards it. ‘I’m sure she’d let you,’ he said. ‘So long as you’ve cleaned your teeth and done your homework.’
Suddenly, a look of amusement passed over her face, then love—he was sure it was love—and a moment later, she let her bag fall off her shoulder to the ground at his feet and threw her arms around his neck.
He held her harder. What a beautiful child, and she’d come into his life like a feather on a breeze. A feather that had knocked him around and helped him understand so much about being good. About what good was and about how to handle the bad—or at least, see a point in time when the bad would end and the good take over again ‘Thank you, Ali,’ he said softly.
‘What for?’
‘For trusting me with your problem. It’s like a gift, and I don’t expect you to understand what I mean, but I won’t forget this. I love ya, kid.’
‘I love you too, Tom.’
***
‘So where is she?’ Adele’s heart punched through her chest in shots of wonder. She turned for the door, her focus flashing left and right. ‘Where is she?’
Tom caught her arms and stopped her. ‘She’s with Imelda.’
‘What?’ Adele turned to hi
m, and he released one of her arms. ‘Why?’
‘I thought it best. To begin with.’
‘What do you mean?’ Her child had come out of her agony, she’d spoken to Tom about her problems and wanted to talk to others. ‘She has a friend!’ The incredulity of this tore around inside her, bouncing her heart in a chest that had swelled. ‘I need to see her.’ To touch her, to smile at her, to hold her. To tell her it was all going to be okay.
‘Adele, I have to explain something.’
‘What?’
‘That night I babysat, she told me—I mean, she didn’t tell me anything concrete, but we had a conversation about baddies, and I thought at first that maybe there was some underlying thing in the conversation that referred to the something bad that had happened to her. Then she clammed up, and I figured I’d got it wrong. So I didn’t tell you.’
Adele’s excitement slowed. ‘But you’ve always told me even the slightest thing that you discovered.’
‘I didn’t think I had enough information to give you—no. Shit—that’s not right. I didn’t think I was capable of handling it.’
‘Of handling Ali?’
‘No. Yes—her problem. I thought I’d got it wrong that night. And I had, kind of.’
‘But you only had to be yourself, Tom. I told you that—and look how it’s worked! It wasn’t to do with baddies, or some hideous trauma that physically and emotionally hurt her, it was all to do with her willingness to help a friend.’ Adele spread her hands, her eyes wide and appealing to him. ‘And her guilt at not being able to see her promise through.’
‘Yeah, but …’
‘But what? You were right, on so many levels. You were a friend to her, Tom. Your friendship with Ali made this happen.’
‘You’re the better person, Adele. You’re her mother. I can’t top that.’
Understanding crawled over her. He’d left Ali with Imelda so that he could talk to Adele, and explain everything. About not having told Adele about another inkling of what might be wrong with Ali, and about … ‘You’re leaving,’ she said in a small voice.
‘I have to.’
‘When?’
‘Soon. Maybe tomorrow—actually, yes. Tomorrow.’
