Ocean's Birth

by Carlton, Demelza

  William couldn't be allowed to see her, and what would I do about our child? If she was born with a tail, as Mother said she would be, I couldn't hide it from him. Or Sarah, if she was my midwife for the birth.

  The motorcycle whined and I quickly shifted gears to quiet it. I could contemplate solutions later, I decided. I had three months before I'd have to set out for the long swim to Cocos, if I had to go there. Three months to find a solution that would allow William and I to stay together with our baby girl. And I would – for his life depended on it.

  Ten

  I pushed the Triumph harder than I ever had before, opening the throttle up completely and letting the jungle on either side of me blur as I revelled in the speed. I needed to regain my calm before William came home from work because he'd know something was wrong the moment he looked at me. And how could I tell him the truth?

  The tyres squealed to a stop in the front yard and I jumped off, setting the motorcycle on its stand. I peeled my hat from my head and glanced down at my mud-spattered body. So much for a relaxing swim. I needed a bath.

  I stumbled for the veranda, but the sound of running footsteps behind me made me turn.

  "What were you thinking?" William shouted, his eyes wild. "Riding on your own. And going so fast. What if you'd hit something?" He grabbed my shoulders.

  I lifted my eyes to meet his. "I went to the Grotto for a swim. I thought the breeze would dry my bathing costume better on the way back if I rode faster."

  His fingers dug into my shoulders as his grip tightened. "You can't go riding on your own. It's too dangerous. You hear me? I won't let you!"

  I jerked out of his grasp. He didn't know a thing about danger. "I heard you, but I'm going to pretend I didn't. I can ride just fine on my own."

  He waved at the mud turning my blue bathing suit brown. "Fine? Fine? Where'd all the mud come from if you didn't fall off? Did you even think about the damage you could do to our baby?"

  After all of Mother's antagonism, added to my worry for William and Apalala's birth, I snapped. "I didn't fall off!" I roared. "The track was wet from last night's rain and I ran through a couple of big puddles. Without falling off. I won't be kept prisoner in your house, William. I'm not some delicate flower you need to press between the leaves of a book. And nor is this baby. You'll LET me do what I damn well please."

  "And then what? You'll go riding dangerously all over the island without me, so when something happens I won't be there to save you? I won't lose you again, lass. And I won't let you hurt our baby. Tonight I'll take your Triumph apart and – "

  "Save me? Since when do I need you – or ANY man – to save me? I lived in the jungle here just fine when – " I broke off quickly before I blurted out anything I shouldn't. Instead, I said, "And who saved who when we went fishing? You capsized the bloody boat and knocked yourself out. If I hadn't dragged you to shore, you're the one who would've drowned. I wanted a swim and I went to the Grotto so you wouldn't worry about me swimming in the cove with sharks. Next time, I'll just dive off the damn pier or take one of the kolaks out by myself or – "

  Sarah shoved between us, her eyes wide with fright. "Lass, don't make it worse. Will, she's your wife. Your wife. She's in a delicate condition, carrying your child. She made a mistake. I'll keep her home and make sure she stays safe. Don't – "

  William the wifebeater. She still believed it, even after living with us and not seeing him raise a hand to me. Sick of the whole McGregor family, I turned and trotted up the steps to the house.

  "Where are you going? We're not done talking!" William shouted. His pounding steps shook the veranda.

  "Your not-so-delicate wife needs a bath. You can come and shout at me there if you want. I'll stick my head under the water when I've heard enough." I threw my hat, gloves and hairpins on the floor as I walked in a bathing suit and knee-high boots to the bathroom.

  Amah ducked her head as I entered. "Your bath is running, Mem." She sidled through the doorway and escaped before William burst in and closed the door behind him with a click of finality.

  I sat on the edge of the bath and tugged at my left boot, but it was stuck fast. The right was much the same. I swore and shed my bathing costume, then stepped into the bath, boots and all. I held one under the tap and then the other, filling them with water before sliding them off and throwing them onto the floor.

  Then I turned the water off and let the bath drain as I stood facing William, waiting.

  He licked his lips, desire plain in his expression. "I won't lose you. I'll do anything to keep you safe."

  "I'd do the same for you, William." I wrenched at the tap and plugged the bath again.

  He dropped to his knees. "Please, lass. I love you and I'll protect you and our child any way I can. I'm begging you not to do those things. I'll go mad with worry. If anything happened to you, I'm not sure I could live with myself. I've lost you once. I won't lose you again."

  I closed my eyes. "I'll do it if you will. Promise me you won't go swimming with sharks, fishing by yourself or swimming at the Grotto alone."

  "You have my word, lass. Anything else?" His relieved smile was the first real sunshine on this otherwise dark day.

  "Yes. Take your clothes off and come here."

  He'd already shrugged out of his shirt before he said, "It's the middle of the afternoon. Don't you think it's a bit early for..."

  I eyed his pants. "No. And nor do you. We can break for dinner. Maybe even get dressed."

  Eleven

  I sucked in a breath, tensing as William pushed me over the brink into bliss before I screamed.

  "Too much for you, lass?" he whispered, not breaking his slow rhythm for a moment.

  "No," I tried to say, but my voice failed. I swallowed and tried again. "No!" It came out louder than I'd expected.

  Someone started knocking on the bedroom door.

  William cursed.

  "Don't...stop..." I panted, then turned to shout at the closed door: "Leave us alone!"

  William grinned. Fastening his hands tightly around my hips, he rolled and pulled me on top of him, matching the movement with a particularly powerful thrust.

  I moaned and threw my arms out to maintain my balance, knocking something off the nightstand. Books cascaded to the floor in a series of thumps. I didn't care. All that mattered was William.

  He sat up, pressing his lips to my breast as his thrusts slowed. He was close – I recognised the signs – and he knew my body better than I did, so I'd reach my peak with him. Already my nerves crackled with anticipation.

  Deep in, then an agonisingly slow withdrawal before he filled me once more. One more...just one...and a second scream ripped from my throat, harmonising with William's groan as he finished deep inside me.

  I kept my eyes closed as I held onto the fading sensations still shaking my body, but the odd feeling of William winding a sheet around my torso made me open them quickly. Why in water would he want me covered up when we'd just made love?

  "Are...are you all right?" Sarah squeaked.

  I glanced over my shoulder. William's sister stood in the wide open doorway, clutching at her pale face. Now I understood why William had tried to cover me.

  I couldn't seem to wrap my tongue around a response. The words fine and well weren't appropriate for the fierce fizzing in my blood when William still filled me.

  William chuckled. "You didn't pick the best time to intrude, Sarah. She's still breathless." His mouth claimed mine and I responded to his kiss as if his breath was all the air I needed. Two...three, four kisses, before I found my voice.

  "I'm fine." Such inadequate words for my feelings.

  Her voice trembled. "You...you told him to stop. To leave you and the baby alone. I heard blows..."

  I peered blearily at the floor, where the stack of books on the nightstand had landed. "I told him not to stop, and you to leave us alone."

  "He beat you. I'm sure of it. You screamed!"

  Inwardly, I cursed the human prude
ry that forbade me from telling her the plain truth. My reticence lasted for barely a moment before I threw caution to the current. "If what we do together is what you call a beating in Scotland, then I'll take it and ask for more." I pressed my cheek to William's chest, where I rejoiced at his racing heartbeat. "Your brother is the sort of lover most women dream about, but never know." I waved at my belly. No amount of sheet could hide the swell of it. "Why do you think I fell pregnant so quickly?"

  William coughed. I was surprised to find his face flushed red from more than exertion. "Excuse me, ladies." I winced as he withdrew from me, wrapping another sheet around his body like one of the Malay men's sarongs. He padded out in the direction of the bathroom.

  Sarah couldn't seem to take her eyes off me. I shifted into a more comfortable sitting position, now that William wasn't between my thighs, and settled the sheet to preserve my non-existent modesty for Sarah's benefit. "Sarah, if your brother tried to beat me, I'd match him bruise for bruise. And he wouldn't be capable of – " Making love to me like it was our last night together. " – what we just did. Have you ever seen your brother in a fight?"

  She pressed her lips together, as if she was weighing her response. Finally, she lowered her eyes and nodded.

  "Me, too. And only once did I see him lose."

  She stared at me in horror. "He fought YOU?"

  I shook my head slowly. "Of course not. He fought two men who had...said unkind things about me. Then a man challenged him for a wager. A very experienced Japanese fighter. William went down."

  "Will always won. He never lost a fight, even against the bigger boys. He was the best fighter, always."

  "Kaito was better. William wouldn't...wouldn't let the fight end, though he was injured. So I stepped into the ring." I met her horrified eyes. "I won the bout against Kaito. His was a different style of fighting to what you have in Scotland, I think. More agility and calculation than force, which gave me the advantage. Even if William tried to strike me – and he hasn't, not once – he would struggle to land a blow."

  "But the bruises. I saw the bruises in Singapore..."

  It was my turn to lower my eyes. "The afternoon rain turned the marble floors as slick as ice and my illness made me clumsy. William managed but I simply couldn't. Ice on the ground is not something I'm used to." I thought of the only ice I'd known and laughed. "Well, except when the crabs tipped the bucket over in the fish market. Then we had ice everywhere and the silly creatures to catch again, too. But they were never my crabs, so I could stand back and watch, if I wanted." I winked. "Nothing's more entertaining than a group of rugged fishermen crawling around on their hands and knees trying to grab creatures that were just as aggressive and happy to nip tender bits in their claws."

  She stared at me, evidently struggling to find an appropriate reply. Finally, she said, "Did you really rescue Will when your boat capsized?"

  I nodded. "We weren't far from shore," I explained, then closed my mouth before I had to tell her how many miles constituted close to land for one of my kind.

  "I don't think you're as young as you look," she said. Two bright spots appeared on her cheeks.

  "I'm twenty-seven years old," I stated wearily. "I've been shipwrecked twice, widowed once, and lost all of my family. Including my daughter." I caught sight of the tears trickling down Sarah's cheek and broke off.

  "Does Will know?" she whispered urgently.

  "Not about my daughter. Don't tell him, please," I implored.

  Her expression turned thoughtful. "That depends. Did she die at birth or during some complication? If you can't bear children, you should tell him."

  I shook my head. "No. She was born perfect. It wasn't until she was two years old that...that..." My murderous mermaid of a mother ripped her from my arms and banished me from her life. I wrapped my arms around my belly. I wouldn't be parted from this child the same way. Mother would feed the sharks before I let her touch William's little water dragon.

  Twelve

  "Drink, Mem?" A child whose head barely reached the arm of my cane chair lifted a cup into the air, tilting it at an alarming angle that almost spilled the contents down her back.

  "Thank you." I rescued the cup from the Malay girl and sipped. Fresh, young coconut water filled my mouth, and I nodded my thanks to the girl's mother, who stood under the shade of a coconut-fibre-thatched atap roof on the other side of the football field.

  Well, it was our tennis court in truth, but Anne's son Alan had insisted he needed to practice football before he went to school in Scotland after Sarah had said how good her own son was at the game. So the kampung boys (and some girls) had been conscripted and Sarah had explained the rules as young Alan translated.

  A piercing whistle lanced across the field and the tired children trooped off into the shade for a mid-match drink. Sarah flopped into the chair beside me. "Refereeing these games makes me miss my own sons. All three of them are at school, but when they were home for the holidays, they'd play from dawn until dusk. I wish I had the energy." She nodded at my midsection. "You just wait until that one's out. You won't believe the energy they have when they start running."

  I smiled and rested my cup lightly on top of my bulging belly. Apalala promptly kicked it and we both laughed. "Just over two months to go. It can't come fast enough. I feel like a whale already. A beached one. But I think if I managed to get into the water, I wouldn't be able to get out again, so I'll be a whale right here for a while longer yet."

  "Will would pull you out," she said, rising. Sarah stuck her fingers in her mouth and whistled shrilly again. "Second half!"

  Perhaps, but he'd need a winch. I'd grown so heavy even he couldn't lift me any more. I hadn't felt this huge with my first daughter, but then I'd been buoyed up by the ocean for the whole of my first pregnancy. Not dragging my feet on land.

  I slipped into a light doze as the game resumed, jerking my eyes open when Sarah whistled at rule breakers, before sinking back into slumber. Apalala took so much of my energy, sapping my strength – or so it seemed. There was no way now that I could manage the long swim to Cocos. Mother wouldn't be able to tear me away from William no matter how hard she tried. It'd be like trying to control a deaf orca.

  Quiet, male voices roused me. "How long has it been since you played football, McGregor?"

  "Since that match where you blocked the penalty with a kick so high the other team cried foul," William replied, laughing. "They wouldn't have if they'd ever seen you fight."

  "I still can't believe the dean made me resign from the team after that. None of their goalkeepers were up to scratch after I left."

  "I bet I could best you now, though."

  The unfamiliar Englishman chuckled. "You're on, McGregor."

  I turned my head to regard the men. William's expression softened into an instant smile but my eyes widened when I caught sight of the other man. He didn't look like an Englishman at all – he looked Japanese. Only his eyes were lighter than those of most Japanese men I'd met – a sort of hazel, instead of inky brown or black.

  "Who's the beautiful lady?" the strange man asked.

  I snorted. Beautiful whale, maybe. Apalala kicked her agreement at my battered bladder.

  "She's not just any lady. This is my beautiful wife, Maria," William replied. I met his laughing eyes and didn't protest. "Lass, this is Kent Warwick. We attended university together and when I felt the need to leave Scotland in search of adventure, he and his father persuaded some important people to have me exiled at this godforsaken place to keep me out of trouble." He helped me rise from my chair, wrapping an arm around me to support Apalala's weight.

  "I should've known you'd manage to find trouble no matter where you went. Didn't you sink your ship on your way here?" Warwick laughed, but William's smile died.

  "No, that was me," I said, inclining my head toward Warwick. I cast my memory back to the day I met Kaito on the Trevessa. "Ha... Hajimemashite, Warwick-san."

  He looked taken aback. His return bo
w was unusually low. "Hajimemashite, Mrs McGregor. Douzo yoroshiku onegaishimasu."

  It was my turn to laugh. "You'll have to translate for me, I'm afraid. My Japanese is limited to a few words only. The ones William taught me."

  "I only said I'm honoured to meet you. McGregor's kept mighty quiet about you – he didn't breathe a word about a wife in all his letters. If you sank his ship as you say, that's nine years of silence. And I can see why." His look of admiration was so lusty it made me uncomfortable.

  I pressed closer to William. "We met on the Trevessa. Our lifeboats and, indeed, our lives were separated until recently." I glanced at the cove, but all three piers stood empty, their lower supports bombarded by today's swell. "How did you reach Christmas Island, Mr Warwick?"

  He nodded at the ocean, lifting his chin to point at the horizon, where I could just discern a freighter drifting offshore. "The Miharu Maru brought me most of the way, but I got impatient waiting for your infernal cove to calm down, so some men and I took a lighter and rowed ashore." His eyes glinted. "And I'm delighted I did."

  I suppressed a snort. Unless Warwick fancied whales, his misplaced compliments would land him in a lot of trouble with William. And if he did fancy whales...he'd find himself in deeper still.

  "You must join us for dinner, Warwick. And afternoon tea, too, if we're not too late." William glanced at me.

  I smiled and nodded. "Cook won't expect us back until the game's finished. Today she promised chocolate cakes and she knows to make extra just for you, so I'm sure there will be plenty."

  Cheers erupted from the field as someone scored a goal. The boys looked exhausted. Sarah sounded the end of the match with one more whistle, sending the children home.

  A red-faced Alan jogged up to Anne. "Did you see me block that goal, Mother? And that header! It almost went in. So close..."

  As Anne's face lit up with a proud smile, I realised that her son was the same age as my daughter would be. Who cared for her now that Mother was here, hunting me? The only person I could think of was Wulan, my later sister's daughter and my niece, though she was twenty years my senior. The woman Mother should have chosen as her heir, instead of pursuing me.