30. Ford
Ford
Ford’s cheeks were aching from smiling, and he thought he might have taken a selfie with every person who worked in Burra hospital and most of the visitors, as a crowd had gathered around him while he chatted with the police officers.
After three hours, he called time and excused himself to go to the hospital café and grab something to eat and drink, which took him more time than he wanted, as he had been accosted for more photos.
He was relaxing in his car when he finally got a text message from Sie.
‘Heading out now.’
Ford grinned and sent her back. ‘I’ll meet you at the front door.’
By the time he'd started the car and pulled it around to the hospital's entrance, Sie was standing there waiting for him. She looked tired, but had a smile on her face.
At some point, she had washed all of the makeup off that made her look like the old Sie, and was wearing pink scrubs, rather than the black clothes that she clutched in her hands.
He liked this new version of Sie, the one that embraced colour and let you see her face, not a mask of makeup.
Sie pulled the car door open. “Thanks for waiting for me. You didn’t need to. I could have taken a taxi home.”
“It’s no problem.” Ford put the car into drive and drove away. “Have you had food?”
“Sort of. I ate a hospital sandwich.” Sie shuddered.
Ford grinned. “Me too! I visited the café, the food was…“ he hesitated, searching for the right word, “…interesting.”
“It is.” Sie spluttered with laughter.
“Do you want to go and grab some dinner?” Ford blurted out the words before he could change his mind.
Sie was silent for a long time. “Is that a good idea?” she asked hesitantly.
“Yes,” Ford said firmly. ”We should get sushi.”
Sie loved sushi, and once they’d had a little bit of money, they’d indulged in it whenever they could.
“Unless you want tuna out of a can, I would suggest avoiding the sushi in Burra Creek.”
“What would you suggest then?” Ford drove toward the centre of town.
Sie thought about it. “We might as well go to the pub. The quiz is on tonight, and some of my friends will be there.”
Ford hesitated. He wanted time with only her, getting to know her again. But equally, maybe it would be a low-pressure environment to spend more time with her. “Sure, that sounds fun.”
“Great. It’s the Railway Tavern. It’s second left, then up on the right,” Sie directed.
Ford followed the instructions. “How was everything with Clara and Taylor’s baby?” He glanced over at her as he asked and saw her face light up at the mention of the baby.
“He’s adorable. I’ll let them announce all the names and weight, etcetera, but he’s a little champion.”
“That’s great.”
“It’s just over there.” Sie pointed to the pub up ahead, then looked down at herself. “Oh shit. I forgot I was in scrubs.” She poked the black clothes she'd thrown into the footwell with her shoe. “I’ll have to put this outfit on again.”
“You looked good,” Ford said without hesitation, and his eyes shot to her in time to see a blush spread up her cheeks.
“Thanks. It’ll confuse my friends. I don’t think they’ve ever seen me wear black.” She gestured to the pink scrubs she wore.
“Why don’t you ever wear black?” Ford asked as he pulled into a parking space.
Sie didn’t say anything for a long time, until she finally said quietly, “It helped me hide. To pretend that Sie wasn’t real, that I hadn’t been her. For years, it was the only way I could sleep at night, pretend it didn’t happen.”
“I didn’t sleep for a long time either,” Ford replied honestly.
He had used booze and drugs to try and get the rest he needed. But that always made it worse the next day, and he would need more to get through. Until he spiralled into a place of no return. He was thankful Donnie had stayed by his side and taken him to rehab again and again until it stuck.
“I’m sorry,” Sie whispered, a hitch in her voice.
“I know,” Ford said simply. Switching off the car, he turned to her. “I’m not saying I understand what you did, and I’m not ready to say that I forgive you because you ripped out my heart.”
Sie winced at his blunt words.
“But I do want to get to know you again and find out what’s happened in sixteen years.” Ford watched her face carefully and saw the surprise cross it. “Unless you don’t want that.”
“No, I want that,” she blurted.
Ford held her gaze, and the air in the car became heavy. He finally wrenched his eyes away.
“Good,” he said, then opened his door and climbed out of the car, hearing Sie do the same.
The building they parked outside of was a pub that wouldn’t have been out of place in any small town in Australia. In fact, it looked just like the one they used to play at in their hometown.
“We’ll find the others, then I’ll go and change.” Sie led the way to the door, swinging it open she ushered him inside.
As she scanned the room, he saw her grin in recognition at a woman waving at her and pointing to some seats at their table.
“That’s Hel and Frost. They were at Clara’s baby shower.” Sie looked over her shoulder at him and pointed at a ginger woman and the big fella sitting next to her. Then she added, “Although you probably didn’t get to meet anyone after finding me.”
“No, I didn’t. I stormed off pretty fast.” Ford’s lips pulled up at the corner.
“Yeah. I figured.” Sie didn’t comment further, instead leading him across the room. “Hi, guys!” she greeted her friends warmly. “This is Ford.” She pointed at him, but didn’t give them any more explanation.
A few of the other doctors waved in greeting, then froze when they looked at him properly. It looked like at least some of her friends knew who Ford was.
Hel’s eyebrows nearly shot up into her hairline, and Frost choked on the sip of drink he had just taken.
“Ford?” the ginger woman said squeakily. “As in, Ford?” She put more emphasis on his name.
“Yes. As in Ford.” Sie lifted her eyebrows in return.
“Nice to meet you.” The bear of a man was on his feet, having recovered from his choking fit and held his hand out. “I’m Frost. This is my fiancée Ethel.” He had a wicked grin on his face as he said it.
“Jake Winston Forster. I will kneecap you if you keep using that travesty of a name to introduce me by.” The woman who didn’t want to be called Ethel admonished, then made eye contact with Ford.
“Don’t listen to him. He’s taken one too many hockey pucks to the head and can’t remember his fiancées name is Hel. ”
“Ice pucks to the head?” Ford asked, his eyebrows raised.
“I used to play ice hockey in the NHL,” Frost said.
Ford nodded. Oh yeah, Clara had told him that. His eyes strayed to Sie. Finding her had knocked that fact clean out of his head.
“I need to change. I’ve come straight from work. Can I trust you to look after Ford for a few minutes and not terrify him?” Sie asked, glaring at her two friends and ignoring the others who were whispering among themselves.
The couple glanced at each other, and Hel grinned broadly. “Nope. If you want to change, you need to take the risk.”
Sie rolled her eyes and turned to Ford. “If they ask anything you don’t want to answer, just say no comment.”
Hel chortled. “No comment means yes.”
“Behave. And have you checked your phone?” Sie asked.
Hel shook her head. “No. It’s in my handbag.”
“Do me a favour and check it while I’m gone,” Sie informed her, then murmured to Ford, “Will you be okay?”
Ford grinned at her. “I think I’ll be fine on my own for five minutes.”
Sie stared at him a moment longer, then muttered, “Don’t be so sure of that.”
Before Ford could answer, she strode off towards the toilets. He watched until she was out of sight.
By the time he turned back to the table, Hel was rifling through her bag for her phone. Pulling it out, she looked at the screen and screamed in delight, clutching onto Frost’s arm.
“They had their baby!” She thrust the phone under Frost’s nose, so he could look at the picture too.
“That’s awesome!” Frost exclaimed, then frowned. “Isn’t that really early?”
“Shit. Yes. Oh shit, they’re only thirty-four weeks.” Hel scrolled through a few more photos. “The baby is small but looks okay. His name is Hayes Anderson. Evidently, Mai was in theatre. No wonder she wanted me to check my phone.”
Ford pulled up a seat beside Frost, content to sit and wait for Sie. It was only a couple of minutes, and they were distracted from him, with Hel messaging Clara and Taylor.
When Sie got back, he blinked. It was so strange to see her in black clothes, with blonde hair and pink glasses.
“Hey.” She sat down next to him. “Did they behave?”
“Yeah, the photos of the baby proved to be an excellent distraction.” He gestured to the phone that Hel was still engrossed in.
“Mai,” Hel called.
Ford felt Sie stiffen.
“Yes.” Sie tried to relax and look unconcerned about what her friend was about to say.
“You were at the delivery? Why didn’t you say anything?” Hel asked.
“I wanted them to have a chance to tell you. It wasn’t my news.” Sie shrugged.
“Fine,” Hel huffed, before a mischievous twinkle lit her eyes up. “And how did Ford end up here?” Hel’s eyes darted between Sie and Ford.
Ford’s gaze rested on Sie, letting her explain, as he wasn’t sure how much she'd told her friends.
Sie shrugged again. “I did a photoshoot with the band. They’re putting out a press release about finding me.”
Hel blinked in surprise. “Really?”
“Yeah. Rumours are starting, and we figured we should get in front of them.”
“Really?” Hel was leaning forward to talk around Frost, who tried to interject and say something, but she shushed him.
Ford laughed and slid his chair back so the ladies had a better line of sight to chat, and Frost did the same.
“Did you just get shushed?” Ford asked the other man.
“Yep.” Frost rolled his eyes. “Evidently, when the women are talking, it’s best to let them finish before I have an opinion.” The dry tone in Frost’s voice suggested he was joking.
Ford’s phone buzzed in his pocket, then buzzed again and again. He pulled it out and frowned when he saw Donnie’s name on the screen.
“Sorry, I just need to grab this,” he apologised to Frost and stood up, stepping away from the table. Pressing the green button, he answered his phone. “Hey.”
“Ford, I’ve fucked up,” Donnie told him immediately.
Ford's eyebrows rose. This was not something his manager had ever said to him before.
“What’s happened?” he asked.
Moving further away from the table, he saw Sie look over at him, concern on her face, and he smiled reassuringly back.
“The photos and videos from my work phone automatically back up to the cloud,” Donnie said.
“Yeah.” Ford couldn’t quite see where this was going.
“The social media department have access to my work cloud.”
“Okay.”
“They use anything they want for publicity,” Donnie continued. “I told them to expect something from the old lineup of Midnight Thunder soon.”
“And?” Ford said slowly, his mind beginning to churn as he had a horrible feeling he knew what had happened.
“I used my work phone to take the video of you guys playing. It uploaded to the cloud, and the social media department have posted it to Midnight Thunder’s Instagram.”
“Oh, shit. Is it too late to take it down?” Ford asked, already knowing what the answer would be, as they had thirty million followers on Instagram.
“Yep. It’s had fifty thousand likes, and multiple news outlets have contacted us for comment.”
“Fuck,” Ford groaned. Then, he waved in apology to the couple sitting near where he stood, who had glanced at him sharply.
Stepping away from them, he walked back toward Sie, who was laughing and joking with her friends. “Well. I guess a video is one way of announcing Sie to the world. Get the official photo from the photographer now, and get our statement online.”
“It’s already done, the official statement is up,” Donnie reassured him. “Sorry I didn’t phone earlier, I needed to do immediate damage control.”
“That’s alright. I know it was an accident.”
“I wanted to phone you before I called Sie. I’ll phone her now.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll tell her,” Ford said.
“You’re still with her?”
“Yeah. I waited at the hospital for her.”
“Shit, yeah. Is the baby alright?”
“Yeah, he’s good.” He glanced across to Sie, who was still deep in conversation with Hel. “I’ve got to go, Donnie. Talk soon, man. Thanks for letting me know.”
“No problem. Sorry again for the fuck up.”
“Like I said. It’s okay. I’ll see you later.” Ford ended the phone call and immediately pulled up his Instagram to check.
The photo of the four of them was at the top of the feed. It already had twenty thousand likes and several thousand comments. The next was the video of them playing. He opened the comments and found people were going insane.
‘OMG, is that Sie?’
‘She’s alive! I thought they had killed her and covered it up.’ Ford rolled his eyes.
‘What the fuck. They’ve let a girl into Midnight Thunder.’ Ford guessed that was a newer fan.
‘Chicks belong in the kitchen, not on stage.’ He growled when he read that one.
‘I went to their last concert. She’s better than Ryan. #bringSieback.’
Once someone started the hashtag, he saw it again and again in the comments. #bringSieback.
His eyes rose to the table and locked onto Sie. She glanced around, and when her gaze met his, she gave him a tentative smile, which soon fell off her face, and she shifted uncomfortably in her seat.
Shit, was he glaring at her? He smoothed his features and strode back over. Sitting down, he leaned and whispered into her ear.
“Sie, we’ve got a problem.” He held his phone out to her, which showed the main grid of their Instagram account. “This is Midnight Thunder’s Instagram.”
He was terrified it was going to make her run again. He had only just found her. He needed her to stay.
She took the phone and looked at the photo of the four of them and the statement.
“Why is there a problem? That’s what we planned, although it was quick. I thought it would be a couple of days before the picture was posted.”
“Yeah. The photo is great. It’s the next post that I don’t think you’re going to like. There was a miscommunication with Donnie’s team.”
Sie pushed her glasses up her nose and peered at the video. “It’s a video of you guys playing.” She shrugged and squinted harder.
“Yeah, not quite.” Ford reached over and pressed on the video so it was full screen, not a tiny thumbnail.
Sie held the phone closer to her nose, and her eyes widened behind her glasses. “Oh shit. Is that us earlier?”