Chapter 25 #2
‘Sorry, I have to take this,’ I said quickly. The house was heaving with people, so I ducked into the small nook Lily used for work to hear him.
‘Dad! Hi!’ I said.
‘Darling. I heard you had a bit of a rough week,’ he said in his booming voice.
‘Oh, yeah,’ I said. ‘Sorry they disturbed you at work. I hadn’t updated my emergency contact.’
‘I rang my colleagues at Frankston Hospital to make sure you were getting the royal treatment as soon as your boss called,’ he said.
I felt a sting of remorse. I’d been quick to judge Dad for not checking on me but he’d been one step ahead.
No wonder my very junior doctor had been quickly replaced with someone who was in charge, who’d had the authority to let me go home.
‘Thanks, Dad!’ I felt my eyes well up again – was I becoming a crier? Dad had shown up for me.
‘I’ve just pulled into the hospital car park so—’ The call ended abruptly. My calls with Dad had been cut off mid-conversation for as long as I could remember. He would have reached his designated parking spot, deep in the bowels of the hospital car park with no reception.
I stood in the nook for a moment. Lily’s office was peak Lily – an old-fashioned roller top school desk, which she’d painted emerald, showcased a hot-pink U-shaped resin vase, holding two dahlias.
The desk had a stack of what looked like bills on it.
The letter at the top of the pile had Final Notice printed on it in an aggressive red that matched neither the desk nor the vase.
Was everything okay? I took a step towards the pile then paused.
Lately, I’d been rushing to the wrong conclusions.
I had to stop. It was none of my business.
If Lily had forgotten to pay a parking fine or whatever, it was none of my business.
If Alex wanted to spend his Saturday afternoon at a kid’s birthday party, well, that was lovely.
If Dad wanted to work every weekend, wouldn’t his patients feel cared for.
I needed to stop imagining every worst-case scenario.
Like Matt said, I wasn’t cursed. I was lucky.
The party, because it was a party hosted by Lily Li, was a triumph. Even Mia, who’d returned after inhaling a handful of Paracetamol and a strong coffee, looked like she was enjoying herself despite the many babies in situ.
We all gathered around a table as Aaron lit the candles on the cake, which fitted Lily’s party aesthetic perfectly. Matt kneeled in front of them taking photos. I scanned the room. Alex was at the back of the crowd, standing by himself.
I shot him a friendly smile – the same kind I’d give Mia or her parents.
But he didn’t see me. And then I noticed his expression.
He was staring at Arlo, flanked by both his parents, with the saddest expression I’d ever seen.
I’d seen glimmers of this look before, when all the bravado, all the self-assuredness, had melted away, exposing a man who looked so vulnerable, so sad.
His mouth moved along with the final line of the birthday song, but I could see that he wasn’t really in the room. As Aaron leaned forwards to blow out the candles and Lily kissed Arlo on the cheek, her eyes bright and face burning with love for her son, I could almost see the pull in his heart.
Ever since he’d reappeared, I’d been so focused on Alex as a concept: the ex, the client, the harbinger of the curse. I’d forgotten that he was just a guy. One I’d once really cared about. One I knew was a bit broken.
As people shouted, ‘Hip, hip, hooray,’ and one of the grandparents made a brave attempt at ‘For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow’ I found myself moving through the crowd, following him down the hallway.
I caught up with him as he reached the front garden and as soon as he saw me his mask slipped back into place.
‘Birthdays are hard.’
‘Always,’ he said. ‘I avoid them.’
‘What did your mum do for your birthdays?’ I asked.
‘She didn’t have a lot of time. Or money,’ he said, still looking a bit dazed. Then he smiled as he remembered. ‘But on my birthday every year, she’d stick candles into a watermelon. It was normally school holidays, so we’d do it on the beach and then we’d swim and get an ice cream.’
I could almost see the warmth of those days wash over him as he let himself bask in the memories.
‘That sounds like an amazing tradition,’ I said softly.
‘I mean, it probably started because the beach was free and she didn’t have time to make a cake,’ he said.
‘Doesn’t matter. She made magic,’ I said.
‘Yeah,’ he said.
‘Do you still do it?’ I asked.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your traditions.’
He broke eye contact. ‘My new tradition is to pretend I don’t have a birthday.’
‘When is it?’ I asked. If he and his mum had spent the day on a beach then surely it was coming up soon, before the summer ended.
Once again, I was struck by the strangeness of what I didn’t know – that we’d never known the information about each other you’d need to apply for a passport.
We’d just known each other, in all the ways that didn’t have boxes on a form.
‘Last week,’ he said. ‘Last Saturday.’ His expression was now defiant. I worked hard to keep my face neutral, from looking even slightly sympathetic.
It made sense. I’d never bought the idea that he was lonely and was desperately trying to make friends in Melbourne. Alex was a lone wolf (or owl); he’d always been happy in his own company, in his own thoughts. But on his birthday... I could see why he jumped at Matt’s invitation.
‘Though I mainly went to the tennis with Matt because I wanted to see who you were marrying. And I really did want to say hi to Lily after all these years,’ he said, preempting my questions. ‘But yeah, I guess I didn’t really want to be alone too much on that particular day.’
I remembered that Alex was acerbic, insanely smart, focused and looked like Jamie Dornan (when he wasn’t playing a sociopath). But I’d forgotten he was also human.
‘Happy belated birthday,’ I said. ‘Wait here, okay? Don’t move.’
I ducked to the kitchen and returned to the front garden a minute later holding a paper plate. Alex laughed. On the plate was a slice of watermelon with a half-melted candle in it.
‘Did you steal that from a child?’ Alex asked. The watermelon slice had a single bite taken out of it.
‘It was abandoned. And possession is nine-tenths of the law,’ I said.
‘And you want people to believe you went to law school?’ he replied.
‘Be nice or I’m going to sing at you, and we both know I can’t sing,’ I said. ‘Just pretend to blow out the candle and make a wish.’
He went to take a breath then let it out. He looked up from the watermelon slice.
‘I don’t know if I should make this wish,’ he said, his aqua eyes almost boring into me.
‘Then make another wish,’ I said firmly.
‘My wish is that I want to be with you,’ he said. ‘I tried to forget that I did. But it’s still what I want.’