Chapter Fifty-Six Netta
Chapter Fifty-Six
NETTA
Netta stood on the front steps of the Espy and hugged her friends goodbye.
Her fortieth birthday had been celebrated with her nearest and dearest in the dim lighting of one of the restaurants that now sat deep within the hallowed belly of the former pub.
Its innards had been carved out and revamped into a place that barely resembled the Espy Netta remembered from her twenties—the one with the perpetually sticky carpet and only two wines on the list: red or white.
Freya was the last to hug her. ‘Happy fortieth, you old cow. You sure you don’t want to share my Uber?’ Her eyes were lit by one too many glasses of wine topped off by a cocktail in the bar on the upper level.
‘Nah, I want to walk,’ said Netta, holding her friend steady as she wavered on the steps. ‘It’s a beautiful night.’
Freya pointed her index finger so close to Netta’s nose it made her eyes cross. ‘Don’t talk to strangers,’ she said. ‘And text me when you get home safe.’
‘Likewise.’ Netta pointed to a silver SUV idling out the front. ‘Is that your ride?’
‘It is now!’ Freya gave her one last squeeze. ‘Forty’s going to be your best year yet, Netta. You’ll see.’ She loosened her grip. ‘Christ. I hope I don’t spew on the way home. That cocktail was brutal.’
As Freya wobbled her way down the steps, Netta gathered the gift bags at her feet, stopping for a moment to take in the view.
Crowds of people gathered either side of the staircase and the water of St Kilda Beach sparkled in the moonlight, palm trees dancing in the balmy night breeze.
The smell of beer and food and cigarettes mingled in the air and the deep thrum of music from the dance floor inside sent a gentle vibration through Netta’s chest. Tonight had been great, but she couldn’t wait to get home to some comfy pants and quiet.
She made her way west along The Esplanade, passing much younger revellers who were just on their way out. Netta smiled to herself. That had been her once. On an early night, she’d start getting ready at nine and be on the dance floor by ten thirty. Just thinking about it now made her exhausted.
The footpath swooped right into Fitzroy Street, crowded with people out for a good time.
Netta stopped to drop some coins into a homeless man’s hat and pat his dog, glanced wistfully at a couple in first-date mode in the front window of a restaurant, and stopped at the 7-Eleven for a Magnum to enjoy on the couch—a consolation prize for not drinking.
She let her mind settle, the ringing in her ears abating the further she walked.
I’m forty. I’ve got a job I love, I have my own place, I have great friends. The other stuff will come.
Forty is a birthday, not a use-by date.
Forty is a birthday, not a use-by date.
Forty is a birthday, not a use-by date.
The mantra played on a loop in her mind, feebly attempting to distract her from homing in on the things she didn’t have. The things she’d spent her life merrily taking for granted that she’d have locked down by forty. A relationship. A little family.
Her body had felt foreign since the miscarriage but, four weeks later, things were gradually starting to feel closer to normal.
She’d stopped crying as much. Her stomach wasn’t as bloated.
The ache in her heart hadn’t dulled, but it had been joined by a sense of determination; the grief she felt at losing the baby told her how much having a child mattered to her.
That feeling was propelling her towards doing it on her own, and she didn’t want to leave it any longer.
She’d had an appointment with the GP and there was an action plan in place.
She’d taken to thinking that the lost baby had been sent to steel her, to prepare her and give her the push she needed to take matters into her own hands.
To strip away the distractions, to help her stop treading water and just go for what she wanted.
A couple walked past her, intertwined so naturally they looked like they’d been made for each other.
The man’s easy stride and dark hair reminded Netta of Mo and, as was wont to happen, he leapt into her mind.
The way his cheek dimpled when he smiled.
His one crooked tooth. The sound of his voice, rough and molten all at once.
The way it had felt to be held against him.
The complete peace she’d felt with her head on his chest.
The couple disappeared around the corner and Netta sighed.
Mo had been everything she needed and everything she didn’t in one irresistible, heartbreaking package.
The song he’d sent still played in her mind, his words like smoke, curling around her thoughts, giving new dimension to her memories of him.
New fuel to the fantasy. She’d wanted to answer his calls, so much.
But she needed to stay blinkered. Eyes forward. No distractions. No diversions.
She reached her apartment building and stopped to look up at her bedroom windows, the soft glow of her bedside lamps illuminating them against the dark of the night, welcoming her home.
She gathered her gift bags to her chest to avoid smacking them against the bins as she walked up the side path to the L-shaped external staircase.
Something felt off as she started her ascent and her senses sprang to life. She noticed a soft glow emanating from somewhere near her front door. Something scuffed against the concrete. Netta stopped mid-step, her knuckles white as she gripped the gift bags.
‘Is someone there?’
The light disappeared.
A cough.
More scuffling.
Footsteps.
Netta was rooted to the spot, at the mercy of fate, both fight and flight leaving her for dead. Of course she would get mugged or murdered on her fortieth birthday. Of course she would.
A shadowy figure rose from the top landing. Broad shoulders. Tall.
Netta opened her mouth and released a voiceless scream for help, and the man stepped out of view, descending the stairs.
This is it. This is how I die.
Netta squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath, her heart on pause as though practising for death.
‘Netta?’ The voice was low. Rough.
Her eyes snapped open. ‘Mo?’ Her knees liquified and she sank to the cool concrete of the steps.
‘Fuck, I’m so sorry.’ He descended the steps two at a time to help her up. ‘I didn’t mean to frighten you.’
Netta shoved his arm away. ‘You scared the absolute shit out of me!’ She breathed hard as her heart went into overdrive, her head swimming with adrenalin and shock. ‘I thought you were a murderer.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ he repeated. ‘It was supposed to be a surprise but you weren’t home and I—’
‘Thought you’d loiter on my doorstep and give me a fucking heart attack instead?’ Netta gathered up the bags up and stood.
‘Can you two take it inside?’ Netta’s elderly downstairs neighbour’s voice floated through his window. ‘Some of us are trying to sleep.’
Netta took in Mo’s flight-weary face and rumpled outfit and sighed. ‘You’d better come in.’
He stood aside as she made her way to the front door, her fingers trembling as she brought the key to the lock, every cell of her body aware of him standing behind her. The key finally turned and the door swung open.
Netta went inside. ‘Come in.’
Mo entered silently, holding a gift-wrapped box. Netta’s heels clip-clopped along the hallway to the kitchen, Mo’s Converse trailing quietly behind.
She walked behind the kitchen bench, dumped her bags on the worn Laminex and spun slowly to face him.
She drank him in. His blue jeans, his soft grey T-shirt, the tattoos scattered over his arms. His muscles were taut with apprehension as he leaned against her dining table and clutched the present.
His hair was mussed and his jaw was stubbled, his face arranged into an unfamiliar expression.
‘What are you doing here?’ Netta said.
‘I wanted to give you this.’ He held the box out to her. ‘For your birthday.’
‘You came all this way to give me a present?’
Mo nodded wordlessly but Netta didn’t move to take it from him.
She glanced at the gift, trying to ignore the inconvenient beauty of the hands holding it, and then returned her gaze to his face.
Seeing him in her apartment felt too surreal to be true.
A jarring collision of two very separate worlds.
A cosmic admission that the whole thing had been real, not just a momentary shift from reality, but a part of it. A part of her.
‘How did you know today was my birthday?’
‘You told me when it was. I remembered. I remember everything about the time we had together, Netta. Everything.’ He put the present on the bench, twisting his fingers together until the white of his bones showed through his stretched skin. ‘I’m so sorry about how I left things.’
Netta pressed her hands into the benchtop and looked down at them, nodding silently. She raised her gaze to meet his. ‘Why?’
‘Because I was an arsehole to you,’ he said. ‘It was unforgivable. We had a connection—something really special—and I treated you like it hadn’t meant anything.’
‘No, I mean why did you leave it that way?’ Netta’s icy gaze was an eggshell-thin front. Inside, she was on fire, the flimsily taped-up box she’d attempted to keep Mo in reduced to a smouldering, useless mess.
‘I … I can’t explain it. If I could go back in time …’ Mo’s eyes dipped to the present and back up to her face. ‘Did you listen to the song I sent you?’
‘It was beautiful.’
‘But not enough.’
Netta shook her head. ‘So much has happened since I came home.’ Tears filled her eyes and she swiped a tea towel from the oven handle and pressed it to her face.
Mo moved around the counter and opened his arms to her but she stepped back, out of his reach.
‘No,’ she said. ‘You have no idea what I’ve been through since London.’ She sniffed. ‘And now you’re with Lorena … I can’t complicate things again.’
Mo let his arms drop. ‘I’m not with Lorena.’
‘I saw the photos, Mo.’
‘It’s not what it looks—’
‘Don’t.’ Netta cut him off. ‘I don’t want to know.’
Mo pressed his lips together as though fighting against words desperate to escape his mouth, and Netta had to look away from it, cursing the power it still had over her.
‘Do you want me to leave?’ Mo’s voice was low, smaller than Netta had ever heard it.
She fixed her gaze on him once more and bungeed between London and losing the baby and this moment, right now, flung from heaven to hell and now to this precipice.
Toeing the edge of a crumbly cliff with this beautiful, messy, irresistible, unreliable man—who she now knew, unequivocally, she was in deep, dangerous love with.
Her chin crumpled and dragged the corners of her mouth down, closer to her aching heart, which she knew she’d have to break to move forward.
Her eyes met his and she nodded. ‘I do.’
Mo swallowed hard, blinking. ‘I understand,’ he said, his voice wafer thin. He tapped the box on the bench. ‘Read the card.’
Netta nodded.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘Goodbye, Netta.’
‘Goodbye, Mo.’
Netta closed her eyes as he turned to leave and didn’t let the sob she was holding escape until the door clicked closed behind him.