Ten years…
Her parents would never forgive Raff Finn. How could she?
‘It’s okay, Kleppy,’ she whispered. ‘We’ll manage, you and I. Thank you, Raff. We’d appreciate it if you took us home.’
He drove them down from the mountain, a woman and her dog, and he felt closer to her tonight than he had for ten years.
Maybe it was what she was wearing. The normally immaculate lawyer-cum-Abby was wearing old jeans, a faded sweatshirt and her hair had long come loose from its normally elegant chignon. She still had flour on her face from pasta making. There were twigs in her hair.
Her face was tear-streaked and she was holding her dog as if she were drowning.
She made him feel…
Like he’d felt at nineteen, when Abby had started dating Philip.
He and Abby had been girlfriend and boyfriend since they were fourteen and sixteen. Kid stuff. Not serious.
She hung round with Sarah so she was always in and out of the house. She was pretty and she laughed at his jokes. She was always…there.
Then he’d come home and she was dating Philip and the sense of loss had him gutted.
He should have told her how he felt then, only he’d been too proud to say,
He’d been too proud to say that seeing her and Philip together had made him wake up to himself. Had made him realise that the sexiest, loveliest, funniest, happiest, most desirable woman in the world was Abby.
He had known it. It was just… He thought he’d punish her a little. He and Ben had even been a bit cool to her- Ben had hated her dating Dexter as well.
They’d backed off. The night of the crash, where was Abby? Home, washing her hair?
Home, being angry with all of them.
That probably saved her life, but what was left afterwards…?
The sexiest, loveliest, funniest, happiest, most desirable woman in the entire world had been hidden under a load of grief so great it overwhelmed them all. Then she was hidden by layers of her parents’ hopes, their fixation that Abby could make up for Ben, and their belief that Philip was the Ben they couldn’t have.
He’d watched for ten years as the layers had built up, until the Abby he’d once known, once loved, had been almost totally subsumed.
And there was nothing he could do about it because he was the one who’d caused it.
He felt his fists harden on the steering wheel, so tight his knuckles showed white. One stupid moment and so many worlds shot to pieces. Ben and Sarah. And Abby, condemned to live for the rest of her life making up for his criminal stupidity.
‘You know I once loved you,’ he said into the night and she gasped and hugged Kleppy tighter.
‘Don’t.’
‘I won’t,’ he said gently. ‘I can’t. But, Abby, if I could wipe away that night…’
‘As if anyone could do that.’
‘No,’ he said grimly. ‘And I know I have to live with it for the rest of my life. But you don’t.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘I mean you lost Ben that night,’ he said. ‘For which I’m responsible and I’ll live with that for ever. But Ben was my mate and if he could see what’s happening to you now he’d be sick at heart.’
There was a long silence. She wasn’t talking. He was trying to figure out what exactly to say.
He had no right to say anything. He’d forfeited that for sure, but then…
Forget himself, he thought. Forget everything except the fact that Ben had been his best friend and maybe he needed to put what he was feeling himself aside.
Make it about Ben, he told himself. Abby hated him already. Saying what he thought Ben would say couldn’t make things worse.
‘Abby, your parents and Dexter’s parents are thick as thieves,’ he told her. ‘They always have been. After the accident, your families practically combined. The Dexters had Philip. The Callahans were left only with Abby. Two families, a son and a daughter. When Ben died you were about to go to university and study creative arts. Afterwards, Philip told you how sensible law was. Your mother told you how happy it’d make her to see you at the same law school as Philip. Philip’s dad told you he’d welcome you into his law firm. And you just…rolled.’
‘I did not roll,’ she said but it was a whisper he knew didn’t even convince herself.
‘You used to wear sweaters with stripes. You used to wear purple leggings. I loved those purple leggings.’
Silence.
‘I never saw you wear purple leggings after Ben died.’
‘So I grew up.’
‘We all did that night,’ he said gravely. ‘But, Abby, you didn’t just leave behind childhood. You left behind… Abby.’
‘If you mean I left behind stupidity, yes, I did,’ she snapped. ‘How could I not? All those years…
He couldn’t answer that.
The car nosed its way down the mountain. He could drive faster. He didn’t.
He knew Ben and Abby had been given those orders. He even knew why.
His grandfather’s drunkenness. His mother’s lack of a wedding ring. His family’s poverty.
The prissiness of Abby’s parents, secure in their middle class home, with their neat front lawn and their nice children.
‘I dunno about the Callahan kids.’ He remembered Gran saying it when he was small as she tucked him into bed. ‘You be careful, Raff, love. They don’t fit with the likes of us.’
‘They’re my friends.’
‘And they’re nice kids,’ his gran had said. ‘But one day they’ll move on. Don’t let ’em break your heart.’
As a kid, he didn’t have a clue what she was talking about. He’d figured it out as he got older, but Ben and Abby never let it happen. They simply ignored their parents’ disapproval and he was a friend regardless.
But for how long? If Ben hadn’t died…would Abby have gone out with him again?
And now she was a defence lawyer and he was a cop. Never the twain shall meet.
Except she was staring ahead with eyes that were blind with misery and she was heading into a marriage with Dexter and he couldn’t bear it.
‘I’m not talking about us now,’ he said, and it was hard to keep his voice even. ‘As you say, we’ve both grown up and there’s so much baggage between us there’s never going to be a bridge to friendship. But I’m not talking about me either, Abby. I’m talking about you. You and Dexter. He’s burying you.’
‘He’s not.’
‘Mrs Philip Dexter. Where’s the Abby in that equation?’
‘Leave it.’
‘You know it’s true. Would Mrs Philip Dexter ever spend the night trawling Banksia Bay looking for a dog?’
‘Of course she would.’ She gulped. ‘No. That is…I’ll hang onto Kleppy from now on.’
‘And if Dexter leaves the door open?’
‘He won’t.’
‘Don’t do it, Abby.’
‘Butt out.’ They were pulling up outside her house. She shoved the door open and hauled Kleppy out. She staggered a little, but straight away he was beside her, steadying her.
She was so…so…
She was Abby. All he wanted to do was fold her into his arms and hold her. Dog and all.
He’d had ten years to stop feeling like this. He thought he had.
