There were birds back as well, and as they drove there were wallabies feeding on the roadside. As dusk settled Tori could almost imagine the fire had never been.
But it had. Her life would never be the same.
If the fire hadn’t happened…she wouldn’t have met Jake. She wouldn’t be pregnant-and her hand touched her tummy as it did a hundred times a day.
‘Thank you for sending me the ultrasound pictures,’ Jake said gravely, and she thought he must have seen the movement. Self-consciously she linked her hands onto her knees and stared straight ahead.
She would not think about why he was here, she decided. She would not.
She would not allow herself to hope.
‘Did you like them?’ she asked. ‘I carry mine in my purse.’
‘I carry mine in my wallet,’ he said, and she gasped.
‘You’re joking.’
‘My kid,’ he said gravely. ‘My wallet.’ He smiled. ‘By the way, I checked every picture and not one of them’s taken from the right angle. Do we know if we have a daughter or a son?’
We. The tiny word was enough to make her breathless all over again. She had to fight to make herself speak.
‘I didn’t want to know,’ she managed at last. ‘I like surprises.’
‘Like me coming?’
‘I’m not sure what to think about you coming.’
‘Don’t think,’ he said again. ‘Just feel. It’s the only safe way.’
There was nothing she could say to that, so she sat in silence until they pulled up at their destination. Which was his farmhouse-her former wildlife shelter-only it was very different from when she’d left it.
As a child she remembered this place looking beautiful, when the doctor and his wife had loved it. But it had only ever been a weekend retreat for them. Jake’s father been on call all the time, and he’d lived in Combadeen, so maybe it had been shabby even then.
Now it was anything but shabby. It was a magnificent homestead, its weatherboards gleaming with fresh white paint, its gracious verandah running the full circle of the house, the ancient river-gum timbers of the decking rubbed and oiled back to their original glory.
Someone had worked in the garden. There were so many roses that possums could come and share, she thought, and there’d still be enough to go around.
The French windows were cleaned and gleaming. Some of them were open, and there were soft white drapes floating out in the warm evening breeze.
It looked…like home, she thought, stunned, as Jake helped her out of the car. She didn’t need help but she was so dazed she accepted it anyway and she didn’t object as he led her into the house and took her from room to room without saying a word.
Why was she here? Why was he here?
It was so beautiful.
It wasn’t furnished yet. The rooms were bare. The place was a home waiting for its people. Dogs, she thought suddenly, and kids, and her hand touched her tummy again before she could help herself.
‘There’s something else you need to see before I explain myself,’ Jake said softly, and she opened her mouth to argue-or ask, or something-but she couldn’t think what to argue or ask or something so she closed it again. He took her hand and led her and she let herself be led.
Out of the house. Back to the car, then along the track, and into the first driveway on the left.
Home. Or home as she’d once known it. Now it was a mass of regenerating bushland. All that was left was the chimney. The hearth, the fireplace, the heart of the home for her parents’ lives, for her grandparents’ lives, stretching far, far back…
Now the scene for grief and destruction.
Only she wasn’t feeling grief now, or not so much. It was tempered by this new little life inside her. It was tempered by her dogs, her new job, her new life.
It was tempered by Jake’s hand.
Once again he was helping her out of the car. He was leading her along the path to where the house had once been, then stopping by the ancient lemon tree that had somehow miraculously survived. Its singed branches had regenerated, and amazingly it was loaded with lemons. The sight actually made her smile.
A massive gum had fallen right in front of it. The team of men who’d cleared the place had taken away the smaller litter but they’d chopped the log into three, obviously thinking she might want to use it. For landscaping or something.
She couldn’t think of using anything here.
But Jake had brought along a rug. He spread it across the log so any soot was covered and he propelled her gently downwards.
‘Sit,’ he said, and she sat because she was beyond arguing.
Then, ‘I’ve done all I can without your input,’ he told her. ‘It’s time I brought you onboard.’
‘Onboard?’
‘Onto my sea of plans,’ he said. ‘I have three directions I can go, and I don’t know which one to take.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Okay,’he said gently and he sat down beside her. He took her hand in his and held it, like it was truly precious. ‘First things first. I’ve come home.’
How was a girl to respond to that? She couldn’t.
‘I was born here,’ he said, taking no obvious offence at her silence, but ploughing on regardless. ‘I suspect I was conceived in the house over there. As you were conceived here. They say there’s a strong chance you end up marrying the girl next door. How about that?’
Whoa! She should say something, she thought. But what? What?
‘But I’m getting ahead of myself,’ he said, smiling. It was a teasing smile. It was the smile she loved with all her heart.
‘I’ve quit my job,’ he told her. ‘For the past two months I’ve been undertaking intensive post-graduate training in pain management. There’s more to learn, but instead of being an anaesthetist who’s good at managing pain, what I’ve decided to do is to become a pain management specialist. I need more training still, but I can learn it on the job, and I can learn it here. I can be useful now. I can be useful here.’
And then, as surprise did give her something to say, he pressured her hand, telling her there was more to come, that for now he simply needed her to listen.
‘Tori, I was brought up believing my father didn’t care,’ he told her. ‘My mother didn’t care either-not emotionally-and that left me with nothing. Or maybe I had emotions, but I learned to lock them away. And then I found you, breaking your heart over a dead koala. And I found the community of Combadeen. I found people who’d loved my father and who he’d loved in turn. I discovered that I’d been raised on a lie.’
He tugged her hand then, just a little so she turned and was facing him.
‘None of that matters,’ he said, ‘except in explaining why I was so long in seeing what was before my eyes. When you left I kept going to work, telling myself I was dumb, only you’d left me colour, all through my apartment.’
‘I knew you’d like it,’ she interrupted, absurdly pleased.
‘I love it,’ he said simply. ‘I’ve had it all shipped here. And I love Ferdy and Freddy. They’re already in quarantine. I’m hoping Itsy, Bitsy and Rusty take kindly to them. They’re very bossy cats.’
She was almost beyond hearing. She was so confused she felt dizzy. He was shipping his life…here?
‘You’re coming here?’
‘I’m here.’
‘You can’t.’
‘Why can’t I?’
‘Your life’s in Manhattan.’
‘My life’s with you.’
There was a heart stopper if ever she heard one. Her heart definitely stopped, and it took time before she got it going again. And when she did…
