Oliver’s mouth twitched, but it wasn’t amusement. It was resignation.
‘In this instance you are. There are things in life you can’t change,’ he said quietly. ‘Who we are. You can pretend for a while, but reality catches up sooner or later. Might as well make it sooner. Save everyone the…’ He trailed off as if he’d run out of energy, or else didn’t want to say the word.
Save everyone the… what? Heartache? Trouble? Time?
Lucy kept driving, pulse thudding. ‘And what’s your reality that you’re so afraid of?’
‘I’m not afraid of my reality. It’s what I’m used to. And I’ll be back into it tomorrow morning. Sooner than I imagined.’ He sighed and raked his fingers through his hair. ‘But that’s fine.’
His monotone made the ‘fine’ sound positively morbid.
‘Tell me about it.’ She wanted him to talk, to loosen up, to confide in her.
‘What?’
‘What your reality is like. The one you’re going back to.’
‘Sydney. Work. Gym. Bars. Dinner. Meetings. Airports. My apartment for sleep and showers.’ He shrugged, like it didn’t matter. ‘That’s it.’
‘And the…bars?’ she asked, immediately regretting the question as soon as it left her mouth.
He shot her a look. ‘Do you really want the details?’
‘No,’ she said, quickly. ‘Not really.’
His mouth curved, faint and tired, and then the silence returned.
Ten minutes later they turned off the highway and the dark ribbon of road unwound towards home. Lucy felt her shoulders relax for the first time all night.
They passed her apartment.
Oliver glanced at the building. ‘Aren’t we going to your place?’
‘No.’
He didn’t push. He just sat back again.
At the end of the road Lucy turned into the street that led to MacLeod’s Cottage and pulled up.
She turned the engine off and they both looked across to the old house. All the lights were on and she could hear voices and laughter coming from the rear of the house where the verandah faced the beach. Again, she wondered if she’d gone mad. What would her family say? But it was the only place she could think of to make Oliver see what he was walking away from. The only place she could think of where he might be forced to reflect and look inward, and acknowledge that his heart was well and truly alive and trying to tell him something. She suspected his heart was practically screaming at him, but that Oliver was resisting with all the dedication of the tone deaf.
‘Ready?’ she asked.
He turned to her with a wry look. ‘Would it matter if I said no?’
‘No,’ she said, returning the smile before opening the car door and stepping out into the night. She had butterflies dancing in her stomach. Would this all backfire on her? What did she expect to happen? She didn’t know. She was running purely on instinct now. She hoped it wouldn’t let her down.
She felt a huge wave of relief when she saw Augi walking up the road towards them. Someone cool, calm and collected — everything she wasn’t. She waved.
‘Augi!’ Lucy called, hurrying forward. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Kate invited me,’ Augi said. ‘I couldn’t make supper, but I said I’d come for a short while.’
Lucy forgot that Augi wasn’t a hugger and threw her arms around her. Lucy had never been so glad to see anyone in her life. Augi’s presence would definitely have a tempering effect on Dan. Then Augi looked over Lucy’s shoulder and her smile faded.
‘Oliver,’ Augi greeted him with a cool nod.
‘Augi,’ smiled Oliver pleasantly. ‘Good to see you again.’
