She didn’t pull any punches. And he didn’t have an answer ready. Why had the Drummonds stopped coming here? Ben had died and the whole family had fallen apart, not feeling whole when one of them was missing. Maybe that was the problem. They hadn’t clung to each other; they had all done everything they could to get away. Richard with the business, him too – the only person who’d tried was Cynthia. And she was still valiantly trying now.
He shrugged, sitting back in his chair. ‘Ben died. It didn’t feel right, I guess.’
‘But you and Tony are friends;youstill came here on your own.’
He shook his head. ‘Not for a long time. And Momma Romario never lets me forget it.’
‘I wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side of that one. She has the grip of a strongman.’ She picked up another piece of pizza and gazed out onto the street. Two children were building a snowman on the sidewalk, their parents helping gather up piles of snow. It reminded her she’d promised to make Angel a snow president.
‘Angel loves Christmas,’ she remarked.
‘She’s a kid. All kids love Christmas.’
‘I always like the food more than the presents,’ Hayley said, poking in the pizza slice.
He laughed. ‘You surprise me.’
‘So do you do the whole going to church thing at Christmas?’
‘When I was a kid. Not now.’
‘Me neither. I’m not sure I know what religion’s really about. I’d just like a world where everybody respects everybody, for who they are as people, not anything else.’
‘Thought about running for office? You’d definitely get my vote.’
‘People make life too complicated,’ she mused.
‘There’s just never enough time,’ Oliver stated.
‘It’s us notmakingtime that’s the issue,’ Hayley corrected.
‘Sometimes, it isn’t that simple.’
‘And that’s my point. Itisthat simple… if you want it to be.’ She looked up at him. ‘Like, if you knew your father and Ben were going to die, what would you have done? Would you still have done whatever you did or would you have spent more time with them?’
‘It isn’t an ideal world.’
‘And you haven’t answered the question.’
‘Of course I’d want to spend more time with them.’
‘And you know you should have.’
‘That’s not really fair, Hayley.’
‘I wasn’t talking about you.’ She sighed. ‘I was talking about me.’ She kicked the table leg. ‘My father died just after I had Angel and, unlike my mother, he didn’t think I was a waste of space, or a let-down because I’d made a mistake. I took him for granted, Oliver. I assumed he would always be there. I didn’t cherish things, I didn’t spend enough time living in those moments and I wish I could go back and change that.’
‘He wouldn’t want you to be feeling guilt about it. No one knows how long they have here.’
Oliver swallowed as the conversation hit close to home. He certainly didn’t know how long he had here. He was supposed to be all about the moment. He’d always tried to pack everything he could in to however long he had left. But in an entirely different way to what Hayley was suggesting. In a detached, solitary way that meant nothing to anyone. Hayley would hold her loved onesclose, not push them as far away as possible like he was. He took a sip from his glass.
‘My mother told me at my father’s funeral that me getting pregnant and having Angel had aged him. She practically accused me of putting the nail in his coffin.’
‘She’s wrong, Hayley and you know that.’
‘Is she?’
He reached his hand across the table, slipping his fingers in between hers. ‘Yes, she is.’ He used his other hand to raise her chin with his finger, forcing her to look at him. ‘And I’m betting anything if your father can hear you now, he’s hammering his fists on whatever cloud he’s on, telling you you’re letting him down thinking this kind of crap.’
