Page 32

Thirty

I was wide awake. Curled up on the couch eating, perhaps even sulking a little over the fact Adam hadn’t called, or texted me.

Maybe he was regretting last night, maybe he just had some personal stuff to take care of.

Maybe I should just bloody call him. Would that seem desperate?

Would I usually call him at ten o’clock on a Monday night?

I tried to think back to all the times we had spoken lately.

Munching on the last of the chocolate Maltesers, I had decided to re-watch The Blues Brothers . I was smiling to myself as I watched Carrie Fisher threaten John Belushi in a dark, muddy tunnel with a semi-automatic weapon; he was on his knees pleading for forgiveness.

“You go, gurl,” I said, with a mouthful of chocolate.

Yeah, nobody puts Princess Leia in the corner.

After the movie was over and the Maltesers long gone, I shuffled along, dumping the bowl into the smallest sink, in the smallest kitchen in all the world, before getting ready for bed.

If nothing else, I really needed to put my thoughts to bed.

I tried to tell myself that he hadn’t messaged during the day because maybe he thought I was at work.

I was struggling to think of other excuses for all the other unaccounted hours in the day, but at least that made me feel a little better.

The thought of Adam being like any other typical boy, that he had simply used me for sex, well, that just was too much to bear.

I had held him on a pedestal all my life.

He wasn’t that man, Ellie, you know that.

He didn’t manipulate women or treat them badly.

He was a larrikin, but he was also a gentleman.

Surely he hadn’t simply used me. I peeled back the doona I had held him on a pedestal all my life.

I couldn’t bring myself to think badly of him, not just yet.

I peeled back the doona to my freshly made bed, basking in the clean sheets.

One foot hadn’t even left the floor by the time I went to hop in when my phone rang, always scaring the life out of me.

My main objective was to just answer it as quickly as possible, scrambling for it and juggling it to stop the ear-piercing ringing.

“Hello?” I answered, settling into bed, adjusting the pillows for the night.

“Tell me a story?” a familiar voice asked.

There was no controlling the grin that spread across my face, or the way my heart skipped a beat just by simply hearing his voice.

“So you made it home safely then, I see?” I didn’t mean to sound snarky, I didn’t want to be that girl, but I was still kind of pissed at him.

“Chris, God bless his soul, called me up to do a grog run while I was in the city. I won’t be answering that call next time.”

“Oh noooo.”

It was the common theme whenever anyone did a trip to Maitland.

It was usually accompanied by a list from Chris with a “Can you do me a favour?” We all caught on pretty quickly to head to the city on the down low, if we didn’t want to have to return with a boot full of slabs, and a back seat of Samboy Salt and Vinegar chips and bottles of tonic water; we had all been there.

“Yep, there goes a few hours of my life I won’t get back.” Adam sighed; he sounded tired, no chance of a nap by the sounds of it.

“How was work?” he asked. I couldn’t quite bring myself to admit that I had been so exhausted from our all-night rendezvous that I had to go home early. It really was as bad as it sounded and I couldn’t bring myself to voice it.

“Good,” I said, trying to keep my voice neutral. “So how was dinner with Tess?”

“Yeah, good,” he said, and then silence fell between us.

Ghastly, drawn-out, awkward silence. There was never any silence between Adam and me, not in our entire lifetime had we suffered from the affliction.

And if there was to be any kind of silence, it had always been a comfortable silence.

This was not comfortable. This was drum-your-fingers-and-look-up-at-the-ceiling kind of uncomfortable.

“So, you heading back to Onslow on the weekend?”

I snapped to attention, relieved that Adam had broken the silence, excited he asked that kind of question.

Why, did he want me to?

I wanted to voice that exact question, perhaps use it as a means for some harmless flirtation. That’s what came to me naturally. Instead, something else entered my mind, something infuriating and responsible.

“Ugh, I can’t. Mum’s coming for the weekend.” I pouted, and then felt instantly awful. I know I complained about my mum often, but in light of Adam’s situation with his mum, I kind of felt like a spoilt brat. “Which will be good, to have some girl time,” I quickly added.

“Yeah, cool.”

Was that the sound of disappointment in his voice? I couldn’t tell what was real or what was overthought anymore.

Again, I kind of expected the whole “Hey, about last night” to pop up in conversation. Lord knows I had been mentally psyching myself up for it the minute I woke up. So, much like dousing myself in a self-inflicted stream of soda water, I thought I would put the ball in my court, so to speak.

“Listen, um, about last night—”

“Oh yeah, about that,” he interrupted. My mouth gaped, my body went rigid as I braced myself for the onslaught of “We’re friends, right?”

“You know what?”

“W-what?” I breathed, clutching my mobile with a white-knuckled intensity.

“I’d kind of like to do it again.”

I couldn’t wipe the smile from my face; if I could whistle properly I would be belting out Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah all the way to work, via the best coffee joint in the city, as my daily ritual would demand.

I inhaled the strong, rich brew, basking in the fresh morning sunshine and how glorious life was right now.

I couldn’t hear birdsong exactly, so I revelled in the city surrounds of the traffic, and general hustle and bustle from the manic crowd off to work.

I took it all in, thinking it almost sounded like my name rolling across the wind, a very distant cry.

Ha, today really was poetic, now I was hearing things, until of course I paused mid-sip, my eyes narrowing as the sound became louder, less sing-songy on the wind, and just damn well annoying.

“Hey, Ellie, wait up.”

Oh God, please, make it not be so.

I slowly turned, thinking maybe my mind was playing tricks on me; sure enough, as soon as I turned, my eyes widened, as right before me, closing the distance a good head and shoulders above the commuters, came Rory Fucking Franklin.