Lost in You (22 page)

I could practically hear the air quotes.

‘I can’t go to Paris,’ I said. Anxiety clawed inside me. This was the problem. This difference in our realities. His was jetting off to Paris, mine was marble floor repair in a big building that was older than me by several decades.

‘You can. I want you to go to Paris.’ He smiled.

I struggled to move back a little, watching the confusion turn to sadness on his face.

‘Clover –’

‘I’m not like you, Dorian. I can’t just fly off whenever I feel like it. I have Gram –’

‘But you said she was doing well,’ he said. His hands came down on my thighs and he splayed his fingers. Heat and arousal surged through me. Despite how my mind was reeling, my body still wanted this with him. Wanted it badly. The look on his face made my chest hurt. I wanted so much to be the girl who could just laugh, toss her hair back and say, ‘Paris? Sure! Let me pack a bag. I can buy all the other stuff I need while we’re there …’

‘She is, but she still needs me. I have responsibilities. I have someone who’s counting on me.’

He squeezed my thighs and kissed my neck. It took everything in me not to wrap my arms around him, cradle his head against me, open my legs a bit further and welcome him back into my body. We were frozen there in time. No clothes, pinned to a big white wall, me shoved back into a little alcove that was meant for some fine piece of art, not some awkward blonde lunatic.

‘I can hire someone –’

Rage spread like a stain inside me. I pushed back fast, wiggled my way past him and dropped to the floor. My foot slid on the marble and I nearly fell but caught myself. I found my trousers and slipped into them. Too late, I spotted my panties. I shoved them in my pocket.

‘That’s the problem,’ I practically hissed. ‘This is exactly what’s wrong with us, Dorian.’

‘Nothing is wrong with us,’ he said. He watched me but didn’t try to stop me or help me. Why would he?

‘Yes, a lot is wrong with us. You don’t hire someone for things you should do yourself. But you don’t know that, do you? Your life is your life and you get to do whatever you please because if something is standing in your way you can just
hire
someone.’

I yanked the cups of my bra up angrily and pushed away the memory of him touching me. I buttoned my shirt with shaking fingers.

‘Clover, I didn’t mean –’

‘I’m sure you meant well. But my grandmother is …’ My voice broke and I hated it. Hated how weak I sounded.

‘She is everything to me,’ I went on. ‘I will not just hire some stranger to take care of her so I can flit off to Paris with some guy.’

His mouth narrowed and what looked like unadulterated pain painted his face. ‘Some guy,’ he said, echoing me.

Dorian shook his head and looked away – anywhere but at me. Then he reached down and grabbed his jeans. Something about seeing his anger and his hurt stopped me cold. I watched him, wishing for all the world I could suck back the last words I’d spoken. I’d said it all wrong. In my moment of frustration and anger I had said something I couldn’t take back. Dorian was more than some guy. But this encounter – this
fiasco
– perfectly illustrated why the clashing of our two lives was impossible.

‘Dorian –’

He buckled his belt and found his shoes. I didn’t remember him kicking those off either. I’d been too wrapped up in being so close to him. Feeling him. Kissing him. I swallowed with difficulty. I couldn’t breathe.

‘If you have problems with how I live, we could talk about it. We can compromise. Maybe you can see that once … just once in a while, you could do for yourself and not for others. But even if that isn’t a possibility … ’ He took a deep breath and ran his hand through his hair, mussing it. ‘We could
talk
about it. Not just go through your standard kneejerk reaction of pushing me away. You know, Clover, I can’t help feeling like I’m paying for crimes I didn’t commit. I’m not your father. I didn’t leave. You’re the one who keeps doing that.’

Even as he said it I heard myself blurt. ‘Oh, so now I have daddy issues?’

It had been easy to hide from him up until now. But this – this confrontation – this was breaking my heart.

‘I get it,’ he said, refusing to look at me, ignoring my childish rebuttal. ‘Congratulations, I get it. I’m finally starting to understand that you will not
let
this work. I didn’t mean you should run off and marry me, Clover. But you know that, don’t you? I just thought maybe a few days, a week, away could give you some rest and some relaxation. Of all the people in the world I’ve not met but would like to, I think your grandmother would want that for you too.’ He finished tying his shoe and stood abruptly. ‘But I guess it wasn’t goodwill. Or a desperate desire to be with you. To have you to myself for a while. I guess that was just my entitlement rearing its ugly head.’ He stooped to grab my vest and handed it to me. ‘You know, I spent twenty-six-odd years disappointing my father by being myself. It seems very strange to me that it would hurt so much worse to disappoint a woman I just met by being myself. But there it is. Me disappointing you. I’m sorry,’ he said.

Then he turned stiffly and walked down the wide marble steps.

I didn’t realise I was crying until the tears started hitting the marble at my feet.

I poured myself a glass of wine in the kitchen. I could hear the after-dinner game shows on TV. Could hear the soft murmur and laughter of Brani and Gram as they played along. My fatigue wasn’t very evident until I sat down. Once my bottom hit the padded stool in the kitchen the heaviness in my body became apparent. I ached all over. My feet, my hips, my back. Even my eyes ached, but worst of all was the ache in my chest. And that one had nothing at all to do with fatigue.

I sipped the wine and rested my head against the kitchen wall. The EAT YOUR DINNER sign above my head brushed the very top of my hair. Not the most comfortable position in the world, but just sitting and doing nothing was nice. Between daily physical therapy appointments, various follow-up doctor visits and my daily hours at the Rotunda, I was pretty whipped. On top of it I found myself unable to sleep most nights. I replayed the final argument with Dorian in my head over and over again.

It had been four days and I knew he was in Paris. I also knew that my brain might as well have gone with him. During the day my head was full of the argument. My harsh words, his harsh reply. His parting shot about disappointing me. The ripping pain I felt when I thought of his words. At night, my head was full of the sex. The last time we were together. How his mouth and hands had felt on me. How overwhelming it had felt to have him in me, to have him take me.

My brain was full of Dorian Martin despite my irritation and my struggle to eradicate him.

I jumped when the wine glass slid from my hand, but was grateful to realise that I hadn’t dropped it, Brani had taken it.

She set it on the counter and leaned her hip against the cabinet. ‘You look exhausted.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘Maybe you should take a day off. Call in sick to work tomorrow. Lie in bed, eat potato chips, read a book. I’ll take Gladys to her PT appointment. Then I can take her to –’

‘Not necessary,’ I said. I hadn’t meant it to sound so rough.

‘I think it is necessary, Clover.’

‘Brani, butt out,’ I snapped.

Her eyes narrowed and she fixed her face in that stubborn look she was famous for. ‘You know what, little girl? You don’t scare me. And you don’t upset me. You can be as bitchy as you want and I will still know that look of yours. It’s the look you got during high-school finals when you were popping No-Doz so you could study even more though you had the material down pat. The same look you got in college when you decided you’d do a three-year programme instead of four because you could totally squeeze the four years into three. Only mere mortals needed four years to get through all that stuff.’

I turned my face from her, unwilling to hear this about myself right now.

‘And it’s the look you get when you are sick as a dog but don’t want to give yourself even a foot of slack to stay home and take care of yourself. And now it’s the look of a woman whose heart is broken and who refuses to acknowledge it. Even a little.’ She settled her hands on her hips and got in my face. ‘Now, I am going to
tell
you what tomorrow is going to bring.
You
are going to do whatever you are going to do.’

‘I –’

‘Hush up,’ she ordered and I did. ‘But
I
am going to take your grandmother to her PT appointment. And then I will take her to an early dinner. You can go to work, you can paint the house, you can go skydiving or you can give yourself some time to feel what you are feeling without running from it like a child.’

I blinked again. My throat had narrowed. I felt nothing but pressure, like I had a golf ball wedged in there.

I opened my mouth, shut it and opened it again. I reached for my wine. ‘You’re not really my aunt, you know.’

We both looked startled that I’d said it. I could feel the surprise etched on my face. I wanted – for the second time in a week – to immediately retract what I’d just said. Instead I watched her face go from surprise to anger to a sudden amused smile. She laughed out loud and patted my leg.

‘I know that, kid. But after all this time you’re stuck with me. Like it or not. Now, if you want to have a smack-down drag-out in front of Gladys over tomorrow, we can. And I’ll still win because if I lay it all out for her, she’ll agree with me. You need to deal with how you feel about this.’ She slapped something down on the counter before moving to pour herself a glass of wine. ‘It has to hurt like hell, but judging from the flower shop that was sent here a while back, I’m willing to wager you have a shot at fixing it. If that’s what you want.’

I waited for her to walk out, to hear her and Gram laughing in the next room, before I picked up the paper. It was folded to the Around Town section. The headline was simple. D
ORIAN
M
ARTIN
O
FF TO
P
ARIS WITH
M
OTHER AND
N
ATALIE
H
ODGINS TO
H
ONOUR
F
ATHER
.

The two inches of text then went on to speculate what it would mean for the two families if these hot singles got together and got married.

I heard her – Natalie – in my head.
He’s good in bed, isn’t he.

My wine threatened to come back up as I stared at the three of them waving as they ascended the few steps into the private plane we’d used to fly to Nantucket. I touched his face in grainy black and white.

I’d broken my chance with him. I had to move on. He’d done what I’d wanted. Gone back to his life and the people who fitted into it. I had no idea until that moment how painful my own wishes would be for me.

I texted Ed at the Rotunda that I had what felt like mild flu. I’d be taking the following day off. Then I texted Brani even though she was only a room away.

I’M STAYING HOME TOMORROW. THANK YOU FOR HELPING WITH GRAM. I LOVE YOU. I’M SORRY.

It was only a moment before she texted me back. Unlike Gram, Brani had totally embraced the technology of texts and emails and Internet surfing. She was often quicker on her phone than I was.

NO PROBLEM, KID. TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF FOR ONCE. WE LOVE YOU.

The fatigue that I’d just become aware of, moments before, threatened to overwhelm me. I took Gram her meds, kissed her and Brani on the head and carried my glass of wine into my room. I was asleep on top of my duvet before the ten o’clock dramas started.

I dreamed of Dorian. Flying high in the air. Locked in his arms, feeling safe, feeling pleasure, feeling as if I belonged.

* * *

Next morning, Brani stuck her head into my room at about ten o’clock. ‘Leaving soon to take Gladys to her appointment.’

I nodded. ‘Don’t you think she looks like a praying mantis?’ I asked.

I kicked the covers back and held out the newspaper. Natalie Hodgins looked very Jackie O in her smart little fall coat, a fetching shade of emerald. Because anyone who was anyone knew that green was in this season. Green was the ‘it’ colour. But unlike Jackie O she was tall and willowy and blonde. Her big sunglasses shielded a lot of her face and her well-styled hair was wind-whipped but perfect.

Brani came in and sat on the edge of my bed. She looked at the picture and I pointed, desperately wanting someone to agree with me. To validate the feelings that overcame me when I looked at the horrid image of him flying off to Paris with his mother and some other woman.

As if I could have gone to Paris. As if that could have happened.

‘She’s pretty,’ Brani said.

My heart fell. Even my own honorary aunt could not back me up that Natalie Hodgins, heiress extraordinaire, looked like an insect.

I sighed, flopped back. I could not wallow in bed for ever. I did not even know if I could wallow in bed for the whole day. Truth be told, I’m not much of a wallower. I’d rather be doing, moving on, pushing past. But apparently always pushing past without acknowledging things wasn’t super-healthy.

‘I wasn’t really looking at her, though,’ Brani said, tapping the paper with her fingernail.

‘What?’

‘I was looking at him,’ Brani said.

‘If this is where you tell me how handsome he is and what a good catch he is and that he’s rich, as if I didn’t know … well, I know all that!’

‘No,’ Brani said. She thrust the paper back at me and I took it. Looked at the two women turned and smiling to the camera. Looked at Dorian halfway up the steps and caught between them. His mother, Elizabeth Martin, and the green heiress behind him. ‘Look at him.’

I looked at him again. ‘What?’

She leaned over and patted my head as if in exasperation. ‘Look how
miserable
he looks, girl. That is not a moment to be jealous of. She does not make him happy. He is not happy. He is downright miserable.’

‘But he took her –’

‘You said no. And I’m sure there was a lot of pressure from her.’ She tapped Elizabeth Martin’s tiny face.