Miracle Man (6 page)

Inside, laughter and
conversation were as warming as the fire. Lahra pushed her plate away and leant
back in her seat, stretching. "I think I'm going to explode!"

Marcus laughed, and poured
them both another wine from the second bottle.

"I've eaten way too
much. I've drunk far too much. You're obviously a very bad influence on
me." Lahra closed her eyes, and the only thing she could see was Marcus’s
smiling face. Her nerve endings seemed to be having a party all of their own,
and she sat there like that for a little while and enjoyed the sensation.

"What are you
thinking?" Marcus asked.

"Nothing. Just resting
my eyes. That's what Mrs McDonald always told me to do."

"Mrs McDonald?"

"Our Nanny back in
Sydney. Mum and Dad would work at odd times so Mrs McDonald looked after us.
Becky was always happy playing with her dolls, but it seems all I ever used to
do was watch television, sitting about three feet from the screen. Mrs McDonald
used to tell me that if I watched it too much it would ruin my eyes. I should
rest them more, she always used to say. I got glasses when I was six and she
never stopped saying I told you so. I kept sitting right in front of the TV, of
course, and always did. I missed her when we moved out here."

Lahra opened her eyes
suddenly. "It seems we've spent most of tonight talking about me, and
hardly at all about you. I think it's time we turned the tables!"

"Actually," said
Marcus, standing, "I think it's time we cleared the table."

It took a minute for them to
do just that. They sat on the couch near the fire, Lahra aware of every
centimetre between them. She gathered her knees up and rested an arm on the
back of the couch.

"So what do you do,
exactly?"

"Exactly? Civil
engineer. I construct and design buildings, bridges and such."

"A civil engineer.
Well, you weren't so civil this morning, were you? Do you have your own
company?"

Marcus smirked. "Not
yet. But I'm working on it. I work for a 'boutique' place, if you want to call
it that, called Stone Rowbottom & Partners. We do specialist work. A lot of
private sector contracts. I've been with them a year, but I expect to make
partner within three years."

"You sound
driven."

"That's my father
coming out. He used to push me pretty hard. We learnt our work ethic from him,
I guess."

"We?"

"One brother, one
sister. Anne got married young and started having babies. Ronald... well...
he's a bit of a free spirit. I think Dad singled me out as the big achiever of
the family from the day I was born. He always said I made the most noise when I
came out. He got me interested in the financial markets by the time I was ten,
and I was barely out of university when I started buying houses and renovating
them as a business on the side."

"What about your
mother?"

"She was a fantastic
cook. I guess I inherited that from her," Marcus smiled into Lahra's eyes.
"But I never got really close to Mum. Dad had a habit of…
dominating."

Again Lahra could sense a
sadness within him. What was it? Here was a man who was focussed and strong,
highly successful at what he did, with the whole world seemingly at his feet.
Yet something wasn't right. Something was missing. And when a chill swept
through the empty space inside him it showed so clearly in his eyes that she
couldn't help but want to reach out and help. It was crazy. She'd only met
Marcus that morning, and here they were with a bottle and a half of wine behind
them and she was delving into his past like some amateur psychologist. By an
open fire, no less. Perhaps it would be wise to stop prying, before things
became too intimate. Perhaps she should put down her wine and call an early end
to the evening now. Perhaps she should ignore the welling feelings toward
Marcus Dean that threatened to spill from inside her like a river breaking its
banks, and not encourage them any more than they already were.

But instead she asked,
"Do you have a girlfriend? Or maybe a wife hidden away somewhere in one of
these houses of yours?"

Marcus laughed. "What
would I want one of those for? I've only ever succeeded in making women
miserable. They said I loved my work more than I loved them." He stopped
and thought for a moment, and Lahra couldn't help but wonder what faces and long
lost embraces were filling his head. "I suppose it boils down to not
having met the right woman."

And what type of woman would
that be, Lahra thought. Was she a five foot three brunette wearing glasses who
was afraid of the water? Was she a lecturer, a film producer, creative and
ambitious? Was she a hopeless romantic who lamented the fact that her life
never resembled the movie scene where the dashing, dark hero swept her
completely off her feet and declared his undying love? Was she?

Lahra's eyes fell to the
empty space between them on the couch. It was absurd to think like that. She
smiled in an attempt to lighten her suddenly downturned mood. "Perhaps you
should practise your gentlemanly behaviour a little more. I'm sure you'll meet
the right girl in no time."

Marcus looked at her over
his wineglass. "Perhaps you're right."

"I would never have
picked you for a dreamer," Lahra said after a short silence. "You
come across as being so practical, so confident, so now, now, now. But I
suspect there's something much softer beneath. Something very... attractive.
You should let it out more. Share those dreams of yours."

"Oh, I've had
experience with dreams. The trouble with dreams is that the harder you chase
them the more it hurts when someone sticks their foot out beneath you and trips
you up. Which isn't to say that you shouldn't chase your dreams. I mean, if you
want to win those Oscars, then great, go for it. Just understand that things
can go wrong. Things can get in the way. Sometimes insurmountable things."

"That's a depressing
way of dreaming," Lahra decided aloud. "It kind of defeats the
purpose. Isn't the nature of dreams an acceptance of the fact that they are
just that—dreams? You can't catch dreams, because then they're not dreams anymore.
They're real."

"When I was in high
school," Marcus said seriously, "I was a champion swimmer. By the
time I was seventeen I was swimming the fastest 1500 metres in my age group in
the country. I always dreamed of winning the Nationals, and that's just what I
did. I broke the national record. It all happened so suddenly, and before I
knew it the coach of the National Swimming Team was banging down my door asking
me to get involved at a more serious level. There was talk of the Olympics,
just eighteen months away. Finally, after much wooing by the powers that be, I
decided to go for it. I mean, the national championship was an incredible dream
come true, but the Olympics. That was something else again. And everyone got
behind me, believing I was good enough to do it. Everyone except my
father."

Lahra watched and waited as
the light flickered on Marcus’s face. "My father realised that if I was
going to train seriously for the Olympics it would leave little time for
anything else. I'd graduated from high school with great marks and had been
accepted at the best civil engineering course in the state. All he understood
was work. Hard work. To him, my swimming was just something that got in the way
of more important things. I argued, but the end result was that he banned me
from training for the Olympic Games. He took what had become not just my dream,
but the dream of all those people who believed in me, and ended it just like
that."

"But surely if you wanted
it badly enough, you could have gone through with it."

"You don't know my
father. In a strange way he was right, and in the end I had to acknowledge
that. A career is a lifelong commitment, and it takes hard work. The Olympics
would have impaired my progress."

"You sound like you're
convincing yourself."

"Maybe because even now
I feel bad for all the people I let down. Especially myself. Plus the fact that
the Olympic Gold went for just eight seconds less than my best time. I could
have been in with a real shot. As it is, I stopped competitive swimming
altogether. So the moral of this sad tale, Lahra Brook, is to be sure of what
you want and then make sure you don't let anything get in the way. Here endeth
the lesson."

"Your parents sound so
different to mine," Lahra mused. "My parents were the most romantic
couple in the world. At least that's how it always seemed to me."

"That would explain
that look in your eyes," Marcus said softly. Lahra looked at him, and the
space between them seemed to shrink.

"What look?"

"That look of belief.
Of passion. Your parents obviously inspired you. What happened to them?"

Lahra breathed deeply. It
was now her turn to release the spirits of the past. Normally she would have
changed the direction of the conversation quickly, especially with a person
she'd only known for a day. But it hadn't been any ordinary day. And the wine
was like a truth serum, its soporific effect dismantling the barriers of her
mind.

"When I was seventeen,
in my final year of high school, they went on holiday to Europe. They hadn't
been back there since their honeymoon in Paris. Becky and I were staying with
my Aunt and Uncle at Bristol Bay. The weather is so nice there, we spent most
of our time in the pool, or walking along the beach. Then one day I emerged
from being underwater to see Auntie Joy standing there, crying. She ushered me
out of the pool and held me. Becky joined us. I remember feeling very scared,
and I asked what was wrong." Lahra stared off into the dim corners of the
room as she recounted the moment. "She said mum and dad had been killed in
a ferry disaster in the North Sea. I was so shocked I didn't even cry. I
couldn't. Becky burst into tears, and I watched her. It just didn't seem real.
I didn't cry until two weeks later, when I was eventually back here at the
house. I was sorting through things here in the living room, remembering, and I
came across the soundtrack album from
Dr Zhivago
that they had loved so
much. One of the tracks from it was the music they had danced to at their
wedding. It's called
Lara's Theme
. I sat here and listened to it, and
suddenly… I cried for three days solid." The silence in the room grew
heavy as they sat there, motionless. Finally, Lahra spoke. "And just as a
footnote, I've been afraid of the water ever since. Which explains my
embarrassing episode in the river this morning."

Lahra's memories settled
back down onto the bed of her mind. And then she felt Marcus’s hand on her
shoulder. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah, well,"
Lahra shrugged, then placed her unfinished wine on the coffee table and stood.
She moved over in front of the fireplace and stared down into the fire's dance.
"They were together at the very end. I'm sure they would have seen the
romance in that and wanted us to remember it."

Then Lahra felt a hand
lightly grasp each of her arms. "Lahra..." Marcus’s voice was soft
and close. She responded to his touch and turned to face him. She looked up
into his beautiful eyes and could see her reflection. And around her was the
fire, burning there in his eyes like some primal instinct come to life. His
hand moved up and stroked her cheek so gently that she couldn't even be sure
that he'd touched her. Her insides were like some wild amusement park, whirring
and flashing and turning and spinning, and she parted her lips as if to invite
him inside. There were so many things she wanted to say—that she felt she
should
say—but the bells and sirens of the amusement park drowned them all out before
they could reach her mouth. He slid her glasses off, and she momentarily closed
her eyes as if preparing to reopen them to a whole new view of the world. When
she did open them, the flames in Marcus’s eyes were growing larger, closer, and
she felt her body surrender to his arms as they encircled her. She shut her
eyes again, the disbelief in her heart evicted by a thousand chemical reactions
as she felt his soft breath against her waiting lips. And then he was kissing
her, tender caresses across her mouth like whispered promises in her ear. It
still wasn't too late to revoke the invitation her lips had made to him. She
could still pull away and listen to all the reasons why it was wrong for her to
let herself be kissed by this man. But she didn't stop. She pressed forward.
His arms held her tighter and her lips yielded to the subtle message in his
kiss. Everything that she was seemed to gather at some imaginary gate, the key
to which he had somehow found. It was only a matter of time before the tumblers
fell and the gate swung wide, before her heart, mind and soul enveloped him
like bright light bouncing off a silver screen. Alarms seemed to sound, like
distant sirens in the night. If only the bells would stop ringing. If only this
insulated world they had created was free from the bells... the ringing... the-

The phone!

Lahra broke the kiss and
pulled away. She had a momentary vision of Marcus forlornly standing there
holding a key, but by the time she grabbed for her glasses it was gone. The
phone in the kitchen was ringing. She slipped past Marcus’s enquiring gaze and
went to answer it.