‘I’m going to bed.’ She didn’t bend her head to kiss him and James hardly looked up, neither quite brave enough to have that talk.
He sat in the semi-darkness, teeth gritted, and tried to concentrate on the film, because if he didn’t he might just march into that bedroom and say something he’d regret.
Some welcome home.
He was a night person, and once Ava had been. She’d been a morning person too—up at the crack of dawn and swimming on weekdays, riding at weekends, and he was glad she was doing that again. It was the early nights he couldn’t stand and she was going to bed even earlier. Now it was lights down at ten, like some school trip.
James hauled himself from the sofa and wandered into his study, saw the wedding photo on the desk and he barely recognised them so he closed the door, went back into the living room, opened up his case then headed to the cupboard and took out a blanket and pillow and tossed them down.
God, but he hated that sofa.
There was a small bathroom in the hall and he was quite sure she’d prefer that he use it, but he refused to, so he took out his toiletry bag from the case and walked into the bedroom where she lay pretending to be asleep as he went into the en suite.
James took off the shirt and discarded the linen pants on the floor, then he rinsed off the cologne and looked at her make-up bag, saw the little packet of pills that was supposed to have been the solution. He thought about having a shower, but decided that it could wait till morning. There was a show he liked starting soon, so he put a towel around his hips and walked past her bed on the way to the sofa. They’d talk tomorrow, he decided, or maybe they should wait till after his mum’s birthday. He was starving. One piece of grilled chicken and a baby potato with a tiny knob of low-fat sour cream—there hadn’t been butter in the apartment for years, another thing that was banned. Maybe he should ring for a pizza; that would really get under her skin …
And then he stopped.
He just stopped.
Because he could do this no longer, because it had come to this. He was sick of the sofa and sick of not wanting to come home—and, as hard as it was, he had to say it—he was an oncologist after all, should be able to stand by a bed and deliver a grim diagnosis.
‘Ava.’ He stood by the bed. ‘I need to talk to you.’ Her eyes were still closed but he carried on. ‘These last months while I’ve been away in Brisbane, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.’
‘James.’ She turned on her side. ‘It’s late, can we talk tomorrow? At the weekend maybe?’ She didn’t want to hear it.
‘No,’ James said. ‘We’re going to talk now. You know how we agreed about no children, that we weren’t going to have babies …’
She didn’t want this conversation, just didn’t want to have it, but James pressed on regardless. ‘When you went on the Pill, I thought it was supposed to take the pressure off, supposed to be a relief, but if anything it’s made things worse.’ She could feel him standing over her, could feel tears building behind her eyes, and then as he carried on, she grew angry. ‘I mean, even if we only had sex because you wanted to get pregnant, at least we did it …’
‘Oh, poor James.’ She opened her eyes now—angry eyes that met his. Three months apart and a whole lot of thinking and that was all he could come up with, that they weren’t doing it any more. ‘So you’re not getting enough!’
‘I know I’m not good at this.’ James hissed his frustration. ‘I know that I say the wrong thing, but will you just hear me out? Every day you tell your patients to talk things through,’ James said. ‘Every night you come home and refuse to.’
‘What do you want to talk about, James? That we’re not doing it? Well, sorry …’ And she stopped. She just didn’t have the energy to argue any more, couldn’t drag up any more excuses, and she sat up in the bed and looked at the face she had always loved, and he was looking at her as if he didn’t even know who she was.
‘We’re finished, aren’t we?’ James said it for them and it made her want to retch, but instead she just sat there as he answered the question for them. ‘I mean, how much more finished can you be if after being away for three months I’m automatically heading for the sofa?’
‘Some sex therapist!’ She made the stupid joke for him, the one he must hear every day, when no doubt people nudged him and said how lucky he was. If only they knew. She wanted to reach out to him but she didn’t know how. She’d tried so many times to have the conversations that ran in her head with him, to mourn the loss of their babies together. She had tried to tell him how she was feeling, that it wasn’t just the baby she grieved for but the chance to be a mother, to fix what had been broken with her own mum. She really had tried. At first she’d cried on him. James all big and strong, telling her things would be fine, that there would be other babies, except that wasn’t what she had wanted him to say.
Neither had it helped when he’d told her that they’d try again soon because she hadn’t wanted him to say that either.
He was an oncologist, for God’s sake; he should know how to handle grief!
She could remember how excited he had been the first time she had been pregnant. He’d told her how much he wanted children, how much he was looking forward to being a dad. He’d shared his dreams with her and she felt like she’d ended them.
‘What happens now?’ She looked over at him.
‘I don’t know,’ James admitted. ‘I guess we both get a lawyer.’
‘We don’t need lawyers.’
‘That’s what everyone says, isn’t it?’ James said. ‘Let’s just get a lawyer and get it done.’
He headed out to the sofa and she called him back. ‘It’s your mum’s birthday next weekend—should we do it after that?’
He gave a short nod. ‘I’ll go to a hotel tomorrow. I’ll tell her after, well, not straight after …’
‘Okay.’ She couldn’t stand it—she couldn’t stand to look at what she was losing so she moved to turn out the bedside light. ‘Night, then.’
That incensed him. He strode over, his face suddenly livid, and as she plunged them into darkness he turned the light back on and stood over her. ‘You can’t even squeeze out a tear, can you?’ James accused.
‘Don’t say that.’ Because if she started crying she thought she might never stop.
‘You’re just glad it’s done, aren’t you?’ James said. ‘Well, you know what? So am I. It’s been hell …’
‘It wasn’t all bad.’
‘No, Ava, it wasn’t all bad,’ James said, his voice rising, ‘but it wasn’t all good either, so don’t try and sugarcoat the situation. This last year has been hell and I just want done with it.’ She winced at his anger, at the hurt that was there, and then he stopped shouting. ‘Sorry.’ he ran a hand through his hair. ‘I’m sorry, okay? I don’t want to fight.’ He sat down on the bed and took her hand. ‘We’ll do this civilly. I don’t want any more rows, we’ll finish things nicely … You’re right, it wasn’t all bad.’ And he looked at her. ‘There was an awful lot of good.’
‘I don’t want to fight,’ she begged, because she hated fights, she hated rows, they made her feel ill, and James knew that.
‘We won’t,’ he promised. ‘We’ll just …’ He gave a shrug. She could see all his muscles, he’d really toned up, he looked amazing, he felt amazing on her skin as his hand met her arm. ‘We’ll remember the good times,’ James said. ‘We don’t want to end up like Donna and Neil.’
And