Chocolate Cake for Breakfast (36 page)

‘I was a tree, with wind in my branches.’

‘Wow. Can you show me?’

Bel looked at me pityingly. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘I need the music. Daddy, I’m starving to death.’

‘Would you like a piece of cheese?’ he asked. Dentists don’t really approve of eating between meals, but if you must snack at least let it be dairy. Or bread. But never raisins – the very thought almost prostrates them with horror.

‘Yes!’

‘I’m starving too,’ Caitlin said.

‘Aren’t you cold?’ Dad asked, getting a block of cheese out of the fridge.

She shook her head. ‘Just hungry.’

‘Poor little waif,’ said Dad, and she giggled. He cut two slices of cheese and handed them out. ‘Now vamoose. Go and get dressed.’

‘Take your towel!’ I called after them, but Caitlin, who can detect the rustle of a crisp packet at a hundred metres, continued serenely up the stairs.

‘So,’ said Dad, ‘I hear it’s all back on.’

‘Yes.’

‘Very good.’ He cut a third slice of cheese, speared it on the end of his knife and held it out to me.

‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘How was work?’

‘Oh, about the usual. Nothing too startling. You?’

‘Well, I did get felt up by Kelvin Pryor. That was pretty startling.’

An expression of mild surprise crossed Dad’s face. ‘Wouldn’t have thought he had it in him,’ he said.

‘A proper father would roar round there and beat him to a pulp,’ I remarked.

‘Did he frighten you?’

‘No,’ I said, nibbling my cheese. ‘It was just all a bit unpleasant.’

‘I’m sure it was. You know, he’s coming in next week for a root canal. It’s funny how sometimes the local doesn’t work as well as you’d expect.’

‘I love you, Dad,’ I said. ‘Hey, would it be okay with you and Em if I came and stayed for a couple of weeks from this weekend?’

‘I expect so. Why?’

‘I’m going to finish work on the thirteenth of May and go and live with Mark, so it seems a bit pointless to move into a new place for two weeks.’

‘Go and live with him permanently?’ he asked.

‘Yep.’

‘Are you sure you’ve thought this out? That’s a fairly drastic step, considering that last week it was all over.’

‘I know,’ I said.

‘You’ve got nobody in Auckland except him,’ said Dad. ‘And he’s not there half the time.’

‘I can always come and annoy you if I get lonely.’

‘And babies change everything. They’re incredibly demanding little things.’

‘I know,’ I said again. I didn’t – I had all but left home by the time Caitlin was born – but I had been imagining the worst for some months now. ‘Dad, I’m scared out of my tiny mind. But – but if it all turns to custard, at least I’ll know we gave it a really good try.’

My father took off his glasses and began to polish them on the hem of his shirt, which was disheartening.

‘I love him a lot,’ I offered.

‘Yes,’ he said heavily. ‘I know.’

Em came downstairs, swathed from throat to ankle in a very glamorous pink satin dressing gown that cried out for a pair of pink feathered mules. ‘Have you told him?’ she asked, pulling the sash tight around her waist.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘He’s polishing. Not a good sign.’

She looked at Dad with her head on one side. ‘Tim?’

‘Hmm?’ He ceased to polish and swung his glasses by one stem instead.

‘What’s wrong, love?’ asked Em.

‘Nothing’s wrong,’ he said testily. ‘I’m just not convinced that Helen rushing off to live in Auckland at a moment’s notice is the best move.’

‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ she said. ‘It’s the first sign of intelligence she’s shown for months!’

Harsh
, I thought.
True, quite possibly, but harsh nonetheless.

‘And anyway, it’s got to be better than having her mope around here with big, lost eyes like a baby seal’s.’

‘Hey!’ I said indignantly.

‘You
have
been. For
months
! We’ve been
beside
ourselves with worry!’

‘I’m so sorry.’

‘That’s alright. We love you. But it’s high time you did something a bit more proactive.’

‘I
am
!’ I cried.

‘Good,’ she said. ‘Tim, they’ll be fine.’

I was quite touched for a moment, until she added, ‘And if it doesn’t work out, sweetie, remember you’ve always got us.’

Torn between amusement and affront, I went home to my small cold house and found Murray waiting at the door with his tail wrapped around his feet. He sat companionably beside me on the bench while I transformed a packet of two-minute noodles, one limp carrot, half an onion and the dregs of a frozen bag of mixed veggies into possibly the world’s least interesting stir-fry, then draped himself across my lap when I sat down on the sofa to try to eat it. I took a mouthful, grimaced and pulled my phone from my pocket to text Mark.

Good day?

He answered straight away.
Yes esp waking up and u there.

Same. Love you.

Yr door locked?

Yes.

Actually, no. But good point. I put down my stir-fry, and Murray, who ate almost everything but lettuce, didn’t even glance at it. Instead he yawned and began to wash his bottom. ‘It’s not
that
bad,’ I told him, struggling to my feet.

The kitchen door opened with a click and a groan, and I jumped about a foot.

‘Liar,’ Mark called.

34

‘
DID YOU GET THE LINEOUT SORTED
?’
I ASKED WHEN WE
’
D
 finished acting like the reunion scene from
The Notebook
and settled on the couch.

‘Yep,’ said Mark, pulling me more closely up against him. ‘Running like a well-oiled machine. Hey, I’ve been thinking about you moving this weekend –’

‘All organised. I rang the second-hand shop this afternoon, and they’re happy to take all my furniture.’ At a fraction of the price they had originally charged me for it, but you get that.

‘Yeah, but –’

‘And Sam and Alison are coming on Saturday afternoon to help me load it all up. Everything else’ll fit in the car, and I’ll just have to do a bit of cleaning between after-hours calls. Easy.’ I slid my fingers down between his.

‘You are not loading furniture in your state.’

‘I’m pregnant,’ I pointed out. ‘Not crippled.’

‘Look, why not wait till Sunday, when I can give you a hand?’

‘
You’ ll
be crippled on Sunday.’ Post-match blood tests of professional rugby players, according to an article that had done nothing for my enjoyment of Mark’s games, show levels of muscle damage comparable to those of car-crash victims. ‘Anyway, Sam and Alison are going to the beach. Honestly, love, it’ll be fine. I promise not to lift anything heavy.’

‘Hmm,’ said Mark. He detached his hand from mine, took his iPhone out of his pocket and googled
commercial cleaners
Broadview
.

‘Are you casting aspersions on my housekeeping skills?’ I asked.

‘No, I’m trying to help.’

‘It’s very sweet of you, but the cleaning really won’t be a big deal.’

He lowered the phone and looked at me. ‘Would you please stop being so bloody self-sufficient and let me do something for you?’

Oh. ‘Sorry,’ I said meekly. ‘Yes. Thank you.’

I spent Saturday morning from nine till twelve at the clinic, where I microchipped one puppy and admired the speed at which Zoe’s thumbs moved across the keypad of her cell phone (a speed she never exhibited when doing anything else).

Sam, Alison and her mother’s horse float arrived promptly at one. We loaded up the furniture, and Sam, although he obviously thought I was burning my bridges to a crisp, drove the lot to the second-hand shop while Alison and I packed everything else into my car.

Everything else consisted of three boxes of kitchen equipment, four of books, a wicker laundry basket full of shoes, a shoebox of CDs, three green shot-silk cushions, a black plastic rubbish bag full of bedding and another of towels, my mother’s spade, a vacuum cleaner and two suitcases of clothes, most of which didn’t fit me. Also one pissed-off cat, yelling from his cage on the porch. It seemed a fairly meagre haul – I had intended to start accumulating grown-up stuff like lounge suites and nice crockery when I got home from overseas, but I was distracted by an All Black.

I crammed the last cushion into the last available bit of space, and Alison sat on the boot to close it. ‘Done,’ she said.

‘Thank you. You’re wonderful.’

‘You’re welcome.’

My cell phone beeped, and I extracted it from my jeans pocket.

Hows it going?

All packed. You?
I wrote back. ‘Sorry, Ali.’

‘It’s fine,’ she said. ‘Is that Mark?’

‘Yeah.’

The phone beeped again.
All good x

xx
, I typed. Then I thought for a moment, deleted an x in case he should think I was starting one of those tiresome ‘no, I love
you
more’ exchanges, pressed send and put the phone back in my pocket.

‘Has your dad got used to the idea of you leaving yet?’ Alison asked.

‘No,’ I said. ‘He’s still shaking his head and muttering. Poor Dad – I can totally see his point. Last week it was all over, and this week we’re moving in together. It’s enough to worry any parent.’

She smiled.

‘Do
you
think I’m making a terrible mistake?’ I asked.

‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘But it doesn’t matter what I think, as long as you’re sure.’

‘I am.’

‘Good.’

She left for Dad and Em’s in my car, and I went slowly back across the lawn and up the porch steps. Empty, the cottage looked smaller, shabbier and depressingly unloved. I made a little farewell tour, retrieving a stray sock and a bottle of body wash as I went, and in a burst of sentimentality kissed the kitchen doorframe on the way back out.

I left the key in the door for the cleaners and turned to look out over the lawn. The grass was the lovely luminous green of autumn and a flock of goldfinches swirled past to settle in rows on the wires of the fence. Just the setting for a bit of pensive contemplation on the closing of a chapter in one’s life – except that it’s impossible to be properly pensive with a caged cat wailing at your feet. I gave up the attempt, carried Murray out to the ute and went to Dad and Em’s, where I spent the rest of the day making plaster-of-Paris fridge magnets, having my toenails painted Smurf blue and stitching up a wounded pig dog.

I had a midwife’s appointment on Wednesday afternoon. Originally billed as the Birth Plan appointment, it had, due to my imminent departure from the district, been scaled down to a referral and farewell chat. Mark came, which was particularly nice. I wanted to show him to Eloise and prove I honestly wasn’t a delusional rugby groupie, and he and Dad were well overdue for a catch-up. I’d been so morbidly aware of pressuring Mark that I had carefully shielded him from all family contact since Christmas, which probably isn’t the best way to reassure your father that your boyfriend’s a top bloke.

Mark arrived at the clinic at four twenty, and my cunning time-saving plan to meet him in the car park was foiled by a phone call from a woman whose dog may or may not have eaten the plastic wrapping from around a bacon hock. Once inside the clinic, Mark was instantly surrounded and it was quite difficult to extract him again, but it was only four thirty-three when we left for our four-thirty appointment.