Holding Out for a Hero (5 page)

Ella, who was pretending she wasn’t walking next to God’s gift to the female anatomy, was grateful for the silence. “Talk is overrated.”

Jake laughed. “Now you sound like my kind of woman.”

Ella rolled her eyes. “More the wham, bam type, Jake?”

“Well, you’d know, sweetheart.”

She gritted her teeth at his ungentlemanly reminder. But still those muscles deep inside her did another wild tango.

They walked in silence for a moment or two, Cerberus trotting between them as they appreciated the sultry twilight and the first sprinkling of stars.

“So what’s the story with you and Rosie?”

Ella didn’t answer for a while. Where did she start? How did she sum up their relationship in one or two sentences? How could she adequately convey just how much Gypsy-Rose Forsythe meant to her? How did you put almost two decades of friendship into words?

“It seems to me like you’ve known each other for a long time.”

Ella nodded. “Nineteen years.”

Jake did a quick calculation and frowned. “Do you know her from Huntley?”

She nodded again. “Rosie came halfway through twelfth grade.”

“Has she always been … alternative?”

Ella grinned. “Always. Her family are carnies. She grew up in a circus. I think she was a little extreme though, even for them.”

He laughed. “I bet Huntley wasn’t ready for that.”

His laugh was delicious. Rich and warm, oozing over her like warm treacle, and it gave her goose bumps despite the warmth in the air. Those muscles did their thing again. The way she was going, she’d have the tightest pelvic floor around. Which could be a plus. At least when they shut her school down she’d be able to get a job as an exotic dancer firing ping pong balls out of her twat.

“Huntley most definitely disapproved.”

He looked at her speculatively. “So you befriended her?”

Ella caught the trace of skepticism. “Yes.” Actually, Rosie, recognising a fellow misfit, had invaded her personal space and refused to leave. Thank God
.
“Is that so hard to believe?”

Jake shrugged. “You were always such a … loner.”

Ella snorted. “Do you think that was through choice, Jake?” She stopped walking and Cerberus looked up at her and gave a low whine. “None of the good mothers of Huntley wanted their precious little girls playing with Rachel’s daughter.” Ella had learnt early that loneliness was preferable to rejection.

Jake nodded. He knew the feeling well. He hadn’t been good enough for the daughters of Huntley either. Fortunately for him teenage girls and their mother’s often didn’t see eye to eye. “The mothers of Huntley were a mob of prissy, small-town, narrow-minded, bigoted bitches.”

Ella held Jake’s gaze. She knew he was right but, oh, how she had longed to go to Sarah Charlton’s eighth birthday party along with all the other girls in her class. Or any of the other birthday parties.

Cerberus’s cold nose nudged her palm. She looked down at him as she scratched his head—another misfit. “Yes, I know that—now. But as a kid, you just want to fit in. To be like the others.”

Jake shook his head. “That’s what I liked about you. You were different from the others.”

He’d liked her? “Jake, we barely said boo to each other.”

“Yeah, but you never judged me, Ella. You never condemned me because my father was a drunk or blew all our money on the horses.”

“That would have been completely hypocritical of me, wouldn’t it?”

“Huntley thrived on hypocrisy, sweetheart.”

Ain’t that the truth. Ella stared for a few more moments then started walking again. Jake and Cerberus joined her.

“For what it’s worth, I really liked your mother.”

“You knew Rachel?” Jake looked at her. Of course. Everyone knew Rachel.

Ella remembered the first time she realized what her mother did and why they were ostracized. She’d been in fifth grade and overheard some teachers talking. She remembered the shock as if it was yesterday, trying to comprehend how the woman who danced with her to ‘Blue Moon’ every morning and had home-made choc-chip muffins waiting for her after school was the same person these adults were talking about.

She’d always known her mother wasn’t like the other mums but she’d actually kind of liked that. Rachel had been the prettiest mother by far and Ella had been secretly proud. She used to sit and watch her mother’s make-up ritual every morning, totally entranced, longing for the day when she would be old enough for red lipstick and pink cheeks.

Of course the fact that Rachel was always in her silky dressing gown, day and night, should have been a clue. As a kid, Ella had just loved the cool slippery feel of it against her face and the way it smelled of perfume and powder. It had seemed so sophisticated. So adult. Later she’d grown to hate it and all it represented.

“Yeah, well,” she said derisively shaking off the memories, “she tended to have that effect on anyone with a Y chromosome.”

Jake shook his head. “She always had the time of day for my dad. A lot of people didn’t. It meant something.”

They stopped at a traffic light and Ella glanced at him. He was looking at her with sincerity blazing like a beacon in his eyes and she stopped herself from pointing out it was her mother’s
job
to give people the time of day. It was startling to hear someone defending Rachel and she felt like a child again, desperately wanting her mother to be the person Jake knew her to be, not the one Huntley had painted her as.

The red man turned green and the moment passed. When they got to the other side, Ella turned right, away from the main road and into the back streets.

“So you two have been friends since twelfth grade,” Jake prompted.

Ella nodded. “We hitched out of Huntley together, ended up in Brisbane at her aunts’ place. Rosie always jokes she’s probably the only kid in the world who ran away from the circus to join home.”

Jake laughed. It filled the warm air around her and cocooned her in a comforting embrace. “So, you didn’t flee with the principal that night?”

“No. Contrary to popular opinion, Mr. Edmonstone and I were not having an illicit affair.”

“He liked you though.”

“Yes. He did. He was the most inspirational person I had ever met. He told me about all the places he’d been and the people he’d met. He encouraged me to aim high. To get out of Huntley and make something of myself. Go to uni. Travel. Expand my horizons. He was a good teacher. The kind of teacher every student should have. I owe him a lot.”

Jake nodded. “He was a pretty decent guy. I wasn’t much of a scholar but he never gave up on me.”

As Jake had spent more time outside Mr. Edmonstone’s office than he’d spent inside a classroom, Ella figured he spoke from experience.

“He certainly didn’t seem the kind to run off with a student.”

Ella couldn’t agree more, still pissed off at the rumour. “How were we to know he was high-tailing it out of Huntley that night too? He told us he was going to a curriculum meeting in Wombialla.”

“Guess he must have just flipped,” Jake mused.

She nodded. “It must have been hard for a worldly man to settle in such a bigoted backwater. I think he just couldn’t take it another moment.”

They drew level with her gate. The night was almost completely upon them now and the trees framing the house looked like stands of black coral against the velvet sky. Cerberus sniffed at the gatepost with great interest.

Jake blinked at the massive old Queenslander. “That’s a big house for two chicks.”

Ella smiled. “Two chicks, two crazy old aunts, several stray animals and a teenage boy.”

“How is Cameron?”

Ella’s hand tightened on the gate. “He’s fine,” she said, a little too quickly.

Jake saw the white of her knuckles. “He’s what, fifteen?” He whistled. He remembered what a handful he was at that age. How full of hormones and rage he’d been. “That’s a tough age.”

“He’s … it’s … difficult at times.” Now there was the world’s greatest understatement. She felt like she’d been beating her head against a brick wall for the last two years. She was somewhere between concussed and rupturing a blood vessel. Even the thought of having to go in and confront him now over his latest misdemeanour was bringing on a headache.

Jake put his hand over hers. “Don’t forget, he grew up in Huntley, too.”

She looked down at his hand. She was trying hard, really hard, to remember. God knew she’d cut him enough poor-kid’s-grown-up-in-whacko-central slack to last a lifetime. But she was nearly at the end of her rope. Her brother was so hostile and she didn’t understand how blowing off his education, his one true chance at leaving his upbringing behind for good, was going to make anything better.

“Do you want to come in?” The husky invitation was out before she had a chance to recall it. She really didn’t want to face Cam and was willing to use whatever delaying tactics she had at her disposal. She shrugged. “It’s usually a three-ring circus but if you’re game …”

Jake could sense her desperation. Something inside was waving a giant red flag. This was cosy, family crap. Dangerous waters. But something else, something bigger, wrapped his resistance in a giant tentacle and yanked him forward at the same time Cerberus nuzzled his hand. He looked down at the dog and received an enthusiastic tail wag/whole body wiggle.

Surely seeing Cerberus settled was the responsible thing to do? He smiled at Ella. “I’m always up for a challenge.”

Ella smiled back, bolstered by his presence, and pushed open the gate. “Virgin sacrifices first,” she said and gestured for him to precede her.

Jake grinned as he moved past her. “Should I be afraid?”

“Very. Daisy loves fresh blood.”

A sensor light shone through the tree canopy and lit the path almost immediately as a rumble of barking and a flash of fur tumbled down the stairs to greet them.

“Whoa,” Jake laughed as Genghis leaped up at him. He ruffled the dog’s head affectionately and razzed him up for a few seconds before crouching to pat the other dogs too. They spent a bit of time watching while the dogs all sniffed Cerberus’s bottom and generally got to know the skinny intruder.

Ella decided not to take him through the house. It was a bit like entering an alternative reality and as much as she was grateful he was beside her tonight, this house was the only place she’d ever felt at home and she didn’t want to share it with him. How could someone who lived in a sleek riverside address understand her total devotion to this sagging old beauty?

She led him around the verandah, the dogs charging ahead. The cigarette smoke greeted them long before they reached Iris and Daisy’s table. She was nervous and wasn’t at all sure it was totally to do with Cameron and his truancy.

“And who do we have here?” Daisy held Cerberus’s head in her hands and stared into his eyes. He wagged his tail.

“That’s Cerberus,” Jake said.

Daisy looked at the pathetic mutt and raised an eyebrow, then she looked up and appraised the other newcomer through a waft of blue smoke. “And who are you?”

Ella performed the introduction and Jake felt an instant rapport with Daisy. She reminded him of his own aunt, Thelma. Well actually, she’d been his great aunt, his mother’s aunt. But she’d raised him for many years after his mother’s desertion with the same shrewdness he saw in Daisy’s gaze. She’d died of a heart attack when he’d been twelve and he’d missed her every day since.

“Jake!” Rosie leaped from the table and gave Jake an enthusiastic hug. “Sit down. I have some curry left.”

Jake looked at Ella, who gave him an almost imperceptible shake of her head. He glanced at who he assumed was Simon, his nose shiny red, gulping greedily from a large cup of water. “Er, thanks but I can’t stay for long. I have to get back to the pub.” He took the seat opposite Simon with views over the backyard. He noticed Cerberus was making himself at home by methodically lifting his leg on every tree and bush. Genghis followed after him peeing over the top of the newcomer’s wet spots.

“You’re a Sag, aren’t you?” Iris asked.

Jake smiled at the older woman with the dreamy voice as Ella introduced him. “Yes, I am.”

Iris nodded, picked up her tarot cards, shuffled them and presented them to him. “Pick one.’

Jake grinned as he looked from one Technicolor twin to the other. He chose one from the middle of the pack and flipped it over.

It was Death.

The whole table stared at it in silence. “Guess that’s bad, huh?” Jake grinned, unperturbed.

Iris glanced at Daisy. “Trouble, I tell you,” she muttered, picking it up.

Simon blinked at the laidback guy who’d joined them. The heat of Rosie’s curry had finally eased its strangle hold on his vision and he realised his fellow newcomer looked familiar. “Good God,” he said. “You’re Jake Prince.” He rose from his seat and extended his hand across the table. “I’m a big fan. It was a tragedy to see you go.”

Jake shook Simon’s hand as Rosie introduced him. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Do you miss it?” Simon asked, sitting back down.

“Sure,” Jake said also taking a seat.
Every moment, of every day.
Football had been the only thing he’d ever been any good at.

“What do you think the Heroes’ chances are this season?”

Ella rolled her eyes at Rosie. “Where’s Cam?” she interrupted before the conversation descended into a cave man-like dialect that required either a degree in anthropology or a Y chromosome to decipher.

“Watching the footy. Where else?” Daisy said, eyeing Jake with interest. “That kid watches too much TV.”

Ella nodded, Daisy’s bluntness washing over her. She knew Daisy had her own thoughts on the way Cam was being raised, which she generally kept to herself. She doubted any of them involved the softly, softly approach that Ella had thus far favored. Certainly Cam wouldn’t be game to give Daisy the amount of crap he heaped onto her. But she had a lot of years to make up for and she was trying to get by as best she could. At least when Cam was glued to the box, she knew where he was. And watching football made him less sullen. No doubt it was his way of trying to piss her off further.

“Some girl rang him earlier,” Rosie chimed in. “Miranda. Or something like that.”