Seven Days: The Complete Story (46 page)

I pause beside him and look out into the
garden. I sneak my hand in the direction of his, too scared to take
his yet hoping he’ll reach for mine. Joel has his eyes trained
somewhere in the distance. He’s ignoring my hand. I wish he’d look
at me. I want him to tell me everything’s going to be okay, that we
can get through this together. I want him to make some wise crack
to break this awkward black ice between us.

I give up waiting and nudge his side.
“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“It’s heavy in there.”

“Yeah. Lotta people.”

And that’s the extent of the conversation
for the next three minutes. It appears that the roses trailing the
arbor are more interesting to Joel. And he’s not ‘a plant man.’

Then the baby begins to snuffle. I feel him
wriggling against me and I cluck and soothe him. It’s enough to
gain Joel’s attention.

“Can I see him?”

I turn toward Joel and gently pull the
swaddling aside. The baby is nestled into my chest, his eyes
closed, sucking his thumb. He’s wearing a little blue romper Emily
bought because the clothes we originally got are too big for a
premmie and even the one he’s got on is a little baggy for him. His
blue striped beanie almost covers his eyes. The nurses assured me
he’d fill out quickly though. I think they’re right. He already
feels heavier now he’s getting the hang of feeding without the
tube.

“This is Nicholas Joel Lawson.” I smile up
at Joel. “Nicky, meet your old uncle Joel.”

“Hey, enough with the ‘old’.”

“I could have said playboy.”

“Slight improvement.” He looks down at the
baby. “You named the kid after me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’ve got a thing
for Joel Madden.”

A sort of chuckling snort escapes Joel’s
lips and for a second he’s my old Joel, the one I love. He strokes
the baby’s cheek. “Hey there, little fella. You gotta watch your
mum. She’s a bit of a wise arse.”

“Don’t swear in front of the baby,” I
chastise.

A tender smile bends Joel’s lips. He’s so
gentle, so loving as he continues to stroke the baby’s head with
his finger. It’s a different side of my wild boisterous Joel. “He’s
adorable, Sadie. He looks like you.”

Together, we watch the baby for a bit more,
both of us with these goofy maternal-proud type of smiles. Then I
say, “Do you want a hold?” I know that sounds like a weird think to
ask, given boys usually run a mile from the word baby, let alone
want to hold a real one, but it seems like something Joel might
want to do. This baby could be his connection to Nicholas.

“Um. Yeah. Okay.” He looks nervous.

Understandable. Baby Nicky is very
teeny.

“It’s okay. You won’t break him.” I take the
baby from his pouch and hand him to Joel. Joel’s big hands are like
a cradle enveloping Nicky’s body. He holds him awkwardly to begin
with, then lifts him to snuggle him into his chest, rocking him
gently.

“You’re a natural.”

“
Hmm
, debatable. Don’t think I’ve ever held a
baby.”

“First time for everything.”

The baby opens his eyes and looks up at
Joel. He removes his thumb from his mouth.

“He’s a cutie, alright.” Joel smiles at me.
It’s nice to see him smile.

“I know. Just like his daddy. He has that
intenseness Nicholas had about the eyes.”

Joel stiffens. “Okay, you can have him back
now. I don’t want to ruin my rep being seen getting gooey over a
kid.”

Shit. I’ve hurt him. I shouldn’t have said
that. I shouldn’t have mentioned the dead person in the room. Not
even if it’s true.

I take the baby and settle him into his
pouch. “Bit late for that. Besides, girls love men and babies. It’s
like a guy with a puppy. Instant chick magnet.”

“Are you proposing to rent the baby out to
me so I can pick up girls?”

I grin. “I never thought of that. It could
be a great money-spinner. You’ll have to learn how to look after
him first, though.”

Joel picks up his wine glass from the
railing and takes a swig before replacing it. “What are we gonna do
without him, Ariel?”

“I don’t know,” I mumble. “I’ve been trying
to figure that out for the last week. I have literally no
clue.”

“Are you coming home tonight? I’m
lonely.”

“You’ve only been there a day or so.”

“It’s weird there by myself.”

“Imagine how weird it was for Nicholas and I
without you.”

And this is the crux of the matter. I don’t
want to go home because it’s less weird for Joel. I want to be
there because Joel wants me. And not as a replacement for his best
friend, but because he needs me and loves me for me.

“I don’t think I can,” I say. “Not yet.”

“Why not? It’s yours and the baby’s home. I
saw you decorated his room. All your stuff is there.”

And Nicholas’ stuff. I don’t know if I can
face getting into the bed without him. I don’t know if I can go
into the baby’s bedroom and see the deflated balloons that are
probably lying on the carpet. I can’t bear to think about him
proposing all over again. Instinctively, my fingers go to my
engagement ring and I twist it on my finger.

“When did that happen?” Joel gestures to my
left hand.

“A couple of weeks ago.”

“Fucking shit timing.”

“You’ve got that in one.”

“Come home, Ariel. I just want you with me.
In our home.”

“
Technically it’s
your
home now,” I say. “I’m sure you and Nicholas had
some sort of an agreement about what would happen in the event of
death or something.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think I’d be using it. It
was a joke thing we did one night over a bottle of tequila.”

“So the house belongs to you. You should
feel free to do as you please without Nicky and I getting in your
way. Besides if I did come home where would I sleep? Where would
you sleep?”

“You can have Nicholas’ room. You’ve moved
in there already.”

“And that doesn’t bother you?”

“No.”

I stare at him.

“Okay. Yes. It does, it makes me jealous as
hell that you two got to play happy families but I’ll deal. Seeing
that ring on your finger sends fucking daggers through my heart
knowing I didn’t put it there. We just need to get things back to
the way they were. It’s pointless you shacking up with Emily when
you can be at home with me. We can’t get back what we had before if
you’re bunking on the other side of the city.”

“Things can’t go back to how they were
before, Joel. I can’t love you the same as before and I don’t want
to hurt you like I did before. Everything’s changed. I’ve
changed.”

Joel stares at me. I don’t think he’s
considered the possibility that things can never be the same, that
no matter what we do, our relationship is different now. Do we even
have a relationship without Nicholas? For about the tenth time
today, my eyes well with tears as I look into the face of the other
man I love so much. We can’t just go home and pick up where we left
off. It won’t work.

A couple of days after the wake, Mr. Lawson
and I sit down to discuss the disposal of Nicholas’ ashes. It’s not
a topic I’m keen to explore straight after his funeral but I feel I
have to make his wishes known. Nicholas always worried he’d be
shoved in some wall somewhere, for people to poke flowers in when
they came to ‘visit’ on birthdays and Christmas. He didn’t want
that.

“
I want to take his ashes out on the
Constance
and scatter them in the water,”
I tell Mr. Lawson. “Nicholas loved that boat and he loved being in
The Bay. He told me that was where he wanted to be scattered if he
died before me, though I guess he was talking about when we were
eighty or something. He wanted to be riding the waves
forever.”

Mr. Lawson considers this. “I’ve paid for a
plaque next his mother’s at the cemetery. It was meant to be mine
but I think she’d like it if he were near her. Nicholas and his
mother were very close.”

“I know, but he wants to be in The Bay.” I
won’t let this go. If this is the last thing I can do that will
make Nicholas happy, I’ll fight until I get my way. I can be very
stubborn like that.

Mr. Lawson crosses his leg and rubs his
hands thoughtfully over his chin. “Can we sprinkle half the ashes
in the water and put the other half with his mother?”

Eww
. Gross. I don’t want Nicholas’ head floating
around by itself for eternity with his legs in a little box
somewhere. He might come back to haunt me in pieces. No, thank
you.

“
He wants to be scattered in The Bay.” I
surprise myself with the forcefulness of my voice. I have no idea
where it’s coming from. It’s as if becoming a mother and Nicholas’
death has forced me to grow up. I’ve always stood for what I
believed in but now I’m even more vocal. “What about if you
acknowledge Nicholas on his mother’s plaque? I have his signet
ring, you could put that in the crypt with his mother. That way,
you can keep
your
space and
all be there together. Plus, it will be a place you can visit and
little Nicky can come with you. I want you to be a part of his
life. You are his grandfather.”

Mr. Lawson nods. “That’s a possibility.”

“And Nicholas can ride the waves for
eternity. You know how much he loved to sail and surf.”

“I suppose so.”

“I know you didn’t have a great connection
with The Bay because of what happened with my mother but Nicholas
was happy there. It’s where we met and I really want to lay him to
rest there. My feelings have to be taken into account. I was his
partner.”

Mr. Lawson agrees to my final proposal and I
leave, relieved that I’ve done what Nicholas asked me to do. One
hurdle down, a whole track more to come.

*****

Emily drops me at the house around seven the
next night, after I’ve packed the baby’s things and mine from her
spare room. Alex carries them to the car for me and kisses me
goodbye, saying I can come back if being with Joel gets too tricky.
I don’t know what’s got into Alex, why he’s being so super nice and
has suddenly changed his tune. Emily says it’s because Nicholas’
death reminded him how short life is and that he was wasting his
own by being petty. She said he knew how upset our fight made her;
that Alex has changed. He’s trying hard to let her be her own girl,
to step away and not be so controlling. I hope I can believe her. I
hope Alex has changed for the better. I didn’t like the Emily I
knew six months ago. She scared me.

After the last of my things are deposited in
the house, I put Nicky to bed in his crib and walk Emily to the
door.

“Please call if you need a single thing,”
she says, as she hugs me goodbye. “I don’t care what time of the
day or night it is. I know how hard this is going to be for you
guys but you don’t have to try and make it work out of some sense
of misguided loyalty. Alex is more than happy to have you in the
spare room until you get your shit together.”

“Thanks Em. I’m just taking it day by day.
The baby will take up most of my time so I won’t have time for
romance anyway.”

“Does Joel know that? I sort of got the
feeling he thought you were going to pick up where you left
off.”

“He knows. We had a good talk at the wake.
Things can’t ever be the way they were before.”

“And if he decides to move on?”

“It’s his choice. Just as it’s my choice to
do as I please. It was always that way. Being together now might
not be the best thing for either of us. We’ll have to wait and
see.”

I close the door behind her and stand for a
minute, my back leaning against the timber. This time, just over a
year ago, Emily had kicked me out of our flat. I was standing here
homeless and the boys welcomed me in. I never felt that anything we
did was wrong. The love and intense attraction we felt was the most
natural thing in the world. We had to be together. But what will
the relationship between Joel and I be now? Has Nicholas’ passing
changed the way we’ll react to each other?

Joel is sitting at the kitchen bench when
I get back to the living room. A stack of dirty dishes and wine
glasses are piled in the sink and there’s a carton of milk sitting
next to the fridge like he forgot where he had to put it away or
something. I walk around the bench and sniff the milk. It’s off, so
tip it down the sink with my fingers pinching my nose to ward of
the stench.
Ick
.

Then I turn back to Joel. A trail of smoke
rises above his head. There’s a distinct aroma of weed. I move to
sit on a stool beside him. He has a joint cupped in his hand and I
know he’s self-medicating but now isn’t the time, especially with a
baby in the house. Slowly, I pull the hooch from between his
fingers and stub it out in the saucer he’s put on the bench for
that purpose. “I don’t want to sound like a party pooper but you
can’t be doing that in the house with the baby here.”

And since when did he take up smoking weed
anyway? It’s never been his thing before.

Joel’s eyes are red rimmed. I hope it’s from
the hooch. I don’t like to think he’s been crying.

“Sorry,” he says. “I forgot about the
bambino. Where is he?”

“He’s in bed. Hopefully, we’ll get a couple
of hour’s downtime before he wakes and starts squawking for a feed.
Just warning you: he’s got a set of lungs on him.”

“My little sister used to be like that. She
could squeal the fur off a cat.”

“I didn’t even know you had a sister. What’s
her name?”

“Ella.”

“I bet she’s pretty.” I mean, look at Joel.
Even in his despair, he’s hotter than a fire full of coals.

“Gorgeous. Tended to get herself into a lot
of trouble being so pretty though. She was gullible. She believed
the shit people told her. Plus, she could never say no. I tried to
look after her but… you know how that goes.”