Page 47 of Nothing Without You

‘Was your father a good man?’

‘He was the best father. I have very good memories of him. He gave me lots of love and everything else I needed.’ She stopped talking then, thinking how good life had been before the Jaffa day. ‘That was before we left him.’

‘What happened?’

Evie paused. Usually she let Matilda talk, preferring to listen to her stories about her life before she came to live at Yeppoon. She had been taken from her mother when she was only five, and lived on a mission to the west of where she lived now. Her life had been full of struggle and heartache, but she never complained. Evie never revealed much of her life, but today Matilda was asking.

‘My mother and him split up. Mum was in love with someone else and my dad, well, you might find this hard to believe, Matilda, but my dad likes other men, not women.’

Matilda pulled a face. ‘Hard to believe? Not really. That’s the way of the world. I have a son, Mattrick, Baker’s younger step-brother. He likes men too. As long as he’s happy, so are all of us. He’s a good man. That’s all I care about.’

Evie breathed a sigh of relief. There weren’t many people she talked to about her father, and Matilda’s reaction was a surprise. ‘The man my mother fell in love with stayed with his wife for a while, but now she’s passed away. He came and found my mother in Cairns. They’re going to get married in May, and I’m going to the wedding.’

‘That’s a good story. A wedding. And you? I don’t see a ring on your hand. Will you marry Bob? And how come no children?’

Cupping her hands around her mug she looked down at the tea leaves in the bottom. If only she could read her future in them. ‘No. I don’t want children with him, and he’s never asked me to marry him.’

Matilda leaned forward over the table. ‘And if he asked, would you?’

‘No.’

The two of them looked up as a car pulled up beside the house. It was Baker. Sometimes he was there when Evie visited, but usually he was working. ‘G’day Evie. Wow, you’ve had your hair cut. It looks great.’

She blushed, unused to compliments. ‘I’m going to Brisbane for my mother’s wedding.’

Matilda held a floral dress up. ‘I’m going to hem this. My sewing skills still come in handy. You know, Evie, Bob still brings me all of his mending to do. Boys. They never learned how to sew.’

‘You always did such a good job, Mum. I still remember all the patches on Dad’s shorts. They held together for years.’

Flicking the dress out so it lay flat, Matilda then held it high in the air. ‘You will look beautiful in this.’

Evie tried not to look at Baker, who hadn’t taken his eyes off her. When Matilda went inside to make some more tea, he leaned over the table towards her, his dark eyes full of fun. ‘I wish you were single, Evie.’

Evie checked that Matilda was out of earshot. ‘I wish I was too. I like you too, Baker.’

They stared at each other, until Matilda came back with a fresh pot of tea. ‘Right. Cuppa for everyone,’ she declared.

‘I think I should drive you home and drop you off at the beach before town again,’ Baker said, as he looked towards the sun that was sinking in the western sky.

‘I wasn’t watching the time either. Yes, thank you. That’d be good.’

They chatted as his old Holden ute traversed the bumpy track. When he pulled up in a spot where she could get out and make her way to the beach, he turned the car off and swivelled in his seat towards her. ‘I wish you weren’t with Bob. If you were single, I’d ask you out.’

She turned towards him. ‘And I would say yes.’

She moved closer and then leaned in further, as he put his hand gently around the back of her head and drew her towards him. His lips were sweet and soft, and she moaned softly as he pressed them down on hers. When they pulled apart, he stared at her until she looked down.

‘I can’t, Baker. It’s a small town. He’d make life hell for you and me.’

She didn’t add that he’d also probably kill both of them if he saw them together. ‘I need to go.’

‘Please Evie, I’ve been waiting for you. I’d take you away from here. We could make a life together, somewhere else.’

‘I can’t. I’m sorry. I can’t.’ She reached up and stroked his face, before kissing him. His arm wrapped around her and he drew her into his chest, her face pushed into the warmth of his body as his hand stroked her hair. He whispered, ‘You deserve so much better.’

She didn’t look back when she walked away from the car, towards the beach. Her heart burned. It would have been easy to say ‘yes’, to leave her life and start a new one with Baker. But it wasn’t only the fear of Bob tracking her down that stopped her. Baker was gorgeous and she loved him, but only as a friend. His kisses had sent her mind spinning, but it was because no one had touched her so intimately for so long. This time she would not make a mistake. There was no use getting into another relationship, just to escape a bad situation.

She walked quickly along the beach. For once the spray from the ocean and the birds wheeling above did not interest her, and she started to run. She ran as fast as she could, until her chest hurt. She ran until her legs ached and a stitch in her stomach felt like a knife twisting in her gut. She ran until her throat was parched and she wanted to vomit. She ran away from what she couldn’t have and ran towards the one thing she wanted to get away from.

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