Page 48 of A Midlife Gamble

‘How you doing, Kay?’ Tony’s voice carried across the room slow as a winter shadow.

Kay turned. Tony looked as weary on the outside as she felt on the inside. Coupled with the look that Marianne had given him on the way out, it was clear they’d just had an argument. Love’s middle-aged dream. She wouldn’t ask. She didn’t actually want to know. ‘Well,’ she sighed. ‘I have to admit, I’ve been better.’

From under deeply hooded eyes, he almost smiled. ‘Ditto, my friend. Ditto.’

‘It’s such a beautiful place you have,’ she said. ‘Thank you for inviting us.’

Nodding, he looked down at his hands. He didn’t speak.

Kay leaned back in her chair. The silence in the room was profound, rich as an ocean, as multicoloured and various, filled with shoals of thoughts never destined to surface, currents of emotion that always threatened. She looked across at Tony’s bent head and his sloped shoulders. A minute passed, maybe longer. And then Tony looked up and said, ‘Shall we play?’

But she didn’t understand what he meant.

‘Shall we go back and play?’

‘Blackjack?’

‘We were lucky before. You and me.’ He shrugged.

‘Well…’ Instinctively she turned to the window. Far across the yard she could see the flames of the campfire where Helen and Caro still sat. Against the backdrop of black, it looked tiny and she had no way of knowing if they were in fact still there. ‘What about the others?’ she said, understanding that Tony’swehadn’t included them.

Again, Tony shrugged. ‘I need to get outta here,’ he said.

Kay looked at him. Whatever had just happened between him and Marianne had obviously tipped him over into this rudderless swell she felt that she was also caught in. Torn between a certainty that she couldn’t leave Helen and Caro, and equally determined to steer away from them.

‘I’ll ask Gabe to drive them in, when they’re ready. He paused. ‘If there’s trouble, perhaps it’s best to let them talk it out.’

‘What about Marianne?’

Tony smiled. ‘Marianne will be glad of the space,’ he said. ‘Trust me.’

And here was the weathervane she’d been hoping for. Practical aspects answered, a compromise seized that would enable her to say yes to Tony’s suggestion. She didn’t want to go out and sit by the fireside with Caro and Helen. She didn’t want to get dragged into the discussion. Not at all. The silence and peace of this place had worked its magic, massaged a poisonous dose of grief out of her and now she was ready to go back. And yes, to play. To gamble. Why not? For the first time in her short life, why shouldn’t she take a chance?

‘Kay?’Helen called again. She was standing now, her voice higher with every repetition of Kay’s name.

‘Kay isn’t here.’ Marianne answered and her voice was shrill with impatience, rising like a flare in the desert night as she approached the campfire.

‘Where is she?’ Caro said. She too was on her feet. ‘She was here a moment ago… where is she?’

‘Don’t panic.’ Sighing, Marianne collapsed into the fold-up chair Kay had so recently vacated. ‘She went inside to get away from you two. Which is good for me, because Tony is very annoying.’ She crossed one leg over the other and bouncing her foot, shook her head vigorously. ‘So!’ she declared, and looked first at Caro and then at Helen. ‘Now you have me instead!’

‘Inside?’ Over the flames Helen’s eyes met Caro’s.

‘Is that what she said?’ Caro turned to Marianne. ‘To get away from us?’

Marianne nodded. ‘This is what she said. Just now, and all afternoon actually.’

‘All afternoon?’ Helen echoed.

‘Yes. While you were riding, we sat for a while.’ With a wave of her hand, Marianne indicated that they should both sit down, that she was here to talk.

‘And she really said that?’ Caro’s eyes had widened with disbelief.

Helen looked at her. She was at a loss as to why Caro should find what Marianne was saying hard to believe, because she wasn’t remotely surprised. In fact, the only thing that surprised her now was that Kay had agreed to come on this trip in the first place. She closed her eyes, momentarily subdued by the understanding of the leap of faith Kay must have taken. After the way the Cyprus trip had been derailed and the troubles of last year… Yet again, they had failed her. Swallowing down the lump in her throat, she looked at Caro whose desolate expression must, she thought, mirror her own. They had let Kay down. Oh, how they had let her down. Turning to Marianne, her voice was quiet and slow. ‘She’s been talking to you for a while now, hasn’t she?’

Marianne nodded. ‘Since the diagnosis.’

‘And… I suppose she explained what… the problems we’ve had?’

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