Page 23 of Together Again at the Cornish Country Hospital

‘Can you come too?’ She kept her voice low and Lijah squeezed her hand as he nodded. She was going to have to release his hand eventually, but she couldn’t have let go in that moment if her life had depended on it.

* * *

Aidan and Jase had been rushed through to get changed into scrubs for theatre and the corridor outside the theatre was quiet. There was a row of four seats halfway down, about twenty metres away from the double doors that Aidan and Jase had disappeared through. Amy had explained to Lijah that only emergency surgery would take place at this time in the evening, and it felt eerily silent, almost deserted, as the two of them sat and waited for news.

‘How did you persuade Aidan to come back?’

‘He was worried that he wouldn’t be able to give Ellen or Jase the support they needed and that him being there might somehow make things worse. I said sometimes all people need is for you to be there, and that’s enough.’

‘Sometimes it really is enough.’ She was looking at him like she wanted to say something else, and he had an almost overwhelming desire to reach out and touch her face. They’d held hands all the way from the main entrance to the hospital, but they’d broken off to hug Aidan and Jase and wish them luck, and it was like the spell had been broken too. His fingers had twitched with the desire to reach for her hand again. Instead, he’d rested his hands on his legs.

‘Claire’s moving to Tenerife, she’s met someone.’ He needed to talk to someone about his aunt leaving, someone who understood why that had left him feeling as though the last of the roots he had in Port Kara had been wrenched from the ground.

‘I know.’ She smiled. ‘We still chat and meet up for coffee every once in a while too. She told me all about Dee, and it’s so nice to see her smile again after losing your mum.’

‘I should have known you wouldn’t stop visiting, just because Mum was gone.’ Lijah sighed, wishing he could say the same about himself.

‘In a way it was always easier spending time with Claire than with your mum.’ She shook her head when he widened his eyes in surprise. ‘I really loved Maria, but sometimes seeing her made me miss you more, especially when she seemed determined to try and convince me that you’d be back eventually and that we’d pick up where we left off. When I said we needed to split up, to give you a chance to make a go of things, I held on to that hope too, for far longer than I should have done. Then when your career started to go crazy, I had to accept that our moment had passed. But your mum still kept insisting that you’d come home eventually because of me, and that was hard to hear when…’ Her words drifted away to nothing.

‘When what?’ He couldn’t stop himself from asking the question. He didn’t know what she was going to say, but he knew what he wanted it to be.

‘When that’s what I still wanted too, deep down: for you to come home.’ She looked at him and he couldn’t hold back the smile that was tugging at the corners of his mouth. This had been exactly what he’d wanted to hear, but she shook her head again. ‘I knew it could never work. You lived in a whole different world, surrounded by people as famous and successful as you. Mine was the ordinary, mundane life you’d wanted to escape from, and I know the only way you’d come back here was if something went horribly wrong with your new life. So I stopped wishing for that, because you were living the life you’d always wanted.’

‘I never thought of your life as ordinary or mundane. I missed everything about Port Kara, especially—’ He’d been about to tell Amy that she’d been what he’d missed the most, but she didn’t let him finish, cutting him off by standing up.

‘I’m going to get a drink; do you want one?’ It was clear by her tone and her decision to remove herself from the situation that this conversation was over. The last thing he wanted was to put any pressure on her, especially when she was already so worried about the baby.

‘I’ll go.’ He moved to stand up, but she put a hand on his shoulder.

‘No, I need a minute. I’ve got to call Mum and let her know I’ll be back late for Monty.’

‘Tea would be great then, thank you.’ Maybe it was for the best that she hadn’t let him finish. He needed to process his own thoughts. Losing his mother and then hearing that his aunt was moving away had done something strange to him. It was as if he was desperate to cling to the last vestiges of his past, and all of that now suddenly seemed to be wrapped up in Amy. That was a lot to put on her, he was a mess right now, and she deserved so much better than that. He didn’t want to cause her any pain, even accidentally. He had to be certain of his plans before he told her just how much seeing her again had affected him.

‘Still one and a half spoons of sugar?’ She smiled, lifting some of the tension between them, and he couldn’t believe she remembered, even as she teased him about the reason. ‘One isn’t sweet enough, but two is far too sweet. That was always your justification for being so awkward, wasn’t it? Still Goldilocks then! It’s good to know some things never change.’

‘No, some things never do.’ He returned her smile, but she had no idea he wasn’t just talking about the way he took his tea, and he wasn’t going to tell her, at least not until he’d got everything straight in his head. But as he watched her walk away to get the drinks, he felt more confused than ever.

Amy was back within a few minutes, clutching two cardboard takeaway cups and as she came back down the corridor towards him, suddenly there was no doubt left in his mind. He still had really strong feelings for Amy, and he was almost sure it wasn’t just because he felt rootless. The trouble was, he had no idea whether acting on those feelings would be the right thing for her, or whether she’d even be interested.

‘Here you go, Goldilocks.’ She laughed as she passed him the drink and the urge to kiss her was so powerful he had to grip the edge of his seat with his other hand, to stop himself from acting on it.

‘She’s here! She’s okay and she’s here!’ Aidan’s shout reached all the way down the corridor and Lijah looked up to see him thundering towards them, just before he scooped Amy into his arms and spun her around, coffee cup and all.

‘Oh my God that’s brilliant, I’m so happy for you both.’ She was already crying as Aidan finally set her down, and tears were pricking Lijah’s eyes too. He barely knew this man, but there was a wave of emotion welling up inside him all the same.

‘She’s beautiful Ames, you should see her. She’s got loads of hair and the most amazing eyes. She’s tiny, only four and a half pounds, but she’s absolutely perfect. Thank you so much for making sure I didn’t miss it.’ He planted a kiss on her cheek and then reached down towards Lijah, doing the same to him. ‘You too Lijah. I mean any other time I’d have been totally star struck, but what you did today… making me see how stupid I was being. I can never thank you enough.’

‘I didn’t do anything special, I’m just so glad things worked out.’ Lijah shrugged. ‘I feel really lucky I got to be part of something so amazing.’

‘I want you both to meet her as soon as you’re allowed, but right now I’ve got to get back to my husband and my baby girl, because I miss them already.’ Aidan wasn’t even trying to hold back the tears any more, but he was smiling too.

‘Get yourself back in there. The introductions to your beautiful daughter can wait. Just not too long, okay?’ Amy hugged him again, and then he turned and ran back down the corridor in the opposite direction, as Lijah got to his feet.

‘How amazing is that?’ He looked at Amy and she nodded, her eyes glassy.

‘It wasn’t nothing, you know, what you did for Aidan. You don’t even know him, but you still managed to make him see sense. I’m not sure many people could have done that, and I’m so glad you did.’ She leaned towards him as if she was about to follow Aidan’s lead and plant a kiss on his cheek, but then she moved her head slightly so that their lips met. All the feelings he’d been trying not to act upon came rushing to the fore again, and suddenly he was holding her and kissing her as if he’d been waiting a decade to do it again, and it turned out he had. It felt so right and all of the doubts and questions seemed to fade away in that moment, because he was incapable of thinking about anything else when he was kissing Amy. Just like he always had been.

15

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