Page 69 of Unworthy
I’d felt better when she was in my arms, but the anxiety I’d been feeling came back as Max dragged me away. Marriage was just so conventional. It felt too restrictive for my Yaz – like I was tethering a wild creature, or putting a butterfly in a jar. But Yaz had said yes. I’d been so ecstatic after she agreed to marry me that my feet had barely touched the ground for weeks. Then she’d been worried that a beach wedding at the crack of dawn wasn’t whatIwanted. What I wanted was to marry Yazmin Hardcastle. If I’d had to do that suspended upside-down over a sea of man-eating crocodiles, or standing on hot coals, I would have. And anyway, this was the only way I could ever imagine Yaz getting married – next to the sea she loves with the people she loves.
So yes, up until yesterday I’d been floating on my own cloud of bliss. That was until I went to spend the night at Max’s, so that Yaz and the wedding party could get ready at mine. I’d had one beer with Max, Teddy and Aubrey, when I’d started to doubt that Yaz would be there the next day. I think it was part of being let down so consistently as a child. I wasn’t used to people following through. I convinced myself overnight that Yaz would remember what a prick I’d been in the past and not bother showing up. It wasn’t until I’d seen her on the sand, so beautiful she almost looked like a mirage, that I could finally breathe again.
Shoving my way through the crowd to get to her, and then snogging her in front of all our family and friends before the ceremony had even started, wasn’t ideal. But I just didn’t have the self-control to stand there and wait for her to come to me. Waiting for her now as she walked up the improvised aisle on her father’s arm, smiling straight at me, and looking so happy she was almost glowing, was a struggle – but I stayed where I was until she was at my side and I could grab her hand in mine and hold it tight.
“Istillhaven’t given her away to you yet,” Aubrey grumbled, and the crowd rippled with laughter again. I looked at him and tried to convey how much it meant to me that he trusted me with his daughter, that he’d treated me like a son when my own parents hadn’t ever bothered.
“Thank you,” I said. “I promise I’ll look after her. I swear it.”
“I know you will, Heath,” he said, his voice gruff and his eyes looking bright with emotion. “Just like you’ve looked after your sister and my Max. You’re a good lad and no mistake.”
I don’t think that any other compliment I’d ever received in my life would ever compare to Aubrey Hardcastle calling me a good lad before I married his daughter. Yaz squeezed my hand, and I looked down at her before pulling her closer to my side.
“I’m not going anywhere, you know,” she whispered.
I gave a tight nod, but didn’t loosen my grip on her hand.
It was only when we were saying those vows to each other out loud that I felt the tension I’d been carrying start to dissipate.
But, in truth, it was really only after the ceremony – once we had all run off into the sea – only when Yaz and I were holding hands under the water with her dress swirling around her legs and her amazing hair around her face, that I felt truly at peace. That was the picture we had blown up and put over our fireplace – the two of us under the waves, smiling at each other like lovesick idiots. Just looking at that picture is enough to centre me nowadays. To remind me how lucky I am.
*****
Yaz
“I need to talk to you about something,” I said to Heath as he walked through the door. He frowned as he approached me.
“It’s nothing bad, I promise,” I said, giving him a hug to reassure him. His arms came around me and he pulled me into his chest, before kissing me the way he always did when he’d been out of the house and arrived home to find me there – with relief, like he couldn’t quite believe I was still here. It broke my heart a little for him each time, but I was hoping that his fear of abandonment would slowly fade over the years. Therapy was helping. Me telling his mother to fuck off and blocking her calls after I found out that she’d been intermittently contacting him for money had also helped.
This had only come to light when I’d answered Heath’s phone one Sunday morning when he was out for a run. I’d recognised her voice immediately and she’d launched straight into her spiel about whatsheneeded. I’d told her never to call my husband again, and then blocked her. When I gently confronted Heath, he looked like that little broken boy again. Said she’d threatened to go to Verity. That he was protecting his sister. Well, I’d put a stop to that bullshit. The bitch was now blocked from both of their phones.
“Let me say something first,” Heath said once he released me and put the kettle on. “I know you’ve not been right the last few weeks–”
“Heath, I–”
“No, Yaz, don’t deny it. I can see with my own eyes you’ve not been yourself. More tired, pale, you’ve lost some of your spark and it’s my fault.”
“Er… okay, well, it is kind of your fault, I guess. But not in the way you–”
“Well, I’m going to put it right.”
My eyebrows went up, and I crossed my arms over my chest. “It’s a bit late for that, handsome.”
“I don’t think so,” he said as he pulled out a sheet of paper from his back pocket. “It can’t be too late. Not for us. I won’t allow it.”
He handed me the paper, and I frowned down at it. It was a flight itinerary for two people to Brazil, leaving next month.
“I know you turned down Brazil, and I know you did it for me. But it’s too much of a sacrifice to make. I’ve spoken to work and I’m going to take a sabbatical. Dee’s able to manage the business while you’re away, and it’s the off season right now anyway. We can go out there for three months at least. And… and if you want to move out there, then I can do that too. I’ll learn Portuguese. I’m sure they need doctors out there as well. I can–”
“Heath!” I cut him off and he frowned at my smiling face. “Oh my God, I love you, you crazy bastard.” I launched myself at him and crushed him in my own fierce hug. His work meant everything to him. That he would let my windsurfing supersede his career was nothing short of incredible, and showed just how much he loved me. But the stupid man had got totally the wrong end of the stick. I pulled back a little and looked up at his face. “I can’t go to Brazil. Soon I won’t even be able to windsurf at all. At least, not for a while.”
“What?” he said, confusion in his expression and his body tense with worry. “Why on earth?”
I rolled my eyes. “Bloody hell, for a doctor you don’t exactly catch on that quick, do you? I’m having a baby, you idiot.We’rehaving a baby.”
He froze in my arms, his eyes flying wide in shock.
“H–h–how…?”
