Page 27 of Just Say Christmas
“Or maybe you’re right, and it was me.” She’d seemed to gain authority from the instrument and the music, because she was looking him in the eye, not looking away.
“You’re good,” he said. “Aren’t you?”
“I’m pretty good.”
“So why did you become a lawyer?” He’d never asked that, had he? He’d talked about himself. That, he remembered. Maybe not so much about her, though.
Bugger. He reallyhadn’tbeen noble.
She didn’t answer for a moment, and the silence stretched out. A snatch of music floating on the breeze, presumably from the massage activity, and the scent of roses from the canes twining up the slats of the pergola, their fragrance rich and spicy, and Victoria in her yellow dress and her new hair, holding her cello like a barrier.
Finally, she said, “For most people, music is always going to be a hobby. Never mind. It’s a good hobby. There aren’t too many career opportunities for a cellist. Besides, my dad wanted me to be a lawyer. Use my brains for good, he said, and he was right. And it’s turned out well, being able to buy my house and all. Making a living, and knowing I can keep doing it.”
“You should play in public.” He focused on that, possibly because saying,What the hell happened with us? And why do you think everything’s on you? Why do you assume you’ll always be alone?didn’t seem likely to turn out well. Not crashing into it, anyway. He’d never been accused of being a subtle bloke, but you couldn’t tackle your way out of every situation.
“I do,” she said. “I started playing with the Auckland Symphony Orchestra this year.”
“And that’s not professional? Sounds professional.”
“It’s a community orchestra.” She drew the bow lightly over the strings, then dug into them, pouring out another passage of music as if the notes had to emerge.
“What’s that one?” he asked.
“Stay With Me.You know. Sam Smith. Nyree’s recessional. Like I said, not conservative. A song nobody else would choose for their wedding, I’m sure of that.”
“I don’t know the words,” he said. “But wanting somebody to stay with you sounds right for a wedding.”
“Not if you’re begging them to stay, and knowing you’re going to be left alone instead. Not so much.”
Wait,he thought.What?He wasn’t the one who hadn’t turned up.“If you want to play it,” he said, “I’d like to hear it.” See? He was being patient again. Being subtle. At least, he was trying to be. He wasn’t too sure how you did it.
She opened her mouth, then shut it again, and finally said, “If you want to hear it, I will. But I’m not sure why you would.”
“Because it’s beautiful, maybe. Sounds a bit the way a northern river feels in winter.”
“Is that a memory you want?” It was quiet, but it rocked him. The most personal she’d been today, like he’d got behind her barrier, or she’d got behind his.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Some of both, I reckon. It’s a memory that’s there, anyway.”
“A memory of saying goodbye,” she said. “That’s what the song is.”
Shewasbeing personal, and she did remember what he’d told her, that first night. And yet—after all that, she hadn’t said goodbye to him. This was such a confusing place to be. “Yeh,” he said. “A memory of that.”
She started to play again, and that was what he got. A memory, cold as the barely-not-freezing flow of the river Tyne in December when you were standing alone, looking out from the docks. Or more than one memory.
The song reminded him of his brother. Why would that be? Luke wasn’t here this weekend, and if he turned up for the wedding at all, it would be a surprise. Made no sense, but here he was, thinking about Luke getting ready to walk out the door. Thinking about the cold that had gripped him on the day his brother left. Again.
“There’s no family on the field,” his dad had said on the day, fifteen years earlier, when Luke had announced that he was leaving the Highlanders and their dad’s coaching, and going north to play for the Crusaders. This time, unlike when Luke had left for boarding school at age nine, or when he’d left for New Zealand aged twelve, it hadn’t been their dad’s idea, and it was contrary to all his plans, even though coaching your own son would have been on nobody else’s list of good ideas. Not because you’d be too easy on him. Pretty much the opposite.
“If you do this,” Grant had told his elder son, his face and body hard and still, “know that I won’t be doing you any favors. I know your weaknesses, and I’ll use them. Once the match is over, you’ll be my son again. For a day.”
Luke had said, “Understood,” his expression absolutely blank, and that was all. Kane had to wait until that night to ask, “How did you even say it? Weren’t you scared?”
“Yeh,” Luke answered, dropping to the floor of his bedroom to start the fifty press-ups and fifty sit-ups he did every night before he let himself sleep. “I did it anyway. There’s no choice, not if I ever want to live my own life. You can do it, too.”
Kane hadn’t thought so. It had seemed impossible. He’d been fifteen at the time to Luke’s eighteen, drilled into fitness and skill, as Luke had been, under their dad’s iron hand from the age of twelve. Before that, they’d learned their lessons about hardening up and taking their learnings from an English school of the less nurturing type, the one their parents had chosen. It was hard to say which had been a tougher breeding ground for rugby, but you’d probably give the nod to their dad.
They’d been twelve, each of them in turn, when their parents had swapped them out between them. First Luke had left, and then, three years later, it was Kane’s turn. New Zealand and their dad during the school term, the rugby season, and then, just when the weather was heating up and the lazy holidays arriving, back to the rain and snow of a Newcastle December for Christmas, and again, briefly, for the annual Easter holidays, with their mum. That had been the agreement when their parents had divorced, when Grant, whose Scottish roots ran deep but whose Kiwi blood ran black, had taken the opportunity to go home to New Zealand, to coach the Highlanders in Dunedin and someday, maybe, to coach the All Blacks. Or at least to coach his two sons into the squad, which had become his meager consolation prize for missing that top goal.
