“Where’s your kid?”
“At the café. I took her down there to get you coffee.” She brushed sawdust off a seat. “She decided to stay and hang out with Rex.”
Alex encouraged Bridget to call him by name, mortified by the thought of being called Grandpa. Rex was the best she could do. Gabrielle had ended up with the unfortunate title of Prizzy. She was mystified as to how Bridget had come up with it. Charli and I theorised that it was a shortened version of Parisienne, but we didn’t dare tell her.
“So we’re home alone?” I asked, wiggling my eyebrows at her.
“All morning. I told Alex we’d pick her up this afternoon.”
“Excellent.” I set my coffee on the deck and leaned over the side of the boat. “You can help me pull this stripping off.”
Charlotte let out a quiet giggle. “I was hoping we could talk, actually. It’s important.”
I straightened up. “Of course. What’s going on?” Her mouth opened as if she was going to speak, but gave me nothing. I tried to help her out. “Is it about your meeting yesterday?”
She nodded.
Charli had barely mentioned her trip to Melbourne. I found it odd considering she’d been so looking forward to it.
“Tell me,” I pushed.
“Art Bloke has a gallery,” she began. “Every piece in it is some form of motion photography. Gorgeous, beautiful pictures of things like sports and concerts and the ocean.”
I pulled a crate across the deck and sat opposite her. “Okay.”
“He really liked my oceanic photography, especially the ones of the surfers at Cobb beach.”
“So he wants to buy them?”
“Not exactly,” she hinted. “He wants me to consider taking on the position of curator at his gallery. He offered me a job.”
I stared at her lovely face for a long time, pondering what that meant for our little family. Unless Art Bloke had opened a gallery next door to Charli’s, the position wasn’t local.
“Are you thinking of taking it?”
She shrugged. “Maybe. I think it’s an amazing opportunity, but it’s a big deal because it’s so far away.”
I reached, tangling my hand through her long hair before resting it on the back of her neck. “Melbourne is an hour by plane. It’s not that far.”
She shook her head and I lost her eyes as she looked to the deck. “Adam, have you heard of Bronson Merriman?”
The name sounded vaguely familiar but I told her no.
“He’s an art dealer in Manhattan,” she explained.
“Oh, yeah,” I amended. “I have heard of him. He has a gallery on Madison Avenue, I think.”
“Yeah, he has.”
As soon as she looked up at me, the penny dropped. I released my hold on her and straightened up. “Art Bloke is Bronson Merriman?”
“Yes. He first saw my work at Billet-doux,” she explained. “He came all this way just to meet me. I guess I impressed him.”
Of course she’d impressed him. Charli Décarie was the most beautiful, talented girl on earth.
I took a few seconds, trying to come to grips with what she’d told me. “You want to take a job in Manhattan?” I asked, making doubly sure I had the story straight. “You want us to go back to New York?”
She shrugged again. “Only if you do.”
I could hardly make sense of it. We’d only been back a handful of times to visit my family. Bridget had experienced white Christmases, my parents had spoiled her rotten and my brother did his best to corrupt her. As much as we enjoyed it, we were always glad to get home. Unless I could be absolutely certain that Charli was going to be happy there, I wasn’t even going to entertain the idea of moving back there permanently.
“I’m not sure, Charli,” I admitted. “Why would it be different this time?”
“Because I think I’d really like the job,” she reasoned. “I couldn’t hack New York before because I had no place there. A job in a gallery could be my place.”
I smiled at her and she grinned back at me. “Can I think about it?” I asked.
“Yes, it requires going with the second thought.”
“Is going to New York your second thought, Charli?”
She slapped her hands on her knees, dusting them off. “It was my first and second thought. I can’t see a reason not to do it.”
As she stood, I reached for her hand and pulled her onto my lap. “I love you very much,” I declared, making her smile.
She linked her arm around my neck. “I know. Tell me something else that’s true. Tell me anything, as long as it’s true.”
“Bridget had chocolate cake for breakfast while you were away.”
“I know that too. She told me. Tell me something else.”
I pretended to think, leaving her hanging for a long moment. “We’re going back to New York,” I said finally.
“Really?” she asked, her bright eyes shining.
“Sure, why not?” I shrugged. “I’d go anywhere with you.”
I meant it. Having a good life had nothing to do with geography. It was about being whole. As long as the three of us were together, we were whole.
Her lips pressed against mine. “Inside will be fine, for now,” she breathed, breaking free for only a second.
Charli
Because getting out of Dodge is best done quickly, we needed to tell Alex we were leaving. We drove to the house that afternoon to collect Bridget and to hit him with our news.
“How do you think he’ll take it?” asked Adam.
“He’ll be devastated,” I replied quietly.
We pulled onto the long driveway, immediately noticing that the ute wasn’t there.
“Do you want to wait?” asked Adam. “It doesn’t look like they’re home yet.”
I pointed to the little red Mazda parked near the garage. “Gabi’s here. We’ll tell her first.”
We hadn’t even made it to the house when the Parisienne came rushing out.
“No! No! No!” she ranted, wagging her finger at us. “You can’t be here today. Go home.”
“We’re just here to pick up Bridget,” Adam told her. “Then we’ll leave.”
“Fine,” she relented. “They will be here in two minutes. Take your baby and leave. Come back tomorrow.”
I’d seen Gabrielle in some strange moods before but nothing like this. Adam grabbed her hand.
“Stop,” he ordered. “Calm down. What’s wrong?”
Her smile was blinding, even for a Décarie. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I just don’t want visitors today.”
Alex pulled onto the driveway and Gabrielle clapped her hands. “Oh, he’s home.” She took off, leaving us standing at the base of the steps to the veranda.
“What the hell is going on?” Adam whispered.
“No clue,” I muttered.
Our little girl caught sight of us and started running up the path toward us. I couldn’t help laughing. She was all gumboots and crooked blonde pigtails.
The amped-up Parisienne collared her as she passed and gave her a quick kiss before letting her continue on her way. Bridget took a flying leap at Adam and he caught her in mid-flight.
“Prizzy crying,” she told him in French.
Both of us stared at Gabrielle as she made her way to Alex. We were too far away to hear their conversation, but she seemed to have calmed down.
Bridget wriggled free of Adam. We were so engrossed in the muted conversation taking place on the driveway that neither of us noticed her go into the house. We did, however, notice her when she came back out, mainly because of what she was holding. I took it from her and waved it at Adam.
It was a positive pregnancy test. Finally, after nearly five long years of waiting, my father and the Parisienne had got their wish, and the timing couldn’t have been better. Nothing would ease the pain of us leaving town more than a new baby.
Our news could wait a day or two. We slipped away without a word to the happy couple. I turned to them as we
got to the car. Their position hadn’t changed. They held each other tightly while Gabrielle sobbed. I’d seen this before, usually accompanied by a woeful expression on Alex’s face. He wasn’t stricken this time round. My dad looked happier than I’d ever seen him.
* * *
I didn’t feel like going home. Bridget fell asleep before we hit the main road.
I rested my head on the window, watching the trees whizzing past. “Do you want to go somewhere special, Adam? To a secret place?”
He reached for my hand. “Somewhere new?” he asked.
“No, somewhere old,” I replied, glancing at him.
He smiled, the gorgeous half-dimpled smile that I’d been besotted with since I was seventeen-years-old. “Lead the way, Coccinelle.”
We hadn’t been to the top of the cliffs in years, and if Bridget hadn’t been strapped into her car seat fast asleep, we wouldn’t have been there that day either. Adam wound her window down a little so we could hear her and we got out of the car.
“We can’t leave her here, Charli,” said Adam, frowning.
“I know. We don’t need to go down the trail. We just need to listen.”
“To what?” he asked.
“Shush. Close your eyes.” Mine were already closed. I took a peek to make sure his were too. “What do you hear?”
“The ocean,” he replied, breaking a smile. “We haven’t been up here for a long time.”
“I know. It’s still amazing, right?”
“It’s not my favourite place,” he admitted.
“No? Why not?”
“Well...” He snaked his arm around me and dipped me backward. I ignored the fact that my ponytail was sweeping the ground. I was too focused on his eyes to care. “Last time we were here you broke my heart. I’m hoping you didn’t bring me back here to do it again.”
I gripped his forearms. “No. You have a daughter now. It’s Bridget’s job to break your heart from here on in.”
Adam chuckled and righted me, but his hold didn’t waver. He brought my hand to his shoulder and before I knew it, we shuffling in the dirt, slow dancing to the sound of the waves crashing against the base of the cliffs.
“Are you sure you’re okay with going back to New York?” I asked.
“As long as you’re happy, I’m happy,” he replied making me smile.
“What will you do there, Adam?”
He barely hesitated. Perhaps he’d already put some thought into it. “Well, I have a law degree,” he replied, grinning. “I could probably put that to use.” He held my hand above my head and twirled me around before drawing me back in close. “I have something for you.”
“Really? Where?”
“In my pocket.” He glanced at the top pocket of his shirt.
“Can I have it now?” He let go of my hand, freeing me to reach into his pocket. I was absolutely dumbstruck to find my wedding rings.
“Bridget found them,” he told me. “I don’t know how long she had them before I found them. She’d hidden them in her boots.”
I looked at the rings in my hand, suddenly blinking away tears.
“They were a little worse for wear after years in the dirt so Floss cleaned them up for me.”
When I studied them closer, I discovered something even more special. “Did she engrave the billet-doux too, Adam?”
“There’s a billet-doux?” He failed miserably at sounding surprised. “I hadn’t noticed. What does it say?”
The words hitched in my throat. “I will love you always, wherever we are.”
Adam put his hands to my face and brushed my tears away with his thumbs before moving in to murmur his next words against my lips. “Even if it is New York City.”
I inched my head back. “You did this yesterday?” He nodded. “You didn’t know about New York yesterday.”
He smiled wryly. “Don’t know what to tell you, Coccinelle. It must be magic.”
THE END
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G. J. Walker-Smith, Storm Shells
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