-- Chapter 2 --

Coming from his parents, the name hit hard. What was happening here? Jesus, it had been years since he’d even thought of her, let alone spoken her name.

He saw an image of her in his mind. A beautiful girl who had once meant everything to him. He saw a girl he’d held hands with at a bus stop, a girl he’d said things to that he had thought he had meant at the time; and should have said other things to as well. She was his first, for many things, but then things had changed.

Then he saw the night of their year twelve formal, when something had happened between him and Luke . . . the something that had changed all three of their lives.

But he had no regrets. Luke was the one with whom he wanted to spend the rest of his life, while at the same time, it’s impossible to erase history. The history he had shared with his high-school girlfriend.

‘How did that happen?’ Matt asked. It seemed like such an odd question. ‘Is she here?’ His mouth had already made the words before he knew what he was asking.

‘Yes. And she’s very unwell,’ his mother said carefully. ‘She has asked to see you.’

Matt stared at the scuffed linoleum between his shoes. He thought of Luke, of all the years since that school formal, and of the life they had built, which had nothing at all to do with the girl whose name was now in his head.

‘Me? Why?’ he asked, finally.

‘Because she has something to tell you,’ his father said. ‘Will you see her?’

Matt rubbed his palms against the work pants he was still wearing, the friction a small distraction as he thought things through. ‘Where?’

Moments later he found himself following his father out the door and back into the main corridor. He was led past the nurses’ station and then down another corridor that smelled faintly of antiseptic and an ancient building. They stopped at the open doorway of a darkened room, inside which Matt could see a pale-blue curtain pulled across and around one of the two beds it housed. Matt’s father rapped lightly on the doorframe before announcing his presence.

‘You can come in,’ a tired, soft voice replied.

‘I have a visitor for you,’ Matt’s father said, before pulling the curtain back slightly.

The woman in the bed was small, in the way people get when life has begun to close in around them. Against the white of the pillow, her hair was cropped close, silvery, her skin appeared bruised and paper-like. For a moment Matt saw only the illness, and the sterile hospital paraphernalia that said medication, drip, monitors. And then she turned her head. The green of her eyes was exactly the colour he remembered; a vibrant, piercing, sea-glass shade that had once made him think he could drown in it.

‘Hi,’ she said, her voice papery. She tried a smile, but that was a sad effort and didn’t quite make it to her eyes.

‘Hi,’ Matt answered, while hating the way it sounded. It was almost like he was twelve again and about to ask for a first date.

‘How about I give you two a minute?’ Matt’s father suggested, then quickly stepping back and leaving, before Matt could decide whether to stop him.

They listened to his retreating footsteps for a few moments, before Matt dragged the visitor’s chair closer and sat, because standing felt awkward.

‘You look . . .’ he started to say, but then he clammed up. Just what do you say in situations like this? He had no idea really.

‘Like what?’ replied Julie. ‘Like death warmed up?’ Her mouth twitched; the old Julie, the sharp one, was still there somewhere, making jokes to balance an all-too-serious world. ‘It’s alright, Matt. We’re allowed to say it.’

He winced. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘So am I,’ she said, and then let that just hang. She wasn’t sorry about this, or about him, but about all of it; the big messy everything called life. She swallowed, her movement laboured. ‘So, how have you been?’

He almost laughed at that, the tilt of it.

‘I . . . I’m good,’ he replied. He hesitated, then made himself say what next came to mind, just in case she didn’t know, or in case she’d somehow forgotten how things had turned out, half a lifetime ago, way back when. ‘I’m with Luke. We’re . . . still. You know.’

‘Yeah, I figured,’ Julie said, and for a second her eyes warmed. ‘Even when you and I were together I sometimes felt like a third wheel. The way you two were always with each other . . . almost like the rest of us were just hangers-on.’ She caught her breath, grimaced, and then carried on. ‘I’m happy for you both. And I truly mean that.’

‘Thanks.’ The word felt small. ‘Mum said you asked to see me.’

She closed her eyes, gathering herself, going over in her mind the speech she had prepared years earlier, and now unsure if she could deliver it. When she opened them again, they were wet, but bright, and alive. ‘I should’ve told you a long time ago,’ she said quietly.

‘Told me what, exactly?’

‘We were just kids, and I was proud, and stupid and . . . and then it got harder to say. I convinced myself it wasn’t your business, and by the time I thought about it again we each had lives that were a million miles apart.’

‘Julie . . .’

‘I’m dying, Matt.’ She said it as plainly as giving a street name. ‘Ovarian cancer. There isn’t time anymore to sugar-coat things.’

The words landed like cold, flat stones, one after the other. He had known, of course. It was there in her face, her voice, the way the air around the bed had been set to fragile—but knowing and hearing were different. He swallowed.

‘I’m sorry,’ Matt said again, because there really wasn’t anything else he could think of to say.

‘So am I,’ Julie repeated, but then paused. ‘Do you remember the last time we saw each other?’ she asked.

Matt had to think for a moment, but then his mind focused on a sunny day when he was having lunch in the mall, with Luke and their other friends. It was just before Christmas, he thought. A few weeks after their having finished their final exams.

‘Yeah, I think so. In the mall one day, after we were done with school. You and Kerrie saw us all one lunchtime, if I’m not mistaken.’

‘Yes. That was it. Not long after that I moved to Sydney and stayed with family for a while.’

‘I think Kerrie told us that later.’

After a breath she continued. ‘I didn’t ask your parents to bring you here just to reminisce, though. I asked because there’s something I need to hand to you before I go. Something I should have handed to you years ago.’

He looked at her hands, now resting in her lap. Her skin on the back of them was still smooth, like he remembered. The rest of her body was different, though. The way she had to breathe between sentences now was a struggle. He wanted to reach for her and didn’t know where to put his hand.

‘Matt,’ she said softly, as she held out a hand for him. The softness of his name on her voice almost made the room spin, almost made him feel like he was seventeen again. It was then, when he reached out and took her hand in his, that she said, ‘You have a son.’

The world suddenly stopped. Even the monitor seemed to hold its breath, silenced by a bombshell sixteen years in the making.

Matt’s mouth suddenly went dry as he heard the words bounce around inside his head.

You have a son . . . You have a son . . . You have a son.

‘I . . . what?’ Matt finally managed to croak. ‘How?’

‘How do sons usually get created?’ Julie replied, with just a hint of a smirk on her face.

‘Julie . . . that’s . . .’

‘I know. And I’m sorry for not telling you before this.’

Now it was Matt’s turn at struggling to breathe.

‘He’s a good kid, Matt. His name is Levi,’ she said, and the ghost of a laugh gently shook her. ‘A boy, though not really a boy anymore, I don’t suppose. Fifteen years old. He’s stubborn and smart and too hard on himself. He’s . . . he’s mine. And he’s also yours. Very much yours.’

She watched his face, measuring the way the news settled upon it.

Matt shook his head, and then did it again because the first time hadn’t cleared enough of the static crackling around him. Words formed, but then he let the sentence stop, because it had nowhere to go that wasn’t messy.

‘I know,’ she said, as she squeezed his hand. ‘I should have told you long ago. But I was angry, and then I was scared, and then I told myself it would just . . . complicate things. My family helped, for a while. And then I came back here when dad first got sick . . . I guess Levi would have been about five years old then. Then dad died, and it was just the two of us, me and Levi, and the church . . . and a town that doesn’t forgive girls like me easily. I didn’t want you to look at me and see what they saw. But you had moved on anyhow.’

He thought of that fiery girl he had once loved. He thought of change, and the awakening of his true feelings for Luke that meant leaving things behind. He thought of time, and the years that stood between him and Julie . . . and now, Levi.

‘Where . . . where is he?’ he asked, his mouth dry, as he sat back in the chair.

Julie smiled, small and worn and sudden. ‘Probably down the hall, pretending he isn’t listening. He doesn’t venture very far from me these days. He knows it’s not going to be long now.’

Immediately he thought of the boy in the grey hoodie, who he had seen in the hallway earlier.

Matt reached for the arm rests on the visitor’s chair. His fingers wrapped around the cold metal frame, while his forearms rested on the padded sides. He didn’t know where to look, or how to sit, awkwardness oozed out of him. All he knew was that the room was tilting, and so too, was his life. The life he would be going back to after this, was not going to be the same.

‘I’m not asking for your forgiveness,’ Julie said quietly. ‘All I’m asking is for you to see him. And after that . . . if you can . . . to be there for our son, when I can’t be.’

He closed his eyes and saw an image of Luke. He saw their life together, their home, the beach, their friends. How were their lives about to change? And bringing that change, was that something that was selfish on his part? When he opened his eyes and looked at the woman who had once been his first, for everything, he knew what he had to do.

‘Okay,’ he said, and the word felt like stepping onto a road with no idea where it led. ‘Okay. I’ll see him.’

Julie exhaled, a sound like something being let go of. What was that? Anxiety? She reached out, and he met her hand halfway, their fingers cool and dry and odd, a handshake across years.

‘Thank you,’ she said. When Matt looked at her, the overhead light made a halo of the silver in her hair.

They sat for a moment in the quietly humming space. Beyond the curtain someone laughed down the corridor and the sound floated in, an ordinary, offhand note of the living. There were sounds of footsteps.

Julie’s eyes slid past him then, to the doorway. Her mouth softened.

‘Levi,’ Julie said, her voice as warm as it could be. ‘Come in, love.’

Matt turned, half-standing before he even realised he had moved, and a figure stepped through the gap in the curtain. A boy . . . no, this was more a man-child, not a boy; a lanky, wary fifteen-year-old, with eyes that Matt knew all too well, even before he knew why. Levi hovered at the foot of his mother’s bed, the hall light framing his shoulders and the mop of dark hair. There was no mistaking his heritage.

For a moment they just looked at each other, two strangers in a room, each a long way from where either of them had thought they’d be that evening.

Julie’s hand tightened around Matt’s.

‘Matt, this is him,’ she said, her voice soft with pride. ‘Levi. This is your dad.’

The word was too hard to say, so Matt didn’t try. How could he be a dad. He did the only thing he could think to do. He smiled, not the big, affable grin he used for friends and customers and neighbours, but the smaller, quieter one that Luke knew, the one that said I’m here.

‘Hi,’ he said, his voice rough. ‘I’m Matt.’

Levi’s jaw moved, as if the words in him had teeth. He didn’t smile. He didn’t step closer. He nodded once, almost imperceptible, and lifted his chin like armour.

‘Hi,’ the boy replied, and the room, after having held its breath, finally remembered how to breathe.

*   *   *

The hospital was an old one, a modest two-storey block that had been added to in the eighties and painted bright white. On sunny days light would reflect from its walls, almost blinding the unexpected. By sundown, the hue would change to amber, then by night it took on an almost ghostly appearance. Its corridors held a peculiar hum of squeaking linoleum floors, muted conversation and ducted air conditioning. The stillness was broken only by the occasional buzz from a patient needing assistance, or the squeak of trolley wheels.

Matt sat in the visitor’s chair, his elbows on his knees, staring across the bed at the boy. Levi. His son, if Julie’s words were true — and God, they had to be, didn’t they, because one glance was enough. He had those same big, brown, puppy-dog eyes. The same stubborn tilt of the jaw he used to see in the mirror when he was the same age as Levi was now and trying to pretend the world didn’t scare him half to death.

Other than the one, ’Hi,’ the boy didn’t speak. He stood at the foot of the bed like a sentry, with his shoulders squared, gaze flicking between his mother and Matt as if to guard her from him. Julie reached for her son’s hand, and he stepped around to the other side and took hold of it, squeezing it weakly. ‘It’s alright, love,’ she whispered. ‘This is your father.’

Levi’s mouth twisted. ‘I already have one,’ Levi said, so quietly that Matt might have missed it if the words hadn’t cut straight to his chest.

Julie gave him the look. It was a mother’s look, fierce, even given her frailty. ‘Your grandfather’s gone, darling. It’s just been me, and when I’m gone, Matt will be all that you will have. You deserve more than to be alone in the world.’ Her eyes flicked to Matt. ‘Both of you do.’

‘But I don’t want you to go,’ Levi said, almost in a whisper.

Matt leaned back and ran a hand over his face. ‘Why now, Julie? Why did you wait until . . .’

The words sounded cruel even as they tumbled out. He broke off.

Julie’s expression was tired but steady. ‘Because I thought I had more time, Matt. And because I was proud. I didn’t want to admit that I had lost, that I couldn’t raise him without help. I wanted to keep him all mine.’ Her voice cracked. ‘But the truth is, he’s as much yours as mine, and he’s going to need you. Really need you.’

Levi scowled. ‘I don’t need nobody.’ His voice carried more defiance than conviction.

Matt swallowed hard, his heart banging inside his chest. He wanted to reach for the boy, but he couldn’t do that. He knew it. Instinct told him that any sudden move could easily send Levi bolting. ‘Mate, you don’t have to decide anything now,’ he said carefully. ‘We’ve all had a shock today. But if you’ll let me . . . I’d really like to get to know you. And so would your grandparents.’

The boy looked at him, as if he were weighing up some extensive list of options that been laid on the table.

‘Grandparents?’ Levi finally asked.

‘The man I was talking to yesterday, honey. He’s your grandfather.’

‘You said his name was Matt also.’

‘Yes, it is,’ Matt answered. Though Levi didn’t respond at all.

Julie just nodded, before her eyes fluttered closed, exhaustion dragging at every pore of her body. ‘That’s enough for now, boys. But both of you, please . . . just be here.’

Matt nodded, his throat too tight for anything more. He watched as Levi pulled the other chair close, then tucked his mother’s frail hand between both of his own, as if by sheer grip he would be able to hold her in this mortal world forever. And while the resemblance between them was undeniable, the distance between them, right at this moment, was a yawning chasm.

When the nurse appeared moments later, cheerful in her clipped, professional manner, Matt stepped out into the hall to give them some space. He leaned against the wall, his palms pressed flat against cool concrete, while he let the truth sink in. He had a son. He’d had a son for fifteen years. All those years stolen, and now the boy has been dropped in his lap, when it was almost too late to start.

From the other end of the corridor Matt’s parents materialised, both of them looking concerned.

‘Well?’ his father asked quietly.

Matt shook his head. ‘He hates me already.’

His father’s mouth curved upwards. ‘He just doesn’t know you yet. Give it time.’

Time. That was the one thing none of them seemed to have.

After a few moments of leaning against the wall, with his eyes closed and his head against the cold concrete, Matt turned back to his parents.

‘You could have at least warned me,’ he said.

His parents shared a look, which didn’t go unnoticed.

‘What?’ Matt asked.

‘We couldn’t, love,’ his mother replied.

‘Why the hell not?’

‘It wasn’t our place to,’ his father answered. ‘Julie asked that she be able to tell you herself. She just wanted us to get you here so she could do just that.’

To be continued . . .