‘I know, Merry.’ Ruby interrupted her and held her gaze. ‘I know. I think it might be my hormones and—’
‘And what?’ She pulled the blanket around her legs and turned to face her sister, wanting to have this conversation, no matter how painful, knowing it was open communication that would take them forward. Her dad had paved the way with his beautiful letter. ‘What is it you were going to say?’
Ruby looked into the middle distance. ‘I don’t want to say it,’ she said slowly.
‘Come on, whatever it is, it’s better out of your mouth than sticking in your throat, where it’ll only go bad until you have no choice but to spit it out!’
Ruby took a deep breath. ‘When you left Port Charles, after Digby—’
‘Yep.’ It was Merrin’s turn to interrupt, with no desire to go over the details of that day again.
‘Mum and I gave nearly all the presents back to the people who had sent them, apart from a bottle of champagne from someone at the Rotary Club, which we drank when we ran out of blackberry wine.’
‘That’s fair enough.’ Merrin let her mouth twitch in the beginnings of a smile.
‘There were a load of cards, all unopened, and there was one in a shiny gold envelope. It was from Jarvis.’
‘Right. Yes.’ She vaguely remembered him dropping one off and the girls ribbing her.
‘I don’t know why,’ Ruby began, ‘but I opened it.’
‘What did it say?’ Her curiosity surged along with her fear; did she really want to know if Jarvis had made some misplaced declaration? She knew it could only make her feel awkward in his company and stoke the fires of her sister’s ire.
‘It said’ – Ruby swallowed – ‘something along the lines of, “Have a nice day, but if things with Digby don’t work out, then I will always be there for you.”’
‘Well, that was kind. He is kind. Maybe he had a sixth sense.’ She felt more than a little bit uncomfortable, but figured it could have been worse.
‘It felt like . . .’ Ruby chose her words slowly. ‘It felt like he was saying, “Pick me, Merry! Pick me!”’
‘Don’t be ridiculous! Of course he wasn’t! That’s nuts. He was just being a good friend, being funny. Don’t forget he wrote it thinking Digby and I were going to open it together; he’d hardly have written that if he was being serious, would he?’ she reasoned.
‘I guess not. It just hurts me, because I always liked him, loved him even, and the thought that he might have had deep feelings for you—’
‘He didn’t.’ She spoke sharply. ‘We were kids, and if Digby and I had opened that card you would never have seen it and never have had those crackers thoughts. Have you asked Jarvis about it?’
‘Yes. He said he doesn’t even remember writing it.’
‘There we go!’
‘I think about it a lot,’ Ruby confessed.
‘Well, don’t. Stop it! It’s stupid and destructive and we’ve just lost our dad – our family’s got a little bit smaller, and Dad’s right: we need to be tight and close and supportive. We have never needed each other more than we do right now. We need to look after each other, hold each other close, celebrate the good and not dwell on the bad. That’s what he said.’
‘You’re right.’ Ruby nodded. ‘I’m tired of feeling mad at you because of my own stupid insecurity. It’s like it’s built up. It started as a joke when we were kids, but then I didn’t know how to stop it, how to be different. I do love you, Merry.’
‘And I love you.’ She felt a lightness to her being as Ruby’s posture softened and she and her sister sat quietly in an atmosphere of calm.
‘I wish my babby had met Dad.’ Her lips trembled.
Merrin reached for her hand and held it, mitten to mitten. ‘I remember saying once to him that I wished Gramps was here, and he told me he was, and I think the same. I think Dad’s here with us, and so are Gran and Gramps; I think they always will be.’
‘I think so too.’ Ruby wiped her nose on her sleeve. ‘We’re going to be okay, aren’t we, Merry?’
‘We sure are. We’re Kellow girls.’
‘Kellow girls,’ Ruby repeated.
‘Oi!’ Bella shouted from the top of Fore Street, waving from the other side of the slipway as she pushed baby Glynn in his pram in the early-morning sun.
‘She’s got some gob on her,’ Ruby noted.
‘She has. I sometimes hear her yell when I’m in Thornbury.’
They both laughed a little, as much as their sadness would allow.
Bella came close and jumped up on to the wall with baby Glynn snug as a bug, asleep and swaddled warmly in his pram.
‘Look at us all up and out like early birds!’ Merrin commented.
‘Actually, I haven’t been to bed,’ Bella corrected her. ‘Not in the way we used to in the olden days when I didn’t have to be a responsible adult and we danced till dawn, but in the way that I got drinking tea, and then before I knew it, the sun was coming up, and here I am. I thought the funeral was the best it could be.’ Bella smiled. ‘I think we did Ben proud and Jarv did so good with them singers.’
‘He really did.’ Ruby beamed with a pride that was heartening.
‘And you’re heading back to Thornbury and Miguel this afternoon?’ Bella pulled a sad face.
‘I am; need to find a way to hide my eyes that I’ve cried into little puffy slits and my sore nose that won’t stop running. I look a right state.’
‘Didn’t your mother ever tell you it is what’s inside that counts?’
‘Oh, Bells! Says the girl who won’t go out to the doorstep to collect the milk if she hasn’t got her push-up bra in place,’ Ruby tutted.
‘I wasn’t talking about what my mother told me, I was talking about what her mother told her!’ Her friend gave the thin defence.
‘Do you really believe that, Bells? That the outside wrapping doesn’t matter?’ Ruby snorted her laughter. ‘Cos you sure used to spend a lot of time making sure you were nicely wrapped!’
‘Truthfully?’ Bella seemed to consider this. ‘I think men want the whole package. They want you to be funny, smart and sexy.’
‘What about what we want?’ Merrin asked a little sheepishly.
‘The same, I think, and why not?’ Bella stood her ground.
‘Agree.’ Ruby looked up to the bedroom window where her husband slept. ‘I guess I got lucky with my Jarv.’
She and Bella looked from one to another, as if not quite seeing the same level of appeal, but knowing what voicing it would mean, even in jest.
‘You sure did.’ Merrin snuggled up to her sister.
‘I can’t see myself dating any time soon.’ Bella checked on Glynn. ‘It’s not the dating that bothers me as much as the idea of stripping off in front of a stranger . . .’ She exhaled. ‘Sure, I can glam up the outside, but I caught sight of myself in the mirror yesterday and I’ve got this bulge of tummy that now hangs over my knickers and stretch marks that have destroyed my once immaculate boobs. Honestly, my chest looks like a map of the Nile Delta. I can’t imagine any man finding me remotely attractive. I think I might have to face the fact that the Flying Dutchman might actually be the last man to see me naked and dancing in the candlelight.’