Forty-One
Nick
First, the coffee machine breaks. Then, I realise we’re out of dog food. Paige has been staying at her parents’ for a week and is completely ignoring my calls. I know this won’t go on forever – she has surely got to talk to me again some day, but there’s no denying the fact I’m a lost man without her, and it has nothing to do with the fact the only things in the fridge are sour milk, some limp lettuce and a yellowing head of broccoli.
I miss my wife.
And I wish I could go back to a time before I made that stupid phone call. I knew, even before I made the appointment, that I wouldn’t go through with it. I just had to try. It was like ticking a box, appeasing my ego, giving myself an insurance policy to fall back on if ever in the future I started to question whether I’d done enough.
Outside, it’s warm, the sky a golden pink.
‘Come on, Piper, rise and shine.’ I dangle the lead in front of her and she races towards me. ‘Looks like it’s your lucky day. We’re doing breakfast at a café this morning.’ She wags her tail and pants at me.
We reach the foreshore and I let her off the lead and she runs alongside me. At this hour of the morning, there’s nobody here but a few other joggers and a couple sipping their takeaway cappuccinos from the café across the road. I reach the pier and am ready to turn back when I notice the body in the water. I stop, bend over, hands on my knees as I try to catch my breath. The sun is shining directly onto the glistening water, making it hard to tell whether this kid is swimming or waving. I squint, trying to get a better view.
For twelve years I was a member of my local Surf Life-Saving Club. I learnt enough to know that an arm in the air isn’t a wave. It’s a cry for help. I have no board and there’s nobody to call out to since it’s too early for anyone to be patrolling the beach. Before I can think, I’m swimming towards her, Piper barking at me from the water’s edge. The glaring sun in my eyes makes it almost impossible to find her. I stop in the area I thought I last saw her but there’s nobody to be seen. But then I catch a glimpse of blonde hair and my body lurches towards it. My arms grip a body part. An arm? A leg? I drag her up to the surface. She can’t be older than twelve or thirteen. She’s unconscious and not responding.
I tow her behind me to the shore, where Piper is waiting for me. Now the couple who were sipping their coffees are standing there with her.
‘Call an ambulance!’ I yell as I carry the girl in my arms to the dry sand.
‘Hey, darling, can you hear me? Open your eyes.’
Nothing.
‘What’s your name?’
After no response, I check her airways, positioning her chin in preparation for CPR.
Someone is kneeling beside me, asking what they can do to help. ‘I need you to get to the Club. Check if anyone’s opening up and see if you can get a defibrillator here. If nobody’s there, try the supermarket.’
Suddenly, there’s a flurry of activity around me – fumbling and panic as the child’s mother starts yelling. Someone holds her back. ‘I left her on the pier. She was feeling faint. I went to grab something to eat. She must have fallen! Cleo, baby! Wake up!’
My training kicks in, and I’m suddenly on autopilot, but this time I don’t have the team I normally rely on to help me. It’s like how it was with Zac, only now I have the training – the know-how – to save this girl’s life.
I start delivering compressions.
Thirty compressions at a rate of one hundred per minute.
One, two, three four…
All I can think of is how this young girl doesn’t deserve to die today. Her parents don’t deserve to lose her.
Two rescue breaths…
Five minutes pass, then another three. There’s still no ambulance.
‘Come on!’ I yell.
One, two, three, four…
The paramedics arrive and they want to take over, but I don’t know if I can take my hands off her.
‘We’ll take it from here, sir.’
Before leaving, I brief one of the other paramedics and pass on my details. I take one last glance at Cleo. And then I turn around and start to walk away, realising that maybe it really is time to let go. Because I did my best, and maybe that was enough.
Throughout the course of the day I leave three voicemails for Paige. She finally calls me back before seven, right as I’m opening the door to the pizza delivery guy.
‘How’s Piper?’ she says.
‘She’s fine, but I think she misses you.’
‘I miss her too.’
‘Listen, I know you need your space. There’s something I have to tell you.’
‘If this has anything to do with—’
‘No, not at all. There’s someone I need to tell you about. Someone I knew vaguely from uni. She works at the hospital in the psychology clinic. She’s a friend.’
‘Does she have a name?’
‘Miranda Summers.’
‘The woman who called the night we were making the croquembouche?’
‘Yes. She’s the one who asked us to her son’s birthday.’
‘What kind of friend is she, Nick?’
‘She’s a psychologist.’
There’s a pause.
‘You went to the birthday party alone. At her house…’
‘Yes. I ended up getting there late, actually. I wanted to drop Will’s present off. He… he reminds me of Zac in a lot of ways.’
‘Nick, the way you’re talking, you’re making me wonder if there’s more to this.’
‘There’s not. There’s absolutely not. But I’ve been meeting with her. Talking to her. Just talking to her… about how I’ve been feeling about things.’
‘Because you can’t talk to me?’
‘It’s not like that. I’ve needed to talk to someone who isn’t… close to all of this.’
‘And you kept it a secret because…?’
‘Because I… because maybe I haven’t been handling this all very well,’ I admit.
‘Wow.’
‘For what it’s worth, it’s been helping.’
‘Well, I’m glad Miranda has been so helpful.’
‘I met with her a few times, Paige. Inside and outside the hospital. I don’t know why I didn’t mention it earlier. It’s stupid, really, but I think I was embarrassed.’
‘Why would you feel embarrassed? Look at what we’ve been through. I still talk to Imogen.’ Paige pauses. ‘But you’re only talking?’
‘Yes. Just talking,’ I say quietly, and I’m pleasantly surprised at how calm we’re both being. The way things have been, it’s not how I envisaged this conversation would go.
‘So, is that all you wanted to talk to me about?’ she says eventually.
‘Well, I really want to ask you if you’re ready to come home but I think I should give you some time.’
‘Okay,’ comes her response. I don’t know what I was expecting but it isn’t this.
‘Paige?’
‘Yes.’