CHAPTER THREE

      THEY could fail her.

      Ruby tried not to think about it as she stalled the car coming out of the staff car park. There were new boom gates and the car was so low that, as she leant out of the window to swipe her ID card, it stalled and, grinding the gears in the shiny silver sports car all the way home she wished, not for the first time, that her brother had bought an automatic.

      Normally she walked or took the bus to work, but it was Saturday and she’d promised her housemates to get home as soon as she could and meet them at the Stat Bar, so had taken the car. But as she pulled into Hill Street, the temptation to change her mind and forgo the rapid change of clothes and mad dash out was almost overwhelming—a noisy bar was the last place she wanted to be tonight.

      Far preferable would it be to curl up on the sofa and just hide, but she’d had two excited texts from Tilly already, urging her to get there ASAP because she had some wonderful news.

      Ruby let herself into the house and could smell the perfume her housemates had left behind on their way out. There was a bottle of wine opened on the kitchen table and a box of chocolates too. How much nicer it would be to pour a glass of wine and sit in the darkness alone with chocolate than head out there, but then they’d ring her, Ruby realised, and as if to prove the point her mobile shrilled.

      ‘Where are you?’ Tilly demanded.

      She was about to say that she was going to give it a miss, but could not face the barrage of questions. ‘I’m just getting changed.’

      ‘Well, hurry. I’ll look out for you.’

      Ruby trudged up the stairs, had a rapid shower then tried to work out what to wear—nothing in her wardrobe, or over the chair, or on the floor, matched her mood.

      And it wasn’t just what Sheila had said that was upsetting her. As she’d headed away from her hellish shift and a very prolonged assessment, she’d passed the young man’s family, comforting each other outside the hospital—and worse, far worse, the daughter had come over and thanked her.

      For what? Ruby had wanted to ask, because she’d done absolutely nothing.

      ‘You were lovely with Mum,’ the daughter had said, and only then had Ruby recalled that when Cort had asked them about the priest she’d found herself holding the woman’s hand.

      Their grief was so palpable, so thick and real that it seemed to have followed her home, and despite the shower it felt as if it had seeped into her skin.

      ‘Come on, Ruby,’ she told herself. She turned on some music and danced around the room for a moment, doing all she could to raise her spirits.

      And it worked a bit because she selected a nice cream skirt and a backless halter-neck top, pulled on all her silver bangles and put big silver earrings on. Looking in the mirror, Ruby decided that with a nice dash of lipstick she could pass as happy.

      She didn’t feel quite so brave, though, as she walked down Hill Street, turned the corner and walked past the New-Age shop she had worked in for two years after finishing school. She’d been happy then, if a little restless. Her desk had been stuffed with nursing brochures and forms and she had tried to pluck up the courage to apply to study nursing, telling herself she could do it, that even if didn’t appeal, she could get through her general training and then go on to work in mental health.

      It would seem she’d been wrong.

      She could hear the noise and laughter from the beer garden, knew her friends were wondering where she had got to, and she stood outside for a moment and pretended to read a text on her phone. She looked out at Coogee Beach and longed to walk there in the darkness and gather her thoughts.

      ‘Ruby!’ Tilly, her housemate, caught her just as her decision to wander was made. ‘Finally you’re here!’ Tilly said, and then frowned. ‘Are you okay?’ Tilly always looked out for her, for all the girls really. Ruby wondered whether she should just come out and say that Sheila had warned her that unless things improved she was going to have to repeat her Emergency rotation, except Ruby remembered that Tilly had news of her own and was desperate to tell her friend.

      ‘I’m fine. So what’s your news?’

      Tilly’s face spread into a smile. She was a redhead too, but there the similarities ended. Her hair was lighter and much curlier than Ruby’s and Tilly was taller and a calmer, more centred person. Also unlike Ruby, she was totally in love with her work. ‘I delivered an unexpected breech today. Ruby, it was brilliant, the best feeling ever.’ Tilly was a newly qualified midwife and babies, mothers, bonding, skin to skin were absolutely her passion. Even if Ruby could think of nothing more terrifying than delivering a breech baby, she knew this was food for Tilly’s soul.

      ‘That’s brilliant.’ Ruby didn’t force her smile and hug. She was genuinely thrilled for Tilly.

      ‘I just saw this little bottom …’ Tilly gushed. ‘I called for help but as quickly as that he just unfolded, his little legs and hips came out and he just hung there. Mum was amazing. I mean just amazing …’

      Ruby stood and listened as Tilly gave her the first of no doubt many detailed accounts of how the senior midwife had let her finish the job, how the doctor had arrived just as the delivery was complete.

      ‘I’m talking too much,’ Tilly said.

      ‘You’re not!’

      ‘Come on,’ Tilly said. ‘Your mob are here too.’

      ‘My mob?’ Ruby asked as they walked in. ‘You’re my mob!’

      ‘There are loads from Emergency here.’

      God, that was all she needed. Half of Ruby’s problem with Emergency was that she didn’t like the staff. Okay, it was probably an eighth of her problem, but they were just so confident, so cliquey, and so bloody bitchy as well, and close proximity to them was so not needed tonight.

      Ruby walked in and straight over to her friends, deliberately pretending not to even see the rowdy Emergency crowd and hoping that they wouldn’t see her. Not that there was much chance of that. With her long auburn hair she