Midwife's Christmas Proposal. Fiona McArthur
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glanced around. ‘Well, half of that hill behind the lake …’ he pointed across the water ‘… is full of disused gold mines and labyrinths of old tunnels crisscross underneath our feet.’
She looked down at the path and grimaced. Imagined falling through into an underground cavern. She’d always had claustrophobia—or had since one particular foster-sibling had locked her in a cupboard. Now, that wasn’t a pleasant thought. ‘Thanks for that. How to ruin a walk.’
‘Well, not really under our feet. That might be stretching it a bit far. But certainly all around the hillside and a long way this way.’
‘Okay.’ She shook off the past and thought rationally about it. ‘I guess half our hospital’s business comes from the mines out of town so it makes sense we’d have some here.’ She glanced at him as they walked at a steady pace around the lake. Maybe she could start fossicking for gold after work—above ground, of course—and make her fortune to pay off the debts Mick had left her with. ‘Have you been in them?’
He laughed. Even looked a little pink-cheeked. ‘Once. To my embarrassment.’ Shook his head at himself. ‘I can’t believe I brought this up.’ He glanced at Tara ruefully and sighed. ‘I had to ring Mia to get my dad to rescue me.’
She looked across at him and grinned. Good to see other people did dumb things. ‘Ouch.’
‘Not one of my more glorious moments.’
She looked at him, loose-limbed, strongly muscled with that chiselled jaw and lurking smile. A man very sure of his world and his place in it. She wished. Shook her head. ‘I’m sure you have enough glorious moments.’
The quizzical look was back but all he said was, ‘Yep. Hundreds.’
She had to laugh at that. ‘I’m still waiting for mine.’
‘My turn not to believe you.’ So he’d noticed her scepticism. He tilted his head and studied her with leisurely thoroughness. ‘Do you enjoy your work?’
‘Love it.’
‘Then I’ll bet you have lots of successes too.’
She thought about earlier that morning and smiled. ‘I do get to share other women’s glorious moments.’ Changed the subject. ‘Mia says you’re running a breech clinic at Sydney Central?’
‘Yep. Was converted by an amazing guy I worked with when I was a registrar. Had the motto “Don’t interfere”. Said most women had the ground work for a normal breech birth.’
She couldn’t agree more but her training hospital hadn’t subscribed to that theory. The only babies allowed to be born in the breech position were the ones who came in off the street ready to push their own way out. She’d never been lucky enough to be on duty for that. ‘I’ve watched a lot of breech births on videos but I haven’t seen one in real life.’
‘You will. Hopefully trends are changing with new research. Women are demanding a chance at least. Maybe one of your glorious moments is coming up. You obviously love midwifery.’
‘I was always going to be a nurse, because my mother was a nurse, even though I don’t remember much about her, but then one of my friends lost a baby and I decided I’d be a midwife. It was a good decision.’
‘I think it’s a fabulous decision. Some of my best friends are midwives.’ He returned to their previous conversation. ‘But I can’t believe there isn’t more to your life than your job.’
‘You’re right.’ She thought of her arrival here six months ago. ‘I love my bike.’
‘Ah. So the black monster is yours?’
‘Yep. The sum total of my possessions.’
‘University can be expensive.’
She’d only just started paying that back. It was the bills Mick had run up all over town that crippled her. More fool her for having the lease and the accounts in her name. They’d both been in the orphanage together and when she’d met him again she’d been blinded to his bitter and dangerous side because, mistakenly, she’d thought she’d found family.
But her dream of everything being fair and equal had been torn into a pile of overdue notices. ‘Druggie boyfriends can be expensive too.’ Unintentionally the words came out on a sigh. What the heck was she doing?
‘Nasty. Had one of those, did you.’
She turned her face and grimaced at the lake so he couldn’t see. She was tempted to say ‘Dozens’ but it wasn’t true. It had taken her too long to actually trust someone that first time. ‘Hmm. I’m a little too used to people letting me down. Don’t usually bore people with it.’
‘Don’t imagine you bore people at all.’
She could hear the smile in his voice and some of the annoyance with herself seeped away then surged again, even though it was unreasonably back towards Simon. What would he know about where she’d been? What she’d been through?
Then, thankfully, the calmness she’d been practising for the last six months since she’d met these people whispered sense in her ear and she let the destructive thoughts go. Sent the whole mess that was her past life out over the rippled water of the lake and concentrated on the breath she eased out.
She had no idea where the conversational ball lay as she returned to the moment but let that worry go too. Took another breath and let her shoulders drop.
‘That’s some control you have there, missy.’
She blinked at Simon and focussed on him. On his calm grey eyes mainly and the warmth of empathy—not ridicule, as she’d expected, but admiration and understanding.
‘I’m practising positive mindfulness and self-control.’ She didn’t usually tell people that either.
He nodded as if he knew what it was, probably didn’t, then he surprised her with his own disclosure. ‘I’m not good at it. But if it makes you feel any better I have hang-ups too. Luckily I have a very busy work life.’
She smiled at the statement. ‘Funny how we can hide in that. I was studying like mad, paying bills for two in my time off, and he was gambling and doing drugs when I thought he was at uni.’ She shrugged it away. ‘Now I have a busy work life and a really big bike.’
‘The bike’s a worry.’
‘The bike?’ She shook her head and could almost feel the wind on her face and the vibration in her ears. ‘Not if you have no ties. Always loved the spice of danger. It would be different if I had someone who needed me.’ There was a difference between someone needing you and someone using you. She’d agreed not to drag them both through the court system but she would only keep all the bills at the cost of his bike. Even though it had only been worth a quarter of the debts he’d run up, possession of the bike had restored some of her self-esteem. Mick hadn’t been happy and sometimes she wondered if it really all was finished.
‘Ah. So you admit that motorbikes are the toys of possibly “temporary” citizens?’
‘Spoken like a true doctor.’
‘Ask any paramedic. The stats are poor.’
She grinned at him—he had no idea. ‘But the fun is proportional. I could take you for a ride one day.’
He raised his brows. ‘I’d have to think about that.’
‘Sure. No rush. You have time.’ She couldn’t imagine him ever saying yes. Which was a good thing because she suspected the experience of Simon’s arms wrapped around her and his thighs hard up against her backside would make it very difficult to concentrate. Instead she looked up ahead. ‘So how far are we walking? You’ll be at your father’s house soon.’
He glanced up in surprise. Looked around. ‘You’re right. I guess he’ll be at work anyway.’