“No,” she said, and her heart was pounding now. “What?”
“I realized that I want you, too. That if this isn’t what loving someone is, I can’t imagine what more it’d be, because what it is—it’s knowing that I’d do anything I could to keep you from hurting, but if you are, I want to be there to soften the blow. I want to know that I’m there for you, and I want you to know it too. I need you to trust that if you need me to come pick you up because it’s raining, I’ll do it, no matter what, no matter how angry you are with me, no matter how angry you think I am with you. And if that isn’t love,” he repeated, “I guess it’s close enough for me. I hope it’s close enough for you.”
“I can’t …” Her chest was tighter than ever, the tears pricking behind her eyelids, and she couldn’t have kept from showing him how she felt if the most important role of her life had been riding on it. “I can’t have children,” she managed to say.
“That’s all right,” he said, and he was smiling. “I’ve already got children.”
“Your own children,” she insisted.
“You told me,” he said, “that children were yours when you cared for them, and when you loved them. I reckon you were right.”
“So you don’t want … babies?”
“Maybe I do,” he said. “Maybe I do, if you do. But aren’t there other ways to have babies?”
“You’d do that?”
“Don’t you know by now,” he asked her, “that I’d do just about anything for you?”
“You may change your mind, though,” she said, wanting so much to believe him, wishing so much that she dared to trust that he meant it. “It happens. It’s what happened with Derek. You can say it doesn’t matter, but you may get older, and in the end, it will.”
He sat a minute, thinking, and she waited, hardly managing to breathe. She waited, because his answer mattered. His honest answer.
“You said once,” he told her at last, “that you weren’t planning on moving. That the two of us weren’t likely to live in domestic bliss next door to each other, forever and ever.”
“You should be an actor,” she said, trying to joke, because she wasn’t sure where this was going, and she so desperately wanted it to go in the right direction, “the way you remember my lines.”
He didn’t respond to that. “Maybe,” he said, “what we need to do is try that. Try living in domestic bliss next door to each other for as long as we need to. For as long as it takes for me to convince you that I can love you, that I will love you, and that this is the real thing. That this is forever. I know it already, but I can see you need some telling, and some showing, too, and I’m willing to keep telling you and showing you until you believe it. All I’m asking is that you give me the chance to try, and that you try too. And that, whatever happens,” he said, his face filled with so much tenderness, “whatever happens, you promise me that my rubbish bags are safe.”
She was laughing, and she was crying, and she was in his arms.
“So is that a promise to try?” he asked after he’d held her and kissed her and wiped her tears away.
“That’s a promise,” she told him, both hands on his face, her fingers smoothing over the dark rasp of his beard, and she’d never wanted anybody or anything more in her life. “To keep your rubbish bags safe, and you, too. To keep you safe, and cared for, and loved. That’s my promise to try.”
Epilogue
One year later
Another December day, a fair one this time, the pohutukawa just coming into bloom in Katikati, and there was music in the air.
“Are they coming?” Charlie asked for what must have been the tenth time.
Hugh looked down at his brother, whose hand was going up to tug at the unfamiliar constraint of the gray necktie for what must have been the twentieth time, and reached out himself to give the thing a quick straighten. Charlie was nervous about doing this, and about the dance he was doing later, too, he guessed. His brother tap-dancing at his wedding reception. That was one he could never have imagined a couple years ago, and here it was, and how lucky was he?
“Wait,” he said. “Almost. Got the rings for me?”
Charlie swallowed with nerves, gave a quick bob of his head. “Yeh.”
“Then we’re all good,” Hugh said. “Hang in with me here, mate.”
The music changed, and he looked up fast and saw his sister standing at the end of the aisle, clutching her bouquet, saw the figure in ivory leaning down, a graceful shape, to give a tug to the skirts of the pale green dress Hugh hadn’t yet been allowed to see. He saw a hand lift a veil for just a moment to allow a kiss on Amelia’s cheek, and could imagine the smile, the encouraging word before Amelia had turned to face him, had started her slow march down the aisle, concentration evident in every fierce line of her thirteen-year-old body. Josie’s maid of honor.
And this was it. This was the day. The villa next door was on the market again, because when he and Josie came back from their three-week honeymoon in the Cook Islands, she wouldn’t be living there anymore. The kids would have another Christmas with Josie’s parents, her mother would be spoiling the mokopuna, truly hers now, with chocolate fish every day, no doubt, and then they’d be together. All of them. A family, complete at last.
His sister continued her achingly slow progress down the aisle, and Hugh waggled his fingers at her, got a nervous little waggle in return, and offered a smile to his mum, sitting in the front row with Aunt Cora and her Henry. However much any of them had to give now, it was going to be all right, because he and Josie had enough. He and Josie had it all.
Everything was coming together, except Dr. Eva, because Dr. Eva had disintegrated about as thoroughly as a woman could. She’d met her nemesis at last in the cliffhanger to end all cliffhangers, to be revealed in the first episode of the following season, when her obsession with her brilliant colleague had reached crisis point, the woman scorned had demanded revenge, and a plot had been hatched involving a highly improbable assassin and a car bomb gone horribly wrong.
Dr. Eva was no more, because the new series had been cast by the network, Josie’s script for the pilot was being refined even now by a team led by Rose, wooed from Courtney Place as head writer to everyone’s satisfaction, and the men of a fictional Northland town weren’t going to know what had hit them.
But Hugh forgot all of that in the next instant, because the music had changed again, the congregation of the little church was standing, and everyone had turned to watch the woman starting down the aisle on the arm of her father. The big, broad figure beside her radiated sober strength in his black suit, his eyes looked straight into Hugh’s, and the message was about as clear as it could be.
Take care of my little girl, her father’s set gaze said, or I will kill you.
No worries, he told the other man. I’ve got her.
Josie was a slim ivory column, and just like always, there was nothing too tight, nothing too low. The veil obscured her face and hair, leaving nothing but her own beautiful shape visible, coming towards him without a falter in her step. So sure, and so right. All his tomorrows.
Amelia reached the altar, and Hugh smiled at her, made an “OK” sign with finger and thumb, and she smiled back and took her place. And then Josie’s father was there with his daughter, placing her hand in Hugh’s, giving him one final sober nod before going to sit with his wife.
Hugh wasn’t looking. He waited for Josie to hand her bouquet off to Amelia, then reached out with hands he could have wished were steadier, gently picked up the ends of the veil, and lifted the gossamer thing over her head.
And there she was. Smiling up into his eyes with the warmth, the life, the light that was Josie, and he could have sworn that his heart actually stopped for a moment.
“Hi,” he said, and smiled at her.
“Hi,” she said, and smiled back.
He took her hand, twined his fingers through hers, and turned with her to face the altar.
“We’re ready,” he told the priest
. “We’re all good. Let’s go.”
The End
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Turn the page for a Kiwi glossary and more links!
A Kiwi Glossary
A few notes about Maori pronunciation:
The accent is normally on the first syllable.
All vowels are pronounced separately.
All vowels except u have a short vowel sound.
“wh” is pronounced “f.”
“ng” is pronounced as in “singer,” not as in “anger.”
ABs: All Blacks
across the Ditch: in Australia (across the Tasman Sea). Or, if you're in Australia, in New Zealand!
advert: commercial
agro: aggravation
All Blacks: National rugby team. Members are selected for every series from amongst the five NZ Super 15 teams. The All Blacks play similarly selected teams from other nations.
ambo: paramedic
Aotearoa: New Zealand (the other official name, meaning “The Land of the Long White Cloud" in Maori)
arvo, this arvo: afternoon
Aussie, Oz: Australia. (An Australian is also an Aussie. Pronounced “Ozzie.”)
bach: holiday home (pronounced like “bachelor”)
backs: rugby players who aren't in the scrum and do more running, kicking, and ball-carrying—though all players do all jobs and play both offense and defense. Backs tend to be faster and leaner than forwards.
bangers and mash: sausages and potatoes
barrack for: cheer for
bench: counter (kitchen bench)
berko: berserk
Big Smoke: the big city (usually Auckland)
bikkies: cookies
billy-o, like billy-o: like crazy. “I paddled like billy-o and just barely made it through that rapid.”
bin, rubbish bin: trash can
bit of a dag: a comedian, a funny guy
bits and bobs: stuff (“be sure you get all your bits and bobs”)
blood bin: players leaving field for injury
Blues: Auckland's Super 15 team
bollocks: rubbish, nonsense
boofhead: fool, jerk
booking: reservation
boots and all: full tilt, no holding back
bot, the bot: flu, a bug
Boxing Day: December 26—a holiday
brekkie: breakfast
brilliant: fantastic
bub: baby, small child
buggered: messed up, exhausted
bull's roar: close. “They never came within a bull's roar of winning.”
bunk off: duck out, skip (bunk off school)
bust a gut: do your utmost, make a supreme effort
Cake Tin: Wellington's rugby stadium (not the official name, but it looks exactly like a springform pan)
caravan: travel trailer
cardie: a cardigan sweater
chat up: flirt with
chilly bin: ice chest
chips: French fries. (potato chips are “crisps”)
chocolate bits: chocolate chips
chocolate fish: pink or white marshmallow coated with milk chocolate, in the shape of a fish. A common treat/reward for kids (and for adults. You often get a chocolate fish on the saucer when you order a mochaccino—a mocha).
choice: fantastic
chokka: full
chooks: chickens
Chrissy: Christmas
chuck out: throw away
chuffed: pleased
collywobbles: nervous tummy, upset stomach
come a greaser: take a bad fall
costume, cossie: swimsuit (female only)
cot: crib (for a baby)
crook: ill
cuddle: hug (give a cuddle)
cuppa: a cup of tea (the universal remedy)
CV: resumé
cyclone: hurricane (Southern Hemisphere)
dairy: corner shop (not just for milk!)
dill: fool
do your block: lose your temper
dob in: turn in; report to authorities. Frowned upon.
doco: documentary
doddle: easy. “That'll be a doddle.”
dodgy: suspect, low-quality
dogbox: The doghouse—in trouble
dole: unemployment.
dole bludger: somebody who doesn’t try to get work and lives off unemployment (which doesn’t have a time limit in NZ)
Domain: a good-sized park; often the “official” park of the town.
dressing gown: bathrobe
drongo: fool (Australian, but used sometimes in NZ as well)
drop your gear: take off your clothes
duvet: comforter
earbashing: talking-to, one-sided chat
electric jug: electric teakettle to heat water. Every Kiwi kitchen has one.
En Zed: Pronunciation of NZ. (“Z” is pronounced “Zed.”)
ensuite: master bath (a bath in the bedroom).
eye fillet: premium steak (filet mignon)
fair go: a fair chance. Kiwi ideology: everyone deserves a fair go.
fair wound me up: Got me very upset
fantail: small, friendly native bird
farewelled, he'll be farewelled: funeral; he’ll have his funeral.
feed, have a feed: meal
first five, first five-eighth: rugby back—does most of the big kicking jobs and is the main director of the backs. Also called the No. 10.
fixtures: playing schedule
fizz, fizzie: soft drink
fizzing: fired up
flaked out: tired
flash: fancy
flat to the boards: at top speed
flat white: most popular NZ coffee. An espresso with milk but no foam.
flattie: roommate
flicks: movies
flying fox: zipline
footpath: sidewalk
footy, football: rugby
forwards: rugby players who make up the scrum and do the most physical battling for position. Tend to be bigger and more heavily muscled than backs.
fossick about: hunt around for something
front up: face the music, show your mettle
garden: yard
get on the piss: get drunk
get stuck in: commit to something
give way: yield
giving him stick, give him some stick about it: teasing, needling
glowworms: larvae of a fly found only in NZ. They shine a light to attract insects. Found in caves or other dark, moist places.
go crook, be crook: go wrong, be ill
go on the turps: get drunk
gobsmacked: astounded
good hiding: beating (“They gave us a good hiding in Dunedin.”)
grotty: grungy, badly done up
ground floor: what we call the first floor. The “first floor” is one floor up.
gumboots, gummies: knee-high rubber boots. It rains a lot in New Zealand.
gutted: thoroughly upset
Haast's Eagle: (extinct). Huge native NZ eagle. Ate moa.
haere mai: Maori greeting
hang on a tick: wait a minute
hard man: the tough guy, the enforcer
hard yakka: hard work (from Australian)
harden up: toughen up. Standard NZ (male) response to (male) complaints: “Harden the f*** up!”
have a bit on: I have placed a bet on [whatever]. Sports gambling and prostitution are both legal in New Zealand.
have a go: try
Have a nosy for… : look around for
head: principal (headmaster)
head down: or head down, bum up. Put your head down. Work hard.
heaps: lots. “Give it heaps.”
hei toki: pendant
(Maori)
holiday: vacation
honesty box: a small stand put up just off the road with bags of fruit and vegetables and a cash box. Very common in New Zealand.
hooker: rugby position (forward)
hooning around: driving fast, wannabe tough-guy behavior (typically young men)
hoovering: vacuuming (after the brand of vacuum cleaner)
ice block: popsicle
I'll see you right: I'll help you out
in form: performing well (athletically)
it's not on: It's not all right
iwi: tribe (Maori)
jabs: immunizations, shots
jandals: flip-flops. (This word is only used in New Zealand. Jandals and gumboots are the iconic Kiwi footwear.)
jersey: a rugby shirt, or a pullover sweater
joker: a guy. “A good Kiwi joker”: a regular guy; a good guy.
journo: journalist
jumper: a heavy pullover sweater
ka pai: going smoothly (Maori).
kapa haka: school singing group (Maori songs/performances. Any student can join, not just Maori.)
karanga: Maori song of welcome (done by a woman)
keeping his/your head down: working hard
kia ora: welcome (Maori, but used commonly)
kilojoules: like calories—measure of food energy
kindy: kindergarten (this is 3- and 4-year-olds)
kit, get your kit off: clothes, take off your clothes
Kiwi: New Zealander OR the bird. If the person, it’s capitalized. Not the fruit.
kiwifruit: the fruit. (Never called simply a “kiwi.”)
knackered: exhausted
knockout rounds: playoff rounds (quarterfinals, semifinals, final)
koru: ubiquitous spiral Maori symbol of new beginnings, hope
kumara: Maori sweet potato.
ladder: standings (rugby)
littlies: young kids
lock: rugby position (forward)
lollies: candy
lolly: candy or money
lounge: living room
mad as a meat axe: crazy
maintenance: child support
major: “a major.” A big deal, a big event
mana: prestige, earned respect, spiritual power
Maori: native people of NZ—though even they arrived relatively recently from elsewhere in Polynesia
marae: Maori meeting house