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He thumped down on the bed next to her. She closed her eyes. She could smell him. The familiar scents she associated with Duc. The laundry detergent he used for his clothes. How many times had she cuddled him, or lain with her head against his shoulder breathing that in?
He swung his legs up on to the bed so he was sitting parallel with her. She could almost hear his brain spinning, trying to find words. She knew him. Sometimes she thought she knew him better than he knew himself.
She took a deep breath. ‘You’ve done well, Duc. This place is great. You’ve sorted things out. You can go back now. You can go back and be the surgeon you’ve always wanted to be.’
There was a long pause. ‘You think that’s what I want to do?’
‘I know that’s what you want to do. You should live the life you want.’ Her voice started to shake a little. ‘You should be happy.’
‘What if I told you that’s not what makes me happy?’
She jerked, and automatically turned to face him, cursing herself for letting down her guard.
His brown eyes were fixed straight on her. Sincere.
‘Viv, what if I told you that it might have taken me a number of years to figure out, but the thing that makes me happy is you.’
She felt herself start to shake. She shook her head. ‘No. No, it’s not, Duc.’
His voice w
as steady. He reached over and intertwined his pinkie with hers. She wanted to pull her hand away, but the warmth from his skin seemed to hold her there.
‘Viv, I’m sorry. I never really tried to walk in your shoes. I never really understood what your life must be like. You always seemed so independent, so self-sufficient, as if it was what you wanted, what you needed. I just didn’t think any further than that. I didn’t look deep enough when I should have.’
She didn’t know quite where this conversation was going. ‘What do you mean?’
He ran his other hand through his hair. ‘I thought we told each other everything. I thought we were best friends. But when I look back, I’ve not been the friend that I should have.’ This time it was his gaze that dropped to their intertwined pinkies. ‘I let you down. I should have realised—I should have understood.’
She could feel herself starting to panic—she couldn’t quite follow where he was going with this. ‘What do you mean?’
‘All those bad boyfriends. All the no-hopers and ratbags. The one guy you went out with who was actually nice—Archie? Remember him?’
She felt herself shudder. She still couldn’t understand what this conversation was about. Archie. Yes, of course she remembered him. The electrician from Bristol. A lovely guy, good-natured, hard-working and hopelessly devoted with a good sense of humour. She’d dumped him after a few months. Archie had been nice. Archie had been safe. Archie would have looked after her. There wasn’t a single bad thing she could say about him.
She nodded without speaking.
‘You ran, Viv. You ran so fast you practically sprinted. Because Archie could have offered you an attachment. Love.’ He bit his bottom lip. ‘A home. But you couldn’t do it. You couldn’t cope. And everyone you picked after that? They could offer none of those things. I didn’t see it at the time. I didn’t understand. But you deliberately went for guys like that because they would never make you form an attachment. You didn’t need to invest your heart in them. It was like you predetermined every relationship. And I think you did it without even realising why.’
Her skin prickled as he spoke. There was something so achingly familiar about some of the things he was saying. She actually felt nauseous. She wanted to be indignant. She wanted to automatically shout and deny every part of this. But too much of it was making her feel uncomfortable. Too much of it sounded so close to the truth that it made her stomach hurt.
And it seemed that Duc didn’t know when to stop. ‘You run, Viv. You run because it’s easier than stopping to find out if love and home are actually worth the heartache.’
Now she snapped and snatched her hand away from his. ‘Not all of us had the life you did, Duc. Not all of us had Khiem and Hoa.’ It was cruel to bring them up when only a few months before they’d been snatched away from their son, but it seemed like now it was time for no holds barred.
‘But when do you stop running, Viv? When do you stop and catch your breath? When do you take the time to look around and decide if someone and somewhere might actually be worth the risk?’
She could almost hear his heart in those words. There was a pleading tone to his voice.
‘I could have lost you. I invited you here. You contracted a disease that’s endemic to my country. I invited you to a place that could have killed you. I’ve spent the last few days scared to breathe, Viv. Scared that every breath might be the last one with you by my side. I had no idea. No idea what I had. And every idea about what I might lose.’
Her heart gave a little flip. Where was this going? She wanted to speak. She wanted to say something. But all the words were just gummed up in her mouth.
‘You taught me about here. You let me learn to love being a doctor again. Not a surgeon, a doctor. You made me realise just what I’ve got here. Not just a building, but the people too. I can’t imagine leaving. I can’t imagine ever working anywhere else.’ He took a deep breath. ‘But I will. If you want me to.’
She frowned. ‘What?’
He took a few moments. ‘I want you to be happy, Viv. And if staying here isn’t something you can contemplate, then tell me where you want to go, and I’ll come too.’
She shook her head. ‘What are you talking about?’
He pointed to his chest. ‘Me.’ Then pointed at hers. ‘You. We have to give this a chance. We have to give us a chance. We have to see if this, us, is meant to be.’ He reached over and gently touched her cheek. ‘Let me show you what home can be.’
Maybe it was the way he said the words. Or maybe it was some of the stuff he’d said before, but every hackle went up at the back of her neck.
Her stomach plummeted. This was so not what she wanted to hear. He felt sorry for her. It was like he was still in doctor mode. ‘You can’t fix me, Duc.’ She shook her head and tried to stop the tears forming in her eyes. ‘Even if all the stuff you think about me is true, I’m scared to form relationships, I’m scared to take a chance on a home. I’m not your charity project. You don’t get to feel sorry for me. And what you never get to do is...’ she lifted her fingers in the air ‘...fix me.’
The very thought repulsed her. This wasn’t what she wanted. In every tiny splintered dream she’d imagined what they could become to each other, and this wasn’t it.
Duc gave a bewildered smile and shook his head. ‘I don’t want to fix you, Viv. That’s not why I’m here. You don’t need fixing. You’re perfect just the way you are.’
‘So what are you trying to say?’
He fixed his deep brown eyes on hers. ‘What I’m asking for is permission to love you.’
She froze. Was that really just what he’d said?
‘But...but you pulled away. You didn’t want us to go down that path. You pulled away as if it was the worst thing you’d ever thought of. As if kissing me was the worst thing you’d ever done. Then you made an excuse about us just staying friends.’
He let out a wry laugh. ‘Really? You thought I didn’t like kissing you?’ He looked incredulous. ‘Viv, when you’re wrong, you’re so wrong it’s scary.’
She scowled as he used one of her own expressions, mimicking her Scottish accent.
‘Viv, I’ve thought about kissing you from practically the moment you stepped off that plane in those denim shorts and that tied-up shirt. From the second you wrapped your arms around me at the airport something changed. At least, for me it did. Every casual hug or brush of your hand just seems to set me crazy—in a good way. I spend my life sniffing for that orange-blossom scent from your shampoo, wondering where you are. You sent my blood pressure skyrocketing in your “interview” outfit. As for that red dress?’ He shook his head again, his smile reaching his twinkling eyes.
‘I have no idea why we didn’t go down this road before. Maybe we just both weren’t ready. Maybe we weren’t at that point in our lives. Maybe we needed to both find our feet a little. But now? Now, Viv? I’m ready if you are. Just say the word. Because I want to love you, Viv. I do. I want us to try and be together. More than anything in this world. More than this place. More than the other hospitals. I want to try with me and you. So, just say the word. Say that you’ll give us a chance. It can be anywhere in the world. I’ll follow you anywhere you want to go, Viv. Just tell me that you think we’re worth a chance.’
She was stunned. This conversation had started in a very different way. She wasn’t quite sure how after all this time Duc had just managed to say a million things at once.
‘You have no idea—’ his voice was lower, more gravelly ‘—what it felt like to see you collapse. To see you lying in that hospital bed. I lost my mum and dad this year, Viv. The thought of losing you too? I couldn’t handle that. I can’t handle losing the person I need most. I’m not crazy. I know I’m not crazy. But things have changed between us. We both know that. So let’s take this, let’s grab it with both hands and see where it takes us. We’ve got to be worth a try, sur
ely, Viv.’ He lowered his voice even more. ‘I know I want to, with all my heart.’
A single tear slid down her cheek. She looked over at him. Now she saw it. Now she saw the fact he hadn’t slept properly in days. The lines around his eyes.
She took a deep breath. ‘It’s not your fault I got sick. That’s life. I was taking precautions, but I did go out to the accident in short sleeves. I didn’t think about it—and I didn’t notice any mosquito bite. That’s my fault, not yours. But—’ she locked gazes with him ‘—you haven’t really told me how you feel about me, Duc. You say you want to try—but why do you want to try?’
He looked confused for a moment.
She held out her hands. ‘This place is... different too. For me, that is. Maybe it is an age and stage thing, but I finally feel as if I’ve found a place I can fit in. I can be me. I like the people. I like the patients. The only thing that stops me wanting to stay here is you.’
He looked shocked. ‘Why?’
She shook her head. ‘You can’t stay because it seems like a good idea. You can’t stay because you think I want to. You dreamed of being a surgeon. Is that dream still there? Because if it is, in a few months you’ll start to be miserable and unhappy. You won’t want to be here, and it will affect everyone around you.’
He shook his head. He looked out the window across to the hospital. ‘I’d never taken the time I’ve had here to look at things. You know what surgical teams are like? It’s a back-stabbing competitive world. I thought that was how I wanted to live my life. But after a while I realised just how much more of a doctor I can be here. I’m still adjusting. But there’s so much work to be done that I don’t want to stand still. I want to keep this place moving and make sure we’re doing all we can. This is a job of a lifetime, Viv—at least, for me. I know you’ve moved about. I know you might still want to. You asked me how I really feel about you? I love you. I think I might always have loved you. If this place doesn’t make you happy...’ he put his hand to his chest ‘...and I don’t make you happy, then I want you to know that I will always love you, I will always be here, I will always be your best friend. And...’ he slowed down ‘...you will always have a home here, with me.’
