‘She said we’d know more after the next scan but that the size and heart rate could mean the pregnancy isn’t viable.’
‘And you’re sure the timing’s right? There’s absolutely no chance it could be Mo’s baby?’
‘It would be a miracle if it was,’ said Netta as Fitzroy Street came into view up ahead. ‘I’d already missed a period by the time we slept together and we used a condom every time.’
‘So, unlikely then,’ said Freya. ‘And I’m tipping you haven’t heard from him?’
‘I’ve heard more from my pot plants. It’s almost like it never happened.’
‘Except it did.’
‘Yeah, of course it did. Because that’s what I do, isn’t it? It would be weird if Ididn’tget involved with an emotionally dented man it was never going to work out with.’ Netta stumbled on the uneven footpath. ‘And to make it worse,’ she said, recovering her balance, ‘I’m still thinking about himallthe time. It feels like I might be in love with him.’ Netta released the statement like a bird whooshing from an opened cage. ‘Which is totally ludicrous, I know.’
‘It’s not ludicrous.’ Freya’s voice was gentle. ‘Falling in love isn’t meant to be a rational decision. It’s not meant to be a decision at all. You can decide whether you follow the feeling, but you can’t control when it turns up.’
Netta paused as she neared the corner of Fitzroy Street. A tram screeched past and a flock of teenagers swooped around the corner. ‘It’s never felt like this with anyone before. Not even Pete,’ she said. ‘With Pete, it was more like consciously making a good choice and then growing into it. I’d done all that therapy about how what happened with Mitch had affected my sense of self-worth and choices in men. Pete was like my graduation—proof that I’d gotten better. He was asensible choice. But with Mo it was different.’ The crossing light bleated and Netta walked onto the road, eager to be enveloped by the quieter western side of St Kilda. ‘It felt like I’d known him forever but that everything was brand new, too.’
‘Sounds like love to me.’
‘Whatever it was, it’s dead in the water now.’ Netta blinked against the threatening tears as she rounded the corner into her street. ‘My heart hurts, Freya—likephysically.And now with the baby stuff too, it honestly feels like it’s about to cave in.’
‘You don’t know there’s anything wrong with the baby yet,’ Freya reminded her. ‘It could be fine. And have you thought about calling Mo?’
‘Pretty much every second since I last saw him,’ Netta admitted. ‘But I’m not being that person again. I’m not going to lay myself out for another man who’ll just end up messing me around. Who’salreadymessed me around. He’s shown me who he is, and for once in my life, I’m paying attention.’
‘And who is he?’
‘He’s a great guy who hasn’t dealt with his trauma,’ said Netta. ‘And that spells trouble, Frey. Guys like that—peoplelike that— won’t let you love them. They can’t. They don’t think they deserve it, so they think if you love them, then there’s something wrong withyou.Then they treat you accordingly. I’ve been through this before.’
‘What if he got help?’
‘He won’t. He’s had thirty years to get a therapist.’
‘Maybe he just hasn’t had enough of a reason to. Maybe he’s been able to hide from it because, until you, nobody’s scratched the surface.’
‘Nope.’ Netta picked up her pace, almost home. ‘I’m not going there. He’s a minefield. And anyway, whether I’m in love with him or not, whether he gets help or not, it would never work. I don’t want to live in his world, with all the attention and drama. I just want a quiet, normal life and for this baby to make it. That has to be my focus for now.’
The conversation ended abruptly when Freya announced she had a bum to wipe and Netta walked the last two blocks with nothing but her circling worries for company.
She climbed the stairs to her apartment and clicked the door shut behind her. The remnants of the scented candle she’d been burning in the morning lingered in the air and a puddle of sunshine warmed the end of the couch. She sank gratefully into its softness and closed her eyes, waiting for her thoughts to settle into manageable piles. The baby. Mo. The inconvenient reality of having left a chunk of her heart with him, even though he didn’t want it. The embarrassing ember of hope that, despite her better judgement, she still held that maybe he’d come back to her.
It was too much. She groaned and tipped her head back, resting her hand maternally over her lower belly, willing her baby to be healthy. Strong. ‘Why me?’ she asked the universe out loud. ‘Why can’t it ever just beeasy?’
Like pressing on a bruise just to see how much it would hurt, she took her phone from her back pocket and typed Mo’s name into Google. His face filled the screen and Netta tapped on the first article on the list, posted a week ago.
MORRISONMAPLESTONEANDLORENALONGGETITONASMOANDMUSICSPLIT.
Netta’s heart shrivelled to the size of a pistachio. The photos showed Mo walking out of a club in Soho with Lorena on his arm. She looked incredible, of course. He looked like exactly the same man Netta had folded herself into in front of an open fire on Christmas Eve. Lorena was smiling, waving coyly at the camera, her face framed by a cascade of blow-dried hair. Mo’s face was turned away in every photo, his stride purposeful. He was taking a hiatus from music, the article said. Netta wondered if that was true or just spin from Rhona. She scrolled through the article, every photo of Mo with Lorena another needle in her heart and another nail in the coffin. He’d moved on, and the twisting pain that realisation caused made Netta realise just how much she hadn’t.
Chapter Fifty-One
NETTA
It started as a rust-coloured smear in her knickers the next morning. By lunchtime, Netta knew she was losing the baby. She keened as she sat on the toilet, blood draining from her as though it was seeping from every part of her body, smearing her thighs in a veil of scarlet. A cramp burned violently through her, pushing out more blood, clotted into clumps that dropped into the toilet like stones in a lake. Tears buffeted her useless, traitorous body as it rejected the one pure, beautiful thing she had left. She stuffed her knickers with a huge wodge of toilet paper and stood, staring at the crimson mess waiting to be flushed away. She closed the lid and floated on shock to the lounge room.
I’m losing the baby. She tapped the message robotically and sent it to Freya, before turning the phone off and throwing it with force, deep between the cushions crowding the couch. She doubled over as another cramp gripped like a vice around her abdomen—and herheart—and heard herself howl like an animal, roaring her grief as she slid to the floor and sat, curled up, squeezing her knees into her body against the pain. Her curled spine pressed against the wall and the roar dissolved into tears—an uncontrollable release of expectations and love and hope.
She crawled to the couch, its cushions holding her like jagged rocks, and stayed there for an hour, barely aware of anything until the sound of thumping on her door jolted her from her daze.
