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“Polly, love.” His voice was chirpy on the other end. “Me and Mim are up in town, we wondered if we could catch up for a bite?”
“Oh, yes.” Party hard was clearly out. And strangely, she felt relieved. “Sure.”
Later that evening, Polly sat with Mim and Ted in a small Italian restaurant she frequented when Dad came to the city. Ted was a man of habit: home-cooked or his one favourite Italian restaurant. That was it.
They’d just finished their first course and Ted had filled their water glasses and paused.
Why did she think there was an agenda here?
Ted plonked the water jug down and rubbed his hands together. “Mim and I are in town to see someone. We’ve finally decided to get some counselling. Put things properly right between us.”
Polly hid her look of surprise. “Oh, that’s great, Dad. How come now?”
Mim fidgeted, took hold of Ted’s hand. “After the party, your dad decided he wanted to bring more intimacy, more closeness into our relationship. I’d stopped nagging a while back, sometimes you need to let people come to it in their own time. Seems like it worked.” She smiled lovingly at Ted and a pang of envy hit Polly. How wonderful it would be to find this level of closeness after so many years. To keep on trying to make things better.
Ted looked a bit coy. “Yeah, I asked Solo if he could find me some names—”
Polly’s eyes widened. “Solo!”
“Yeah, when we had that talk in the barn. Man to man. He said he’d ask around.”
The unfairness stabbed her in the chest. All her years of trying, and in one meeting, Dad had confided in and opened up to Solo. Just like the PTSD group. How come everyone trusted Solo? He wasn’t trustworthy, he was a heart-thief, or at least would be, if she’d let him.
“You could have asked me, Dad. For some names, I mean.” Damn it, she sounded huffy.
Dad shrugged. “Thing is, me and Solo—I guess we hit it off. He got it, the PTSD stuff, the problems”—he snapped his finger—“just like that, he really got it. Besides, love, you’re too close to all this stuff.”
Polly sipped some water. “Sure.”
Dad’s face took on an eager look. “So, anyway, what’s going on with you two?”
Her glass clunked hard onto the table. “Nothing. Why?”
“Aren’t you a couple yet?”
“No, Dad, no. We most definitely are not.”
“Oh.” Dad sounded crestfallen
Mim gave a little tut. “Well, you should be. We noticed the vibes between you both. Everyone reckons he adores you.” Polly glanced over. Mim had her smug, Mim-knows-best look on her face. “He’s a keeper, that one.”
“He’s not a keeper.” Under the table she dug her nails into her thighs. “He’s heading back to Sydney.”
“That’s a real shame,” Mim said, and made another clucking sound with her tongue. “Honey, you’ll miss the boat if you go on like this.”
Polly’s eyes smarted. She muttered, “Thanks, Mim, but I’m not interested in getting on that particular boat.”
Really, this whole conversation was pointless. because the boat had sunk. And if she had to choose a name for it, it would be theTitanic.
Polly gulped in great mouthfuls of air. “I think I’ll skip the next course. I’m not very hungry for some reason.”
Dad and Mim gave each other a knowing look. A look that said, what a shame.
Shame on them, Polly thought. Shame on them for bringing it up.
* * *
That night was even worsethan the previous ones as she tossed and turned and played through Dad and Mim’s pitying looks. Sleep evaded her. She wound herself into knots in the sheets, and when she did finally fall into a doze, she dreamed of nose kisses and dynamic hot sex and silver eyes bathing her in love.
