AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘I’ve never met anyone who’s had everything they ever wanted before.’
Jess nudged her shoulder against his arm. ‘Don’t be dense, Greg. There’s not much point in wanting things you’re never going to have.’
‘No. But sometimes you have to acknowledge them.’
‘Because?’
‘Because you can’t start to work on what you need, unless you acknowledge what’s missing.’
Maybe. She’d need to think about that. ‘I guess I miss knowing about him. Silly things, like whether my eyes are the same colour as his. Whether there’s anything in his medical history that I should be watching out for.’
He chuckled. ‘Always good to know. Have you any idea where he is now?’
‘In a manner of speaking. He was killed in a car accident fifteen years ago. Someone came to tell Mum.’ Jess remembered that day well enough. The stranger who’d knocked on their door, and who her mother had taken into the kitchen to talk with privately. The silence in the house, and then the sudden resumption of normal life, as if her mother had made a conscious decision to put all of that behind her and never speak of it again.
Greg’s pace slowed and he found her hand, tucking it under his arm. They fell into step together almost automatically. ‘Did anyone ever say they were sorry? For that loss?’
‘No. No one ever thought it was one.’ It was what Jess had told herself, too.
‘I’m sorry. For your loss.’
‘Thank you.’ She smiled up at him. He must have repeated that phrase any number of times in his career, but he always seemed to mean it. It came as a surprise to find how much it meant to her, too.
‘Can I ask you a question, Greg?’
‘Since when did you need permission for that?’
‘How did you feel when your mother remarried? I mean… did you mind?’
‘Mind? Well, Ted was practically living with us anyway. And we all went to Italy and had an enormous party, and I got to stay with my aunt, while they went off on honeymoon. I kissed a girl, broke my arm coming off my cousin’s motorbike and generally had a whale of a time. My mother was horrified when she got back.’
‘I bet she was. How old did you say you were?’
‘Fifteen.’
‘Hmm. M
y mother married when I was twenty.’
‘And?’
‘And her husband’s a really nice man. He gives her the life she’s always deserved and she’s happy with him.’
‘That’s nice. And?’
He waited. Laid his gloved hand over hers, tucking it more firmly into the crook of his arm.
‘I don’t know if I should even say it. It sounds so stupid… ’
‘Oh, go on.’ He chuckled. ‘You can’t leave me hanging now.’
Why not? He’d done the same to her. But if Jess gave a little, maybe he would. ‘It was just a bit confusing. All my life she’d been telling me that we could manage on our own, that I didn’t need a father and she didn’t need a husband. Then all of a sudden she upped and got married.’
He chuckled. ‘Must have been love.’
‘Yeah. Suppose it must have been.’ Jess wrinkled her nose.
‘Did you look that disapproving when she broke the news?’
