The Gift of a Child. Sue MacKay

he was near. Then there were those mesmerising blue eyes that had reminded her of summer, even on the bleakest of days. Until the end of their relationship, that was. That had been a grey day.

      ‘It will be winter glittering out at me today, though. Mitch is so going to hate me.’

      Being dunked in an ice bucket couldn’t have chilled her as much. Her skin lifted, her spine shuddered, and her fingers clenched.

      ‘Remember how quickly he replaced you. Two weeks? Or was it three?’

      That did not alleviate the chill gripping her body. At the end of the day there was no denying she’d done a bad thing. The fact they’d broken up wasn’t an excuse. But everything else that had happened might have been. Would Mitch understand her actions back then? Forgive her?

      She already knew the answer, and yet still pleaded, ‘Please, please, Mitchell, remember one of the good moments we shared and go easy on me. I know I did wrong, but I need you onside now.’

      Five hours later the digital clock in the rental car clicked over to eight-thirty.

      Jodi grunted. ‘He’s not coming home any time soon.’ She’d returned to his house to find it in darkness, the curtains not drawn. As far as she could make out, Mitchell hadn’t been back in the time since her previous visit.

      Still obsessed with putting in the hours at hospital. That man was driven. He never wanted to come second in anything. To anybody. Especially not to his twin brother. Their one-upmanship battles had been legendary at Otago Med School. Probably still were here at Auckland General.

      She shivered. The temperature had dropped when the sun had gone down. And her memories of long, lonely nights waiting until Mitch had deigned to come home and see her sprang out of the dark place she’d forced them into a long time ago. Not so surprising when she sat outside his house, in his city, the closest she’d been to him in three years.

      ‘Back to the motel, and Jamie.’ Her darling boy would be tucked up in bed, hopefully sleeping easily. Earlier she’d kissed him goodnight after a meal of chicken bites and chips, a treat that remarkably Mum had forked out for. Breathing in his little-boy smell, stroking his head, tickling his tummy, a huge lump had blocked her throat. Rapid blinking had kept the tears at bay. Just. Even now they hovered, ready to spill down her cheeks in a moment’s weakness. Toughen up. There’s no room for weakness.

      What if Mitchell didn’t agree to her request? There was no ‘what if’. He had to agree. He might be a self-focused man but he also knew the right thing to do. So Jamie should be safe.

      She couldn’t, wouldn’t, imagine life without Jamie in it. He was so sweet, wickedly cute, and totally uncomplaining even when the pain struck. He didn’t know what it was like to be full of energy, to be able to run around the lawn shouting at the world, or to ride a bike, or to go a whole day without having to take at least two naps. And yet he still had an impish grin that twisted her heart and made her hug him tight, trying to ward off the inevitable.

      A tired smile lifted one corner of her mouth. Even now her mother would be hooked into the internet, reading the stocks and shares figures from the other side of the world, impervious to anything else. Another workaholic who hadn’t learned to stop or even just slow down and, as the saying had it, smell the roses.

      She took a right turn to head back to the grotty, dank motel room. Back to another night tossing and turning as she argued and pleaded with Mitch inside her head, as she argued with herself. Back to check up on her darling little boy, her horrendously ill little boy, who’d been dealt a black card in the stakes of life.

      A car zoomed past in the opposite direction, headlights on full, and temporarily blinded her. Her foot lifted off the accelerator as she twisted the steering wheel sideways. ‘Idiot,’ she yelled at the unseen driver whizzing past, narrowly missing her rental vehicle.

      ‘Delinquent. Look where you’re going.’ She vented some of her pent-up anger and fear. ‘You could’ve killed me.’

      Then who would talk to Mitchell about Jamie? Maybe leaving this until tomorrow wasn’t such a great idea. Who knew what might happen in the intervening hours? She hadn’t tried to find him anywhere else but at home. Which was fairly silly. The Mitch she’d known would always be at the hospital. Which meant he’d be very busy. Saturday night in ED was never a picnic. She had to wait until the morning.

      ‘No.’ Her fist crunched down on her thigh. ‘No. I’m done with waiting. Done with planning the arguments for and against my case. Done, done, done.’ Her palm slapped the steering wheel. She had to see Mitch. Now. The time had come. No more avoidance. No more lying to herself, saying she’d done the right thing. Because being right or wrong wasn’t going to change a thing. It wasn’t going to alter the fact she should’ve told Mitch about Jamie a long time ago.

      The hurt she’d known of waiting up for Dad to come home and read her a story, or to say she was his princess, had been behind her decision in not telling Mitch about Jamie. Yes, Mitch, love him or not, would act the same as her father had. He’d never be there for his child because there’d always be one more patient to help, one more urgent case to deal wtih before hanging up his white coat and heading home.

      If Mitch kicked her butt hard and fast when she told him why she was here, and why she hadn’t come knocking three years ago, so be it. If he sent her packing, refusing to believe her—which was her expectation—she’d deal with that too. She’d argue till she was all out of breath. If he refused categorically to meet Jamie, to help him … then she’d tie him up and pour boiling oil over his beautiful body.

      Doing a U-turn, she headed into the city centre and Auckland General, the hospital with New Zealand’s best renal specialists and the most modern equipment available for what ailed Jamie. The hospital where Mitch was head of the emergency department. Where he looked out for patients, including other people’s little boys and girls. Would he look out for her boy? Of course he would. He wasn’t an ogre.

      Over the coming days she would ask him to consider doing something he’d never, ever have contemplated. Who would, unless faced with it?

      She was also about to grovel before the man she’d once loved, the man she’d never shown a moment of weakness to in the months they’d lived together.

      She was about to give away her soul.

      It was far too easy to find a parking space outside the ED. But despite the pounding in her chest Jodi didn’t linger anymore. The time had come. Having once worked briefly in the ED, she knew the ropes and within moments she was inside the emergency department asking for Dr Maitland.

      ‘I think he took a break.’ A young nurse answered her enquiries. ‘Though he was talking about going to a party tonight so you might be out of luck.’

      She’d been out of luck for years. Just not tonight, please. ‘Where’s the staff kitchen?’ she asked the next person. ‘I’m looking for Mitch Maitland.’

      ‘Mitch headed towards his office,’ a harried junior doctor told her as he raced past.

      ‘Which is where?’ Jodi asked the disappearing back of the doctor.

      ‘Down the corridor, turn right, left, left, and then try the third door on your right,’ another nurse told her.

      Okey-dokey. Showtime. Jodi’s footsteps slowed as she took the last left. They stopped entirely outside the third door on the right. Her knuckles rapped on the door. No reply. Her hand shook as her fingers gripped the doorknob. Shoving the door wide, she stepped into hell.

      ‘Hello, Mitchell. Long time no see.’

      The reply was a snore.

      She felt like a balloon that’d just been pricked. ‘Oh, great. Wonderful to see you, too.’ All her over-tightened muscles cramped further. Her tongue licked her dry lips. And once again her legs threatened to drop her in a heap on the floor.

      Another snore.

      Jodi closed the door quietly, leaned back against it, desperate