I threw the still half-full coffee cup into the first bin I passed in the corridor on the way back to Jen’s room. As soon as I pushed open the heavy frosted-glass door, the scent of the dying slammed into me the way it did every time I walked into this ward.
Her door was slightly ajar, how I’d left it. I walked in, treading as lightly on my feet as I could.
‘Tobes.’ Jen’s voice was croaky.
Shit, she was awake. I never wanted her to wake up to an empty room.
I strode to her bedside and picked up her icy hand. ‘Hey, how long have you been up? I just went to get a coffee.’
‘S’okay. Just woke up.’ Her breaths were shallow. ‘What were you thinking about?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You were miles away.’
‘Really? I wasn’t thinking about anything important. Just about how a girl in the café had a public meltdown about her ex.’
She took a shaky breath. ‘Was she pretty? I bet she was by that gaga look on your face.’
I shrugged. ‘Oh, you know, average looking.’
Jen snorted. ‘Bullshit. Describe her to me.’
‘Why would I do that?’ I laughed.
She gave me her all-knowing look. ‘I’m curious about who turned you on.’
‘You’re so full of it.’
‘Just describe her, would you?’ she insisted.
‘Okay, fine.’ I sighed. ‘She had this curly blonde hair. It was really long, like Rapunzel-long, and she was tallish, I think.’
‘What colour were her eyes?’
‘God, Jen, I don’t know!’
‘Don’t lie to a dying woman.’
‘What makes you think I’m lying?’
‘Because you’re doing that thing with your mouth. It’s bunched up to the left.’
I laughed. ‘Okay, they were kind of like . . . bluey-greeny, almost aqua.’
‘Nice,’ Jen murmured. ‘How old is she?’
‘How should I know? I didn’t make her fill in a questionnaire, you know.’
‘Like our age or younger?’
‘Younger.’
‘Illegal-to-screw young?’ She smiled.
‘No! Not that young. God, what’s wrong with you today?’
She winced as she tried to sit herself a little higher. This was the most alert I’d seen her in days and the most words she’d spoken in sequence for longer than that.
‘Did you get her number? If there’s an ex, she’s single.’
‘No, you lunatic, I didn’t get her number.’
‘Why not? She’s single, you’re single.’
My heart snapped as I took in her white lips and the transparent skin hanging loose over her sunken cheeks. I pressed a kiss on the back of her hand. ‘Jen, don’t.’
‘Don’t what?’
‘Don’t say I’m single.’
She looked away. ‘I wish you were.’
‘Hey,’ I leaned my head close to hers and whispered. ‘Stop that.’
She rested her head back on the pillow. ‘Love you, Tobes,’ she slurred.
She was asleep in seconds, the smile faded on her face.
‘Love you more,’ I whispered back to my somehow, even now after everything, still beautiful wife.
I sat back in the chair and watched her. She whistled softly through her nose. At least she was in less pain today. That was the one thing they managed to get right. The morphine was doing its job.
But the morphine, her saviour, was also her killer. The doctors had told us that there was no way she could take these doses and survive more than a fortnight. They’d said that six days ago. And since then they’d upped the levels twice.
But I couldn’t think about that so I reached for the remote control and flicked on the television to mute my thoughts. I had the volume on so low I strained my ears listening the sports update – a preview of the afternoon’s match. They were replaying footage of Nick Harding out on the ground last night, at the week’s final training session. Yes, he confirmed to the sports reporter, he was fit to play.
‘Yes!’ I whispered.
The news moved onto tennis and I yawned. I jolted upright when I heard Marcia say my name.
I stood up and gave my mother-in-law a weak hug. She clung onto me longer and tighter than I felt comfortable with.
‘I’m glad to have your company this afternoon, love,’ she said. ‘You can help me with my Sudoku.’
Excellent.
I squeezed my hand into my front jeans pocket and pulled out my keys. ‘I might go grab something for lunch up the street, Marcia. Give you some time alone with Jen. I’ll be back in an hour or so.’
‘Oh, yes, of course, go and enjoy yourself.’ Her narrowed eyes and the way she spat the words out left me in no doubt that Marcia most definitely did not want me to enjoy myself over lunch. Like there was any chance I could, anyway.
She sat in the same chair I’d just been snoozing on and took out her knitting. She’d aged another five years in the last week. It shocked me the way the grief had ravaged her. Her hands looked as if they belonged to an eighty-year-old, not a woman in her early fifties, and over the last year she’d stopped colouring her hair so it was mostly white now instead of brown.
I walked over to Jen’s bed and planted a kiss on her forehead. She stirred and opened her eyes, squinting at me.
‘Your mum’s here. I’m going to get something to eat and come back, okay?’ I stroked the damp hair off her face.
She smiled and nodded.
‘Hello, my princess,’ Marcia whispered, appearing at Jen’s bedside. ‘Less pain now is there, my darling?’
‘Mmm, so much better.’ Jen turned her head back to me. ‘Tobes?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Today’s Saturday, right?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Doesn’t the footy start today?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Why aren’t you going?’ she slurred.
‘Uh, because I’m here . . . with you.’
‘No, no,’ she protested. ‘It’s the first game. You have to go. I want you to.’
‘No, I don’t care about going to the footy. I’d much rather be here.’
She chuckled hoarsely. ‘Your mouth’s bunched up again. Please go.’
I gave her a long questioning look and she squeezed my hand.
‘Go!’ she nodded.
I imagined myself at Subiaco watching the Rangers rather than sitting there doing Sudoku with my mother-in-law while Jen slept.
‘Okay, if you’re sure, I’ll go.’ I turned to Marcia. ‘But I’ll have my phone on me. So if anything changes or Jen needs me, please call me, Marcia, and I’ll come straight back.’
Marcia’s face was pinched. She gave me a sharp nod, avoiding eye contact. My shoulders slumped under the weight of her judgement.
‘Can’t miss Harding’s comeback game.’ Jen smiled. ‘And Tobes?’
‘Yeah?’
‘I’m fanging for lemon pie. Bring me some after the game.’
Ever since I’d known her, Jen had always been ‘fanging’ for something or other.
She hit me weakly on my stomach with the back of her right hand, which didn’t have a drip attached to it. ‘I’m serious.’
‘Sweetie, I’ll bring you some lemon pie tomorrow,’ Marcia cooed.
But Jen shook her head. ‘I want it tonight. And I want him to make it.’
Luke walked into the room, looking unsure of himself. Poor kid, he was only nineteen. He shouldn’t be living this nightmare with his sister.
I nodded. ‘All right, I’ll bring back some pie for you tonight.’
‘Lemon,’ she coughed.
‘Lemon,’ I confirmed.
‘But don’t buy it. Bake it.’
‘What? Bake it?’ My voice came out in a squeak. ‘Jen, I don’t have a clue how to bake a pie.’ I looked to Marcia for help.
‘Now, Jenny, come on, darling, that’s a lot to ask of dear Toby,’ Marcia scolded.
Jen held out a shaky hand out for Luke to hold as he squatted beside her head. ‘Hey, Lukester. Bake me a lemon pie, Tobes,’ she scowled at me. ‘I mean it.’
Then she had a coughing fit that only ended when she spat a giant glob of blood-stained mucus into a tissue that Marcia held under her chin.
I left with a heavy heart, wondering if it was a big mistake to go to the football. I hoped I didn’t end up regretting it.
I’d almost reached the car when I got a call from John.
‘It’s gone twelve and I haven’t heard from you. Are you coming to the game or not, you big girl?’ He sounded congested. ‘Or can I give your ticket to Ren?’
‘Are you still pissed?’ I laughed. ‘You sound it.’
‘Mate, I feel like shit. I’m not drinking again, ever, I swear.’
‘Too bad,’ I said, ‘seeing as though I’m up for a pint at the footy. I’m on my way home now.’
‘Excellent!’ His voice lost its thickness. ‘First game of the season, maaate!’
I got home to find John lying down, resting on his forearms on the lounge room floor, with sections of the paper spread far and wide across the room. He slurped on his spoon as he shovelled in mouthfuls of Nutri-Grain. His wavy brown hair was in messy clumps, his stubble was well past the point of being trendy, the whole room reeked of Bourbon and a large portion of his arse crack was showing over the top of his Mr Happy boxers. My brother.
He looked up and grinned at me, scratching his head with the back of the spoon. I sat down next to him and we discussed the Rangers’ line-up and what we would do better if we were coaching instead of Craig Mears.
John sent Renee a text message to say she couldn’t have my ticket, and when she replied asking if he wanted to meet up for dinner after the game, he deleted her message.
‘Best way to get out of anything you don’t want to do, mate,’ he said with a wink. ‘Sooo sorry, babe, I never got that text message. That bloody mobile network must be playing up again.’ He hauled himself up off the floor and hit me between the shoulder blades with three hard slaps. ‘Listen and learn, mate. Learn from the master.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘Like I’d take relationship advice from you! Poor Renee.’
We got changed into our Rangers jerseys and John chanted the team song as I drove us to the station with hope in my heart that our team would show more dash in their first game of the season than the way they did towards the end of last year’s.
We had a stiff moment on the train when he asked about Jen and I tried to make it sound less awful than it was. Being the shallow bastard that my brother was, the awkwardness didn’t last long and he moved straight onto whether the Rangers would score a win for Big Bruce in his two hundred and fiftieth game.
Over the next two hours, I kept imagining that I saw Jen in the crowd. I hated the way my mind messed with me.
Since we were kids she and I had shared a love of footy. We spent countless days playing kick to kick at the park at the end of our street. And then, when we were in our last year of high school, after a Rangers’ night match that we watched at her house when her parents were away, we slept with each other for the first time. She even walked down the aisle to the Rangers’ team song.
Going to Rangers’ games had never felt the same since she stopped coming with me, which was a long time before the cancer got to her.
I felt the sun beat down on my face, listened to the roar of the crowd, and my eyes watered because it wasn’t fair that she’d never experience these things again.
The football was epic. Surrounded by thirty-one thousand others, we celebrated a convincing win against the Cats. Joel Coombs and Nick Harding both starred, and the captain, Big Bruce Everett, was carried off the oval at the end of the game on his teammates’ shoulders, while we joined the crowd in a standing ovation.
We hit the nearest pub straight after the victory, flaunting our scarves, but I had to leave after one drink to shop for the lemon pie ingredients.
‘Stuff that, mate!’ John screwed up his nose when I told him why I had to go. ‘Drive past Black Salt on the way to the hospital later. There’s at least a third of a lemon pie that Chef made fresh yesterday sitting in the cake fridge.’
‘Do you know how stupid you sound calling Wayne “Chef”? You run a coffee shop with six employees, not a bloody Michelin star restaurant.’
‘Hey.’ He pointed at me. ‘It’s the impression that counts. If I say “Chef”, it takes the whole establishment up a notch. It’s called creative marketing, mate. Give things a fancy name and they become instantly more desirable.’
‘Is that right, Gianni?’ I snorted.
‘That name’s scored me a shitload more girls than John ever did.’ He smirked. ‘And who would you want making your coffee? John Watts, born and bred in the Western suburbs of Perth, or Gianni Tavello from Roma?’
His attempt at an Italian accent made me cringe.
‘Like the saying goes, Tobes, if you can’t dazzle them with your brilliance, baffle them with your bullshit!’
‘All right, well, I’m going to leave the bullshit to you, mate, because I promised Jen a homemade pie, and that’s what I’m going to give her. I’m leaving now. You coming or not?’
He didn’t answer. He was focused on a blonde woman in a skin-tight white mini-dress. There wasn’t much of her left to the imagination.
‘Think I’ll stay on,’ John said dismissively, not taking his eyes off her. ‘I’ve seen something I might like to eat for dinner.’ He pulled out his phone and took a burst of photos of her from behind. ‘Topping up the wank bank for later.’ He winked at me.
‘Ugh, are you kidding me? You can’t do that. Delete them.’
‘What’s your problem, Constable Watts?’ John laughed. ‘It’s just a bit of fun.’
‘It’s not funny, it’s actually illegal, you fuckwit. Delete the photos, John.’
I watched as he deleted them and then I left. Why the hell Renee put up with him, I’d never understand.
I sat squished between two other blokes on the packed train home, googled ‘best lemon pie recipe’ and took a screen shot of the ingredients list. Eleven eggs. Eleven eggs?
As the train rattled along, I remembered how yesterday after work I’d sat and stared at Jen while she slept. Her knuckles, elbows and collarbones were poking up against her paper-thin skin. We’d laughed about it a few weeks ago, how she’d fought a lifelong battle with the scales – was the sort of girl to get excited if she ever caught a tummy bug and dropped a kilo or two – and now she’d ended up thinner than in her wildest dreams.
‘You were always beautiful. I don’t know why you were so worried about your weight. Your body was gorgeous, perfect,’ I’d told her that day but she’d looked away.
‘Don’t, Tobes. Don’t say nice things to me.’
‘Why not? It’s the truth.’
‘Because it just proves to me that I never deserved you. And it makes me feel like shit.’
‘I never wanted anyone else, so it’s not a matter of who deserved who.’ I insisted.
She blinked back tears. ‘Thank you for being here, after everything. Nobody else would still be here.’
I picked up her hand and kissed the back of it. ‘There’s nowhere else I’d be.’
The train screeched to a stop at my station. I couldn’t remember any of the journey. As soon as I stepped out of the carriage, I smoked two cigarettes in a row and considered a third.
I got in the car and drove straight to the shops to buy a pie tin, hoping it would be the right size. I found a shop assistant and asked him to help me hunt down ingredients I’d never used before. Armed with two bags of groceries and forty-six dollars poorer, I went home to bake for the first time in my life.
I didn’t get far. I gave myself thumb cramps trying to mix the flour and butter with my fingertips until it was supposed to resemble fine breadcrumbs. That alone took fifteen minutes. I smacked an icepack between my hands, cursing Jen and her stupid cravings while I read the next instruction.
Leaving a 3 cm overhang, blind bake pastry for ten minutes after it has been rested for at least half an hour in a disc. Then return to oven and bake without weights for a further ten minutes.
What the fuck?
I rang Mum. ‘What does blind baking mean?’ I read out loud the recipe I’d printed off, adding notes in the margins as she explained the bits I didn’t understand.
‘Why don’t I come over and help?’ Mum offered.
‘Thanks, Mum, but she really wants me to bake it myself so that’s what I want to do.’
‘Well, how about I come over and talk you through it but you do all the baking yourself?’
‘That would be perfect, thanks.’
She was at my door ten minutes later. She pulled up a bar stool and, holding the printed-off recipe sheet in one hand and a glass of wine in the other, she talked me through the pie. I found myself with an all-new respect for anyone who’d ever baked a pie and actually stepped back into a kitchen again to bake another one.
At eight o’clock, with a perfect lemon pie tucked up in an esky, I walked gallantly into Jen’s room. It was clear she’d gone downhill during the day. She made small whimpering noises and wriggled around on the bed. She gave her mother a long hug goodbye and Marcia walked out fast, keeping her head down.
I shook the chills off my spine and fixed a smile on my face. ‘I have one whole lemon pie for you here, Jennifer. Made from fucking scratch.’
‘No way!’ she whispered. ‘You made it?’
With flair, I pulled out the pie that Mum had placed on a copper platter to make it look fancy. I spread out a small chequered tablecloth over the trolley next to her bed (again thanks to Mum), sliced a small piece of pie, and fed it to Jen with a silver spoon. She had a tiny mouthful and chewed it slowly. I watched her. Then she started to cry.
And despite every promise I’d made myself never to do it in front of her, I cried too. I continued to feed her until there were only a few crumbs left on the plate, then I hopped up into bed next her, being careful not to hurt her or pull on any of the tubes. She rested her head in the crook of my arm and fell asleep quickly. I stayed awake and repeated every prayer I could remember from my childhood.