How To Save a Marriage in a Million (21 page)

He paused for a moment, taking in what she’d said. He’d lost an entire day.

‘At night? And it’s Monday?’

‘That’s right.’

She withdrew her hand and pulled a chair close to the bed but he still had the impression something was wrong. Had the operation not gone as well as he had been led to believe? Had he done something to upset her? He couldn’t imagine what. He’d been unconscious for most of the day. Perhaps something had happened that had nothing to do with him. The thoughts began to spin in his
head and he closed his eyes and took a couple of steadying breaths.

‘There’s something wrong, Jo. I can tell you’re upset. I know you must have been to hell and back over the last twenty-four hours but—’

‘There’s nothing wrong.’ She smiled with a return of the old warmth that he knew so well. ‘But, yes, it’s been a strain. I’m not the one with a metal spike in my leg, though, and a face that bears an uncanny resemblance to a half-inflated soccer ball.’

He laughed. And his awareness of the pain in his leg increased, but he felt a little better.

At that moment the nurse came in with his analgesia. She glanced at Joanna, who stood and dragged the chair a little away from the bed to give the nurse access to the arm with the drip.

‘Are you happy to stay while I set up the PCA?’

‘If it’s okay with you.’

‘No problem.’

Richard felt the effect of the bolus of medication almost immediately. The throbbing in his leg eased and a swooning light-headedness made the room spin. He closed his eyes and that was the last
thing he clearly remembered until he felt a gentle squeeze of his hand.

‘I’m going now.’

He saw Joanna through a fuddled haze.

‘So soon? You’ve only just arrived.’

‘You’ve been asleep for…’ she looked at her watch ‘…five hours. It’s past midnight and I have to work tomorrow. I have an early. I’ll come in and see you after work.’ She grinned. ‘And Mr Nichols made a brief appearance and said you’re doing great.’

‘Midnight? I’m sorry…Of course you must go…Come here.’

He kissed her hand, drew her close then kissed her lips.

He wanted to reaffirm that he loved her but she pulled away, patted his hand and left the room before he could even say goodbye.

His earlier worries came rolling back. Something was definitely wrong. His heart did an uncomfortable somersault and then fell with a heavy thud and came to rest in the pit of his stomach.

She’d stopped loving him. And he was somehow to blame.

* * *

Joanna couldn’t tell him. It was too soon after his operation and it wasn’t fair to add her life-changing news when he’d been through what she assumed was one of the biggest traumas of his life.

She decided she’d leave it at least a few days, until he was over the worst of his post-operative pain. She’d know when the time was right. Or at least that’s what she kept telling herself, over and over.

She’d know when the time was right.

* * *

It was the fourth post-operative day and, apart from a nagging pain in his left thigh when the physio cajoled him into his daily exercises, Richard was feeling nearly normal. He had started eating and actually enjoying the hospital food. One of the IV lines and his urinary catheter had been removed the previous day and the frequency of his morphine injections was decreasing and being replaced by tablets.

What had been his prime motivation to make as speedy a recovery as he could was Joanna. She’d visited every day and they’d managed to fill in an hour or two chatting about the goings-on in
Matilda Ward—how Alan Price had apparently welcomed a break in his retirement to return to work, Karen’s new boyfriend, the death of Barbara’s elderly father from a heart attack, and a dozen other snippets of inconsequential gossip.

Joanna seemed to have developed an uncanny knack for avoiding discussion of anything more personal than work, though.

So he was going to talk to her today. To explain that the dinner that had never happened was all part of a surprise that he hoped she’d be pleased with.

She was due any minute and he felt strangely nervous.

Half an hour later she arrived, looking absolutely gorgeous in a gauzy, floaty mini-dress that wasn’t sheer enough to be transparent but it certainly drew attention to Joanna’s feminine attributes.

‘You look fabulous,’ he said with a grin. ‘I love the dress.’

Her cheeks flushed. ‘It’s new. They had a fifty per cent off sale at Jenny Lee’s.’

‘It really suits you.’

‘Thanks.’

Small talk was all they’d managed over the last couple of days and Richard wondered if a serious talk would clear the air and at least restore their relationship to where it had been before the accident. Perhaps the drama of his injuries had swept them up in the
idea
that they loved each other but now she was having second thoughts.

Second thoughts? Was it possible?

He knew he still loved Joanna and he’d believed what she’d said on the night of the accident—that she loved him. But now he was beginning to have doubts of his own and was confused about whether the feeling was still reciprocated. Or perhaps she had told him in the heat of the moment.

Joanna rummaged in her bag and brought out a packet of photographs.

‘Lynne organised these. She said it might help you realise how much the staff and the kids all miss you.’ Her smile was one of genuine affection, most likely for her young charges whose smiles lit each snapshot.

‘They’re fabulous. Can you make sure you thank Lynne for me?’

‘Perhaps you can tell her yourself. She said she’d come and visit on the weekend.’

‘With her camera, no doubt.’

‘Of course.’

The conversation dried up and Joanna began fiddling with the photos. He took them from her, put them away in the drawer of his bedside cabinet and grasped both her hands in his.

‘We need to talk.’

‘Yes,’ she said in a quiet voice. Then she presented him with a heart-melting look and added, ‘About our future.’

‘That’s right.’

Richard was about to continue: to try and explain how much he wanted the marriage to work again; to tell her he couldn’t imagine spending the rest of his life with anyone else.

But she spoke first in a trembling voice so quiet he didn’t quite hear what she said. At first he thought she’d said, ‘I’m pregnant,’ but he knew that was impossible.

‘Pardon?’

She cleared her throat and reached for his hand.

‘I’m pregnant.’

There was no mistaking the words this time. He beamed, not quite believing that she was telling
the truth but thinking there was no reason for her to lie.

‘Pregnant?’

She nodded, a smile spreading across her face.

‘But—’

‘We didn’t believe it was possible, but we’ve been given another chance, Richard, another chance to bring a child into this world.’ She took a deep breath and the tears began to trickle down her cheeks. ‘And I’m scared to death.’

He spread his arms and reached out to her and she dissolved in his embrace.

‘We’re in this together, my darling Jo,’ he managed to say, before tears started streaming down his own face.

They were tears of happiness.

It appeared all his dreams were coming true.

CHAPTER TEN

T
HE
next month turned out to be an ordeal for both Richard and Joanna. Despite the pain and frustration of what seemed to be a never-ending struggle to get Richard back on his feet, an unfailing light shone bright to keep them both moving forward with hope and optimism.

That light was their love for each other, which was fuelled by the knowledge of the new life they had created. That love survived and sustained them through those awful early days of tests and surgery and not knowing.

Fortunately Richard’s only broken bone had been his femur, which had apparently taken the full impact of the motorbike and snapped in two. Its repair had involved surgery to insert an intramedullary nail to hold the broken ends in place over the many months it would take the fracture to heal. Joanna still cringed at the thought of a massive nail being hammered through the top of
the femur at the hip down the hollow part inside the main bone of the leg.

His other injuries had been relatively minor—concussion with no sign of long-term brain injury, a dislocated shoulder, a badly bruised ankle and various cuts, abrasions and bruises.

‘I’m beginning to hate the physio sessions,’ he said on the Monday of the third week when Joanna called to see him at the rehabilitation hospital. He’d been transferred from Perth General the previous week, keen to at least learn the basics of day-today living so he could be discharged. He sat on a chair next to his bed. It was the first day she had seen him dressed in day clothes, the clothes he had insisted she bring when he had been moved. He looked even more handsome than usual.

She leaned across and kissed him, at first a light touch of her lips on his but he captured her face in his warm, strong hands and kissed her long and thoroughly until she had to pull away to catch her breath.

She laughed.

‘You’re feeling better, then?’ she said.

‘When can you take me away from all this, my wonderful fairy godmother?’

‘You know they say doctors make the worst patients.
Have you forgotten already what it’s like, dealing with those stubborn souls who think they know best and don’t do what they’re told?’

He looked wistful for a moment.

‘No, of course I haven’t. That’s why I want to get out of here. As soon as I can manage getting around on my own for longer than the regulation half-hour in this place, I should be able to at least touch base with work.’

Joanna chose to ignore his comment. She realised it would be a while before Richard was strutting the boards of Matilda Ward again but she had no doubt he would.

‘You’ve had two days of rehab and you think you’re ready to go back to work?’

He grinned sheepishly.

‘No, not really.’

‘Good, you’re not as pig-headed as you pretend to be. And Alan Price is quite happy to interrupt his retirement. He actually said he’d become bored with golf.’

‘Not too happy, I hope,’ he said with a grin, and then added, ‘Patience is something I’ve had to learn quickly here to stop me going insane.’

‘Mmm.’

They sat in comfortable silence for a minute or two, holding hands. Richard had a single room on the second floor, overlooking an expanse of garden crisscrossed by several meandering, wheelchair-friendly paths. Joanna was impatient for the day they could walk together through the gardens and hoped it wouldn’t be too long.

Richard had been told by his surgeon that early intervention following surgery focused on immediate weight bearing and then progression to strengthening exercises. She’d been amazed at his progress and suspected in those early post-op days he’d made a heroic effort to work though his pain without complaint.

* * *

Richard and Joanna decided to reaffirm their vows in the second week of spring to allow Richard’s bones to heal and to give them plenty of time to make sure the day was as wonderful as it could possibly be. Joanna would be nearly six months pregnant by then. They decided on a small morning ceremony in one of their favourite places followed by a lunch for a group of close family and friends in the recently renovated and landscaped garden of their spacious new home. On a
Saturday in mid-September it dawned an ideal day for a wonderful wedding and by mid-morning the small group of guests had assembled.

Joanna held a bouquet of yellow, perfectly formed, sweet-smelling rosebuds, which complemented the delicately feminine, cream silk dress that was softly gathered below the bust to accommodate her now very obvious pregnancy. Richard looked elegant and sexy and gorgeous all at the same time in a tailored black suit, the palest lemon-yellow shirt and a silver-grey tie.

The second-time bride hesitated as she reached up to tame a feral lock escaped from her dark glossy cap, still a long way from reaching her pale, bare shoulders. His smile reached out to her like the first sunlit rays of a delicate spring dawn and her husband made her feel so special in an amazing way she’d always dreamed he would…again.

They stood at the makeshift altar in the secret courtyard garden of Lady Lawler Children’s Hospital amongst a crowd of beaming children. Some were on crutches; others were in wheel-chairs hooked up to IVs and portable oxygen cylinders; many were bald and had the round faces of chemotherapy—but every single child was brimming
over with happiness for the couple about to endorse their love and commitment.

Richard and Joanna recited their vows of love and caring to an audience hushed with anticipation, and then the clear, sweet voice of a boy soprano rang out in the crisp air of a perfect spring day. Danny Sims sang ‘The Rose’.

Then a tiny girl in a long white dress toddled forward and presented the bride with a small posy of sweet-smelling freesias to add to her bouquet.

‘From all us kids,’ she said grandly.

Joanna bent forward and kissed the child’s cheek.

‘Thank you, Taylor,’ Joanna whispered a moment before the little girl ran back to the protective arms of her smiling mother.

Richard squeezed his wife’s hand.

‘And I’d like to thank everyone here today for sharing our happiness. Though I’m afraid we can’t put it off any longer: what you’ve all been waiting for; what started this whole thing with Joanna and I.’

The guests chuckled and then began to clap as Jessie and Cassie brought out a chair, Karen following close behind carrying a small case and
what looked like a Spiderman cape slung across her arm.

Lynne and Barbara came next with sombre expressions on their faces.

With the theatrics of a circus ringmaster, Lynne led Richard to the chair. He sat down and Karen draped him in the cape while the noise of the clapping gradually increased to a crescendo.

Barbara raised her hands.

‘Quiet, everyone.’

She beckoned Joanna to come across and handed her a set of battery-operated shears.