Midwives On-Call

‘Thank you for that,’ Isla said when he handed her her drink. She was a little taken aback when he came and sat on the low sofa beside her, and she took a sip.

Oh!

With all the functions that Isla attended she knew her wines and this was French champagne at its best! ‘When I said champagne …’ Isla winced because here in Melbourne champagne usually meant sparkling wine. ‘You must think me terribly rude.’

‘Far from it,’ Alessi said. ‘It’s nice to see someone celebrating.’

Isla nodded. ‘I’ve just been at the most amazing birth,’ she admitted, and then, to her complete surprise, she was off—telling Alessi all about Cathy and Dan’s long journey and just how wonderful the birth had been. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said when she realised that they had been talking about it for a good ten minutes. ‘I’m going on a bit.’

‘I don’t blame you,’ Alessi said. ‘I think there is no greater reward than seeing a family make it against the odds. It is those moments that we treasure and hold onto, to get us through the dark times in our jobs.’

Isla nodded, glad that he seemed to understand just how priceless this evening’s birth had been.

They chatted incredibly easily, having to tear themselves away from their conversation to say goodbye to colleagues who were starting to drift off.

‘I can’t believe that we went to the same school!’ Isla said when Alessi brought it to her attention. ‘How old are you?’

‘Thirty.’

‘So you would have been two years above me …’ Isla tried to place him but couldn’t—they would, given their age difference, for the most part, have been on separate campuses. ‘You might know my older sister Isabel,’ Isla said. ‘She would have been a couple of years ahead of you.’

‘I vaguely remember her. She was head girl when I went to the senior campus. Though I didn’t really get involved in the social side—I was there on scholarship so if I wanted to stay there I really had to concentrate on making the grades. Were you head girl, too?’

Isla nodded and laughed, but Alessi didn’t.

Alessi was actually having a small private battle with himself as he recalled his private-school days. Alessi and his sister Allegra had been there, as he had just told Isla, on scholarship. Both had endured the taunts of the elite—the glossy, beautiful rich kids who’d felt that he and his sister hadn’t belonged at their school. Alessi had for the most part ignored the gibes but when it had got too much for Allegra he would step in. They had both worked in the family café and put up with the smirks from their peers when they’d come in for a coffee on their way to school and found the twins serving. Now Allegra was the one who smirked when her old school friends came into Geo’s, an exclusive Greek restaurant in Melbourne, and they realised how well the Manos family had done.

Still, just because they had been on the end of snobby bitchiness it didn’t mean that Isla had been like that, Alessi told himself.

They got on really well.

Isla even texted him an image she had on her phone of a school reunion she had gone to a couple of years ago.

‘I remember him!’ Alessi said, and gave a dry laugh. ‘And he would remember me!’

‘Meaning?’

‘We had a scuffle. He stole my sister’s blazer and she was too worried to tell my parents that she’d lost another one.’

‘Did you get it back?’

‘Oh, yes.’ Alessi grinned and then his smile faded as Isla pointed to a woman in the photo who he hadn’t seen in a very long time.

‘Do you remember Talia?’ Isla asked. ‘She’s a doctor now, though she’s moved to Singapore. She actually came all the way back just for the reunion.’

Alessi didn’t really comment but, yes, he knew Talia. Her name was still brought up by his parents at times—how wrong he had been to shame her by ending things a couple of days before their engagement. How he could be married now and settled down instead of the casual dates that incensed his family so.

Not a soul, apart from Talia, knew the real reason why they had broken up.

It was strange that there on Isla’s phone could be such a big part of his past and Isla now dragged him back to it.

‘She’s got four children,’ Isla said. ‘Four!’

Make that five, Alessi wanted to add, his heart black with recall. He could still vividly remember dropping by to check in on Talia—he’d been concerned that she hadn’t been in lectures and that concern had tipped to panic as he’d seen her pale features and her discomfort. Alessi had thought his soon-to-be fiancé might be losing their baby and had insisted that Talia go to hospital. He had just been about to bring the car around when she had told him there was no longer a baby. Since the morning’s theatre list at a local clinic he had, without input, no longer been a father-to-be.

Of course, he chose not to say anything to Isla and swiftly moved on, asking about Isla’s Debutante Ball, anything other than revisiting the painful past. She showed him another photo and though he still could not place a teenage Isla he asked who an elderly woman in the photo was.

‘Our housekeeper, Evie.’ Isla gave a fond smile. ‘My parents couldn’t make it that night but she came. Evie came to all the things that they couldn’t get to. She was very sick then, and died a couple of months later. Evie was going to go into a hospice but Isabel and I ended up looking after her at home.’

Isla stared at the image on her phone. She hadn’t looked at those photos for a very long time and seeing Evie’s loving smile had her remembering a time that she tried not to.

‘Would you like another drink?’ Alessi offered as Isla put away her phone, both happy to end a difficult trip down memory lane.

‘Not for me.’

‘Something to eat?’

She was both hungry enough and relaxed with him enough to say yes.

Potato wedges and sour cream had never tasted so good!

In fact, they got on so well that close to midnight both realised it was just the two of them left.

‘I’d better go,’ Isla said.

‘Are you on in the morning?’

‘No.’ Isla shook her head. ‘I’m off for the weekend. I’m pretty much nine to five these days, though I do try to mix it up a bit and do some regular stints on nights.’ They walked down the steps and out into the street. ‘So you start on Monday?’ she checked.

‘I do,’ Alessi said. ‘I’m really looking forward to it. At the last hospital I worked at there was always a struggle for NICU cots and equipment. It is going to be really nice working somewhere that’s so cutting-edge.’ He looked at Isla—she was seriously stunning and was looking right into his eyes. The attraction between them had been instant and was completely undeniable. Alessi dated, flirted and enjoyed women with absolute ease. ‘I’m looking forward to the weekend, too, though.’

‘That’s right, you’re going away with your girlfriend …’

‘No,’ Alessi said. ‘We broke up.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Isla said, which was the right response.

‘I’m not,’ Alessi said, which was the wrong response for Isla.

She was terribly aware how unguarded she had been tonight. Perhaps safe in the knowledge that he was seeing someone.

She looked into his black eyes and then her gaze flicked down and she watched as his lips stretched into a slow, lazy smile.

His mouth was seductive and he hadn’t yet kissed her but she knew that soon he would.

As his lips first grazed hers Isla’s nerves actually started to dissolve like a cube of sugar being dipped into warm coffee—it was sweet, it was pleasurable, it was actually sublime. Such a gentle, skilled kiss, so different from the forced ones with Rupert. It felt like soft butterflies were tickling her lips and Isla realised that her mouth was moving naturally with his.

Alessi’s hands were on her hips, she could feel his warm hands through her denim shorts and she wanted more pressure, wanted more of something that she didn’t know how to define, she simply didn’t want it to end. But as the kiss naturally deepened, her eyes snapped open and she pulled back. Her first taste of tongue was shocking enough, but that she was kissing a man in the street was for Isla more terrifying.

He thought her easy, Isla was sure, panic building within her about where this might lead. She almost was easy with him because for the first time in her life she now knew how a kiss could lead straight to bed.

She had many weapons of self-defence in her armoury but she leapt straight for the big one and shot Alessi a look of absolute distaste.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she snapped, even if she had been a very willing participant. ‘I was just trying to be friendly …’

Alessi quickly realised that he had been right to be cautious about her.

He knew the looks she was giving him well.

Very well!

She didn’t actually say the words—do you know who I am? Though Isla’s expression most certainly did. It was a snobby, derisive look, it was a get-your-hands-off-me-you-poor-Greek-boy look.

‘My mistake,’ Alessi shrugged. ‘Goodnight, Isla.’

He promptly walked off—he wasn’t going to hang around to be trampled on.

Her loss.

Alessi knew she’d enjoyed the kiss as much as he had and that her mouth, her body had invited more. He simply knew.

Isla had enjoyed their kiss.

As she climbed into a taxi she was scalding with embarrassment but there was another feeling, too—despite the appalling ending to tonight her lips were still warm from Alessi’s and her body felt a little bit alive for the very first time, a touch awoken to what had seemed impossible before.

As she let herself into her flat, a gorgeous penthouse with a view of Melbourne that rivalled that of the Rooftop Bar, she smiled at Isabel.

‘Sorry I didn’t get there,’ Isabel said. ‘Did you have a good night?’

Isla, still flushed from his kiss, still a little shaken inside, nodded.

It had, in fact, been the best Valentine’s night of her life.

Not that Alessi could ever know.

CHAPTER ONE

NEW YEAR’S DAY.

Isla saw the sign for the turn-off to Melbourne International Airport and carried on with her conversation as if she and Isabel were popping out for breakfast.

They were both trying to ignore the fact that Isabel was heading to live in England for a year and so, instead of talking about that, they chatted about Rupert. He was back in Melbourne for a week and the supposed news had broken that he’d had a fling with one of the actresses in his latest film. Not even Isabel knew that Isla’s relationship with Rupert was a ruse.

‘You’re truly not upset?’ Isabel checked, and Isla, who wore her mask well, just laughed as she turned off the freeway.

‘What, I’m supposed to be upset because reports say that he got off with some actress in America a few weeks ago?’ Isla shook her head. ‘It doesn’t bother me. I couldn’t care less what they say in some magazine.’

‘You’re so much tougher than I am,’ Isabel sighed. ‘I simply can’t imagine how I would feel if …’ Her voice trailed off.

The conversation they had perhaps been trying to avoid was getting closer and closer and neither wanted to face it.

Isla knew what Isabel had been about to say.

She couldn’t stand to hear about Sean if he was with someone else.

Sean Anderson, an obstetrician, had been working at the Victoria since November and was the reason they were at the airport now. Sean was the reason that Isabel had accepted a professional exchange with Darcie Green and was heading for Cambridge, just to escape the re-emergence of her childhood sweetheart into her life.

The large multistorey car park at the airport had never made Isla feel sick before but it did today.

They unloaded Isabel’s cases from the boot, found a trolley and then headed to the elevator. Once inside Isla pressed the button for the departure floor and forced a smile at her sister as they stood in the lift.

‘If Darcie’s flight gets in on time you might have time to see her,’ Isla said, and Isabel nodded.

‘She sounds really nice from her emails. Well, I hope she is, for your sake, given that she’s going to be sharing the flat with you.’

Isla had never lived alone and so, with her older sister heading overseas and as their flat was so huge, it had seemed the perfect idea at the time. Now, though, Isla wasn’t so sure. Isabel was going away to sort her heart out and Isla was going to do the same. She really wanted things to be different this year, she wanted to finally start getting on with her life, and that meant dating. That meant letting her guard down and dropping Rupert and, despite being terrified, Isla was also determined to bring on a necessary change.

Not tonight, though!

Tonight there were drinks to greet Darcie at the Rooftop Bar and Alessi would be there.

It was almost a year since that Valentine’s night and since then the atmosphere between them had been strained at best. He was a playboy and made no excuse about it and Isla loathed his flirting and casual dating of her staff, though he barely glanced in her direction, let alone flirted with her. Alessi, it was clear, considered Isla to be a stuck-up cow who had somehow wormed her way into her senior position thanks to her father. They rarely worked together and that suited them both.

The early morning sun was very low and bright as Isla and Isabel crossed the tunnel that would take them from the car park to the departure lounge. A few heads turned as the sisters walked by. It wasn’t just that they were both blonde and good-looking but that, thanks to their frequent appearances in the celebrity pages of newspapers and magazines, people recognised them.

Isabel and Isla were more than used to it but it felt especially invasive this morning.

Today they weren’t minor celebrities but were sisters who were saying goodbye for a whole year, for a reason even they could not discuss—an event that had happened twelve years ago. Something that both women had fought to put behind them, though, for both, it had proved impossible.

What had happened that night had scarred them both in different ways, Isla thought as she watched Isabel check her baggage in.

She didn’t really know Isabel’s scars, she just knew that they were there.

They had to be.

Isla forced a smile as Isabel came back from the check-in desk.

‘I’m not going to wait to meet Darcie,’ Isabel said, and Isla nodded. Yes, they could stand around and talk, or perhaps go and get a coffee and extend the goodbye, but it was all just too painful. ‘I think I’ll just go through customs now.’

‘Look out, England!’ Isla attempted a little joke but then her voice cracked as they both realised that this was it. ‘I’m going to miss you so much!’ Isla said. She would. They not only worked and lived together but shared in the exhausting round of charity events and social engagements that took place when you were a Delamere girl.

They shared everything except a rehash of that awful night but here, on this early summer morning, for the first time it was tentatively broached. ‘You understand I have to go, don’t you?’ Isabel asked.

Isla nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

‘I don’t know how to be around him,’ Isabel admitted. ‘Now that Sean is back, I just don’t know how to deal with it. I know that he doesn’t understand why I ended our relationship so abruptly. We both knew it was more than a teenage crush, he was the love of my life …’ Tears were pouring down Isabel’s cheeks and even though she was younger than Isabel, again, it was Isla who knew she had to be strong. She pushed aside her own hurts and fears and cuddled her big sister and told her that she was making the right choice, that she would be okay and that she could get through this.

‘I know how hard it’s been for you since he came to MMU,’ Isla said.

‘You won’t say anything to Sean …’

‘Oh, please,’ Isla said. ‘I’d never tell anyone, ever. I promised you that a long time ago. You’ve got this year to sort yourself out and I’m going to do the same.’

‘You?’ Isabel said in surprise. ‘What could you possibly have to sort out? I’ve never known anyone more together than you.’

Isla, though, knew that she wasn’t together. ‘I love you,’ she said, instead of answering the question.

‘I love you, too.’

They had another hug and then Isla stood and watched as her sister headed towards customs and showed her passport and boarding pass. Just as she went past the point of no return Isabel paused and turned briefly and waved at a smiling Isla.

Only when Isabel had gone did Isla’s smile disappear and Isla, who never cried, felt the dam breaking then. She was so grateful that she had an hour before Darcie arrived because she would need every minute of it to compose herself. As she walked back through the tunnel towards the car Isla could hardly see where she was going because her eyes were swimming in tears, but somehow she made it back to the car and climbed in and sat there and cried like she never had in her life.

Yes, she fully understood why Isabel had to get away now that Sean had returned. The memories of that time were so painful that they could still awake Isla in the middle of the night. She fully understood, with Sean reappearing, how hard it must be for Isabel to see him every day on the maternity unit.

It was agony for Isla, too.

She sat there in her car, remembering the excitement of being twelve years old and listening to a sixteen-year-old Isabel telling her about her boyfriend and dating and kissing. Isla had listened intently, hanging onto every word, but then Isabel had suddenly stopped telling her things.

A plane roared overhead and the sob that came from Isla was so deep and so primal it was as if she were back there—waking to the sound of her sister’s tears and the aftermath, except this time she was able to cry about it.

Their parents had been away for a weekend. Evie, their housekeeper, had lived in a small apartment attached to the house and so, effectively, they had been alone. Isla, on waking to the sounds of her sister crying, had got out of bed and padded to the bathroom and stood outside, listening for a moment.

‘Isabel?’ Isla knocked on the bathroom door.

‘Go away, Isla,’ Isabel said, then let out very low groan and Isla realised that her sister was in pain.

‘Isabel,’ Isla called. ‘Unlock the door and let me in.’

Silence.

But then came another low moan that had Isla gripped with fear.

‘Isabel, please.’ She knocked on the door again, only this time with urgency. ‘If you don’t let me in then I’m going to go and get Evie.’

Evie was so much more than a housekeeper. She looked after the two girls as if they were her own. She worried about them, was there for them while their parents attended their endless parties.

They both loved her.

Isla was just about to run and get Evie when the door was unlocked and Isla let herself in. She stepped inside the bathroom and couldn’t believe what she saw. Isabel was drenched in sweat and there was blood on the tiles, but as she watched her sister fold over it dawned on Isla what was happening.

Isabel was giving birth.

‘Please don’t tell Evie,’ Isabel begged. ‘No one must know, Isla, you have to promise me that you will never tell anyone …’

Somehow, despite the blood, despite the terror and the moans from her sister, Isla stayed calm.

She knew what she had to do.

Isla dropped down to her knees on instinct rather than fear as Isabel lay back on the floor, lifting herself up on her elbows. ‘It’s okay, Isabel,’ Isla said reassuringly. ‘It’s going to be okay.’

‘There’s something between my legs …’ Isabel groaned. ‘It’s coming.’

Isla had been born a midwife, she knew that then. It was strange but even at that tender age, somehow Isla dealt with the unfolding events. She looked down at the tiny scrap that had been born to her hands and managed to stay calm as an exhausted Isabel wept.

He was dead, that much Isla knew, yet he was perfect. His little eyes were fused closed and he was so very still.

Tomorrow she would start to doubt herself. Tomorrow she would wonder if there was something more that she could have done for him. In the months and years ahead Isla would terrorise herself with those very questions and would go over and over holding her little nephew in her hands instead of doing more. But there, in that moment, in the still of the bathroom, Isla knew.

She wrapped her tiny nephew in a small hand towel. There was the placenta and the cord still attached and she continued to hold him as Isabel lay on the floor, sobbing.

‘He’s beautiful,’ Isla said. He was. She gazed upon his features as her fingers held his tiny, tiny hands and she looked at his spindly arms and cuddled him and then, when Isabel was ready, Isla handed the tiny baby to her.

‘Did you know you were pregnant?’ Isla asked, but Isabel said nothing, just stared at her tiny baby and stroked his little cheek.

‘Does Sean know?’ Isla asked.

‘No one knows,’ Isabel said. ‘No one is ever to know about this.’ She looked at Isla, her eyes urgent. ‘You have to promise me that you will never, ever tell anyone.’

Some promises were too big to make, though.

‘I have to tell Evie,’ Isla said.

‘Isla, please, no one must know.’

‘And so what are we supposed to do with him?’ Isla demanded.

‘I don’t know.’

‘You know what you don’t want me to do, though. You know that he needs to be properly taken care of,’ Isla said, and Isabel nodded tearfully.

‘You won’t tell anyone else,’ Isabel sobbed. ‘Promise me, Isla.’

‘I promise.’

Isla sped through the house and to Evie. The elderly housekeeper was terribly distressed at first, but then she calmed down and dealt with things. She understood, better than most, the scandal this might cause and the terrible impact it would have on Isabel if it ever got out. She had a sister who worked in a hospital in the outer suburbs and Evie called her and asked what to do.

Isla sat, her tears still flowing as she recalled the drive out of the city to the suburbs. Isabel was holding the tiny baby and crying beside her till the lights of the hospital came into view. Evie’s sister met them and Isabel was put in a wheelchair and taken to Maternity, with Isla following behind. The midwife who had greeted them had been so lovely to Isabel, just so calm, wise and efficient.

‘What happens now?’ Isla asked. It was as if only then had they noticed that Isabel’s young sister was there and she was shown to a small waiting room.

It had been the last time Isla had seen her nephew.

She didn’t really know what had gone on.

Evie had come in at one point and said that the baby was too small to be registered. Isla hadn’t known what that meant other than that no one would have to find out.

Her parents would later question Isla’s decision to become a midwife. They had deemed that it wasn’t good enough for a Delamere girl but Isla had stood by her calling.

She’d wanted to be as kind and as calm as the staff had been with Isabel that night.

With one modification.

Though her sister had been gently dealt with by midwives who had been used to terrified sixteen-year-old girls who did not want their parents to find out, one person had been forgotten.

Isla had sat alone and unnoticed in the waiting room.

Now she knew things should have been handled differently—the midwives, the obstetrician, at least one of them should have recognised Isla’s terror and spoken at length with her about what had happened. They should have come in and taken care of the twelve-year-old girl who had just delivered her dead nephew. They should have carefully explained that the baby had been born at around eighteen weeks gestation, which had meant that there was nothing Isla could have possibly done to save him.

It would be many years before Isla got those answers and she’d had to find them out for herself.