Page 49 of Reluctant Chemistry

“Look, it’s not the end of the world,” Brad said. “You can sit them again.”

“Yeah, but it’s still a kick in the guts.” Deep down, Luka had known he would fail. He’d let his nerves and lack of sleep get the better of him that morning and had tried to put it from his mind ever since, hoping Duncan hadn’t noticed.

Luka gathered up the papers and slotted them back into the envelope, taking a deep breath to calm himself. “I thought I was a good pilot.”

As he sipped his coffee, Brad said nothing, his expression answering for him.

Luka stared. “What?”

“You failed those modules because you let your indecisiveness get the better of you.” Although softly spoken, his boss’s words were pointed. “You know it, and I know it. And in this game, you need to leave that shit on the ground, where it belongs. You can’t take it up in the air, man. Not if you want to get ahead.”

Luka sat in the chair opposite Brad’s desk and dropped his head into his hands. “Yeah, you’re right. Shit!”

“Look, I get that you’re hurting, mate. All that stuff going on at school with CeCe Dobson, you’ve let your standards slip. Most of us have been there at some point, so cut yourself some slack. At least you get to have another crack at it.” Brad’s reference to CeCe returned her to the front of Luka’s mind. A place she’d sat for over two months now, most of that time invited, some of it not.

“This isn’t about CeCe.”

“No? Well get out there and prove me wrong. And you’d better work your ass off over the next three weeks. Fail once, and Duncan will overlook it—fail twice, and he won’t be happy. I’m not saying you shouldn’t have a social life, but don’t lose that focus. You came here to do a job, not chase after CeCe Dobson, and if you think her distraction isn’t an issue, I suggest you think again.”

Luka slouched back in the chair and massaged the bridge of his nose, thinking back to the weekend before his practical exam. The weekend he’d slept with CeCe in her parents’ house. “Yeah, point taken.”

“Good. And if you ever want a job back here, call me. If a vacancy comes up, it’s yours.”

“Thanks.” Luka glanced around the office. “I’m going to miss this place.”

“Yeah, we’re going to miss you too. But you have bigger fish to fry, and we both know it.” Brad held out his hand for the envelope. “Right, let’s have a look at those papers to see where you’re going wrong.”

24

Chasing Cars

On Easter Monday, a blue-sky day, fresh with the turn of autumn, CeCe stepped from her mother’s car and walked down Luka’s driveway for the last time. The nectarines on the tree in the backyard were long gone, as was the usual clutter by the hot tub. No surfboard, no wetsuit, no board shorts drying over the rail. If it hadn’t been for his SUV parked in its usual place, she would have thought he’d already left.

CeCe stood on the deck and knocked on the door. She should have texted first, but that wasn’t their thing.

Dressed in a faded AC/DC T-shirt and slashed-at-the-knee jeans, Luka opened the door. In the narrow entranceway, a large rolling duffel and smaller weekender sat ready for the trip. She held his gaze for a second, then looked away. It had only been three weeks since that night at the orchard, when they’d stolen their last tender moment. Now he studied her as if they were strangers.

Luka stepped outside, leaving the door ajar. “I was just about to head off. You shouldn’t be here, you know that.”

She fiddled with the chain around her neck, drawing strength from her butterfly as usual. “I know but I came to say goodbye. We haven’t seen each other in three weeks.”

“Yeah, I’ve been busy. And I thought that was the way you wanted it. No contact.”

“I needed it, not wanted it. There’s a difference.” CeCe tried to swallow away the dryness in her throat with little success. “Anyway, I want to apologize. I shouldn’t have let you stay that night. It was wrong, and lately, my wrong decisions seem to outweigh my right ones.”

Luka nodded and ran his fingers across his stubbled jaw. “We were both at fault. I wanted to be there, so—”

“Maybe, but I can’t help feeling a little bitter right now. And sad.”Honesty.“But it will pass. I just need time.”

He opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it again. She’d rarely seen Luka at a loss for words. He was a teacher, used to explaining complexities over and over, but today, his explanations seemed thin on the ground.

“Look,” he finally managed, “if we were both a little older, this whole shitty situation probably wouldn’t mean a thing. But you need the freedom to do whatever you choose without me hovering in your background—waiting for you to text, wondering when we’ll see each other again.” His attitude softened. “I wish you every success, CeCe, every happiness, but we both know I’m not the guy for you.”

They stood in limbo, the fray of their broken affair hanging between them. CeCe looked down, scuffing the toe of her boot along a gap in the concrete path before glancing up again. She wanted to sayI love you. Ask him to wait for her. But she knew the impossibility of that request. Next year, she’d be at university, with hundreds of miles and the Cook Strait separating them. It wasn’t fair to disregard that.

“It’s just…”

Luka sighed heavily. “It’s just?”

---