Page 73 of Because of Them

We go through the rest of the walkthrough without dragging the conversation through the mud. It resonates as I sign away my satisfaction, and I dwell on it as I secure Baxter back in the tray of the ute. One more stop, then I’ll be home.

Noah is a little more understanding when I tell him I need to make the meeting quick. He starts rushing me out of his office as soon as I tell him the boys are home. We fly through the progress report. Everything’s on track, the site is in lock up and all the inside carpentry is complete. Nearly ready to start all the finishings. The hotel will be ready for bookings before the next Spring/Summer season.

Pride swells as Noah thanks me for my hard work, assuring me he never would have known it was my first big project if we hadn’t told him. And he is right, everything went off without a hitch. I renegotiated contracts and timelines with tradies and suppliers. I’ve managed all the paperwork and invoices. We’ve had plenty of these progress meetings, and each one has been positive. It’s still a big step to think my dad is gearing me towards running the whole business. But if I can do this, maybe I can do that after all.

“Why are you even still here?” Noah asks after I pack up my small stack of papers. I slide them into the folder I purchased after our first meeting. “Surely you can take some parental leave? It’s your dad’s business, right?”

“He offered.” I mumble.

“Huh?” Noah moves around his desk and opens the door. He’s pushing me out, knowing more than I do that I need to get home. To Audrey. To our boys.

I stand from the chair and pivot on my heel. “He said he would get someone else to cover the job while I took some timeoff. But I wanted to finish this. I need to finish this. To show myself, him, that I can.”

Noah closes the door and takes a step towards me, ready to give me what I’m sure will be another one of his meaningful TED talks about life and relationships, and how terrible I am at them. He sucks in a breath and places a firm hand on my shoulder. I have to look up at him, and I hate how small I feel in this moment. I’m not short, but the man is tall. And even though I have a good few kilos of muscle on him, I feel like a child as he looks down on me.

“You can, Michael. Remember how you were the only one who doubted that?”

I clear my throat, trying to rid it of the lump that forms against my will.

“It’s easier for me to keep up with the progress on Audrey’s house while I’m still working anyway.”

His brow furrows.

“She was complaining about how small the townhouse was. She lost all her painting space when Maisie’s toys had to be moved into the sunroom, and the boys’ cots are squished into their bedroom. I had land just sitting there. So, I’m building her a house. I just hate that it means I keep having to sneak away, and at least while I’m working I can say I have meetings.”

I step away from Noah’s reach as I tell him. His face doesn’t soften, if anything, the line between his brows deepens. He purses his lips into a tight thin line.

“Does she know?”

“Not yet.”

“Not yet?You mean you haven’t told her? Fucking hell, Michael. You don’t think she deserves to know that you’re building her a house? That she might want to know that?”

Noah takes a few steps back until he is leaning against the wall. He props one knee up and crosses his arms over his chest.My shoulders sink and I drop, sideways, into the chair behind me. The armrest juts against my leg, but I ignore it, leaning forward until my head falls between my knees.

“I wanted it to be a surprise. But then the boys were born early and there’s been no good time to tell her. When I left today she was so distant.”

Noah sighs, long and hard. His eyes close and I get the sense he is carefully thinking through each word he is about to say. A skill I probably need to master.

“Her life is on hold, right?” he asks, but continues before I can answer. “She’s on maternity leave, juggling between the boys and Maisie and trying to find maybe a sliver of time to herself to process everything she has been through. And the day after you can finally bring the boys home from hospital, you rush off to ‘meetings’. No wonder she seemed distant.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah. I get that you wanted to keep busy while the boys were in the hospital. And as sideways as building a house for Audrey might be, I get why you’re doing it. But now that the boys are home, Audrey is going to need your help. A lot of it. You can’t keep walking out on her and you especially can’t keep doing it without telling her where you are.”

“But the surprise …”

Noah shakes his head and opens the sliding door. Noise from the winery filters into his office, glasses clinking, cutlery shuffling, people laughing. But it’s white noise against the steady pounding in my ear as I realise how royally I’ve fucked up.

Noah pulls me out of the chair and shoves me through the door. Pointing to the exit, he pats the back of my shoulder, nudging me forward. “Fuck the surprise.”

AUDREY

Amidst the noise I suspect will become my new normal, I miss the rhythmic sounds of the hospital. The scurried footsteps in the hall would be worlds better than the steady thumping of Maisie bouncing her basketball in the backyard. And I’d take beeping monitors and the gentle buzz from the lights over the crying and shushing. Times two.

Because everything is times two.

Henry screams in my arms, and no amount of swaddling or rocking or bouncing or shushing or feeding seems to help. He spits out his dummy, over and over again, and I put it back in, holding it in place, hoping he sucks it.

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