Page 46 of Just One Look
Not Diving Deep
He drove her home.
This was why he didn’t date women with issues, he thought as he made the turn onto Quay Street and felt her silence from the other seat, all the tension and the reserve in her.
He didn’t dive deep. From time to time, somebody got emotional and did that deep dive, but that somebody was never him. For one thing, he was bad at it. Perfect example right here. Exactly the wrong thing to say, that there was something wrong with her, and yet he’d said it. What did he say now?
He’d obviously said it because he’d wanted to sleep with her, too. Maybe it was his competitive nature, to see if he could make it better than she thought it could be, or maybe just that she seemed like she didn’t know how to have fun. He was good at providing fun, and he’d like to provide it to her, because that body looked like fun to him, but he was the wrong bloke.
He had a certain amount of time and energy to devote to dating, and that was all. He could barely handle whatever emotion had happened back there in the restaurant, and as for being in the spot where Marko’d been today? He wasn’t that man, and there was no point trying to fool himself or anybody else that he was. And that was what she needed. It was obvious.
That was a no, then. Mismatch all the way. There was clearly something very wrong in her life, because no eminent surgeon would spend a year in the early phases of her career in a backwater like New Zealand otherwise. It would be like him leaving the country at twenty-five, after all those years of struggling and sacrificing to be the best and finally reaching that pinnacle, playing on the most successful sporting team in the world, in order to play in … Italy. Japan. It would be stepping back. It would almost be giving up.
Unless she was only looking for sex, he was the wrong bloke. And she wasn’t looking for sex.
He said, finally, when they were in the car and headed down Quay Street, “I’m sorry about that. Too personal, I reckon, and it was an emotional day for you.” There. That was good. Let them both back away.
“No.” She was looking out her window at nothing, at stacked containers at the port and the enormous, squat, ugly bulk of a car carrier, delivering its part of the endless supply of used sedans from Japan. “It wasn’t emotional. I was glad, of course, that it worked out well, but it’s what I do. It’s my life, and I love my job. It’s intense because it matters, that’s all, and I’m used to it.”
It hadn’t been emotional? Really? He’d have sworn she’d felt that. That moment looking at the baby, in the nursery? Marko’s palm against the glass? It had madehimemotional.
Purple, Marko had said. Sensitive and powerful. He’d felt Elizabeth drawing back from the words like a snail sprinkled with salt, as if they burned her. Wouldn’t you have to be sensitive, though, to react like that?
Too confusing. Had he mentioned that he was bad at this?
“Life and death,” he said. “When you’re a sportsman, especially playing for the All Blacks, you think that sometimes. That it’s not life and death, however it feels to people. It helps you cope. There’s still pressure, but you can accept it and know that the sun will still rise tomorrow, win or lose. But your job actuallyislife and death, and if it’s ‘death,’ that sun isn’t rising for somebody. Not rising for their whanau, either. How do you cope with that?”
Finally, she looked at him. “First, because my own sunwillrise tomorrow. It has to, because there’ll be more patients, and I can’t help them if I’m crying on the couch. You don’t want an emotional surgeon. You want a surgeon who’s passionate about performing the surgery well, and that’s it. That doesn’t mean I don’t care. It means that I do my best and move on, the same way you do. I’m guessing you work hard before you get on the field, so that when you’re out there, you know you’ve learned everything you can and trained as hard as you can for it. And then you work hard when youareout there. You do your best, but afterwards, if you lose, you don’t cry. You go get a sandwich.”
“Yeh,” he said. “That’s about it. Team sport, though, so there’s that. It’s never entirely your fault, eh, and you’re also never really the hero. That helps.” They were passing Victoria Park, which gave him about five minutes to her door. Not much time to …
To what? Nothing, that was what. He did not need complication, and everything about her screamed “complication.” He’d barely started a rugby season that would see him gone from home nearly half the time until early November. He had time for casual. He didn’t have time for complication, and he definitely didn’t have it in what could easily be his last season. He was throwing himself into this season boots and all, going flat to the boards. That was the only way he knew how to play.
She said, “Surgery’s a team sport, too. Residents. Scrub nurses. The anesthesiologist.”
“No,” he said. “Not the same, because surely the responsibility starts and ends with you. It could be like being the coach, maybe, but I don’t think so. The coach isn’t out on the field.”
“More like the captain of a ship, probably,” she said. “You’ve got a good crew, or if you don’t, that’s at least partly your fault, too. You get the credit or the blame, and that’s right, because everything that happens in there is your responsibility.”
“The captain goes down with the ship,” he said. “Except not. The captain walks away and onto another ship. He doesn’t drown in the wreckage.”
“This conversation,” she told him, “is way too serious. It’s also extremely depressing. I thought Kiwis were cheerful.”
He laughed. “Clearly, I’m the one who’s had an emotional day. Trust me, I’m not normally serious.” So shewasn’tcomplicated and emotional? He’d swear that was what had happened, though. Now, he was getting the same thing as in the waiting room, like she was behind glass.
“Although,” she said, just to prove his point, “thoseweremy underwear the dog ate, and thatwasextremely sad.” They were in front of her house now, but she didn’t move to get out. She also didn’t unfasten her seatbelt, the way a woman did when she was expecting you to kiss her. She just sat there and said, “What’s the All Blacks, exactly? That’s the second time tonight somebody’s mentioned it. I don’t get it. The team that played last night wasn’t the All Blacks.”
“International squad,” he said. “You’re selected for it. Or not.”
“Oh. So, like, the … Sorry. I’m blanking. I have no analogies, because I know absolutely nothing about sports. Any sports. I know more aboutbandthan I know about sports. I played the flute in high school, because my father thought I should have an extracurricular activity to list on my college applications. I wasn’t very good at it, though. I am not a multidimensional person. No sports.”
“Separate season,” he said. “You play after Super Rugby’s over, and a few games in June as well, during a break from Super Rugby.” She looked at him blankly, and he said, “What you saw last night. Which is teams from New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Argentina, and Japan.”
“Which isalsointernational,” she said, “so I don’t get it.”
“Because New Zealand is small, but our rugby game isn’t. Europe has a competition as well, though there’ll be multiple teams from each country. Think of it like that. But the separate countries pick their best players and put them onto their national teams, and they play each other at various times, too.”
“Orthopedic surgeons must make a killing,” she said, which made him laugh again. Then she unfastened her seatbelt, opened her door, and said, “Thanks for dinner. See you.”
