Page 25 of A Smart Girl's Guide to Second Chances
‘What curse?’ Dad asked, turning towards her, an eyebrow raised.
Lily helpfully filled him in. ‘The one where every woman in Helena’s family gets engaged to a man before the person they marry.’ I shook my head at her behind Dad, but she missed it. ‘Because Becs is marrying her first fiancé, Helena thinks the whole wedding is doomed.’
A rare belly laugh exploded from Dad.
‘Sometimes I miss her dramatic flair,’ he said, wiping his eyes. ‘She was never going to marry... I can’t even remember his name. He had less personality than Hamish does.’
‘Dad,’ I said, jerking my head towards Evie. Brown and pink ice cream was dripping down her face onto the dove-grey couch, and she was was looking more interested in our conversation than she normally did watchingGabby’s Dollhouse. I ran to the bench to grab a roll of paper towel.
‘It happened to Grandma Evelyn too,’ I said as I dabbed at the pale fabric.
‘Evelyn probably forgot she said yes to two men,’ he said. He’d always loved Grandma and had been grateful for how much time she’d spent with me as a kid, but he’d always treated her like a child he found adorable but occasionally exasperating.
‘Maybe,’ I said, but Dad’s attention was already on Evie who was campaigning heavily for access to his phone.
A few minutes later I retreated to the bathroom, Alice strapped to me in her carrier. I stared at myself in the mirror and smiled. The reflection was reassuring. A thirty-something face and a baby on my chest. This is who I wanted to be. I was no longer a confused teenager or a girl in her early twenties, unsure of everything. Now I knew exactly what I wanted. I held my left hand up next to my face. Matt and I had a plan. I just needed to get through the next month. I just needed to get through today.
In a few hours, Matt would come home, and we would order something fried and watch a movie. I’d apologise for throwinghim in the deep end and thank him for being so welcoming and explain what I’d been trying to achieve.
I heard a car crunching across the gravel driveway – it was probably Nick, home after being called in to see a patient. I looked out the window and was surprised to see the car was Matt’s. We’d planned to meet back at home.
I quickly washed the residue of Evie’s ice cream off my hands and raced out to greet him. I was dying to know how the afternoon had gone, to make sure that everything was okay, preferably away from my dad, best friends and assorted children.
But I stopped in my tracks as I reached the front step. Not only were Dad, Lily, Evie and Arlo already in the front garden, but Alex was standing next to Matt looking relaxed in a faded T-shirt and a new Australian Open cap. Matt was wearing a matching one. How did the same cap look entirely different on each of them? Alex, in his oversized sunglasses looked like a hipster celebrity trying to hide from the paparazzi, whereas Matt, whose white linen shirt matched the hat, looked like the dad you’d love to have a gentle flirt with at a school fundraiser.
But hats weren’t the important thing right then. How had the afternoon gone?
‘Who’s this?’ Alex waved at Arlo.
‘This is my son, Arlo. He’s one next weekend,’ Lily said, greeting Alex with open arms.
‘Matt said that you’d be here, so I thought I’d say a quick hello on the way home,’ Alex explained. Was Alexthatdesperate for company in a new city? Or had Matt encouraged him to come along?
My spiralling thoughts were interrupted by a clinking sound. I looked down. The wedding band had fallen off my still slightly soapy hand and straight through a metal grate, into a drain.
Chapter 12
‘Shit!’
A small pair of eyes lit up.
‘Sorry, Evie.’ I began to bend down but realised I couldn’t with a baby strapped to me.
Everyone had stopped talking to look at me.
‘The ring... it just slipped off my finger and fell through the grate,’ I explained. My heart began to race. Lily’s custom rings were handmade. I couldn’t just lose one, my one.
Both Matt and Alex wordlessly kneeled down on either side of the stormwater drain, peering into the darkness. My breathing became shallower.
‘Maybe your mother is right. Maybe this weddingiscursed,’ Dad said, with an amused chuckle.
‘The symbolism isn’t great,’ Lily added wryly, though I could hear the catch in her voice as she realised one of her creations had been dropped into the ether.
‘Google says that it’s possible to get a ring out of a drain with a fishing rod and a big hook,’ Matt read off his phone, pretending not to hear Dad and Lily. ‘Do we know if Nick has a fishing rod?’
Despite the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, a hollow laugh escaped me. Nick barely had time to see his kids and wife, let alone take up hobbies.
‘I can make another ring. Leave it,’ Lily said.
