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‘Of course we know each other. We’re married. We...’ Love each other? No. He couldn’t speak for Abbie. He changed tack. ‘I know you, Abbie. I know that you like two sugars in your coffee. That you hate lacy knickers because they make you itch. That people who hurt their children make you very, very angry.’ He was counting off his list on his fingers. ‘That one of your favourite surgeries is making new little ears for children. That—’

But Abbie was shaking her head as she set her own cup carefully aside. ‘I mean something that goes deeper than that. You don’t know why I did what I did. Why I had to take Ella to New York even if it was going to mean the end of the marriage that meant so much to me.’

‘But I do...’ Rafael swallowed hard. ‘I know that your little sister, Sophie, died when you were only twelve. That you felt your parents had failed her because they refused to try any treatment that might have added to her suffering when they knew it would gain nothing but a little more time. But that was different. It wasn’t leukaemia and we tried everything we could even it was only going to give us a little more time. The idea that the treatment in New York could really work was...’

Way too much of a miracle to hope for. Rafael’s words trailed into silence. It had worked, hadn’t it? He’d been wrong.

‘You knew the reason,’ Abbie agreed quietly. ‘But you didn’t understand how I felt about it because if you had you would have been there with me, Rafe. By my side. And it really hurt that you weren’t.’

It hurt thinking about Sophie, too. The little sister she’d lost. The way her family had fallen apart. Sophie had been ill for so long that family life had centred exclusively on her and Abbie had felt almost invisible. The feeling had only strengthened after her sister’s death. Had her parents been too afraid to love her too much in case they lost her, too? Did they come to blame each other—the way she secretly did—for not having tried hard enough to save Sophie?

Or did all the love just die because it got smothered under the grief?

She’d tried so hard....

She’d been driven to fight for Ella instead of standing back and watching her die. But her new family had still fallen apart, hadn’t it? Was it impossible to win in a dreadful situation like that?

Rafael could see the pain he’d caused by reminding Abbie of what she’d lost as a child. And by not being there for her in New York when she’d needed him. What could he say?

‘I’m sorry.’ The words were raw. ‘I was wrong.’

This time it was Abbie who took hold of his hand. ‘It’s not just your fault, Rafe. Don’t you see? I couldn’t understand why you were so opposed to it, any more than you could understand me. Oh, I knew how much you hated to see children suffering when there couldn’t be a positive outcome, and that’s why you changed specialties to get away from oncology, but this was your own daughter. I just didn’t get it.’ She bit her lip. ‘We don’t get each other.’

‘Get?’ Sometimes, if he was really fired up about something, his languages could tangle in his head and make him miss subtleties.

‘Understand. No...it’s more than that, I think. If you really love someone and you can understand why they feel the way they do, then you’ll support them, even if you might not agree with whatever it is.’

Rafael turned the words over in his head. ‘You’re right,’ he said into the quietness. ‘I should have supported you.’

‘And maybe I should have supported you.’

‘Che cosa? But I was wrong. You only have to look at Ella to see that I was wrong.’

‘But if I’d understood why, maybe we could have changed things. All I could see was someone who was being a doctor, not a father. Or a husband. Someone who couldn’t feel what I was feeling.’

It was true. He had isolated himself emotionally. Circumstances had then isolated him physically.

But they were closer now, surely? They were talking about things they’d never talked about before.

‘It won’t happen again,’ he told Abbie. ‘I love you. I love Ella. I want to be a good father and husband.’ He touched her face. Cupping it gently the way he always had before trying to convey his sincerity with a tender kiss.

But Abbie pulled away from his touch. ‘Don’t,’ she whispered. ‘Please, don’t.’

It was too bittersweet, that touch. She could give in to it so easily but it still wouldn’t solve anything. It would still be a throw covering a stain.

Rafael dropped his hand. He turned to stare straight ahead and Abbie followed his line of vision. Through the arbour she could see a young couple, wrapped in each other’s arms, sharing a passionate kiss. As intent on each other as Abbie and Rafael had been when they’d first come here together. As oblivious to the twists of fate that might pull them apart in the future.

Rafael had to turn away from the sight of the young lovers. He and Abbie had been that close once. He’d hoped that they might get that close again today but they were as far apart as they had been before they had come here, weren’t they? Talking had solved nothing.

‘I’m still hurting, Rafe.’ Abbie spoke so quietly he had to strain to hear the words. ‘And I can’t go through anything like this again. I know Ella needs her father as much as she needs her mother right now but...I need time. I need to be sure.’

Rafael closed his eyes. She wasn’t the only one who was still hurting. ‘And how did you think it made me feel, Abbie? When you wouldn’t listen to anything I had to say? When you took Ella away and I was so sure I would never see her again? Never hold her? You’re not the only one who was hurt.’

‘I know. And I’m sorry.’

Rafael’s fingers found a tangled part of his hair but he shoved them through the obstruction, welcoming the pain. ‘Can we ever get past this? What do we do now?’

‘I hope we can get past this.’ But Abbie’s smile was shaky. Unsure? ‘And now? I think we should go and spend some time with our daughter.’

It was Abbie who picked up the empty coffee cups and found a rubbish bin to put them in. She put on the soft cardigan she’d been carrying because there were a few clouds in the sky now and when the sunlight dimmed, the temperature dropped noticeably. The picnic feel to the day was gone. The date was over. They walked out of the Secret Garden and back through the main park in silence but it was a different kind of silence from the one when they’d first entered the park together.

Things were out in the open. Yes, their marriage was still on the line but it seemed that they both wanted to repair it, at least. Surely that was a good thing?

‘Maybe, one day soon,’ he said, ‘we’ll be able to bring Ella to the park. To show her the Secret Garden.’

‘I hope so,’ Abbie responded. ‘And we could take her to the zoo.’

‘To see the monkeys.’ The unenthusiastic tone made them both look at each other. And then they both smiled.

She understood. And if they did go to the zoo, she would know that it was a generous act on his part because those monkeys drove him pazzo.

He could feel his heart lift. The connection was there. And the love. Surely it was going to be possible to build a bridge over the troubled waters that still lay between them?

It had to be possible, Rafael decided as they went through the ornate iron gates and he raised his arm to flag down a taxi.

It was as simple as that, really.

CHAPTER SIX (#ua36f27db-9446-5b77-a1c2-01538fd92dea)

GIFTS WERE STARTING to pile up in Ella’s room.

While the big pink bear was the frontrunner in the popularity stakes, everybody who looked after Ella was enjoying the growing stack of bright picture books and the toys, especially the board with the animal pictures and the buttons that made the appropriate noise for the animal when Ella pushed it. Her attempts to imitate the noises made them all laugh.

And Rafael had a new audience on which to try out his own animal noises.

‘This is a lion, Ella. Rrrroahhh... You’ll hear them when we take you to the zoo one day. You might even hear them at home. And this is a monkey. Eeek, eeek, eeek.’

The noises made both Ella and Abbie grin but they had yet to hear their little girl giggle again. What would it take?

‘You don’t have to bring a present every time you come, Rafe. You’re spoiling her.’

‘I want her to look forward to seeing me.’ But Rafael put the bag he was carrying today on the floor and leaned on the edge of the cot, watching as Abbie caught the small, waving arms and pushed them gently into the sleeves of her sleep suit.

‘Mum-mum-mum,’ Ella crowed.

‘That’s me.’ Abbie snapped some fastenings closed. ‘Mama. Can you say papa?’

Ella stared up at her, her eyes round.