I did not respond. There was nothing I could say. I thought about the Christmas-tree shaped vegemite sandwich I’d made. It was a silly gesture – an innocent gesture – and I’d felt light as air as I cut the shape out clumsily with a knife. It was waiting for Leo in the fridge. Instead of being safely home to eat it, I thought a little hysterically, maybe I could serve it at his wake. There was absolutely no point in me trying to ask him not to stay; he had already made the decision. This was a courtesy call so I wasn’t standing at the airport when his flight landed without him on it.
‘I love you, Molly,’ Leo said – at least, I thought maybe he’d said it, given the line was badly crackled by that point. I wanted to be silent and to make him see how livid I was and how hurt I was, but I was too scared that he would never come home and his last words from me would be an accusation – why can’t you leave? That was always the thing. If I tried to make Leo come home, I was stopping him from doing his work. And his work was important – too important for me to stand in the way of. Even, apparently at Christmas.
‘I love you too,’ I whispered. I was crying, and Lucien stood again and tried to lick my face. Our damned pet was moved by my pain, yet Leo was never even there to see it. He was busy tending to other people’s pain – other people’s problems that were so much worse than mine and so much more worthy of his attention.
‘I’ll be home in a week or two, I promise. We’ll have Christmas then, okay?’
But I knew that he would not be home in a week or two – not when the timeline was so vague. I knew that his vagueness meant that New Year’s Eve and my birthday would also be casualties to his work this year. I murmured something as if I believed him and then I hung up the phone. I had stopped crying by then; instead, I lay on my back and let Lucien cuddle up on Leo’s pillow. When I finally fell asleep again, I slept until eleven, and then I was awoken by a text from Mum.
Molly, Merry Christmas! I’m sure you are busy today, but if you do get time to get away on your own, please call past. We have a gift for you and we’d love to see you.
I didn’t even bother to wake up properly before I called her.
‘Molly! Darling!’
‘Mum,’ I said. ‘Can I come for lunch?’
‘Lunch? You want to come for lunch? Today?’
‘Yes, Mum.’
‘With… I mean, but – with––’
‘No, Mum – Leo is overseas. It’s just me.’
‘Oh, yes, darling – please – come! Dad will be so delighted; this is going to be a wonderful Christmas!’
I popped next door to give Mrs Wilkins the audio books I’d ordered for her, and she smothered me in hugs and gratitude and then sympathy when I told her Leo wasn’t going to make it home. Mrs Wilkins had bought each of us a gift but hadn’t had time to wrap them – there was a hand-knitted brown jumper for Leo, a lovely purple throw rug for me and a horrifying pink collar with diamantes on it for poor, emasculated Lucien. I left Mrs Wilkins when her son arrived to take her for lunch.
I hadn’t bought a gift for Mum and Dad – there was no point, really – they had enough money to buy any item in the world they might desire. Instead, as I walked into their dining room and saw the sheer joy break on their faces, I realised that my unexpected visit was the best gift they could have imagined. They lavished warmth on me that day – fussing over me at lunch as if I were a toddler. I felt a little guilty the whole time I was there, because I was only half in the moment and missing Leo’s presence so dreadfully that I could barely stand it. Once or twice I mentioned him because he was right there at the forefront of my mind – something I’d never done in all of the time since I reconciled with them. I learned that day that Leo’s name had the same effect on my parents that Declan’s once had; Dad would turn red and get snappy, Mum would freeze up and get teary. If I pushed it, the fragile bridge we’d built between us would disintegrate, and so as the hours stretched on, I tried harder to avoid his name – as if I were ashamed of him.
As we sat out on the deck afterwards and sipped champagne, Mum passed me an envelope. She and Dad were beaming, and I nearly dropped it when I realised what it was.
‘Happy Christmas, Darling,’ Mum whispered. She and Dad suddenly linked hands and I looked down at the cheque again and then back at them.
It was an obscene amount of money – more than my trust fund. I knew it was nothing to Mum and Dad in terms of their net wealth, but it would mean that I could expand the work of the Foundation immeasurably.
‘This is…’ I whispered, and I could barely breathe. When I looked up, Mum was still beaming at me but Dad was staring at the floor, his jaw stiff.
‘We figured you didn’t need anything for yourself,’ Dad said tersely. ‘And it’s a tax deduction.’
‘Dad, Mum – this means the world to me.’