‘Un-be-liev-a-ble,’ Mel said, dragging all five syllables out of the word.
I huffed out a laugh. ‘He’s not changed much over the years, has he?’
‘He never could stand conflict,’ Mel agreed with a sigh.
I looked up when a shadow fell across the table as a waitress carrying a tray of cocktails came to a stop beside our booth.
‘These are from Jackson,’ she said, sounding a little bemused. She frowned as though trying to remember her next line. ‘He said, “Don’t throw them at each other.”’ She set two margaritas down in front of us.
‘As if,’ Mel said, sliding a glass closer. ‘I hope he’s left a sizeable amount on the bar tab.’ The waitress backed away with a slightly nervous smile.
‘So, what do we do now?’ I asked, still unsure if Mel intended to get to her feet and leave.
‘I guess we stay,’ she said, lifting her glass from the table as her phone pinged.
She read the screen and her eyes flickered with an expression that looked troubled.
‘What did he say?’ I asked, as my own phone had remained silent.
‘Talk to Ellie. Tell her what’s been going on with you.’
My eyes probably held a thousand questions as they searched her clearly distraught face.
My phone dragged my attention away.
Mel looked up, waiting to hear the latest missive.
‘Don’t screw this up, Harker,’ I read in a deadpan tone.
‘What did Jackson mean? What is it that you’re not telling me? Because whatever it is, I want to help.’
Mel was biting her lip, drawing the sensitive skin back and forth until it began to look painful.
‘Not having you around to talk to was always going to hurt, but you unknowingly picked the worst time ever to go AWOL.’ Her chest gave a tiny hitch, and I could see how close she was to tears. ‘And that’s been hard, because I could have really done with you being around these last six months.’
I wanted to get out of my seat and put my arms around her, but had I lost the right to offer that kind of support? Wasn’t that reserved for friends who know what you’ve been dealing with, because they’ve been right there beside you, helping you through it? Whatever the hell ‘it’ was.
Throwing caution to the wind, I reached across the table and gripped her hand. She didn’t pull away.
‘I don’t know what’s happened. I don’t know what you’re having to deal with, but please, Mel, let me help you.’
There were tears running slowly down her cheeks as she looked up at me. She looked tragic and ethereal and incredibly beautiful.
‘Whatever is wrong, let me try to fix it.’
‘You can’t,’ she said softly, her lips managing to summon up a sad smile.
I was frantically rifling through ideas of what was troubling her. Was Steve the one who was sick? Were they in financial trouble? Had he lost his job? Was he cheating on her? The last seemed almost as ludicrous as imagining anyone ever cheating on Rhys. Steve and Mel were one of the most well-matched and in-love couples I’d ever met.
‘At least let me try to help,’ I implored.
‘It’s not possible,’ she said, reaching up to wipe away her tears with the back of her hand. ‘Unless you’re willing to have a baby for me. Because it turns out that’s something I can’t do myself.’
It took half an hour and another round of margaritas for her to tell me everything I would have known if I hadn’t dropped off the radar and devoted all my time to nurturing my business instead of my friends. How could I have got my priorities so badly screwed up?
‘As far back as two years ago we suspected there might be a problem,’ Mel confided. ‘We’d always been a bit hit-and-miss with birth control and when we abandoned it completely, I imagined I’d fall straight away.’
That would have been my worst nightmare, but Mel was different; for her it was a perfect fit. She would glow throughout pregnancy, she would blossom, she was a natural-born earth mother. But it seemed nature had no intention of making it that easy. Mel and Steve hadn’t got pregnant. ‘And let me tell you, it wasn’t for want of trying,’ she said, colouring in a way that brought some much-needed pink back to her cheeks.