Someone Like You(48)

Accidentally shagged him. Fallen in love with him.

What use had she been to anybody?

'I … I've got to go,' Lizzie stammered. She stood on shaky legs, grabbed  her bodyboard and held it in front of her like a big red shield,  guarding herself from him, and turned to run up the soft sand to the  stairs.

'Lizzie, where are you going?' Dan called. As he watched her jog up the  sand, over the dunes and away, he planted his hands on his head, hoping  the move would stop the top of it blowing off.

All the stress relief the surf had provided was gone. As Lizzie pounded  the hot bitumen road back to her house, the sound of her thongs slapping  against her heels echoing around her, she swore good and proper. The  tension was back in her shoulders, she felt herself grinding her teeth,  and the beginnings of a headache were pounding at her temples. And most  embarrassingly, her eyes were swimming with tears.

Why did Dan want to probe so much? What did it matter why she didn't  visit him in hospital? From what she'd heard, it had been like Grand  Central Station in there, anyway. What possible difference could she  have made?

The pink flamingos beckoned her home and as she got closer something  seemed strange to her. There was a noise in the distance which raised  the hairs on the back of her neck, sent a skitter of panic right through  her. It was a faint cry, and a voice, calling out weakly. Lizzie's  footsteps quickened and when she made it to her driveway she gasped in  shock at the sight of Harri, flat on her back in her own front yard,  moaning and distressed.

'Harri!' Her bodyboard dropped with a dull thud on the garden bed and Lizzie scrambled to Harri's side.

'Harri, what's happened?'





CHAPTER


25


Lizzie hovered over Harri, her own heart pounding like a drum in her  ears. The older woman lay crumpled, her mouth twisted in distress and  her face already pink from sunburn. She held an arm over her eyes in a  feeble attempt to block out the blazing sun and the heat, and her bun  had come loose, a grey curtain of hair on the footpath around her head.

'Bugger, Lizzie,' Harri moaned. 'I tripped on the hose. I think it's my hip. It hurts like the devil.'

Lizzie's pulse throbbed in her head. She took a quick look up and down  the street so see if anyone was outside, anyone who might hear her  shouts for help. She found no one. She grabbed her board and propped it  against Harri's elbow, creating some shade on her face.

'Hold that, Harri. I'll get help.' Lizzie dashed past Joe's four-wheel  drive in her driveway and shoved the back door open. She'd left her  mobile on the kitchen bench and raced for it, pressing Joe's name. She  hoped like hell he was at Ry and Julia's.

'Hey-'

'Your car keys,' she demanded. 'Where are they?'

'In my pocket.'

'Shit, Joe. Harri's had a fall. Looks like she might have broken her hip. I don't-'

'Stop right there,' Joe ordered. 'I'm hanging up now and calling an ambulance. And I'm on my way.'

Lizzie raced back out to Harri with a wet flannel, knowing enough about  first aid not to move her or give her anything to drink, in case she  needed surgery later.

She knelt down on the cement footpath, taking care to mop the older  woman's brow gently. From somewhere, she summoned a calm, low voice. The  last thing she wanted to do was upset Harri any more than she already  was. 'How long do you think you've been out here?'

Harri's eyes flickered. 'I'd just had a cuppa during the five o'clock  news on the ABC and then I came out here to water the garden.'

Lizzie glanced at the face of her mobile, still gripped tight in her  fingers, and noticed it was past six o'clock. 'That's more than an hour,  you poor thing.'         

     



 

'I figured someone would eventually hear me.' Harri began to tear up and  she reached for Lizzie's hand, clutching at her with weak fingers. 'I  knew you'd be back soon enough. Thank goodness for you, Lizzie.'

A screech of tires announced the arrival of Joe. In Dan's car. With Dan  driving. Car doors slammed and the two men were at Harri's side in a few  long strides.

Joe immediately knelt on the other side of Harri's prone body, shooting a quick glance at his sister before speaking.

'What the fuck, Harri? Don't you know old women like you should be more  careful?' The affection and concern in his voice was evident. When  Lizzie lifted her eyes from Harri's face, she could see the worry in  Joe's eyes. He held Harri's hand in his, gentle and caring. They'd  obviously become closer than she'd realised over their morning  crosswords.

And then she looked up to Dan. He was standing back from the huddle, a  wrinkled black T-shirt on inside out. His hair was still wet and his  feet were bare. What was he doing here with Joe?

He must have sensed her question because he answered it. 'I was about to  head out, saw Joe and he jumped in the car. I drove so he could call  the ambulance. We figured it would be quicker that way.'

Lizzie couldn't find any words, just nodded her thanks. Then they heard  the sirens, becoming reassuringly louder as the ambulance approached.  When it pulled up on the side of the street, two women wearing green  uniforms climbed out calmly, one moving to the back of the van to  retrieve a kit.

Lizzie and Joe moved out of the way while the paramedics checked Harri's  pulse and blood pressure and administered some pain relief. They spoke  calmly to Harri, asked her a few questions and then gently loaded her up  onto a stretcher for a trip to hospital.

'Anyone coming?' The taller of the two paramedics looked from Lizzie to Joe to Dan.

'I'll go with her,' Lizzie said quickly. With a downwards glance and  then an embarrassing realisation, she saw she was half-dressed in her  wetsuit, her bikini top all that was covering the top half of her body.  'Just give me a minute.'

But before she could turn to race back inside, a strong hand shot out to grip her forearm.

'Mosquito,' Joe said firmly. 'You're staying here. I'll go.'

She tried to shake him off. 'No, I can go. She'll need someone with her.'

'Which is why I'll go with Harri.' Joe dropped his hand, turned to the paramedic.

Lizzie followed the rolling stretcher to the rear of the ambulance. It  slid in to the back of the vehicle and one of the paramedics hopped in  the back alongside her.

'You're in good hands, Harri,' Lizzie called. Seeing the inside of the  ambulance sent a chill down Lizzie's spine and she tried to control her  breathing. She hated ambulances and hospitals. And Joe knew it. He'd  remembered. She swallowed the tears at how wonderful her big brother  was. She'd forgotten that about him since he'd been home.

Before he hopped into the back of the ambulance, she reached for him.  Although hesitant at first, he finally hugged her right back with a  comforting pat on her bare back.

'Thanks, Stinkface,' she murmured into his shirt. 'Call me when you know something. Anything.'

'It's the least I could do, Mosquito.'

He stepped up into the back of the ambulance and the doors swung closed.

Lizzie and Dan stood side by side, watched it manoeuvre back out the  driveway and drive off down the road. Lizzie had to remind herself that  Harri was safely strapped in the back, the best care at her side, and  that Joe was right there with her. She had to remember to breathe. She  let out a slow exhale, hoping the tension she felt in every synapse in  her body would disappear with it. It didn't work. Rubbing her hands over  her arms, she felt tense, distracted, slightly dizzy.

Two magpies, perched on the electricity wires above, called an evening song to the wind.

'Mosquito?' Dan asked, finally, the humour in his voice hard to hide.

She stole a quick glance at him, all she could bear to do. 'I was always  buzzing around him when I was a kid, desperate for the attention of my  big brother. He, of course, wanted nothing to do with me.'

'And he still gets away with it, all these years later?'

'Yeah, well.' Lizzie shrugged. 'Nicknames seem to stick in my family.'

Just saying the word family took her to the precipice of panic all over  again. The adrenalin rush was still buzzing through her veins and she  felt hyper-aware of everything and half-sick with it. The rush of cool  breeze on her hair. The still warm sun making her squint in its glare.  The goosebumps still prickled on her bare arms. The taste of salt on her  lips.         

     



 

And Dan. The sexy smell of salt on his skin.

And then she couldn't hold it in any longer, needed to get it out, to  dissect it, to understand it. 'What if she'd knocked her head? What if I  hadn't come home when I did?' Lizzie's throat clenched and her bottom  lip quivered. She turned to look at Dan, wanting answers from somebody,  anybody.

'You've had a big scare,' he said, and reached over to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

It was enough contact for her to feel the jolt of heat from him, and  when she watched his eyes taking a slow tour of her lips, her neck, her  breasts and the exposed skin on her stomach, a tremble of awareness  rocked her.

'Yeah. What a day.' She propped her hands at her bare waist, just above  the rolled down wetsuit, and tried to breathe. Poor Harri. She covered  her eyes with her hands and her shoulders shook.