Like cook her dinner, for example.
Callum. She shook off the traitorous thought. ‘So Michael’s doing all the planning, huh? Where do I get me a man like that?’
‘I’m lucky, Ava.’ Lulu let out a deep breath. ‘I know the past year or so I’ve been a sad sack and I haven’t been the best company or anything like a half-decent sister to you. I’ve had so many things to work out. I’ve had lots of time to look back and think about what happened and … I just want to say … I know you never wanted me to marry Callum.’
The truth of it was like an electric shock to Ava’s heart and she sat bolt upright. ‘God, Lulu … that’s not true.’
‘C’mon. I know you never liked him. From the first day I brought him home to meet you and Mum and Dad, I could tell.’
‘Well …’ Ava floundered.
‘You were kinda bitchy,’ Lulu said with a laugh. ‘And I loved that you turned all big sister, that you were trying to protect me. I really did. I know how excruciating it must have been for you to never—not once, ever—say a word.’
Lulu was right. Ava had never said a word, the reasons for which were so damn complicated. ‘It was your heart and your choice,’ Ava finally said, trying to keep her voice flat and unemotional.
Lulu sighed. ‘There was nothing you could have said anyway that would have stopped me, but I know now you were right.’
Ava squeezed her eyes closed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Lulu had mostly kept her own counsel about the break-up. So why this, and why now? Admitting she shouldn’t have married Callum felt cruel. Not that Lulu intended it that way, but it stung.
‘Did you love him?’ Ava swallowed the gulp in her throat, hoping like hell the past tense in her words was correct. This was the most open discussion she’d had with her sister about her marriage break-up. Lulu had kept things close, private, to herself, while she and Callum were in the middle of the heartbreak. She’d never told Ava exactly what had happened. Clearly, it was too big and too painful to reveal.
‘I thought I did. But if that were true …’ Lulu paused. ‘Oh, never mind. I can see it now, how huge that mistake was, and it hurts to look back on it. I’m not proud of what happened, but maybe I had to go through that to accept this happiness with Michael. This is real, Ava, what I have now. What we share is so different and a million miles away from what Callum and I had.’
‘I’m glad you’re happy, Lulu.’ And Ava genuinely was. But. There was a ‘but’. She felt a big old pang of defensiveness about Callum. He’s not that bad, she wanted to say. In fact, he’s pretty damn wonderful. But how could she say that to her sister after what he’d done? And anyway, what did Ava know about married life? Or marriage to Callum? How on earth would she know what he was really like outside the strictly defined confines of her fantasy about him? Sure, he seemed like a wonderful man. But perhaps he was something different when you got to know him. Was he uncaring? Mean? Inconsiderate? Distant? Clearly something had gone wrong between them and Ava was a firm believer in the ‘it takes two to tango’ school of relationship advice. But Ava had never uttered a word of that theory to her sister and wasn’t about to start now.
‘I am happy, Ava,’ Lula said and there it was, that unintentional girlish giggle in her voice. How was it fair, Ava wondered. Lulu had married Callum and was now with the lovely, if slightly too normal, Michael. She’d had two shots at love and happiness and the whole damn thing.
Ava was still waiting for hers. Her problem was that she’d never met a man who’d measured up to who Callum Malone was in her head. She’d seen everyone through that lens. And it hadn’t done her any good.
‘Oh no,’ Lulu gasped. ‘I don’t know how we got into this conversation. I didn’t mean to go over all that old history. You called me, didn’t you? Did you have something to tell me or were you just calling for a gossip?’
Ava steeled herself. It was time to bite the bullet. ‘I’ve got some news, actually. I’ve been meaning to tell you something. I’ve got this amazing new landscaping job lined up that I’m really excited about. Callum has contracted me to do his Coogee house.’
‘Oh.’ Lulu’s voice was small and faraway.
‘Look, I really hope it isn’t weird for you, but it was an offer too good to refuse. He’s paying very well and Andy and I could do with the work.’
‘But … but I thought you hated him, Ava?’
‘Apparently not enough to say no to landscaping his garden. His multiple gardens.’ And then the guilty words came out in a rush as Ava flopped backwards on her sofa and stared at the ceiling. ‘He’s offered me really good money and a recommendation to the big end of town.’