Mette laughed over the way that Flora struggled to get her tongue around the Norwegian pronunciation, and when Flora stretched out her arms Mette gave her a hug. So simple, so natural, without any of the thought that Aksel put into his hugs. None of the wondering whether he was going too fast, or too slowly.
But, then, Flora didn’t have agonised hope to contend with. Or the feeling that he didn’t deserve Mette’s hugs. Aksel watched as Mette showed Flora her toys, noticing that Flora didn’t help Mette as much as he did, and that his daughter responded to that by becoming more animated.
‘What’s that?’ Flora pointed to a box of jumbo-sized dominoes and Mette opened it, tipping the contents onto the floor. ‘Oh, dominoes! I love dominoes…’
‘Would you like to play?’ The words slipped out before Aksel could stop them. He wanted to watch her with Mette for just a little longer.
Flora treated the request as if it was an invitation to a tour of the seven wonders of the world. Mette couldn’t resist her excited smile and gave an emphatic ‘Yes!’
‘Shall we do that thing first…?’ Mette took a few uncertain steps towards Flora, clearly wanting to know what that thing was. Aksel wanted to know too. ‘Where you stand them all up in a row and then knock them down again?’
Flora started to gather the dominoes together, putting them in a pile on the floor. ‘It’s such fun. Your papa will show you, I can never get them to balance properly.’
That was a ruse to get him involved. But Flora could manipulate him as much as she liked if this was the result. Aksel sat down on the floor, and started to line the dominoes up in a spiral pattern, seeing his own hand shake with emotion as he did so. Flora and Mette were both watching him intently, Mette bending forward to see.
‘Spirals, eh? Show-off…’ Flora murmured the words and Aksel felt his shoulders relax suddenly. Maybe this wasn’t so difficult after all.
When Flora walked out to her car, it was already getting dark. She’d stayed longer than she’d intended with Aksel and Mette, and the work that she’d expected to take an hour had taken two. That might be something to do with the daydreaming. Aksel’s bulk and strength and the gentle vulnerability that little blonde-haired, blue-eyed Mette brought out in him were downright mouth-watering.
He was so anxious to please and yet so awkward with his daughter. Aksel watched over Mette’s every move, ready to catch her if there was even the smallest likelihood that she might fall. He meant well, but he was smothering her.
Not your business, Flora. Dr Sinclair will deal with it.
Lyle Sinclair had a way of taking patients or their families aside and gently suggesting new ways of looking at things. And Lyle would have the advantage of not feeling quite so hot under the collar at the mere thought of a conversation with Aksel.
‘Flora!’
Flora closed her eyes in resignation at the sound of his voice. However hard she tried to escape him… When she turned and saw him striding across the car park towards her, she didn’t want to escape him at all.
‘I wanted to thank you.’
He’d done that already. More than once, and in as many words as Aksel seemed capable of.
‘It was my pleasure. I always bring a little gift for the children, to make them feel welcome.’ She’d told him that already, too. They could go on for ever like this, repeating the same things over and over again.
‘I…’ He spread his hands in a gesture of helplessness. ‘You have a way with children.’
He made it sound as if it was some kind of supernatural power. Flora frowned. ‘Children are just…people. Only they’re usually a bit more fun.’
‘You have a way with people, then.’
It was a nice compliment, especially since it was accompanied by his smile. Something was bugging him, but she wasn’t the right person to speak to about it. She had too much baggage…
Baggage or experience? Experience was something that she could use to help her get things right this time. She’d been an impressionable teenager when she’d loved Tom, but she knew better now. There was no cosmic rule that said she had to fall for Aksel, and she could handle the regrets over never being able to trust a man enough to build a relationship. If that meant that she’d never be able to sit on the floor and play dominoes with her own child, she could deal with that, too.
Flora turned, opening the rear door of her car and dumping her bags in the footwell. Then she faced him. If all he had to throw at her were longing and regret, she’d already made her peace with them, a long time ago.
‘You’ve said “Thank you” already, there’s no need for us to stand in the cold here while you say it again. What’s bugging you?’
That was obviously confronting. But the slight twitch at the corners of his mouth told Flora that challenge was one of the things that he thrived on.
He took a breath, as if preparing himself. ‘My relationship with Mette’s mother was over before Mette was born and we never lived together as a family.’
What was he trying to say? That he’d been an absent father who hardly knew his own child? His obvious commitment to his daughter made that difficult to believe.
‘And now?’
‘I can’t bring her mother back, or her sight. But I’d give anything to make her happy and…’ He shrugged. ‘It’s not working. When I saw you with her this afternoon, I saw how much it wasn’t working.’
Flora thought quickly. Aksel needed the kind of professional help that didn’t fall within her area of expertise.
‘Maybe you should talk to Lyle Sinclair. The clinic has a family counsellor who deals with just these kinds of issues, and Lyle could organise a session for you both.’
He shook his head abruptly. ‘Mette’s just fine the way she is. I won’t put her into counselling just because I need to change.’
‘Maybe it’s not about change, but just getting to know each other better. Kathy uses storytelling a lot in her sessions, to make things fun. I’m sure you have plenty of stories about the places you’ve been—’
‘No.’ That sounded like a hard limit. ‘That part of my life is over. Mette needs to know that I’ll be there for her, always. That I’m not about to leave, and go to places that she can’t.’
His heart was in the right place, but his head was way off course, and lost without a map or compass. This was something she could help with; Flora had grown up with a brother who hadn’t always been able to do the things that she had. When Alec had been ill, she’d learned how to go out into the world, and to bring something back to share with her brother when she got home.
‘Who says that you can’t go together?’ Flora gave an imperious twitch of her finger, indicating that he should follow her, and started to walk.
