A New Life

by illuminata79

A look at Mick and Evelyn as they are settling into their life as a couple.

1. Too Many Secrets

Like some infernal monster, still venomous in death, a war can go on killing people for a long time after it's all over.
- Nevil Shute, Requiem for a Wren

This is what Evelyn finds to be very true when a few months after moving into her place, Mick is still troubled by his wartime experience and the ramifications of his injury and finds it rather hard to settle into this different kind of life. While she is more than happy to have him back, she is sometimes hard pressed not to take his behaviour personal, although she knows that some things simply need time.

If some aspects of this story appear familiar to some of the ladies who have been following Mick's path faithfully from the beginning: I have re-worked bits and pieces from my very early work into this more detailed account of Mick and Evelyn's first months together. I hope you don't mind my recycling of old ideas.

I found the lyrics of Ghosts That We Knew by Mumford & Sons quite fitting at this point of Mick and Evelyn's story when things can be quite difficult at times and their relationship is burdened by Mick's ghosts from the past.

You saw my pain, washed out in the rain
Broken glass, saw the blood run from my veins
But you saw no fault no cracks in my heart
And you knelt beside my hope torn apart
But the ghosts that we knew will flicker from view
And we'll live a long life
So give me hope in the darkness that I will see the light
Cause oh they gave me such a fright
But I will hold as long as you like
Just promise me we'll be alright

So lead me back
Turn south from that place
And close my eyes to my recent disgrace
Cause you know my call
And we'll share my all
And our children come, they will hear me roar
So give me hope in the darkness that I will see the light
Cause oh they gave me such a fright
But I will hold as long as you like
Just promise me that we'll be alright

---

„What's all this?" he inquired irritably, nodding at the tray on the bed. "Why aren't we having breakfast in the kitchen, as usual? I can get out of bed and eat at the table just like normal people do, you know."

I set the cup I had been about to fill with freshly brewed coffee down on my nightstand, making more of a clatter than was called for.

"I just thought it would …", I began, forcing back angry tears.

"You just thought it would be so romantic, didn't you?" His eyes were cold green fire, full of spite and scorn. "It is not. I've had enough breakfast in bed to last a lifetime. Two lifetimes, minimum. Have you got any idea how good it can feel to be able to actually get up in the morning and eat your breakfast sitting in a proper chair at a proper table?"

"OK, fine, I've got the message", I retorted sharply. "I'll go and take all of this back into the kitchen and we'll do everything the usual way. Sorry for trying something new."

I picked up the tray I had so lovingly arranged and carried it back down the hall, spreading things out on the kitchen table noisily.

Some days he could be extremely hard to be with, and this was apparently going to be another of them.

I had nursed some admittedly over-romantic images of a bright and sunny morning, my filmy white bedroom curtains billowing in a soft wind while we lounged cosily in my big bed, scattering crumbs all over the covers, trying not to spill our coffee, joking, laughing, feeling at ease, and he had wiped it all away with one of his scathing remarks that made me feel so dumb and unhelpful.

You never knew what might trigger one of those, how he might react to some perfectly harmless comment, some totally trivial situation or well-meant suggestion.

He hadn't exaggerated when he'd told me on New Year's Eve that I was going to have a grumpy invalid under my feet.

Of course, I did not quite agree with the "invalid" part – I hated the word for implying that a person was worthless just because they were missing a limb or suffered from an illness – but, good Lord, I could relate to the grumpiness.

I knew he didn't mean it. I knew he couldn't help it, and when I tried to put myself into his place, I had to concede that I had no idea how I would manage to bear a disability like his, inflicted on me out of the blue. I couldn't even begin to imagine how he must feel, my ever-active, independent, outdoorsy pearl diver, suddenly having to lead a truncated life full of limitations and constraints.

But still it hurt so damn much when he was like that.

On days like these, I never seemed to find the right tone to speak to him or the right thing to do. He would brush me off brusquely if I offered to help him, saying something like "Oh please, I'm not completely useless", then, five minutes later, he'd look daggers at me for failing to notice that he needed assistance with something he was about to do.

Once, I asked him what was wrong, and he snapped at me, "What's wrong? What's wrong? I'll tell you what's wrong: Everything! I'm a fucked-up cripple, I just sit around doing nothing, I haven't got a job and live at your expense and I've no goddamn idea if that's ever gonna change - and you seriously ask me what's wrong?"

Another time, he knocked over a glass on the kitchen table, water dripping on to the floor. Before I could get a rag, he was already down, trying to mop up the mess with a napkin, shakily balancing on his one knee, grabbing at the door handle of the fridge just quickly enough to keep himself from falling over, the puddle still there on the pale blue tiles.

I wanted to reach out my hand to help him get up, but I knew he'd bat it away like some irritating insect, so I just stood by and watched with a lump in my throat as he hurled the sopping napkin in the general direction of the sink before he dragged himself up into a standing position.

He stood with his back turned on me, leaning on the worktop for support, making an effort to breathe easy and to keep his posture rigid, but nothing could hide the telltale little twitch of his shoulder blades.

At that point, I couldn't just look on any more.

I got a dishrag to throw over the spill and soak up the water, then went over to lay a hand on his back and, helplessly searching for words, stupidly stated, "You're crying."

"Yes, I am crying", he said sarcastically. "Do you mind? Are men not allowed to cry? Must I remain stoic and brave as befits a soldier, no matter how screwed up the situation?"

If only he would let me get through to him, accept my attempts to comfort him.

I never ceased trying, but every time he snubbed me, it broke my heart all over again.

He had also been right on that enchanted New Year's Eve in that I wasn't fully aware of what I was getting myself into. I had not imagined it would be quite as difficult at times.

My sister, for her part, had seen fit to warn me about getting involved with a cripple.

"Are you really certain about this, Evelyn?" she had asked me at Christmas, when Aunt Maggie was having her after-lunch nap and we were washing up in the kitchen. "You'll be playing his nurse more than anything, believe me, and things will only get worse as he grows older. Someone to look after him, that's probably what he's after, not love. And I'll bet he hasn't got a penny to his name. Are you sure he's not just a freeloader who wants to live off you? Or that, next thing you know, he'll want a say in everything you do and you'll end up renouncing your social life completely to attend to his needs day and night?"

"Oh yes, my social life that is so incredibly exciting", I scoffed, furious at myself for having let my hair down at all at this stage when things were anything but clear between Mick and myself.

I should have known all I'd get would be a load of advice I had not asked for. Marjorie had always loved telling other people what to do.

"Sorry, Marge, there's obviously something you don't seem to get at all. Several things, really." I took a deep breath. "First of all, he's not some … some drooling bedridden geezer, you know. He's had a leg amputated after he was wounded in the war, which is an awful thing to happen, but it's not like he needs care twenty-four hours a day. Apart from the leg, he's in fine health for all I know, and perfectly capable of looking after himself. Second, it is me who's trying to persuade him to come and live with me. He'd have been way too proud to come begging for shelter, as he'd probably put it. He would rather sleep under a bridge, missing leg and all, than ask me to take him in. And, put that in your pipe and smoke it, he's not some opportunist stranger. I'm doing this because I want to. Because I don't want to live without him and because I goddamn love him."

"Oh, how utterly romantic!" Her voice was dripping with rude sarcasm now. "How do you know you love him so much when you haven't seen him in – what? Two years? When all you had before that was some chance encounters on that island full of naked savages and a shag in a beach hut?"

I wanted to slap her smug face for the derisive tone she employed to desecrate the wonderful thing Mick and I had shared back then. I wanted to tell her to go to hell and bloody stay there.

Barely restraining myself, I said very coolly, "You can think whatever you want. It may have been a short time we had back then, but sometimes, Marge, sometimes you just know. It doesn't always take several years of engagement" – I put particular emphasis on the word, knowing full well that it would remind her of the only serious boyfriend she'd ever had, a bloke who'd broken off theirs after he'd kept her waiting for ages – "to realize somebody is the one."

She gasped for air, incredulous.

"Maybe you would see what I mean if you had met him", I added.

Or maybe she wouldn't. I had a feeling she and Mick would not get along, and I was suddenly glad he had declined my invitation to spend the holiday with us.

I had not spoken to my sister since, and never in a million years would I have admitted she was right.

For she wasn't.

Yes, this new kind of life was difficult, very much so sometimes.

There was such a lot I didn't know about him, so many secrets I felt he might never tell, so many experiences he might never be ready to share. He spoke almost as little of his childhood and youth as he talked about the war and the hospital.

I was loath to push him, but I did feel locked out of a large part of his life, and many a time I wished he would open up to me, at least occasionally, to help me understand him and all his needs and hopes and fears.

His mood swings hitting out of nowhere could be hard to cope with, but there were worse things than that, like those phases when he was physically present but not actually there, when depression kept a tight grip on him and he retreated into his shell for hours, days even, hardly speaking, barely touching his food, brooding way too much.

Sometimes, mostly when the weather changed, his leg played up and tortured him with phantom pain. I got the impression that he bore physical discomfort a little more easily, but it was still tough to watch him suffer in silence, stubbornly refusing to complain, trying hard to let nobody see his trouble while the way he held himself and how he clamped his lips so tightly shut that they turned white around the edges spoke volumes.

But for all the distress and dejection, there were plenty of good things, too.

Simply having him back was so much more than I would have dared wish for, which made every day a little gift in itself.

The mere fact that he lived, that he was with me now, sufficed to make up for much of the frustration and all the tears shed in secrecy so he wouldn't see.

We had those wonderful mornings when he opened his eyes and smiled at me, his lovely crooked little smile that never quite managed to push all the sadness from his haunted face but made me feel so warm and tender and overflowing with love.

We had sunny days spent in the Royal Botanic Gardens, a place we both loved, and the occasional picnic lunch on a bench in the park near where we lived, and rainy afternoons when I'd make a pot of tea and we'd both make ourselves comfortable on the sofa with a book and a cuppa.

Gradually, I learned not to let his outbursts get to me too much, learned to weather those storms of desperate, destitute wrath, knowing he was not actually lashing out at me but at the cruel fate that had let him survive the war but claimed his leg and with it the absolute independence that had been his greatest treasure.

Gradually, he learned to tolerate a bit of closeness, although he was always very careful not to be seen fully naked, and all he'd let me do in bed was hold his hand or lay mine on his shoulder as we went to sleep. But at least he didn't wrap his quilt quite as firmly around himself to make sure I wouldn't accidentally brush his leg with nothing but the fabric of his pajamas between us, and sometimes he allowed me to cuddle up to his good side under the covers after we'd woken up in the morning.

But I found that I missed the physical aspects of love a lot more than I had expected, now that we were sharing quarters.

We had moved from chaste hugs and kisses on to more passionate embraces, but we never went all the way, and it never involved his getting undressed below the waist or my touching his leg.

I sensed that he was not ready yet and decided willy-nilly to take matters slowly there, but nevertheless the slightest gentle touch, the softest kiss made a desire flare up deep inside me that begged urgently to be quenched.

He didn't have to do more than run a finger along the back of my neck to have me shivering all over, the fleeting brush of his lips on my cheekbone had me tingling with an anticipation that I knew would be in vain once more.

Sometimes it simply killed me to be so close to him and yet so far apart in this respect.

If only I could find a way to convince him that he was still attractive to me, that I was not only pretending he was still able to arouse those feelings in me, that there was no need to hide anything from my view.

When he had first moved in, it had cut me to the bone to see all the little things that hinted at the terrible, permanent damage the war had done – most of all, the single shoe on the floor beside the bed, but also the ever-present crutches, the large vial of painkillers in the bathroom cabinet, doors in the apartment kept open so he'd not have to bother with the knobs before entering a room, and those slow halting steps where a confident stride used to be even on unknown terrain – but not once had I felt put off by his disfigurement.

In fact, I wished he'd be more candid about it, that he'd finally let me in on what he was hiding, break that big taboo between us, allow it to become a normal part of everyday life, but no matter how often I tried to make him see he was absolutely wrong there, he still seemed to believe it was out of pity or compassion or a sense of obligation that I had asked him to move in with me, that all we could have was maybe not entirely platonic love but certainly not the kind of intense intimacy we had known for such a short time back on the island.

I knew full well that this was nothing that could be forced. What was required most of all was time, and patience.

Alas, waiting patiently for something I could not influence had never been my strong suit. I had always wanted to make things happen, to speed them up, to see quick progress. Now I sometimes felt like a child who wishes for a magic wand to bring about change in the blink of an eye, particularly in moments like the breakfast episode.

He remained cranky all day long after that. All I got when I addressed him were monosyllabic, barked answers, so, eventually, I stopped speaking to him altogether and retreated into my study to sort my papers and begin with the preparations for my new job as a lecturer at the University of Sydney.

My first working day was just two weeks away, and I had not done much so far, but of course I couldn't think very clearly with the atmosphere so tense.

Having stared at a blank sheet for I didn't know how long, I threw down my pencil angrily and went to get myself a drink.

A gust of cool air and the familiar aroma of his cigarettes greeted me when I entered the kitchen.

Mick was leaning out the open window, elbows propped upon the sill, shoulders drawn up, blowing out a little cloud of smoke.

I didn't say anything, but he had noticed my coming in and gave me a weary look over his shoulder. There was no aggression in his eyes now, just a tired kind of melancholy.

Still smarting from the harsh way he'd treated me all day, I didn't react immediately, just poured myself some water and then stood with the glass in my hand, meeting his gaze.

It was him who spoke first.

He flicked his cigarette butt away and gingerly turned around, holding on to the windowsill for support, and said, "I behaved like a moron this morning. I'm … I'm sorry, Evelyn. I … know you just wanted to do something nice."

I set down the glass, quite surprised. He had never been one to apologize easily.

"And I know it's hard for you sometimes, living with a …"

"Don't say it", I cut in, sharper than intended. "Don't call yourself all those dreadful names."

"Okay, fine, if that's what you want. But still … don't think I never see you cry. Don't think I never notice how you look at me and wish you'd got me back in one piece."

"I don't …"

"Yes, you do", he insisted softly. "'Course you do. Isn't it just natural to wish I hadn't come back a … like this?" He indicated his leg with a tiny resigned nod that was so much more eloquent than a million words and melted the last bit of resistance left within me from the day's strife.

I went and put my arms around him and rested my face against his chest, closing my eyes, too overwhelmed to even weep.

He rested his chin on the top of my head, and we held each other silently for a long while, until he gave a little suppressed groan and straightened up, pressing his fingers hard into the flesh at the base of his neck in an attempt to loosen up the cramped muscles there.

I told him to go and lie on the sofa, closed the window, washed my hands with warm water so they wouldn't be too chilly and went after him.

Using the crutches put a great strain on his upper torso in spite of his well-developed muscles, and massaging his ever-tense back and shoulders was among the very few things he would gladly ask me to do for him.

He had stretched out long, face down on the sofa, his shirt flung over the armrest, one hand kneading a tight knot right next to his left shoulder blade.

I bent over him, digging my fingers firmly into the hardened muscles, sometimes even employing my elbow to loosen up a particularly tense spot.

"You're getting really good at this", he muttered into the cushions.

"Thanks. But I think I'm going to switch to a different method now. My arms are getting tired. What do you think of this?" I tickled the curve of his spine very lightly, which made him shiver.

"Mmmm." He turned his face sideways and smiled luxuriantly.

Thus encouraged, I proceeded to kiss the nape of his neck, just below the hairline, trailing my lips along the taut round contours of his shoulder and down his side to where a new scar bore witness of something that had happened after we had parted, probably during the war. I drew a finger along the slender triangle of pearly white tissue, then brushed it very gently with my lips and made my way back up to his face for a kiss.

He responded instantly, his hand twining into my hair at the back of my head, his mouth eagerly meeting mine.

Still holding me close, he sat up, and I slipped onto the sofa next to him, our lips locking again.

At some point I pulled back for a moment, taking his face in both hands, just looking.

What a beauty he was, more than ever to me, despite all the traces two hard wartime years had left.

His enigmatic green eyes appeared larger and his cheekbones much more pronounced in his leaner face, his features all the more chiselled and sharply intense.

Lines had begun to etch themselves into the smooth skin of his forehead and around the mouth and eyes, speaking of past pain and sorrow, and he had not regained much of the weight he had lost, but his month by the sea had brought back a lovely golden touch of suntan. His hair, thick and wavy as ever, had finally outgrown the all-too-neat army cut, sticking up in places and beginning to curl, which made him look a lot more like himself even with a good deal of grey around the temples.

He drew me closer for another kiss, his hand sliding from my shoulder to my breasts, cupping one of them through the thin cotton of the shirt I wore, his mouth playfully nuzzling my neck.

I was on fire, a desperate yearning pulsating deep within me, and let my fingers wander slowly down his side and along the waistband of his khakis. He did not stir but I felt him flinch ever so slightly.

Nevertheless, my hand moved a little further south to where his reaction to my caresses had become quite obvious, resting for a moment on the firm bulge straining against the fabric of his pants.

All my previous self-control crumbled, and I quickly undid his belt and was fumbling for the top button of his khakis when his hands swiftly swooped down to grab mine.

"No!"

The tormented, almost panicky undertone of his voice startled me even more than the sudden crushing grip of his hands.

I stared at him, astonished, shocked, and tried to tug my hands free.

Only then did he seem to realize that he was clutching them way too hard.

He let go with a mortified, almost appalled expression, repeating in a much smaller voice, "I'm sorry … but please … don't. Don't … make me. I'm not sure if I'm still … able to … do that."

"But …"

"I know it looked as if … it even felt like I wanted …" He closed his eyes for a second and, weakly rubbing his forehead, murmured hoarsely, "I can't, Evelyn. Heaven knows I wish it wasn't so, but I really can't."

I watched with a bleeding heart and stinging eyes as he did up his belt again and hastily threw on his shirt, buttoning it up with a determination that made it feel like a door being shut in my face.

With a sinking feeling, I realized that what I'd done had been terribly beside the point.

I should have known better than to go on when I first sensed a certain reluctance on his part. Instead, I had barged right into the minefield in my rush of desire, egged on by his body's treacherous signals, thinking he'd go along if I was resolute enough.

While he did not deign to look at me, he hadn't moved farther away from me either. He was sitting in exactly the same place as before, with just a few inches of space between us.

Inches that felt like miles now, as he kept his face turned the other way purposefully, one hand resting on his mangled leg in a protective manner.

I sat motionless, too, but my mind was racing.

What had I done that warranted such a fierce reaction? What exactly had it been that made him freak out like that?

Was it something he didn't want me to see by any means? Had the detonation or whatever it was that had cost him his leg done vaster damage and mutilation than I had assumed, or were there some physical impediments, due to some kind of disease or injury, that prevented a normal sex life? It had certainly felt like everything was in fine working order down there, but who knew what he might be hiding.

Or was it all in his mind? Had I touched on some horrifying memory, done something that reminded him of some traumatic moment?

Again, I wished I knew so much more about him, about what he had been through in the war, about the extent of his injuries and about the things he had seen happening.

How was I supposed to help him heal when I had no clue what his wounds were, neither those of the body nor those of the soul?

Would I get another chance at helping him at all?

A leaden cold fear took hold that I had messed it all up in a short unbridled outburst of passion, overriding his apparent unease single-handedly, and that this was the end of it all.

I was so terribly afraid I had destroyed the trust and closeness we had rebuilt in the last weeks.

Again, I longed to touch him, even more than before if that was possible, but there was no lust, no carnal appetite now, only the ardent wish to bridge this deep rift that had suddenly opened.

His back was still half turned on me, his jaw set tightly, pushed forward just the smallest fraction in that forbidding way he had.

He didn't acknowledge my presence in the least, and I didn't dare reach out for him, feeling utterly alone right there beside him.

A wave of self-pity finally washed away all restraint, and I dissolved into bitter tears, which I tried to keep silent at first, but the fist I pressed against my mouth could not muffle the desperate ragged sob that broke from my throat, followed by another, and then another.

But the crying did nothing to ease my misery. My whole body still seemed to be thrumming with a tension that made my ears ring and my heart pound out a merciless march in my chest, leaving me weak and quivery.

I wrapped my arms around myself without even trying to stem the flow of tears. I didn't have the strength to wipe my eyes or blow my nose.

I was beyond caring. I just cried.

And then, there it was, his cautious, tentative hand on my back, the gentlest touch between the shoulder blades.

I cried all the harder for it.

His arm came around my waist, pulling me closer, his cold hands cradling my head to his chest. The warm pressure of his lips on my forehead triggered another bout of violent sobbing.

I simply couldn't stop, gasping for air in between like a young child who has worn herself out in a fit of tears, and he simply held me, let me bury my puffy face in his shirt, stroking my back, patiently waiting until it was over.

"I'm so sorry about … what happened", he said when I sat up again, dabbing at my eyes with the handkerchief he'd produced from his pocket. "You must have thought I'd lost my mind."

"I …"

"Don't say anything now. I know I gave you quite a fright. I gave myself quite a fright. It wasn't your fault. I sort of panicked, I guess, because I … don't think I can … well, you know what I mean."

"But … that's not …"

"See, Evelyn, I love you, very much so, but if you find you can't live with ... what I am now, I won't blame you. You're not obliged to me in any way, and I'd understand if you found it unbearable after all to be stuck with a crippled nothing of a man who can't even satisfy you in bed any more." He swallowed hard and said in a thick voice, "You're young, you're beautiful, and you're pretty damn smart, and you've got all of your life still ahead of you. You don't have to stick around if you think you can't stand it in the long run. I can manage on my own, you know."

"Oh yes, Mick, I'm sure you can."

It sounded way more sarcastic than it was supposed to, but his defeatism simply drove me up the wall, so I continued, only slightly less biting, "Don't you think I'd have happily abandoned you if you really were so useless and off-putting as you make it sound?"

I realized I was all but shouting and toned down my voice a bit as I went on, "Can't you see I'm with you because I want to and because I love you? I don't care if you've got one leg or two or none at all as long as you're there, and I'm pretty sure we'll work out a lot of things given enough time. I won't be running away if the going gets tough. All I want is for you to trust me and to talk to me and to believe me when I say I want you, just the way you are! If you feel you can't … do certain things just yet, well then, I promise I will wait until you think you're ready to, whenever that is. There's only one thing I couldn't possibly bear, and that is a life without you!" I sniffed loudly to stifle another sob and wiped at my nose with the back of my hand in a very unladylike way.

He looked up at me, utterly surprised, and remained silent for a thoughtful minute until his mouth curved into the tiniest hint of a smile.

"Well, if you are so sure you want to stay … I'm not likely to run away any time soon, am I?"

"No, I don't think you are." I put my hand on his knee and added, "And that's just as well."