Chapter Two Hundred and Ninety Eight

After church on Sunday morning, Charlie and Joey went for a walk along the beach.

"Hey, Juliet," Joey teased when she spotted Romeo coming back out of the sea with his surf board.

"What's wrong?" Charlie asked when she noticed he didn't look very happy.

"Annie's leaving today," he explained.

"When?" Joey wondered.

"In about fifteen minutes."

"Then what are you doing here?" Charlie asked. "Shouldn't you be there to see her off?"

Romeo shrugged. He had never looked more like a petulant teenager.

"She's the one choosing to leave," he said. "Why should I be bothered? She could have stayed here with me just as easily."

"Do you really want to let that get in the way?" Joey wondered. "If you love her then shouldn't you want the best for her?"

Romeo hesitated.

"What would you two do?"

"Go and say goodbye and hope she comes back soon," Charlie and Joey replied in unison.

Nodding, Romeo dumped his board and ran off in the direction of Irene's house.

"What is with me babysitting his board?" Joey grumbled.


Having put Romeo's surf board in the back room of the bait shop, Charlie and Joey had gone to the Surf Club for a smoothie and hopefully a couple of games of pool. They were both meant to be back at work in the morning and neither of them really wanted to go. Charlie was struggling to carry on upholding the law when she believed that the police had failed Summer Bay by lying about Hugo. And after another night of nightmares, Joey was desperately worried about her partner.

"Fine!" a male voice bellowed from the gym.

"Fine!" another male voice said.

Feeling nosy, Charlie and Joey craned their necks to see what was going on. Tony appeared to be in and argument with John.

"Oh dear," Joey said quietly. "I thought things had calmed down since Tony sold the gym."

"Apparently not," Charlie said, sinking into a chair.


"I'm going to miss you so much," Annie said.

Romeo kept his arms around her and nodded.

"Well, come back and visit soon," he requested.

Annie nodded and kissed him before getting into Irene's car in order to be driven to the airport. Romeo stepped back with Ruby and Xavier, watching them leave.


"Is everything alright?" Joey asked when Tony emerged from the gym.

"Bloody John Palmer," he grumbled.

Joey chuckled, wondering if John would ever stop rubbing people up the wrong way. She and Charlie had enjoyed a pleasant enough meal with him recently but generally, he was very good at offending people.

"What about John?" Gina asked, appearing behind her brother and making him jump.

"He's convinced that I'm not doing well enough in training Xavier up," he complained.

"Ruby said that Xavier's really enjoying the training," Charlie pointed out.

"Not that we're actually doing that much of it," Tony admitted. "He's always busy."

"I guess he's been rehearsing a lot for the play," Joey mused. "Maybe now it's over he'll have more time."

Gina looked puzzled.

"I thought he was still doing the training with you," she said. "He told me he was."

Tony merely shrugged.

"We'll get back to it next week," he said.

Gina continued to look concerned. She was absolutely certain that nearly every time Xavier left the house these days it was to train with Tony. Someone was lying and she didn't know who or why.

"Did you settle the argument in the end?" Charlie wondered.

She was trying to keep focussed on the conversation but her mind kept wandering. She felt utterly lost with no sense of direction at the moment.

"Argument?" Gina asked.

"John and I have decided to settle our differences in a boxing ring," Tony informed them.

Charlie and Joey exchanged worried glances as Gina began to loudly object.


"Let's do something fun," Ruby suggested.

"There's nothing fun to do now that Annie's gone," Romeo complained.

"Thanks," Ruby said sourly. "Sorry we're such bad company."

Romeo immediately apologised as they continued to trudge along the beach.

"I think she was teasing," Xavier said.

"Mostly," Ruby confirmed.

"Ruby's right though," Xavier said. "It's the weekend. We should be doing something entertaining."

"Like what?"

"We could always bug Charlie and Joey," Ruby said. "I think they were planning to hang out at the Surf Club after church. We might be able to wangle snacks and a few games of pool."

"You are one of the only people I've ever met that hangs out with their parents by choice," Xavier remarked.

"That's because most parents aren't as cool as them," Romeo pointed out.

"Or as hot," Xavier remarked.

Ruby poked him in the arm.

"I'm getting a little worried about how hot you think my parents are," she complained.

"I can't help it," Xavier said. "I have eyes. Plus, you quite obviously think Liam's hot too."

Ruby coloured and looked horrified, immediately denying it.

"She's gone all red," Romeo teased.

"Yep, she has," Xavier agreed.

Internally, he tried not to feel too threatened that his girlfriend appeared to have a crush on someone else.


"What's the deal with Charlie at the moment?" Watson asked abruptly.

She and Angelo were working separately at their desks in the office they had been sharing since the start of the year.

"Sorry?" Angelo replied, stalling for time.

"She's obviously got something on her plate," Watson said. "And she changed after her conversation with you the other day. What's the deal?"

"If you and Charlie are as close as you think you are, shouldn't she have told you?" Angelo challenged.

Watson glared at him.

"If you've done something to hurt her..." she said.

Angelo looked up sharply. He was currently sporting a black eye that he refused to tell anyone about.

"I haven't done anything," he snapped. "Why won't people just leave me alone?"


"Would you just leave me alone?" Miles snapped.

Rabbit looked offended and then disappeared. Immediately, Miles was full of regret. She'd been annoying him, going on and on about whether he was taking his medication or not and where they stood with his treatment. It was frustrating,

"Rabbit!" he called out. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped at you. Please come back. Rabbit?"


Joey was kicking arse in a game of pool with Xavier and Ruby, even though she was a team member down. Charlie sat at a table with Romeo who looked even more morose than she felt.

"I just miss her so much already," he complained. "I wish she'd loved me enough to stay."

"I don't think it was a case of her not loving you," Charlie said gently. "Even when you love someone, sometimes you still have to follow your own path."

"If you got the chance to live in another country and leave Joey behind, are you really telling me that you'd take it?" Romeo asked.

"Well, okay, no I wouldn't," Charlie admitted. "But it's different. I have a partner, a child, a job and an apartment. I'm thirty years old and unfortunately tied to being a responsible grown up. Annie's barely seventeen and she's being given a unique chance to explore other parts of the world."

"Part of me feels like I should have tried to make her stay but she obviously wanted to leave again, didn't she?" Romeo said. "I mean, if she'd have stayed just because of me she would have only resented me in the end."

Charlie nodded.

"What's that line?" she said. "If you love someone, set them free. If they don't come back then they were never yours to begin with. Or something like that. I'm not entirely sure."

Romeo nodded unhappily.

"I guess she was never mine," he sighed.

"Maybe not," Charlie said. "But someone else will be. You're only young, Romeo. You're what, eighteen?"

He nodded.

"You have the rest of your life to find 'the one'. It took me twenty nine years. But now I've got her, I'll hold onto her. And when you find the girl you're supposed to be with, she won't be going anywhere."

"I hope you're right," he said.

"I'm always right," Charlie replied with a grin.


Night had fallen and Charlie was still not looking forward to going to work the next day.

"Are you due any leave?" Joey asked.

They were still in the Surf Club but Ruby, Xavier and Romeo had all gone home.

"I have some overtime to get back," Charlie said.

"Can you take time off at short notice?" Joey asked. "If I can convince Alf to let me do the same, perhaps we could go and visit your Dad and Morag?"

Charlie's eyes lit up at the mere thought.

"Do you think we could get away with it?" she asked.

Joey looked at Alf who was on the phone.

"One way to find out," she said standing up and approaching her boss.


"He has a locker at the gym?" Gina asked.

She was at the Diner, having a spontaneous dinner with John. Having challenged him about the upcoming fight with Tony, they had got to talking about Xavier.

"Yeah," John said. "Which is weird because he's never there."

Gina couldn't help but think back to Liam's former suspicion that her son was on drugs. She and Martha hadn't found anything but he could have easily just hidden things better.

"Could you break the rules?" she asked hopefully.

"What do you mean?"

"It's probably nothing," he said. "But I wouldn't mind finding out what he's keeping in that locker."


Alf had agreed to let Joey take a few days off, mostly because he wanted to be helpful but also because he was stressed out and struggling to concentrate. Miles was meant to be over at the Diner with Elijah but he hadn't shown up and nobody had heard from him. According to Marilyn, he hadn't been home all evening and knowing how stressed he was at the moment, Alf was worried.

"Are you sure you don't mind?" he asked.

"Of course not," Joey said sincerely.

Having found out about Miles, she and Charlie had offered to go and help Alf, Leah and Elijah look for their friend.

"Thanks," Alf said. "I really appreciate it."


Charlie and Joey were just leaving the Surf Club when Gina and John hurried inside and towards the gym. They exchanged brief pleasantries before Charlie and Joey stole into the night in a bid to find Miles. John led Gina to the gym locker Xavier had hired out on a long term basis.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" John asked. "I don't want to help you fall out with him again."

"I need to know what my son is caught up in," Gina said.

Nodding, John opened the door. Inside the locker were thousands of dollars in a rather shabby box.


Next time... Xavier tells Gina about the money Hugo left behind, everyone is worried about Miles and Angelo fails to get through to Charlie...