Happy Endings by Jon Rance

threatening cold had dissipated too and all that was left was Kate and me. The rest of the world seemed to evaporate, as if we’d been cut and pasted onto a blank piece of paper. After what seemed like an age, and just as my knees were really beginning to hurt, Kate said, ‘Oh, Ed.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Why are you doing this now? Of all nights, why tonight?’
    I had to get up. The moment had come and gone. I’d thrown my heart into the ring and it had been returned slightly battered and a bit bruised.
    ‘I thought it would be . . .’
    ‘Romantic?’
    ‘Yes, sort of.’
    ‘Well it isn’t, Ed, it’s just . . . I can’t believe you sometimes.’
    ‘What? What have I done?’
    I was completely flabbergasted. I was hoping to get engaged and in my head I imagined an emphatic ‘yes!’ or at the very least a ‘maybe we should wait until I get back’, but I definitely didn’t anticipate anger. ‘It’s emotional blackmail. Get a ring on my finger and I won’t be able to leave on my stupid trip. Was that your big plan?’
    ‘No, Kate, of course not. I didn’t want you to leave without knowing how I felt.’
    ‘But why now and why here? It just doesn’t make sense.’
    It felt at that moment like nothing really made sense any more. The girl I loved was taking off for six months on a trip that didn’t make any sense. We were standing outside in the freezing cold arguing over a marriage proposal that perhaps didn’t make any sense. I was twenty-nine, almost thirty, and for the first time in as long as I could remember, my life didn’t make any sense.
    ‘I’m sorry, just forget it,’ I said and I walked back inside.

Jack
    Dad died of a heart attack when I was fifteen. Up until that point in his life he’d been healthy, but one day, while Mum and I were out shopping, he had a massive heart attack and that was it. He was gone.
    I loved and admired my father. He was a brilliant dad and an amazing man. In his younger days he had excelled at sport and played cricket for his state. In his twenties he started a thriving real estate business and we lived in a large house in Sydney and had everything we wanted. I idolised him. I wanted to be just like him and thought he’d always be there to set the example for me to follow. That was before his heart stopped, and after that I knew better. That’s the trouble when you lose someone at such an early age, it destroys the notion that people are around forever. I’d barely touched adulthood and already I was one parent down. It didn’t seem fair.
    It crushed Mum and she returned with me to England soon after. She’d grown up there and only moved to Australia in her thirties when she met Dad. I loved living in Australia, it was my home and all I ever knew, but without Dad it was too much for her to handle. Every street corner held too many memories. Mum still had family in England and she thought a fresh start would be best for the both of us. At first I resisted and in some ways resented her. I didn’t want to leave Sydney and especially for cold, wet England, but in time and once I realised the anger wasn’t aimed at her, but really at Dad for dying, we made our peace.
    Most Sunday mornings Emma and I would visit Mum. Sometimes it was a bit of a chore, but it was Mum. We were all she had.
    ‘You can’t make it?’
    Emma was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee, going through the script. I was waiting for my toast to pop and for my tea to stew.
    ‘I need to go through these new notes and I’m meeting Rhys for lunch.’
    Mum adored Emma because I think she’d always wanted a daughter. My parents met later in life and Mum was in her late thirties when she had me. In those days having babies beyond that age just wasn’t the done thing – I was their one shot at a proper family.
    I was trying to be understanding about the film, but it was becoming harder and harder with every passing day. Emma and I already didn’t see each other as often as we