Meredith Webber - Christmas at Jimmie's Children's Unit - Bachelor of the Baby Ward / Fairytale on the Children's Ward

‘See,’ she said quietly, ‘just there under the lemon tree, I’ve a little table with cut-up apple and banana and some cherries on it.’

She had the outside light on, knowing its soft yellow glow didn’t disturb the nocturnal animals.

Holding Hamish steady on the bench, she was aware of Angus moving up behind her, aware of the warmth of his body close, and even the scent of him, citrusy yet still male. It was some primordial instinct that had her body responding, she told herself, trying hard to concentrate on Hamish in order to blot out the effect Angus was having on her hormones.

‘Listen,’ she whispered to Hamish, ‘can you hear them scrabbling down the tree?’

Hamish nodded, his little body rigid in her hands, though she could feel excitement thrumming through him. The longing for a child—her child, family—zapped through her like an electric current, shocking her with its intensity. It had to be because she was holding Hamish, because normally the longing was no more than a vaguely felt dull ache.

Well, at least it had shocked her out of focusing on the man behind her.

‘Look, Dad, look!’ Hamish said excitedly, and Kate was happy to yield her place to Angus so he could hold his son and share the excitement as the small furry animals with their pointed noses and big bright brown eyes landed on the fruit table, the older pair looking around, checking their safety, while the two youngsters began to eat.

‘Oh, they’ve got little hands!’ Hamish cried as one of the possums turned towards them, a piece of apple in its paws, sharp white teeth nibbling at it.

‘They’ve got wonderfully expressive faces,’ Angus said, a note of genuine delight in his voice as he turned to smile at Kate.

‘I know,’ she agreed, ‘and I love them to bits, but they are not going to continue living in my ceiling!’

They watched in silence, broken only now and then by Hamish’s exclamations of wonder and delight. Then, the feast finished, the possums leapt into the branches of the lemon tree and, from there, scrambled into a jacaranda, scurrying up the trunk, then out along one of the top branches, from which they leapt into a eucalypt.

‘There’s a hole in the trunk of that tree where they can live,’ Kate told Hamish. ‘They could go and live in the park but they probably won’t because they know they get fresh fruit here every night.’

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