Chapter 24
Olive
It’s not going to be good. I realize that when Dad asks me three times on the drive to Edinburgh if everything’s OK.
I say “Yeah” three times, and stare out of the window to stop him seeing I’m close to tears.
I manage not to cry. By the time we get home, I’m more or less in control.
Or so I think. Mum’s not here, she’s working, which means she could be back any time, or not until the wee hours.
A birth takes as long as it takes, she always says, and I believe her, but for some time now, I’ve found myself thinking that her work as a community midwife is excellent cover for spending nights away from home. It makes me want to boak.
She isn’t back by the time we sit down to dinner, and she still isn’t back when we move to the couch, ostensibly to watch a film, but then Dad asks how things are going and, in the end, I talk to him.
Reluctantly at first, but after a while I see that it’s doing me good.
And then I tell him about Colin, which I really didn’t plan to do.
“That’s nice, Olive,” he says, his voice deliberately nonchalant. “I’m sure it wasn’t easy for him to start at a new school either.”
“Presumably not.” I shrug. “But he isn’t planning to stay long.”
“Really?”
“Well, that’s what he says.”
“Hm.” Dad leans back slightly. “That would be a shame.”
“Yeah,” I say, hardly recognizing myself. If anyone had told me a couple of weeks ago that I’d ever think that, I’d have laughed at them. But here we are. “And what I said earlier wasn’t true. Nothing’s all right.”
“What’s wrong, pet?”
“I told him about the fire. And Colin . . .” I falter. “I don’t know, he reacted really weirdly.”
“Uh-huh?”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have told him.”
Dad looks at me, a funny expression on his face. “It’s never wrong to tell the truth, Olive. Don’t let anyone tell you it is.”
I gulp hard and nod, because my throat’s gone dry. “You think?”
Dad nods. “Absolutely.”
God, if he knew . . . I can’t imagine Dad would still say that if he had any idea of the truth I’m lugging around. But with him sitting here with me now, giving me the feeling that I can tell him anything, I don’t know how I can keep it from him even one day longer.
“So do you think that the truth is better even if it could hurt someone?” I ask hesitantly.
“I think the truth is the most important thing of all, love,” Dad declares, giving me a brief smile. “You know that.”
Apparently I don’t. I’d forgotten, not just briefly but for way too long.
Until now. “If that’s so, then there’s something you should know.
” No. Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it.
But I have to. I can’t bear not telling him any longer.
I always used to think not knowing stuff was bad.
Now I think I was wrong. Knowing things you’re not meant to know is way worse.
I shut my eyes for a moment, then carry on.
“Mum’s . . . she had . . .” God, get on with it.
Spit it out. There’s no going back now. “I saw her kissing another man.”
I shut my eyes once I’ve said the words. Why did I tell him? What good does it do Dad to know? It was just egocentric and selfish of me, to stop me feeling like a traitor. But his feelings should be way more important to me.
Dad says nothing, and that might be the worst silence I’ve ever experienced. When I look at him, he’s pale but together.
“I wanted to tell you sooner, Dad, truly,” I say. “I saw her in Ebrington, ages ago, and she convinced me not to say anything to you. Dad, I thought I was doing the right thing, I didn’t want to . . .”
“I know, Olive.”
“I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you sooner . . .”
“Olive,” he repeats. “I know about it.” Dad stresses every syllable, and the world stops spinning.
“Your mother told me. A few weeks ago. We had . . . several long conversations.” He clears his throat and I want to jump up.
To run away. “Sadly, we haven’t had a genuine relationship for a long time now. And I recently met someone too.”
Two sentences that shatter my world.
I feel numb. Dizzy. Empty.
“What?” I whisper. The expression on Dad’s face as he leans forward slightly and I flinch back is one of pure pain, which matches the feeling in my chest.
“We wanted to tell you together. Calmly. When we were totally certain.”
“So you’re getting divorced?”
Dad says nothing. Then he nods slowly.
I don’t know what changes at that moment, but I can’t remember how to cry. I don’t yell. I don’t create a drama. I just stand up.
“And now you’re totally certain,” I suggest.
“We’re still your parents. It won’t change anything there.” Dad has stood up too. “Olive, I’m sorry you’re only finding it out this way. I had no idea that you knew about your mother and Alexis.”
“So she is still with him?” My voice has never sounded so empty. “She said it was over. When I got out of hospital, she . . . I thought . . .”
“Your mother spoke to me not long after that.” Dad sounds serious, but he doesn’t seem half as hurt as I always thought he’d be.
“And you . . . you’ve already met someone new?” It takes every bit of my self-control to ask that. But I can’t freak out now, I just can’t.
Dad looks so sad that it makes me angry. What was he expecting? What? “Nathalie,” he says, after a while. “I haven’t known her long. But she’s really looking forward to meeting you.”
“You’ve told her about me?” My voice breaks.
“She has two grown-up sons, students—one’s at Oxford and the other’s at Cambridge. I’m sure you’ll get along and . . .”
Dad keeps speaking, but I don’t hear the rest. I wait till he’s finished. I nod when he asks questions. I feel like a shell filled with nothing.
Mum’s back with Alexis then. It’s official.
Even though she and Dad only ended things a few weeks ago, he’s ready for a new relationship, which can only mean one thing: He was expecting it.
He knew it, he guessed it, he had time to come to terms with it.
He knew it while the thought that I was letting him down was causing me sleepless nights.
Now I know I’m not doing that. But what I feel now is no better. Now I’m the one who’s been let down.
“Nothing will change between us, pet,” Dad insists again, and I wonder how people can flat-out lie like that.
“So are the two of them moving in here like one big, happy commune?” I burst out, because I’m only human and I can’t hold it in much longer. Not when my dad’s making me promises he can’t keep.
There’s an embarrassed silence. “We haven’t quite come to an agreement about the house yet.”
“Well, I’m at boarding school anyway. And after that, I’ll be at uni.”
“Olive, this will always be your home.”
It’s hard not to laugh. “Right, Dad.”
“Darling, we weren’t deliberately keeping secrets from you. We just had to work out what it all means and the best way to go from here. But we love you. We’re your parents. We’ll always love you.”
I try not to cry. I spent over a year beating myself up every day because I knew something that I thought would destroy my family when, in truth, it was already long broken.
My dad isn’t some knight in shining armor who goes out to work and comes home innocently, with no idea of what’s going on.
He was just slogging on, the same as Mum.
And I was sat there between them, desperately trying to figure out how to save something that couldn’t be saved. What an absolute idiot.
Colin
I feel cut off. From myself, from reality. Nothing gets through to me, and I know myself well enough to be aware that that’s dangerous.
My first impulse, after I was done with the lighter, was to go to Mrs. Sinclair.
I’d lost all sense of time, but it must have been later than I thought because her office was shut and Mr. Harper was nowhere to be seen either.
Maybe that’s for the best, because I don’t want to put myself through the humiliation of begging her to throw me out of the school and convince my mother that this is the last place on earth I should be.
The rest of the weekend blurs into a collection of moments. I’m such a loser that I can’t even bring myself to call the police in Manhattan. I psych myself up to do it a bunch of times but always fail. I’ve never felt so ashamed.
I don’t see Olive—she seems to be away, and I hear from her friends that she’s gone home. Which is better for her, but it’s stressing me out. I have to speak to her. I have to apologize to her, explain everything. Only then can I do what needs to be done.
But at the same time, I feel as if I can never again go anywhere near her.
She doesn’t have a goddamn clue what I’m responsible for.
What a monster I am. But however I twist and turn, it’s not an option to keep the truth from her.
She’ll hate me, if not for what I did, then for not accepting the consequences.
Because if I understood her correctly, even now, nobody knows who’s to blame for the fire in which Olive nearly died.
The buildings are old and so are the gas pipes.
It could have been an accident. Not that it would change anything for Olive—I’m just wondering if it would help to know somebody was responsible for it.
If it helps to be able to hate a specific person. Or if ignorance is bliss.