45. Marlowe
CHAPTER 45
Marlowe
B rendan holds my hand as we weave through the bowels of the hospital, and I let him.
He holds it in the fancy car that’s waiting outside for him, complete with driver, and I let him.
He doesn’t mean anything romantic by it—I’m pretty sure it’s just that I’m clearly not with it and in need of a little guidance.
A little friendly comfort.
That’s how it feels.
Friendly and supportive.
I may have given him short shrift in there, but I’m too exhausted to keep on pretending a piece of me isn’t glad to see him.
On the short journey to his hotel, he asks me in great detail about the surgical procedure Tabby’s just undergone.
Some of his questions are too complex for me to even answer.
Neither of us touches the elephants in the room: the fact that I’ve lied to him consistently since applying for the job and that he treated me like dirt last time I saw him.
Instead, he asks me about me.
About how I’m holding up.
How long it’s been since I slept in a bed.
Since I’ve showered.
Eaten a square meal.
Judging by the set of his jaw and the thin line his lips make, he doesn’t like my answers one bit.
He’s staying in a luxurious suite that’s about four times bigger than my flat, with a vast living area and a beautiful terrace.
After several days of being holed up in hospital hell, it feels like I’ve died and gone to heaven.
‘Do you want me to leave?’ he asks, stopping to look at me, his expression unsure.
He’s still gripping my crappy little suitcase.
This is a far less confident version of Brendan than the one I’m used to seeing.
I sigh. ‘No. You’re fine.
’ It’s his hotel suite, after all.
‘Okay, then. What do you need first? Shower? Nap? Food?’
I groan.
This is like those times when you get home and you’re parched and also dying for a pee, and it’s impossible to know which to tackle first. They all sound amazing, but the thought of falling into Brendan’s wonderful, clean bed while I’m this crusty is too revolting.
I’ll feel amazing if I have a good wash.
‘A shower would be amazing.’
He jerks his head.
‘This way.’
I follow him through a set of double doors into a master suite that’s all slick neutrals and fresh flowers.
The bed is untouched, his bag still sitting on it.
They must have checked in and headed straight to the hospital.
Beyond that is a glorious white marble bathroom with a tub I could happily drift off in and a shower cubicle the size of a football pitch.
He heads straight for it and opens the glass door, cranking on the shower so that a torrent of water bursts instantly to life.
I glance around the bathroom, second-guessing myself.
Now that I’m away from the hospital and in this place of luxurious stillness, I’ve hit a brick wall.
I don’t even know if I have the strength to wash my hair.
Everything feels like so much effort.
Maybe I should just go to bed first, crustiness be damned.
‘Hey,’ Brendan says, coming towards me.
‘You okay? You’re white as a sheet.
’
I nod. ‘Just tired. I’m fine.
’ Saying the words takes so much effort.
I sway slightly on the spot, and he grabs my biceps.
‘Woah. You’re on your last legs, aren’t you?
Okay, look. I know I’m probably not your favourite person at the moment, given my little stunt last week, and I won’t try anything funny, I promise…
but let me take care of you, please.
You can lean against me while I wash you, at least.’
The thing is, I trust this version of Brendan.
I trust most versions of him.
There’s no swagger today.
He’s here, and that speaks volumes.
I don’t know if it’s guilt or a misplaced sense of duty, but I know in this moment he has my back.
That, and I’m not sure I can make it through a shower in one piece without some help.
‘Okay,’ I say, and he nods.
‘Okay. Good. Here. Sit here.’
He settles me on the toilet seat as he strips off his clothing, tugging on the back of his t-shirt and pulling it over his head before losing his shoes and socks and shoving down his jeans and boxer briefs.
It’s a testament to how exhausted I am that I can’t muster up more of a reaction than vague appreciation, even when he walks towards me in all his naked glory.
‘Your turn, love. Up you get.’
I rise, and I shamelessly allow him to peel off my skanky clothes and probably stinky underwear as if I’m a helpless child.
With great care, he releases my hair from its knotty bun.
Then he takes my hand, leading me gently into the shower and under the torrent of water.
Oh wow. It’s gloriously hot and the pressure is amazing.
I stand under it like a zombie.
I just want to sink to the floor and let it wash over me.
Brendan is eyeing me with concern, and I gaze back at him exhaustedly.
I swear there are two of him.
Mmm. Two Brendans.
‘Jesus, Marls, I can’t bear this,’ he says finally.
‘Come here. Let me give you a hug, for fuck’s sake.
’
My tiny nod is all the permission he needs.
He closes the space between us and joins me under the spray, banding an arm around my back and tugging me close.
With his other hand, he cradles my head, pressing it against his chest.
The relief is instant.
His body is huge, the most physical reminder of how much I’ve missed having any kind of support.
I bury my face in his chest and luxuriate in the incredible sensation of hot water and warm, solid man.
If he wasn’t holding me up, I’m not sure I could have stayed upright for another second.
He holds me more tightly, crushing me to him, his body a cocoon.
He drowns out everything else: the exhaustion, the worry, the isolation, the noise.
I wrap my arms around his torso and hold on tight, an overwhelmed child clutching her giant teddy bear for dear life.
Whatever fuckwittery he’s been guilty of recently, right now he’s undoubtedly my safe space, my port in a storm.
Gently, silently, we sway together, his hand smoothing my hair as the water soaks it.
After a few moments like this, he speaks.
‘I’m so fucking sorry you’ve had to go through this, sweetheart.
I’m just—I’m so blown away by you.
Athena’s filled me in on a lot of stuff.
’ He pauses. When he speaks, his voice is gruff.
‘I think you might be the best parent I’ve ever met.
’
I give a little laugh-sob then, because what he doesn’t know is that anyone would do this.
In my place, anyone would fight for their child’s health and wellbeing like I have.
It’s all part of what you sign up for when you have a kid.
‘I can’t imagine how tough it’s been on you, especially this week,’ he continues.
‘You’re bearing up so well.
And I’m not here to waltz in and save you—Athena made it very clear on the way over that you’re far too strong to need saving, and I agree.
’ He twists my hair idly into a soaking rope before resuming his stroking.
‘You’ve been saving yourself and your little girl for longer than I can bear.
But I’m here to support you for as much as you need, okay?
Let me take some slack off you, whatever I can, even if it’s doing laundry runs for you, or sitting with Tabs every day while you come back here and shower.
I’m not going anywhere.
’
‘What do you mean, you’re not going anywhere?
’ I mutter against his skin.
‘I mean, I’m staying here till she gets discharged.
’
I summon the energy to lift my head so I can gape up at him.
He looks down at me and nods sternly.
‘Seriously. I’m not leaving you.
’
‘But you can’t do that,’ I protest. ‘We could be here another week! You have work—oh my God, isn’t it the summit this week?
’ I wade through the treacle in my brain.
‘Wednesday?’
‘Today is Wednesday, love. I canned it.’
I gasp.
This summit has been Brendan’s sole professional focus for weeks.
I know what a massive deal it is for him.
It’s today? And he’s here, casually hugging me in the shower like he has nowhere else to be?
The horror on my face makes him smile.
‘It’s just work. Whatever.
No one’s saving lives.
Not like you.’ He gathers me close again, and I lay my cheek against his chest. ‘Through that lens, it’s completely unimportant.
Everything is unimportant compared to you and what you’re going through right now.
Do you understand what I’m saying?
’
His heart beats steadily against my cheek as he resumes stroking my hair.
I can’t hear his heartbeat under the thunderous water, but I can feel it.
I’ve spent the past few days monitoring the beat of my daughter’s heart, obsessing over it.
The steadfastness of Brendan’s tells me he’s healthy.
Strong enough to take some of this cup of suffering for me.
He fucked up big time last week with his nasty, degrading behaviour, and I honestly don’t know where that leaves our unique professional relationship.
But right now he’s here.
He’s sacked off a huge career opportunity and chartered a jet and crossed an ocean to be here with me.
And he’s telling me he’s not going anywhere.
That he’s staying here, of his own volition, for me and for a child he doesn’t know, for whom he bears no parental responsibility.
The gravity of his gesture hits me like a freight train, and I screw my face up as I turn to bury it fully in his lovely pec.
Stress has built this week, just as surely as exhaustion.
I’ve had no outlet, no ability to fall apart.
Not when I’m the sole adult present for Tabs.
A heart operation is exhausting and terrifying, an enormous strain on not just her heart itself but on her whole body.
She’s the brave one.
She’s the one who’s had to put her life in strangers’ hands.
She’s so full of courage that it blows me away.
I’ve been helpless to do much except be there for her.
Comfort her when she’s scared.
Distract her when she’s in pain.
Stay strong.
So no.
Falling apart has not been an option, but it’s come at a hell of a price, because my entire head feels like it’s going to explode.
I’m so full of unresolved stress and anguish and fear that my eyes and my sinuses ache with the tears I have not been able to shed for my little girl, the suffering I haven’t been able to take from her.
Something was always going to have to give.
Something was eventually going to push me over the edge.
And it’s this. The kindness of a man with whom I’m supposed to have a purely transactional relationship.
The very fact that he is here, offering to help me carry this burden for as long as it takes.
I’ve been holding the vaguest appearance of sanity together with the emotional equivalent of a rusty old lock securing a dam, and Brendan’s unexpected acts of compassion have that lock giving up the ghost and the floodgates bursting open, obliterating every last drop of composure in spectacular style.
The tears aren’t decorous tears.
I don’t sob prettily into his chest.
I bawl.
I wail.
I howl.
I actually keen .
I cry on Brendan like the world is ending, like I’ve lost everything there is to live for, which is ridiculous!
Because Tabby’s had her lifesaving op, and she survived it!
It’s as though my body hasn’t got that message, as though all of that embodied trauma of the past hours and days, years even, is making a break for freedom, as though my body has been a pressure cooker all this time and now, at the kindness of my boss, it’s completely unleashed.
I cry like I’ve seen mourners cry on the news at bomb sites.
I cry in a way we Brits tend to find overly dramatic, incredibly awkward, and not a little unseemly.
If he didn’t band his arms even more tightly against me, I would certainly fall to my knees.
I’m practically bent over with the relief of it all and the grief of it all, with a tidal wave of emotions I can barely make sense of.
Emotions I’ve pushed down and down and which now have me in their chokehold.
Emotions, it seems, that have no intention of going back in that very effective bottle of mine.
As I fall apart in spectacular, horrifying style, Brendan holds me under the water, rocking us gently, whispering words of reassurance and praise, the same words I’ve whispered to Tabby over and over this week, words with whom parents have comforted their children through the ages.
That’s it. Let it all out.
Such a brave girl.
I’m so proud of you.
You did it.
It’s over now.
Everything’s going to be okay.
You don’t have to worry.
I’m here now.
You’re not alone anymore.
I’m not leaving you, I promise.