Chapter 8
THEO
I’m not sure what’s more surprising: Sadie agreeing to stay out, or the sight I make right now – sitting on a pink chequered blanket, a cucumber sandwich in one hand, a chilled beer in the other, enough food to feed an army, and a teddy bear sharing my plate.
Because all picnics require bears. It’s a rule, apparently.
If Axel could see me now, he’d die laughing.
But he’s not. And I am. Laughing, that is.
My phone’s muted, work with it, and I’m all about getting Sadie to laugh with me. That is until Lottie starts squealing the park down… and not in a good way.
She bolts into Sadie’s lap, her face a picture of sheer terror as she stares down an approaching pigeon. Apparently, her love of giant, white birds doesn’t extend to small, grey chubsters. Go figure.
‘Hey, it’s okay, honey,’ Sadie coos, stroking her hair. ‘It’s just a pigeon.’
I flick my hand out. ‘Shoo!’
The pigeon barely flinches, its beady eyes locked on the crushed delight in Lottie’s hand as it continues its waddling approach. There’s no accounting for taste…
‘What’s in that thing?’ I chuckle out. ‘Crack?’
‘Theo!’ Sadie gasps, eyes laughing despite her outrage.
‘Sorry, I mean… pigeon- nip ?’
Lottie gives it a suspicious sniff. ‘It’s cheese!’
‘Well, clearly it’s very special Lottie cheese.’
She peels apart the bread to look inside, her eyes filled with wonder while Sadie shakes her head at me and smiles – and it’s that smile that hits me. The one I want to see again and again.
She hasn’t been the same since we got back on land. And though it’s quieter here, like I hoped, she’s quieter too.
And don’t get me wrong, she’s trying. But it’s the obvious need to try that’s killing me.
‘All right, Lottie,’ I say, ditching my sandwich and planting my beer in the grass. I wipe my hands off and get to my feet. ‘I have a mission for you.’
They both blink up at me.
‘A mish’un?’ she slurs.
‘Yup. We need someone to guard the perimeter…’
‘The ’imeter?’ she echoes, frowning hard.
‘That’s right,’ I say, nodding seriously, while my brain gives me the side-eye.
‘That pigeon looks mighty shifty and there could be more on the way.’ I grip my hips, roll my shoulders back, and strike what I consider to be prime superhero pose.
‘I need someone small, fast, and brave to fly around us for exactly thirty seconds.’
She looks at the pigeon, looks at me, the pigeon, then me…
‘Do you need a demonstration?’
She nods.
Sadie’s eyes go wide – Are you seriously doing this?
It would appear so.
You sure your sandwich wasn’t the one laced with something?
But then, desperate times call for desperate measures…
And off I go, whirling around the roses, arms flung out like an airplane, engine hum engaged.
Oh Axel… you really would die!
The pigeon, nonplussed, backs up but stays surprisingly close.
Maybe the thing’s more cuckoo than pigeon.
And you’re calling the bird cuckoo; have you seen yourself?!
But it doesn’t matter, because Sadie is laughing. Truly laughing. And Lottie – she’s dancing on her feet, ready to join in the fun. Mission accomplished.
I stop short of the blanket, and nod to my mini recruit. ‘What do you reckon, soldier? You got this?’
She’s already flapping her arms. ‘I can d’it!’
‘Excellent… I’ll hold onto this for you.’ I prise the sandwich from her grasp. The last thing I want is a scene worthy of a Hitchcock movie as she’s set upon by a stream of pigeons begging for the toddler-mushed delight.
‘Now, GO!’
Off she races, her throaty engine sounds putting my own to shame. And Sadie lets out another chuckle, her eyes crinkling at the corners, their blue depths sparkling bright.
‘That’s more like it,’ I say, dropping back down beside her.
‘Huh?’
I smile. ‘The laugh. You didn’t think that ridiculous display was all for Lottie, did you?’
‘Wow, am I really that bad?’
I look at her, really look. She’s watching Lottie, ponytail over one shoulder, sunglasses in her hair, cheeks flushed pink…
From a distance, all anyone would see is an attentive mother sitting in the shade of a tree while her daughter burns off steam.
But up close, I see the way her eyes pinch with her thoughts, their depths too quick to dampen.
With a glorious day like this for a backdrop, the difference between Sadie now and Sadie pre-Danny is impossible to ignore. The T-shirt she’s wearing doesn’t help either. Because the fun isn’t out; it’s not even close.
How could someone as warm, as happy, as loving as her, ever end up trapped in a life with someone so cruel, so twisted…?
‘It’s not a question of being bad, it’s more…’ You’ve changed. You’re not the same light-hearted girl. You’re not… happy. I don’t know how to say any of that without making her feel worse. Or dragging the past straight into the present.
But then, maybe distraction isn’t the answer.
Maybe facing it head-on and talking about it is.
It’s how she helped me once.
‘It’s more…?’ she presses.
‘It’s him, isn’t it?’ I say, quietly putting the blame where it belongs. ‘Your ex?’
She looks at me then, those eyes rimmed with that crushing sadness, the kind that doesn’t scream – it hums. Constant and low. Like white noise she’s lived with for far too long.
‘Yes.’
* * *
Sadie
I draw my knees to my chest as a sudden chill washes over me. One I can’t explain. Or I can, I’ve just never said it out loud before. Not outside of a police station, where the person didn’t know me from Adam and needed it to fill in a report.
Not even with Taylor. Especially not with Taylor.
She knows bits, but she doesn’t know it all.
Partly because I know she’ll blame herself.
Partly because I know she’ll blame me.
Ask me why I didn’t run. Why I didn’t come back sooner.
The only place I’ve been able to talk about it openly is online – telling my story to strangers through an anonymous blog I now run. At first, it was just an outlet, a way to feel less alone, to try and make sense of what was happening. But it became a lifeline. Not just for me, but for others too.
Now it’s a full site – resources, shared stories, warning signs, chat channels… a quiet, growing community. And I’m proud of what it’s become.
But that’s all behind a screen, protected by anonymity.
Telling Theo, face to face?
That’s different.
‘It’s okay, Sadie. You don’t have to talk about this, not if you don’t want to. But you lent me an ear when I needed it, and I can do the same for you now.’
I meet his gaze. He’s stripped the hat and the shades. It’s just him and those green eyes – open, steady, full of compassion.
And I want to talk.
God , I do.
But the words sit like stones in my throat.
‘You can tell me anything,’ he says gently. ‘And I’ll listen. No judgement. No fixing. Just… listen.’
I chew the corner of my mouth, eyes drifting back to the roses. To Lottie.
I believe him. It’s not that I don’t.
It’s just that I’ve spent so long judging myself, I don’t know how to talk about it without breaking down all over again.
Silence settles between us, but not the uncomfortable kind. Just space. Space to think. To feel. To breathe.
And then I spot a piece of my past in the garden ahead…
‘I used to come here before,’ I say quietly.
‘I’d sit on that bench over there and vlog about the dumbest stuff – eyeshadow palettes, lipstick shades, skincare routines.
’ I let out a breath, tinged with laughter and memory.
‘I once reviewed a highlighter that looked like sparkly mayonnaise. Smelt like it too.’
He gives a small chuckle. ‘Bold choice.’
‘You could say that. In fact, I probably did.’ I smile with him. ‘I used to love it. Talking to the camera. Playing around with different media. Chatting with my followers.’
‘I remember your YouTube channel.’
‘You do?’ I blink. I don’t know whether to be surprised, self-conscious, or quietly touched. He was hardly my target audience.
‘Yeah. You had quite a following.’
I did, but…
‘You watched it?’
He glances away, and for a second, I swear his cheeks flush pink – unless it’s just the sun catching up with him and playing tricks on me.
‘I saw bits…’ he says.
‘Did you think I was flaunting myself too?’
‘ What ?’ His eyes snap back to mine. ‘No.’
Of course he wouldn’t. But… a soft breath slips past my lips. ‘Danny did.’
I drop my gaze to the grass beside me, staring at the blades as I pluck them from the dirt – trying to hide from Theo and from the flashing images I can’t escape. I stare and stare, because I won’t let another tear drop. Not in Danny’s name. I won’t.
‘He hated it. And the more successful I got, the more followers I gained, the more he hated it. Didn’t matter that it brought in money. All he saw was me selling myself for attention and embarrassing him in the process.’
Theo mutters something sharp under his breath – too low for me to catch.
‘That’s why you shut it down, isn’t it? Why it disappeared? Your channel?’
So he noticed that too… Something flickers warm and fragile in my chest as I nod.
‘But by then, I’d stopped enjoying it anyway. I was always on edge, terrified he’d walk in mid-shoot and flip out, or he’d see it later and tear it apart.’
My throat tightens, the memories in free fall, my words with them.
‘I figured if I just took the vlog away, took that trigger away, things would get better. Go back to how they were, when he was more loving than…’ I swallow, shake my head.
‘He just found other things to get angry about. The comments that used to revolve around my videos started spilling into the everyday. At first, I thought I was imagining it – the way the air shifted if I laughed too loudly, spoke too much, said something he didn’t like…
I kept thinking, maybe if I was quiet, if I kept myself small…
’ My voice thins with my breath ‘…then maybe he wouldn’t get mad.
Maybe he wouldn’t break things, he wouldn’t… ’
…break me.
I sense Theo stiffen beside me, and I know I don’t need to finish it for him to understand where it ends.