Chapter 23
Rachel
I don’t have a chance to talk to Josh until the following evening, when I get home from work.
I find him in the living room. He gets to his feet, his expression open and hopeful. Damp-haired, he’s freshly showered, wearing jeans and an old Teenage Fanclub T-shirt.
Usually, he would come straight over to put his arms around me. But there must be something in my face tonight that tells him I do not want to be touched.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he says, before I can speak. ‘We should go away. Anywhere you like. My treat. Aruba?’
‘Aruba’s in the Caribbean,’ I say faintly.
‘Exactly.’ His voice is low and earnest. ‘Rach, I know I fucked up, I know—’
I talk over him, because I cannot bear to hear the end of that sentence. ‘I’m going to stay with Polly for a bit.’
A beat. I watch a lump jump in his throat. ‘How long is a bit?’
I know now that our world is moments from cleaving in two. The loveliness of our old life, versus a future I never thought I would have to imagine.
‘I think . . . we should separate. For a while at least.’
‘You’re not serious,’ he says, after a couple of whirling moments, his face and body stiffening with shock.
I press my gaze to his, so he can be in no doubt. ‘I am.’
A muscle quivers in his jaw, and I look at him as if for the last time, his tumbled hair and autumnal eyes, that expressive brow, the gentle contours of the bones in his face.
‘Rach, I know I fucked up. I know I betrayed your trust and let you down and risked our future and . . . But we can get back on track. I want to have kids with you, I—’
‘I don’t want to wait decades to see if that pill has worked, Josh.
I can’t afford to. And not knowing what the future holds, for us .
. . that isn’t who I am. Maybe you can live with uncertainty.
An unconventional life. But I’ve felt completely at sea since you took that pill.
And I can’t live that way. You know I can’t. ’
He takes a step closer and grasps my hand, as if we’re at the edge of a cliff and he’s trying to stop me jumping.
Through the propped-open sash window drifts the scent of a barbecue, kids laughing on the street, the thump of a football.
The sublime simplicity of everyday life. And it reminds me why I am doing this.
A tear slides down my cheek. ‘I want to be a mum, Josh. You know that about me. You always have. And I want to be good at it. It already feels wrong, and I can’t risk fucking it up. I won’t risk it.’
His brown eyes parch mine. ‘So, what – you’re going to go off and have kids with someone else?’
I think of what my dad said. Sometimes, the healthier thing is to walk away. Sometimes, you leave with love.
‘I want to be happy . . . and I don’t think I will be, with you.
Not now. Not long-term. Maybe we could be, for a while.
I’m sure we could pretend that none of this has happened.
But everything has changed. And we’re going to have to face up to that, one day.
And if there’s a hard decision to be made .
. . it will be so much less painful to make it now. Don’t you think?’
‘No,’ he whispers, his voice and whole face crumpling. ‘I will never say I think it’s the right thing not to be with you.’