Chapter 27
Josh
I told Mum about the pill pretty soon after Rachel left. I’d been debating keeping it to myself, worried she would panic about side effects and suchlike. But, in the end, I didn’t want to lie to her about why Rachel and I broke up.
She’s been doing her best to be brave, periodically assuring me that Rachel will come around, in time.
And I think she probably does believe that.
She was happy, obviously, not to have had to attend my funeral – as far as Mum’s concerned, her only child is still alive, and her family tree’s intact for the first time in well over a century.
In most people’s eyes this would be classed as a solid win.
So it’s clear she’s conflicted, deep down, and who can blame her?
Unsurprisingly, Darren, Giles and Lola weren’t too jazzed to find out about the pill a full year after Polly and Ingrid.
But they have just about forgiven me. Looking back, I feel thankful they did witness my fear, from time to time over the years.
Because I think it helps them to understand why I did what I did.
The weird thing is, I think Rachel gets it, too. Just as I get why she felt she had to leave. Why staying seemed impossible. None of her reasons was lacking in logic.
But in a way this makes it worse. Because I’ve long been convinced that resentment is easier to live with than regret.
Even a year on, I can hardly bear to be at the flat we used to share.
I’ve been writing a new book, trying to keep my mind occupied.
And it has helped, putting words on the page and not actively hating them for what feels like the first time in a long while.
The story grips me, but I can’t do it justice at home.
So I transplant myself to the library and cafés, take on extra teaching hours at the college, where I write between classes.
I even head alone to bars and bistros at night, sit there until closing with my notebook and pen.
Rachel and I have yet to do an official division of our stuff, which means I still encounter her every day, all over the flat.
I set them tenderly aside, the recipes she tore from magazines, her stockpile of Tunnock’s Teacakes, cartoon sketches on scraps of paper.
There are tops mingled with my T-shirts in the wardrobe.
A half-used bottle of Herbal Essences shampoo I cannot bring myself to smell.
An invitation to a wedding, addressed to us both, that Rachel helped design.
Her winter coat, still hanging by the front door.
I often think about bumping into her, at that party last year.
The way she moved back against the wall, allowed me to pin her there for a few delicious seconds.
Her tawny eyes holding mine as our favourite Christmas song came on to the stereo.
Telling her I still thought about her, at home alone.
The kick of knowing just from her expression that she did the same.
How desperate I was, in that moment, to take her by the hand and find an empty room or a bed or a chair, so I could show her again just how much I still loved her.