Chapter Forty-three
I understand. Finally. Because I’m no longer in his arms; I’m a two feet away.
“You mean this is a one-night stand?” My voice is a scrape of disbelief.
The answering look in his eyes says something like ‘well, yes, of course’.
“I thought…” How do I say this? How, without sounding needy? “I thought we were moving forward.”
He steps back. A clear answer. “Evie? You know,” he says, almost begging for understanding. “You know I can’t.”
Tears sting the backs of my eyes. I have to blink very fast to stop them. “When we talked about your sister, I thought you understood. People change over the span of years. I thought…”
He looks shocked. As if I’m asking him to change into a criminal.
“Some things don’t change,” he says, sounding defeated. “Can’t.”
“Your wife, no matter how much you loved her—”
He flings an arm up as if warding a blow. “Don’t. Don’t. Don’t mention her.”
“My God, even her name is sacred. And lesser mortals like me aren’t allowed to sully it.”
Something restricts my arm movement. It’s my bra strap, over my shoulder and down halfway to my elbow; how long has it been there? Did he pull it down earlier? I snap it back into place and snatch my shirt off the sofa.
“Not can’t.” I push one arm into the sleeve.
“But won’t.” I drag on the other sleeve.
“Everything changes if it’s not tied down.
You know what?” I button my shirt, over the chest first because I don’t want him looking at my breasts if all he sees is a one-night stand.
“You are just like that legend of Rhys and Meinir. You”—I fix him with an accusing glare—“are the bride imprisoned in the tree. Except you put yourself there and condemned yourself to die.”
I have to leave. Where is my other sandal? Not on the floor, not on the sofa… I scatter cushions looking for it.
“Evie, please wait. Can we try to fix this?”
I straighten up from looking under the coffee table. “No. I can’t. And this time it really is can’t.”
His eyes search my face as if he doesn’t believe my words. So I give him the proof.
“You want to know why I can’t? Because I’ve done this before, at school. And I’m not doing it again.”
The change of subject throws him; he stares at me, nonplussed.
“I fell in love with you. Not when you asked me on a date, but the thoughtful way you acted after you broke my plant.”
His eyes widen. “I broke your pl—?”
“It was an accident. You bumped into me at the school gates and knocked a flowerpot out of my hand. It was a rare hybrid camellia. You were very sweet and went to the trouble of finding a replacement. And you wrote me this card which said, ‘We’ll do it another time.’ Your words. Your exact words.”
He frowns at me, and I think for a moment he’s trying to remember, then he asks, “My exact words? You still remember them from sixteen years ago?”
“Yes. I still remember.” I lose the battle against my tears, and one runs down my face. But even with my eyes closed, I see his card; the careful handwriting. “’Hey Evie’,” I recite, my eyes still closed.
“‘I’m really sorry, but something’s come up.
I’ve got a place in the Argentinian Open because someone’s dropped out, and my coach wants me to fly to Buenos Aires immediately so I can get a lot of practice.
My flight’s booked for tomorrow morning so we won’t make the dance tomorrow night.
I’m really sorry. We’ll do it another time.
Also a replacement for the flower I killed.
Hope this one survives. Just don’t let me near it. See you in the new year. Osian’.”
I open my eyes and look at him, hoping to see a glimmer of recognition.
He just looks blank. Surprised, but blank. “What happened after that?” he asks.
“What happened?” I’m trying not to cry again. “Nothing. You came back a star and never spoke to me again.”
He flinches as if I’ve slapped him. “What?”
“Even better, you went around dating every girl in sight, it seemed like. From our school, from the tennis club, from God-only-knew where. You dated a lot of girls.”
“Yeah, I know I did.” He looks almost ashamed.
“And I? I was forced to watch from the sidelines for the rest of the two years leading up to our A-levels.”
“I didn’t know.”
He walks around the coffee table, straightening the books knocked aside, picking up cushions that had fallen to the floor. All this activity to give himself time to think?
“I’m sorry. I can’t even remember any of those girls.
After the Argentinian Open, things were hectic, insane.
It felt like I was on a fast-forward film clip.
Everything before Buenos Aires faded. But, Evie”—he looks up at me—“why didn’t you tell me that we were supposed to go out?
I’d never have been deliberately cruel. I just didn’t know. Why didn’t you tell me how you felt?”
“I am,” I whisper. “I’m telling you now.
” We look at each other, eye to eye, while my throat works to swallow down the lump and allow my voice to sound stronger.
“Since we started working together, I’ve fallen in love with you.
Not a childish school-girl crush, but a real grown-up connection. Won’t you meet me halfway?”
He takes a step towards me, not looking, so his foot gets tangled up with the leg of the coffee table and he has to stop. But his eyes are on me.
“How can I make you understand how much you mean to me? All last week, I couldn’t wait to speak to you.
I missed…” He shoves the table away impatiently, then brings it back to its position.
All this activity to avoid saying the obvious.
I want to beg him to just allow himself out of the tree. To live and allow love into his life.
“I missed you,” he says at last. “It scares me that if you become one of my quick encounters, I’ll have to give you up afterwards. Because I don’t want to lose you.”
“Lose what?” I force my voice out because I’m afraid of the F-word he might use.
He meets my eyes. “Our friendship, our amazing partnership, our business, our…” He goes on listing the different aspects of our relationship, all of them synonyms of that F-word: friendship.
“You want me to be your Beryl Kendric.”
“Who?”
Of course, he wasn’t there for the lecture. He left me and went off to do something else, then got into his car and drove away to Cardiff without telling me. You tell your lover – the person you’re in a relationship with – you tell them what you’re doing and where you’re going. But not a friend.
“I won’t do this. I can’t let you hold me at arm’s length for the rest of my life. If you really can’t love me, then I can’t be around you anymore. I’ll have to go away.”
He’s at my side in an instant, pulling me into his arms. “No. Don’t say that. You can’t go.”
The scrape of his stubble on my cheek and neck makes my insides turn to liquid. I close my eyes for a moment. Not knowing what comes next.
“Don’t throw away what we have. What we have built together.” He says this over my shoulder, speaking to the air behind me.
It takes real effort to peel myself out of his embrace. It feels more painful than peeling off my own skin, but I take a single step back and wait for him to meet my gaze. “You need time to cool off. We can talk again tomorrow,” I tell him.
He starts to speak but I don’t let him. “And please don’t tell yourself that I might reconsider or change my mind after a good night’s sleep.
This isn’t something that came out in the heat of the moment.
But I will give you time to think and you can tell me what you want to do after you’ve had a good night’s sleep. ”
And I make myself turn and walk out of his sitting room, through the balcony and into my own apartment. With one sandal missing.
He has a day to think about it.