Chapter 34 #2
‘Jesus, Florence,’ he managed to say, gasping for breath. And she saw that Jack, a man not given to shock, was shaken.
‘I’m … so … sorry,’ she tried to say, all her strength spent.
He wrapped his arms around her. ‘You gave me a fright.’
‘I gave myself a fright.’
She heard the rolling sea, the waves thundering against the cliffs and the rain beating on the tin roof and stumbled into a corner where her legs gave way. Like a rag doll, she collapsed onto some blankets that smelt as if they had been there for years.
He sat next to her, knees drawn up. Neither spoke and Florence fell into a kind of stupor.
Sometime later she roused herself to find the noise of the storm receding – just the hum and thump of the water now – and Jack had lit a candle.
‘Lucky the first match wasn’t damp,’ he said.
‘Lucky?’
He gave a grim little laugh. ‘I found it in here along with the candle. Only one in the box. The gods were on our side.’
‘A miracle then.’
Another grim laugh, but she heard something else in the laugh. Fear maybe?
After that the conversation fizzled out and there was a long silence.
He held her close, and she could feel his heart beating.
While out in the storm she had felt the wind behind her back driving her.
Propelling her. She had felt terrified that she was about to die.
But now all that was making her think, making her feel, forcing her to speak her mind.
‘You shut yourself off from me, Jack, from life,’ she suddenly burst out. ‘Why?’
‘What?’
He sounded irritated. Nevertheless, she continued. ‘After what we both just went through, I must ask. We are connected. Be honest. You know we are and yet you keep denying it.’
‘I haven’t said a word.’
‘Does it need words?’
‘I don’t understand you.’
‘Oh, but you do. You keep me at arm’s length. What are you so frightened of?’
‘That was a confrontation with death today,’ he said, sounding exasperated. ‘That’s what I was frightened of.’
‘No, that isn’t true, you aren’t scared of dying. It isn’t that. What you’re scared of is living.’
He drew away from her in silence, the atmosphere tense. He didn’t reply immediately, then he said, ‘Can we just drop it, Florence?’
‘What are you avoiding, Jack?’
He snorted. ‘You have no idea.’
‘Then tell me,’ she said, raising her voice.
She heard his sharp intake of breath. ‘Very well. You’re right. I wasn’t scared of dying. I was scared of you dying.’
‘Me?’
‘You are my responsibility,’ he said, his voice catching.
That’s it, she thought. That’s it. ‘You’re still holding so much pain inside you,’ she said almost to herself.
He didn’t speak for a moment. When he did his voice was ragged and deep. ‘I didn’t keep my little boy safe. And I didn’t keep you safe from the BNA men who raped you.’
She heard the anguish and longed to make him feel better, but sensing he was on the verge of telling her everything, she kept quiet.
‘The loss of a child is indescribable.’ He paused for a moment and when he spoke again there was a tremor in his voice. ‘It was my job … but I couldn’t protect him.’
Her heart twisted and she ached to reach out to him but he carried on speaking so she simply listened.
‘I can’t allow myself to love, Florence, do you see? I did not deserve the child I lost. When Charlie died, I reached the end of the line. I could never endure grief like that again.’
‘Oh Jack.’
She heard him sob and then suddenly he was weeping and taking great gulping breaths. She did not try to stop him and felt her own eyes grow damp. Had he ever cried about the loss like this? She doubted it. Men like Jack rarely cried.
She stroked his back and after a while, still shuddering, he ran a hand over his wet cheeks. ‘Sorry.’
She didn’t speak but reached for his hand.
‘Hélène once asked me if I wanted a family,’ he said.
‘What did you tell her?’
‘I wanted to tell her the truth but being in France was my only escape. If I spoke of what had happened while I was there … well, it was impossible. I just told her I couldn’t think of it.’
‘It was the truth.’
‘Yes. But I did feel I’d short-changed her.’
She hugged him close. ‘You can move beyond this.’
He shook his head and spoke very quietly. ‘Florence, I just don’t know how.’
‘It wasn’t the same thing, of course, but after the rape I discovered that unbearable pain can pass through you without destroying you. Little by little you let it in, feel it, and it passes.’
‘Does it?’
‘Yes, and that’s how you learn to live again. In the middle of something that seems so impossible there can be peace. Moments only, but peace all the same and they grow longer. But if you spend your life suppressing the pain it really will destroy you.’
‘You know I love you, Florence.’
‘Yes … I do. And I know you’ve been trying not to.’
‘Will you help me?’
She blinked hard, wanting to cry herself. ‘Of course. Of course I will. Only you can do it, but you don’t have to do it alone. I’ll be there, Jack. I’ll always be there.’
He nodded.
‘And you know, everything passes, everything, no matter how loved or how precious. We all live with that knowledge. It’s life. And yet we still have the courage to love knowing that one day that same love will break our hearts.’
And then he kissed her. Properly. Longingly. Passionately.