Chapter 30
‘My good friends!’ Donovan, standing with one elbow resting on top of the piano, called for everyone’s attention.
‘If I’ve not had time to introduce myself yet, my name is Donovan, and up until a few months ago, I was a lonely old man in dire need of some good company.
So, in a moment of madness, I put up some posters, and Friends Wanted was born.
I’ve sailed the seven seas, making music and merriment as I went.
I’ve jammed with rock stars and dined with Oscar-winning actors.
Got rip-roaring drunk with the rich and famous.
I’ve had the privilege of meeting many, many marvellous people.
Plenty of whom have called me friend. However, at my age I’ve no more time for friendship that only lasts as long as the party.
What is life without people who are still there the next day to commiserate your sore head?
I found myself longing for authentic, ride-or-die friends.
Friends who tell me the truth and love me no matter what.
I’m incredibly honoured to call these beautiful people my friends.
Even if it took me seventy-eight years to find them.
‘And then, here are all of you. Friends-to-be. Not all of you mine, because true friendship needs both time and trust, and is too precious to spread too thinly. But seeing this evening unfold, something so far beyond the original dream of a lonely man, what I hope and pray will be the birth of many more friendships as meaningful and life-giving as the ones I have found, I am jubilant. The Christmas Eve Eve Friendship Dinner is, I say with utmost sincerity, the single best thing I have ever been a part of. And, not to brag, but I played piano for the first dance at a royal wedding reception. It is all down to you. Stand to your feet, so we can thank you properly. Merry and Joel, Darya, Lola, Alex and Will – Will, when did you sneak in? – and the stupendously talented Samira, who won’t leave the kitchen but will hear if we cheer her name loud enough. The best friends a man could hope for!’
We clapped, and hollered, and cheered so loudly for Samira, she cracked the kitchen door and poked a hand through to wave at us. We laughed and toasted our new friends, and as Will slipped his hand into mine, I was the happiest and most heartbroken I’d ever been.
We, of course, had to formally end the festivities with ‘Auld Lang Syne’, even though New Year’s Eve was over a week away. We then switched to a playlist as we waved people goodbye and began to clear up.
‘Come on,’ Will said, having found me emptying a bin into the skip outside. ‘The main reason I’m here is because I saw the pictures Darya posted of you dancing with that guy in a kilt and I grew so monstrously jealous I dug out a suit I haven’t worn since Edith was born.’
‘Come on, what?’ I laughed, pretending not to know what his outstretched hand meant, because I wanted to hear him ask me.
‘Alex Nixon, will you please dance with me?’
‘Out here by the bins, in the freezing cold? That’s the most romantic thing anyone’s ever asked me. How could I refuse?’
I wasn’t lying. Enfolded in Will’s arms, his bowtie now undone in obligatory, post-party fashion, hair dishevelled, eyes hooded as he gazed at me, the sound of ‘Lonely This Christmas’ drifting through the open kitchen window, was by far the most romantic two minutes of my life.
When he kissed me, I didn’t even think about pulling away. I couldn’t think about anything, other than that I loved this man. And I was awestruck that he loved me too.
‘Can we talk about it, now?’ he asked softly, when we eventually broke away.
I started to shake my head. Talking about it was the last thing I wanted to do. Talking would ruin the memory of this night, forever.
Then I caught the flash of pain in his eyes, and I knew if I refused him this, Will would question whether I’d meant what I said about him.
So, leaning against the damp wall with his jacket draped around my shoulders, I talked about it. What Lacey had done, and what I must now do.
I left no room for alternative solutions.
I couldn’t agree to try long distance. If a miracle happened and I found someone else to babysit the kids, there wouldn’t be time to fit in anything meaningful around school, nursery and the endless tasks that would accompany supporting three children with a mother on the other side of prison walls.
Even if Will managed to occasionally visit me in Crandon, I couldn’t – I wouldn’t – allow that part of my life to be the environment in which we tried to create something lasting and meaningful.
If I did move, I had to be prepared for the next however long to be all-consuming.
I would have nothing to offer Will, save exhaustion, grief, parental drama and a big, fat pile of issues.
It would be a completely one-sided relationship – a wonderful man and worn-out husk of a woman.
Even if I agreed with Will’s entreaty to carry on as friends, messaging, talking on the phone, getting to know each other better while we couldn’t be together in person, after my weekend with the kids I knew I couldn’t be the friend Will deserved.
‘I will wait for you,’ he whispered, holding tightly to my hand as he rested his forehead against mine.
‘No.’ I shifted back, bumping against the bin. ‘It will be years. I won’t ask you do to that.’
‘You’re not asking.’ His mouth twisted up.
‘Even if you ask me not to, I’ll wait. What do you expect me to do?
Join Tinder? I’ve not met anyone else like you in almost forty years.
I can’t see that happening in the next three, or five, or whatever it will be.
We promised to be honest, and honestly, it doesn’t matter what we agree to do, my heart will wait for you whether I want it to or not. ’
‘Please don’t say that.’ I’d tried so hard to maintain some level of composure, but this was too much. My face crumpled alongside all the tender dreams of the past month.
‘No,’ Will said sharply. ‘Don’t pretend this doesn’t matter. I won’t let you try to play this down.’
‘What matters is three children who lost their mum—’
‘Stop,’ he snapped, dropping my hand. ‘Are you seriously telling me again what my children need? What they can handle? How dare you bring their mum into it. I carried these children out of the pit of grief, and have been there every day since. Alex, you can’t tell me what I can or can’t do.
How I feel. Whether it’s worth even trying.
’ His face crumpled, voice growing hoarse.
‘I should have known you wouldn’t think we’re worth even trying. ’
‘It’s not about that!’ I tried to take his hand again, but he turned away.
‘I’m sorry for bringing up their mum. But this is also about four other children having to learn to cope without theirs.
Lacey got into this situation because I wasn’t there for her.
I’m not about to up and leave her again, even when she does come home, for a man I just met.
You are lovely, Will. I meant it when I said I love you.
But these kids are everything. I need to be able to give them my everything.
I can’t do that if lurking in the back of my head is the notion that I could be somewhere else.
Somewhere easier, where I’m not fumbling my way alone. It will destroy me.’
Whew. I was full on sobbing now. Surely my snotty face and croaky whine were enough to put Will off even if my words weren’t?
Just in case, I played my final, brutal card. Will had told me enough times how desperately lonely he had been. I couldn’t live with myself if he put his life on hold and spent the next few years on his own because he was waiting for me.
I took a deep breath, summoned up the ruthless version of Alexis Nixon who’d clawed her way out of Crandon, who only a few days ago had finally stood up to her mother. I straightened my shoulders, tipped up my chin and took a moment to steady my voice.
‘I’m sorry, Will. I don’t choose you. I choose Bronte and Lennon and Harley and Kaylynn.
I choose Lacey. There are tonnes more amazing women out there who’d love to be a mother to your kids.
Who are free to do that. I’m not. I’m choosing to give all of me to my family.
I will have nothing left for yours, and that isn’t going to change. ’
He was quiet for a long time.
‘What if she’s found not guilty?’ he asked, quietly.
‘She won’t be.’
‘If she doesn’t get a long sentence? We can wait a year.’
‘Hana said to expect at least three. And, like I said, I’ll have built a new life in Crandon by then.
It won’t work unless I do. I’ll be a second mum to those children.
I can’t simply up sticks and abandon them once she’s home.
I’ve thought about this non-stop for days.
There’s no way I can do this. I’m sorry. ’
It would have been so much easier if he’d argued or stormed off.
Instead, he brusquely nodded his head. ‘Well. I did ask you to tell me if you changed your mind. A shame it was too late for me for to avoid another broken heart, anyway.’
Then the only man I’d ever loved, the one who had helped me to love myself, had gone.
Darya found me in a crumpled heap against the side of the bin, the brightest evening of my life having disintegrated into the darkest night. My limbs were so stiff with cold she had to fetch Merry to prise me out of the muddy puddle and help carry me inside so I could begin to defrost.
I slept on Darya’s too-small sofa, balancing on the edge as Ernest squeezed in and made himself comfortable. The aching back, stiff neck and throbbing head that woke me in the morning were a fitting accompaniment to the shards of broken heart coursing through my veins.