Chapter 25
MEGAN
When I speak to Marisa on FaceTime early the next morning, I tell her all about the hot air balloon, but I leave out the part where Mum revealed her MS diagnosis.
I’m still working through my own thoughts and feelings surrounding that and I’m not ready to talk about it yet.
Mostly because if anyone asks me how I feel about it, all I’d be able to say is, ‘I don’t know, I don’t want to talk about it’, and therefore it would be a pointless, time-wasting conversation from start to finish.
‘As I was saying, now is as good a time as any to tell you that I have MS.’ What a way to tell me.
Even the phrasing of it seems absurd. Her tone was flippant and casual.
There was no weight to it, no stepping carefully, no hesitation in honour of the gravity of the statement.
I’m still on the fence as to whether that was a good way of doing it. I suppose it was always going to be her way of doing it. Maybe I’ll laugh about that later.
‘You are amazing, Megan!’ Marisa gushes as I conclude my balloon tale, propping her phone against something on her kitchen table while she sits down in front of it clasping a mug of herbal tea, looking bright and summery in a blue gingham puff-sleeved dress.
‘I can’t believe it. I mean, remember the time I suggested we go on that ride when the funfair was in Peckham and you almost threw up just looking at it? ’
I try not to get distracted by how my skin looks in the little thumbnail of myself in the bottom right corner of the screen – I’ve just applied a tinted moisturiser with SPF and while others might ‘glow’ with this ‘dewy’ product as it promises in the blurb on the back of the ridiculously small but expensive bottle, I look oily and sweaty.
‘Why would you ever trust a ride that packs up onto a truck like IKEA furniture?’ I ask her in disbelief, repeating the reasoning I had back at the time.
‘You know IKEA furniture is super sturdy and also doesn’t pack back up, right? That analogy doesn’t make sense,’ she says with a smug smile.
‘I stand by it.’
She giggles. ‘Hey, I’m proud of you.’
‘Thanks. I’m proud of me, too.’
‘Sounds like you and your mum are getting along,’ she observes.
‘I know. It’s weird.’ I shuffle my lower back more into the propped-up pillows so I’m sitting straighter. ‘I’m enjoying her company. I’m usually able to see through the life-of-the-party act, but I have to admit that out here, she’s been nice.’
Marisa nods in understanding, her elbows on the table, one arm folded across the other. ‘I think it’s cool you’re reconnecting with her.’
I give a non-committal ‘Mm’, but I think I might agree.
In that hot air balloon yesterday, I needed someone and, thanks to Dad’s ludicrous last wishes, it happened to be her, someone I’ve spent years teaching myself not to rely on.
But, to her credit, she has a way of making bad things seem like par for the course.
Mum’s always had a c’est-la-vie attitude to unexpected change and in the past I’ve found that infuriating.
When you’re trying to make her take something seriously and she dismisses it with a ‘so be it, darling’ and a wave of her hand, probably already ordering another drink.
She’s not the person I lean on or go to with a problem.
She has made it clear she doesn’t want to be that person.
But when I was paralysed with fear yesterday, her frivolous aura genuinely helped.
She distracted me by talking about . . .
well, everything. She didn’t push me to talk about Dominic, it all came spilling out before I could stop it. That distracted me, too.
Anyway, when I got out of the basket and back onto dry land where I could finally think straight again, I was glad it had been Mum who was with me.
‘So, what’s the plan for today?’ Marisa continues, checking the baby monitor.
‘We have most of the day off until the evening, so I’m going to—’
‘Let me guess, check your work emails?’ she says drily.
‘Actually, no,’ I say to her surprise. ‘I was thinking of going for a swim and read my book and have a light lunch somewhere.’
‘Hang on.’ She raises her hand. ‘Are you telling me you’re going to act as though you’re . . . on holiday?’
‘I’ve been considering it.’
‘Wow. I’m impressed. I wonder what’s brought on this change. Could it be the excitement of a holiday romance?’ she says, winking at me.
‘I’m going to regret telling you anything about Nico, aren’t I.’
‘Without a doubt. Okay, so a relaxed day, and then what’s going on tonight?’
‘It’s the first day of the Saint Vincent festival,’ I tell her brightly, a flurry of excitement bubbling through me as I anticipate the day ahead.
‘There’s a parade in Collioure later, street bands, dancing, all of that sort of thing.
Dad used to love it, we’d go every summer at the end of the holiday.
I wasn’t surprised when Nico told us that was today’s task. ’
‘I’m sorry, did you say “dancing”?’ Marisa checks with an impish smile. ‘Please tell me you somehow get involved.’
‘Obviously not,’ I say flatly.
‘Whatever, in my head, I’m picturing that scene from Step Up 2.’
I squint at her quizzically. ‘The end one?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s at night and in the rain. And everyone is a professional street dancer.’ I quirk a brow. ‘How did you get there in your head when I said summer street parade?’
‘Leave me alone. I want to imagine you in a crop top dancing in the rain with this Nico guy in a tank top and backwards cap, falling in love with every slick, snazzy step.’
I wince. ‘Snazzy?’
‘I’m sleep deprived,’ she says apologetically.
‘Marisa, this whole vision . . . you’re completely off. I mean, tank top? Really?’
She shrugs. ‘He sounds like the kind of guy who could pull it off.’
‘And neither of us are professional dancers.’ I hesitate. ‘I don’t think.’
‘Maybe he has a secret talent for breakdancing,’ she mutters wistfully. ‘And a secret penchant for tank tops. Guess we’ll see. Has he asked you out yet?’
‘You need to calm down. I don’t know if he looks at me in that way anymore.’
‘Oh please, there’s always a frisson between people who were childhood sweethearts. It’s an unspoken rule. You never fully shake your first love.’
‘I don’t think that’s factually correct.’
‘Could you please admit that you have feelings for this guy?’ she begs impatiently. ‘The way you’ve been talking about him, Megan, I can literally hear it in your voice. You like him.’
There’s a squeak from the baby monitor and I witness Marisa tense and then after a few moments of silence, her shoulders relax again.
‘Admit it,’ she repeats in a quieter voice.
‘Okay, yeah, fine, I think . . . I like him. He’s been so great throughout this whole experience and it sounds like he was really there for my dad when he needed him, you know? He’s gone out of his way to help carry out all his wishes. Dad must have trusted him.’
She’s nodding along as I talk. ‘Your dad could always tell a good character.’
‘He did love you,’ I say, smiling at her.
‘Exactly. A man with excellent taste. I say you go make things happen with Nico. Is he going to be at the street parade with you today?’
‘Yes, but likely not wearing a tank top.’
‘Hey, we all have our vices.’
I laugh lightly. ‘I don’t want to make how I feel obvious and then make a fool of myself.’
‘You wouldn’t!’
‘But he could have anyone. Do you know how hot people are in France? There are so many amazing, beautiful women just swanning around the place here looking tanned and fresh and perfect all the time. He’s not going to really want me, is he, someone who is none of those things.
And I don’t think I helped my case in the car journey home from the air balloon ride yesterday.
I was on a natural high mixed with champagne and I couldn’t shut up.
He practically ran away when we got back.
He said it was because he was busy with the festival preparations but I think I scared him off by chatting so much shit. ’
Marisa is watching me with a serious expression on her face, a reaction that is unexpected.
I’d have expected her to be giggling at the details of the journey I’m describing, ready to tease me about ruining my chances with Nico by losing my head.
But she’s staring at me intently, before her eyes drop down and she takes a deep breath.
She looks as though she’s building the courage to say something.
‘Can I say something?’ she asks, and I congratulate myself on knowing her so well.
‘Sure.’
‘I don’t like bringing up Dominic—’ my stomach crunches at his name ‘—because all of that is in the past and, unless you want to talk about it, I don’t want to waste my breath on him.
Megan, you’ve always been self-deprecating, but ever since you met Dominic, you’ve got even worse at bringing yourself down.
And then after what he did to you . . .’ She trails off, her expression filled with fury for a moment, before she sighs.
‘Why would you not think that you’re as amazing and gorgeous as all the other women passing you on the street?
You describe them as perfect in a way that makes it sound as though that’s a genuine state achievable for others but out of reach for you. ’
I bow my head, picking at the skin around my thumbnail.
‘I know that shithead knocked your confidence, and I understand that it’s going to take time to rebuild it, but what baffles me is—’ she exhales here, trying to work out the best way to say it ‘—why is it that the actions and words of a man like Dominic – a man we know to be a feeble-minded, cowardly, selfish man-child – are what you take on when it comes to seeing yourself? Instead, you should absorb what someone like me – someone who you know you can trust – says and does. You are beautiful, Megan. Nico would be crazy not to fall in love with you. Even if you’re not able to do head-spins and backflips in the rain. ’