Jacob
From:
Olivia_Jackson@
Subject:
Hi
I’ve written and rewritten this email so many times that I’m not even sure what makes sense any more. I just want to say that I’m sorry about the other night. I hate how we left things and that we never got to say goodbye properly. I hope you’re
OK
.
Yours, incredibly apologetically, Olivia x
He rolled the dice in his hands. How much heavier they felt now. How much weaker he had become.
To reply to her.
Or not to reply to her.
He had been asking himself the same question continuously for weeks now. It had become second nature to him. More so than breathing. More so than eating. But every time he went to give an answer, he stopped himself.
It had been a mistake to open her email. He’d told himself
a thousand times not to do it. Wasn’t thinking about her painful enough?
Pain.
How naive he’d been to think he’d known it before.
‘Jacob! Is everything OK up there?’
The voice startled him, even though every fifteen minutes on the dot, the same call would echo up the stairs.
‘Fine,’ he replied, pushing himself out of his chair and making his way back to bed.
Another day, and the ache in his chest and the clouds in his head were growing stronger with every passing minute. What he would give to be back on that beach in Goa. What he would give to be anywhere but here right now.
‘Jacob?’ His mum was louder now, more urgent. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine!’ he called back, as loudly as his weary body would allow. Then he whispered to himself, ‘Everything is just fucking fine.’