Chapter Eighteen
Rowan
I lay on my back in the dark, cataloguing all the ways in which I’m fucked.
The campsite is quiet, but for the steady drumbeat of rain on canvas, the whistle of the wind, and the occasional owl hooting softly through the trees.
Quiet enough that I can hear each of Angus’ deep breaths and every rustle of the sleeping bag when either of us moves.
Mine was too wet to even contemplate unrolling, so Angus unzipped his and laid it over both of us. I’m in his sleeping bag liner, which he insisted I take, and wearing my only pair of leggings – thankfully not soaked, unlike my long-sleeved top – and a soft, flannel shirt that smells like him.
The tent is small. Small enough that if one of us so much as twitches, our bodies will touch, separated only by the whisper-thin fabric of Angus’ liner.
I’m aware of every inch of my skin, goose-pimpled and sparking with electric nerves. Angus’ profile is limned by moonlight. Are his eyes shut? Is he asleep, unbothered by our proximity? Or is he as on edge as I am, all too aware of my body next to his?
“Angus?”
“Yes?”
Awake then. Alert. The word crisp and clear in the small space we share, not slurred and softened by the edges of sleep.
“Thank you. For letting me sleep here. And the liner. And the shirt.”
“Couldn’t have you freezing to death.” He shifts, head turning toward mine. “Stubborn, aren’t you?”
“I don’t like being helped.”
Angus makes a noise of agreement low in his throat. I bite down on my lip. Men should not be allowed to make sounds like that.
“I can understand that.”
I’m sure he can. He calls me stubborn, but if I’m a stick in the mud, he is a boulder, locked in ice.
I’ve spent my life avoiding the world in case I can’t handle it; he’s spent his ensuring that no matter what, he can.
Hyper-competent, hyper-independent, pushing through pain like it’s something to be celebrated.
“I was thinking about what you said earlier,” I venture. “That the good things in life are hard. The hard things in life, they haven’t always been good for me.”
“No?” Angus’ voice is soft.
It sits there. The kernel of my shame. I’ve built myself around it over the years, warping my roots, twisting my branches, but I’ve never been able to outgrow it. Even thinking about it now, my mouth goes dry. Failure. Useless. Waste of space.
“University was a… it was a hard time for me. Before I went, I loved my life. Loved school, and learning, and my friends, and drawing. I was always doodling, coming up with new designs to stencil onto my clothes. I had this dream that I’d graduate and start my own business selling these bright, fun outfits that would bring people joy, the way they’d brought it to me. ”
It hurts to remember her: the girl I used to be. The woman I should have been.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know, exactly. But when I arrived, everything stopped: all the joy, and creativity, and fun was…
gone. I couldn’t make friends. I couldn’t keep up with the course.
I couldn’t get out of bed. I wasn’t me anymore, and I didn’t know where I’d gone.
So I quit.” The word tastes like ash in my mouth.
“I was scared that if I stayed, if I pushed myself any harder, then I’d never feel anything good, ever again. And that terrified me.”
In the hush of the tent, I can remember it so clearly: the clouds rolling in.
Endless fog in my brain. Oceans of tears.
Room full of old pizza boxes and tissues I didn’t have the energy to clear.
Jager shots and pints of beer and always being the one to drink too many, anything to silence the new, awful thoughts, and being kicked out of the club and left on the side of the street to vomit out my shame.
It was hard. Too hard. I was lonely, and sad, and I walked away.
Would something good have come of it if I’d kept going?
My downward spiral somehow averted, a clutch of new friends, a piece of paper in my hand to tell the world I was smart.
Or would I have kept sinking, swimming in waters that were too deep?
Would I have found the surface, or would I have drowned?
“Do you still feel that way?” he asks, carefully.
I hesitate. “Sometimes. Not… not as bad. But there are days when getting up feels impossible. Days when I can’t face myself in the mirror.”
Even in the darkness, I can barely look at him. I’ve never told anyone outside my therapist and my family – and Marnie, of course – how I feel. Not even Ethan.
It takes Angus a long time to respond. “I’d buy them.”
“Buy what?”
“Your clothes.”
He startles a laugh out of me. “No, you wouldn’t! You barely even tolerate brown, let alone neon.” Even thinking about it brings a smile to my face.
“I’d buy them because they were yours.”
“Oh.”
Angus sighs and shifts under the sleeping bag. “Hard isn’t always good, Rowan. Sometimes it’s just hard. Sometimes there’s nothing to gain from it.”
I can tell he’s speaking from experience. His dad. I want to ask about it, but I don’t know how.
“What do you do then?” I ask instead.
I can feel the movement of Angus’ body against mine as he shrugs. “I guess you do what you can, and you accept what you can’t. And you keep trudging on, and hope that the view changes. That’s the thing about mountains, isn’t it? There’s something new on every turn.”
I listen to his steady breaths, soothing as the sea.
“This right now, though,” he adds. “This is good.”
I take a breath of my own. “Yes. This is good.” And then, because I can’t take the tension. “I’m down to less than fifty per cent water content.”
He laughs. “See? Something always changes.” Then he sighs.
“The farm. That’s been hard for a long time.
Da, he… He didn’t just pass. He was an alcoholic.
Drank himself into cancer and an early grave.
Last Christmas, Mason and Ross – they’re my brothers – they stayed on an extra night after everyone else left, and Boxing Day they sat me down, took out these speeches they’d written on the back of a bit of wrapping paper.
Guess they thought they were staging some kind of intervention. ”
“And? What did they want?”
“They wanted us to sell. Neither of them are involved anyway – not that I’ve ever asked them to be – but they said it wasn’t for them.
It was for me. They didn’t want to see me trapped in a life I didn’t choose, pining after Da.
” Angus is quiet. I can hardly see him. Only hear his voice, soft and sad.
“It’s different for them. The farm is something they’ve always been able to pick up and put down.
But for me? It’s my home. It’s in my bones.
Without it… I don’t know what I’d do. Who I’d be. ”
“I guess you didn’t agree to sell then?”
“No. I didn’t sell. Come up with a new business model. Got investment from my friend. Spent the year trying to turn things around. And now here we are, our first big event on the horizon, and I’m shit scared it’s all going to go wrong.”
“My sister’s wedding is your first event?”
“Big event, London. Calm down. And don’t even think of telling her.”
I hold up both of my hands. “I swear by my right hiking boot that I will not.”
“Your hiking boot? That’s serious.”
“What can I say, I’m a serious woman.” I bite my lip. “Hey, at least if it does all fall apart, you’re in the same position you started.”
“You’re right. That’s very reassuring. Fucked either way.”
“Or it will all work out: the farm will be saved, your brothers will come around, and you can stay there for the rest of your life.”
“Or that.” But he doesn’t sound convinced – or happy. “Thanks, London. You’re a good listener.”
“No, thank you. For telling me.” I echo his words from the night before.
Angus turns his face towards mine, and I can feel the warmth of his breath on my cheek, catch the glint of his dark eyes in the low light. There it is again. That tension between us. Stretched tight enough to snap.
We freeze like that. Nose to nose in the quiet tent. Outside, the wind howls. The rain lashes. Inside, a different kind of storm is brewing.
I don’t know if he moves, or I do. If he lowers his lips, or I raise my chin.
Our lips touch. A fire sparks.
It is nothing and everything. It is a rush of pure sensation: soft and deep and all-encompassing. Angus presses his lips harder into mine, and I open for him, letting my fingers tangle in the soft hair at the nape of his neck.
He groans. I’m lit from within.
I never want this to end. I’m greedy. Hungry for him.
Angus pulls back. “I— Rowan. We need to stop.”
“Why?” I hate how much the words sound like a plea.
“Because if we keep on like this, it’s going to lead us somewhere else.”
“What if I want to go somewhere else?”
His every touch sends shivers through my skin. I want him. All of him.
“Not like this.”
“But why not?”
Angus’ mouth twitches. “Because if we’re going to do this, I want more than an awkward fumble in a damp tent. I want to take my time. Learn your every sigh and gasp. And I can’t do that if I’m going to have to worry about Lila and Priya overhearing us through these thin walls.”
“That’s actually a very reasonable argument.” I try to hide my pout.
“No need to sound so surprised.”
“I’m hoping for a little more neanderthal ravishing.”
The twitch turns into a full-blown smile. “So sorry to disappoint. I’m not actually a yeti. You do know that?”
“I’m coming to terms with it.”
“We all have our crosses to bear.” He pauses, watching me. I can still feel his lips on mine; I wonder if he is thinking the same. But instead of leaning back in, he pulls further away, laying his head on the makeshift pillow. “Good night, London.”
“Good night, Angus.”
A gust of wind hits the tent, buffering the canvas into my back. I snuggle down in my half of the sleeping back and close my eyes. Somewhere, between one breath and the next, I fall into sleep.