‘You were never who I thought.’
‘Neither were you.’
‘Was any of it real?’
‘I think we were both pretending.’
He clutches at the buttons of his dove-grey shirt. His whole body is shaking, is he having a heart attack, should I open the door? But then, he takes a sudden, wet gulp of air and slumps down on the lowest step. I watch the unmoving heap of him for what seems like hours. Finally, he pulls himself up. Makes his slow journey to the top of the stairs. So close to me, he sits down. Unscrews the Thermos. Pours himself a full cup of juice.
‘What about you?’ he asks, cupping the lid in his palm. ‘What will you do?’
I shake my head.
‘You can’t go back,’ he says gently. ‘You know that, don’t you?’
Tears sting my eyes.
‘You’re not cut out to be his wife, her mother. You want to be, I know how much you do, but however much you try, you’ll only hurt them.’
I stare at the sunburst of his irises, unable to hide the crushing fear, the flooding doubt. He’s right. I was never a good wife, a good mother, I tried to get better, I left them to become better but all I’ve got to is here, to a man in a hole and the juice I’ve made to kill him. How can I go back? He lifts his hand towards me and, for a second, I think he will release me, this man – who’s loved me and wounded me more deeply than anyone else – he will take back what he’s said, he will convince me that I’m worthy of returning.
He doesn’t.
He touches his fingers to the glass and says, ‘Let’s do it together.’
Something in me gives up then. All fight gone. I’ve been struggling against it for so long – whenever I stared at the electrified train tracks or imagined falling off a building or water closing over me. But I can’t anymore.
I look out to the estuary, to the mudflats at low tide, the crimson sky, and I think of Millie growing up, the books she might read, the subjects she might study, who she might become. Of the hair on Kit’s temples growing grey, the wrinkles deepening under his eyes. Of Alex and all the waters he will dive in, the scallops opening like treasure boxes, the drift seeds he’ll find and I feel for the one he gave me in my pocket, I want to see it one last time before I get up and pour myself that drink.
It has everything of autumn in it – shined and conker brown – yet it is large and flat, unbelievably heart-shaped. Waves haveroared at it, it has travelled thousands of miles under sunny and stormed skies, all to wash up on a beach, where a man who’s been searching for them for a girl he once knew, finds it, keeps it and then presses it into her palm eighteen years later. Isn’t this the lesson of the drift seed, of botany and science and love? Everything is impossible – seed to flower, cone to pine, caterpillar to butterfly – there are a billion ways to fail. But there are also a billion chances to grow. To tell the truth to Kit. To try again with Millie.
He looks at me with lake eyes. It seems so foolish now, to want a drowning man to pull me to shore. But my salvation isn’t up to him.
‘Pour it out,’ I say.
He watches me closely, searching for clues, and then he moves quickly because it doesn’t matter what I’m thinking, it never has, all that matters is that I’m not poisoning him. He overturns the lid first and then the Thermos. Liquid pools thickly at his feet.
‘You were right,’ I say.
‘About what?’
‘I can’t go back to my family. But not because I’m going to hurtthem. I can’t go back if I hurtyou.I can’t be a murderer and mother. So, I’m making a choice. I choose them. Not you.’
‘What?’
‘You won’t be here long. I’m sure they’ll come quickly after I give my statement.’
‘Who?’
‘The police.’
The flicker in his eyes dies.
‘You’ll be free. Though, probably not for long, after what I tell them.’
‘You can’t do this.’ His voice is breaking, he is where I was seconds ago, more fearful of living than dying. ‘I can’t go back there, I can’t do that again, I barely got out in one piece, stop, darling, please, we belong together, we always have, I love you—’
I crouch down on the fractured glass. Put my hand against the enormous animal of his. Love for one last time the man I’ve squandered my life for. Then I walk away. Step out into the impossible dark.