“Do you get lonely?” I asked Jack, chancing one last probe into this landmine-laden topic.
“Sometimes,” he said, and I was surprised at how quickly – and honestly – he answered. “I mean, I really enjoy my own company. I’m actually quite happy on my own. But I do remember what it’s like to have someone to share the small joys with. The intimacy of waking up together; planning your day together. I miss that.”
I didn’t know what that felt like; I’d never had it, except maybe with Cara. But it spoke to something I’d always felt was missing when I’d tried getting to know people. Something I’d been beginning to feel with this new group of friends. And to an extent with Jack, as infuriating as he was.
After a digestion break, we took a relieving dip in the river, the hot sun having turned our shoulders a pale pink. And was I imagining things, or did Jack’s gaze linger on me a little longer and more openly than usual? We dried off and reapplied our suncream; Jack decided to go shirtless for the rest of the afternoon and asked me to do the skin he couldn’t reach. I was so cautious of being overly intimate that I had to apply twice because I’d missed so many spots, of course just prolonging my contact with his muscled back. Then we were back in the kayaks and headed downstream, side by side this time, admiring the world around us whilst we enjoyed a more relaxed return trip now that we were travelling with the current. Jack pointed out the willow trees and the pink balsam blooms, and I felt like we’d rounded a corner in our friendship. Like maybe what had happened before actually could be “water under the tree”.
As we rounded a bend in the river and the put-in came into sight, I sidled up next to Jack, one more thing I really wanted to say to him.
“Today has been great,” I said. “I mean, it’s hard, and I’ll need a shoulder replacement after this, but thanks again for bringing me. And for teaching me how to do it. Sorry I was such a wuss.”
“Don’t be silly,” he said, smiling and holding my gaze for a long moment. But he must have spotted the mischief in my eyes, because his expression turned, and it was his turn to panic.
He couldn’t even get my name out of his mouth before I tipped him unceremoniously into the river.
Chapter18
Jack
Ispent most of the next two weeks replaying that day on the water with Morgan. Yes, partly because she’d read me like a picture book. And despite how hard I’d tried to tow the line of friendly but not too friendly, I’d opened up like that book had a long-ago-cracked spine. I hadn’t talked about my breakup in that much detail in years, and only two other people knew about my tattoo and why I’d got it: Phil and Chloe.
A fortnight later I was still shocked at how Morgan had taken a sledgehammer to my meticulously constructed walls, despite everything. Why did she care so much? And why was I glad she did?
But I wasn’t just thinking about me, and the revelations I’d had. I was thinking about Morgan, too: the curves of her body as she splashed around after lunch, the tentative touch of her hands on my back as she applied and then reapplied my sunscreen, the cackle she’d unleashed as she’d ruthlessly tipped me into the water. I’d set a firm boundary on our hike, and she’d respected it, but all of a sudden I was the one who was beginning to regret that it was there. I knew it was for the best, but I couldn’t help but imagine what our most recent adventure would have looked like if I hadn’t stopped her from kissing me on that mountaintop.
I thought about her – about that day – whilst I worked, when we were sat across from one another at Fatima’s and the pub, and at night when I was trying to quiet my mind. A montage of Morgan played on repeat, and I couldn’t press pause. I also wasn’t sure I wanted to.
Which was why, when I texted her a few days after kayaking to see if she’d be free for a day trip away in a couple weeks’ time, I’d basically held my breath for the three minutes it took her to reply and say yes.
* * *
I tookthe scenic route to Manchester later that week; it only added about twenty minutes to the three-hour drive, but it meant that I got to admire rolling hills and charming villages rather than the monotony of the motorway. My phone showed the M6 in deep red, so I did my best to bypass as much of the traffic as possible. I rode with the windows down and the music up, trying to turn off my mind, where the Morgan Montage played incessantly.
I was on my way to collect Amy from her flat. She’d only stayed home for a few days before heading back, but then she’d messaged to say that she needed to move out suddenly, and apparently she didn’t have enough money for a train ticket. She’d texted me, I imagine because she was too embarrassed to admit to Mum and Dad how broke she was. She would have known that they’d have sent her money in a heartbeat.
Which was how I found myself cancelling my standard Friday night plans with Chloe and Phil to drive to Manchester instead. If my little sister needed me, I’d be there. In person.
The red lines leading into the city thankfully turned green as I got closer, so I pulled up in front of Amy’s building about fifteen minutes earlier than the ETA I’d sent her. I leaned over to read the parking sign to make sure I’d be okay whilst I waited, and then looked around. Despite all the cities I’d travelled to all those years ago – even living in them for a month or two at a time – I’d never been a city guy. I’d enjoyed being in New York for a few weeks when I was twenty, but seeing how busy everything was around me on a Friday afternoon in the middle of summer, I was already tired. I felt like an old man. I saw people spilling out of a stopped bus, huddling around standing tables outside packed pubs, walking their dogs in the tiny park across the street … none of it appealed. If I were questioning everything about my life all of a sudden, at least I could definitively say that I was a country mouse through and through.
I looked up across the street at the building that I knew Amy lived in, wondering what it was like to share a flat with people she didn’t particularly know, surrounded by identical units of people she didn’t know at all. I counted the windows up to the sixth floor where I knew she lived, and then my heart dropped.
I could see her looking out the window, and gone was the confident smile and pulled-together impression she’d given me a few weeks ago. She looked as awful as Mum had been insisting she was. In fact, she was too far away to say for sure, but she kind of looked like she’d been crying.
I decided to let her know I’d arrived, pulling out my phone to shoot her a quick message. I watched her as she looked away from the window and down, then back up to scan the street. I pressed myself into the back of my seat so she wouldn’t see me watching her when she spotted the Defender. A moment later she texted back to say that she could see me, and she’d be down in a minute or two.
When she did come down, she only had a single box, a suitcase, a duffel bag, and Dad’s toolbox with her. I took the box and toolbox from her, gave her a hug and helped her load her things into the car, which I’d prepared for the drive by putting the back seats down and lining the floor with an old blanket.
“Shall we go get the rest?” I asked, cracking my knuckles. Amy just blinked at me, confusion etched across her face.
“The rest of what?”
“Your stuff…”
“This is all my stuff, Jack,” she said, gesturing to the three things we’d already loaded into the boot. I tried not to balk at the fact that years of living here had amounted to just two bags and a box; I considered myself quite a minimalist, but even I would have needed more than that for my things, even without furniture.
“Okay,” I said, trying to save face. Not to embarrass her when I knew she was already on the edge. She was trying to act casual, happy even, but I’d seen her before, and I knew now it was just an act. So I had to be peppy enough for both of us, I supposed. “But you and I both know that box is full of crystals, so excuse me for assuming you had at least a few things.”
Amy flipped her middle finger at me, and I smiled. I handed her a twenty-pound note to go grab us some dinner for the drive home, and as soon as she was out of sight, I put the back seats back up so that her things wouldn’t slide around or fall over. Then I texted Chloe and Phil with a change of plans.
