Page 69 of People Skills

We tidy up, and the silence between us, which usually feels companiable, feels tense and self-conscious. As we both walk to our bedrooms, he touches my arm.

‘Thank you for coming tonight. I know you had to, that you went because my mother asked you to, but it still meant a lot to me to have you there.’

‘I’d also have gone if you asked me to. If you ever need me somewhere, you can ask me,’ I say.

‘Thank you.’

We stand staring at each other in the hallway. He has those eyes again. Even more noticeable now there’s no hair to frame them.

‘Good night, Xavier,’ I say.

‘Good night, Charlotte,’ he says.

18

THE NEXT MORNING, Xavier is still in bed and I’m doing a yoga video in the lounge room, when there’s banging on the front door and it opens before either of us can answer it.

James walks in, looking agitated.

‘James,’ I say, slightly surprised. I’m wearing a sports bra and bike shorts, with an oversized T-shirt that hangs off my shoulder and is long enough that it might appear that I am not wearing pants at all. I see him sort of clock this, the potential pantlessness, but he also seems too distracted to really notice.

‘Is Xav here?’ he asks.

‘Xavier,’ I yell.

Xavier appears and shakes his head at James. ‘Did you just barge in without knock—’

‘Something’s happened,’ James says, and he’s so wild-eyed that I think someone has died or had an accident.

‘What’s wrong?’ Xavier asks, looking like I feel, slightly scared. ‘Is everyone okay?’

‘Everyone’s fine. Except me.’

‘What’s happened?’ Xavier says.

‘I…’ He pauses. ‘I can’t say it.’

‘Jesus, what?’

James sits down on the couch and buries his face in his hands and speaks, muffled. ‘I walked past Mum’s bedroom early this morning, and I heard a weird noise, and the door was shut but not all the way, so I pushed it a little, a crack, to see if she was okay and I saw—’

‘What?’ Xavier asks, eyes wide. I feel like mine might be even wider than his.

James lifts his head, stands up, and starts pacing. ‘I saw Mum. And Dad.’

I gasp.

Xavier hasn’t grasped what James is saying. Or his mind can’t compute it. ‘Mum and Dad what?’ he says.

‘What do you think?’

‘I don’t know!’

‘I saw them going at it.’

‘Going at it? Like they were…you mean they were…?’ Xavier is shaking his head.

‘They were having sex. Yes.’