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“I don’t think it works that way.” His answering smile was sad and distant. “You can’t make up for hurting others by hurting yourself worse.”
“Well,” I said, “it’s a good job I don’t do that, then.”
“Don’t forget, I’ve known you for a decade.”
“And yet here you are, talking bollocks anyway.”
Edwin made a gesture ofI cannot with you right nowI recognised of old. “I’ll go get you that duvet.”
With Abel in the kitchen, bundling things into the washing machine, and Edwin upstairs, rummaging around for bedding, I took the opportunity to put my head in my hands. It was slowly dawning on me that, while I certainly was tired, I was also a lot of other things, and tired was the name I was giving them so I didn’t have to deal with what it meant that I was just so fucking…sad. Sad, hopeless, distraught, forlorn, choking on regret, missing with such annihilating intensity a stranger I had parted from mere hours ago.
Missing Leo.
But also missing the boat. The pared-down, untrammelled life it offered. The warmth of the stove. The slow turning of the hours. The stillness of the river and the brightness of the stars. The infinite worlds waiting between water and sky.
Oh, why had I come back here? I could have gone anywhere if I’d pressed the issue. Could even have survived a week or two with my perpetually ironic father and my impossibly interested mother. And yet instead I had ping-ponged straight from the last man I had hurt to the first. From a place I hadn’t been ready to believe I wanted to be to the place I hadn’t been ready to admit I didn’t.
I had just about managed to get a grip again by the time Edwin returned. And any not-gripping I was still handling, I was able to conceal by busying myself with the removal of my Terminatorboot. He put a pile of bedding generous enough to almost completely obscure him on the other end of the sofa and settled Mr. F atop them.
“Cup of tea?” he asked.
Ten years pretending to like tea. Ten fucking years. “No, thanks.”
“I’d love one, petal.” That was Andy. “And how about we reheat that casserole?”
Of course they had a casserole they could reheat. Their freezer was probably as bristling with Tupperware as my mum’s: an ever-building legacy of shared meals and prepared-for tomorrows. The only thing I ever remembered to put in my freezer was my palette. And, honestly, even that was touch and go.
“Yes, definitely.” A domestically glowing Edwin bounded off into the kitchen. “Do you want some casserole, Marius?” he called out.
“I’m not hungry.” And for once, it was true. Not some game I was playing with myself. I was just too fucking miserable.
Amos strolled back into the hallway, a bottle with a handwritten label clutched in his hand. “I suddenly remembered we had some elderflower wine left. WesolychSwiat, Marius.”
Having tasted Edwin’s elderflower wine on many previous occasions, I gave a full-body flinch. “No, no,” I said faintly. But urgently. “I couldn’t possibly.”
“Believe me”—Alec gave me a broad grin—“it’s my pleasure. I’ll just tuck it into your bag for you.”
“You should save it for someone who’ll appreciate it.”
It was at this juncture that Edwin reappeared. “What’s going on?”
“I just thought,” said Arsehole before I had a chance to speak, “that it’d be nice to give Marius some of your wine.”
Edwin pressed his hands to his heart like a cartoon character. “Adam, you’re so thoughtful.”
“It’s…” I tried. “I mean, I don’t think… I’ll probably… I think I’m good. You know. Without the wine.”
“Why?” asked Edwin, looking pre-wounded. “What’s wrong with my wine?”
I’d said many terrible things to Edwin and he to me—the sort of terrible things you only said to someone when you loved them. But I’d never quite been able to bring myself to tell him that, nine times out of ten, his elderflower wine tasted like piss. Or at least how I imagined piss tasting. And that this was not a minority opinion. By rights, I should have said so now. What did I have to lose? We’d already broken up. He had Audi. And emotionally speaking, I was bleeding out on his couch.
I busied myself with unfolding the duvet he’d brought me. “I just think you should keep it for…you know, guests or something. Proper guests,” I added quickly. Since I was sure Axel was about to claim Iwasa guest.
Instead, his grin just, somehow, got even bigger. And even grin-ier. “Oh, no,” he said, stashing the bottle amongst my belongings, “you deserve this.”57
To which I had no counterargument.
Because I did indeed deserve it. And more besides. Perhapsthat was why I’d come. Looking for something. Well, something that wasn’t a bottle of terrible wine. Pain or retribution or absolution, at this point I couldn’t tell anymore. Or maybe it was both simpler and more selfish than that.
