“Well, there’s some stuff I miss,” Caleb says, and I wonder if he’s starting to feel a bit uncomfortable, given London is where his life with Helen was, “but on balance, no. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”
—
Later that evening, we make the most of the long daylight by heading down to the beach hut, where we fling open the door and settle down together to drink in the view. It’s that grainy half hour now before dusk turns into darkness. The moon in the sky is dulled by cloud, like a lamp in mist.
“Thanks for today,” I say, rocking into Caleb with my shoulder. “Tash and Simon really loved you.”
He smiles. “They’re great. I liked them, too. You’re very lucky.”
I draw the scent of sea-soaked sand to my chest. Tiny lights speckle the horizon—ships, maybe? Oil rigs? The air tonight is warm and calm, still balmy from a day of unbroken sunshine.
“How often do you see your family?”
He wrinkles his nose. “Not often. It’s always a bit like walking on eggshells. Everyone trying not to offend one another. Surface-level chat. The kind of get-together you need a drink to recover from.” He hesitates. “Sorry.”
I shake my head, to let him know it’s okay. “Well, Dylan adored you, too. You’ve got a friend for life there.”
He smiles. “He’s such a little dude.”
“He is.” I sip my tea. “Did you ever think... you might have kids with Helen?”
I know it’s an intensely personal question, but it doesn’t feel like personal’s off-limits between us. Plus, Caleb is the sort of guy who’ll be straight-up if he doesn’t want to talk about something.
“Yeah,” he says, then clears his throat. “We actually tried, for ages.”
“You did?” I say, pulling away slightly from where I’ve been tuckedup against him, my head on his shoulder. I don’t know why I’m so surprised—I suppose I just imagined they broke up before they got serious about starting a family. I mean, you wouldn’t try to have kids with someone if you thought they wanted completely different things to you, would you?
Caleb glances down at me without quite meeting my eye. “Yeah.” But he doesn’t elaborate.
“Didn’t you... break up because you’d grown apart?”
“Eventually, yes. But we were in denial for a long while before then, I guess. Or maybe I was. I think I convinced myself I could be happy staying in London, if we had a family.”
I wait, sensing he has more to say.
“We went through six rounds of IVF.” His voice is heavy with admission. “Unsuccessful, obviously.”
Six rounds of IVF?
“Helen’s five years older than me. She was worried about... you know. Leaving it too late.”
I struggle for a moment to find the words. So... surely it was those six unsuccessful rounds of IVF that broke them—not disagreeing on whether to hike the Inca Trail or keep their own chickens?
“Caleb, I thought...” But then I don’t know what to say.
I take a moment to collect my thoughts, absorbing as I do the peace of the windless night, the sound of sea meeting shingle in soft, briny bursts.
“What?” he says, gently.
“Do you think you’d still be together? If the IVF had worked.”
He exhales. “That’s... impossible to answer.”
Hardly the reassurance I was hoping for. “I thought you broke up because you wanted different things.”
“We did. I guess it just took all the stress of the IVF to fully realize it.”
“Wow.” I mouth it more than say it, which I suppose comes across as slightly snarky.
