This isn’t about you.
Of course it isn’t. And as the thought completes, Aidan sways on his feet. I steady him, wishing this wasn’t the first time I’ve ever seen him upright. I wish he was happy and free and that it was easy to let him go. But he’s not happy, and I knew that even before today. “Aidan.” I try again. “Where are you trying to go? Do you live near here?”
He leans on me, though I can tell he doesn’t mean to. That he wouldn’t for one second if he realised. “I live round here,” he says slowly, slurring, like he’s drunk. “But you don’t.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because I’d know.”
“Would you?”
“Yeah.”
I turn us round so we’re facing the road, my arm still looped under his broad shoulders. “Then you don’t know much. My house is right there, on the end.”
“It’s not.”
“It is.”
“It can’t be.”
“Why not?”
He’s run out of answers, and energy, apparently. His legs give way and it takes every ounce of my strength to hold us both up. Lacking any better ideas, I manoeuvre him away from the wall and start walking.
“Where are we going?” he grunts.
“For a cup of tea,” I say, even though I don’t have any in my cupboards. “Then maybe I’ll call you a cab to wherever you’re supposed to be.”
He doesn’t answer, so I keep towing him until we reach my front door, wide open, as I left it when I charged across the road to get to him. I kick it shut and somehow manhandle Aidan into the kitchen, thankful I have the bad habit of leaving all the chairs untucked.
Aidan falls into one and instantly slumps over my cluttered kitchen table. One arm is flung out in front of him, the other tucked under his unshaven chin. His hair falls over his face. The urge to brush it back is so strong it takes my breath away, so I retreat to the kettle while I try and come to terms with the fact that the man I’ve been dreaming of is passed out in my kitchen.
It’s a tough reality to swallow, and I almost don’t, but then Bella comes in from the patio where she’s been chomping on the stick she brought home from the woods and stops dead in the doorway, her standard reaction for the rare occasions someone she doesn’t know comes into the house. She tilts her head sideways and sniffs the air. Then, clearly deciding she likes what she smells, she prances over to Aidan and treats him to an exuberant lick.
“What the—” He straightens so fast he must have given himself whiplash. He stares at Bella, and in slow motion, he drags his gaze to me. “I—I don’t know what’s happening.”
I think of all the times I’ve stuttered those words at a well-meaning stranger and been even more terrified by their response. I think of the one and only time a stranger has ever managed to calm me.
“You are crazy, Ludo, but never forever. Everything always is fluid. Nothing sticks.”
The student nurse was kicked off his course for repeated use of the termcrazy. It’s inappropriate, judgemental, and cruel, and for some shows a level of ignorance that can’t be forgiven,butthe word has never botheredme. It’smine, and I own it, and since that day I’ve never considered it a theme that can’t be swapped out for something else.
I was unwell then and I will be again, but I’m not right now.
Aidan was unhappy when I met him and he still is, but that doesn’t mean he has to be.
I cross the room and crouch in front of him, my hands on his knees, and I’m so sure I can feel the pins holding his bones together that I almost pull away.
But I don’t pull away. I hold his gaze and smile enough to help him feel safe. “I think you’re drunk and lost, in every sense of the word, so I’m going to make you some tea and some food. Then we can talk, and maybe I can help you get home.”
Twelve
Aidan
It’s not often that I sober up to find my dreams have come true. Usually I’m face down on the carpet having rolled off my bed in the dead of night or, more recently, in the middle of the day.
This time, I come to my senses in a cosy kitchen I don’t recognise, but it feels so fucking familiar, I can’t help wondering if I’ve been here before.
