“I wasn’t ready. Alfie’s ready. Or at least he thinks he is. Maybe he is.”
“Alfie has lived more life than you.” That was true.
“It’s selfish, isn’t it? I ought to want it.”
“Why ought you? Who says so?” The world, I thought. Society. Everywhere I looked I was told so. “Maybe you will be ready. In your own time.”
“But what if I never am? What about Alfie? He wants a family.”
“He wants you more and you have to love yourself enough to believe you’re worthy of that love even without a child thrown in. It took me a while to get there. I must have ended things with Elliot a dozen times. Every time I lost another one I told him to go. I felt like I didn’t have enough to offer. But I do. And so do you.”
I leaned into her, tears on my cheeks.
“Have I made you feel worse?” She wrapped an arm around me.
“No, you’ve made me feel like my mum is here.”
Later, I found Alfie up on deck. I’d asked the chef to make smoothies for us and carried them up myself. I found him in shorts and a shirt, frowning at the sea as if it owed him a debt.
“How was the meeting?” I asked after he helped me to sit down.
“Unproductive. They don’t want me to leave. So much of the company's success rides on someone with the Tell name running it. They’ll figure it out.” He turned his head, studying me. “You look better.”
“I look the same.” He’d only seen me two hours ago, I definitely hadn’t gotten my whimsy back in that time.
“You look better,” he repeated. “What happened?”
“I talked to Ada.”
“That will do it.” He took my hand and I leaned into him as much as my ribs would allow. We’d spent the week waiting for the right time to have this conversation. But there was never going to be a right time.
“We talked about the miscarriage. I didn’t know she’d had so many.”
“Neither did I. Elliot and I had a similar conversation. Separately. I guess they tag teamed us.”
I smiled, of course they did.
“I’ll tell you what I told him if you’ll tell me what you told her.”
“Deal.”
“I told him that I’d never felt more helpless because I didn’t know how to make you feel better. I told him I felt guilty, like I’d done something to you that you didn’t ask for.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said, though of course it didn’t matter. We both knew how irrational emotions could be.
“I told Ada I was relieved not to be pregnant.” There it was. The elephant in the room. The monster under the bed. “I know that you want children more than I do. You must be so disappointed.”
“Lola, do you seriously think I would want you to be pregnant if you weren’t ready?” I wanted to remind him that he’d stolen my birth control once but I kept my mouth shut. He must have seen the memories on my face though because his own features twisted into a scowl. “Don’t look at me like that. You know that I was a fucked up individual when I did that to you and you know how relieved I was when that test was negative even though it meant losing you.” I held his hand tighter as he relived those dark memories. “I would love to have children with you. I think I could be a good father. But only when you’re ready.”
“And if I never am?”
He took a breath. “If you never are, you will always be enough. You’re my heart, O’Connell. I will love you more than any other dream.”
Forty
Iclosed my eyes as we drove through London. After almost two weeks on the Isabella it felt too loud in the city. We’d avoided the world for long enough and now, the world wanted us back. I had a best friend and a sister that were desperate to see me. Maia was about to be discharged from hospital and the few conversations on the phone weren’t enough for me to tell her how grateful I was, I needed to see her in person.
On the outside, my injuries were almost healed, internally I still had a ways to go. Still, every day Alfie treated me like fine china. I didn’t feel ready to come back but Alfie had business to deal with, we had my sister's wedding to attend and I had a swan sculpture to build. We couldn’t hide anymore.
