“No lies,” Marnie reminded him. “Tell me about Ari.”
“I . . . Ari was just . . . She was just . . .”
“Just what? A one-night stand? A quick fling?”
“No,” Tom snapped sharply, a flare of protectiveness running through him. “Don’t talk about her like that.”
Marnie looked up from her knitting, a sudden interest filling her eyes. “She was more to you than that?”
Tom swallowed uncomfortably. “Yeah. She was more to me than that.”
“Care to clarify? If she wasn’t a fling, what was she to you?”
“Everything,” Tom replied honestly, his fists clenching. “She was everything to me.”
Marnie’s face suddenly softened, and she nodded. “So, there was a woman then.”
Tom sighed. “There was a woman.”
“Ari,” Marnie said softly. “Her name was Ari.”
“Ari Lightowler,” Tom informed her, his tongue slipping over the syllables, relief flooding through him at finally saying out loud the name that had tortured him internally for years. “She was from London, although I suspect you already knew that.” He gave his mother an inquisitive glance.
Marnie shrugged. “It isn’t about what I know, it’s about what I don’t know. So, this Ari... How did you meet her?”
“At an airport,” Tom said softly, looking down. “Keflavík, in Iceland.”
“I forgot you went to Iceland.” Marnie dropped her knitting for a moment to stare at him. “Why did you go there again?”
“Why not go there?” Tom shrugged. “It doesn’t even matter why I was there.”
“And Ari?”
Tom clutched the bedsheet in his hand. “She was travelling. She’d just finished a course in art and design. It was meant to be her round-the-world adventure before she settled down to work. She wanted to be an artist. She was going to paint landscapes. When she held a brush in her hand and stood before an easel, something inside of her... She just lit up. It was like looking at a candle flickering in the dark, like watching a...” Tom trailed off, suddenly embarrassed. He caught his mother’s eye, and realised she was looking at him oddly, her eyes soft and almost woebegone.
“An artist?” she asked him, and he nodded, looking down again.
“Yeah. I hope it happened for her.” He cleared his throat around a sudden lump that had risen. “I hope she still found time for it, even with—” Abruptly, Tom stopped, shaking his head as a painful memory reared forth.
“Even with what?” Marnie asked sharply, but Tom only shook his head once more.
“No. It doesn’t matter.”
Marnie gave him a look that showed she didn’t believe him. However, she picked up her knitting again, the needles clacking lightly as she spoke.
“So, you met at an airport?”
“Yeah. Volcanic activity meant all the flights leaving Iceland were grounded. I was on my way back to the States, she was headed to Norway. She was sitting on the ground by a window, her bag next to her, and I was playing cards nearby.”
“You were playing with Marie Leszczynska’s cards?” Marnie asked in disbelief. “In an airport?”
Tom nodded. “Yeah. I just... She was so pretty, and her eyes were so blue, and when she smiled at me—” Tom stopped, giving a rueful sigh. “The first time she smiled at me, I was gone for her. That was it. I was a lost cause. We played cards for a while — kept each other company. I showed her a magic trick.”
Tom closed his eyes, suddenly feeling suffocated by the memory of that night, and the pang of regret that followed and threatened to consume him. Next to him, he could hear Marnie’s knitting needles still moving, just as he could hear the bleeps of nearby hospital monitors, both noises grating on his fractured nerves. He missed Ari so much sometimes that he could hardly breathe.
When he opened his eyes again, Marnie was rolling her eyes. “Magic tricks and card games,” she huffed. “You’re your father’sson, all right. Those were the sort of lines your father used on me, back in the day.” She scowled. “And on a dozen other women too, I bet.”
“Let’s leave Dad out of this,” Tom said painfully.
