That is what he had said when he’d left him at the boarding school, stepping back into the carriage without so much as a farewell. That is what he had said each time Damien had sent a telegram – asking when he could come home.
That is what he had whispered with every look, every brusque letter, every Christmas Damien had spent alone with the housemaster, and the handful of other boys that’d been left for the holidays.
At least the other parents had sent gifts – fine, woollen scarves to stave off the school’s creeping chill, or fruitcakes wrapped in crackling wax paper.
But his father?
His father had sent nothing.
And so … when he’d gotten a little older, and the number of boys left at the boarding school come Christmas had dwindled to become just him, and some of the much younger students, he’d left.
He’d stolen out in the dead of night, his small suitcase packed with whatever he could fit within it.
‘I’ll not let him find me,’ Damien mumbled.
‘Is he looking for you, Damien? Your father?’
Something reached inside of him, squeezing at his chest, making it hard to breathe.It was better this way.Better his father believed him dead – better to start a new life. One in which it was buried.
Because it was all my fault.
‘What was your fault, Damien?’
Ava’s voice again – and it pulled at him, dragging him down twisting alleyways, and damp boarding houses, over rolling hills, and sodden dirt-tracks, back – not to the lake house this time, but to London, to a red door yawning open – and a tall man, with a hunched posture: his father. And suddenly he knew the door wasn’t opening.
No.
It was closing. On him. On his family. On everything he had known – and the water was getting colder, and blacker, and—
‘Damien.’
He felt warm hands upon his face, warm breath making his hair flutter, and he opened his eyes. Ava was crouched in front of him, her pale hair pulling free of its bun, her stone-grey eyes verging on blue, tears welling within them.
‘Damien,’ she said, and his name was a breath upon her lips. ‘You’re safe. All is well.’
The look he gave her was unguarded. Exposed. And his eyes flicked away. ‘Yes,’ he muttered – though his voice was thin as wire, and shaking. ‘I’m well.’
She could see that was a lie from how he avoided her gaze. How he folded his arms tightly across his chest. He sat back, away from her touch, his attention fixed firmly on his hands.
‘He was wrong, you know,’ she said, trying to draw his gaze back to her. ‘Your father.’
He shunted a breath through his lips. ‘How?’
‘Because you are not a “bad thing”, Damien.’
When he finally looked up at her, his eyes were dark with challenge. ‘And how do you know?’
‘Because no mistake makes us bad people, Damien. Especially not the mistake of a child.’
‘Really?’ His lips curled upwards a little, and he huffed a humourless laugh through his teeth. ‘And what if I’ve made worse mistakes since? Not once – not twice – but dozens of times. What then?’
Ava sat back on her heels, considering this for a moment. ‘Well,’ she said quietly. ‘I suppose that depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On how it felt, afterwards. Whether you felt guilty.’
He shook his head. ‘I know what you’re trying to do, Ava. But I’m trying to tell you—’
