A little while later, we sat on the couch with the cups of coffee I had eventually got round to making. She was drinking out of one of Jonah’s mugs. The sight of it in her hands made me feel something I couldn’t quite explain.
There were a lot of things I couldn’t quite explain, if I was being honest. There were so many things I wanted to say that it was hard to know where to start.
Chess met my eyes and smiled, a little awkwardly. Clearly I wasn’t the only one.
‘So,’ I said, sipping my coffee, ‘um… how’ve you been?’
The awkward smile turned into an awkward chuckle. ‘Did the bursting into tears before not give it away, or…?’
‘Well, I thought I should probably check,’ I said, ‘given I seem to have recently become very bad at reading.’
Chess sighed, setting her coffee cup down. ‘No, Sadie. No. I don’t want you to think you’ve done anything wrong. I fucked up, not you. This is all my fault.’
‘Forgive me if I’m wrong,’ I said, ‘but I don’t think it was you who came to me and said,surprise, I’m marrying my nemesis tomorrow, you must be cool with it or else.’
‘I’m the one who immediately tried to steamroller over you without listening, though. I’m the one who didn’t even turn up to your wedding. I’m the one who—’
‘Chess, we’re both adults, okay? Please let me take some of the blame.’
She exhaled audibly. ‘One of us is an adult,’ she said, ‘but I don’t think it’s me.’
‘Then listen to me.’ I put my coffee cup down too. ‘Let me be the big sister for a minute.Listento me.’
She closed her eyes and bit her lip.
‘I need you, Chessie,’ I said. ‘I’m always going to need you. That’s never, ever going to change.’
Tears started to bead on her lashes again. She blinked them away.
‘There’s no version of my life without you in it,’ I said. ‘I am who I am because of you. You raised me. Youmademe. You shouldn’t have had to – fuck knows no one else wanted to – but you did, and I’ll never stop being grateful to you.’
‘I didn’t know how to stop doing it, though,’ she said. ‘I still don’t know how to stop. I don’t know how to… it’s been months, and I still don’t know how to live my life without putting you right at the centre of it, Sadie. Every time I think I’m making progress…’ She shook her head.
I reached over and took her hand. ‘How about we figure it out together, then?’
Chess paused for a few moments, and then she nodded. I tugged at her fingers and pulled her into me, putting my arm around her so that her head rested on my shoulder, the way she always used to do for me when we were kids.
‘I’ve missed you so much,’ I whispered. ‘Going all these months without talking to you – it’s been so awful.’
‘You’ve done all right without me.’
She gestured at the three things hanging on the wall – mine and Jonah’s doctorates, separated by our wedding photo. ‘It’s real now, isn’t it? You and him?’
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘It wasn’t, when that photo was taken, but it is now.’
Even as the words were coming out of my mouth, I knew they weren’t quite the truth. I might have been too proud and too stubborn and too stupid to admit it, butsomethingbetween Jonah and me had been real ever since I’d turned up at his bedroom door and asked him if he wanted to marry me.
‘I need Jonah too,’ I said, resting my cheek against Chess’s hair. ‘Not the same way I need you, but I’ve needed him for a long time, even if I didn’t really know it. I think… I think that was why I was so scared to tell you we were getting married. I knew you hated him – and I knew you’d talk me out of it, if I gave you enough time to do it – but something in me knew I needed him.’
‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry I made you feel like you couldn’t tell me that. Like I wouldn’t listen to you.’
‘That partreallyisn’t your fault. I didn’t even know it myself.’
I let out a long breath. ‘Jonah and I have always been on a level playing field,’ I said. ‘It’s… different, the way I need him. The way I’ve always needed him: to keep me sharp, to challenge me, to push me when I need to be pushed. He made me too, in his own way, over the years, for better or worse, and now… now he’s made me really happy. He’s the best thing that’s happened to me in a long, long time.’
Gently, I pushed Chess away from me, so we were both sitting upright again and I could look her in the eye.
‘But none of this,’ I said firmly, ‘changes a single thing about how much I need you, Chessie. How much I love you.’
