‘Not that I’m suggesting we actually stay married until death do us part,’ she added. ‘Just until we both pass probation. We’d be much harder to fire then.’
I wasn’t considering this – no, I absolutely wasn’t considering this – but the unfriendly lighting was catching fiery highlights in her hair, and—
‘How long is probation?’ I asked. ‘Three years.’
‘Threeyears?’ My voice hadn’t hit a note this high since before it had broken.
She shrugged. ‘We’ve lived in the same house for eight years already and managed to not kill each other. What’s another three?’
How was she so nonchalant about this?
‘Although it doesn’t have to be the full three,’ she added. ‘That’s for your protection, not mine. No skin off my nose if you want to end it earlier.’
I could hear my own heartbeat pounding in my ears. ‘Come on, Shaw. You haven’t thought this through. Not really.’
She gave me a pointed look. ‘When, exactly, over the last fifteen years, have I given you the impression that I don’t think things through?’
‘There are so many reasons why this is a bad idea,’ I said. ‘What if… What if we got married and you fell in love with someone else? What would you do then?’
‘Who says we can’t have an open marriage? We could be the Lit Studies equivalents of Sartre and de Beauvoir.’
‘Sartre and de Beauvoir weren’t married.’
‘Iknowthat, Jonah.’
She exhaled through her teeth. ‘Listen, I relate to your sister more than I’d like to, okay?’ she said. ‘I especially relate to her kids. I know what it’s like to be abandoned.’
I remembered what she’d told me all those years ago when we won the University Medal. Her mother dying. Her father leaving. The look in her eyes when she’d said,When I said I fought hard for this, Fisher, I didn’t just mean I fought you.
‘My dad was an abusive shithead birthed directly from Satan’s arsehole,’ Sadie said. ‘Leaving was the best thing he ever did for us, but it still hurt.’
She folded her hands in her lap, lacing her fingers together. ‘It wasn’t my mum’s fault, but when she died, you can bet that felt like being abandoned too.’
I couldn’t even imagine what that was like.
For all that my parents were terrible – for all that they’d pitted Elias and Fiona and I against each other – they were always there. Even when my dad had made that awful,awfulcrack about not being able to catch me if I fell because Fi had come begging for money, I knew he didn’t actually mean it.
If I fell, he would never let me hear the end of it. That dirtiest of words –failure– would be wielded against me like a weapon for the rest of my life.
But there was a reason Fi had set aside her pride and gone to them when Matt refused to pay child support. She’d fallen, and – financially, at least – they’d caught her.
‘There’s only one person in my life that hasn’t abandoned me,’ Sadie said. ‘My sister.’
She took her listing topknot down. That glorious hair of hers fell wild around her shoulders. I swallowed reflexively, hoping she hadn’t heard the way my breath caught in my throat.
‘I’ll never be able to pay Chess back for everything she did for me. Not in a thousand years. The only thing I can do is pay it forward.’
Then she paused. ‘Your sister is going through a nightmare,’ she said. ‘But if we can pull this partner hire thing off, and you can show up for her, be there for her, the way that Chess was for me, then… then in the middle of that nightmare,something good happens.’
I swallowed again.
I knew – Iknew– this was a terrible idea.
I knew what I should say.
This is unbelievably generous of you to offer, Sadie, and I don’t want you to think I don’t appreciate it – but I can’t.
‘All right, Shaw,’ I said instead. ‘Let’s get married.’
