Tom falls asleep before I return.
I slide under the covers, hoping I haven’t betrayed myself.
I wonder if it’s possible to miss someone you told yourself you didn’t need.
If it’s possible to lie in a bed beside someone warm and kind and utterly the wrong shape—
And still feel cold.
THIRTY-THREE
Gemma bursts into the living room like she’s auditioning for another reboot ofGladiator.She’s wearing a glittery pink tutu, half an Elsa costume and one light-up sneaker.In her hand is a foam sword, which she raises above her head.
‘AUNTY J!’she shrieks.‘YOU’RE NOT DEAD YET!’
I sit at Issy’s kitchen table in a Snow White outfit Gemma insisted I wear twenty minutes ago, tiara askew, lipstick smudged across my cheek because I let her paint my face.
I glance down at my plastic heels.‘Sweetheart, Aunty J is emotionally dead.That counts.’
She whacks me with the sword.
‘Break time,’ I announce, holding up my hands.‘Go torture Billie for a while.’
Gemma frowns.‘But she’s hiding in the washing machine and that’s cheating.’
‘That’s also called strategy.You should take notes.’
She pouts dramatically – an inherited Hayes trait, I’m almost certain – and then sprints off to find her sister with the unhinged energy of someone who’s consumed three Zooper Doopers and made peace with chaos.
Issy walks in carrying a laundry basket the size of a small car.She surveys the glitter trail Gemma’s left in her wake like it’s the aftermath of a tiny, sticky hurricane.
‘Sorry about that,’ she says.‘Gemma’s going through a phase.’
I raise an eyebrow.‘Is Greg going through a phase too, or is this absent thing more permanent?’
Issy flinches, almost imperceptibly.But I catch it.I always catch it.
She waves a hand, too casual.‘He’s fine.He’s just … stressed.’
Right.And he wasstressedtwo years ago when she showed up on my doorstep with tired eyes, two feral toddlers and a duffel bag she wouldn’t unpack.
I’ve tried to get her away from him.For her sake.For the kids.For my own sanity, so I can stop waking up in the middle of the night wondering if I should’ve said more, done more, been more convincing.
But Issy has her own rules.Her own warped logic that staying married means stability, and stability means her kids won’t end up like us – fractured and sharp-edged and covered in wounds that never quite healed.
She thinks staying means they’ll be okay.
I think she’s wrong.
But I’ve already said that.So instead, I peel off one of the plastic heels and flex my toes.
Issy finally sinks into the chair across from me.She looks exhausted.The bone-tired kind of exhaustion, like something is slowly draining her from the inside.
‘You okay?’I ask softly.
She hesitates.Then, ‘Some days I feel I’m … watching my own life happen.’
I blink.That’s not the Issy I know.The one who always had a plan.Who colour-coded her high school diary and married the first guy who said he wanted a future with her.
