Page 70 of You Were Always the One

‘He needs a miracle.’ She’s silent. ‘You know how I’ve always said anything is possible? Well, what’s going on now is forcing me to rethink.’

‘Don’t say that. Don’t ever stop believing,’ I say suddenly. ‘It’s who you are, Holls. Someone who believes.’

‘I used to be.’ When she looks at me, her eyes are filled with tears. ‘But I don’t feel like that any more.’

Alarm bells are going off. In the years I’ve known her, through whatever challenges she’s faced, Holly’s innate optimism always shone through; she rarely wobbled. If she loses herself, what hope is there for the rest of us?

‘You must know what I mean, Riggs.’ She hesitates. ‘We’re older, aren’t we? All this stuff is happening in our lives. I mean, after everything you and Emma have been through… And now you’re going to be a father… Doesn’t all of that make you feel different about yourself?’

I frown. ‘A little, perhaps.’ But no more than that. Should I, though? Am I missing something? ‘You have a lot more going on than I have, Holly.’

She turns to me in surprise. ‘You called me Holly. You always call me Holls.’

‘There you go. I have changed, after all,’ I quip. Then instantly berate myself. It’s hardly the time for cracking jokes.

‘When are you leaving?’ she asks.

‘I have a ferry tomorrow evening,’ I say. ‘Overnight to Caen. Then a long drive south to the Pyrenees.’

For a moment, she looks wistful. ‘Sounds wonderful.’

Come with me, I want to say, imagining the two of us watching the sun set behind the mountains, but I bite my tongue.

‘I hope it’s everything you want it to be,’ Holly says.

‘I’ll be back,’ I say uncertainly. ‘I really hope Miles responds to treatment.’

‘Thank you.’ Her smile is tight.

Both of us are silent as we walk back. But I guess we’ve said all there is to say. And by the time we return to the car park, I have the sense that we’ve gone full circle, that it’s like we’re two strangers again as we stand by her car.

‘Thanks for coming.’ I kiss her on the cheek.

‘Good luck, Riggs,’ she says softly. Then she gets in and drives away.

There it is. I’m almost in shock as I realise that this is the end of us. But we have never been in more different places. I’m free, relatively speaking, while Holly’s steering her family along the path through her husband’s terminal cancer. A path of tangled roots, unknowns, of fear. Ultimately, of heartbreak.

I don’t go home straight away. Instead, I lean on a five-bar gate, gazing across the landscape, a terrible sadness gripping me inside, the sense that I’m losing someone special. Because that’s what Holly is. Unbelievably special to me.

But then I remind myself: you already lost her, years ago.

Before I leave, I have one last thing to do. Carefully wrapping the Murano lamp, I pack it in a box. Driving over to where Emma lives with Archie, I park across the street. Then I go over and leave the parcel on their doorstep.

Back inside my car, I send her a text. Then I watch as the door opens. Seeing the box, she picks it up, glancing inside, a smile playing on her lips.

EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO

I was never sure why our story had to be so complicated. In the end, I came to the conclusion that it was just how life goes sometimes. While Skye trained, I vacillated over which path to take, concluding that in the short term, at least, it was less about what I did, and more about the money I’d earn.

I got turned down for the job as cabin crew. Instead, I worked in a pub. A summer passed during which I earned less than I’d hoped I would and learned far too much about people. When autumn came, I picked up some work freelancing as a writer. At the same time, Skye found a tiny cottage for a pittance of a rent and we at last moved out of my mother’s house.

It was wonderful to have our own little place – Skye had been right about that much. We started working on the neglected garden, then when the temperature dropped, we spent cosy evenings next to our own log fire. And so we went on, Skye with her nursing training, me doing whatever came my way.

Somewhere inside me, however, uncertainty lurked. Was this how it was now? For the rest of our lives? For some reason, the thought shocked me, enough that, at one point, I questioned whether Skye would be better off without me. If that day in Greece when she was about to leave, I’d let her go, so that she was free to find someone who really wanted what she did. And that was the problem, even now. I still wasn’t sure.

I knew we all made decisions, not knowing what the outcome would be. I was doing the best I could. But there was a restlessness building inside me which I hid from Skye – or so I thought.

Until one morning, I could tell there was something on her mind.