Chapter Forty-Six

KAT

I push open the door to my flat, ignoring the airless heat that hits me full in the face. I stand in the middle of my lounge with no idea what to do with myself. I go to the bathroom to wipe away the remnants of the make-up my salty tears didn’t wash away. I ignore the pallid reflection looking back. I go to the lounge, sit at the head of my dining table and point the chair towards the window. Late-afternoon sun flickers through the trees onto the path leading up to Norfolk Park. A young girl pushes an empty buggy as her toddler runs on up ahead. A helicopter hovers nearby and the door to my block of flats slams shut as someone comes or goes.

And I feel faint. Like I’m not really in my skin. Like I’m somewhere above, observing the mess I’m hurtling through. The car crash. The total fuck-up. I rest my feet against the windowsill, pushing the chair back till it meets the dining table, and sit, suspended, caught between wall and table, not moving.

I think back over the last week or so: the first time I saw Rhys as he raced into the hospital in a panic. The sadness in his eyes when he talked about his brother, and the sense of purpose that replaced it all when he thought he could help Susan. How I saw a flash of life in Susan when Rhys busied himself around her. How she would look at him. The note she wrote. The book. The news clipping and the overwhelming sadness that her entire life could be dictated by one choice. A choice she never quite forgave herself for. Her life not lived, but dedicated to the care of her parents. A life she is now desperate to leave behind because she can’t see what place, what purpose, she has within it.

Is it a life I could have changed, if perhaps I’d done things differently?

I shift my legs, letting the chair drop back to the ground. I head into the kitchen, reaching to the top of my cupboards to pull out a packet of cigarettes I hid in there months ago. I lift the lid and sniff inside, tasting the memory of a first draw. I dig out a lighter from the back of the cupboard and kiss the flame with the end of the cigarette. Thick smoke hits and burns the back of my throat as I inhale, the initial buzz quickly replaced by a dizzy sickness. I run the tip under the tap, waiting for the fizz to fade. There’s a knock at my door. ‘Yep?’ I say, opening it. Lou stomps straight in, carrying a wicker basket and bottle of Prosecco.

‘Did you forget we were supposed to be going out for an afternoon picnic? We’ve been sat in Graves Park for the last two hours waiting for you.’

‘Who has?’ I ask, racking my brains for any memory of such an invite.