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Back I Know What I Saw
Chapters (59)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise for I Know What I Saw
  3. By the Same Author
  4. Dedication Page
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  54. Now read on for a preview
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  59. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

And yet there is a version of this memory in which I threw my arms around him and held him as he teetered on the balcony. I smothered his sobs and then once they had subsided, I wiped his eyes. My hand was there on his head, stroking his hair. I whispered to him, my love. And my forgiveness.

And as his breathing settled into a steadier, slower rhythm, I leant into him.

And, gently, I pushed.

49

Tuesday

It takes an hour to reach Waterloo Bridge. It is the one that I use more than any other to cross the border. It has none of the beauty or the fancy ironwork of Chelsea or Albert. It has no lights, or towers. There is only one thing to mark it out from every other: the view.

I avoid it, now, that view. But halfway along I stop and gaze into the river instead. The river’s muddy faces swell and shift but they are still impassive, inscrutable. Tourists and workers in suits and coats pass behind me but don’t give me a second look. I don’t want to be seen. I could climb over this low barrier and slip into the water without so much as a turned glance. I would slide in like a knife and sink to the bottom with mouthfuls of river water in my stomach and lungs. The cold of it, the shock of it, will make me gasp. I will flail and when the water begins to claim me, I will rail and fight as my body’s instincts overpower my will. But then, after a brief rattle of life, I will go.

When Rory died, he succeeded but I did not. I see that now – at last. The haunting of those years finally over. I see it. I know what it means to yearn for release in this way. To be free of the oppression of memory and action. I know what made him want to go and why he climbed on to the ledge. When you are there facing the eternal nothingness, it is overwhelming. It is all that it can do. It must overwhelm because that is its nature. So, he was overcome, as he was bound to be.

Now I am, as he was then, straddling the barrier. I swing a leg over until I am sitting on the wide wall that separates earth from air and water. The surface is slippery and sitting on it makes me feel giddy, as if on a downward swing. I swivel to face the water and feel the pull of the waves. When people visit high buildings and climb to the top, the thing they fear most isn’t falling, but jumping. They are afraid that some urge will take them and they will jump. And now here I am fearing the opposite – that I don’t have the courage to jump.