Chapters (40)
- Cover
- About the Author
- PENGUIN BOOKS
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- THE BEGINNING
‘When are you going to come over and see us?’
‘I’d love to. You know how much I’d love to. We’re such a crowd though.’
‘That’s OK. We don’t mind. Or you could come on your own.’
‘On my own?’
‘It’s not such a shocking idea. I’m not asking you to run away.’
She laughed. ‘I miss you,’ she said.
Jem put the phone down as Juliet came through the door, carrying the cauldron of soup. Clouds of steam rose round her face; her forearms were strong and tanned and her bare feet dusty.
‘How’s Irene, then?’ she asked, putting the cauldron on the table and standing back.
‘OK. I guess.’
‘You guess?’
‘Treading water.’
‘She should come and visit us, get away from everything for a while.’
‘That’s what I keep telling her.’
‘We’re not treading water, are we?’
He put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her on her forehead, then her mouth.
‘Treading water? No, my darling.’
‘The soup’s getting cold.’
‘God, Juliet, how did I ever get so lucky?’
‘Was it luck? That’s not the way I remember it. I believe I chased you until you were cornered and couldn’t escape.’
‘I was just shy.’
‘Just as well that I wasn’t, then.’
‘Come here.’
‘The soup …’
‘Never mind the soup.’
When Adrian came in, walking with the exaggerated care of someone who has drunk too much, he babbled something about Sarah going into labour. But when he looked into Irene’s face he stumbled over his words. He felt that she saw straight through him, to the bubbling mess inside.
Four
The next morning Adrian got up late, after a restless night. He’d been aware of Irene sliding out of bed in the early hours and noises downstairs, and she had returned much later with cold feet. At just after six, he’d heard Aggie call out and she had groaned and buried her face in the pillow for a few seconds until Aggie had called again, insistent. She’d hissed his name a couple of times, then heaved herself out of bed once more and left the room. Adrian squirmed into the duvet, feeling the patches of warmth where she had been. There was the faint clatter of hail against the window; even from where he lay, he could tell that it was an inhospitable morning.