‘The bed’s over there,’ she whispers.

‘I want you just like this.’ I kiss her, my fingers rough against the soft skin underneath her jumper.

She moans against my mouth, starts pulling at my belt buckle, the fly of my jeans, and the noise that comes out of me then is more relieved than eager. When I push her back against the wall again, the wood-framed picture next to the mantelpiece rattles.

Mary whispers shh as she stills my hand against her breast. But she’s flushed and still smiling as she glances at the closed door. ‘Calum’ll hear us.’

‘No, he won’t,’ I say. So that when she kisses me again, harder and longer, I can finally give in to all that burning heat. All that comfort offered like an Old Norse saga or a white-bright light. Slow and steady and wild. Full of triumph and ruin.

And afterwards, as she strokes fingers through my hair, long and slow, I press my face into the hollow of her neck and say aloud the words that are inside my head every hour of every day. ‘I just … I want this to work, Mary.’

She shoves against my shoulders until I have to step back. Her fingers are cool, and yet they make my skin burn.

‘Always so serious,’ she says, pressing her palms against my face as she kisses me one more time. But her eyes are sharp and dark and unblinking. ‘It’ll work if you want it to. You don’t need to own something to have it, Rob. You just need to believe that it’s yours.’

*

Later, when the nightmares wake me up, I get out of bed and go into the mudroom. The door to Calum’s tiny bedroom is open, and I lean my shoulder against its frame, watch him for a long time. The dark stars and blue-silver sky of his nightlight moving across his round little face and soft huffs of breath. The love I felt for him when he was born was terrorising, debilitating. The love I have for him now feels big enough to fill the world, the universe, yet still I can only think of it in increments and never as a whole. We none of us get the father we deserve.

I go back into the main room, glance at the sleeping Mary as I creep towards the kitchen. A change in the wind will wake me from the deepest dream, while she could most likely sleep through an earthquake. Still, I open the trapdoor as quietly as I can, the wooden steps icy against the soles of my feet as I climb down into the cellar. I can hear the wind howling around the eaves of the blackhouse, rattling my resolve. It sounds like screams ricocheting around high cliffs and bluffs.

Being afraid of the sea on an island is like being afraid of the fucking air, boy. All those nightmares that I had in the days and months afterwards – drowning, choking for breath through waves of salt and strings of seaweed. Those frown lines like furious scars cut deep into his face. Because he only ever saw my fear, and never once my anger. The rage that grew in me like crop fodder.