“Sweetheart, I think you’ve just had a partial. You were staring past me.”

I try not to look as crestfallen as I feel. I haven’t had one of those in ages—at least, I don’t think I have—and although they’re relatively harmless, I still feel unnerved when they’re pointed out to me.

He gives me a hug. “Don’t look so worried, darling. It was only a tiny one.”

“But what if I start getting more? What if the big ones come back, too?”

Ross steps back and assumes his “I’m a doctor so listen to me” face. “Worrying about the possibility of something happening is pointless. It’s not as if you have any control over it, so you might as well not worry.”

I roll my eyes. He can be maddeningly logical at times, and though I know what he says makes sense, it’s not what I want to hear right now. I want him to put his arms round me and tell me that it won’t come back. Not ever. Which is, of course, the one thing he won’t say. Because he’s a doctor, and no self-respecting doctor ever makes a promise they can’t keep. Even to his fiancée. To be fair, I probably wouldn’t believe him even if he did say that.

“That, if you don’t mind me saying, is a typical male response.”

He pretends to look upset. “Are you saying I’m a typical male? And there was me, thinking I was special.”

I give him a playful push, but later, when he’s spread his papers all over the dining-room table and I’m on my own again in the study, the anxiety returns. Maybe Ross did tell me he was going to be late the other night and I missed it because of a partial. I think I’ve underestimated how much stress this Elodie Stevens story has triggered, not to mention sorting through that wretched box and all the memories it’s dredged up.

I’m worried about other things, too. Things I can’t tell him because I can’t put them into words but that seem to be gathering around me. Nameless, shapeless fears rising to the surface once more.

“One day we’ll have babies of our own,” she said. “I’ve made a list of possible names.”

She brushed an ant from her leg and flicked it across the patio.

“Did you know that an ant can lift twenty times its own body weight?” I said.

She rolled her eyes and I felt my cheeks redden. Why on earth was I talking about ants? If I wasn’t careful, she’d find someone else to hang out with. I used to think that that bad thing we’d done would bind us together forever, but lately, I wasn’t so sure.

I couldn’t bear the thought of losing her.

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