I am sitting here feeling guilty for upsetting you so much. Hayley may have thought you are secretly in love with me but she was wrong. I shouldn’t have believed her. I believed her because I so wanted it to be true. She is young and lacks life experience. Maybe she is fantasising about magazine romance for other people because she is with that prick Jono and she doesn’t have enough of it in her life. I have been admiring you from a distance for so long, Saffron, I am used to it. I will just have to continue doing that. At least I can stay close enough to be your friend. To share your life as a brother-in-law, an uncle to your children.

Lunch is the usual. Two different meals. A roast dinner with all the traditional accompaniments, and a vegan casserole that looks like vomit mellowing in dishwater. Everyone except my mother is eating. Mother isn’t touching her food. She is just sipping a glass of tap water, and looking tired. So tired. Waif-thin, with bags under her eyes. Even her colour is wrong; her pale skin brushed with a glint of lime.

After lunch I volunteer to help you wash up and clear the table. My best chance to speak to you, as it’s your turn on the rota. We load the dishwasher and our fingers accidentally meet. The touch of your skin against mine sends a pulse of electricity through me. I look into your eyes.

‘Saffron, I’m really sorry about Friday. I truly promise it will never happen again.’

‘Thank you, Aiden, because as you noticed, I can’t cope with it. I love Miles. My life would fall apart if our marriage didn’t work. Your attention has caused enough trouble already. I can’t cope with any more.’

I take your hand in mine and squeeze it. ‘I absolutely promise. And this time I mean it, I can assure you. I apologise for the damage I have caused already. I want what is best for you, nothing more. I just hoped … and I thought maybe … and I’m sorry. I will respect your wishes and leave you alone.’

Your scream resonates in my head. It will haunt me forever. A scream of anguish. Not the scream of a woman in love.

128

Miles

I pop my head around the kitchen door. Aiden and Saffron are holding hands, eyes locked.

129

Saffron

Aiden is leaving at last. I sigh inside with relief, as I escort him through the hallway towards the front door. As I watch him pull away from the driveway in his dark blue Maserati; his shiny new look-at-me car. Today he has behaved as if he finally believes that the only man I want is Miles. So that is an improvement. A breakthrough, I hope.

Siobhan McConnaughey, the Law Society’s solicitor’s words sear through my head.