Page 35 of All the Things We Never Knew

Her words stung, and I had to bite back a sarcastic retort. There was no point in rising to her anger – not only would it get me nowhere (except possibly slung out into the street without having seen Gray), but her feelings were totally understandable. She was furious – with me, with the world, no doubt with Gray himself – and I couldn’t blame her for it.

‘Did he have a bad night?’ I asked gently.

She sat down on one of the stools by the counter, as suddenly as if she was a puppet whose strings had been cut. ‘They’re mostly bad now. The carers come and get him ready for bed, then again in the morning, but it’s the time in between.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘It’s not easy.’

‘It’s like when the kids were babies.’ She pulled a square of paper towel off the roll and looked at it the same way she’d looked at the eggs, then folded it in half and blew her nose. ‘Except I’m twelve years older, I don’t have a husband to help me, and…’

I waited. It was almost as if she had forgotten it was me she was talking to.

‘And with babies everyone tells you it’ll get better, but this won’t. At least, not until…’ She trailed off, not wanting to say the words that were on her mind as they were on mine.

I felt emotion welling up inside me, sweeping away my careful veneer of composure. I was angry too. I was hurting too. And I was full of self-loathing because, in spite of all Anna was going through, I envied her. I was jealous as all hell of the time she was getting to spend with Gray when I wasn’t – jealous in a way I’d never been before I knew the hours and days he had left were finite in number.

I put down the tray, pulled a tissue out of my pocket and dabbed my eyes. Anna watched me coldly, as if by my display of weakness I was trying to detract from her own pain.

‘You should take that up before it gets cold,’ she said.

‘Anna – let me know if there’s anything else I can do to help. Please.’

Her lips tightened and she shook her head. She wasn’t letting me in – wasn’t granting any more privileges than she already had. ‘You can let yourself out and leave the tray in the hallway.’

I said, ‘Okay,’ again, turned away and set off up the stairs.

Gray was awake, sitting in an armchair by the window, next to the bed. The curtains were open and the morning light fell across his face. It had only been a week since I last saw him, but the change in him was noticeable – shocking, even. His cheeks were hollow, and the veins on his hands stood out like twisted strings. I could see his abdomen swollen with ascites, pushing against the fabric of his pyjamas. The skin on his feet above his slippers was bone white.

But when he saw me, he managed a smile.

‘Room service,’ I announced, stepping through the door. ‘Would you like this on your lap?’

‘Stick it on the bed for now,’ he said, ‘and come here.’

I did as he asked, squatting down next to him so he could fold me in his arms. There was still strength in him, as if all the power from his wasted muscles had been absorbed, concentrated into bone and sinew. When he kissed me I could smell his familiar aftershave and toothpaste alongside the other smell – the smell of acetone or pear drops on his breath, which was familiar too, in a different way.

We held each other for a long time, until my Achilles tendons were screaming from squatting.

‘You should eat your breakfast,’ I said at last.

He looked at the tray. ‘I can smell those roses through the window. I wonder if Anna will ever be able to enjoy them again.’

I didn’t know the answer to that, but I didn’t need to respond because his train of thought had already moved on.

As I settled the tray on his legs, removing the speckled brown egg from its woolly hat and carefully slicing off the top, he went on, ‘I thought we’d be able to sleep together again. Well – not sleep, but…’

‘I know what you mean.’

‘Just a couple of weeks ago, I was lying here with a massive hard-on, imagining you walking in and taking your clothes off. But you didn’t come that day.’

‘I must’ve been working. Damn – I missed out on the fun.’

He dipped a piece of toast in his egg and ate it, then took another. ‘I suppose that ship has sailed. And we wouldn’t have done it anyway.’

‘We couldn’t have. Not with Anna here. Not even if she wasn’t. It wouldn’t be right.’

‘I know. I wouldn’t have expected you to. Funny – that night at Eldercombe Manor was the last time, and we had no idea.’

My heart twisted with sadness. ‘And the time before that – in my room at Mel’s flat.’