Page 51 of The Fall I Fell

The hay beside me shifts with the weight of another and I blink through the tears to see his face. Will places an awkward hand on my back in a way that would imply he’s trying to comfort me, but he thinks that if he presses too hard, I might crumble, or turn on him. I’ve certainly been known to do the latter a few too many times, so I don’t blame him for his fear.

‘Do you need me to punch him?’ he whispers after a few more awkward minutes rubbing my back like I’m sick at a party after a few too many drinks.

I try my best to laugh, but it just comes out as a damp, snot-filled breath. Shaking my head, I try and swipe away the moisture on my face, but still the tears fall. ‘I really … I just thought we were more than friends.’ I sniff. ‘Was it really just nothing, all this time?’

Will sighs. I can’t work out if it’s out of sympathy, or regret that he bothered to get himself involved, but he gives me a tight smile that looks more like a grimace, and finally pulls his hand away.

‘All I know is that I’ve never seen him like he was after you left the last time. Whatever fight you had then really did a number on him.’

‘Wait, what?’ I swipe at my face aggressively, as though wiping away my tears would help me to hear him better.

‘I don’t know what you said to him, but man, it broke his heart.’

‘I broke his heart?’ I remember that night so vividly. Still, I wrack my brains for anything I could have said, any way I could have hurt him, but I’m only reminded of my own pain.

‘I don’t think I saw him for days,’ Will explains. ‘Usually, he’s like an animal, happy to wander the earth alone, but always comes home for food. But no. That summer, after your Granny’s funeral, he just disappeared. He came home a few days later, and then didn’t leave his room, as though it hurt more to be outside. It took weeks for him to tell me it was because of you, and months before he went back to any sort of normal. Mum hasn’t let him out of the house without a phone since. We were all worried sick.’

I don’t understand. Jacob wasn’t the only one suffering from sleepless nights. For weeks after that, I could hardly function. I’m not sure I even remember the days after that night in the treehouse. It’s like my mind switched off and I kicked into auto-pilot, knowing that any more heartbreak might send me spiralling. He was the one that left me there that morning, alone.

‘He was the one that made his choice,’ I say to Will, confused.

Will’s face mirrors mine, brows furrowed, head tilted just a little to the side as if nothing I just said registered in his brain as English. ‘I don’t know … he seemed pretty gutted if it was his choice.’

My head aches from all of this back and forth. I have flicked through so many emotions in the space of half a day that I’m sure one more word from anyone will be enough to make my skull explode. Massaging my temples with my thumbs, I try my best to make sense of it all: Jacob’s actions, his words, my conversation with Pen, Will’s revelations. My throbbing heart is being pulled in every direction and at risk of being torn into several pieces.

‘What am I supposed to do, Will?’ I plead with him, my tears flowing anew.

Instead of answering, he pulls me tightly into his chest, burying my face in his shirt, not worrying about me soaking it. Will has never been one for words, but on rare occasions, he’s given the best hugs – even if it’s just to muffle your sobbing after one of his ideas for a game has gone wrong and he doesn’t want you to run off crying.

‘Just don’t give up,’ he murmurs as my crying settles. Getting to his feet, he rubs his hand across the top of my head, sending my hair into a static mess, before walking away as though none of this ever happened.

Chapter 28

Two years ago

I’m sorry

That was all he’d left behind for me. I knew his handwriting; I’d know it anywhere. He never left enough space for an apostrophe; it was always crammed between the letters that were pressed together in his joined-up style. When we were kids, I asked him how he did it – managed to join every letter seamlessly – but he had shrugged and said he only did it because he’s too lazy to lift the pen from the page. There was no denying that this lazy scribble belonged to him.

My hand trembled as I read those two words over and over. The ink smudged as my tears hammered the page. There must’ve been some sort of mistake.

Climbing down from the treehouse in a daze, I found myself in the yard of Hope Farm, desperately searching for him, hoping I’d find him making me a flask of tea and he’d explain that it was all a misunderstanding.

‘Ava.’ An unexpected voice found me before I reached his home.

‘Adam?’ I pressed my palms into my eye sockets to try and clear the tears, and to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating. When his red hair pulled back into full focus, the confusion knocked me out of my anxious stupor for a moment. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I needed to catch you. I wouldn’t forgive myself if I didn’t.’ I hadn’t seen him since that night on the beach, and so much had happened since then that he’d hardly crossed my mind.

Seeing him now, so serious, stirred a sense of dread within me. ‘What’s going on?’

‘I came by last night to see Will and had no idea that you were all having the wake for your Gran. I’m so sorry, by the way.’ He cringed at his own heavy handedness, but it didn’t deter him. ‘I hung around for a little bit, at Will’s request. He had some bits he wanted to show me on his car – but that’s irrelevant. Anyway, I saw how close you were with Jake … and I thought you deserved to know.’

‘Know what?’ I could’ve shaken him, but still, he chewed on the inside of his cheek, debating how to tell me.

‘After the beach, where, you know, we kissed—’

‘Yes?’ I pushed him on, my patience dangerously thin.