Page 69 of You, As You Are

“I hate sci-fi films,” he mused.

The sigh which Maisie tried to dampen was bored of trivial things. “Something real, please?”

Iain’s eyes snapped to her then. “Real?”

“We’ve covered a lot of your surface, Iain, but I bet there’s even more inside.” Maisie poked his solid thigh with the butt of her pencil – because she was close enough somehow to do that – while Iain pressed his tongue into his cheek.

She didn’t know why he was so reserved. It wasn’t his deepest, darkest secrets that Maisie wanted to uncover – though she didn’t doubt those would be interesting to delve into, because no man was bornthisstony. Just something more substantial which might give the appearance that they were actually trying to get to know one another.

She waited for the answer Iain worked himself up to give, watching the creases at the corner of his eyes.

“I was engaged,” he confessed, and tightness loosened in Maisie’s chest. “It ended two months before the wedding.”

Engaged?Her lips stayed in the ‘o’ that they’d parted. Iain caught the look on her face.

“Yes,” he intoned, “someone agreed to marry me.”

“No, that’s not what I …”

Well, it was just a little … The confession was just so unexpected. To be engaged meant he’d been in love once, or at least believed himself to be in love enough to almost marry someone.Oh my god,she realised as her pulse doubled,what if he still is?What if that’s the reason why he said he couldn’t commit to someone else?

“We split.” Iain turned his face to the window, quoting,“‘Irreconcilable differences.’”His body was so still, but Maisie could see a thousand things turning in his mind behind his stormy eyes, under the pinched set of his brows. What would it take for this man to relax? There was obviously still something about that breakup which haunted him.

It was a struggle for Maisie to not reach out and touch him as she said, “I’m sorry you went through that.”

Iain didn’t look at her. “Don’t be. One of us would’ve been miserable if the marriage had gone ahead. It’s better this way.”

Maisie set her pencil down in her lap, tucking her feet further beneath her. What she wanted to know was about to cross at least three different boundaries between them, but if they were going to continue to pretend, then she needed to know if everything ‘fake’ that he did for her was done with another woman in his mind.

She rolled her lips. “Did you still love her?”

Iain’s eyes were lost in a distant land. “Enough to let her go.”

“Oh.” Maisie didn’t think that she’d ever been close to that in her life. She wasn’t sure that she ever would get there.

It was hard enough as a woman of her size in this society to believe that she would find the deep, unyielding, main character love as a person who’d always been resigned to the ‘best friend’ status. It was difficult enough to find a man who wouldn’t give up on her before she’d even had a chance.

She didn’t feel obligated for more information; whatever had happened was Iain’s business; but as he worked his fingers back and forth over the backrest of her sofa, he offered up pieces of himself that Maisie didn’t think had been said aloud in months. Maybe years.

“Initially, she’d said she didn’t want children,” he told her. “Then her sister had a boy three months before we were supposed to be married. I guess that something within her changed, and all of a sudden she wanted three kids, nappies, swimming lessons, football on Sundays. I handled it badly.”

How heartbreaking that must have been, to be so close to marriage only for it to all go wrong.

Iain shifted his body. “Either way, she lied.”

Maisie knew that he was bruised, but that was harsh. “Or maybe she was just trying to make you happy by sacrificing what she really wanted?” She knew what that was like too well.

His eyes flicked to her and fell away slowly, perhaps reading between the lines she’d laid out. “Maybe.”

For the sake of making her point, she uttered, “Some people don’t know what they want until they realise they might never have it.”

Iain didn’t acknowledge her, deep off into his own world, but Maisie hadn’t just been talking abouthim.

Bloody hell, this had taken a turn.

She shivered, wishing all of a sudden that she’d worn a cardigan. She’d had a tickle in her nose and the edge of a headache all morning, which was probably just an effect of their walk the day before, and maybe her impending periodtoo. Goosebumps peppered her arms, and she convinced herself they were from the perpetual chill in this old flat andnotthe conversation they were having.

“You don’t want children, then?” she asked, making light of the topic as she bundled herself up for warmth.

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