Page 61 of The Art of Loving You

The three of us had never felt so close and after they left, following a fish and chip supper at the kitchen table, I changed into my pyjamas and fed Socks the leftover cod, feeling content. While he ate I wrapped myself in Norma’s quilt and opened up the notes app on my phone.

Things to do to get the centre up and running.

I studied those words until they blurred, hopping and skipping on the page, rearranging themselves into something else entirely.

I can do this.

Jack’s whispered voice echoing, ‘You’ve got this’.

It was a small start, but it was a start.

Tomorrow I’d do more.

Later, Socks sat on my lap, my fingers picking bits of mud out of his fur, loving thoughts of my family filling my mind. I could get through this, with them.

Of course then I was unaware that the following day a crack would appear in my relationship with Alice. That I’d discover something she’d been trying desperately to keep hidden.

A secret.

A lie.

Chapter Twenty-One

It was early when I woke, the sun already bright, the sky wide and clear. The world had shrugged off the last vestiges of spring and leaped into summer. June so far had been glorious. The air fresher, days lengthened. Today my thoughts didn’t linger on Jack; instead I replayed the conversation of yesterday with Mum and Alice, drawing the memory to my chest. It was a warm hug, a promise of a future where we were closer as a family. Socks jumped onto the bed, sprawled across my lap and began to lick his paws.

‘I said I’d renovate this house.’ His black fur shed over my crisp white duvet as I rhythmically stroked him. ‘Do you think that I can?’

Yes.

It was Jack’s voice I heard and I believed him.

Step by step.

Square by square.

It was a day of possibility, but despite my positivity I knew my emotions were still turbulent and I didn’t want to risk despondency if I stayed here, hemmed in by myriad empty rooms, each one demanding attention. Instead, I decided to take my laptop to Alice’s café and contact the contractors there. I’d drink cappuccinos,eat cake, surround myself with people who had been out there living a life while mine had been paused.

I was ready to press play again.

If I’d known what was to come, perhaps I’d have stayed at home.

I drove the long way into town, avoiding the chemist, unsure whether there still might be flowers taped to the lamp-post along with the photo of Kenny but knowing that even if there weren’t, I would see them anyway.

There were road works on Brampton Avenue, temporary traffic lights, a diversion sign pointed down Brown Street. If I took that route I would pass Jack’s studio. Flustered, I frantically tried to map a way out of the queue of traffic but the shunting engines and blaring horns prevented me from making a U-turn, pushed me forward until …

Oh God.

Oh God.

Oh God.

And there it was, Jack’s studio. Slowly I pulled over to the kerb and rested my forehead on the steering wheel both wanting to and not wanting to look.

I waited for my stomach to settle again before I raised my head. The sparks of joy that once ignited whenever I came here were now nothing but ashes of despair.

He was gone.

Everythingwas gone.

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