In Too Deep (15 page)

I’m nodding automatically. I can’t pinpoint exactly why it is that I’m feeling so tense, so I put it down to bailing Mum out of a potentially tricky situation. The fact is, she’s going to have to get used to talking about Dad to other people, offering a bottled explanation to those who ask and leave it at that. I won’t always be there to cover for her.

‘And it’s such a coincidence that you two both go to the same university,’ Susan continues.

‘Yeah, crazy,’ I say, thinking that we’re bound to have passed each other on campus without knowing. But there are thousands of students, so it’s unlikely that we’ve
actually met. Susan doesn’t say what her son is studying, and I don’t think she mentioned his name. I’m not that interested anyway. Not interested in the place much at all any more, if I’m honest. But that’s not something I can begin to think about yet – let alone break the news to Mum. If she thought I was quitting my degree, it would tip her over the edge.

‘I know what you mean about the empty nest,’ Mum suddenly says. ‘Not having Hannah at home each night is really weird.’ Then she gives a laugh, dispelling any tension from before.

But then Susan goes and asks if I’m an only child, building it right back up again.

‘Let’s get out of here before they cast us as the villains,’ the boy from the auditions said. I stared at him incredulously, disconnecting the call while he did the same. I didn’t say a word as we walked outside, unable to form a single coherent syllable. Whether it was because of the incredibly unlikely coincidence, or the fact that he was gorgeous – I mean
seriously
gorgeous – I didn’t know, but the palpitations were coming thick and fast. Thankfully the fresh air outside revived me.

‘Well,
Dad
,’ he said to me in a jokey way, whilst pushing hair back off his forehead. It was kind of long, kind of messy, but then sort of neater at the sides. ‘You’ve really changed since I last saw you.’ He grinned, wide and mischievous, looking me up and down. ‘You’re a lot . . .
cuter
than I remember.’

My heart backflipped and I still couldn’t speak. I made a funny noise in my throat, handing him the phone.

‘Thanks,
Dad
,’ he said wickedly, looking at it then turning back to me.

My mouth opened and closed a few times before the words finally came. ‘I found it. By a bin. Is it your dad’s, then?’

‘She speaks!’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘Tom,’ he added confidently. ‘Tom Westwood. Proud owner of the chap who carelessly lost this.’ He flashed up the phone. ‘So you found it in a bin?’

He looked disbelieving, his strong neck tilting back his head suspiciously. I tracked the skin on his slightly stubbly jaw down to where it disappeared inside his grey T-shirt. It led me to his chest, broad and solid, so I quickly glanced up again, embarrassed.

‘Not in a bin.
Under
a bin,’ I said, sounding slightly more myself now. ‘I was going to hand it in to lost property, but it was closed and then I forgot. So I charged it up and thought I’d dial the last number called. And here we are.’ My hands flapped against the sides of my legs.

‘Well done, you. The old man’s careless, but I didn’t think he was quite such a dumbass.’ Tom rolled his eyes playfully. ‘He dropped me off here yesterday. It must have fallen from his pocket. When did you arrive?’

‘The day before yesterday,’ I said, frantically trying to think of something clever to say. But my mouth just hung open.

‘Let me buy you a coffee to say thanks.’

But instead of replying with a cheery and grateful
Yes please
, my mind fumbled around trying to make up excuses for the old sweatpants and faded T-shirt I was wearing, insisting that finding the phone hardly warranted buying me a drink, and going on about missing the auditions.

Tom laughed. ‘The auditions are on again tomorrow,’ he said. ‘And I don’t think there’s a dress code in the uni caff. Besides, I like casual. Some of the girls round here seem a bit too obsessed with their appearance.’

It was the look that tipped it – his eyes slanting upwards from his broad grin, velvet with kindness, and the coy tilt of his head. We ambled slowly to the coffee shop, with him asking me loads of stuff about my course, my family, my flatmates, and me trying not to sound like an idiot.

We found a table and, as I stirred my mocha, I felt myself relaxing in his company. Despite his good looks, Tom was easy to talk to and the conversation flowed naturally. He told me that he was studying engineering, and he seemed genuinely interested in what I’d been reading for my course over the summer. I discovered that not only was he about the best-looking boy I’d ever seen, but he was actually interested in me, instead of talking about himself all the time. He wasn’t the least bit shallow like some of the guys I’d been out with.

‘Let’s get another drink,’ he said, standing up. ‘And after that, you must give me your number.’ He grinned. I was meant to be meeting Karen in the library, but sent
her a quick text saying I couldn’t make it. I smiled back at Tom, hardly able to believe my luck.

‘That’s utterly heartbreaking,’ someone says. ‘I’m
so
very sorry for you. I didn’t mean to pry.’

I blink, not realising where I am for a moment. Then I see Mum and Susan, their voices rising and falling in understanding and sympathetic tones, layered beneath my thoughts of university, of Tom, of what happened next.

Of why I had to get away.

‘Thank you,’ Mum says, wafting her hand in that way of hers. She won’t want Susan to feel awkward, but inside she’ll be hurting like hell. She takes a sip of wine. ‘I appreciate that, and so you know, I’m able to talk about it. I can’t go through life pretending Jacob never existed. He wasn’t the sort to sit quietly in the corner. He was such a happy lad. Isn’t that right, Hannah?’

I nod. ‘He was a character.’

Since Jacob died, Mum’s learned how to put others at ease when it crops up, which it does from time to time. Now I’m wondering if that’s how it will be with Dad. A year from now, will she be able to talk about what happened more easily, help people climb over the conversational difficulties that inevitably follow awkward questions?

I’m suddenly shivery and cold even though it’s warm in Susan’s flat. I feel nauseous and dizzy, too, as if I’m not inside my own body.

‘My son’s an only child,’ I hear Susan telling Mum, and
she goes on about how they tried for another baby years ago and gave up, believing it wasn’t meant to be. Their voices blend into each other as sick pushes up my gullet, forcing me to swallow hard. It burns all the way back down my throat.

‘Excuse me while I check on the lamb,’ Susan says, heading for the kitchen. She leaves Mum and me alone, just long enough for me to make a pained face and tell her that I don’t feel well, clutching my stomach.

‘Do you want to go back to the room?’ Mum whispers. ‘Perhaps you ate something dodgy.’

I nod, not caring how I get out, just that I need to. I know how the evening will go – Mum drinking too much and revealing things that will have her in tears, pouring her heart out, and feeling hungover and regretful in the morning. Susan seems the type to listen, to show sympathy, to provide Mum with all the things she’s missing.

‘Hannah’s not feeling too well,’ Mum says when Susan returns with a fresh bottle of wine in hand. My predictions are already correct. ‘She’s going to get an early night. I hope that doesn’t mess up your food plans too much?’

Susan turns to me, her silent, lingering look held for a moment too long.

‘Not at all,’ she says kindly. ‘If you need anything, please do call reception.’

As I say goodnight and leave, stopping perhaps a little too long outside the living-room door, I hear Susan telling Mum not to worry, that any leftover lamb will keep and be gratefully scoffed by her son. She says he’s just
messaged her with news that he’s leaving the ski trip early and will be home tomorrow.

‘I’m sure that will cheer Hannah up no end,’ Mum says. ‘She needs something to take her mind off things.’

My hand comes up over my mouth, forcing everything back down as I dash back to our room, locking myself in the bathroom.

Cooper thumps his tail as I burst in, running for the loo. I lean over the pan, bringing it all up, letting out the pain before flushing it away. I scrub my teeth and drink some water, then I go to Cooper’s bed, dropping to the floor and pressing my face to his neck. Sometimes I think I still smell Dad on him – the intricate layers of Cooper’s natural scent mingled with the spice of the simple sandalwood cologne he used to wear.

‘
Why
didn’t he take you with him to the shop that day?’ I whisper. ‘Or walk another route, or not go out at all?’ One small change – perhaps the difference between life and death.

Then a deep sob comes out of me. Cooper doesn’t mind that I shove my face against him, using him like a sponge. He half groans, half growls in a comforting way, sticking one paw out as if offering it to me. I take it, gripping his foot in my hand, remembering the time years ago when Dad pretended to be a blacksmith shoeing a horse, though really he was plucking a deep splinter from Cooper’s pad.

I sit up, wipe my face on my sleeve. In the mirror opposite, I am shocked by the girl I see. Blotchy-faced, pale, bloated, sick and exhausted, I don’t look anything like the young woman who set off to university last September with a bag full of hope and a mind full of ambition. ‘She’s long gone,’ I confide to Cooper, barely able to remember who I once was.

‘What societies are you signing up for?’ I asked Tom in the café, almost dying inside for not coming up with something more original. He was so eloquent, I didn’t want him to think I was a loser.

Given my track record with boys, another meeting was almost unthinkable, let alone a proper date or, heaven forbid, a kiss. But I didn’t want to blow my chances. My eyes widened as we faced each other across the table. I felt myself blush, making Tom laugh, making me wonder if he’d somehow read my mind.

‘As many as possible to start with,’ he said. ‘I’m signed up for the Debating Society because I’m an argumentative sod,’ he added with a wink. ‘And Drama, as you know, plus a few sports teams. How about you?’

‘Just Drama so far,’ I said, feeling inadequate. ‘But maybe I’ll try a sport too.’ Truth is, I’m useless at anything physical. Always have been. But I wanted to impress Tom.

‘What’s your game?’ he asked.

I plunged a teaspoon into my frothy mocha and stirred slowly. I twisted my face into something unrecognisable, and looked away to the side, then down at the floor.
‘Gymnastics,’ I said perfectly seriously, looking him in the eye. Then I burst out laughing.

‘Actually, I’m about as good at sport as soy sauce would taste in this coffee,’ I confessed, telling him that I hadn’t exactly signed up yet.

‘You’re weird,’ he said, watching me lick chocolate powder off my spoon. ‘Though you could be on to something with the soy sauce.’ He touched his top lip while looking at mine, pretending to wipe it.

‘Thanks,’ I said, slowly running my tongue around my mouth, praying I didn’t look disgusting. ‘Falling off the stage in a play aged eleven was about as gymnastic as I ever got,’ I told him, chattering on about other funny things from school. Tom came back with a similar story, and before I knew it, we were talking for ages – a really good, unselfconscious, meaty, funny, interesting, profound and perhaps even a little sexy hour of chatter.

Then it was time to go. That’s when Tom kissed my cheek and promised to call me soon.

Later I managed to scrape together some kind of meal in the university halls kitchen, which was more like a bumper-car arena than a place to cook. Six students vying for hob and sink space, knocking shoulders while hacking up cheap cuts of chicken, burning toast and boiling pans dry, was less than my idea of culinary fun.

But I didn’t care. Something warm was simmering inside me. Something content and excited all at the same time.

I managed to whip up a spaghetti Bolognese, probably the most edible thing in our flat. As I sat down to eat at the communal table, I received longing looks and a couple of comments from girls who had barely managed to boil the kettle for their Pot Noodles. Karen told them to shut up.

It was then that my phone buzzed, dancing a few millimetres across the laminated table.

What are you up to?

Eating dinner. You?

Going crazy from my flatmates. Fancy a walk?

I’d only had three mouthfuls, but I couldn’t take another bite. I felt queasy from anticipation.
Sure
, I texted.

Great. Meet me at the lake in twenty minutes.

OK
, I typed. And that was that.

The beginning of the end of the rest of my life.

‘Jacob would have loved that giant chess set of yours,’ I tell Susan, imagining him lugging the pieces about. He always took his time doing things – whether it was tying his shoelaces, or helping me in the kitchen, or pondering a piece of schoolwork. His intense eyes reflected the feelings he hid deep inside – a place he liked to guard fiercely. Unlike many of his peers, Jacob took things to heart, slowly working through anything that upset him or, indeed, if he thought he’d upset someone else. The process could never be rushed.

‘The chess has been a great hit with guests. We have croquet too, if the weather improves. Roll on summertime.’ Susan tops up each of our glasses. She hasn’t asked details of what happened to Jacob, but I’m ready for it if she does. I made it clear that I don’t mind her mentioning her son, that it’s fine for her to talk about him.

‘I’d better not have too much,’ I say, knowing I’m past that point already.

‘Nonsense,’ she replies. ‘Enjoy yourself. You’re not
driving anywhere, and besides, you’re doing me a favour. I don’t like to drink alone, so that means I rarely get to open a bottle. This is a luxury. I’ve given myself the night off.’

A vague question about why she’s taken the night off to spend time with me, a virtual stranger, passes through my mind, but the alcohol doesn’t allow it to linger. I’m flattered that she likes my company. And besides, we have things in common – kids the same age and at the same university, and husbands who aren’t here, albeit for very different reasons. What I wouldn’t give to be in her shoes, to know that Rick would be home at the end of a lengthy business trip. I’d put up with him being away for ages if only I knew he were alive.