Page 57 of Secrets at the Little Music Shop

‘Jem. What kind of guy do you think I am?’

‘It’s the fact you’re a guy. That’s all.’

He frowned. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

I rocked on my feet. ‘You know you said you didn’t date? Because you were afraid, of rejection, of not being perfect, of—’ I gestured rather wildly. ‘Of whatever,’ I finished. ‘I don’t date because I don’t want to make those mistakes again.’

I felt him flinch he was so close to me. ‘Like how?’

‘Look. Gray wasn’t — he wasn’t exactly the perfect boyfriend, you know what I mean?’

‘Jem.’ He breathed it rather than saying it.

‘There were other girls. And he’d flaunt it, tell me who he was getting off with, what they did for him that I didn’t. And he’d make me . . . He used me for everything, I was like his toy, you know? Something for him and his friends to play with, something that would take anything, do anything. And yeah, I knew deep down that’s not how it should be, but — I stayed. And, since then, I’ve promised myself no men. Nothing. Until I can feel that I’m a person, you know? In my own right, a something. Not just a thing bringing nothing to the relationship except my body. That’s why — I thought I was making it, with Saskia’s shop stocking my buckles and my website and everything and now, one by one, it’s all going down the pan and I’m right back where I started.’ I caught the sob before it escaped. ‘And I won’t be used again, Ben. I won’t.’

He took half a step away. ‘You think I’d use you? Christ, Jem, it’s not like that, not at all.’

‘I need to know that when . . . if . . . I walk away, I’m still the person I was. That I’m not losing myself by giving myself to someone. I can’t trust and I can’t . . . won’t depend on anyone for anything. So you can see, I’m not really girlfriend material.’ I stopped, aware of how stupidly close we were to one another.

‘Jem, we’re friends. You must know that, even with all the shit that you’ve had before, you must recognise a good thing when you see it?’

Now it was my turn to step back, to widen the physical gap as the psychological one was becoming a chasm. ‘You mean that because you’ve got all this . . .’ I swept an arm round indicating the house. ‘That I’m supposed magically to throw off the memories of everything that’s happened to me? Because you’ve got cash to spare, suddenly the death of my brothers doesn’t matter?’ My voice was icy.

‘That’s not what I meant at all and I think you know it. You’re using your past to stop you from having to make yourself a present.’

‘You know nothing about it.’

‘Yes, I do.’ His voice was low. I had to lean a little closer to hear him. ‘What do you think I was doing, Jem? Pushing everyone away, keeping the deafness secret? It was all so that I never had to face up to it. If I never told anyone then maybe it wasn’t real, maybe I wouldn’t have to live with it forever. That’s what you’re doing, denying the problem, moving on whenever life starts to get real just so you never have to face it.’

‘You know nothing,’ I repeated and stalked out of the room feeling the weight of his gaze on my back. I looked over my shoulder, just once, to see him raking his hands through his already dishevelled hair and rubbing his tired-looking face and I almost turned. Almost. I wanted him so much that it ached. But why would things be any different here, with him?

Chapter Seventeen

‘Oh, my God.’ Rosie’s hand shook on my arm. ‘Oh, Jem. Can we still call you Jem? Or what? I mean — oh, I don’t know what I mean. It’s awful.’

At our feet Harry sat in his new cushion chair, chuckling and waving a well-gummed elephant rattle. I kept my eyes on him. ‘Jem is fine. I was always called Jem anyway. That’s one of the reasons I chose Jemima as a name.’ One of the other reasons was that Jemima had a ginger-beer and salmon, jolly-hockey sticks ring to it. A name close enough to my original one, and conjuring images of the life I’d lost so so long ago. No more than thirteen years in time, but thirteen lifetimes in experience.

‘God,’ Rosie repeated, pulling me into a strawberry-shampoo-scented hug. ‘Jase and I thought you must have left an abusive boyfriend, that’s why we didn’t push. We thought you’d tell us, when the time was right.’

‘I am. And it is.’ I straightened away and took another sip of the too-hot coffee. ‘And for the record, Gray wasn’t exactly going to get “Boyfriend of the Year”, so you were pretty nearly right.’

‘Jase is going to be so smug,’ Rosie said thoughtfully. ‘Although, actually, I think his first theory was that you were on the run from an international consortium of white-slavers, but he’d been reading Ian Fleming novels. Well, looking at the pictures anyway.’

I still kept my gaze on Harry. If I had to meet Rosie’s eye, if I had to see the sympathy there I’d collapse. ‘Shouldn’t you be—?’ I waved at the half-filled box by the table and the stack of cards.

‘Sod Saskia, she can wait. This is important.’

‘Look.’ I took a deep breath. ‘The reason I’m telling you now is because I’m going. I didn’t want you to feel that something you’d done had driven me away.’ Everything here was dangerously familiar, the smell of baby powder and last night’s dinner, the worn edges of the sofa cushion, the pictures on the walls. It had been the very ordinariness that had seduced me into staying as long as I had, the way that life had gone on around me and drawn me in. I knew I couldn’t outrun my old life, but I’d hoped that by standing still it might have passed me by unnoticed. I should have known that it would double back and creep up behind me.

‘I don’t see why you have to go!’ She was plaintive. ‘Sorry, Jem, but it’s just stupid. You fancy Ben, he fancies you. Why can’t you just throw yourself into it and see what happens?’

I hid my face in my hands. Harry, thinking I was playing peek-a-boo, chuckled even more. When I raised my head he gave a delighted whoop of laughter. ‘Ben is — complicated. He’s going to need someone who can give him what he needs.’

Rosie looked at me shrewdly. ‘You mean you’re scared.’

‘No. Not of Ben. Maybe of the situation.’

‘And you can’t tell me what that is?’

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