Page 31 of Before You Say Goodbye

“We had a fight tonight. Bowie and I,” he said.

“What about?” she asked.

“Because he’s supposed to be leaving for England next week and now he’s saying he doesn’t want to go anymore.”

Autumn blinked in the darkness and said nothing. She tried to ignore the knot of fear in her stomach. Marley was staring out across the city.

“The plan was that we would all go home and spend the next few months together. I’ve quit my band. We have our tickets. Everything is all set, but now he’s saying he doesn’t want to leave you.”

He paused to take another drag. She could tell he was struggling to say whatever it was that he needed to say next. “We all want to be at home when . . .”

He stopped and blew smoke out until it surrounded them both. Autumn tried to communicate her understanding wordlessly. She didn’t want him to feel like he had to speak words that were torturing him. She watched his face, and realised he had been frowning since she’d first opened her apartment door to him that morning. This man was in serious pain.

“But Bowie wants to be wherever you are,” he said. His eyes pleaded with her. She knew what he was asking her to do. She smoked her cigarette, thinking carefully. Autumn hated living in England. As soon as she’d been able to, she’d left her home country. Her mum and her sister had pretended to cry when they’d dropped her off at university like all the other families,but nobody called her for a week after that, and even then it was only so they could ask her if she had space in her uni dorm to store some boxes because they wanted to turn her bedroom into a gym. She’d made one real friend during her time there, but they had lost touch not long after graduation. Becca had married a man they’d met in a grubby bar in freshers’ week almost right away. Autumn had been a bridesmaid at her wedding, but now she could barely remember Becca’s husband’s name. Was it Jonathan or James? It definitely began with a J.

Autumn had worked as a journalist for a small newspaper in Manchester after her studies, then as a charity worker in Brighton. She’d moved to London for a role as a copywriter when she was twenty-five. Fortnightly phone calls with her mother had drifted into awkward chats once a month and then every other, and now she barely heard from them at all. Family just wasn’t Autumn’s thing. That was fine by her. She hadn’t chosen them and they weren’t the type of people that she liked. Still, she had often wondered why she struggled to make friends.

On the best day of her life, the day someone called to say they wanted to publish her book, she’d had absolutely nobody to talk to about it. Autumn didn’t feel as though she’d had enough casual conversation with her mother in the weeks beforehand to ring her up and announce her success. It would have been profoundly uncomfortable for both of them. Her mum and her sister would feel awkward about congratulating her and probably think she was bragging. At the very least, they would be confused about why she was choosing to tell them. They were under the impression she had a vibrant social life and plenty of friends, so they might ask why she wasn’t celebrating her success with them instead of ringing up to boast.

Autumn couldn’t stand the idea that they might realise that she didn’t really have anyone. Plus, they wouldn’t be able to give her what she wanted anyway. They wouldn’tappreciate the commitment she’d needed to work full time while simultaneously writing and publishing her book, nor the hours spent poring over paragraphs to make her story right, or the courage needed to face the many, many rejection letters she’d received. They wouldn’t recognise that her blood, sweat and tears were on every single page, or what a big deal it was to Autumn herself. She hadn’t dared to believe that she wrote well for a very long time. She’d kept her words to herself, avoiding her dreams being dashed, inevitably as she saw it, throughout her teenage years and her twenties, because if she didn’t have writing she didn’t have anything.

Being published was the greatest thing that had ever happened to her. It was confirmation she was actually good at the thing she loved to do most. Still, to her surprise, it had saddened her to have no one to share her joy with. Those had been her happiest days and also her saddest. Instead of marking her success, she’d found herself crippled with loneliness, so when her publishers suggested she participate in a book tour and Autumn had visited and enjoyed New York, she’d set about figuring out how she could move here. The city provided the perfect new backdrop for her relentless social media posting, which had so far been the key to her success. Autumn was quiet and private in her everyday life, but she’d cultivated a quirky and confident internet persona, a heavily edited and outgoing version of herself. Her timing had been accidentally impeccable, she’d started her page when building an audience online had been possible if you were brave enough to try it. She’d built a moderate following of fans, who had followed her writing journey and — eager to push her message — bought her book. By the time she was considering moving to New York, Autumn felt invincible. She was ready to try surviving somewhere new. It had been the best decision she’d ever made. She had found her home, then Walter, then Bluebell had come along, and nowthere was Bowie. Despite the new and scary things happening around her, she hadn’t felt as happy as she had that afternoon, doing nothing really except relax with the Whittles, in a very long time.

Autumn knew Marley was studying her while she mused. They leaned back against the railings, aware that the lights in the lounge meant nobody could see them looking in on them. Bowie was still sleeping, his family gathered around him. Autumn watched Bluebell, who was sitting on the floor supporting Bowie’s head, staring into his face and stroking his hair with her fingers. Autumn shook her head bitterly. Bluebell was flighty, but she was an extraordinary friend. When Autumn had admitted recently that she’d had nobody to celebrate with when she’d won her book deal forBeans: An Extraordinary Pig Tale, Bluebell had recoiled in horror, insisting they celebrate together immediately. She’d listened to her talk about her writing for hours on end, held her hair back over the toilet when she was sick, and cooked for her when she had been too busy with her writing to remember to eat. Bluebell was the only person in the whole world who knew how lonely Autumn had been, and that she still cried when she watched movies about parents who loved their kids. She even knew that once, just once, Autumn had thought seriously about jumping off a balcony as high as the one she was standing on now. All this time, she had not realised just how much pain Bluebell had been in and, since Bowie had told her what he was facing, she was ashamed to recognise that she’d not looked at how Bluebell might be coping with it all. Perhaps it was because she had no real relationship with her own sister, but that was no excuse. She had believed herself a better person than that.

And Bowie. He’d smashed his way into her life with more enthusiasm than anyone ever. He had, somehow, driven his way into her heart, and there was no removing him now. TheWhittles felt like her people. The tribe she had been looking for. Her happiness seemed to be wherever they were. Although England didn’t mean home to her, she understood completely why they wanted to be there together for the end of Bowie’s life.

“We can buy you a ticket . . .” Marley said.

Autumn shook her head. She knew what she had to do. Bowie’s family wanted to take him home and there was no real reason to argue. There was no other way.

She turned to Marley, her phone poised.

“I can buy my own ticket. When do we leave?” she asked.

Chapter 7

The New York apartment Ben and Emma rented from their friend was huge, but it was still an apartment. Unlike the first night, when Bowie had been carried to bed by his brothers in a deep slumber and barely moved until the following morning — it seemed now that Autumn and Bowie could not keep their hands off each other. She felt as though everyone could hear absolutely everything they got up to.

Adamant Bowie should be close to his family in case his health deteriorated suddenly, Autumn struggled through silent sex every night, working hard in the daylight hours to honour the promise she had made to herself. She would not take Bowie from his family. She insisted he be with them while they prepared to move, refusing to allow him time on his own with her aside from in the evenings, when she reasoned he would ordinarily be in bed anyway. He complained, of course, and she felt guilty, but she remained determined she would not get in the way of their time together. Autumn could tell his mother and father were grateful, but it was torturous for her, too. She wanted him all to herself more than anything.

“You realise he just sleeps all day anyway.” Bluebell was teasing her over lunch in Manhattan one Friday. “He’s exhausted from whatever it is he’s doing with you all night.”

“Sorry.” Autumn grimaced. She felt the need to defend herself. They also talked, often into the early hours. Autumn wanted to know everything there was to know about Bowie and there was so much to take in. They’d talked about silly things, the background stuff it took some couples years to mention, like whether their grandparents had fought in the war, and the names of the children who’d bullied them when they were young. She’d told him her biggest fear was failure and he’d admitted his was death. Bowie had told her he didn’t believe inan afterlife and he had accepted he would ‘just be . . . gone’. They’d talked about how unfair it all was. He’d told her he was jealous of everyone who would survive him. He couldn’t quite believe that the world would just carry on without him, as though he had never existed. Their conversations were important to her and Autumn was unhappy that his family might think all they did when they were alone was have sex.

“Stop overthinking it!” Bluebell said. “We don’t give a shit about what you do. As long as he’s happy, we’re happy. And my God, is he happy!”

Autumn was happy, too. Bowie personified everything she loved about people, from his sincere desire to help others, to his ability to make people laugh, to the unashamed love he had for his parents and siblings.

“My family loves you, Autumn. We like having you around, so please don’t feel as though you can’t be with us whenever you want to be. Bring your work over here. Stay with us and eat breakfast. Move the fuck in, if you want to. No one will mind. You want to be with Bowie, sobe with Bowie.”

Autumn felt herself relax a little. Bluebell was right. Before she could concur, her friend launched into a dramatic rant about Marley’s friend, the trumpet player she was sleeping with whenever she felt like it.

“So, Adam and I! He found out I slept with someone else and now he’s refusing to talk to me. He says it’s over. It’s handy, really, because we’re going back to England anyway and I absolutely cannot stand goodbyes, but I felt a little bit sad when he said it. He’s good in bed. I wouldn’t have minded an angry shag or two more before we went home. Never mind.”

That afternoon, Autumn dutifully followed her friend through the bustling, busy streets of a city so big it still overwhelmed her. They found Emma and Maddie at home withBowie, who was asleep on the sofa. His mother pulled Autumn into a hug.

“I’m glad she’s made you see sense,” she said, with real warmth.

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