Page 59 of Before You Say Goodbye

“Stop it,” he cut her off. He was surprised, she could tell. They’d never spoken about the plans he had to end his own life. Perhaps he’d come to believe she would never confront him about it.

“I don’t want you to do it,” she said. It seemed like a stupid declaration, but it felt like the right thing to say. Marley winced, but didn’t reply. He was still holding the chicken’s body in his hands, gently stroking the feathers on her neck with his thumb. For someone who was so intent on ending it all, he had an exceptionally attractive attitude towards all living beings. She’d once laughed long and hard when she’d caught him talking to a spider in the kitchen using the exact same tone he used to talk to other humans. Autumn had never seen anything like it, but Marley had not been at all embarrassed. The memory made her sad now. He was special. His death would be a great loss to all creatures great and small.

“I’ve always known I would never want to live life without Bowie,” he said. “My decision was made long before he got ill.”

“There is no denying that it’s going to be shit,” she said. “But there are other things for you to live for.”

“I don’t care about anything except him,” he said. “Not really.”

“That’s not true,” she said. “You have your family. Your career. Friends and the people who love you.”

He shook his head, pursing his lips. She knew it was no use. Marley and Bowie could not comprehend a life in which the other did not exist. She’d always thought it was tragic, but in that moment she realised that she would also miss him so very much. He was her friend. Losing him as well as Bowieseemed incomprehensible. She wished that she could tell him, but she didn’t have enough energy to force him to talk and she didn’t want to fall out with him again. Reluctantly, she reminded herself that Marley was not hers to save. She would have to try to prepare herself for losing them both. She had no fucking idea how she was supposed to manage that. Maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she’d just forget all about it until it smacked her in the face.

“She’s at peace now, at least,” he said eventually, looking down at the chicken in his arms. Autumn shivered. She realised they had somehow huddled close to one another, so she stood up to put some space between them, retying her soggy laces and changing the subject as naturally as she could.

“What do you want to do about the song?” she asked.

“What do you want to do about it?” He was good at answering her questions with a question.

“I’d like to try it again,” she said. “Now I’ve calmed down a bit.”

“I don’t have the music with me,” he said.

“We could just sing it through without?”

He nodded, stubbing out his cigarette. “OK. I’ll start. You can join in when you feel ready.”

His smooth, low voice rolled out across the field, backed by the rain and the rustling of the trees overhead. Autumn found herself so captivated by him that she almost forgot to come in when she was meant to. She closed her eyes and followed his lead, harmonising with him the way he had taught her. She remembered what he’d said earlier, about being better at things than she thought she was, and mentally heaved her self-doubt out of her mind. She faltered a little as they transitioned into the second song, but he encouraged her to continue with an enthusiastic grin and an affectionate nudge in the ribs. She was so excited by how good it sounded that she dared to open hereyes for the third song. She caught Marley peeping out from beneath his eyelids. He opened his eyes properly and gave her a delighted thumbs-up. They watched each other as they sang to the end of the song. Autumn marvelled. When had this man become her biggest supporter? She acknowledged with a jolt that the sicker Bowie had become and the less energy he had to talk or to play with her the way he used to, the more reliant she had become on Marley. He was struggling with the absence of his brother’s playful nature too, and was always there, willing to entertain her and help her if she needed anything. She appreciated him. Loved him, even. Not the way she loved Bowie, but the way she loved Bluebell. She didn’t tell him. He would be embarrassed, she knew.

“Didn’t I say you could fucking do it?” he said, handing her another cigarette in celebration. Autumn beamed. She could fucking do it. She had fucking done it. She was no professional, not by any stretch, but she knew that their voices had sounded lovely together.

“Emma Stone and Ryan Geeseling, eat your mother-fucking hearts out!” She punched at the sky, lighting her cigarette.

“It’s Gosling.” Marley laughed. “But OK.”

Chapter 12

The day before Larry Ross’s summer ball, Emma insisted on taking Maddie, Bluebell and Autumn dress shopping. They protested, but she was adamant that they needed some frivolity. It would do them good to get out of the house and away from the men, she argued. Her decision had been driven by one too many arguments over Monopoly, which they’d taken to playing on the kitchen table in their pyjamas. Bowie and Marley were incorrigible cheats, and Pip was a terrible loser. More often than not, the game descended into chaos.

Emma had told them her plan two days before, but Autumn had hoped she might forget about it. She had always hated going shopping with other women, preferring to look for clothes by herself when she had to, and not at all if she could help it. She had some dresses she’d had since she was a teenager.

“I’m really not into this,” she told them snippily once they were inside the shopping centre. She knew she should have said so earlier, but Emma would have told her she didn’t have to come even though they really wanted her to, and Autumn would’ve spent the whole day feeling guilty. Still, they might as well know that she was not in the mood. “I have something I can wear.”

“You brought a ballgown back to England with you?” asked Emma, fluttering her eyelashes in a way that made it clear she already knew the answer. Autumn blinked vacantly. She definitely hadn’t. She didn’t even own a ballgown. She’d had no cause for one in her entire life.

“I have to wear a ballgown?”

“To a summer ball?” Emma raised her eyebrows and smiled, placing a loving hand on her shoulder. “Yes, my love. Yes, you do.”

Autumn agreed to try on some dresses so long as Emma promised not to try to stage any kind of fashion show.

“But that’s the best part about having daughters,” she said, a whiny note in her voice. “And we haven’t done it for so long. We haven’t ever done it with you, Autumn. I know you’re a modern ‘screw-the-patriarchy’, ‘feminism-for-all’ type woman, but does that mean we can’t have a bit of fun when we shop?”

“It’s not about that, Mum,” Bluebell said, leading them into an expensive-looking boutique. “It’s just that we’d rather pick out what we want as quickly as possible and then go for a beer.”

Emma rolled her eyes, drilling ferociously through the hangers on the first clothes rail she came to.

“I’m not happy about how much alcohol you’re drinking at the moment, but I’ll take you for lunch and buy you bloody beer if you’ll just parade yourselves around a little bit for my entertainment. Humour me, would you?”

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