Page 112 of Unbind

Beside me, Nat oohs and ahhs, curling into me with a girlish pleasure that brings me, in turn, the most simple kind of joy. This is how contentment feels, I realise. There are moments where the quickening of one’s pulse is all one wants to feel—case in point, our little rendezvous in the gym earlier. But there are also moments like this, quiet and innocent and perfect, where my soul feels healed and my mind clear.

I could sit here all night.

We watch the ten-minute cycle all the way through three times. Once we come inside, the few members of staff who work weekends will come out and watch for themselves. Toby has mulled wine simmering on the stove for them. I turn my body so I can gaze down at my girlfriend, who’sstretching in my arms. It’s cold even with a thick blanket over us.

‘Thank you so much,’ she says, throwing her arms around my neck. ‘That wasamazing. Can we do it every night?’

I laugh. ‘Absolutely. And thankyoufor organising it. Genius idea.’

‘You’ll have to do that every year,’ she says. ‘Promise?’

I frown inwardly at her use ofyou, because I’m extremely clear on one thing: that this will be her project, next year and every year.

She’ll soon see.

‘Nice try,’ I say lightly. ‘You’re stuck with this job now.’

She smiles a little shyly, her eyes searching my face as if attempting to make sure I mean what she thinks I mean. Her hand comes up to my face and she scratches my beard gently with her fingernails. I lean into her touch like a cat—I love it when she does that.

‘I’m so lucky,’ she says.

I blink. ‘I’m the lucky one.’

‘Nooo. I have a boyfriend who’ll bend me over in the gym and rail the living daylights out of me and then snuggle with me in front of the actuallight projectionhe’s bought for me. You’re a keeper, I’m telling you.’

I’m pretty sure my laugh carries the length of this entire street.

66

ADAM

All I have to do is get through the next hour or two.

That’s what I tell myself as I step out of my car in front of Nat’s parents’ semi-detached house. If I can get through this, then my reward will be bundling my girlfriend into my car and driving back to London so that we can wake up together on Christmas morning.

I think longingly of my home, so beautifully festive in a way I didn’t know I craved, the turkey sitting in its massive pan of brine on the hob. I think of the gifts I’ve wrapped and laid under the tree in the library, Nat’s favourite room. I think of waking up entwined with my girlfriend, of fucking her slowly and deeply and tenderly before wrapping her up in a fluffy robe and taking her downstairs for a cup of her favourite tea and some gift-giving. I think of the long, peaceful morning we’ll have together before Dad and Quinn turn up for a late lunch.

I sigh and take the hamper I’ve bought for Noel and Adelaide out of the boot before approaching the front door, with its pretty pine-cone-stuffed wreath, as if I’m walking to my own execution.

There’s no blindsiding happening here, I remind myself. Stephen is fully aware that I’ve been invited to join the Bennett family for Christmas Eve drinks. This is all pre-planned. I apparently have his permission, if not his outright blessing, to attend. After all, this is the only family time Nat will get this Christmas, given she’s chosen to forgo lunch here tomorrow in favour of spending the day with me.

Twenty years.

Two decades of guilt and shame and anger and what-ifs, of incarceration and self-recrimination, of repentance and rehabilitation. Of making fortunes and battling ghosts. And, most recently, of falling in love and finding forgiveness. The sheer weight of it all swirls tangibly around me, through me, drying out my mouth and tightening my throat and flipping my stomach as I ring Noel and Adelaide’s doorbell.

I’m praying hard that Nat answers the door when that very slab of wood swings open and I find myself face to face with a man I haven’t seen since he appeared at my trial to give evidence, his face heavily bandaged.

My first thought is that I don’t recognise him at all. I wouldn’t have been able to pick him out of a line up. I simply didn’t know him well enough at school. I didn’t give him enough of my attention—until I did.

My second is that he looks as though he’s seen a ghost. The Ghost of Christmas Past, if we’re to get literary about it. I may not recognise him, but I know exactly how he feels.

My third thought is that his eye looks weird. It’s fine, but it’s not okay. It’s not acceptable. And that whopping great glass golfball sitting in his eye socket is my doing.

Good God.

My fourth, as I stand there like a muppet, is that I have no clue at all what to say to him. None at all. Introducing myself to the man whose life I wrecked feels like the worstkind of disingenuity, because of course he’s all too aware of who I am. I gape at him, opening my mouth and hoping something inspired will come out.

And then he speaks.

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