Page 107 of Swept Away

“So my dad wasn’t my dad,” Jeremy says slowly. “He was your dad.”

“Yes.”

“And Lyra’s dad.”

“Yes.”

“And my dad…He’s dead.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Right,” Jeremy says, blinking rapidly. “Well. I suppose I’ve still got a dead dad, so it’s not all that different, really.”

I stare at him. Lyra’s nodding.

“Right, totally,” she says, patting his hand. “That’s such a good way to look at it.”

They’re like…they’re a different species to me. The thought that my father wasn’t really my father ate away at me for years—it changed me. But Jeremy’s taken it on board as though I’ve just rescheduled his Waitrose delivery.

“Thank you for telling me,” Jeremy says. He clears his throat. “I’ll go for a walk, I think.”

“I’ll come,” Lyra says, already standing, but he waves her off.

We watch him walk away for a while, and then, on impulse, I stand and chase him.

He looks around in surprise. He’d expected Lyra, I guess. He should’ve known better. I’ve always been the one chasing behind him.

“I really am sorry, Jeremy,” I say. “I know this is a lot.”

He nods. “I suppose it is,” he says. He looks toward the castle, squinting in the sunlight. “Right now it just seems a bit odd.”

I feel a moment of kinship with my brother. Things’ve been feeling a bit odd for me lately, too.

“It’ll need to sink in.”

“I’m sorry as well,” he says, glancing at me as we walk. “Ididalways think it was…you. That you were the odd one out.”

“I am,” I say. “I’m kind of realizing now that this really doesn’t change that. It was an excuse, I guess. I wanted something to explain it. Other than me being, you know, basically just shitter than you two.”

Jeremy frowns. “Ezekiel. You’re not ‘shitter’ than me and Lyra. You’re different. You’re the creative one. Your brain works in ways the two of us don’t understand. That’s not worse, or better, it’s just not the same.”

He’s never put it like that before. To be honest, we’ve neverreally had a conversation like this before. The closest we’ve ever come was that pint we had together, the night when we discussed buying back the houseboat.

“Look. Things have—Veronica and I have been going through a bit of a tough patch over the last few months,” Jeremy says, without looking at me. “And she’s asked me to do some work on…feelings, and expressing them, and…She’s asked me to step up, actually.” He shoots me a quick glance. “It’s made me look at myself rather differently.”

“God, I’m really sorry to hear that,” I say, a little shaken. Veronica and Jeremy have been together since I was a kid. I don’t know Veronica well, but the two of them have always seemed unshakable—the young suburban power couple.

“We’re working through it. But I’m learning some rather uncomfortable things about myself in the process,” Jeremy says, pressing his lips together. “It’s occurred to me lately that as children…Lyra and I weren’t always as kind to you as we should have been. I’m sorry for that.”

I swallow down on the sudden tightness in my throat and resist the temptation to brush that off.

“Thank you,” I say instead. “Thanks. That’s…yeah.”

“This Lexi,” Jeremy says. He’s still not looking at me, just walking, eyes downcast against the sun. “She’s what’s getting you down?”

“I know you think we just had some kind of weird…trauma romance…”

I see him wince at that and it almost makes me laugh.

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