Page 53 of The Start of the Story
‘No,’ I said, slightly sadly. ‘I used to come up here after Elliot died and will them to take me down to fairyland.’
Connor looked at me, then took a couple of steps in to close the gap between us. ‘And how do you feel now?’
I kept my eyes on the stone. ‘I’ll always miss him.’
‘Of course. That’s natural.’
‘But I’m beginning to let myself believe that life goes on. Just a little bit.’ I didn’t dare look up at him. ‘And I don’t have to wait any more.’
Connor let out an enormous breath that clouded the air for a moment, then tattered at the edges and dissipated into the white-cold of the air. ‘I’m a wee bit glad to hear you say that,’ he said quietly. ‘Because I’d really like us to… I dunno what the modern language for it is, to “have something” here.’ I did glance up at his face now, but he was focusing somewhere out in the distance, watching the rising black V shapes of the buzzards climbing the thermal ladder into the vast blue of the sky. ‘Still as the grave,’ he said under his breath.
‘No graves here.’ I pointed, my arm wobbling slightly under the weight of clothing I had on. ‘Over there is the church – you can see the top of the spire. That’s where all the graves are.’ The sudden memory crashed in: a dark, wet day in early November, where the rain had hidden my tears. ‘Elliot’s ashes are there, in the churchyard.’
I felt Connor flick me a look. ‘Do you visit him?’
‘He’s not there.’ I was surprised at how strong my voice sounded. ‘He’s out here.’ I waved the pointing hand, at the moors which lay all ridges and dips beneath the smooth lightness of the snow. ‘He’s everywhere he ever was.’ And I didn’t cry this time.
We stood for a while longer. I didn’t look at the stone again. Connor was right, it was just a stone, but maybe I could look at getting some kind of plaque put on it? So visitors wouldknow why it was here? One of those information boards that dotted the Roman roads or the wells, giving a potted history and a children’s activity, would look nice and mean that everyone knew that this was the Fairy Stane.
Eventually Connor caught at my hand again. ‘Shall we go back?’ he asked. ‘I’m fecking freezing, and we don’t want the fire to go out, now, do we?’
My legs were tired with the strain of stepping through the snow, I was soaked to the gusset and my feet felt as though all my toes had been welded together in liquid nitrogen. ‘Yes.’
I felt his fingers wind through mine. ‘Then I can give you your present,’ he said. ‘I was going to leave it on the table for you to find, when I flew off to Ireland, but, well…’ He nodded out at the snow, which was unavoidably filling my boots again.
‘Oh!’ I was suddenly struck with horror. ‘I didn’t get…’
‘It’s fine. Honestly, Rowan, that’s not what it’s about. This is us, making new memories, remember?’
Ireland. His home. His job, his family. All a few hundred miles away. ‘How long for, though?’ I sounded despondent and I didn’t want to. I wanted to sound upbeat; fine with the prospect of this ‘something’ we had being temporary, a small step I had to get over before I could properly start living my life again. So I added, ‘Not that it matters,’ in as insouciant a tone as I could manage.
My hand got a little shake and his fingers squeezed for a second. ‘For as long as we want,’ he said softly. ‘It’s not just you that’s lost something, you know, Rowan.’
I stopped walking. He pulled up alongside me and turned me into an embrace that was ninety per cent coat. ‘Saoirse has made me afraid to trust my own judgement now. I used to be so sure… socertainof myself, probably a little bit cocky, if I say so myself, a wee bit…’ He tailed off.
‘Arrogant?’ I supplied. ‘Because I’d not put that so much in the past if I were you.’ I hoped the half-laugh in my voice, muffled as it was by acres of wet wool, told him that I was only a bit serious. Hehadbeen arrogant, when we’d first met. Had he changed, or had I?
‘That whole business, falling for her and realising that it was all fake, it’s given me a touch of a complex. I’m not quite so keen to throw my heart out there for a tumble and a weekend, do you understand me?’
I couldn’t see his face now it was hidden beyond the embrace.
‘I’m not sure,’ I said slowly.
There was another, puffed-breath pause. I could feel his body swaying slightly; the rough fabric moved against my hands, which had been gathered in and lay in loose fists on his chest. ‘I need this to be something real,’ he said at last.
I had a sudden moment of knowing. As though the thin rays of the sun brought me an insight I hadn’t had before and beamed it directly through the top of my head into my mind.I’m not the only one who’s lost something here. Connor has lost his innocence, his naivety about people, and for him that’s nearly as painful as losing a person.
‘I need it to be real too,’ I said.
The embrace tightened until my nose was squashed against his collarbone and I had to squeak until he let me move back. ‘Well, now.’ His voice was back to its jaunty confidence-filled self. ‘That’s a good thing. Shall we go back and thaw ourselves out now? Only I’ve got the horrible feeling that your cottage is going to be largely made of wet socks for the next day or so.’
He doesn’t want to dwell on it.My mind continued to tick over the thoughts as we walked on, heading down the hill towards the cottage in its snow-lined bowl with the river a dark crack through the perfection.He knows what Saoirse did to him, and he knows I understand.
I can’t keep bringing Elliot into everything. Connor knows. It’s turning-the-page time.
22
‘But it’s not Christmas yet,’ I tried, as Connor pressed a package into my hands. ‘Shouldn’t we at least wait until tomorrow?’
