‘Vincent …’ She couldn’t bear to take his hand.
‘It’s over, isn’t it?’ he whispered.
He knew, but he didn’t want to hear her voice say the words he’d been dreading to hear since he’d learned the truth about Eleanor Snow’s ultimatum.
Of course he knows, she thought.
‘Am I that transparent?’ Evie felt tiredness set in, deep within her bones. She knew she’d been acting strangely, differently, distant. How could she not when her heart felt like an anvil, so heavy she could barely lift herself out of bed each morning?
‘Why?’ Vincent asked. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t cry should things end like this but now that he was faced with the reality of losing her, he couldn’t stop himself.
‘Eddie snuck out in the early hours of the morning last night and came here. We talked and he admitted to me … well, he told me that he’s gay. I’ve sort of known for years, but it was the first time he actually said the words. He wants to tell Mother and Father the truth, but when he does …’ Evie paused, ‘Mother will throw him out. He’ll be alone, so I need to take care of him.’
‘Right,’ Vincent said, pulling the blanket tighter around them both.
‘If we run away, if I’m not here to help him, he’ll carry on pretending he’s something he’s not because he’ll have nowhere else to go. He can’t live like that. Even if we did leave and I tried to stay in touch, it wouldn’t be enough. Mother would put a stop to me seeing him, and she’s already pegged Nelly Weathersby for his wife.’ She took a deep breath that stung the back of her throat. ‘If I stay, I’ll have to marry Jim … but that means I could look after Eddie. I could give him a place to stay and the life he deserves, and Mother would never have to know. Jim would agree to that, I know he would, and even if she did find out, she’ll probably just be glad that Eddie is no longer her problem.’
Vincent listened in silence. When had something so simple turned into this impossible situation? Once Evie had finished, he placed a hooked finger underneath her chin and lifted her face to look at him.
‘Evie,’ he whispered, ‘I … I understand.’ Evie felt her lip tremble. ‘Being apart is going to break our hearts, but being together, having the life we want, will cause more trouble for more people. Marrying Jim …’ he paused, giving his heart a moment to start again, ‘is the lesser of two evils.’
‘You couldn’t be evil if you tried.’ Evie placed a hand on Vincent’s chest. She could feel his heart whirring inside him. She needed to give him hope; she needed to give herself hope. ‘Maybe, after some time has passed, we’ll find a way to keep going, even if it is without each other.’ And with those words, the tears came.
Vincent caught Evie as she crumbled into him and he caved in over her. Together they held the broken pieces of each other in place while the glue came unstuck and the ribbons unravelled. Once their tears had been cried out and what was left of their energy had been spent, they fell asleep, huddled against each other under the blanket.
Evie was startled awake by sirens in the street below. ‘What’s happening?’ she asked.
There was no reply, and when Evie looked around blearily, she saw that Vincent wasn’t there to answer. The blanket had been neatly tucked around her before he’d left.
‘Vincent?’ she called, panic rising in her chest when no answer came. She scrambled to her feet to see an ambulance below, paramedics clad in green spilling into the building.
‘Vincent!’
A voice in her head told her that something had happened, that Vincent was the one the ambulance was here for, but when she ran back into the flat and found his toothbrush missing from the bathroom, his mug gone from the kitchen cupboard and his packed suitcase gone from beside the front door, she knew he’d simply left.
She ran back outside and saw Little One swoop down and land on the balcony to her left. The balcony that belonged to Mr Autumn, her quiet neighbour. It was then that her tired, sunken stare fell on the figure sprawled on his back in his blue-and-white-striped pyjamas. A glass of whisky was still in his lifeless hand, but the contents had pooled and poured off the edge of the balcony and into the road below.
Little One was perched on the railings, his feathers entirely ink-ridden. He looked from Autumn to Snow, from Snow to Autumn, lost. Evie stood there, lost herself, and although the paramedics hadn’t yet reached him, she knew that Colin Autumn was already dead.
Vincent didn’t own enough for his possessions to clutter up Evie’s flat, but even so, the place felt empty without them there. Evie sat cross-legged on the rug, staring at the walls around her, her sketches glaring back. The day’s last light seeped in through the windows and moved around the room, touching every sketch and engulfing Evie. Then it passed and faded, and a slow, solemn knock at the door shuddered through her bones. Without thinking or feeling, she got up and opened the door to a sombre Jim Summer, with a beady-eyed Eleanor close behind, ogling Evie’s pyjamas.
‘No fuss, Evie,’ Eleanor said in clipped tones, and Jim flinched.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Jim whispered, wishing he had just one moment alone with Evie before what was to come next.
Wordlessly Evie stood back so they could enter. Jim was reluctant, but Eleanor nudged him through the door. Once it was closed behind them, the silence was suffocating.
‘Well, Jim?’ said Eleanor. ‘Don’t you have something to ask Evie?’
‘Not out of choice,’ he said, his gaze steady.
Jim had never seen Evie like this. She wore no makeup and she was still in her pyjamas, but she didn’t look defeated or tired or ill. She looked like a woman who was ready for war. A woman who knew her fate and was willing to face it with every ounce of strength and bravery she could muster. A woman who would make the best of a future she hadn’t chosen.
‘I want to say something first,’ he continued, and Evie’s eyes flicked up to meet his for the first time since the visitors had arrived. ‘I know this isn’t what you want. I know you will never love me in the way you love him, or … or in the way I love you.’ Evie felt her breath catch. It was the first time he’d ever said that. The first time he’d acknowledged what they all already knew. ‘And I know I can’t give you everything you’ve dreamed of.’
‘Jim, this isn’t the time for sentimental rubbish—’
‘Eleanor,’ he snapped. ‘Quite frankly, I don’t care what you think.’
Eleanor looked startled for a moment, and then her face resumed its usual impassive state, a hint of disdain lingering on her lips.
‘You’re forcing us into a future neither of us wants, so you can afford us a little sentimentality at the very least,’ Jim said sharply.
Eleanor simply nodded once, so quickly it would easily have been missed if you’d blinked.
Jim turned back to Evie, his face and tone softening. ‘I can’t give you everything you’ve dreamed of.’ He swallowed and dropped his voice to a whisper, even though he knew Eleanor could still hear him. ‘I know I’m not him, Evie. But marrying your best friend is the next best thing. I will do everything in my power to make sure you feel safe from every evil.’ He glanced at Eleanor. ‘And I will try to make you as happy as you can be under the circumstances. I know you’ve never needed it, but I will protect and take care of you.’
Evie thought she must have been exceptional at pretending, because all she wanted in that moment was to be taken care of. Properly taken care of as opposed to the way her mother tried to take care of her, by forcing things on her and ignoring all protest. She didn’t let her face change. The tears she’d cried had washed away everything she was and all the hope she’d held for a future that was never to be. She was an empty slate, ready for her mother to draw on and map out her life. Jim deserved more than this, more than her. She didn’t have anything left to give him. She mustered up a small smile and nodded. Jim lifted the ring box out of his pocket and opened it.
‘You’re supposed to be down on one knee,’ said Eleanor, pointing to the flo
or.
‘You’re supposed to be able to marry who you want,’ Jim snapped.
He cautiously walked forward with the box out in front of him. Evie peered inside. The ring was beautiful, if a little extravagant. The emerald was on the large side – undoubtedly Eleanor’s choice – but aside from that, the colour, the cut and the band were all perfect. The only thing that wasn’t was the fact that it was for her.
‘Evie.’ Jim swallowed, his mouth dry and his palms sweaty. ‘Will you marry me?’ The situation was awful and Jim wished it wasn’t happening like this, but (and he hated himself for feeling this way) a part of him jumped for joy that he was finally asking Evie the question he’d wanted to ask for years.
‘Well?’ Eleanor asked, eyebrows raised.
She wasn’t at all remorseful and she appeared to have no real understanding of what was really taking place: that the Evie they’d always known was disappearing.
Evie looked at Jim’s kind, warm face, etched with worry. Her drawings seemed to stare down at her with scared eyes, all desperately hoping she would find the courage to do what her heart was telling her to do. Don’t do it, Evie, they whispered. Eddie will find another way. Do what you feel is right.
When faced with the choice between what is right and what is easy, we are encouraged to choose what is right, even if it puts us in a difficult situation. But what happens when you’re faced with the choice between what is right for you and what is right for those you love, and neither choice is easy? Evie had thought about this far more than many people do or should, and had decided that choosing what was right for those she loved was right for her too. How could she put her own happiness above that of her brother?
She took a deep, steadying breath, not taking her eyes off Jim. Her heart had curled up into a ball in her chest, and she nodded her head in rhythm to its sobbing.
‘Is that a yes, then?’ Eleanor’s tone was that of an unimpressed schoolteacher.
‘Yes,’ Evie snapped, showing her true feelings for the first time that evening. Her eyes were full of hate, and Eleanor couldn’t help but be taken aback by her daughter’s sudden outburst. ‘It’s a yes,’ Evie said, softening as she turned to Jim.
‘Well? Put the ring on her finger! Hurry! We need to get home and tell Jane the good news.’ Eleanor strode out of the room, not bothering even to congratulate her daughter and her new fiancé.
Jim took the ring out of the box and Evie held out her hand, not wanting to look. The cold band slid along her ring finger.
‘There,’ Jim said, kissing the back of her hand. ‘I’m so sorry, Evie,’ he whispered.
‘We’ll be OK,’ she said. She tried to smile reassuringly, but she wasn’t sure it came across as anything other than a grimace. Jim pulled her towards him and held her in his embrace, stroking her hair. Evie wasn’t sure what to do. Her hands hung limply by her sides and her head rested against his shoulder.
‘I know that everything you’ve dreamed of until now has been taken from you,’ Jim said. ‘But you must keep dreaming, Evie. You must.’
An image popped into Evie’s head. It was the image of an eight-year-old Jim standing in her garden dressed as a dragon. He’d handed her a wooden spoon and a saucepan to be used as a sword and shield, then he’d roared and snorted until she’d realised she had to slay him.
That image was replaced by another: Jim teaching her to ride his bike in the woods when she turned twelve because her mother hadn’t got her the bike she’d so desperately wanted. She’d felt so unsteady on the saddle, but Jim hadn’t let go until she’d told him to.
Next she saw Jim’s face through the flames of the eighteen candles on the birthday cake he’d baked for her himself because Eleanor had said that eighteen was too old to be made a fuss of and Evie’s birthday was just another day of the year. Her mind shifted through all the birthdays she’d shared with Jim, frame by frame, a flick book of the kindness and love he’d shown her over the years.
Then her memory spanned through all those ordinary days when they’d simply spent time in each other’s company. At every moment, Evie realised, Jim had put her first. He’d always made sure that she was happy and had done everything he could to be there for her, and now not only was he doing that again, but he was vowing to do it for ever more. It was the greatest birthday gift he could and would ever give her.
Evie felt overcome with sorrow and gratitude. She flung her arms around him and held on to him as tightly as she could, and in that moment, all her drawings turned to glass and fell from the walls, shattering around her, lost for ever.
The Shoebox
Jim had planned to stay the night in the armchair, unwilling to leave Evie on her own, but she had taken his hand and led him to her bed, where she’d curled up in his arms. The resolution to her predicament, although an unwanted one, had brought her some kind of peace, and sleep had found her at last. But Jim stayed awake, trying not to let his tears fall into Evie’s hair or on her face. God forbid she woke up and found him in such a state. Jim may have been less stiff-upper-lipped than his family but crying in front of Evie was something he just couldn’t do. He’d promised to be strong for her, and he wasn’t going to go back on that promise on the night of their engagement.
Before Evie awoke, Jim had shifted her under the covers and started to pack up her things as best he could. It would be too upsetting for her, he thought, to have to put the life she loved so much into boxes, to be taken away from the one place she truly felt she belonged. But what to do with her drawings, which were now just shards of glass scattered about the floor?
He searched the flat and finally found an old shoebox in the cupboard by the front door. He swept every last piece of glass into it, even the little bits that had found their way under the rug and hidden behind the armchair. By the time Evie shuffled yawning into the living room, most of her things had disappeared from their rightful places and were in the very same boxes she’d used to move them into the flat in the first place.
‘We could have done this together.’ She squeezed Jim’s shoulder as he crouched to reach under the coffee table to retrieve the last sliver of glass.
‘I know. But I didn’t want you to have to put yourself through it.’ He picked up the shard and dropped it into the shoebox. ‘I thought you might want to keep these.’ He put the lid on and handed her the box, and although she took it, she shook her head.
‘No. I have no use for them now.’ She smiled. It was getting easier to pretend her smiles were real. ‘They should stay here. This is where they belong.’
She crouched down next to him and started to push the coffee table over to one side of the room, and when Jim realised what she was doing, he moved to help her. Together they rolled up the rug, then Jim fetched a sturdy butter knife from the kitchen and slid it between two floorboards, prising one of them up so that it came out completely. Evie knelt down next to him, holding the box in her hands like it contained something living. He slid his arm around her shoulders, waiting for her to crumble, but she didn’t. Instead she kissed the closed lid of the box and carefully placed it in the hole in the floor.
‘Bye, dreams,’ she said. ‘I hope one day someone else finds you and uses you better than I did.’
8
isla
Evie rocketed down Horace’s throat as though it was a slide and was catapulted into the air in a huge gush of water. Like a cat, she landed squarely on her feet in a burst of ginger fur, and opened her eyes to see that she was standing by the blue front door of her own house. This was the place she had lived after she left her flat. It was a house she knew well, but it seemed different now. The paint on the door looked dull, and the chandelier in the hallway that she could see through the window didn’t shine as brightly as it used to. It felt as though the house had lost its soul, its magic – everything that had made it a home and not just a structure containing a family and their belongings.
There was movement from an upstairs window, and Evie saw the blonde waves of her daug
hter’s hair. Isla. Evie had named her after the woman who had taught her far more than her own mother ever had. Isla had a husband, Chester, and son, Percy, and their house was a two-hour drive from Evie’s, but she had been staying here while she was getting the place in order after her mother’s death. She also knew that leaving her father on his own in such a big house was out of the question.
The front door of the house opened with a creak that Evie had never heard it make before, and out came an old man in his mid-seventies. He took a deep breath and looked around at the overgrown front garden; then, just for a split second, he glanced at Evie, and her breath caught, but his gaze flitted away again and Evie felt silly for thinking he’d seen her. Even though his age was apparent from the wrinkles in his skin and his stooped posture, his eyes still shone like he was twenty-something, and Evie would have known their glint anywhere.
‘Uncle Eddie? Where’ve you disappeared to?’ Isla called from inside the house. She appeared next to the man and linked her arm through his. ‘I know you hate housework, but these boxes need to be sorted. And don’t think your age will get you out of it either. I’ve seen how you chase after Oliver.’ She winked at him, to which he gave a throaty laugh, and she pulled him gently back into the house.
Eddie had lived with his partner in the Snows’ house ever since he was in his thirties (after his parents had passed away, of course. They never would have allowed it had they been alive and able to intervene and Eddie took great joy in the big middle finger it was to his parents each and every day they lived there). However, now that they were in their seventies and having trouble doing all the things they used to do so easily, August and Daphne had moved in with them shortly after Evie had passed away and each of them benefited from the extra company in many ways.
Evie took her chance before the door shut her out, and slipped in behind them into the hallway of the house she’d lived in since her wedding. Cardboard boxes were scattered about, filled with objects she recognised as her own. She knelt down, not sure why she was careful not to touch anything. Her jewellery box, her books, her trinkets and treasures all sat in boxes marked with words such as Charity and Storage. Other boxes had her children’s names on them. These were filled with things that August and Isla associated with their mother so strongly that they wanted to keep them for themselves.