heads bowed against the strong breeze, their hair whipping around their faces.
It wasn’t hard to guess what they were talking about with such intensity. She had immediately clocked Sophie not drinking and she looked terrible, with her skin almost grey under the harsh rays of the afternoon sun. Emily recognized the symptoms, though she wished she didn’t. She loved her Jack so very much. So much that sometimes it physically hurt. But she wished… no, she couldn’t even allow herself to think it. Her life had taken a turn that fateful night and she couldn’t turn it back.
‘You’re drunk!’ she laughed, staggering as he boomeranged between her and the brick wall they were passing.
He ran his hand through his blond hair as he stumbled on. ‘So are you.’
She couldn’t deny it. It was rare for her to let herself go but it had been such a fun night. And such a lovely surprise to see him. They had run into each other by chance at a gig being held at the university. The members of the band had all left at the end of their first year to pursue a music career. Their contemporaries and their lecturers had shaken their heads and mumbled darkly about the ‘biggest mistake of their lives’. But to everyone’s surprise, including the band themselves, they had gone on to be very successful and were already selling out huge venues around the world. This gig was a thank-you to their old uni mates and favourite tutors for their early support, so it was a very small and intimate affair.
Emily had gone alone because none of the other girls in her halls of residence were third years and therefore weren’t invited. Melissa had been at the gig too but Emily had lost sight of her early on and assumed she had left.
He seemed as delighted and surprised to see her as she was to see him. They spent the evening getting more and more drunk and sweaty, as they thrashed amid the adoring crowd. By the end they were barely able to stand up, although he was worse than her.
‘Can I crash on your floor?’ His voice was staccato, as he tried in vain to sound sober by concentrating on each word. ‘I’m not sure I’ll make it back in one piece.’
Despite her drunken state, she hesitated. ‘Better not,’ she slurred.
‘No one will know.’
That was true. If he left first thing in the morning, it was unlikely anyone would see him. ‘OK. But you’re sleeping on the floor.’
‘’S’all I need.’
She was woken by the sound of him stumbling around, crashing first into her desk, then her bed. Still in an alcohol haze, she momentarily forgot why he was there. ‘What the hell are you doing?’
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled, before lifting the duvet and sliding in beside her.
‘What the…?’ she started to say, but he silenced her with a kiss and all argument was lost as she melted into him, her body unable to resist as his hands and mouth moved lower.
Afterwards, he fell asleep straight away, with her awkwardly entangled in his arms. She lay there staring up at the ceiling in shock at what had just happened.
As the smudgy light of dawn began to seep over the top of the curtains, she nudged him gently awake and moved as far away from him as she could. His eyes flickered open and she watched as he tried to compute where he was. Slowly he turned his head towards her, a look of horror in his eyes. ‘Shit,’ he whispered.
‘It’s OK.’ She sounded more in control than she felt. ‘Get dressed. Leave. Go home. We can forget this ever happened. Don’t worry, I’m not going to stalk you…’
Relief made his features relax and he nodded. He lifted the duvet, then hesitated, as if only just becoming aware of his nakedness.
Emily closed her eyes and turned her head to the wall. ‘I won’t look.’
After another second’s hesitation, he climbed out of bed and Emily listened as he gathered up his clothes from the floor, then dressed quickly. She turned her head towards him and opened her eyes. He looked far more handsome than he had any right to.
He put his hands in the back pockets of his jeans and bit his lip, awkwardness and embarrassment enveloping him like a blanket. ‘Sorry,’ he murmured, glancing longingly towards the door, desperate for escape.
‘Go,’ she said again.
After he’d gone, she tried to get back to sleep but couldn’t. The smell of him lingered on her sheets and on her body, bringing with it flashbacks of him thrusting into her, setting her alight in a way that she’d never known before. With an almighty effort, she pushed the thoughts away, got out of bed and began to strip the duvet cover and pillowcases. She threw them into a pile in the middle of the floor and stared at the bare mattress, trying to make sense of what had happened. Already she somehow knew that this night would affect the rest of her life.
Watching Sophie and Melissa out on the beach in the evening sunlight, Emily felt a violent stab of jealousy. Sophie’s situation was so different from the one she had found herself in. Sophie was in a happy, settled relationship with the love of her life, while Emily had been lost, scared and alone, sworn to secrecy and not even able to share the excitement and happiness of all the milestones along the way – the scans, the birth, the first tooth, the first step. Sophie would be able to share all of that with her Steve and although she knew it was irrational, Emily hated her for it.
‘So are you going to tell me or do I have to guess?’ Melissa had borrowed a pair of too-big wellies and an oversized Barbour coat from the house, giving her the comical appearance of a child wearing its parents’ clothes as she and Sophie crunched together over the shingle.
Sophie pulled her own leather jacket around her. Although it was August, the temperature still dropped sharply in the evenings, producing a strong breeze that carried with it more than a hint of ice. She looked ahead at the rapidly setting sun, a fierce ball of orange melting into a slate-grey sea. Walking along this narrow strip of shingle, which rose mystically from the water with each low tide, Sophie had a sudden feeling that she was walking on water. That she was invincible. ‘I’m pregnant.’
She couldn’t be sure if it was the sound of the wind or a sharp intake of breath from Melissa that whipped past her ears. They crunched along without speaking until they reached the end and couldn’t walk any further without wading into the murky depths – the prospect of which Sophie found momentarily, desperately appealing. She hesitated, waiting for the temptation to pass, before turning. Ahead of them the clapperboard house rose up in its pale-blue painted splendour. The last of the sun’s tired rays glinted lazily off the latticed windows, giving the impression that the house was slowly but surely dropping off to sleep.
Melissa reached out and took Sophie’s hand in hers as they stood, still as statues while the wind continued to buffet them, causing their hair to blow around their faces. Her tiny hand felt strong and safe. ‘It’ll be OK, you know.’
Finally, Sophie turned to meet Melissa’s eye and wondered if the gleam of tears she saw there was a reflection of her own.
