The Girl You Left Behind

near-strangers,
     playing games or laughing at their family jokes, and grasps that her sense of constant
     surprise comes from the discovery that, despite it all, she is happy; happy in a way
     that she cannot remember being for years.
    And there is Paul. Paul, who looks
     physically batteredby the day’s events, as if he, not her, has
     lost everything. Whenever he turns to look at her something realigns itself, as if her
     body has to attune itself to the possibility of being happy again.
    You okay?
his look asks.
    Yes
, hers says, and she means
     it.
    ‘So what happens on Monday?’
     Greg says, as they sit around the table. He has been showing them swatches of fabric for
     a new colour scheme in the bar. The table is strewn with crumbs and half-empty glasses
     of wine. ‘You have to hand over the painting? Are you definitely going to
     lose?’
    Liv looks at Paul. ‘I guess so,’
     she says. ‘I just have to get my head around the idea of … letting her
     go.’ An unexpected lump rises to her throat, and she smiles, willing it to go
     away.
    Greg reaches out a hand to her. ‘Oh,
     honey, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to upset you.’
    She shrugs. ‘I’m fine. Really.
     She’s not mine any more. I should have understood that ages ago. I suppose
     I … didn’t want to see what was in front of my face.’
    ‘At least you still have your
     house,’ Greg says. ‘Paul told me it’s amazing.’ He catches
     Paul’s warning glance. ‘What? She’s not meant to know you’ve
     been talking about her? What are we? Fifth-graders?’
    Paul looks briefly sheepish.
    ‘Ah,’ she says. ‘Not
     really. No, I don’t.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘It’s under offer.’
    Paul goes very still.
    ‘I have to sell it to meet the legal
     fees.’
    ‘You’ll have enough over to buy
     somewhere else, right?’
    ‘I don’t know yet.’
    ‘But that house –’
    ‘– was already mortgaged to the hilt.
     And needs work, apparently. I haven’t done anything to it since David died.
     Apparently amazing imported glass with thermic qualities doesn’t last for ever,
     even though David thought it would.’
    Paul’s jaw tightens. He pushes back
     his chair abruptly and leaves the table.
    Liv looks at Greg and Andy, then at the
     door.
    ‘Garden, probably,’ says Greg,
     raising an eyebrow. ‘It’s the size of a pocket handkerchief. You won’t
     lose him.’ And then, as she stands, he murmurs, ‘It’s terribly sweet
     how you keep demolishing my big brother. I wish I’d had your skills when I was
     fourteen.’
    He is standing on the little patio, which
     is crammed with terracotta pots of straggly plants, made spindly in the winter frosts.
     He is turned away from her, his hands rammed into his pockets. He looks crushed.
    ‘So you did lose everything. Because
     of me.’
    ‘Like you said, if it hadn’t
     been you it would have been someone else.’
    ‘What was I thinking? What the fuck
     was I thinking?’
    ‘You were just doing your
     job.’
    He lifts a hand to his jaw. ‘You know
     what? You really do not have to make me feel better.’
    ‘I’m fine. Really.’
    ‘How can you be? I wouldn’t be.
     I’d be mad as … Ah,
Jesus
.’ His voice explodes with
     frustration.
    She waits, then takes his hand, pulls him to
     the littletable. The ironwork is chilly, even through her clothes,
     and she scrapes her chair forward, places her knees between his, waiting until she is
     sure he is listening.
    ‘Paul.’
    His face is rigid.
    ‘Paul. Look at me. You need to
     understand this. The worst thing that could have happened to me already
     happened.’
    He looks up.
    She swallows, knowing that these are the
     words that stall; that may simply refuse to emerge. ‘Four years ago David and I
     went to bed like it was any other night, brushing our teeth, reading our books, chatting
     about a restaurant we were going to the next day … and when I woke up the next
     morning he was there beside me, cold. Blue. I didn’t … I didn’t
     feel him go. I didn’t even get to say … ’
    There is a short silence.
    ‘Can you imagine knowing you slept
     through the person you love most dying next to you? Knowing that there might have been
     something you could have done to help him? To save him? Not knowing if he was looking at
     you, silently begging you to –’ The words fail, her breath catches, a familiar
     tide threatens to wash over her. He reaches out his hands slowly, enfolds hers within
     them