This Is All

by Aidan Chambers

  Pause to observe Julie’s reaction. She was listening, a smile on her face, like a child being told a bedtime story.

  ‘And did you?’ she said.

  I said, ‘It wasn’t his fault. He really loves me. That’s the trouble.’ I suddenly felt I must defend Edward. He’d done everything right. It seemed mean to blame him or make fun of him. ‘The thing is, this morning, when I thought we’d talk about how I was feeling about him and why I wasn’t feeling the same as before, he told me he wanted to divorce his wife and live with me.’

  ‘O God, not that! He has got it bad.’

  ‘I was so shocked, I didn’t know what to say. In fact, I ran away from him.’

  ‘Good for you.’

  ‘We were talking on the beach, and I just ran. But he followed me and we sat on a disgusting pile of rubbishy sand and he said how he didn’t just love me but was in love with me, and I was horrid about that, because I’m very suspicious of those words—’

  ‘You’re right to be.’

  ‘Men say them when they only mean they want to have sex with you, isn’t that right?’

  ‘Not all of them, but they do too often, yes.’

  ‘But it was so difficult because I do sort of love him in a way, but not like Will. He is very attractive and he’s been so generous and it is fun with him and I’ve learned so much, I might have gone along with him – I mean, think of it! – I mean when I think that now, I can’t believe it – but I might have done just to please him, I always wanted to please him, which was another thing that was beginning to worry me. But anyway, he said something that stopped me, he said I’d always come first, except for his children. And that’s what brought me to my senses. I mean, think of me as a stepmother. Lordy! I said to him, I’m not even ready to be a wife yet, never mind a mother, and least of all a stepmother. But I couldn’t tell him outright I wanted to end it, end it between us, just couldn’t say it, I don’t know why – how cowardly of me – and he took me back to the hotel, and I had a shower, and he was working on his laptop, and that’s what he’s really in love with, if you ask me, his work, and I still couldn’t tell him. I think I was frightened of what he’d do if I did tell him – I’ve only just realised that now, that I was frightened of him. How strange! Why didn’t I think of that before? Anyway I just had to get away, just had to, so I told him I was going out for a minute, and I left a note at reception saying sorry, but it was the end, and got the train home, and came to see you, and I know I behaved badly, and I should have told him face-to-face and tried to explain and not run away like that, and now he’ll be worried and angry and lord knows what, and I feel so ashamed and so rotten I don’t know what to do and I didn’t mean to go on like this, I meant to be calm and sensible and rational and I just can’t.’

  And now instead of laughing I was crying.

  Julie didn’t say anything, but held out a hand, which I took, and drew me onto the bed. I lay down beside her. She put her arms round me, hugged me to her, kissed me on the top of my head, and now she was mum comforting her child instead of me being mum telling her a bedtime story, and it was such a relief to be with her and to have said all that.

  22

  But then, on the Friday afterwards, a text message:

  Hm 2nite v late must c u 2moz 10.30 kissin tree. Will.

  I texted straight back: OK 2moz.

  If I slept that night, I don’t remember. What I do remember is thrashing about, sweating, wondering, imagining, holding conversations with Will in my head, trying out various possibilities. He and Hannah were going to get married. Hannah was pregnant, what should he do? He’d caught some terrible disease and had only three weeks to live. That kind of thing. But at the back of my mind, shut in a cupboard to hide it from view, was a reason I didn’t want to face. The knowledge that I’d made a terrible mistake.

  By Saturday morning, no more glow. No more captor’s pride. Instead: trembling weakness.

  Dressed the way I knew he liked best, I set off to meet Will, eager but worried, longing to see him, but confused and nervous, and not sure how to behave. Straight into his arms, kissing, caressing, fondling, breathing each other in, like we always used to? That’s what I wanted. But would it be honest, considering what I’d done with Edward? Or should I hold back till I knew what he wanted to say? Should I tell him about Edward? Or would that depend on what Will said? Anyway, it wasn’t only up to me. What about Will? How would he behave when he saw me? I decided to hold back and take my cue from him.

  He was waiting when I arrived, leaning against our tree, hands in his pockets. As I approached he straightened up, took his hands out of his pockets, gave a tentative little wave – not at all like him – ended the wave by touching his glasses, which he only did when he was nervous, and o, his face, his body, the lovely familiar shape of him, melted me again. And he looked tired, not just tired, weary, as if he hadn’t slept for a week. I wanted to rush to him and hold him and meld myself to him and never let him go. But made myself wave back, and walk steadily on, my eyes on his, trying to weigh him up, trying to feel what he was feeling. I used to be able to do this as if by telepathic radar – pick up his signals, sense his mood and adapt mine to accommodate his. But my radar was rusty from lack of use. The only signal I received was that Will was on edge.

  He did make a slight move as I came close that would have ended with me in his arms if he’d carried it through, but as I was about to respond he checked himself, touched his glasses again, smiled with pursed lips, and said a diffident, ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hi?’ I said in quizzing key.

  A pause while our eyes searched each other through the windows of our glasses. And then one of those tennis match conversations.

  Will’s opening serve: ‘Okay?’

  My base-line return, a nod and: ‘You?’

  Base-line reply: ‘Look.’

  Light return from base-line: ‘I’m looking.’

  Volleyed answer: ‘About last time.’

  Volleyed return: ‘Last time?’

  Base-line forehand: ‘At Christmas.’

  Volleyed reply: ‘Yes?’

  Base-line: ‘When we talked about Easter.’

  To the net, sharply: ‘Yes?’

  To the net, top-spin reply: ‘And Hannah.’

  Attempted backhand passing shot with heavy ironic slash: ‘I know, don’t tell me, you’re just good friends.’

  Lobbed return: ‘That’s what I want to talk to you about.’

  Attempted smash: ‘I can guess.’

  Sharp return: ‘We’re not fucking.’

  Missed ball.

  End of rally. Fifteen love.

  Will turned away, took the three or four steps to the river’s edge, and stood with his back to me, staring down at the water slithering past his feet.

  I waited, leaning against our tree, hands behind my back to stop myself going to him and putting my arms round him and hugging myself to him.

  Will’s second serve, without turning to face me: ‘My fault. I know.’

  Brash return: ‘That you’re not fucking?’

  Emphatic reply: ‘That you got it wrong.’

  A sharp volley: ‘So tell me.’

  He turned, took a couple of steps towards me (again, I could tell, wanting to take me in his arms but stopping himself). A flap of his hand, his glasses touched, his head rubbed. Agitated. Upset.

  ‘For a start, she has a boyfriend.’

  ‘O?’

  ‘Her parents don’t like him.’

  ‘I know the feeling.’

  ‘He lives at Cambridge. Technician in a science lab at the uni.’

  ‘Serious?’

  ‘They’ve decided to get married this summer. She’s asked me to be a witness.’

  The door to the cupboard in the back of my mind burst open, the knowledge I’d locked up there rushed out.

  I couldn’t say anything. Missed shot.

  Thirty love.

  Will came and joined me, leaning against the tree. I kept my eye
s on the view.

  His third serve: ‘I knew what you were thinking.’

  ‘You weren’t wrong.’

  ‘I should have done something.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Told you.’

  ‘Told me what?’

  ‘That I love you.’

  Paralysis. No reply possible.

  Forty love.

  ‘From the beginning. The first time. The first day. At your place. In your aunt’s music room. You’re the one I love. You’re the only one I love. You’re the only one I ever will love. I mean love like that. True love. Whatever you call it. I don’t know how I know. I just do. And I don’t know how else to say it. Love that’s all love. I wish I knew a word that only means that kind of love. But I don’t. So that’s the only way I can say it. I love you, Cordelia, and that’s it. That’s what I came to tell you.’

  Collapse of losing player.

  Game, set and match.

  I slithered to the ground, a puppet cut from its strings. Had our kissing tree fallen on me I could not have been more crushed.

  The words ‘O Will!’ sighed out of me, like a dying breath.

  He squatted beside me, putting an arm round my shoulders.

  ‘I thought,’ he said in his driest tone, ‘the regulation reaction to such a declaration was for you to fling your arms round my neck and generally do whoopee.’

  No breath, no heart to reply.

  ‘Shall I,’ Will tried again, ‘administer mouth-to-mouth resuscitation? They taught us how in First Aid. You certainly look as though you need it.’

  I wanted to laugh. He had always made me laugh when I was low. But this time laughter was not an option.

  ‘No? Well, I know how it is when you’ve wanted something for a long time and then suddenly you get it when you least expect it. Knocks the wind out of you. What about taking three deep breaths before practising mouth-to-mouth? I think I need that too. Together, after three. Three.’

  And I did it. Three very deep breaths in time with Will.

  ‘Better?’

  I nodded and managed to say, ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

  He took his arm away and sat cross-legged, his back against the tree, a slim Buddha.

  ‘Because I’m an idiot.’

  ‘No, Will. Please.’

  ‘Wanted to be sure. Think of people we know.’ He listed off names. ‘First all hot and gone on this one then that one then another. In and out of what they said was love like jumping jacks.’

  ‘But you just said you knew from the first day.’

  ‘I did. But how can you be certain? I mean, when it’s the first time. Everybody tells you the first time is great but it doesn’t last, don’t commit yourself too soon, shop around, play the field, you’ll only know the real thing if you’ve had some experience to compare it with. Blah-di-blah.’

  ‘But you could have said. If you’d said, it would have been different.’

  ‘And Hannah?’

  ‘If you knew what I was thinking, why didn’t you tell me about her boyfriend?’

  ‘It’s not words that matter, it’s actions.’

  ‘Will!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me about Hannah and her boyfriend?’

  ‘You really want to know?’

  ‘You can be infuriating at times! Of course I want to know!’

  ‘Okay okay! I thought about it.’

  ‘You thought about it! Yes, being you, you would. And?’

  ‘It seems to me love, part of love, proper love, is trust.’

  I could see where this was going and could have saved him the trouble of getting there, but let him carry on.

  ‘I decided, if you really loved me you’d trust me, just like I trust you, and so I didn’t have to tell you, didn’t have to explain anything, because you’d know I’d tell you if something was going wrong, such as me seriously fancying somebody else or somebody making a serious move on me or anything that might hurt you or separate us.’

  ‘Separate us,’ I parroted, bleak as midwinter. And greasy Joan doth keel the pot: ‘So you – to you – even at college – to you, we were—’

  ‘Course! Aren’t we? You and me. Us.’

  I sucked in a breath, pushed myself to my feet and propped myself against our tree, feeling I was already the me I would be as a ninety-year-old, with feeble limbs and cranky joints.

  ‘Why now?’ I said as soon as I could. ‘Why tell me now?’

  Will stood and wanted to hold me.

  ‘No no!’ I said pushing him away. ‘Just tell me.’

  He stuck his hands in his pockets.

  ‘When I left you after Christmas, I was really upset. I mean but bad. I’m not a crier, not usually, but I was crying. I knew what you were thinking about Hannah and me and I couldn’t stand it. I hated it. You thinking I’d do that and not tell you. I thought, If she thinks that, she can’t trust me. And if she can’t trust me, she can’t really love me. So I should call it off. End it. But I hated that as well.

  ‘When I got back to college I was still in a swivet. I had to talk to somebody, and the only person I could was Hannah. She went ape. Hit the roof. Really went for me. Told me I didn’t have a clue about life and love and women, least of all women, and that of course you’d be thinking she and I were sleeping together and why hadn’t I talked about it to you weeks ago, and how it had nothing to do with trusting and not trusting, but with worry and, yes, jealousy probably, and how it was normal for you to feel like that, she would if she thought her boyfriend was getting very friendly with another woman, and that if I had anything about me and really loved you and wanted to keep you, I should come home and explain and tell you what I feel.

  ‘I knew she was right as soon as she said it. But I didn’t want to do what she said. Stubbornness probably. Pride. I don’t know. And then it all got too much. I wasn’t sleeping, I wasn’t doing my work properly, couldn’t think of anything else. And yesterday Hannah said, “For god’s sake go and talk to her or you’ll lose her and then you’ll regret it and you’ll be a total mess.” So here I am and now you know.’

  ‘O lordy!’ I said from the frozen depths of the Arctic.

  Will turned and gave me a close look.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  No answer. Tears in the offing.

  ‘There’s something the matter.’ He also in the depths of the Arctic now. ‘Isn’t there?’

  ‘Nothing!’ I said with futile cheeriness. ‘Not really,’ followed by a betraying catch of breath.

  ‘But?’

  ‘I thought I’d lost you.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘It’s nothing, Will. Honest. Just a fling.’

  ‘A fling?’ Death spoke.

  ‘Nothing.’ Suffocation.

  He turned away.

  Desperation. A last pleading struggle. ‘I thought I’d lost you. I thought you were having it off with Hannah. I was upset. I needed to feel wanted. I wanted some fun instead of feeling horrible all the time. I didn’t love him or anything like that. It wasn’t serious. O god, Will. Please listen. Please understand. If I’d known—’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter who. Please, Will.’

  ‘Who? I want to know. Come on. Who?’

  ‘All right! All right! … You remember that night at Mario’s? Our goodbye dinner.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘Edward Malcolm was there. He gave us a bottle of wine.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘After you went away, he was at a party my dad gave and he offered me a part-time job. I thought it would give me something else to think about. So I took it. And he fancied me. But I didn’t let anything happen. But then you came home for Christmas and you seemed to be all taken up with Hannah. And I thought I’d lost you. And after you went back to college, well, that’s when it happened.’

  ‘With Edward Malcolm?’

  The still small voice of despair. ‘Yes.’


  A held breath. I think the river stopped flowing.

  And then a gasp. ‘Edward Malcolm?’

  I nodded. Once. Robotic.

  ‘But – he’s – old!’

  ‘Not,’ Little C aged five replied, ‘that old.’

  ‘But why? I don’t understand why.’

  ‘All sorts of reasons.’

  ‘Name one. One good one.’

  ‘I needed to know more about myself, more about men, more about sex than I’d learned on our own. Don’t you want to know more too? Aren’t you curious? About people? About yourself? You’ve always said you were. Like, remember, at the hotel when I came to see you at college, remember? You said that night how you felt ignorant and wanted to know more—’

  ‘I do, but with you.’

  ‘– and isn’t that what you’re doing with Hannah?’

  ‘No, that is not what I’m doing with Hannah.’

  ‘Well, that’s what I thought. I thought you were fucking Hannah and I couldn’t bear it and— This is awful!’

  A terrible pause before, ‘O god, Cordelia! How could you!’

  Tears flowed. ‘I thought I’d lost you. That’s why. Don’t you see?’

  ‘But with Edward Malcolm! That’s disgusting.’

  I was turning to him, pleading—

  ‘With anybody!’

  – wanting him to hold me, when he began to retch.

  He stumbled to the river and threw up, holding onto the branch where we used to sit and talk and kiss, to keep from falling in.

  I went to help him, put my hand on his back.

  ‘Get away!’ he cried, pushing me from him. ‘Leave me alone!’

  Then threw up again.

  I stood beside him, aching with grief. I knew him. Knew he wouldn’t listen to explanations, wouldn’t change his mind once he was convinced, knew there was no hope for me.

  When the retching stopped he dipped his hands into the river and washed his mouth. Straightened up. Paused a moment, looking across the river, seeing, I knew, nothing. Then took a few paces along the bank before setting off across the field to the path.

  ‘Will,’ I called. ‘Will! Wait!’

  But he didn’t stop, didn’t reply. Began to run.

  ‘I’m sorry!’ I screamed. ‘I’m sorry! Forgive me, Will. Please!’