What Might Have Been

by Holly Miller

  We sit, and for a moment I just enjoy the sight of him across the table from me, newly tanned, fair hair brightened by the sun. He’s wearing a shirt in a flattering shade of blue, and has that particular kind of watch on his wrist most commonly seen advertised by Hollywood actors. I suddenly worry that this man I once loved has soared completely out of my league.

  “You look great,” I say. “Very . . . relaxed.”

  He laughs. “Thank you. Though that really only lasted till I checked my e-mails.”

  “When did you get back?”

  “Last night.”

  “You’re not jet-lagged? What’s the flight time?”

  “Ten hours. I’ve been asleep most of today.”

  I smile. “So that’s why you look so ridiculously—” I break off, feel my face warm a little.

  Max smiles too, lifts an eyebrow. “So ridiculously . . . ?”

  “Well-rested.”

  As he laughs, I remember how much I love the sound of it: completely natural and unaffected, the kind of laugh that slips free while you’re watching live comedy, or your favorite sitcom.

  “Champagne?” he asks, nodding down at the drinks menu, and I notice a waiter approaching.

  We’ve never drunk champagne together before. The most we could ever stretch to as students was bargain bin cava.

  “Actually,” I say (I’ve practiced this bit), “I’m kind of taking a break from alcohol at the moment.”

  He looks surprised for a split second before blinking it away. “No worries. What do you fancy instead?”

  We don’t talk too much more until our mocktails have arrived and we’ve ordered courses one to three of a total of five. And then Max lifts his glass and says, “I loved getting messages from you. I’ve missed you being in my life, Luce.”

  The abbreviation of my name feels flattering and intimate—like we’re right back in his room at halls, making out on his single bed, sharing a bottle of red wine so cheap it made us wince. Half-undressed, laughing into each other’s necks as friends knocked on his door, trying to track us down. We did a lot of that at uni: sneaking off together, hiding in darkened lecture theaters, behind buildings, in bathrooms with the lights off. I love you, Luce, he’d whisper, his mouth on mine, and I’d feel so frenzied I could barely say it back.

  I smile and sip from my glass, hoping my face isn’t flushing with nostalgia.

  “Hey, how was your interview?” he asks.

  I fill him in, tell him I got the job.

  “That’s incredible, Luce. Congratulations.” Max locks eyes with me, shaking his head, because he knows—he knows what this means to me, the chance to get to write for a living. It’s all I ever talked about the whole time I knew him at uni.

  “Thank you.” I realize I’m fighting the urge to well up.

  He raises his glass to mine. “Well, here’s to you. And your new life in London.” We both take a sip. “How are you finding it so far? Must feel pretty different to Shoreley.”

  I lied a little when he called, told him my move had been in the works for a while. I couldn’t bear for him to think our meeting had influenced my decision at all.

  Max visited me back home in Shoreley on just three occasions during university holidays, because the rest of the time he was either studying or doing internships. Max’s degree was one of those where the breaks were really just another form of study leave.

  “I think different is what I need right now.” I mean, Max is right—London is a world away from Shoreley and particularly Tash’s place, where the stillness was so loud it sometimes buzzed. Here, silence is only a concept—it can’t be found, I’ve learned, because the rumble of the city is a stereo you can’t switch off, even at night. Rattling train tracks, sharp blasts of music, the commotion of voices. The city is a restless creature, but I’ve taken pleasure from its fitfulness. It has stirred me up, switched me on.

  “Luce.” Max meets my eye. “Did you ever make it back to uni, to finish your degree?”

  I shake my head. And then I find myself hesitating, because—despite everything—I want to tell him all about what happened after I left, including what went on with Nate. I feel as though he would understand, because he was always compassionate to a fault. It was Max who’d insist we demonstrate in support of good causes at uni, who volunteered to make peace with our unreasonable neighbors on Dover Street, who stood up for someone in a law seminar if they expressed an unpopular opinion.

  But as quickly as the right moment comes, it passes. And now, across the table, Max is grabbing my free hand with his.

  I don’t flinch, trying not to let my mind travel back to that Friday night nearly a decade ago, when we were standing on the bridge over the river next to the railway station in Norwich. Max was heading home to Cambridge for the weekend. I can still picture him so clearly, in his favorite jeans with the scuffed knees, and oversized woolen coat. Our final autumn term had only recently begun, and it was pouring with rain.

  “Please don’t go.” I was too numb at that point to even cry.

  “I’m going to miss my train,” was all he said, his voice vague and watery.

  I didn’t want to beg. I couldn’t. So I just watched him walk away, over the bridge and out of my life.

  I take in his face now—those gray, searchlight eyes, the gentle beckon of his lips—and I am filled with sadness. For all the years we lost. For all we might have been. For everything that happened after our abrupt, inexplicable end.

  “I know this is coming about ten years too late . . . but I’m so sorry, Lucy,” Max says, squeezing my hand like it’s the most natural thing in the world to do. In this moment, it would be easy to imagine we never broke up, because we’re carrying on pretty much where we left off. Which is enjoyable and confusing all at once—like reading a brilliant book with some of the pages missing. Or arriving at the cinema halfway through a really good film. “I wish things hadn’t ended the way they did.”

  He loved me back then, and I knew it. Just the way my parents—only a year older than Max and I had been, when they met—felt it. They still feel it today. They’ll have been married thirty-four years this September.

  Max was unlike any guy I’d known at school, or our other friends at uni. Effusive and expressive, he was vocal in his adoration of me, and eager for everyone to know it. He would flick bar snacks at the people who teased us—Married already?—before gripping my hand even tighter; would make a big show of kissing me in the middle of wherever we were. Pubs, roads, university corridors. We talked about our future all the time: moving in together, marriage, kids. We were bold enough—and sure enough—to want it all. It didn’t even feel fanciful. It just felt like . . . fact. We were meant to have met in that kitchen on our first day at uni, and we were destined not to leave each other’s side.

  Until the night he ended it. Just like that.

  I blamed myself at first—thought I’d demanded too much of him—but he kept saying it wasn’t that, that it wasn’t my fault.

  Of course, it crossed my mind he’d met someone. Not at uni—I was fairly confident about that—but perhaps at the law firm he’d interned with over the summer. Maybe someone who’d be heading to London the following year too, to complete the LPC, the next step in qualification for aspiring lawyers.

  And yet, despite everything, none of that really made sense. Max wasn’t a cheat, a liar. If he’d met someone else, he would have just told me. Wouldn’t he?

  I look into his gray eyes now, heart drumming in my chest. I want to ask him again what was going through his mind when he broke it off that day in September nearly ten years ago. Was it just the classic fear of commitment he kept denying? But we’re in the middle of a nice restaurant—hardly the right setting for turning your heart inside out. Feeling tears crowd my eyes, I slide my hand out from beneath his as our starters arrive.

  “Let’s talk abo
ut something else,” I say, swallowing my emotion away. “Tell me about your holiday.”

  So between bites of his rabbit dish, Max describes the world-class diving, the plush resort, the beaches, the heat.

  “Did you know the group?” I ask. “I mean, beforehand?”

  He shakes his head. “I’ve been diving with the same company before—Egypt, Israel—but the group’s always different.”

  “And did you . . . meet anyone interesting?”

  Smiling, he hesitates. “Are you asking what I think you’re asking?”

  “What do you think I’m asking?”

  “Whether I was messaging you one minute then . . . doing something else the next.”

  I smile too. The rhubarb from my pickled mackerel starter is tart on my tongue. “I mean, I wouldn’t judge. You were on holiday.”

  He sets down his fork and takes my hand. “No. I meant what I said. I was thinking about you the whole time I was there.”

  I’m inclined to believe him. Max was always so straight-up, so honest—the kind of guy who would never copy anyone else’s coursework, or take even a single penny in miscalculated change.

  I swallow. “So, come on. Tell me about your life here. Your friends, your job. I want to know everything.”

  Because actually, right now, I just want to hear Max talk, so I can simply sit back and quietly love the sound of his voice again, after all these years.

  * * *

  —

  We stay in the restaurant till late. The minutes melt into hours. Time becomes a river—long and beautiful and begging to be swum through. We finish our drinks, then order more. We discuss his work, and I fill him in on my years at Figaro. He describes his flat in Clapham, and I tell him about moving in with Jools.

  I’m vaguely aware that outside, dusk has become dark. I’m trying to pretend our little corner of the restaurant isn’t hot with electricity. That his hand doesn’t keep nudging mine. That beneath the table, our knees aren’t bumping.

  “So, Luce. Tell me. Are you . . . with anyone?” Max’s glass is raised to his lips, his eyes glimmering above the rim.

  “Nope. Been single for about two years.” I make a face, exhale. “God, that sounds like a lifetime. You?”

  “Actually, about the same. I broke up with my last girlfriend a couple of summers ago.”

  I swallow. It’s still an odd and uncomfortable feeling, picturing Max with someone else. I guess when someone leaves and you’re not ready, a part of your heart will always go with them.

  “And since?” I ask.

  He tells me tactfully that he’s been concentrating on work. I find myself daring to wonder what he’s like in bed these days, nearly a decade on.

  Once we’ve finished eating and drunk coffee, we’re almost the last people in the restaurant, so I reluctantly suggest getting the bill.

  “That’s already taken care of,” Max says.

  “What? When?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Max, no. It’s too much.”

  “Forget it. Really.”

  “No. This place is . . .” That’s irrelevant, really. “I want to pay my half.”

  “Well, how about you pick up the bill next time?” His eyes brim with amusement. He’s enjoying teasing me, I realize.

  I tip my head, deliberately evade the suggestion. “You don’t have to be all smooth moves, you know.”

  He raises both hands. “What? I wasn’t.”

  “Don’t forget . . . I know you.” Yes—the old Max, with the scruffy clothes and Pot Noodle fetish and terrible timekeeping and secret affection for Take That.

  A busted smile spreads over his face. “Oh, yeah.”

  “I’ll transfer you the money. Just ping me your details.”

  He feigns taking me seriously with a frown. “Okay. I will.”

  I kick him beneath the table with my foot. “I mean it.”

  “Absolutely.”

  I smile and shake my head, glance around the virtually empty restaurant. “Okay. Well, I should probably get a cab.”

  Endearingly, his self-confidence sways momentarily. I watch him swallow. “Unless . . . you fancy coming back to mine? Strictly for coffee, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  * * *

  —

  Max’s flat is less than a five-minute walk from the restaurant. Handy for seductions, I think, before scolding myself. He’s been nothing but a gentleman tonight.

  It’s a two-bed place, which I’m guessing puts it at about three-quarters of a million. Inside, it’s beautifully done out—immaculate paintwork, all the period features not only intact but gracefully showcased. Stylish prints hang in sleek frames from the picture rails—the French Riviera, a Hockney reproduction—and there are polished copper light fittings, cushions in bold geometrics, and potted plants exploding from various corners. The kitchen-diner we’re standing in smells of furniture polish and anti-bac, and I can’t spot a single item out of place. Even the tea towels look as though they were pressed prior to hanging.

  “This is . . . like a show home.” I think about my scruffy bedroom back in Tooting and make a mental note to not invite Max back there for as long as I possibly can. Either that, or I’ll have to fly quickly up the ranks at Supernova so I can afford to rent somewhere as swanky as this.

  “Can’t take the credit really,” he says. “I had someone come in and help with the furnishings and stuff, when I moved in.”

  I sit down on the sofa I’ve been standing next to. “You mean, an interior designer?”

  He wrinkles his nose, clearly slightly self-conscious about it. “Not exactly. It was just a favor really, from a friend-of-a-friend.”

  He presses a button on his coffee machine, then retrieves a bottle from an Art Deco–style walnut drinks cabinet. “Mind if I have a nightcap on the side?”

  “Of course not.”

  He twists the cap from the bottle. “I’ve been really getting into vintage cognac lately.”

  I laugh. I can’t help it. “Did you just say ‘I’ve been really getting into vintage cognac’?”

  He turns to face me, clocks my expression, and smiles. “This is what you meant earlier, isn’t it?”

  “About you being all smooth moves? Picking up the bill, rhapsodizing about cognac? Absolutely.”

  He crosses the room, then—making his voice deep and husky—instructs Alexa to play jazz over his shoulder.

  I laugh, and he laughs too, like he’s enjoying trying—and failing—to impress me. I suspect it’s probably been a while since he’s had to work very hard at the seduction game.

  “Well,” he says, his eyes tracking mine as he sits down next to me, “maybe I’m just trying to win you over.”

  The air seems to thicken then, the levity dropping from the room. Our gazes lock, and I reach for Max’s hand. There is a single moment in which our eyes are asking the same question, and in the next, his lips are on mine. We slide our arms around each other, and now he’s pressing against me, and in the next moment we’re horizontal on the sofa, a tangle of tongues and hands and limbs, tugging at each other’s clothes and making up for that lost decade like both our lives depend on it.

  Six

  Stay

  On my first day at Pebbles & Paper, I spot my old boss Georgia as I’m heading from the bus stop to the shop.

  I stiffen for a moment before diving down the side street to my right. I can’t face her, not after the way we left it—with me accusing her of betrayal and her begging me to stay. Because the truth is, there was a lot to love about working at Figaro. That feeling of knowing we’d built something pretty great between us. The family vibe, the banter.

  I walk a little too swiftly in the opposite direction to Georgia, my ankles wriggling as I navigate the cobblestones. It’s a warm day, and I’ve broken o
ut a cotton skirt and sandals for the occasion. Above my head the sky is a faultless blue, still as a lagoon.

  The morning passes as smoothly as I’d hoped—there’s a steady stream of browsers, a few purchasers, but nowhere near enough people to overwhelm me at any point. Ivan’s here anyway, in case I have any teething problems on my first shift. He takes great pleasure in pointing out just how many of the items in stock are unique and handmade. I think about Caleb’s story from last week and smile.

  So far, I’ve sold some birthstone jewelry, a few toiletries, a handmade silk scarf, several greetings cards, a pair of bookends, and a box of artisan chocolates. Ivan seems to think that’s a decent morning’s takings, and for a moment I wonder how he ever manages to break even, before reflecting on the staggering markup there is on most of the items I’ve sold.

  Things pick up a bit over the course of the afternoon, and by the time I next look up, it’s five o’clock. Checking my phone as I get ready to leave, I smile as I see a message from Caleb.

  Thoughts on Shakespeare?

  I’m his biggest fan, I respond.

  * * *

  —

  We meet at dusk outside the walled garden of Shoreley Hall, where Caleb’s bought tickets for an open-air production of Romeo and Juliet.

  “You can translate,” he says, handing our tickets to the steward. He’s brought a rug with him, plus a picnic in a carrier bag.

  “Me?”

  “Yeah—you know, being a writer. And apparently Shakespeare’s biggest fan.”

  I laugh, prod him gently in the small of his back with my fingertips as we enter the garden and search the grass for a place to sit.

  The walled garden looks magical, like something out of a fairy tale. Long lines of bulbs loop between the branches of the trees, the air full with the scent of late-spring dew and thickening grass. The flower borders are resplendent, bursting with tangerine-toned tulips and wallflowers, blossoms blazing from the plum, cherry, and apple trees.