The Pieces of You and Me

by Rachel Burton

  The night before you left you phoned me. My flatmate, Rich, answered the phone.

  ‘Do you want me to tell him you’re out?’ he asked. We’d lived together for two years and he knew what was going on even though I hardly spoke about it. I almost said yes. For a moment I thought it would be easier that way, but I knew deep down we had to say goodbye. We owed each other that much.

  ‘Your mum said you would be here,’ you said.

  You asked me to meet you at Heathrow. You were standing by the departure gate waiting for me when I arrived, looking around anxiously. You were early and I was late – the story of our lives.

  When you saw me, you smiled that smile that was just for me and my heart broke into a million pieces. I’d made a decision on the tube on my way there. I’d decided that we needed a clean break – I didn’t want to wait around for a year to see what might happen. I knew that in a year you wouldn’t want to get married and you wouldn’t want me in America with you. Within a year you’d have finally found your place in the world, where you belonged, surrounded by the people who would lift you up. Maybe it would involve Camilla, maybe it wouldn’t – I was just sure that it wouldn’t involve me.

  I took your ring off on the Piccadilly Line, somewhere between Earl’s Court and Hammersmith, and I put it in my pocket.

  When I gave you the ring that morning you didn’t say anything – I don’t think either of us had the words to articulate what we felt in that moment. I watched you put the ring in your pocket and close your eyes. I watched the muscles of your jaw twitch.

  ‘I’ll see you around, Jessie,’ you said as you opened your eyes. You didn’t look at me. I almost changed my mind in that moment. If you’d looked at me I would have done.

  I waited until you’d cleared security, watching the back of your body disappear into the crowds. You turned around once, just before you vanished completely. You looked at me then, but you didn’t wave or smile. You just shook your head sadly and walked away.

  By the time I got home it felt as though the jigsaw pieces of my heart would never fit together again …

  24

  JESS

  Rupert, Mum and I walked across Midsummer Common together. The three of us made a strange party, returning to a city in which we no longer belonged. I hadn’t been back to Cambridge since Mum moved to London after Dad died. She went back from time to time for poetry readings and meeting up with friends, but I could never face going with her, not even on days when I felt well enough. Cambridge was full of so many memories of Rupert. Even now as I walked across the Common, all I could think about was the day he first told me that he loved me, the day we kissed on the bench by the river for the first time. I’d always known I’d never be able to return to Cambridge without him.

  ‘Are you absolutely sure about this?’ Mum had asked the day before.

  ‘About seeing Rupert’s parents again?’ I’d replied. ‘No, not really.’

  She’d smiled. ‘Madeleine’s not that bad. Her bark is worse than her bite.’

  ‘And Anthony?’

  Mum had shrugged. She knew there was no love lost between Rupert’s father and me.

  ‘I meant are you absolutely sure about moving to York?’

  ‘I am,’ I’d replied. I’d thought about nothing else since Rupert had asked and the more I’d thought about it the more sure I’d become. Yes, of course I had reservations, and I could tell by the look in his eyes that he did too – we’d hurt each other before but it didn’t mean we would again. ‘I am,’ I’d repeated. ‘I have to give this a chance, and I can’t do that if we’re living two hundred miles away from each other.’

  Mum had nodded, but her face had been full of concern.

  ‘I know you’re worried about what we’ll do if I get ill again, but trust me – Rupert’s not completely incompetent.’ I hadn’t told Mum about what had happened to Rupert when he was at Harvard. It wasn’t my story to tell. But knowing he had experienced something similar made me more confident that he understood what our future could look like. ‘Besides,’ I’d said. ‘Maybe I won’t get ill again.’

  ‘Maybe,’ she’d said. ‘But I’m your mother and it’s my job to worry.’

  We didn’t pass Mum’s old house as we walked through the maze of streets beyond the Fort St George Bridge, but as we stood outside Rupert’s parents’ house, the house that had been my second home for so many years, memories that I’d all but forgotten came flooding back: my grandmother’s funeral, the day Rupert went to boarding school, the afternoon we slept together for the first time, the plans we’d made, my father’s death, the conversation I’d overheard with his sister. I held on to Rupert’s hand a little tighter.

  ‘It’ll be OK,’ he said, as Mum marched up to the door and rang the bell. ‘I promise.’

  When Madeleine opened the front door nobody spoke for a moment. We all just stood grinning at her. She looked the same but different, older, frailer. She looked as though she carried a disappointment that hadn’t been there before. And then I remembered that one of her children lived on the other side of the world and the other barely spoke to her. Part of me, the part that didn’t think that was entirely her own fault, felt sorry for her.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Tremayne,’ I said eventually with more enthusiasm than I felt. Rupert had always called my parents Ed and Caro but it had never felt right to call his parents by their first names and they’d certainly never encouraged it.

  ‘I think under the circumstances it’s time you called me Madeleine,’ she replied with a tight smile that told me she had no desire to be called Madeleine by me, now or ever. But then she probably had no desire to see me again either. We can’t always get what we want.

  ‘How are you, Maddie?’ my mother asked. Rupert’s mum hated being called Maddie.

  ‘Caroline,’ Madeleine replied. ‘How lovely to see you. I read your latest poetry collection. It’s very …’ She paused as though searching for the right word.

  ‘It’s about sex and heroin,’ Mum replied, pushing past me and into the Tremaynes’ house as though she owned the place. ‘Get the stick out of your arse, Maddie.’ Rupert and I exchanged a glance, both trying not to laugh as his mother stood aside to let us in.

  We walked through into the living room, a room we’d never been allowed in as children, where Rupert’s dad, Anthony, was waiting for us. He smiled warmly at me as I walked towards him and it seemed to me then that he’d accepted the situation, that it was no longer him Rupert and I had to convince.

  ‘I must say this does all seem very sudden,’ Madeleine said, before any of us had a chance to sit down.

  ‘What does?’ I asked quietly of nobody in particular.

  ‘It’s hardly sudden, Mum,’ Rupert interrupted. ‘We’re just picking up where we left off, where we should have been a decade ago.’ He was speaking to his mum but looking at me, pulling me close. Out of the corner of my eyes I saw Anthony still smiling at us.

  ‘Shall we sit down?’ Mum said. ‘And pour us all a drink, Anthony, for heaven’s sake.’

  Thank goodness for Mum. She could always make any situation more bearable. We sat down as instructed and Anthony opened a bottle of champagne, which was the last thing I wanted. I was hoping for a cup of tea, but everyone else seemed to need the alcohol to bolster them; mine was the only glass that wasn’t drained almost immediately.

  Conversation was stilted and revolved mostly around how Madeleine thought we were rushing things, that we should perhaps wait for a bit longer before moving in together, get to know each other again. It felt like the day we told her we were engaged.

  ‘We’re not rushing,’ Rupert said. ‘We’re making up for lost time.’

  ‘It might be an opportunity for you to come back to Cambridge, Rupert,’ Madeleine said, completely ignoring him. ‘You’d be nearer to London then.’

  I watched Rupert’s jaw tighten. ‘That’s not going to happen,’ he said. I remembered what he’d told me about not begging for a job, but I also wondere
d if he thought Cambridge would be too much pressure. To be honest I had no desire to be back here either.

  I didn’t say anything. I hadn’t said anything much except my initial greeting since I arrived. I sat in my chair, clutching my unwanted champagne, and let the conversation wash over me. I watched Rupert talking to his mother, trying not to get frustrated, his hair curling on his collar. I watched the light on his skin, on his cheekbones, and my heart filled with love for this man I’d known since he was a lanky schoolboy, since he was a baby. I tried to ignore the voice in my head that asked if we were rushing it, the voice that agreed with Rupert’s parents. I didn’t want to live in a world where Anthony and Madeleine Tremayne were right. I wanted to live in a world where Rupert and I were together.

  ‘I think we have to put our own feelings aside and trust that our adult children know what they’re doing,’ Mum said. She’d changed her tune, but it was good to hear. I watched Madeleine as she smiled tightly again.

  ‘Indeed,’ she sighed. ‘Eventually we have to let our children go and trust they know what’s best.’ Then she looked straight at me. ‘Will you be working in York, Jessica? Or do you expect my son to provide for you?’

  I stared at her.

  ‘Mum …’ Rupert began.

  ‘It’s a legitimate question,’ Madeleine interrupted, looking at us at last.

  ‘It’s none of your bloody business,’ Rupert threw back.

  ‘I have money of my own,’ I said, finding my voice at last. ‘I … I do some freelance writing.’ It wasn’t a lie.

  I felt Rupert’s hand on my arm, stopping me. ‘Jessie, it’s OK – we don’t have to tell them.’

  We looked at each other. Mum had told me Madeleine had no idea I was CJ Rose – she still thought I was a journalist – but she’d also told me Madeleine had enjoyed my books, which gave me a sense of satisfaction. Rupert and I had talked about what we should tell his parents when they asked what I did for a living and I had said that if it came up we should tell them about my health.

  He looked at me now, his face a question and I nodded. It might not be any of their business but Madeleine and Anthony needed to know.

  ‘Mum,’ Rupert said, dragging his gaze away from me. ‘I need to explain something to you and I need you to listen.’

  Between the three of us we told Rupert’s parents what they needed to know about the last few years and about how ill I’d been. I watched Anthony look concerned, his eyes flicking from me to Rupert and back again, and Madeleine’s tight smile grow tighter. I had a feeling she was the sort of person who didn’t really believe ME existed.

  ‘Yuppie flu, they used to call it,’ she said when we finished. She sniffed and looked away from me.

  I knew she wouldn’t have any sympathy. I pushed myself up out of my chair.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said as I walked out of the stuffy room. ‘I just need to get some air.’

  The Tremaynes’ garden was exactly as I remembered it. I walked right down to the bottom and stood on tiptoe to look over the fence into my old garden. The apple orchard was still there, although the hole in the fence had long since been boarded up. I wondered who lived in our old house now. I’d never asked Mum about the family who bought it and she’d never said anything. I think we’d both wanted to move on as quickly as possible.

  I hadn’t been in Rupert’s parents’ garden since that afternoon ten years before, when I’d overheard the conversation he’d had with his sister, when she tried to persuade him to go to America without me and my teenage ears had interpreted his silence as consent. Looking back on it now with the advantage of age and hindsight, I realised how foolish I’d been, how foolish we are when we’re young. Maybe that alone was reason enough for us to have gone our separate ways.

  I had been too young to understand nuanced grey areas of thought back then, too young to understand discretion and diplomacy and how sometimes we have to say things we don’t really mean just to keep the peace. When he hadn’t stood up to his sister, when he hadn’t defended us, I’d assumed he had already changed his mind.

  Later, when he’d asked me to go to America with him and I’d turned him down, he had practically fallen apart in front of me but I’d refused to acknowledge it. All I could think about was the fact that he was leaving me when I needed him most, and that he was leaving me to be with Camilla. I’d got everything wrong back then and I was determined not to make the same mistakes again.

  Standing in the Tremaynes’ garden again after all these years brought everything back, reminding me how stupid I’d been. I didn’t really know why I hadn’t believed Rupert, or why I didn’t want to wait for him, or why I gave him the ring back at the last minute. I thought I was doing the right thing, I thought I was setting him free to live his life. Now I wondered if all I had done was create a prison for both of us.

  Through all our planning and all our dreams there was only ever one thing I was completely sure about, and that was Rupert. I knew I wanted to be with him, have a family with him, live in a house just like the one I grew up in. That was all I’d ever really wanted and I threw it away.

  Whatever Madeleine might think, I wanted to rush into this headlong and I wanted it to be the second chance we were both looking for.

  I heard his tread on the garden path behind me. It still sounded the same after all these years. I didn’t need to turn around to know it was him.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, as he stood behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. ‘How are you?’

  I took a deep breath. ‘I’m OK,’ I said. ‘I just can’t believe how easily your mum can still wind me up, although your dad seems more relaxed about things than he used to be.’

  ‘Mum was so disappointed in me when I came back from Harvard and it’s really soured what little relationship we had. But for some reason Dad seemed to get it. I wouldn’t say we’ve reached an understanding or anything but at least we’re not fighting all the time.’

  ‘Do you want to make it up with your mum?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s easier to keep some distance,’ he replied, not really answering my question. ‘That’s why York works so well.’

  The thought of living in York suddenly felt like a much bigger decision than it had before because of the memories that being back here had dredged up. It had been a long time since I’d done something on my own.

  ‘What’s up?’ he asked. He must have sensed my unease.

  ‘I’m just nervous about being in York,’ I replied. ‘About being on my own for the first time in ages.’

  ‘You won’t be on your own, Jessie,’ he said. ‘You’ve got me.’

  I stepped away from him then, wiggling out of his arms and turning around to face him.

  ‘Are you sure?’ I asked. ‘I don’t want to be a burden to you if I get ill again.’

  He smiled. ‘You sound like your mother,’ he said. ‘Of course I’m sure. Let me look after you.’

  I sighed. ‘I don’t need looking after, I just need …’

  ‘Me not to make a fuss, right?’

  I nodded.

  ‘That’s fine, as long as you promise to tell me if you start to feel sick again.’

  ‘It might never happen,’ I replied. I was hoping it never would, but I also knew one of my biggest triggers was stress and moving across the country to start a new life was likely to be stressful.

  But it was also likely to change my life for the better.

  I looked away from him, chewing my bottom lip. I’d asked him if he was sure, but was I? Was I sure that I could do this and was I sure that I would open up to him honestly if I felt ill again? And I worried that Rupert and I had both been on our own for so long that we didn’t know how to make decisions as a couple and that perhaps Madeleine was right; perhaps we needed time to get used to that again.

  My confusion was another sign that we might be rushing things, but I’d been waiting ten years for this, ten years for him, and I wasn’t prepared to wait any longer.

  I felt his h
ands on my shoulders. ‘Jessie, look at me,’ he said softly.

  I looked at him. His blue eyes were filled with concern. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked. ‘Am I rushing ahead on my own agenda just because I have to go back to work in October? We don’t have to do this. We can wait.’

  ‘I want to do this,’ I said. ‘I’m just worried.’

  ‘You seemed so keen when I first asked.’

  ‘I know, and I still am. But once the initial excitement wore off I started thinking about the practicalities – being away from Mum, from my doctor, even my agent will still be in London.’

  ‘We can work it out,’ he said. ‘Find you the right doctor, help you balance everything. And York won’t be forever. One day I’ll get another job somewhere else. But you don’t have to move up right now if you don’t want to – you can get used to the idea slowly if you like, just come up at weekends?’

  ‘No,’ I replied. ‘I want us to be together. We’ve wasted enough time already.’

  ‘What else do you want, Jessie?’ he asked. ‘Tell me. I’ll do anything to make you happy.’

  ‘All I ever wanted was you,’ I said, looking away from him again. ‘Right from the start all I wanted was to get married and maybe one day have a family and live in a house like the one I grew up in.’ I looked towards the back garden of my old house.

  ‘Why did you never say?’ he asked. ‘I wanted all of that too you know, eventually. Why did you break up with me instead?’

  ‘Everything changed after Dad died,’ I replied. But I knew that wasn’t really the reason. I still wanted all the things I’d wanted back then. Nothing had really changed – I’d just needed some time to myself to understand a world without my father in it. But I didn’t say that to Rupert.

  ‘It seemed like the right thing to do at the time, to set you free to live your life,’ I said instead.