99 Days With You

by Catherine Miller

  ‘Your wish was to see puffins in the wild. Sooooooooo…’ Nathan said the word in that sing-songy way that demonstrated he was leading up to something special and obvious all at the same time.

  Emma realised he was waiting for her to fill the gap. But that wasn’t going to happen while she was in a state of shock. She wasn’t even sure what day of the week it was. Or how many hours she’d slept. Or if she was behind on helping out with her mum. In fact, it had taken a few moments to remember why Nathan was there at all – in her house, in her room.

  ‘We’re going to see puffins in the wild!’ Nathan said it with a startling amount of glee. Having reached a crescendo, his excitement hovered in mid-air as he waited for Emma to catch up.

  Emma stared at him. It was too much to process when she was yet to fully let go of sleep.

  ‘You do want to go and see puffins, don’t you?’ The deflation was already happening, the optimism in Nathan’s tone already two decibels lower than it had been.

  ‘Of course! But right now I’m not actually awake. I never am until I’ve had at least one cup of tea. I might be able to react once I’ve had my first cuppa.’ Emma wasn’t a morning person. No amount of Nathan’s enthusiasm was going to change that fact. Having someone turn up like they were auditioning for the class of High School Musical did not inspire a sunny disposition in someone not yet ready to form words or thoughts.

  ‘I’ll go make tea. And breakfast. You wait there.’

  Emma didn’t plan on doing much else. It was all a bit overwhelming. She’d gone to bed feeling apprehensive, and an overly zealous wake-up call just added to the confusion. Even with Nathan’s ethos of never wasting an hour, Emma liked to think there were some hours that were designed for resting and should be designated as such.

  She felt strange this morning. Like somehow there were parts of her that weren’t acting in the way she would normally expect. Perhaps it was the side effects of her hormone injection. Whatever it was, she felt a sense of uncertainty all over her body.

  ‘Here we are,’ Nathan chirped, as he returned to her room with a tray complete with a boiled egg and soldiers and her much-needed cup of tea. He nestled it onto her lap and perched himself on the edge of the bed next to her.

  The thought of being told to pack her bags somehow filled her with dread… She still had her mother to consider. It was probably every girl’s dream to hear that sentence, but right now she wanted nothing more than the comfort of home.

  ‘Thank you,’ Emma managed, after the first sip of tea. She really hadn’t meant to be so impolite, but she wasn’t used to such an assault on her senses so early in the day.

  ‘Sorry, I thought you were awake when I came in. I didn’t mean to scare you.’

  ‘Just because someone’s eyes are open, it doesn’t mean they’re all there yet,’ she said with a smile. That was certainly the case for Emma’s mum. Maybe not liking mornings was a genetic thing.

  ‘Are you awake enough now?’

  Emma took another sip of tea. It was barely enough caffeine to start an engine, but she would make the exception of only two sips, given that it was Nathan and she really shouldn’t be reacting the way she was. ‘I can form sentences. Is that a hopeful sign?’

  ‘That’ll do. So, I looked into it last night. If we go to the Bempton Cliffs reserve site, which is looked after by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, we stand a reasonable chance of seeing a puffin, and Yorkshire is the closest place to go. We can do the trip in a couple of days. It’s a bit of a trek on the train, so we could stay a bit longer if you’re happy to. If we go today, it should work out okay with your tablets and injections.’ Nathan looked particularly wired, saying each sentence so fast it was almost impossible to keep up.

  ‘Have you had any sleep?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘I can kind of tell. Aren’t you exhausted?’

  ‘Anything but. Sorry if I’ve woken you up with too much enthusiasm. You must be tired. Do you think you’re up to doing anything?’

  Emma wasn’t quite awake enough to know how she was feeling. She normally saved judgement until she was at least standing. ‘It sounds wonderful. And as long as I don’t need to be ready in ten minutes then I should be okay.’ She started to tuck into her food. She wasn’t going to let it go cold when it might be another millennium until she was brought breakfast in bed again.

  The egg yolk was in a perfect oozy state, dribbling out as she dunked in a soldier. The sight only made her hungrier, so she figured she wasn’t harbouring a tummy bug in her state of not feeling right. ‘Did you make yourself some?’ Emma felt a bit self-conscious eating with someone watching.

  ‘Just for you and your mum. I ate some toast while I was waiting for the eggs to boil.’

  The thought that her mother was also enjoying this service made Emma smile. It also reminded her why she wasn’t able to just up and leave on random missions, even to see a puffin in the wild. ‘I can’t just leave. Someone needs to be here for her.’

  ‘I’ve talked to her about it. She has her carers coming in regularly now and she’s called someone to come and stay with her. They should arrive later today. She’s happy for us to go on the trip together. In fact, she’s encouraging it.’

  Emma chewed on a toasted soldier so as not to have to answer straight away. It was like she was being ganged up on, although it wasn’t exactly a punishment they were dishing out. It was her everlasting act. Perhaps that was why she wasn’t jumping for joy… She wasn’t ready for anything to be final yet.

  ‘Who’s coming to stay with Mum?’

  ‘Your brother.’

  ‘Really?’ It had been so long since James had done anything useful, she’d forgotten that he might be capable of such feats.

  ‘Really. I don’t think your mum gave him a choice. Are you going to come?’

  ‘I haven’t got any reason not to.’ It wasn’t exactly the full-on cheering that perhaps Nathan had been hoping for, but she wasn’t about to reel off excuses as to why she wasn’t able to go. She’d spent far too much of her life not living. She wasn’t going to miss out on an opportunity like this – especially when it was presented to her fully organised, without her having to lift a finger. ‘Let me eat breakfast and get dressed and I’ll come down to talk to Mum about it.’ She wanted to make sure her mother was happy for herself.

  Admittedly, it was rushed, and she knew that was the reason for her hesitation. Perhaps she was close to being in shock. Having breakfast in bed was revelation enough for one morning.

  Puffins were bound to bring about happiness, though. She had enough well-thumbed books which she’d read while daydreaming about the possibility. Freedom from her responsibilities would also do her some good. But for some reason there was a glossy film fogging her view and preventing her from being joyful about the whole thing, and she wasn’t able to fathom why that was.

  Some days it was harder than others to paste on a mask and pretend everything was okay. Today, not even warrior paint would cover over the cracks that life was providing.

  Thirty-Three

  Nathan

  Nathan tucked the dream diary away in his overnight bag. If anyone read it, they’d think he was losing his mind. He couldn’t be entirely sure he wasn’t, what with the lack of sleep. There wasn’t enough coffee in the world to sort him out at the moment.

  Emma was sleeping right now, the train’s movement lulling her into slumber. Nathan wished it would do the same to him. He’d never reached this level of overtiredness, to the point where he didn’t know what to do with himself. If it carried on, he’d have to ask the doctors for sleeping pills.

  What he wouldn’t do to be resting his head on Emma’s shoulder in a similar state of shut-eye. But, for whatever reason, his body wasn’t allowing him to rest, and he wasn’t about to risk waking her while she slept so peacefully. Plus, he probably shouldn’t get that close.

  With every train change, Nathan had to deal with the guilt of waking her, b
ut then she would fall asleep again on the next leg of the journey. It was clear this wasn’t just the result of traveller’s fatigue. Whatever hormone cocktail had entered her veins yesterday was clearly taking its toll.

  As they passed beautiful landscapes – horses in paddocks, wide rivers and fields beginning to blossom – he really hoped he’d done the right thing. He’d had this awful sense that there would never be another right time. For the first time, he was recognising that perhaps it wasn’t the healthiest way to go about life. Maybe if he’d waited a couple of days, Emma wouldn’t have been so tired and would have taken more of this in. And he was yet to see how she would cope over the next couple of days. He was going to have to take it hour by hour and let her rest as much as she needed.

  There was another reason why he was worried. There were certain things it was impossible to have an influence over, and there was no way he could change what season they were in. And the season meant there was every chance they wouldn’t even see a puffin.

  It was all very well chasing dreams, but it was never easy to accept they might not be there to be captured.

  But Nathan being Nathan, he vowed to do his best no matter what.

  Thirty-Four

  Emma

  If Emma had required tea to wake her that morning, now she needed some matchsticks to hold her eyes open. Every opportunity they got they were closed, and every time Nathan woke her, she was less sure of their location.

  Nathan was keeping her informed, but the facts went whistling off with the wind. The moment she had hold of a place name it had whipped away and they were somewhere else.

  ‘We’re nearly there. Only a few more stops.’

  Nathan shook Emma into some kind of consciousness for the umpteenth time, to get them off the train. She’d lost count of how many times she’d been woken. ‘Where are we?’ They might be returning to Timberley Drive for all she knew, rather than heading north-east, up and across the country towards Yorkshire.

  ‘We’ve made it to our final destination. We’re in Bempton. I’ll get us a taxi to the cottage. We’ll visit the RSPB Bempton Cliffs reserve tomorrow. It’s too late for us to travel there today.’

  Emma nodded. She really was being the worst company ever, but little had she known the effect one injection would have on her. At least she was only sleepy. Travelling would have been a whole different ball game if she was chucking her guts up.

  In the taxi, Emma rediscovered the ability to keep her eyes open. Bempton flashed by in a whizz of picturesque white houses and idyllic green pastures. They stopped at a place that was directly opposite a church and graveyard. It was late, but the scene was brought to life by a floodlight that cast shadows where she would rather there weren’t any.

  Nathan paid the taxi driver and Emma realised she hadn’t given him a penny yet. All of this – the train journey and the accommodation – must have been paid for already. ‘You need to let me know what I owe you for all this. This is my everlasting act, after all.’

  ‘Let’s not worry about that. We should get inside in the warm.’ Nathan started fiddling with what Emma recognised to be a key safe: a small box on the wall that required a code to be opened. There was one back at her own house so the carers had access to a key when they visited.

  Emma followed Nathan into the small cottage, which was deceptively large once inside. Despite being pretty much an open-plan bedsit, it was a really fancy one. The part that made it larger than it seemed was an extension that had perhaps been a pig shed at some point. It had no conventional windows and from the outside it didn’t appear to belong to the same building, but once inside it was the part that housed the bed area. The absence of normal windows was made up for by a skylight.

  The front door opened straight into a lounge which had an open kitchen. Emma ventured in, peering in cupboards and behind doors, getting familiar with the surroundings. There was one separate room that housed a shower and toilet. Peering outside, she saw that there was a perfectly formed courtyard. If it hadn’t been so cold, it would have been just right for sitting out to enjoy the evening sun. It was a magical little hideaway; Emma was sure she would never have found something quite so quaint and wonderful at such short notice. There were even books on the shelves, some of which she had at home, like a nod to it being exactly the kind of place she should stay.

  ‘Where did you find this place?’ she asked.

  ‘I found it on Airbnb. I thought you might like it.’

  ‘It’s gorgeous,’ Emma said, giving the place a once-over again.

  And before she’d even seen a puffin, Emma felt it happening – a smile spreading across her face. Like this was meant to be happening and she was meant to be here.

  There were just two things worrying her.

  First, she wasn’t ready to die anytime soon. The fact she’d listed this as her last act was making her nervous. There was no way she wanted that to be how it actually worked out.

  Second, there was only one bedroom. With one bed. It was going to be very hard not to overthink exactly what that meant. The only thing to do was to wait until bedtime…

  Thirty-Five

  Way before bedtime, Emma’s main concern was her mounting hunger. She couldn’t remember having food since breakfast, and travelling had taken the best part of eight hours. She’d slept through lunch as they’d trundled across the country on the train.

  ‘I’m starving. Is there any food about?’ she asked, deciding that it was a better idea to concentrate on things she did have a handle on.

  There was a tray in the kitchen with supplies for the usual beverages, and there were a couple of wrapped biscuits there, but they weren’t going to scratch the surface of her current appetite. She’d been the worst company for Nathan since the moment he’d woken her up that morning, and she didn’t want to add ‘hangry’ to the list of unlikeable qualities she’d been demonstrating.

  ‘There’s a fish and chip shop about a five-minute walk from here. I can wander down there and hope that it’s open. If not, there are a couple of takeaway places not far away that should deliver here.’

  ‘Did you really research all of this in one night?’ It was hard to believe only yesterday this hadn’t been on their agenda.

  Nathan shrugged. ‘Food is important. I wanted to make sure we weren’t too far out in the sticks, especially as we didn’t drive and couldn’t load up the boot with food on our way.’

  ‘Fish and chips it is then.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I’ll come with you. I could do with the fresh air to wake me up – I haven’t been this sleepy for a long time. And I can’t have you getting lost in a strange village.’

  It was an excuse to be with Nathan. She’d spent far too much of the day absent. She wished she had spent more time awake, not wanting to miss out on a single part of her adventure.

  It was strange to be somewhere so much more scenic than what she was used to at home. Here there were a pub and post office at the centre of the village, creating a cosy feel, with not much else apart from picture-perfect houses and stunning views across the rolling countryside. She knew that every town and village was different, each with its own little nuances, but so often she saw them in TV programmes or online or imagined them in the books she read. It was quaint to be in a place that had a noticeboard with leaflets about craft groups and upcoming fairs right in the middle of the street.

  It was strange walking with Nathan – side by side, not arm in arm. The natural ease that had once been between them seemed to have vanished into thin air.

  It was amazing how a three-centimetre gap was a chasm neither of them was able to cross. What made it harder was that Emma wasn’t sure if Nathan wanted her to. Even though they’d shared a kiss, there had been no mention of it since Nathan had woken up. Emma inched half a centimetre closer. She wanted to think of a question, something to get the conversation flowing without forging into awkward territory. ‘Have you come up with a name for your charity yet?’
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  ‘I’ve had a few ideas. Some of them sound a bit cheesy though. I thought about “Foxdale Flights”, but it sounds too like a new airline. I kind of need something that reflects its purpose.’

  They reached a crossroads and turned a corner. Up ahead was the neon sign of a chip shop. It really was only a five-minute walk away, if that. And the fact the sign was lit gave her much hope that soon they would have sustenance.

  ‘Right, what would you like to have?’ Nathan asked.

  One of everything off the menu seemed a little greedy, but Emma was so ravenous she’d have a good shot at seeing her way through the order. ‘My eyes might be bigger than my belly, but can I order fish and chips with a battered sausage on the side?’

  Perhaps one of the side effects of the injections would be becoming the size of a house. She was sure she would if her appetite was this shouty all the time, but the wafts of salt and vinegar along with frying fish were making it stronger. For now, she was going to put it down to the fact she was making up for missing out on a meal.

  Nathan was more reserved in his ordering and went for a steak and kidney pie and chips. They weren’t waiting long, as they were the only customers in the shop. Their food was wrapped up in paper and Emma appreciated the fact that at least the hormone injection wasn’t making her desire a pickled onion on the side.

  Once they were walking back, Emma made a conscious effort to close the gap and keep the conversation flowing.

  ‘What about calling it The Nathan Foxdale Trust?’

  ‘It certainly has a ring to it, but doesn’t that make it sound like I’ve gone already? Like it’s been set up in memory of me?’

  ‘I guess. And hopefully we’ll both be around once it’s officially set up.’ Emma really hoped so, and wished Nathan would start to believe it as well.