The Love We Left Behind

by Katherine Slee

  Pulling her boots back on, Niamh stood and headed towards town. She fully intended to spend the afternoon hidden in amongst the Bodleian bookcases, hoping that fate wouldn’t deal her any more sucker punches, at least for now.

  But that was exactly what it had done, smacking her right between the eyes when she opened Leo’s note. Although there was no way of knowing if it was even from him, given that he hadn’t signed his name.

  What if it was from Robin?

  The thought snuck its way into her mind, rewarding her with another jolt to the stomach. The only way he could have known where she lived would be if Leo had told him. Which, of course, he could have, given that she asked him to tell Robin about her need for the diary. But then why bring it to her himself, and only after it was too late to be of any use?

  She wouldn’t go. It was a disaster waiting to happen. No doubt she would turn up only to discover that it was, disappointingly, an invitation from Robin-the-repugnant. Or maybe Leo only wanted to meet in order to let her down gently? He would explain to her why he had nearly kissed her but actually never meant to, it was a heat-of-the-moment kind of thing and could they possibly pretend it had never happened?

  She definitely would not go.

  Why, then, had she returned to her room and was already searching through her wardrobe looking for the right outfit, one that could accommodate both a pint and a punt?

  ‘What are you so pleased about?’

  Niamh’s head whipped round at the sound of Duncan’s voice and she saw first his head peering round the doorframe, then the rest of him as he slunk into her bedroom.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said, but the smile in her voice was all too apparent. He stared at her, lips pursed, before touching one forefinger to his nose and pointing the other straight at her.

  ‘The boy with the amazing arse,’ he gasped. ‘Erika told me he’d paid you a visit. Does this mean what I think it means?’ He looked over at the pile of discarded clothes on her bed.

  ‘I’m not going.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘It’s a bad idea.’

  ‘You, my darling, deserve a little bit of excitement more than anyone.’ Duncan pushed her out of the way and began to rifle through her drawers. ‘Which is why we’re going to find you something that screams gorgeous, with just the right amount of sass.’

  ‘I figured it out,’ Leo said as he lifted the long wooden quant out of the river, allowing it to drift through the water then slip between his fingers until the prong found the muddy bed below.

  ‘Figured what out?’ Niamh was sitting on a faux leather seat by the till, facing towards him. She had taken off her boots and was trailing one hand through the water.

  ‘The song,’ Leo replied, easing the quant out to the left and sending the punt round a sharp corner. He had to duck out of the way of a willow tree then manoeuvre the quant round to the other side of the punt. This gave Niamh another opportunity to stare at him without being caught.

  He was standing barefoot at the back of the boat (apparently only Cambridge students punted from the platform behind where she was sitting – who knew punting was such a particular type of boating experience?). Both his trousers and the sleeves of his jumper were rolled up. He was clean-shaven, his hair was carefully coiffed away from his face and she could just make out a thin, golden chain around his neck.

  But it was something else that caught her eye – the second toe on each of his feet was longer than the big one. It would have been an inconsequential kind of thing if it weren’t for the fact Erika shared the same physical trait. She had taken great delight in telling Niamh that all Rubenesque paintings depicted gods and angels with longer second toes, which clearly meant that she, in turn, was from heaven itself. Niamh smiled as she wondered what Erika would think about the idea of Leo being carved from the same stone.

  ‘I had to call my mum and ask her.’ Leo darted a look at Niamh, then back to the river ahead. ‘But I remember it now. It’s the one from Formula One.’

  What he didn’t admit was that he’d called his mum and announced he’d met the girl he was going to marry. Nor did he tell Niamh of the way his mother’s voice had gone up by at least an octave as she began to barrage him with questions, most of which he had been unable to answer. The one thing he could tell her was that she looked just like the female singer from the band his mum was always listening to.

  ‘Debbie Harry?’ she had asked.

  ‘No, Mum, the one who dressed like a cross between a hippy and a witch.’

  ‘Stevie Nicks!’ His mum had practically shouted the name, making Leo laugh. There had followed a slight swerve in the conversation as she regaled him with details of the one time she had seen Fleetwood Mac in concert. The call ended with him having to promise that yes, he would introduce them the next time his parents were in town.

  Of course, that depended on him not screwing up this date, which was entirely possible given how completely inadequate Niamh always made him feel.

  ‘You told your mum about me?’

  Leo stumbled a little as Niamh brought him back to the here and now. He leant back on the quant and tried to style it out as he met her gaze.

  ‘Is that a problem?’

  ‘No,’ she said, but the frown on her face told him otherwise.

  ‘Does your mum listen to Fleetwood Mac too?’

  She looked at him, then took off her hat and ruffled her hair.

  ‘How come you’re studying law?’ The change of subject was sudden and deliberate, and Leo mentally punched himself for having annoyed her so early on.

  ‘My dad’s a lawyer.’ He looked away from her and cleared his throat. Family history wasn’t supposed to be on the list of first-date questions, but somehow he’d stumbled down a path from which there seemed to be no return.

  ‘So?’

  It was an innocent enough response, but he could tell she understood more than she was letting on. After all, how was he supposed to explain that his dad wasn’t exactly the sort of person it was possible to say no to? Did he really want to tell her all about growing up as the youngest in a family of over-achievers?

  She had touched a nerve, that much was obvious. It made her both sad and a little triumphant, because he had pressed down on a part of her past that she had no desire to share. Or did she? There was a certain vulnerability to him that she hadn’t expected, and it was clear that he got on better with his mum than his dad. She wanted to know why, but was also afraid of how much she would have to reveal about herself in return for an honest answer.

  ‘I wanted to go to film school, but he said it was a waste of time.’

  Niamh thought back to the towers of VHS cassettes in Leo’s room, the film posters on the wall that she had glanced at but not really seen, along with a pile of Empire magazines.

  ‘Bit of a leap from film school to Oxford.’

  ‘Everyone else in my family came here.’

  ‘Define “everyone”.’

  ‘Well, apart from my eldest sister. She went to UCL and is now a top-notch surgeon at King’s.’ He caught the element of sarcasm in his voice, as was his tendency whenever he spoke about his perfect sibling and all her judgements about him.

  ‘How many sisters do you have?’

  ‘Two. And three brothers.’

  ‘Jesus, there are six of you?’ She laughed, and he grinned at her in return.

  ‘You say that like it’s a bad thing?’ Which at times it was. The chaos of a large family, the lack of privacy, the pressure of being the youngest and living up to all those different levels of expectation could be suffocating.

  He wanted to tell her; more than that, he wanted to take her back, show her what it was like to be him growing up. In turn, he wished he could go back in time with her, see her as a small child and ask her how she had experienced the world. All those years when they were strangers seemed a waste. The whole thing was ridiculous, but he couldn’t shake the idea that everything he had been through, each and every tiny moment
of his life, had brought him to her.

  ‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ Niamh said, lifting her hand clear of the water and watching as droplets fell from her fingertips and back into the river. ‘I’m just surprised, is all.’

  And jealous, supremely jealous of the fact he had such a large family. No doubt they lived in a mansion high up on a hill somewhere, the rooms always filled with music and laughter and the sound of all those memories clicking together to create the picture-perfect life.

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘What about me?’

  She answered too quickly and he should have known better than to pry, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted to ask so much more, but was equally afraid of pushing her away before anything had even begun.

  ‘Brothers or sisters?’

  ‘Not that I know of.’ It was a stupid reply, laced with so much suggestion that she wished she could take it back.

  She could tell he wasn’t prying though, even if she didn’t like all the questions he kept asking. He was being nice, more than nice, so why was she acting like such a miserable cow? He’d told his mum about her, for God’s sake; surely that meant he liked her?

  ‘Here’s a question,’ he said, the tip of his tongue grasped between his lips as he steered them away from another punt coming towards them, then came to a stop next to the riverbank.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Book or film?’ He took hold of both the tow rope and a small canvas rucksack, then leapt ashore. Niamh, meanwhile, got to her feet then promptly sat back down again as the punt pitched her from side to side.

  ‘Depends on the book.’ She shook her head as he offered his hand, then stood up slowly with both arms outstretched.

  He watched as she shuffled along the punt, pausing every so often when her balance threatened to tip her overboard. He had to stop himself from laughing at the look of total annoyance on her face, but secretly hoped she might fall in, just so he could wade in to rescue her.

  ‘Give me one example of a book that’s better than the film.’

  ‘Easy’ – Niamh placed one foot on the bank, wobbled, then pitched forward to land on all fours – ‘Little Women.’

  ‘Little Women is your favourite book?’

  She brushed off the grass cuttings from her jeans, breathing in the scent of it, along with mud, mossy water and every now and then something clean and sharp and coming straight from him. It was disturbing her thoughts and making it so very difficult to concentrate on anything other than the memory of how she had felt when he almost kissed her.

  ‘I never said that.’

  ‘Didn’t have to,’ he said with a grin and she punched him lightly on the arm.

  ‘Lolita,’ she countered, ignoring the way he was still looking at her.

  ‘No way. That was Kubrick’s defining moment.’

  ‘But the film wouldn’t exist unless Nabokov had written the story.’

  ‘True,’ he said, setting down the rucksack and undoing the straps. ‘But how can you argue that what’s on the page is more powerful than on the screen?’

  ‘Easy.’ She saw him take out two bottles of Guinness, some plastic glasses and a packet of chocolate Hobnobs. ‘You create your own film inside your head. Silence of the Lambs was way more terrifying when I was imagining it for myself than when I finally saw it on video.’

  ‘Bollocks. Hannibal Lecter is one of the most iconic film characters of all time.’

  ‘And yet first he was simply a character in a book.’

  He went as if to say something, then narrowed his eyes at her and passed over one of the bottles. He waited for her to take a sip, watching how her lips curled around the rim, and then the sight of her tongue darting out to lick the corner of her mouth.

  She saw him shift his weight, noticed the way he tried to surreptitiously adjust the waistband of his jeans and it made her want to reach out and slip her fingers underneath, to feel the warmth of his skin. But there was this irritating voice inside her head, one that sounded decidedly like Erika, warning her to be careful, that if she rolled over too quickly then all that would happen was the boy in question would lose interest and move on to his next target.

  ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’ Leo raised his own bottle as he spoke.

  ‘Never seen it.’

  ‘Tell me you’re joking.’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Fine. Tomorrow night. My place.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why not?’ He felt the Guinness catch in his throat and tried not to gag on it.

  ‘I’ve an essay due first thing Thursday.’

  ‘But you had a tutorial on Monday.’

  ‘I did. And I have another on Thursday.’

  ‘Right.’ What an idiot to think that she was interested.

  He was aware of her leaning forward and the very edge of her arm brushed his when she reached for another biscuit.

  So many emotions were running through her, tossing her resolve all over the place and she wished she could peer inside his mind, find out exactly what it was he was thinking and whether it was anywhere close to being the same as her. Another voice, this one belonging to Duncan, whispered in her mind about taking a chance, and so she decided to do something that normally she’d never have the courage for.

  ‘I could meet you afterwards though.’ It was just a few words, but so heavy with the possibility of both happiness and regret. She held her breath, waiting for his response.

  His head shot up and she saw the way his face folded into a completely different shape from how it had been only a moment before.

  ‘You could?’

  ‘I could.’ Jesus, it was terrifying being so close to him and there it was again, that feeling of being out of control. The knowledge that she would remember this moment for the rest of her life, look back on it as the barometer for everything that was still to come, like the ultimate test for which she had no way to prepare.

  Leo was overcome by the sense of the inevitable. Was this then all that life contained? A series of fractured moments that individually meant nothing at all, but when you looked back made perfect sense?

  He put down his bottle then hesitated, but only for a fraction of time. He wanted to take a picture of that very second, to never forget the way she looked in the instant before he kissed her. So that he might bring it out again whenever he wanted and remember.

  He was so close that she could see her own reflection in his eyes. She could feel his pulse through the thin cotton of her t-shirt as he reached under her jacket and around her waist, her own pulse quickening as soon as he touched her.

  The kiss was slow, hesitant and gentle. But the force with which her body responded was at complete odds to anything she had ever felt before. It was like a million tiny ants were running up and down her spine, along her legs, in through her belly button and then swirling around inside her.

  As his mouth met hers, all other thoughts, all of his fears, were replaced by a deep sense of longing. It began on his lips, darted over his tongue and all the way down to his groin, then it shot back up to vibrate inside his brain.

  It felt like the most perfect part of his life that had ever been, and perhaps ever would be, and all he could think about was that she was the only thing in the entire world that mattered.

  ERIKA

  SMALL GLASS PERFUME BOTTLE

  London, 2007

  The restaurant is crowded, filled to the rafters with pre-Christmas revellers caught up in the festive spirit. The décor is supposed to be French bistro, but all the twinkling lights, fake snow and cheesy Christmas tunes are making it feel brash and clichéd.

  The seats are made of red faux suede, the leg of the nearest table is propped up with a folded piece of paper and the lighting is courtesy of candles stuck into empty wine bottles. All of which is making me feel decidedly overdressed in my belted white dress and Chanel handbag.

  As I raise my glass, all the bracelets around my wrist jangle in annoyance. Just the one
, I tell myself as I scan the menu in search of something that’s not laden with calories or carbs. It’s only a couple of weeks until I’m supposed to be lying on a beach in the Caribbean and I don’t have the time to run off any extra pounds.

  Everything needs to be tied up before I leave on Boxing Day, but the Finnish deal is proving troublesome, not least due to the CFO who seems to be fashioning himself on the Grinch. As is so often the case when I’m met with such a ridiculous example of an alpha male, I can’t help but suspect that it’s all for show, because I’m a woman. I hoped that by this stage in my career the misogyny would stop. If anything, it seems to be getting worse. Even back when we pitched for the deal, one of the first questions the CFO asked me was whether or not I was married. I mean, seriously, would it offer him reassurances if I had a husband at home to keep me in check?

  ‘Erika?’

  I look up to see one of the juniors staring at me, eyebrows raised and holding a bottle of champagne aloft.

  ‘Can I tempt you?’

  ‘I’m good, thanks.’ I take another sip of wine and decide that I am going to need more than one glass to get me through the evening.

  ‘Sure?’ he says, reaching across the bar for my hand and rubbing his thumb over my knuckles as he gazes adoringly into my eyes.

  I really don’t have time to do the whole dating thing right now, especially not with someone who is so fresh out of university that he probably still eats Pot Noodle and has an Xbox in his bedroom. I extricate my hand from his, sighing with relief as my phone begins to vibrate. I peer at the screen, then grab my coat from the back of my chair because she hardly ever calls me this late.

  ‘Back in a sec.’ I toss the words over my shoulder, weaving through the tables and out to the street. It’s raining, which is just perfect because my coat’s going to get ruined, but the call is from the one person I promised never to ignore.

  ‘Layla?’ I can hear her crying on the other end of the line. ‘What’s wrong?’