The Life We Almost Had

by Amelia Henley

  The screen of my phone lit up with a photo of Anna. She was on the beach in the turquoise dress she’d worn on our last night in Alircia. She looked so beautiful my heart ached.

  I rejected the call.

  ‘She’ll try me next,’ Josh said and seconds later his phone began to ring. He read my face, pressing the decline button on his screen. It wasn’t fair. I’d been avoiding speaking to Anna for days and she was worried. She knew something was wrong. I’d fired off the odd text, I’m okay. Sorry busy will call you soon. Low battery, but they were bullshit and she probably knew it.

  The truth was that since I’d had the offer of a new job, I’d been avoiding her.

  It wasn’t like I’d sought it out. The CEO of the agency stopped by my desk for a chat. We were discussing football over a coffee when he casually dropped into conversation that he was looking for a travel consultant.

  ‘You never did go off and see the world, did you, Adam?’

  ‘Nah but there’s still time.’

  ‘What if the time is now?’

  He’d offered me the job there and then.

  ‘You’d be creating bespoke packages for corporate clients and the wealthy. It’s not too dissimilar to what you do now but on a larger, more expensive scale, but you have to know the resorts inside out. Some will want five-star luxury but others something a little more bespoke. I want you to set it up, scout out locations. Take as long as you need to source suitable accommodation, from high-class hotels to yurts off the beaten path.’ He paused and waited for my reaction.

  ‘I… I’m flattered you thought of me but—’

  ‘No buts. You’d be perfect. You’re an intelligent graduate who loves travel.’

  I loved Anna too but I didn’t mention her.

  ‘This is a chance in a lifetime.’ He clapped my shoulder. ‘Think about it but don’t take too long.’

  I had thought of nothing else. My dream was being handed to me with a great big fucking bow wrapped around it. What kind of fool would I be to turn it down?

  I talked it over with Josh, his parents. I talked it over with everyone except the one person I should have been talking to – Anna – but now I was ready. I was ready to try something new and brave and daring.

  I raised my hand to check my watch before remembering that I didn’t have it anymore. My wrist was bare.

  ‘It’s eleven,’ Josh told me.

  ‘I… I’d better get going.’

  ‘Are you sure you shouldn’t tell Anna that you’re coming?’

  ‘No.’ If I spoke to her she’d guess something was wrong and this wasn’t a conversation we could have over the phone.

  ‘You’re doing the right thing.’ Josh gave my shoulder one last clap.

  As I drove up the motorway I wondered if she’d understand how much this meant to me.

  I wondered if she’d love me still.

  I wondered if she’d cry.

  Chapter Eleven

  Anna

  Usually I loved spending time with my nan but today my mind was somewhere else. With someone else.

  ‘If you need to go and be with that young man of yours…’ Nan smiled kindly. Behind me I could sense Mum shaking her head in a don’t-mention-Adam way.

  ‘I’m not seeing him this weekend, Nan.’ I wasn’t sure if I’d ever see him again.

  ‘You’ll see him soon enough,’ Mum said briskly. She was trying to cheer me up but it still felt dismissive. ‘I’m going to make some sandwiches.’ She disappeared into the kitchen.

  ‘If you’ve had a falling-out with Adam, sort it out. Life’s too short.’ Nan’s eyes misted and I knew she was thinking of Grandad. It had been years since he had died but she still missed him. We all did. There was a pause while we were both lost in our own thoughts, gazing out at the garden, which was a riot of spring colour. Nan was looking directly at the tangle of yellow and pink flowers that fought for space in her pots, but from the expression on her face I knew she was only seeing her past. I wanted her to share that with me.

  ‘Nan?’ I tucked my legs under me on the sofa. ‘If you’d known how much it hurt to be without Grandad, would you still have fallen in love with him?’

  ‘Anna, you can’t choose who you fall in love with. I knew that very first night we met that I’d spend the rest of my life with him.’

  ‘Tell me again about your first meeting.’

  ‘You’re not testing my memory, are you?’ Nan narrowed her eyes. ‘Because despite what that doctor who doesn’t look old enough to have left school says, there’s nothing wrong with me.’

  ‘I just like hearing it.’ I was a hopeless romantic although I was feeling more hopeless than anything else, glancing at my phone again. Nothing.

  ‘I was a waitress and Grandad came in for his lunch. I served him faggots and gravy and he asked what time my shift ended. It had only just begun and so he sat there drinking coffee for five hours, waiting for me. At dead on five when I’d finished, he walked over to the jukebox and put on Elvis’s ‘Love me Tender’ and asked me to dance. It wasn’t the place for dancing, but we did, in between the tables, my boss glaring at me. Before the song had finished, I had fallen head over heels for your grandad.’

  Listening to their story always made me emotional but today, more than ever, I felt Nan’s hope, her joy, her certainty. I felt it all in the way I had with Adam at the airport. How had we gone so wrong? I wiped my eyes.

  ‘Anna. If it’s meant to be, it will be,’ Nan said.

  ‘Here we go.’ Mum set a tray down on the coffee table, a plate piled with egg sandwiches. The smell made my stomach roll. Out of politeness rather than hunger, I picked one up and nibbled at the crust but I couldn’t eat it. My stomach was filled with an anxious sick feeling every time I thought about Adam, which was pretty much all of the time.

  ‘I’m not hungry.’ I stood. ‘I’ll go and change your sheets, Nan.’

  ‘You’re a good girl, Anna. I hope Adam realizes how lucky he is.’

  I turned away quickly before she could read me. Adam probably felt many things but was lucky one of them? I just didn’t know.

  ‘Shall we pick up a takeaway on the way home?’ It was almost six by the time we left Nan’s; she was eating with Mrs Percival, the widow from next door. I wasn’t really hungry but we still had to eat. Crispy battered cod and chips doused with salt and vinegar might bring a smidgeon of comfort.

  ‘Let’s not think about food yet,’ Mum said.

  ‘But it’s nearly dinner—’

  ‘I said let’s wait and see.’

  It wasn’t like Mum to snap but I couldn’t imagine how she felt seeing my nan slowly begin to slip away from her, knowing that from here on in, it would only get worse. I glanced at her profile as she drove. Her jaw set. Fingers gripping the wheel tightly.

  ‘Nan was good today, don’t you think?’ There hasn’t yet been a time that she hasn’t known me or Mum. Sometimes it was hard to believe there was anything wrong with her.

  ‘She was. I often think the doctor’s got it wrong. We all get forgetful, don’t we? Walk into a room to find we’ve no idea what we went in there for. Am I kidding myself, Anna? She seems fine, doesn’t she? Mostly.’ Her question drips with a desperation that makes my heart hurt.

  ‘She does, but if there comes a time she isn’t… fine… then we’ll be there for her. You and me.’

  ‘I do the best I can for both of you.’ Mum’s voice was quiet.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Even if it might not seem that way. I do what I think is right.’

  ‘Mum. Everything you do is right. Please try not to worry.’ There had been a shift in our relationship ever since we lost Dad. Often I was the one to offer reassurances. Advice. I was the daughter, the parent, the friend, the adult and the child. Everything.

  We pulled up outside the house. I started to climb out of the car.

  ‘Wait.’ Mum gripped my arm. ‘I’ve left my mobile at Nan’s.’

  ‘Do you have to fetch it t
onight?’ It was a silly question. Nan might need her. Call her. I began to tug the seatbelt back across my body.

  ‘No point you coming with me,’ Mum said. ‘Go in and have a bath or something.’

  ‘It’s okay. I’ll keep you company.’

  ‘No, Anna.’ That sharp tone again. She couldn’t look me in the eye. ‘Go inside.’

  Worried, I did as I was told, clearly the child again, trying not to read too much into it. We all needed space sometimes but it felt like everyone needed space from me right now: Mum, Adam.

  I slipped my key into the lock and pushed open the front door. The hallway smelled of garlic and I cast my mind back to last night, trying to remember what we’d eaten. Mentally scanning the contents of the fridge, wondering if I could pull together some sort of meal before Mum came home. Exhausted, I kicked off my shoes and padded barefoot into the kitchen.

  And there he was.

  Adam.

  Candles flickering on the table. A vase of pale pink roses set between Mum’s best china plates.

  He stepped towards me and I took a step backwards. He’d ignored me for days and now… this. Whatever this was.

  ‘I don’t… I… How did you…’ I licked my dry lips. I’d lost the fundamental ability to speak.

  ‘Your mum left me a key.’ He wiped his hands down the front of his apron. He seemed nervous.

  ‘She’ll be back in a minute.’ My eyes scanned the two placemats.

  ‘No, she won’t. She’s staying at your nan’s tonight.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To give us time. To talk. I’ve made paella. I measured out the rice and everything. I’m afraid it’s lemon meringue pie for dessert though. Limoncello and plum tart was a bit beyond my limited capability.’ He flashed a smile but I didn’t return it. He’d hurt me and I felt betrayed by both him and Mum, going behind my back like this.

  He pulled out a chair, its legs scraping against the kitchen floor, and gestured at me to sit. I sank heavily onto its wooden seat, automatically taking a drink from the glass he pushed into my hand. Sangria, of course. I set it down and filled a glass with water instead.

  Wordlessly he served up the food. Vibrant yellow rice and pale pink prawns. I took a mouthful but it stuck in my throat along with all the questions I wanted to ask. I set down my fork and he did the same.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

  My chest tightened. What was he sorry for? Ignoring me? Or something else. There had to be a reason he’d been rejecting my calls. He spoke.

  ‘I can’t keep doing this. This travelling back and forth. Snatching time when we can. The lack of our own space.’

  I’d been expecting something like this. Steeling myself for it, but that didn’t make it any less painful.

  ‘I’ve been offered a job. A travel consultant. I’d be travelling for months initially, but after that I’d be away regularly. There’s a decent salary. All expenses paid.’

  There was so much I could have said, but I couldn’t say any of it. If I talked, I would cry and I didn’t want to cry. I didn’t want to ruin this for him. This was Adam’s dream and I needed to support it, support him, even if I wasn’t sure if this meal was a ‘goodbye’ or a ‘will you wait for me’.

  ‘It wasn’t a decision I took lightly. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you but…’

  I nodded that I understood. His eyes met mine and his were full of tears too. This wasn’t easy for him either.

  ‘I turned it down,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Why?’ My voice was a whisper.

  ‘Because travel was my dream but sometimes we have different dreams and now, Anna, it’s you. You’re all I ever wanted. Do want.’

  ‘But you said… you can’t do this anymore.’

  ‘No.’ He rose from his chair and walked to me. Crouched down and took my hand between his. ‘I don’t want a long-distance relationship anymore, Anna. I want your face to be the last thing I see before I go to sleep at night. Your voice to be the last thing I hear. I want you. Properly.’ He dropped one knee to the floor and before he had even pulled a ring out of his pocket, I was crying.

  ‘Anna Adlington, will you do me the greatest honour of becoming my wife?’

  Perhaps if I could have frozen one perfect moment in time, it would have been that.

  ‘Yes.’ I launched myself into his arms and he fell backwards. ‘Yes!’ I covered his face in kisses. His hands were in my hair, his lips found mine. My fingers fumbled to undo his belt as he unzipped my dress. It was a good job Mum wasn’t coming home.

  Later, upstairs, I snuggled under my quilt, raising my hand and splaying my fingers, smiling as the small diamond on my ring finger glinted under the lamplight.

  ‘Here.’ Adam passed me a plate of lemon meringue pie and climbed into bed beside me. ‘I’m afraid it’s cold, future Mrs Curtis.’

  ‘That’s okay. You’re pretty hot, future husband.’

  I took a bite but I still didn’t have much of an appetite. I thought about the way my period was late. The sickness I felt. Adam and me hadn’t talked about having children, a family of our own. Our long-distance relationship had been so draining we hadn’t looked properly towards the future.

  I stole a glance at him as he forked a slab of pie into his mouth. I hadn’t taken a test yet. Should I say anything?

  If I was pregnant, he would be happy, wouldn’t he?

  Chapter Twelve

  Adam

  When I proposed to Anna that night, I didn’t expect that six months later we’d be actually getting married, but then I hadn’t expected her to tell me she thought that she was pregnant.

  ‘Please say something,’ she had urged as she’d twisted the corner of the duvet cover round and round her finger.

  ‘I… I…’ It’s the best news I’ve ever received. We’re going to be better at this than my parents. I’m going to love you forever, but ‘Holy fuck,’ was all I actually managed to say.

  ‘Adam!’

  ‘Sorry, it’s… brilliant, Anna. Really. Brilliant.’ I hadn’t realized just how happy the thought of being a dad made me until the following day when we bought a test from Boots, giggling like teenagers, before finding out it was a false alarm.

  ‘Oh.’ Anna couldn’t keep the disappointment from her voice. ‘It must have been stress that was making me feel sick and messing up my cycle.’

  I had hugged her closely to me, feeling like a heel. The worry of me going AWOL had caused this. But later we had talked. Properly talked. We now knew undoubtedly that we wanted children.

  ‘We should get married first,’ Anna said.

  ‘The sooner the better. This year.’

  So a winter wedding it was. Initially we had worried about possible snow and ice but then British summers are never predictable. You can’t book the sunshine and I didn’t need it to be perfect – I was marrying the perfect woman and everything else came second to that.

  ‘Nervous?’ Josh handed me a can of Fosters. It was only ten o’clock in the morning but I couldn’t resist cracking it open. There were a few hours to kill until we had to be at the church.

  ‘Yeah. A bit. It’s mad, isn’t it, how much has changed.’

  ‘Totally. Who’d have thought one holiday would lead to this.’ Josh gestured around his new flat.

  ‘You don’t regret moving?’ Me and Anna had bought a two-bedroom starter house near to her mum. Josh had stayed in our old place for a few weeks but then decided to move up north too.

  ‘Nah, I was ready for a change of scene and you might be a twat but…’ He took a swig of his lager. ‘Someone has to look out for you. I am the best man.’ He adjusted his cravat.

  ‘That doesn’t mean you get to cop off with the chief bridesmaid.’ Despite his best efforts, Nell had, so far, continued to resist his charms.

  ‘One kiss. If she’d kiss me just once, I’d die a happy man.’

  ‘She’d eat you alive.’

  ‘Probably. How about you? Any regrets?’

  ‘I
don’t…’ I trailed off.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean? Anna’s happy?’

  ‘She’s been weird the past few days. Really weird. She was so excited about the wedding but now she keeps crying when she thinks I’m not around. Every time I’ve tried to talk to her about today, she’s clammed up.’

  ‘You think she’s realized you’re a twat and she’s going to do a runner?’

  ‘Don’t even joke about it.’

  ‘Mate, it’ll just be nerves. Anna loves you, God knows why, but—’

  The ringing of my mobile cut him off. I answered it. Listened. My stomach churning as I took in the news.

  Bad news.

  The worst.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Anna

  It didn’t matter that my dress was creasing, my eye make-up running. I curled on my bed, listening to Adam’s heartbreak at the other end of the phone.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said again. It didn’t seem enough. It wasn’t enough.

  At last we said goodbye and I stood, slowly smoothing down the crinkled fabric of my gown. Catching sight of my reflection, my sad eyes staring back at me, and I turned away from them, heading downstairs to break the news to Nell and Mum.

  ‘Hey!’ Nell glanced up from her laptop screen. She and Mum were trying to recreate the wedding crown made of flowers that had looked so easy on YouTube. I’d wanted the complete boho-beach-babe look. A nod to where we’d fallen in love. My dress was cream, the colour of ocean spray, loose and floaty. Instead of heels I wore sandals, my toenails painted as golden as sand.

  ‘Christ, Anna. This is impossible,’ Nell said. ‘There’s only two hours until we have to be at the church. Are you sure you don’t want me to nip to Claire’s Accessories and pick you up a tiara?’

  I didn’t answer.

  ‘Anna? Are you okay?’ Mum asked.