Before We Fall

by Grace Lowrie

  ‘Bay! Here you are! What the hell are you doing up here? It’s bloody freezing.’

  Shifting slightly to look over my shoulder I recognised Tom approaching me across the roof, dressed in his delivery uniform, a package under one arm. ‘How did you get in?’

  ‘The door to the street wasn’t shut properly – lucky it’s only me.’

  Shrugging, I knocked back vodka, savouring the burn.

  ‘I tried your door and then Cally’s and then I noticed the cold draft coming from up here…’

  The mere mention of her name made me wince.

  ‘Great view,’ Tom said, gingerly lowering himself to the roof edge beside me.

  Once he was seated he crossed his arms for warmth and gazed around, casually swinging his feet back and forth above the void below, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Couldn’t a guy contemplate suicide in peace?

  ‘Where is Cally tonight anyway?’ he said turning to me.

  My hand automatically strayed to my chest as if I’d been stabbed. ‘She’s gone.’

  ‘Gone wh—’

  ‘I don’t know where, she’s just fucked off!’ I snapped.

  ‘OK… and you’re sitting up here getting wasted because…?’

  I looked at him, incredulous. ‘Isn’t it obvious? Because she’s calling me. She’s down there calling to me, can’t you hear it?’

  ‘Who, Cally?’

  ‘No! Not fucking Cally – Vesper. This is where she did it, she jumped from here and that’s where I found her; down there; impaled in the trees, blood everywhere…’

  Tom looked uncharacteristically solemn as he looked at me. ‘Vesper’s not down there, Bay, and she’s definitely not calling you.’

  ‘I drove her to it.’

  Tom shook his head. ‘You’re not to blame for her death. I don’t know what happened between you two; why you fell out or whatever, but Vesper… she’d suffered with depression all her life. She’d done it before – tried to do it in all sorts of different ways – before you even knew her. Each time she somehow sweet-talked the hospital into discharging her, but she never stuck to her follow-up appointments, or her medication. I think it was only ever a matter of time before she succeeded.’

  ‘She’d tried before…?’

  ‘Yeah – you remember all those leather cuffs and bracelets she always wore on her wrists? That was to hide the scars. She’d tried other ways, too…’ Tom shook his head to dispel the memories.

  This new information stunned me into silence. How had I not known that Vesper suffered with depression? Why had no-one ever mentioned it? If I’d known I could have been so much more careful. Covering my eyes with my hand I groaned.

  ‘Look, what I’m trying to say is, Vesper wouldn’t want you to throw yourself off this building – she loved you. And I’m pretty sure Cally does too, man.’

  I sighed heavily, exhausted from the sheer weight of guilt on my back. ‘No.’

  ‘Yes. Seriously man, tell me you’re not going to let a woman like that get away?’

  ‘Don’t you think she’s better off without a bastard like me?’

  ‘First off; you’re not half as bad ass as you like to think you are…’

  I glared at him and he laughed, holding his hands up in mock surrender.

  ‘Don’t push me off, OK, I could be wrong, but you’ve been a good friend to me over the years; sticking up for me with Dad, bailing me out when I got arrested… and you’ve got to admit, getting us that record deal was pretty amazing…’

  Shaking my head I gazed out towards the horizon. ‘I just had the right contacts, you guys did all the work.’

  ‘Whatever; my point is, you’re not all bad, OK? And secondly; Cally’s crazy about you – I saw that for myself up close and personal – you can’t fake passion like that.’ An image of the two of them together reared up in my head, making me grimace. Tom rushed on. ‘What I mean is, the woman clearly loves you, but maybe she isn’t sure you feel the same? Maybe she’s just testing you – maybe she hoped you’d fight for her – after all it’s not like the great Bay Madderson to walk away from a fight is it?’

  ‘For fuck’s sake,’ I muttered. ‘She knows how I feel – I told her and it didn’t make any difference – she still left.’

  ‘So then track her down and show her, and then if she still won’t take you back, well, at least you tried, right?’

  ‘Mmm… maybe,’ I lifted the bottle to my lips again. Tom put a hand out to stop me and then quickly withdrew it when I glared at him.

  ‘You might want to sober up and let that crap clear your system before you go after her – you stink.’

  ‘Clear off you little shit.’ I rounded on him and he laughed, carefully shuffling backwards, away from the roof edge.

  But I didn’t take another drink. The kid was right; I never gave up this easily when I wanted something; I was stubborn to a fault and too selfish to be a martyr. Why not find her and show her I was serious – give her one last chance to reject me again? After all, it couldn’t possibly hurt any worse than it already did.

  Tom followed me through the fire exit and back down to the warm, dry emptiness of the floor below. Without Cally it no longer felt like home. While Tom roughly dried his hair with a towel and complained about the damp seat of his trousers, I signed for the parcel of pigment he’d brought and filled the kettle. He clocked the battered state of my knuckles but wisely refrained from commenting.

  ‘So, how are you going to find her?’ he asked cheerfully, steaming mug of coffee in hand and eyes bright with excitement.

  ‘Good question,’ I grunted.

  Chapter Fifty-seven

  It was peculiar being back in Wildham. Everything looked exactly the same; the green verges, clipped hedges and tidy front gardens; all so very welcoming and familiar, but shrunken somehow; as if I was viewing it from a distance. The sensation made me feel dizzy. Head down, hair flying, and a rucksack on my back, I walked quickly across town from the train station, dragging my suitcase behind me.

  Reaching the town square I started to feel faint and perched on a bench to catch my breath. The seat was damp with drizzle. People of all ages mooched in and out between the shops, many of them wearing brightly-coloured waterproof jackets, or clutching umbrellas and pausing to greet one another, regardless of the weather. I’d missed Wildham so much – had been looking forward to seeing it again – but now that I was here I couldn’t summon any feelings of joy or relief, only grief.

  ‘Cally!’ a familiar voice called out to me through the rain. ‘You’re back!’ Silently I berated myself for stopping to rest; of all the people I could have bumped into…

  ‘Hey, Liam,’ I said, squinting up at him. ‘I’m just visiting, actually – Marguerite…’ I hadn’t yet thought up a plausible excuse for being here and my sentence tailed off.

  Glancing down at the suitcase at my feet, my ex looked unconvinced. ‘Don’t you see enough of her in London?’

  I smiled and looked down at my hands, at a loss for more lies. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Good thanks – busy. How about you? Are you feeling OK? You look a little…’

  ‘I’m great! Really. I’m really good,’ I forced a smile, my cheeks straining, my teeth gritted together holding back everything I was keeping from him.

  He stared at me for a long moment and then shook his head. ‘Take care, Cally,’ he muttered as he walked away.

  It was after two when I reached Marguerite’s one-bed flat above the card shop. I hadn’t really expected her to be home on a Saturday afternoon, but she was, and I all but collapsed in her hallway as she greeted me with surprise.

  The time had come and I told her everything – about the doctor’s diagnosis at the hospital, about my reasons for running away, about all the fun I’d been having over the past six months, and about Bay. It was strange to finally admit it; how he made me feel; how hard I’d fallen for him and how devastating it was to leave him behind. My words poured out in an almighty torrent, as
if they couldn’t wait to leave my ailing body, punctuated only by occasional hugs and endless cups of tea.

  Marguerite took my news surprisingly well under the circumstances. She was upset, obviously, and chastised me for not confiding in her sooner; I’d “handled it all appallingly badly” in her opinion. But in due course my steadfast best friend insisted that I must stay with her and declared that “everything will be OK”. True or not, it was exactly what I wanted to hear.

  Now I was hunched over her coffee table in the early hours of Sunday morning, trying to compose a letter. I’d been listening to Lana Del Rey’s ‘Summertime Sadness’ through headphones for hours and I was exhausted, but couldn’t sleep. My body clock was a complete mess – I’d grown used to being up all night and sleeping during the day like a bat, or more accurately, like Bay. The camp bed Marguerite had kindly set up for me in her bedroom was narrow and uncomfortable – not to mention that she snored like a sow with blocked sinuses. But honestly I had too much on my mind to sleep.

  My doctor, relieved to hear from me at last, had pulled some strings and got me booked in for urgent tests, first thing Monday morning. He wanted to assess the spread of the disease so that treatment could finally begin. The next few months were going to be hell, but I was too emotionally drained to feel scared – I just wanted to get on with it. Now that I was no longer in denial, my brain tormented me with thoughts of all the things I was losing by dying early – the places I’d never visit, the friends I’d never make, the books I’d never write, and the children I’d never have. In our six years together, Liam and I had never discussed having kids, and I’d not given it much thought, but knowing I would never have them was crushing.

  These stark realisations had been queuing up in the shadows of my mind for months, just waiting for an opportunity to bombard me. But even these gloomy ruminations were preferable to thoughts of Bay and the time I would lose with him.

  Missing him was a physical, all-consuming, soul-destroying thing, more potent than I could ever have prepared for. We had grown far, far too close – I could see that now – the fact that we had no future, that I’d kept secrets, refused to admit I loved him, and ultimately walked away from him, made no difference at all – he had become a part of me. Knowing him had altered me so irrevocably that I was no longer whole without him. And that made me anxious. Did he feel the same? Where was he now? What was he doing? Was he safe or was he slowly sabotaging himself with a cocktail of drugs and alcohol?

  Ash had returned to LA and I didn’t have contact numbers for any of Bay’s friends. Should I call the tattoo parlour and ask Gibbs or Trudy to check on him? I’d already Googled the number, but if Bay was coping alright without me, their intruding concern would simply add insult to injury. Maybe I should give him the benefit of the doubt – Bay would get over me in time…

  The same thoughts, fears, and arguments chased around my head in a relentlessly loop, so I was trying to focus on something productive instead: composing a letter of explanation to my parents.

  Of course it was a cowardly way of doing things; I ought to break the news in person, but I simply didn’t have the time or energy for a trip to Spain. I hoped a hand-written letter might be less jarring than a phone call or email; hopefully I could downplay matters, reduce any sense of urgency and manage their expectations. Plus the snail mail would give me time to wrap my head around my test results before they inevitably arrived; I had no doubt that Mum and Dad would be straight on the first plane over here to kick up a fuss – and when they did, I’d be glad to see them.

  Abandoning my pen on the blank white page, I moved over to the living room window, drew back the curtains and peered up at the sky. But it was a dark, cloudy night; spots of fine drizzle flecking the glass, and all celestial bodies hidden from view. One glimpse of the moon was all I’d wanted; to reassure myself that I hadn’t just dreamt the last six months; to feel closer to Bay; to convince myself that he was alright. But the rain only fell harder –the night as dank and as bleak as my heart.

  Chapter Fifty-eight

  ‘SIDNEY!’

  ‘Jesus! Bay.’ Sidney clutched his chest with both hands. ‘You nearly gave me a frigging heart attack!’ He had a key in the door and two large, wheeled suitcases stationed either side of him. ‘What are you doing lurking there like that? Were you lying in wait for me or something? Some welcome home! You shouldn’t have – really.’

  ‘Welcome back,’ I said grudgingly.

  ‘Aren’t you usually asleep at this time of day? Hey, are you alright? You look even worse than usual…’

  ‘Shut up for a second, will you? I need the name and address of the house-sitters you hired.’

  ‘Why? What’s happened? Oh lord, what have they done?’ He paled as he spoke, hurriedly unlocking the door and pushing his way inside.

  ‘Nothing – everything’s fine – I just need to talk to them.’ But Sidney wasn’t listening, he was too busy casting an eye over his house-plants and then counting his beloved fish – making kissing sounds at them through the side of the tank. ‘Sidney…?’

  ‘Yes, righto,’ he said distractedly, checking both the bedrooms and then wandering into the bathroom. ‘Holy hell, what happened in here?’

  ‘Oh, shit I forgot about that – don’t worry it was me – I’ll get it fixed.’

  ‘What’d you do, pick a fight with yourself?’ Sidney said, backing away from the gory mess of blood and broken mirror and glancing down at my right hand.

  ‘Something like that – I’ll get it sorted, OK? I really need that information, Sidney.’

  ‘Alright, alright, keep your hair on. I’ve just got here; I’ve just spent twelve hours travelling halfway round the planet and I’m jet-lagged. I could really do with a cup of tea, a chocolate digestive and a hot bath…’

  ‘Now, Sidney,’ I growled.

  He sighed huffily and returned to the landing to wheel his suitcases inside. I watched with barely-contained impatience as he closed the door, carefully laid one case flat on the floor and unzipped it. ‘Oh, it’s not in this one – it must be in the other one…’ When he finally extracted a slim folder of information I snatched it out of his hand and quickly flicked through it as I made my way back next door. ‘You’re welcome!’ Sidney called after me.

  *

  Marguerite looked exactly as I remembered – a small, curly-haired sprite with a stick up her arse and eyes that said “what the hell are you doing in my office?” so that she didn’t actually have to say the words out loud Pursing her lips she raised an eyebrow at me as I towered over her desk.

  ‘Just tell me where she is.’

  ‘She doesn’t want to see you, Bay.’

  ‘I won’t hurt her – I just want to talk to her – I give you my word.’

  ‘That wasn’t… that isn’t…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s not like that.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean? What is it like?’

  ‘You love her, don’t you?’ She sounded more sympathetic than I’d expected and her question caught me off guard. Unwilling to admit my feelings to her and unable to deny them, I simply glared. But the answer must have been written all over my face because Marguerite slumped in her chair with a sigh, dropping her defences along with her perfect posture. ‘She’s trying to protect you.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘From more pain,’ she said flatly. My gut twisted with unease. It was disconcerting seeing a woman as thorny and intractable as Marguerite look so defeated.

  I snorted. ‘That’s ridiculous.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘I don’t need protecting by anyone – especially not by you.’

  ‘You don’t think she can hurt you?’

  ‘She’s already hurt me,’ I snapped, the truth ringing painfully in my ears.

  She nodded thoughtfully. ‘Cally wants to do this alone; she wouldn’t even let me stay with her today… but… I told myself that if you turned up…’

  ‘Jus
t tell me where she’s hiding. I’m not leaving this office until—’

  ‘She’s sick,’ she interrupted. ‘She’s at the hospital getting more tests done, but… you need to prepare yourself, Bay. She might be dying.’ Her voice cracked on the last word, tears welling in her eyes and I stood there, swaying slightly, overcome with horror as my darkest fears were confirmed. Deep down I’d suspected she might be ill for weeks – I hadn’t wanted to believe it. But dying…? My legs gave way and I sank heavily into a chair, my head in my hands, my heart breaking. Not again. This couldn’t be happening again. Would it never fucking end? Death had been stalking me my whole life, stealing everyone closest to me; my twin, my parents, Vesper… as if punishing me for something. And now Cally…?

  ‘Which hospital?’ I croaked.

  Chapter Fifty-nine

  He stood defensively in the doorway to my hospital room; feet planted, hands shoved in pockets and scowling – his dark eyes shimmering with unshed tears. At the sight of him my pulse soared, my blood rushed in my ears and my heart tightened in my chest. God I’d missed him. We’d been apart forty-eight agonisingly-long hours, and I’d never known misery like it. But here he was in Wildham. Bay had found me. Secretly, selfishly, I’d hoped he would.

  But he looked angry, and rightly so. I swallowed several times before I was able to speak. ‘I was sick before I met you, so don’t even think about trying to blame yourself for this. It isn’t your fault.’

  ‘You should have told me,’ he growled, making the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. Prowling towards the bed, gaze fixed on mine, he looked more lupine than ever in his dishevelled, unshaven state. ‘You could have been getting treatment all this time, instead of fucking about with me.’

  ‘But I was happy fucking about with you.’ As he loomed over me I shifted against the pillows at my back. ‘I’ve felt more alive in the past six months than I ever did in the thirty years before that.’