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  “I’m so sorry. Whatever you need, Lil. You know that.”

  “Adam, thank you,” she mutters. “We knew she was ill and well, you know. But it’d be so helpful if we could stay with you for a little while. I don’t have my flat up there anymore and Theo doesn’t want to stay in the house. He’s… not quite there yet. Plus, my parents think I’m making a big mistake cavorting with an actor, as they put it,” she chuckles nervously. “It would be a great help, just while we sort out the funeral and organise some stuff. We won’t be in your hair. We’ll be out a lot, but I thought… I don’t know what I thought.”

  “Don’t think anything more of it, just come. Honestly. I think Susan needs the company, anyway. Or something to do. She will want to help you. You know what she’s like.”

  “Oh, babes. Is she not doing well?”

  “No, no, I’m sorry to say.”

  “Well, Theo is packing as we speak. We’ll get in the car and be with you by this evening, if you’re sure this is okay? Theo has to visit the body before we come to you.”

  “Honestly, please, just come, Lily. You’re welcome anytime.”

  “I’m so grateful,” she whispers, “he needs you, Adam. He’s taking it badly. I don’t think he expected to feel like this.”

  “Lily, we’re here, okay? Like you’ve been here for us. Seriously, get your arse in that car already.”

  “Love you.”

  “Love you both. See you soon.”

  I leave the dinner cooking away. It won’t be as good as Susan’s dinners and I think I overestimated portions, but that’s good because any leftovers can be eaten tonight when our guests get here.

  I climb the stairs to the bedroom and find her in bed reading a book. Her hair is loose, falling over her shoulders, she has no make-up on and her baggy clothes hide her beautiful lines and contours.

  “Your phone rang,” she says, murmuring.

  “It was Lily. Theo’s mother passed away.”

  She looks up as I sit on the edge of the mattress, her doe eyes glistening. “Oh, poor Theo.”

  “They need somewhere to stay and I thought… I hope it’s okay?”

  Some light returns to her eyes and she nods. “Of course, when are they coming?”

  “Later on, tonight. He has to… visit her first, you know? They just need a base while they organise things.”

  “Well, I know where they can get the flowers and my dad’s friend still runs that undertakers, they will do everything very sensitively. Was she religious?”

  “No, no, I don’t think so. I think Theo said so anyway.”

  “That’s okay, the funeral people can organise a humanist ceremony or whatever she would have wanted. What about people? It needs to be announced. Everyone should know.”

  I take her hands and squeeze them. “Maybe we could write a list and talk it through with them later on. I think Theo is really suffering.”

  She nods gently. “I wish it on nobody.”

  I close my eyes as a wave of emotion washes over me. I shed a couple of tears and Susie reaches over to hold my cheek.

  “Baby,” she croons.

  “He’ll be okay, he will. I just… it’s just not good.”

  “I know,” she whispers, pulling me towards her for a hug. She tugs at my hair and murmurs, “Have you burnt the dinner yet?”

  I pull back, smiling. “I’ll have you know, that, I expect to burn some of it… but most of it will be okay.”

  She chuckles and kisses me quickly on the cheek. “I’d better make up the spare room and get them some towels. I can fluff them in the tumble dryer with one of those scented things.”

  I listen as she walks to and fro, collecting things and starting to work on the spare bedroom.

  I stand in the doorway as she strips the spare bed and tell her, “Go and ask your father for the money, Susie. But for just one more try. And if that doesn’t work, I think we should try surrogacy or adoption.”

  She stops what she’s doing and nods, staring at the floor. “Thank you, Adam.”

  “He may have never given you moral support or any kind of parental guidance, but he owes you. Doesn’t he?”

  She turns and walks to me, throws her arms around me and kisses me. “I love you so much.”

  “I love you more.” I kiss her back, needing her so badly to know that I don’t love her any less. We break away, both breathless. “I mean it, Susan. Just once more. I can’t bear to see you going through this. The physical pain… the torment of waiting all the time and the disappointment when it doesn’t work. It’s too much for me. I can’t watch you in pain anymore. It hurts me, too.”

  She sheds a tear and nods, her entire eye sockets red. “I don’t want this pain anymore, either. I’ve come to terms with it. I’ve just needed… time… to get my head around it.”

  “I love you enough to try, but also, enough to know when enough is enough. If that makes sense?”

  She nods and holds my cheek. “What would I do without you?”

  “Well, you wouldn’t have burnt dinners. Which reminds me.”

  She slaps my bum as I beat a hasty retreat from the room to check on dinner.

  It’s late evening when they arrive. I feel raw before I even open the door to them. Lily texted that they were on their way from the undertakers in Leeds. Apparently, the caregiver Allegra was trying to pass off as her meals on wheels or something formally identified the body so Theo didn’t need to do all that. Anyway, Allegra’s body was moved to the funeral parlour earlier today because apparently, Allegra spent the past few months detailing all the arrangements. She’s done it all herself. Theo didn’t know she had and just found out. I think he needed to see the body tonight anyway, just to make sure he’s not imagining it.

  Standing on the doorstep is Lily, with Theo stood behind her. She looks cried out. Theo looks like he’s not cried at all… like he’s numb. He’s staring at the floor, as though waiting to be processed in a queue or something.

  “Hey you.” I grab Lily in a massive bear hug and she clings to me, burying her face in my shoulder.

  “Oh, sweetheart,” I hear over my shoulder, and Lily leaves my arms to head straight for Susan, crying into her hair.

  Lily is a giant of a woman and swamps my Susan even though it is Lily who needs the comfort.

  Theo has his hand resting on the door lintel, wondering what to do with himself. I can see the signs. How he’s holding it all in because he doesn’t want to upset Lily.

  “Oh my god!” Susan screeches, and I turn around to see my wife holding Lily’s left hand and staring at the ring on her finger. “What the hell? When did this happen?”

  Theo briefly lifts his eyes to mine when I turn and look at him, expecting answers. I see only fear… despair. I see a man in incredible pain.

  “We’ve been keeping it secret,” Lily says gently, “we don’t want a big thing. In fact, we’ve been wondering, would you be our witnesses? We just want to be married. That’s all we want.”

  “Fuck, no,” Susan cries, “you’ll be the most beautiful bride. No way. Tell her, Adam. They’re an amazing couple, they must celebrate it. You must have a dress… a cake! Everything! This hair… the things we could do with this hair. I would kill for this hair, you know. Mine never plays ball… but for some reason, Adam loves it… so there we go.”

  “Oh my god, he’s right,” exclaims Lily, “your hair is so lush, I’ve never seen it down before… never seen it curly.”

  Somehow, Susan being Susan, she forces us all inside and we end up in the kitchen.

  I fear if I even ask Theo how he is or even touch him, he will break and shatter. I see that look in his eyes. He’s clinging on by a thread.

  The girls start talking in the way girls do, complimenting one another, chit-chatting, those little ways they have… their coping mechanisms… their little cover-overs for when times are tough.

  Men… we’re not so lucky. We can’t tell each other we’re pretty and think of things good to say about
one another. We’re not as free with our feelings or so comfortable expressing what’s in our hearts.

  “Okay, me and Theo are just going to chew the fat down the pub for a swift one, back in a minute.”

  Susan looks at me aghast, then Lily nods her head, knowing and feeling what I also do.

  Susan gulps and nods. “Okay, be quick.”

  I grab my coat off the peg as we leave the house and I notice Lily’s car has boxed me in. I was going to drive somewhere and give Theo some time to let it all out. But maybe the pub is a better idea.

  “Are you alright, man?” I ask, as we walk towards my local, which has always looked like a complete dive from the outside and I’ve never been inside it before in my life.

  “Just get me a drink,” he says.

  We walk inside and get stared at. We’re not the usual clientele.

  “Can we have two double whiskies and two pints, mate? Cheers,” I say, handing the barman £20.

  We retreat to a quiet corner and before I have time to touch my own glass of whisky, he’s downed mine and his in quick succession. He lifts his eyes to the ceiling and sighs.

  “Never thought I’d ever see that woman dead,” he mumbles, “she always had such a hold on me. I never thought… I mean…”

  “It’s alright, I know.”

  “She was full of herself, even to the end. I told her we were getting married and she told me she couldn’t care less.”

  Even though I’m not sure of the pipes in this place, I take a sip of the pint and find it not too bad. It’s palatable, even if a little watered down.

  “It’s okay to be sad, Theo. It’s okay to hurt. She wasn’t perfect but she was your mother. You exist because of her.”

  He squeezes his eyes shut, pushes his fists into his sockets, his mouth becoming a tight line as he tries to hold it all in.

  “For fuck sake, Adam. I didn’t want to cry.”

  “Tough. If there’s anything I’ve learnt these past few months, it’s that crying ain’t the worst thing in the world.”

  “Fuck you,” he groans, revealing his eyes, now freely shedding tears.

  He looks sideways towards the diamond-shaped lead windows to avoid people’s stares – even though the glass is so old and misted, you can barely see the streetlights outside through these things.

  “No, fuck you,” I groan, rummaging in my pocket. “I needed a whisky too, you twat.”

  “Two more, barman,” I ask, handing him a tenner and pointing to the bottle of whisky behind the bar.

  I down mine before I even get back to the table and he takes his, swiftly chucking it down his gullet. I would be worried if this was anyone else but Theo isn’t your average mortal. He’s a giant and clearly, found his giantess to match him. And still, he’s trying to keep his emotions at bay instead of being the man she needs – being open, honest, available to her.

  “You can’t protect Lily from this, you know?” I tell him, kicking him slightly beneath the table.

  He’s hunched over and looks up at me with bloodshot eyes. “I have to, she’s pregnant.”

  The news hits me like a bullet, right to the heart.

  “I’m sorry, Ads. I’m sorry, but… I can’t. I mean, I’m sorry that we are and you aren’t and I’m sorry that I’m shit when it comes to expressing myself in times like this… but she lost one before. I don’t want her upset because of my selfish mother.”

  “Well, she already is,” I retort, “she already fucking is, and it’s natural. And you, you twat, can cry if you need to and she’ll be happier if you do. Lily is a fucking sponge when it comes to this shit. If you don’t unleash it somehow, she’ll suck it up instead.”

  He groans and tips his head at the barman who has never had such customers, coming in on a Sunday night and paying full whack for the top-shelf whisky, one after the other.

  Two more doubles are brought out and Theo hands over money to the guy who brings them over. “Keep the change, mate.”

  “Alright, lads? Take it steady, you know.”

  I tip him a wink. “We’re celebrating. He just got engaged.”

  “Really? Because he looks like he just saw a ghost.”

  The man leaves our side and heads back behind the bar to shine his glasses and watch over his clientele or whatever it is he does when we’re not looking.

  Theo shakes his head and we think the same thing. Even in a shitty dive this like, you can still find your therapist sat serving the drinks… some guy getting paid a pittance per hour for basically being able to read the whole of humanity in its varied, broad spectrum of fucked-up-ness.

  We leave the pub and head back to my place, Theo doddery on his feet after all the whisky and stuff.

  “She was so tiny,” he whispers, as we near my street. “So little, like a doll, ready to go back in her box. Tiny. Frail. Like she never hurt anybody, like she never had it in her to hurt a soul.”

  “I’m really sorry, Theo.”

  “I know,” he whispers, “I know.”

  “You and Lily… you can get through anything, you know? You belong together. Maybe this time, maybe, just maybe, this baby is meant to be. You and her are certainly more compatible than she ever was with Paul. It’s going to be okay, I feel it.”

  He turns to me suddenly in the middle of the street and grabs me in such a fierce hug, I don’t think to breathe for a few seconds. Either because he’s squeezing me that tight or the shock of Theo hugging me has rendered me inert. Theo has never, ever been a hugger. That’s not his schtick.

  But his hug is so tight and strong, a proper man’s hug, a hug like nothing I’ve ever felt before. He kisses my cheek and pulls away, tears rolling down his face.

  “You’re the best man I’ve ever known, right? You know that, don’t you?” He’s staring at me like I’m supposed to agree with whatever he says.

  “You’re fucking pissed,” I chuckle.

  “No, I’m not that gone,” he counters, “I’m just saying what is true. You and what you’ve been through with Susan, how you’ve stood by her, she must know how lucky she is to have you.”

  I nod a little. “I think so.”

  “Good. I’m glad. Now, let’s go and try not to roll our eyes when our wives bring out all the wedding crap. It was Lily who said she didn’t want a big bloody wedding, but fuck, that wife of yours has a way about her… like she could convince anyone of anything.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “Oh, and you’re my best man, by the way,” Theo says, but I don’t get chance to react as we walk inside the house – me still in a state of shock.

  Chapter Eight

  We sit down to eat around the dinner table. It’s been a while since we used the table, actually; we’ve lately been eating on our laps in the sitting room in front of the TV, probably so we don’t have to talk to one another.

  “This is really good,” Theo tells Susan, tucking into chilli con carne. “Thank you.”

  “Thank you,” Lily agrees.

  “It’s really nothing,” my wife says, “just threw some things in a slow cooker, one of the easiest meals actually.”

  She’s paired the chilli with some homemade potato wedges and cream cheese. She didn’t have to make anything, not after we ate roast chicken for lunch, but she wanted something freshly made and homely for when Lily and Theo got here.

  Theo gets stuck in, his appetite not affected… or maybe the booze has made him hungry. Lily doesn’t seem to be worried so much about Theo anymore, though. Her eyes keep straying to Susan, who doesn’t seem to have cottoned on yet about Lily’s pregnancy.

  “So, are you going to set a date, then?” I figure idle chit-chat is necessary at this point.

  Theo and Lily look at one another in the way lovers do, sharing thoughts with just one look. Theo’s mouth tips up in a grin and Lily opens her mouth to speak.

  “It’s just not for us,” she chuckles, “I mean, I think your wedding was absolutely beautiful. It was.”

  Susan’s e
yes sparkle when she looks at me and says, “It was.”

  “Yes,” I agree.

  “But I personally don’t like attention… and neither does Theo.”

  A laugh so high-pitch rips from Susan and she lights up. It makes me feel happy.

  “Oh, come on. Look at you two. You’re both bloody gorgeous. And Theo, bloody hell. Even my husband wants your body. Trust me, he told me all about it in graphic detail. I wish I’d bloody come to see the play now.”

  Theo finishes his food before any of us have really got started on our own, sinking a glass of water at the end of his meal. Susan offers him more but he declines.

  Lily is still laughing about Theo’s body and how much I allegedly want it when Theo stares into Susan’s eyes and tells her, “I don’t. I don’t like attention. I know it sounds bizarre. I’m an actor for fuck’s sake. I know how it seems. But a part of the whole thing is that I’m not myself when I’m up there. I’m someone else entirely. That’s why I like it. I’m free of it all, you know? I get to do the best job ever… I get to pretend. I get to take a break from myself whenever I’m working. It’s honestly the best therapy.”

  Susan’s face softens and she searches his eyes, thinking deeply about his words. “I’ve heard role play stuff is getting to be a big thing nowadays, so people can get out of their own head.”

  “Ah, you mean ad-lib? Improv?”

  “Exactly, yes,” says Susan, who is still in her baggy clothes, no make-up, hair loose… looking the most beautiful I’ve ever seen her.

  Lily digs her elbow into Theo’s side beside her and giggles. “And he gets paid for it, the lucky sod.”

  “So… what will you do?” Susan asks. “Register office? Beach? I mean, the world is your oyster these days when it comes to wedding venues… literally anywhere.”

  The pair, sat opposite me and Susan, look at one another and smile. “We want to get married in a register office in London, go for Chinese food afterwards and then honeymoon in Torquay. We’ve decided.”

  I shake my head with laughter and exclaim, “Why am I not surprised? You pair of goofs!”