You could have spared us that, Lawrence.
‘Rose...’
I thought, somewhere faraway, I heard someone say my name, but there is no one here. Lawrence has not come back in again but, like a spell, it wakes me up. The cold flagstone floor is hurting my knees, I have to move. Painfully, pushing my hands against the floor, I force my body upright. How long have I been kneeling there? I did not know it was so long, but from the pain in my knees and legs, it has been a good while.
Where is he?
I get up, look around me. Part of me thinks; I don’t care where he is. I want him out of my life. I never want to see him again, ever. Another part of me frets; if he’s still outside, he’ll be frozen to the core. He can’t have got away down to the valley, not in this weather. I don’t want him to have tried it. I don’t want to be hearing, in a few days’ time, that the police have recovered his body...
A pang of real fear goes through me at that. My lips feel cracked and dry. I spy the cup which I knocked out of his hand, earlier. I’d pick it up except I don’t know if I have the strength to bend and retrieve it right now. I feel like an egg with its shell cracked open. If I bend down I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to straighten again. I feel my own pulse quickening at the realisation that I hit him. I didn’t mean to hit him. I don’t know where that came from, and I feel a flash of shame at my own reaction, that I lashed out like that. He didn’t try to hit me back, did he? He didn’t try to stop me. I wince, remembering that.
Then I bend, suddenly, pick up the tin cup. The movement makes my head giddy but I do it. I cradle the cup close to my stomach. I never meant to knock it out of his hand. I feel a tug of anxiety that forces my gaze towards the door.
Where are you, Lawrence? Where did you go?
There
was
nowhere you could go to. We were trapped up here. Both of us. Is there really only just me left?
I don’t want to be here alone.
The fire is burning low again. I drag myself over to it. After a few minutes go by I find the strength to shove another piece of wood into the middle of brazier. There are three bits of wood left now. Just three, unless I can manage to dig out some more myself. There are four crackers and three chocolate liqueurs left. Oh, God! I feel so cold, even in here, standing right by this fire. I need to get back home. I’m going to have to ring them, aren’t I? Confess everything. They’ll have to send some rescue crew or something up here for me, I can’t stay here. And yet... something is making me put the moment off, stopping me from picking up the phone and making the call. Something I can’t put my finger on yet, but whatever it is, it’s very strong. The minutes tick by. After a while I manage to put some ice in the pan to melt for water but I don’t want any tea. I don’t want anything at all.
I realise...
I want him back. Even though I know that is wrong, that it cannot happen. Even though I know that if he were to walk back in here right now I’d still be mad at him, still be
livid
at him, at how he’s hurt me, how he’s torn my family’s life apart...
Still, when I pick up the scarf Lawrence left to dry on the back of the pew, I can’t stop myself putting it to my face as if it were part of him that’s been left behind.
If I could… cut five years out of my life and that’d turn back the clock for her, I would do it. If I could give her father back his dignity and in any way alter what I did that night, I’d do it. But I can’t. What’s done is done and can never be undone, no matter how much I regret it.
I warned Rose that she didn’t know me. She didn’t believe me. She believes me now. Turns out I didn’t know her, either.
Fucking hell - that it should turn out to be her father I hurt by mistake
- how cruel is that?
How fucking tragic is that?
It is somehow fitting, though, because all the pain I delivered that night is back to haunt me in a way I never imagined it would. All along I’ve been trying to convince myself - she’s a girl, just another girl along the road, no one special, no one I won’t forget as soon as I’m on the next plane out of here. I’ve forgotten so many, don’t even remember their names because none of them really counted for anything and I thought she’d be the same.
But she isn’t.
She’s someone special. She’s someone that a person like me could never deserve.
What the hell was I even thinking, to imagine I could ever really make a difference to anyone in this world? I don’t make any difference. I just create havoc, wherever I go. Even that guy I decked in Sri Lanka - it’s caused major waves over there and Dougie’s been arrested because of it. Arjuna says he’ll be let off today but what if he isn’t? The authorities are after me everywhere - what good could I possibly be to a poor little sod like Sunny who’s laying all his final hopes on me? I’m nobody’s hero. I’m going to have to let him down, too. I can hardly even muster the energy to remember what I’m supposed to be doing here. I’ve got too cold. I’ve got too tired. Maybe my dad was right to throw me in the World War Two bunker all those years ago? He was always threatening that next time he’d leave me there to rot; maybe it would have been better if he had.
I’m sorry, Rose.
I hurt you so bad I want to climb up to the top tower of this broken castle and throw myself off it and die. I would if I thought that would make you feel better.
As I think it, I look up. I’ve scaled the eastern section of this tower once before, I remember. I did it on a spring day when I was fourteen, as a dare to myself. I did it because I was shit-scared of the thought of it and perversely that made me want to conquer it all the more. Why shouldn’t I do it again, now? Climb up there. Get out of her way. A faint memory laps at the edges of my mind; there’s a small ante-chamber up there. I think I remember it. It might be somewhere that I could find some shelter? I’m not sure of that at all. I could be wrong, it was so long ago. I rub the sides of my head, which are feeling numb. My ears have stopped burning with the cold but that’s not good. That’s because I can’t feel them anymore. All I really remember is dangling off the edge of that tiny window ledge up there, looking down, the sudden certainty of my own death looming up at me.
I remember that, and how my arms had threatened to give out on me. The climb had been arduous. I’d been up all night and I’d had no strength left in my body. And then something had made me look up. And over the horizon the faint orange sun had been making its appearance over the trees, a new day, and - cheesy as that sounds - I’d suddenly realised that I wanted to be part of that day.
Do I still want to be part of this one? And the next,
without her
, now; knowing how my actions have hurt the only woman I’ve ever truly loved?
I dig my thumbs into my eye sockets and the darkness beneath my lids lights up with a bright flash of remembered sunlight. A dark shape jumps into the light now, reminding me of Kahn. It feels like him. The one friend I always knew would still be waiting for me when I found myself in this dark space before; the one reason I had to keep living when every last ounce of strength had been crushed out of me. He was what always kept me going, because without me I knew he’d be left to fend for himself, no one would see to him. The dark shape nudges forward, imprints itself more strongly on my mind and in the empty space in this silent courtyard I can almost hear his panting. I can faintly hear his paws, scuffing against the door of my prison, and I can feel him... waiting;
willing
me to keep going till the time comes when I will be free again.
Don’t give up wanting
my words to Rose earlier come back to me now.
Even though it would be much easier to give up wanting.
It would be so much easier to just give up.
The temperatures must be grazing minus-something. I slam my fists together inside my frozen gloves, blowing on the palms of my hands and an old survival instinct kicks in. I need to move. Painfully, I pull first one, then the other of my gloves off. I can’t hook my fingers into the nooks and crannies of the walls with these on. I am going to climb up the icy wall to the chamber, and then - and only then - will I give in to this huge urge I have now to sleep. I have to stay alert a bit longer. If I fall, that’ll be the end of me, I know. If I stay here, I’ll perish anyway.
It has been dark for such a long time now.
I don’t look back but Rose is still trailing behind me. I know she is. I left her at her father’s gate five minutes ago but when I stop I can still hear the crunch of her feet against the virgin snow on the woodland floor. It’s so damn dark in here. If she comes in too far she’ll have trouble finding her way back. Where the hell even is she?
‘Go home, Rose,’ I shout over my shoulder but now that I’ve stopped I can only hear her getting closer, her breath coming hard because the air is way too cold.
For God’s sake, just go home.
‘I can’t.’
I swing the torch round and she’s standing right there behind me, shaking, shivering from head to toe but she’s got a stubborn look on her face.
‘You
can.
’
‘I can’t, because I won’t just leave you.’
Has she forgotten? Has she forgotten what I did?
‘
Lawrence
.’ Now she’s caught up with me I feel her small hand slipping into mine, and for a split second I allow myself to remember how good that feels. How delicious it feels to have a companion. Not to be alone.
‘Don’t go back there.’
‘No?’ I take her in tenderly. ‘You want me to save myself?’ I ask softly and my heart expands with hope and joy. Even knowing what she knows, she’s worried that I’m going back to Macrae Farm; she still cares enough to come after me…
‘Do you love me?’ she asks. I feel her fingers tighten against my own and it’s all I can do not to take her in my arms again. I groan inwardly, because I do love her. I love Rose more than I ever knew it was possible for me to love someone. I want her more. For a moment I just stand there, watching her: her huge, beautiful eyes, her pale face and her mouth, that mouth that I have longed to kiss since the first time I laid eyes on her…
‘
Do you
?’ she insists and I pull her towards me, close up against my chest because I want so much to keep her here close to me. I want so much to never have to let her go. And now she’s pulling my head down to her, drawing me hungrily towards her own lips again.
Don’t, Rose. I need to go. Please don’t…
And then I kiss her.
I kiss her, hard
‘God, Rose. You know I love you Tell me what you want, Rose.’ My voice is hoarse, whispering hot breath into her ear and I can feel every fibre of her shudder beneath me when I say it.
‘I want …’ She reaches up and kisses me again, her kiss urgent and longing for one sweet, too-short moment before she breaks away, breathless.
‘I
want
you to stop running away.’
I laugh, lowly. I wind the rain-darkened strands of her hair around my fingers and hold her face captive, close to my own. ‘That’s not what I meant. You know that…’
She turns her head slightly then as the muffled sound of the others, the ones who are still coming, still looking for me along the top lane reaches us.
Who are they? I frown. I can’t even remember who they are, but they are interrupting us and I don’t want to remember them. I will them to go away and for a moment, at least, they fade.
‘You wanted something else a moment ago,’ I pull her face back to my own, and I see her swallow. ‘You did. Didn’t you?’
‘Lawrence, if you don’t act soon,’ she’s protesting faintly, murmuring into my ear, ‘...
it’s
going to be too late.
’ I kiss her neck and I can feel her shoulders relaxing, melting into submission under my touch.
‘Too late for…?’
She takes in a deep shuddering breath;
‘Listen,’
H
er eyes look deep into mine and for a second I catch a glimpse of a determination and a love there that is even stronger than her desire.
‘I
want
you to turn yourself in. Just do it. For me. For my dad.’
Jeez. She isn’t going to let this go, is she? I pull my face back in disappointment and the angry revving of a tractor ploughing back up the hill chops through the air, cutting through my mood in a flash.
‘Do it now and in time you’ll be a free man again.’
I look at her painfully, at the hope shining in amongst the fear in her eyes.
‘I will never be a free man again.’
Doesn’t she know that?
She wants me to turn myself in. But her world isn’t my world. She thinks it’s a simple matter of doing the right thing, seeing justice served and in the end it’ll all work out dandy just like in the movies but she doesn’t have a clue… I return my gaze to the snowy path at my feet, pull my hand out of hers. I take a step backwards and away from her. Because I have to; the rain is hurrying the thaw along. Very soon the roads will be clear, everything will be moving again. I’ve got to get going. I see her face fall then, all the energy draining out of her
‘Marco said you’d run. And he was right. You
are
running,’ she breathes. ‘He knew you were a coward.’
Marco never said that
.
‘He’s the one who’d better run. If I ever catch up with him I’m going to...’
‘You’re going to
what
?’ her momentary laughter is high pitched, almost hysterical. ‘You know who you sound like, don’t you? For God’s sake, Lawrence. You never wanted to turn out like your Dad and here you are…’
I can feel the little tick going now at the side of my face. She shouldn’t say that to me. If there’s one thing in the world she shouldn’t say it’s that.
‘Here I am…?’ I stop. Turn to face her again, shining the torch on her face but she doesn’t flinch.
‘A true Macrae,’ she finishes softly.
‘That isn’t true.’
‘Isn’t it?’ She steps up and pushes me suddenly now in the chest. She’s a little slip of a thing but she catches me off balance and I can feel myself falling now.