sentimental, telling herself that he’d meant every one. If she worked hard, she could almost believe it.
At other times she was haunted by the conviction that he’d been forcing himself to say what would drive her away, not for his own sake, but for hers. That belief was the worst pain of all, because it meant that he’d chosen to withdraw into the bleak cage where no sun shone and where her love couldn’t reach him. And he’d done it for her.
Before leaving his house she had returned to Justin the diamonds that Hope had given her.
‘She meant these for her daughter-in-law,’ she said. ‘So I can’t keep them.’
She was gone before Mark returned. The boy sent her emails, demanding to know when she was coming back, refusing to believe that everything was over. She could hardly believe it herself.
She wrote back, carefully explaining that she and Justin had decided that they had no future together, but that she would always like to hear from him.
He emailed her regularly. Sometimes he would add news about his father, who was apparently snowed under in work. There was never anything personal, except that he sometimes added,
She wrote to Hope, thanking her for her welcome, and the way she had underlined it with the diamonds.
Hope replied in a furious temper.
Evie had to smile at that, recognising the loyalty and affection that lay beneath Hope’s words, as well as the annoyance that the world was daring to disobey her.
The weather turned colder. Mark wrote to say that they were going to Naples for Christmas.
She could have spent her own Christmas with Debra and her family, but she made an excuse. The sight of Debra’s husband and children was more than she could have borne just now.
She spent the festive season locked in her apartment working until she was exhausted, and remembering the words Debra had once uttered.
‘One day I hope you’ll fall hook, line and sinker for a man you can’t have. It’ll be a new experience for you.’
Her friend had been joking, but it wasn’t funny any more.
When the doorbell rang on a freezing February day Evie didn’t know who to expect.
‘Can I come in?’
‘Of course.’ She stood back and ushered him inside, glancing into the corridor outside. But Justin wasn’t there and she forced back the brief surge of hope.
How quickly children grew! Mark had changed, even in six months. The young man he would soon be was starting to show in his face. He was also taller, as she realised when he hugged her.
She was longing to ask him a million questions-about himself, about his father and their life together. But she held off until he was sitting in her tiny kitchen, tucking into a hastily prepared snack.
‘I’m glad to see your appetite is as healthy as ever,’ she said. ‘Another piece of apple crumble?’
He nodded, his mouth still full, and she loaded his plate again.
‘How did you know my address?’ she asked.
‘You wrote it on the outside of the packet when you sent my memory stick back that time.’
‘But that was ages ago. You made a note of it then?’
‘We agreed to keep in touch.’
‘Yes, we did. You really are your father’s son, aren’t you? He’s ultra-methodical too.’
Merely talking about Justin was a pleasure. She forced herself to relinquish it. It was too dangerously sweet.
‘So tell me,’ she said, ‘what’s been happening. How was Christmas?’
‘Great. Nonna’s ever so nice, but I wish you’d been there. I wished it all the time. I kept thinking you might turn up as a surprise, but you didn’t.’
‘Mark, dear, it isn’t possible. Your father and I aren’t together any more.’
‘But you could be,’ he pleaded.
‘No. It was never going to work out. I’m out of his life now, for good.’
‘But I don’t want you to be out of mine,’ he said stubbornly. ‘That’s why I’m here. I want you to come to the funeral.’
‘Whose funeral?’
‘Mum’s. He brought her home. He started talking to me one day, about Mum, and how I felt about her still being in Switzerland. I said I’d like to have her here, so he arranged for her to be flown back and reburied in that churchyard you saw.’
‘That’s wonderful,’ she said. ‘It’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’
He nodded, his eyes bright. ‘I always wanted to have her home, but he didn’t think it mattered, and I couldn’t explain. But he’s different now, Evie. He understands things he didn’t understand before.’
She was silent, feeling a glow inside her that she had thought never to know again. It was almost like happiness. For she knew, as surely as if Justin were standing there beside her, that she was responsible for this.
She had thought their love had turned into a barren thing, but if he’d learned the way to reach out to his son then some good had come from it.
She could keep that and treasure it.
‘The funeral’s the day after tomorrow,’ Mark said. ‘Will you come?’
She gasped. ‘Mark, I can’t. I really can’t.’
‘But you must, because it’s down to you, isn’t it?’
‘I may have said something to him once, but-no, it was his decision.’
‘But you made him do it.’
She shook her head. ‘Nobody makes him do anything.’
‘You do. He did listen to you, although he pretended not to.’
She tried to deny it, but it was hard when he was saying what she longed to hear.
‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I expect your mother’s family will be there. They might not like my being there.’
‘She didn’t have anyone. It’ll just be Dad and me-and you.’
She was shocked by how badly she wanted to say yes. Just to see Justin again, speak to him, watch his face. All these things would be wonderful and terrible.
Then Mark stunned her again by remarking, ‘He’s still got your picture.’
‘What picture?’
‘One of the two I took of you that night you came to the house. Dad cropped it down to your head and printed it out small.’
‘You saw him?’
His smile called her naive. ‘’Course not. But he forgot to wipe it off my computer afterwards. So I checked his wallet, and it was there last week.’
‘Mark, you shouldn’t have looked in his wallet.’
‘But I had to,’ he said with an air of injured innocence. ‘How can I find things out if I don’t check the facts?’
‘Don’t you try to blind me with science, my lad,’ she said, half laughing, half crying.
It was madness to feel suddenly full of joy. He’d kept her picture. Better still, he’d listened to her. In a way they were still part of each other’s lives, even if they never met again.
‘Mark, did you tell him you were coming here?’
The boy shook his head. Before she could speak, his mobile phone rang.
‘Hallo, Dad. It’s all right, I haven’t disappeared. I came to see Evie. Dad? Are you there? I’m at Evie’s apartment. I told her about Mum and asked her to come to the funeral, but she says she can’t.’
‘Let me talk to him,’ she said, holding out her hand for the phone. ‘Justin?’
