His death would leave so much destruction in its wake. Her own sacrifices. A heartbroken daughter, blaming herself for not being enough to keep her father wanting to stay alive. Some of her own grief, perhaps.
She would blame herself for it. And she was done with blame. She had to be.
Adam answered the door dressed in a ratty navy dressing gown. He looked authentically terrible. A sour smell hung off him and it looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks. She hadn’t called to let him know she was coming.
‘I want to talk to you,’ she said.
He turned and walked back inside. Below the floor to ceiling window panes, the city spread out, cut through with a river.
‘You need to stop this,’ Becky said. ‘You need to sort yourself out. You’re upsetting Maisie. It’s not good enough.’
He turned to her, red eyes welling up. ‘I’ve tried.’
‘So try harder.’
It occurred to her that it was possible that Adam’s actions in the last month, the worry he was causing his family and their friends and their daughter, might all have been orchestrated to bring her to this moment. Brought here so that she could bear witness to him paying a price. A calculated offering of despair and atonement, manufactured to satisfy her. She realized that she would never know for sure. And also that, in truth, perhaps it didn’t matter.
‘I can’t live with it,’ he said eventually.
‘With what?’
‘With you thinking about me like that.’
‘You can’t change that.’
‘I know.’
‘Maisie loves you. And you love Maisie. That should be enough for you to get on and do your job as a father.’
‘But you think I raped you.’
‘Yes, and you say that you didn’t. I don’t want to hear it again. I’m only here for Maisie.’
‘We have to.’
‘Have to what?’
‘Go over it again. I’m sorry, but I can’t live knowing that you think that about me. That’s why I couldn’t – that’s why I didn’t – for you to even think that about me … I can’t live with it.’
Becky had gone to the kitchen island then, and taken down two mugs, and boiled a kettle to make them coffee. Black, for want of milk. He had sat, stubbled and lank, on the edge of his armchair. She had felt his eyes on her but she did not look up to meet them. She knew he wanted her to throw her arms around him like a movie heroine proclaiming that they could move on and build something new.
But there would be no heat or ice or raised voices and healing embraces from her. He was a collection of bones, he was flesh, he was a badly wired brain and a heart without a beat now. Her heart had closed to him. She pitied him. That was what she wanted him to understand. And beyond that she was only here to protect what she held dear: a future self unburdened by blame, and a daughter whose skies were clear and bright, unclouded by grief.
‘We were so close.’ He talked to the polished concrete floor.
‘I know we were. Now,’ she said briskly, all practicality. ‘You need to take your rubbish out. And you should call your mum. She’s worried about you.’
‘Can you please stop talking to me like that?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like you’re a social worker or something. Like we’ve never met.’
Becky handed him a mug of coffee. ‘What do you want, Adam?’
‘I want to go back. I want to find you the next day at school and tell you that last night was the best night of my life and that I love you and that I’m desperately hoping you feel the same way.’
‘I want to go back and never go to that party. But here we are. And we have a daughter who needs both of us.’
He couldn’t meet her eye. ‘I’m begging you to believe me.’
‘That’s not how it works.’
‘Then I don’t know what to do.’
‘Ask me how you can make it up to me.’
And then he did look up at her. ‘How can I?’
‘Have a shower. Get dressed. Make pancakes with Maisie again.’ She felt each item on her list land like a blow. ‘She loves you. She respects you. Be there because she needs you.’
‘But you don’t.’
‘No. I don’t need you. But I do love her.’ Becky gripped the coffee mug a little tighter. ‘I’ll make things work with the three of us, for her sake. I’ll invite you over at some point, and you’ll accept our invitation. We’ll have dinner. It’ll make Maisie happy. You’ll go home after we’ve eaten. That’s how it will go. That’s what I want from you. All this …’ Becky gestured to Adam’s stained dressing-gown, to his haggard face and the clothes dumped on the floor, ‘This does nothing for anyone.’
‘What about you though?’
‘You can’t offer me anything I want that I can’t get for myself.’
Becky turned and watched a small aircraft lift itself out of the Docklands. Sunlight caught its portholes as it banked. She tried not to cry. She had once let herself love him and it had left its mark on her. Despite everything, for a moment she felt the urge to put her arms around him and to cry on his shoulder, for all of the things they had managed to lose together. For all of the damage done and the impossibility of finding a way around it.
But she let the urge pass.
‘You were really wasted,’ Adam said softly. ‘The next day when I woke up, I threw up and then I remembered … and I wanted to believe you’d wanted the same things I did. But I couldn’t be sure that was true. I wasn’t sure. And I didn’t ask you. I just hoped.’
Becky’s stomach lurched. Adrenaline made her skin tingle.
‘But that’s not enough, is it?’ he said. ‘And
