The End is Where We Begin by Maria Goodin (open ebook .txt) 📕

I bring my hands up to cover my eyes, tears leaking through my fingers, my shoulders shuddering beneath Peter’s grasp.

I feel someone else’s hand grip the back of my neck and I’m twisted round forcefully, pulled in and held tightly.

“It’s okay,” Michael says quietly, squeezing me tight, “it’s okay.”

I pinch the bridge of my nose in a vain attempt to stem the tears that pour silently from my eyes.

I feel more arms wrapping around me from behind, enveloping me.

“It’s all right, mate,” says Tom.

I take a deep, shuddering breath, air flooding my lungs.

I let my forehead fall against Michael’s shoulder, his grip on the back of my neck pinning me in place, my tears soaking the neck of his T-shirt. I feel the softness of Tom’s belly against my side, Carole’s gentle hands rubbing my forearm, Peter’s warm, heavy hand squeezing my shoulder.

And contained firmly inside this bundle of human warmth and acceptance, I let go, feeling the pain seep out with my tears, feeling the weight finally start to slide from my shoulders.

Chapter 25

Possibilities

Following my meeting with Max’s parents, for the first time ever, I take two whole weeks off work. Scheduled jobs have to be cancelled. I have to let clients down. It’s alien to me, this lack of responsibility and loss of income. But I know this is what I need.

I take Josh out of school a couple of days before half-term starts and we drive up to the Peak District. We mountain bike, hike, take the cable car up to the Heights of Abraham, which we haven’t done since he was about nine. We eat lunch up there, looking out across the wide valley, the subtle spread of autumnal colours just starting to set in, the gentle sun on our faces, not talking much.

I’ve brought things in the van to start work on the millions of jobs I have to do on the cottage. Normally when I’m up here I’m fixing, mending, painting and making future renovation plans. But this time all the equipment I’ve bought stays in the van. I can’t be bothered. And for the first time ever I wonder if I should sell this place. Laura wouldn’t care – she’s never been one for the outdoor life – and as she’s told me so many times, we could both use the money. I no longer see myself moving up here. I have good friends where I am, people who care about me. Why would I want to isolate myself? It suddenly sounds like a crazily lonely existence. I’m far too young. I have my whole life ahead of me.

At night I drift off in the silence of this tiny, pitch-black hamlet in the middle of nowhere. I slumber in deep, dreamless oblivion and wake up late to the sound of tractors in the country lanes and cattle on the move. While Josh sleeps on until lunchtime, I have coffee, sitting on the brick wall in the small, hopelessly overgrown garden. I breathe in the chill country air, close my eyes and let the dappled morning light filter though my eyelids.

Josh spends a lot of time on his phone and I don’t like to pry, but I really, really want to know.

“How are things going with you and Becky?” I ask him one evening as we recline on separate sofas, eating giant marshmallows and watching a quiz show neither of us understands.

“Good,” he says, not taking his eyes off the slightly fuzzy, ancient TV, “although it sucks that she’s so far away.”

“She lives in Reading, Josh, not Timbuktu.”

“She’s actually thinking of coming down again soon.”

“Up, you mean. Do you even know where Reading is?”

“Whatever. So would that be okay? If she came for a weekend?”

“To stay?” I consider this. “Sure. I mean, I couldn’t let her… you know… I’m sure her parents wouldn’t want her staying in your room.”

“You mean you wouldn’t want her staying in my room.”

“No, it’s not… well…”

“Chill out, Dad. I already said we have a sofa bed in the lounge. For me, I mean.”

“The one with burn marks all over it?”

“Yes,” he says sheepishly, “although I’m assuming we’ll get another one.”

I almost laugh and ask him how the hell he thinks I’m going to afford that right now, but it doesn’t really matter. We’ll find the money at some point.

“So,” I say tentatively, “you really like this girl then?”

He stuffs an entire giant marshmallow into his mouth. I’m about to tell him not to do that while he’s lying on his back, that he’ll choke, but at fifteen I guess he’s probably old enough to know how to eat a bloody marshmallow.

“Umm-hmm,” he mumbles, as way of confirmation.

I wait for more, but he just gazes at the screen, where a woman’s jumping up and down and screaming because she’s won an Audi Q3.

“Am I getting any more than that?” I ask.

Josh chews lazily. “Nope.”

We watch the excited woman, who’s shocked the host by kissing him enthusiastically on the lips.

“What about you?” mumbles Josh.

“What about me?”

“Don’t you ever want to be with someone?”

This is the first time he’s ever asked me this.

“I mean, it’s probably a bit weird that you’re not,” continues Josh. “It’s not even like you’re that old really.”

“Thanks.”

“No, I’m serious though. I mean, you’re what? Thirty-four?”

“Thirty-two.”

“Same difference. It’s not, like, normal to be celibate or whatever at that age.”

I smile to myself, amused, wondering if he really believes I’ve been celibate all these years, or whether it’s just too disturbing for him to consider the alternative. When my mum told me she was having an affair, I think part of my horror was facing the fact she had sex at all.

“Talking about what’s normal,” I say, quickly diverting attention away from myself, “can we have a little chat about some stuff you clearly forgot to delete from the internet history on my laptop some weeks ago?”

Josh’s hand pauses halfway to his mouth before he recovers himself and stuffs in another whole marshmallow.

“Stop trying to