Before You Go Read online

‘OK, every other day,’ Jane grins. ‘Ed, don’t look so scared. I’m only kidding.’

  ‘Oh sorry,’ he says, flushing. ‘Sorry.’

  We say our goodbyes then climb into the van and we’re off. Crouch End is only about two miles away from mine and Jane’s flat – sorry, Jane’s flat – in Tufnell Park, but it’s still the end of an era and I feel sad as we sit in traffic on the hill down towards our new home.

  There are moments when I just wish time would stand still, and that nothing, not even the tiniest detail, would change. And although it might not seem like much to anyone else, this, the first few hours in our brand-new flat, is one of those times.

  My eyes are following a vapour trail across the sky and I wonder absently where the trail leads to. It’s the only mark in an otherwise pale-blue expanse and I watch it until it starts to dissipate and my eyes begin to water. I squeeze them shut and shift my head slightly to the right, trying to ease the tension in my neck which has been stuck in the same position for far too long. Beneath the weight of my head Ed’s stomach muscles tense, waiting while I move, and then soften as I relax against him, comfortable again. I can feel the soft pillow of his belly gently moving up and down in time with his breathing, and my head moves slowly up and down, up and down too.

  This tiny square of garden that came with the flat had been the deciding factor for Ed. He longed for outside space, for greenery, clean air and peace and quiet. And while this didn’t deliver all of those – it was still London and the sound of neighbours was impossible to ignore – Ed seemed happy for now. He had wanted to come straight out as soon as we got here, and so now we’re lying on the uneven paving slabs, staring at the sky, and my whole body feels heavy, weighted into the ground; I realize that for the first time in a long time I’m experiencing what it’s like to feel totally and utterly content. I refuse to let any bad thoughts enter my mind, and instead focus on how close I feel to Ed right at this moment. It feels like a miracle. My legs are stretched out in front of me, my arms folded primly on my chest, elbows touching the ground either side to keep me from tipping over. Ed’s body is at right angles to mine; we form a T-shape across the decking. A half-drunk bottle of Prosecco sits next to us, the bubbles rising slowly, lazily, in the sun. Around us trees and plants rustle gently, sounding like a whisper, and the occasional shout pierces the otherwise relative peace.

  My face feels warm and I can feel the heat radiating from Ed’s body to mine, making me feel too hot, but I don’t want to move. I want to stay like this forever, stuck in time. I don’t want anything to change.

  Then Ed’s stomach muscles tense beneath my head again but this time he doesn’t relax, he carries on moving upwards until I’m forced to lift my head, my neck straining with the effort. I prop myself up on my elbow and blink madly, shading my eyes with my forearm to look at him.

  ‘What’re you doing?’ I mumble, as he sits right up and reaches forward, his arm moving towards me. Just as I think he’s going to touch me, his hand goes right past and comes back seconds later holding a bottle of water which he unscrews and puts to his lips.

  ‘Sorry, thirsty.’ He jerks his head back quickly, his hair flicking back with the action, and drinks greedily from the bottle, the water bubbling back inside between each gulp. A line of water escapes from his mouth and runs down the side of his cheek, dripping onto his shoulder, soaking into his T-shirt and leaving a dark-grey stain. Finally, the bottle half empty, he rights his head, takes the bottle from his lips and wipes the back of his hand across his mouth. His lips glisten in the sun and I can’t resist. I lean forward and kiss him. I kiss him deeply, his mouth moist and warm in response. Then I pull away.

  ‘Sorry, couldn’t help myself.’ I grin at him cheekily and a smile spreads across his face, gentle lines fanning outwards from the corners of his eyes.

  ‘Well, who can blame you; I’m pretty irresistible.’ He shrugs and spreads his arms wide.

  ‘True.’ I smile back at him and his grin falters. I know he’s expecting me to tease him, the way I normally would. But I’m not going to, not this time. I don’t want anything to spoil the moment, and so I keep quiet. Instead, I lie back down, stretching my arms behind my head to form a makeshift pillow and continue to gaze at the sky. Ed’s still sitting up and his shadow falls across my chest. I can feel him watching me.

  ‘This is great, isn’t it?’ he says after a moment.

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘You know, this.’ From the corner of my eye I see him sweep his arm, taking in us, the tiny square of garden, the flat. I lift my head and look round, my eyes squinting against the light. Then I look at him; the hair that always flops over his eye no matter what he does, the lightly tanned skin from working outside all day, the dark stubble starting to sprout on his chin, and I know he’s right. This is right.

  I reach my hand out and press it against his cheek, feeling the roughness of two days’ growth beneath my palm. He puts his hand on top of mine and holds it there.

  ‘This is perfect, Ed.’

  He nods. ‘It is. Let’s never let things change.’

  Of course I’m more aware than anyone that nothing lasts forever. Which is why we find ourselves just an hour later back in the house, unpacking boxes, the spell broken.

  ‘I thought you said we were going to do this tomorrow,’ Ed grumbles, pulling out more plates and unwrapping the newspaper from them. ‘Jeez, how many plates do you need?’

  ‘I like to eat. Anyway, how many houseplants do you need?’

  ‘Three! There are only three!’

  ‘Really?’ I raise my eyebrows and look round the room. I can count at least seven.

  ‘Some of these are for outside, Charlie Dimmock.’

  ‘Oh. Well, they all look the same to me.’

  Ed rolls his eyes. ‘God’s sake, such a heathen. Tell you what, I’ll take these outside, leave you to unwrap the contents of Habitat.’

  He turns and lifts one of the bigger pots from the floor behind him with a grunt and heaves it out of the back door. I watch him until he disappears into the bright sunshine, then I turn back to unwrapping plates, stacking them in a pile next to the mugs. Ed’s shuffling backwards and forwards behind me, carrying plants out to the garden. He was thrilled when we found a flat with a garden. For him it was more important than the flat itself.

  ‘Just think, we can escape outside whenever we want, get some fresh air.’

  ‘Ed, it’s a tiny handkerchief of a garden, overlooked by fifteen other flats, in the middle of Crouch End. It’s hardly Kew Gardens.’

  He’d shrugged. ‘Yeah, but one day we can have somewhere bigger, in the middle of nowhere. This is just the start.’

  I hadn’t said anything at the time but now I couldn’t push it from my mind. Ed loved the countryside, and although he was happy in London right now, for him it wasn’t a long-term thing. The problem was, for me it was. I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, had no desire whatsoever to live in the countryside. But instead of talking to him about it I’d buried my head in the sand and hoped it wouldn’t matter.

  But of course it would, one day.

  But what if I could bring it up now, give him some warning that, actually, I was unlikely ever to want the big house in the country filled with kids that he dreamed of? Would it stop the rows, later?

  ‘Ed?’

  He stops in the middle of carrying a plant outside, his breath coming quick and fast. ‘Yep?’

  ‘I love living in London.’

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘But you don’t want to live here always, do you?’

  He adjusts his grip on the flowerpot, rests it on the counter.

  ‘Zo, this is heavy, do we need to talk about this now?’

  ‘Yes. It’s important.’

  ‘Hang on a sec, then.’ He bends down and rests the plant on the floor, wipes his hands down his jeans. ‘Right, all yours. What’s up?’

  ‘I just – I worry this isn’t going to be enough for you, one day.’
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br />   ‘What, me and you, or this flat?’

  ‘Us, in the city. I worry you think this is just for now, that one day I’ll want to move to a massive house in the middle of nowhere. But Ed, I don’t think I’ll ever want that.’

  Ed leans on the counter, takes a deep breath and lets it out in a rush. He’s looking at something in the distance, thinking.

  ‘You pick your moments, don’t you?’

  I shrug. ‘Sorry. It just felt important, you know, to mention it.’

  ‘Well, tell you what, let’s just enjoy today, enjoy being here, and worry about that if it happens. Yes, it would be great to live somewhere else, somewhere with air to breathe and space, but it’s not everything.’ His eyes turn to mine, latch on. ‘It’s you I want, Zoe, and to be honest we could live in a mud hut in the middle of the desert and I wouldn’t care.’

  I can’t help it. A grin crosses my face. ‘Ed, I don’t think they have mud in the desert. I think it’s just sand.’

  Quick as lightning he picks up a piece of scrunched-up newspaper and throws it at my head. ‘You’re not funny, Morgan.’

  ‘I am, Ed, I’m hilarious. You’ll learn.’

  He stops, suddenly serious. ‘I guess we’ll learn a lot of things about each other over the next few years, hey?’ His voice is gentle now and tears prick my eyes. He’s right, we do have a lot to learn about each other, about what the future holds. At least, he does. I know too much.

  ‘Yes, I guess we will.’

  Later, when the darkness has descended and we’ve unpacked everything we own, Ed and I flop, exhausted, onto the new leather sofa.

  ‘I’m bloody knackered.’

  I snuggle into his shoulder and he wraps his arms around me protectively.

  ‘Me too.’

  He picks up the remote and flicks the TV on and we sit in silence, staring at the images on the screen. And soon I can’t hold on any longer, I have to let go of this day and move on, and just hope I get another one. My eyelids droop and my breathing steadies and slowly, finally, I drift off and let the darkness take me . . .

  7

  26 January 2002

  ‘Zoe, it’s me. Mum.’

  I rub my eyes groggily. The sound of the phone ringing had woken me up and I’d just got to it before it stopped.

  ‘Mum. Hi.’

  ‘Are you OK? Did I wake you up?’

  ‘Mmm-hmm. S’OK, though.’

  I glance at the clock through bleary eyes. 7.15 a.m. What’s Mum doing ringing me at this time of the morning? And where am I?

  Before I can work it out, Mum’s talking again and I struggle to tune in.

  ‘I just rang to say good luck today. Me and Dad will be thinking about you all day; promise me you’ll let me know how it goes as soon as you get out?’

  Unsure what she’s talking about, I look around the room, scrabbling for clues, grasping for snippets of memory before they flit away again like butterflies, just out of reach.

  ‘Zoe, are you still there?’

  ‘Yes, sorry, I’m still here.’

  ‘You’re not crying, are you? Oh sweetheart, please don’t cry. You’ll be OK. You will.’ Mum’s voice catches on the last words and my heart flips. What the hell is going on?

  ‘I’ll ring you, I promise.’

  ‘OK. Good. Right, go and get yourself ready and we’ll speak later. Good luck. Love you.’

  ‘Thanks, Mum. Love you too.’

  Mum hangs up and I’m left holding the phone, confused. My feet are cold on the wooden floorboards and I realize I’m shivering. Grabbing my dressing gown from the back of the door, I pad through to the kitchen, hoping to find a clue. Ed’s nowhere to be seen but it’s our flat, at least our old flat, the one we moved into ‘yesterday’. A few plates are balanced on the draining board, clean, and a cafetière of half-drunk coffee sits cooling on the worktop. Ed’s favourite mug is next to it, a ring of brown round the inside rim. There’s nothing else out of place that I can see. I move my eyes over to the kitchen table. For a change it’s clear of papers and bills and envelopes – but there is a note, and I recognize Ed’s scrawled handwriting immediately. My heart stops at the sight of it.

  Have gone to work. Didn’t want to wake you. See you at the hospital at 2. Love you. Ed.

  Hospital.

  My legs feel weak and I pull out a chair to sit down. I’ve spent many, many hours and days in hospital over the last few years being poked, prodded and examined. What’s it about this time? What am I going in for – good news or bad news?

  I know one way to find out.

  I stand and walk, legs shaking, into the flat’s tiny bathroom. There’s no natural light in here but it doesn’t matter. I flick the light on, stand in front of the mirror, and lift my pyjama top up.

  And then I know. There, on the side of my right breast, is a small scar. It would be hardly visible to most people but I can see it. And that, along with the pain I can now feel in my breast, tells me exactly what today’s going to bring.

  It’s January 2002: the previous Christmas I’d found a lump in my breast. I’d been sitting in a boiling hot bath, the steam rising round me, filling the bathroom so I could hardly make out the cabinet on the wall, could barely see my toes at the other end. I was lazily rubbing body wash over myself, when suddenly I stopped. I rubbed my right breast again. Could I . . . ? Was there . . . ? Did I have a lump there?

  I stood up, water and bubbles whooshing down my body with the sudden movement, and almost jumped out of the bath. I grabbed a towel, wrapped it round myself, and went drip, drip, dripping into the front room. Ed was slumped on the sofa, exhausted after a long day gardening, a blank look on his face as he stared at the TV, a glass of wine in his hand. He glanced up as I walked in, his forehead creasing slightly at the sight of me.

  Before he had a chance to speak I blurted, ‘I’ve found a lump.’ I threw myself on the sofa next to him and took the towel off. ‘Look,’ I said, pointing at my boob. ‘Feel this. Does this feel right to you?’

  Ed knew this was no time for jokes, and he dutifully ran his hand gently round the curve of my breast. He stopped when he got to the lump, and I knew he’d felt it too. My body stiffened. ‘It’s not right, is it?’ I said, my voice almost a whisper.

  He shrugged. ‘Zo, I honestly have no idea.’

  I knew he was just telling the truth but it wasn’t what I wanted to hear, and I burst into tears.

  ‘Ed, I’ve got breast cancer!’ My voice wobbled precariously.

  ‘Zo, don’t you think you’re being a bit dramatic? It might be nothing. It probably is nothing. Don’t get upset before you even know if there’s anything to get upset about.’

  ‘It’s easy for you to say,’ I said.

  ‘How?’

  I stopped. ‘What?’

  ‘How is it easy for me to say?’ he said, his voice hardening.

  ‘Seeing you crying and getting all upset and panicking and the possibility you could be ill? That’s not easy at all. In fact it’s bloody hard. But there’s just no point in getting yourself in a state because you’ve found a lump until you know what it is.’

  I stared at him, shocked by the emotion in his voice.

  ‘You’re right,’ I said, wiping my face with the towel I’d wrapped back around my now-shivering body. ‘I’m really sorry. I’m just scared. It’s just – you know, you always read about these things, and it’s always bad news, and, well, I . . .’

  ‘You what?’ Ed said gently.

  ‘I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving you.’ My voice was quivering.

  Ed leaned over and put his arms around my shoulders.

  ‘Oh, you silly sod,’ he said, and I could hear the smile in his voice. ‘You’re not going anywhere. I won’t let you.’ He pressed his lips gently on the top of my head and, even though I had no idea whether his words were true, I felt comforted. I felt safe. My Ed wouldn’t let anything happen to me.

  It was Christmas a couple of days after that, so there was nothing I
could do. We were spending Christmas Day with my family in Doncaster. We hadn’t seen them for months, and had really been looking forward to it.

  ‘Let’s not tell Mum and Dad until we know a bit more,’ I said.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Ed knew how much I hated lying to them.

  I thought about it. What good would it do, telling them about it before we even knew whether it was something to worry about? ‘No, let’s wait,’ I insisted. ‘Let’s have a happy Christmas and deal with this in the new year.’

  And that’s what we’d intended to do. But when I was there, surrounded by the people I loved, I’d realized I needed their support. I needed them. And so I’d told Mum over the sprouts, as I was preparing them for Christmas dinner.

  ‘Mum, I’ve got – some news.’

  ‘Ooh, good or bad?’

  I paused. ‘Um. Not good.’

  I heard her put down the knife she’d been chopping carrots with. ‘Zoe, what is it? What’s happened?’

  Suddenly she was behind me, her hands on my shoulders, and I turned and faced her, buried my face in her chest. Tears ran down my cheeks and soaked into her reindeer jumper and she held me for a moment, quietly.

  I pulled away and wiped my face, sniffing. ‘Sorry. It’s just, I haven’t really talked about it much. Not yet. I – I’m going for some tests. In the new year. I’ve found a lump, in my boob, and I need to find out whether it’s cancer.’

  I felt Mum’s body tense but she said nothing, smoothing my hair back from my face and kissing my forehead gently. ‘I’m scared, Mum.’ My voice was barely a whisper.

  ‘I know, darling. I know. But everything will be OK.’

  I didn’t know whether her words were true but I was grateful for them, grateful she didn’t quiz me too much, want too much detail.

  I asked her to tell Dad and Becky, and later, over dinner, the mood was subdued.

  As we passed the vegetables round the table in silence, I stood up. Everyone turned to me.

  ‘Right, that’s enough tiptoeing around. I know Mum’s told you my – our news.’ I glanced at Ed, and he smiled weakly. ‘But I don’t want it to spoil today. I don’t want it to spoil anything. So can we just pretend it’s not happening and enjoy Christmas dinner? Please.’