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  ‘I’ll try,’ he says, folding his arms and watching her. ‘It’s just the feel of the lace that gets me.’

  She tries not to smile as she opens the door. ‘This is the weirdest break-up ever.’

  ‘It was the weirdest together ever.’

  ‘I can think of weirder,’ she says, looking over his shoulder.

  He turns around, expecting to see Laura and is faced with the closed door of the spare bedroom. By the time he turns back to Bo she has left, and shut the door behind her. He only realises then that his body is trembling lightly, from the shock, from the loss. He looks at Laura’s closed door again and thinks of what Bo said.

  In love with her.

  Of course he is. He knew it the second he saw her.

  He knows now the solution to his dilemma, whether it’s better to protect something precious and rare, or to share it. His love for her was precious, and the intensity of it was rare. His love for her was better not shared. She’d do better without him, he brought her to this point and he hadn’t done her any favours. He was no good for someone like her. Precious was better kept protected.

  His role now is to fix the mess he got her into, the mess he made of her. He took her from her nest, fractured her life, left her. He’ll do everything he can to mend and rebuild. He closes his bedroom door and hears a sound from Laura that breaks his heart. Silence.

  39

  Close to five a.m. Solomon wakes to the sound of the television in the living room. Laura is still awake. He doesn’t hold out much hope for her performance that is technically tonight now that the sun is shining brightly and the morning has begun, and he’s not sure he cares. He weighs up the damage if she doesn’t show up at the studio; Laura doesn’t owe anything to the show, but she certainly owes it to herself. The public have got the wrong impression of her, and while nobody should care what people they don’t know think of them, when somebody has something so beautiful to show the world, when people can benefit from her just being, that’s when they should be understood. She owes it to herself to perform one final time, as herself, in the way that she wants to. He has no idea what Bo has up her sleeve, but he trusts her. The woman she has been for the past twenty-four hours has cemented in his mind her greatness, the reason why she’s won so many awards this year. She’s a champion in her own arena, she can capture hearts and minds through her storytelling.

  He can’t go to sleep, and while he’s trying to stay away from Laura, especially in such intimate surroundings, he can’t lie here while she’s out there. He’s hardly going to jump on her without her permission, but he bloody well wants to. Best to stay away. Yet knowing that, he gets out of bed, doesn’t bother with his T-shirt. He opens his bedroom door. She is sitting on the couch, her back to him. She’s watching The Toolin Twins.

  He watches her. Wearing one of his T-shirts, her long legs folded on the couch beside her, her hair falling lazily down, messy from her restless lie in her bed. His heart pounds. He’s about to say something, something comforting, something warm about her father and uncle, when she rewinds it for a few seconds and plays it again. He doesn’t want to disturb her hearing whatever she wanted to see or hear again. He waits, watching her. And then, when it’s finished, she rewinds it and plays it again, her back straightening. He looks at the TV, at the brothers on the mountain surveying their sheep. She rewinds and plays it again.

  It’s not the right time for him. He was right about it probably never being the right time. He closes his door softly and falls asleep to the sound of Laura rewinding and replaying her father and uncle.

  Laura keeps her eyes on the television as she hears the door behind her open. Her skin prickles, goosebumps rise on her skin. She sits there, frozen. Just him and her in the flat; she heard Bo leave, heard some of their conversation, tried not to listen as a mark of respect. She has felt so in the way of their relationship she should at least stay out of their goodbye, let them own that. So she’d lain in bed, eyes wide open, not at all tired despite the hour, the room smelling of Solomon, the same smell she’d smelled in the forest the first day they’d met.

  She’d sensed him before she’d smelled him.

  She had smelled his scent in the wind long before she’d seen him.

  She’d watched him long before he even sensed her.

  Watching him from behind the tree she had an overwhelming desire to be seen by him. Not like when she was a child. She’d watched other children playing in the woods and she’d wanted to play with them, but she knew better; most of the time she was happy just observing. That felt like enough. But in the forest on the day she first met Solomon, she had lost all reason and selfishly wanted his eyes on her. She’d deliberately made a sound so he would turn around. That moment had made her life change. It wasn’t her mother dying, Gaga moving her to the cottage or her father dying. The biggest risk Laura had ever taken was in making a sound so that Solomon could see her. A man like that, she wanted him to see her.

  And for a moment, in those woods, he’d been hers.

  Everything for her changed; life before she’d met Solomon, and life after.

  She swallowed the hard lump gathered in her throat. She’s dreamt of his hands on her body, his kiss on her skin, she’s imagined his touch, what he would feel like. Would he be gentle or strong, how he would kiss? She’s watched him with Bo, from the corner of her eye, she’s seen the tenderness he’s capable of and wonders, would he be that way, or different with her? She can’t help but wonder how his skin tastes, the feel of his tongue. From the moment she saw him, she hasn’t been able to stop these thoughts.

  She knew it was wrong to feel it. She’d tried to stop, but she kept being pulled back to him. She knew from her mum and Gaga that there was no place for a woman who took another woman’s man. They would have disapproved; she already disapproved of herself, even though they were only private thoughts. She’d clung to him, like a life raft, not thinking about anybody else. She’d thought being so far away from him in Australia would end it, keep her away from him, the other side of the world. It hadn’t. She’d thought meeting other men would distract her. Maybe because he was the only one she knew, that’s why her feelings were so heightened. That hadn’t been the case either. It seemed ironic, romantic and twisted that the first man she’d met would be the only one she ever wanted.

  None of the distractions in the world would work. And his scent … it wasn’t just his cologne, it was his skin. Sleeping in his room, living in his home, she felt like she was embraced by him. When she turned her head to the pillow and buried her face in it, it was like burying her face in him. She’d groan lightly with frustration because it wasn’t enough. To be surrounded by him, on the outside of him, near him. It wasn’t enough. She’d moved to the couch to distract herself.

  She’s afraid to breathe as she senses him behind her. She closes her eyes while the documentary plays and she imagines him coming up behind her, his lips on her neck, hands on her hips, then everywhere. Startled by her thoughts so close to him, she opens her eyes and focuses hard on the documentary, on what her uncle and father are saying. Her heart pounds, and not because she is seeing her father alive again.

  Watching the documentary hasn’t provided her with any solace at all so far. If anything, she feels even more alone. She was hoping to feel connected, rooted again, stop her floating head from drifting, ground herself with what is happening in her life. Start feeling, start hearing again, start making sounds again. However, she can’t help feeling that throughout the entire documentary she was living only metres away and yet there isn’t a trace of her, a hint of her.

  ‘You never wanted a wife, or children?’ Bo asks, on the documentary, and suddenly Laura sits up.

  Joe shakes his head, amused by the question, a little shy. A woman? Even with his lined aged face, he looks like a schoolboy when faced with this topic.

  ‘I’m busy here. With the farm. Lots to do.’

  ‘Sure who’d have him?’ Tom teases.

  ‘Wh
at about you, Tom? Have you never wanted marriage or a family?’

  He spends more time thinking about it than Joe did.

  ‘Everything I have, everything I need, is right here, on this mountain.’

  Laura pauses this, her heart hammering in her chest, and yes, this time it’s because of her father. She rewinds it, then plays it again. She watches Bo ask the same question of the two men in caps bent over hay bales. Whatever about Rachel’s stunning cinematography, the sight of the identical twins alone is beautiful. They have aged in exactly the same way.

  She plays it again.

  Her father.

  ‘Everything I have, everything I need, is right here, on this mountain.’

  On this mountain.

  Laura’s heart is pounding so much. To stop herself getting carried away, she scans the background to make sure it’s the right mountain. Just in case. Maybe there’s another child on another mountain, another woman who came after her mum. She’s sure it isn’t true, but just in case, something so big as this, she needs to understand correctly. She rewinds it again. Plays.

  By the time she has watched it for the fourth time, she’s sure. He had time to think about it, so much time that even Joe looked at him with that shy schoolboy grin on his face. His brother’s being asked about girls, he sniggers at him.

  What was on Tom’s mountain? Joe, his home, his business, his sheep, his dogs, his memories and, yes, Laura. She lived on that mountain, so that meant he was including Laura too. He might not have loved her in a conventional way that fathers love their daughters, but he acknowledged her, he recognised her, he valued her. And that means the world to Laura.

  Only once she has thought it all through does she remember Solomon. She turns around, a big smile on her face. He’s gone. His bedroom door is closed. Her smile fades fast, until she remembers her father’s words, then she goes to bed feeling as though he has just given her the hug she longed for but he never gave her until now.

  40

  Solomon gently raps on Laura’s door. He’s tentative at first and then he knocks with more confidence.

  ‘Laura, I—’

  The door opens, she’s wearing his T-shirt, that’s all. She looks at him, sleepy green eyes barely open or used to the daylight. She has a sleepy smell, a warm cosy bed smell and he wants to fall into her, literally. He looks her up and down while she rubs her eyes, her long legs, lean thighs disappear beneath his T-shirt.

  ‘Sorry about the T-shirt,’ she apologises. ‘I should have asked you but …’ She can’t think of an excuse and he doesn’t care.

  ‘No, don’t apologise. It’s fine. It’s great. I mean, you’re great. It looks great on you,’ he flounders. The neck is too wide for her, there are three buttons on the top, they’re all open so that he can see the curve of her breasts, one side gapes and if he leaned forward he would probably see …

  She looks down at the plate in his hand.

  ‘Oh. Yes. I made you a chicken salad. With pomegranate. Just because pomegranates are in everything these days.’

  She smiles, touched.

  ‘You should eat before we go to the studio, this’ll be better than that plastic crap.’ He looks down at the dish again. ‘Or then again, maybe not.’ He feels like he’s waffling. He’s a grown man, who wants desperately to go to bed with this woman, he needs to act like it. Though he can’t go to bed with her, that’s the problem. He will ruin her. He’s already done a good job of it so far. He straightens up, takes a step backward as he realises he’s practically leering at her. ‘We need to leave in a few hours. You slept all morning.’

  ‘I couldn’t sleep last night.’ She looks terrified at the thought of the show tonight.

  ‘Me neither.’ Their eyes lock. He’d swear she has a hypnotic effect on him. He snaps out of it. ‘The show starts at eight. You’re on first. You don’t need to be there until six. Later than usual, but they said you don’t need to hang around. They’ll do the sound checks without you.’

  ‘What about a rehearsal?’ she asks, confused.

  ‘They said you don’t need one. You’ll be absolutely fine, Laura. It’s the last show. The last two minutes you’ll ever be up there. Make it count.’

  ‘You were making me feel better until you said that.’

  ‘What I mean is, you need to show them who you really are. In fact, don’t show them, just be you. And they’ll see.’ When she smiles at him, he laughs. ‘I’m shit at this, aren’t I? Last time I had a warm-up gig for an act, twenty people left before the main act arrived.’

  She giggles. ‘Maybe you could do that for me tonight, make it easier.’

  She takes the plate from his hand and walks to the kitchen table. She sits down. He watches her eat. She crosses one leg over the other. She’s barefoot. His heart thumps. He should leave, but he can’t leave her alone in the apartment, not when she’s been entrusted to him to bring her to the studio in one piece. She might start climbing balconies again.

  He smiles at the thought of what happened last night.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’ He sits at the table opposite her. Whenever he thinks he should get away from her, he does the exact opposite. But then, the way she looks at him is distracting. ‘I was just thinking of you being the super ninja last night.’

  She bites her lip. ‘I’m glad her husband didn’t come.’

  ‘Hey, if he calls around here today, I’ll be straight out that window. You’re on your own.’ He leans down on the table, head on his crossed arms and looks up at her.

  ‘Hey,’ she grins, kicking him lightly under the table.

  Silence. He watches her eat. He watches her think, studies the furrowing of her brow. Her seriousness makes him smile, every fucking thing she does makes him smile, and when she looks at him his face twitches from hiding the telling smiles. He feels like he’s an overexcited twelve-year-old.

  ‘I was in rehearsal for two days for the last performance. A big elaborate dance routine. This week, nothing. I’m not sure how to take that.’ She looks at him. ‘Did you see it?’

  He can’t stop smiling, and now she thinks he’s laughing at her.

  ‘Of course I saw it,’ he says. ‘It was terrible.’

  She groans, throws her head back, her long neck stretching.

  ‘It wasn’t your fault. Bo suggested a link to the forest to their artistic director, but Goldilocks and the Three Bears wasn’t quite what she was thinking. It wasn’t your fault.’

  ‘I told Jack I didn’t want to do it, but they asked if I had any other suggestions and I couldn’t think of anything.’

  ‘So it was their way or nothing.’

  She nods. ‘Was it shocking?’

  He thinks of how he felt when he saw her. It had felt like such a long time since he’d seen her: she’d moved to the hotel, been to Australia, he felt completely cut off from her. ‘I was just happy to see you, it had been a while.’

  She smiles, her eyes shining.

  ‘But I know you can be so much better. Bo’s working on something for you for tonight. She’s putting a lot of work into it. I think she wants to redeem herself, show you that she cares.’ He wants to do the same, but he’s not sure how to.

  ‘She doesn’t owe me anything.’ She frowns. ‘All those mistakes are mine. I own them.’

  ‘Well then, on the theme of owning mistakes … About what happened with Rory …’

  Laura cringes, can barely think about it.

  Solomon sits up. ‘I let you down. In a big way. I’ll never forgive myself for that, but I want you to know that I’m sorry. I should have protected you better. I just didn’t want to … I thought I should give you space. For whatever reasons, my own reasons, I didn’t want to crowd you and this new path you’re on.’ He looks at her, wondering if he should continue.

  ‘I saw you three years ago,’ she interrupts him suddenly, as if she didn’t hear a word of what he’d said, though he knows she did, she was listening intently. ‘On the mountain. I was foragin
g. I was looking for an elder bush. Tom had cleared them all away, because he was trying to keep the hedge stock-proof, which bothered me because the berries are tasty in autumn and the flower … it doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Go on,’ he urges her.

  ‘The flower has the real power. It adds an incredible flavour to wines, drinks and jams. Gaga used to make the most delicious elderflower cordial, at its best after only six months. I was on a mission. I wanted to find an elder bush that Joe and Tom hadn’t destroyed, so I moved away further than I usually would. I came out from the woods and you were standing there, with your eyes closed, the headphones around your neck, that bag over your shoulder. I didn’t know what you were doing at the time. Now I know that you were listening, for sounds, but all I knew then was that you looked so peaceful.’

  ‘I didn’t see you.’

  She shakes her head. ‘I didn’t want you to see me.’

  ‘This was three years ago?’

  ‘May.’ The fourth of May, she remembers. And not just because the elderflower was in bloom. ‘I asked Tom who you were. He said you were making a TV show. That you liked sounds too. That’s all he said.’ She swallows hard before making a confession. ‘I watched you a few times.’

  ‘Really?’ he smiles. His heart pounds. ‘You should have said hi.’

  ‘I wish I had,’ she says softly. ‘Every day that I didn’t find you again, I wished that you’d seen me the previous time but then, when it came to it, I couldn’t. So this time when I saw you in the forest, after not having seen you for so long, I couldn’t risk it happening again. That’s why I made a sound. I wanted your attention.’

  She looks at him from under long eyelashes. There, the truth was out.

  ‘Well, you certainly got my attention,’ he says, reaching across the table and sliding the plate away. He takes her hands in his.

  She wants him to kiss her.

  He wants to kiss her so badly. He moves around the table, places a hand on her cheek and pulls her close. He kisses her gently at first, drawing away to look in her eyes, to make sure it’s okay. Her pupils are dilated, the green rim around them almost luminous. She closes her eyes, then kisses him hungrily.