The Boy That Never Was by Karen Perry Page B

you’d know within two minutes.’
    That insistence again, the weight of it pressed against the door.
    ‘Come on,’ he said, tapping softly but impatiently. ‘You’re killing me here.’
    There was a mirror above the sink. The face that stared back at me was pale and drawn. The eyes had a haunted look to them.
    Robin, I said to myself. What on earth have you done?
    I left the teabag on the draining board, my hand shaking. Get a grip, I told myself sternly. The tea made, I took it with me to the armchair drawn up to the window and I sat down and stared out at the frozen garden, feeling the mug warm between my hands. The memory had rattled me. Why had it come to me now? And in its wake, I felt unsettled, deflated, my energy draining away, leaving me in a lethargy of discontent. One memory followed another. They tumbled up from the past, demanding recognition. I sipped my tea and allowed my mind to wander.
    I thought of that first pregnancy, the craziness of it. Stumbling and lurching from month to month, my mind struggling to catch up with the changes sweeping through my body. Harry had accepted it far more quickly and easily than I had. He had jumped at the possibility of a baby – pounced on it. From the very start of my pregnancy with Dillon, Harry was there, ambushing me with his eager anticipation, his hunger for it. And yet, last night, when I’d told him my news, he had not been like that at all. Instead he had grown still and silent.He had stared at the table in front of him for the longest time, and I had felt the reluctance coming off him in waves. What was it he had said?
    ‘I can’t believe it.’
    Now, sitting in my armchair by the window, the mug of tea cooling in my hands, those words came back to me, and I felt the chill echo of them in that silent room. I considered again what that reluctance might mean. I told myself that it was the suddenness of the news, coming on a day that had been difficult for him, what with moving out of his studio and all the complex emotions that entailed. I told myself that after Dillon, even good news brought on a strange mix of feelings. I told myself that, given time and space, he would come around to the idea.
    And I knew from experience that it was best not to push it. Better to let these things lie. He was a man with a particular vulnerability. I knew the signs. Funny, the things you learn about yourself when a tragedy takes over your life. Who would have thought that I would turn out to be the strong one, while Harry fell to pieces.
    A creak of floorboards overhead alerted me to his rising. I sat there listening to his movements in the bedroom, a pause before the groan of the door, and then the sound of him coming down the stairs.
    ‘Jesus, you look terrible,’ I said as he emerged from the hallway, a greenish tinge to his skin, his eyes bleary and bloodshot. He was holding himself carefully, as if every movement threatened the delicate balance of his hangover and it was a great effort to keep himself from veering over the precipice.
    ‘Tea,’ he croaked, his voice hoarse from a dozen cigarettes. ‘I feel like something’s died in my mouth.’
    ‘Kettle’s just boiled.’
    I watched him there, pouring hot water into a mug, and I had the thought that the years might have fallen away and we could be students again. From where I was sitting, he seemed the same tall, somewhat gangly youth, with that unruly dark hair, the square set of his shoulders, a skittish energy running the length of his long, taut body. But I wasn’t eighteen any more, and he wasn’t twenty. He tossed the teabag and spoon into the sink and grimaced as his mouth met with the lip of the cup. Then he came and sat down opposite me, giving out a great sigh as he did so, running a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes, and I remembered how agitated he had been the night before, his eyes darting around the room, unable to settle. He has cold blue eyes, like shallow water touched by sunlight. One