somewhere in the black hole of his twenties. He wasn’t his brother. He doubts he ever could be.
Not now.
As he arcs in the cold air, he admires the ocean, a vast steel sheet reflecting a fractured moon.
No, I am a good man , he tel s himself as he drags himself and his heavy conscience back toward home.
As Helen drives, she keeps checking her daughter, numb in the passenger seat beside her.
She has dreaded something like this happening. She has tormented herself many times imagining similar scenarios. But now it has actual y happened, it doesn’t feel real at al .
“I want you to know that it’s not your fault,” she says. In the mirror the car is stil there, its fog lights gleaming. “You see, it’s this thing, Clara. This condition . We’ve al got it but it’s been . . .
dormant . . . for years. Al your life. Al Rowan’s life. Your father and I, Dad and me, we didn’t want you to know. We thought if you didn’t know, then . . . Nurture over nature, that’s what we thought . .
.”
Helen knows it’s her duty to keep talking, explaining, offering her daughter words on top of words. Bridges over the silence. Veils over the truth. But she is crumbling inside.
“But this thing . . . it’s strong . . . it’s as strong as a shark. And it’s always there, no matter how stil the water is. It’s there. Just below. Ready to . . .”
In the rearview mirror, the fog lights stop moving and switch off. Helen finds some slight relief in knowing she is no longer being fol owed.
“But the thing is,” she says, gaining control of her voice again, “it’s al right. It’s al right because we’re strong too, darling, and we’re going to get over this and back to normal, I promise you. It’s
—”
Helen sees the drying blood on Clara’s face, streaked around her mouth and nose and chin.
Like camouflage.
How much blood did she use?
Helen feels such pain, now, as she wonders this. The pain of having built something up, something as careful y constructed as a cathedral, only to know it wil fal apart, crushing everyone and everything she cares about.
“What am I?” says Clara.
It is too much. Helen has no idea how to answer this. She wipes tears from her eyes. Eventual y she finds the words. “You’re who you’ve always been. You’re you. Clara. And—”
A random memory intrudes into her mind. Patting her daughter to sleep as a one-year-old, after another troubled dream. Singing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” about a hundred times over to calm her down.
She wishes for that moment again, and for there to be a right lul aby to sing.
“And I’m sorry, darling,” she says, as dark trees slide by the window, “but it’s going to be al right. It is, it is. I promise. It’s going to be al right.”
My Name Is Will Radley
In a supermarket car park in Manchester, a woman is staring with untold longing into the eyes of Peter’s brother. She has absolutely no idea what she is doing. It is God-knows-what time and she is in the car park with him, this incredible, hypnotical y fascinating man. Her last customer of the day, he had come to her register with nothing but dental floss and wet wipes in his basket.
“Hel o, Julie,” he had said, checking her name badge.
He had looked terrible on the face of it, like a disheveled rocker from some outdated band who stil thought the shabby raincoat was a sound fashion statement. And he was obviously older than her, but when she tried to guess his age she couldn’t.
Yet, even at that first sight of him, she had felt something wake up inside her. The self-wil ed semicoma she fel into at the start of her shift—which lasted through every shopping item she swiped and every receipt she tore out of the til —suddenly left her and she’d felt strangely alive.
Al those clichéd things a more romantical y inclined person believes in: the quickening heart, the giddy rush of blood to the head, that sudden light warmth in the stomach.
They’d had a
Not now.
As he arcs in the cold air, he admires the ocean, a vast steel sheet reflecting a fractured moon.
No, I am a good man , he tel s himself as he drags himself and his heavy conscience back toward home.
As Helen drives, she keeps checking her daughter, numb in the passenger seat beside her.
She has dreaded something like this happening. She has tormented herself many times imagining similar scenarios. But now it has actual y happened, it doesn’t feel real at al .
“I want you to know that it’s not your fault,” she says. In the mirror the car is stil there, its fog lights gleaming. “You see, it’s this thing, Clara. This condition . We’ve al got it but it’s been . . .
dormant . . . for years. Al your life. Al Rowan’s life. Your father and I, Dad and me, we didn’t want you to know. We thought if you didn’t know, then . . . Nurture over nature, that’s what we thought . .
.”
Helen knows it’s her duty to keep talking, explaining, offering her daughter words on top of words. Bridges over the silence. Veils over the truth. But she is crumbling inside.
“But this thing . . . it’s strong . . . it’s as strong as a shark. And it’s always there, no matter how stil the water is. It’s there. Just below. Ready to . . .”
In the rearview mirror, the fog lights stop moving and switch off. Helen finds some slight relief in knowing she is no longer being fol owed.
“But the thing is,” she says, gaining control of her voice again, “it’s al right. It’s al right because we’re strong too, darling, and we’re going to get over this and back to normal, I promise you. It’s
—”
Helen sees the drying blood on Clara’s face, streaked around her mouth and nose and chin.
Like camouflage.
How much blood did she use?
Helen feels such pain, now, as she wonders this. The pain of having built something up, something as careful y constructed as a cathedral, only to know it wil fal apart, crushing everyone and everything she cares about.
“What am I?” says Clara.
It is too much. Helen has no idea how to answer this. She wipes tears from her eyes. Eventual y she finds the words. “You’re who you’ve always been. You’re you. Clara. And—”
A random memory intrudes into her mind. Patting her daughter to sleep as a one-year-old, after another troubled dream. Singing “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” about a hundred times over to calm her down.
She wishes for that moment again, and for there to be a right lul aby to sing.
“And I’m sorry, darling,” she says, as dark trees slide by the window, “but it’s going to be al right. It is, it is. I promise. It’s going to be al right.”
My Name Is Will Radley
In a supermarket car park in Manchester, a woman is staring with untold longing into the eyes of Peter’s brother. She has absolutely no idea what she is doing. It is God-knows-what time and she is in the car park with him, this incredible, hypnotical y fascinating man. Her last customer of the day, he had come to her register with nothing but dental floss and wet wipes in his basket.
“Hel o, Julie,” he had said, checking her name badge.
He had looked terrible on the face of it, like a disheveled rocker from some outdated band who stil thought the shabby raincoat was a sound fashion statement. And he was obviously older than her, but when she tried to guess his age she couldn’t.
Yet, even at that first sight of him, she had felt something wake up inside her. The self-wil ed semicoma she fel into at the start of her shift—which lasted through every shopping item she swiped and every receipt she tore out of the til —suddenly left her and she’d felt strangely alive.
Al those clichéd things a more romantical y inclined person believes in: the quickening heart, the giddy rush of blood to the head, that sudden light warmth in the stomach.
They’d had a
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