I wake up from the best night’s sleep I can remember for a long time. I don’t think I even dreamed. Nick certainly didn’t wake me when he came in. It would have been nice if he had – more than nice – but I feel so much better for the proper sleep that I can’t complain. I can wake him up now though. I slide my leg across the bed, but it just keeps going and the sheet is cool. He’s not there. My stomach clenches with a familiar fear – it reminds me of how I felt when we were properly together, always worrying that he’d meet someone else, someone he liked better. I hated feeling so insecure, but I couldn’t seem to get past it.
But now I’m not scared that he’s met someone, I’m scared that something’s happened to him, that he’s lying hurt somewhere. Or worse. My stomach clenches again like I’ve been punched. I can’t even think about it. I can’t lie here wondering. I sit up.
Nick’s sitting in the chair by the window. The chair I was sitting in when I texted Adam last night. I can see my phone on the table in front of him. The red message light is flashing. I didn’t turn my phone off. Last night. After I texted Adam, I didn’t turn it off.
‘Hey,’ Nick says. He looks exhausted. And hurt.
‘Hey.’ I pull my knees up to my chest.
‘Adam texted a few times,’ he says, his voice flat and cold. ’And it kept buzzing on the table. I was just going to turn it off, but then I saw his text and I –’
‘You read mine too?’
He nods.
I put my face in my hands.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, but I can’t look at him yet. I have that feeling again. That I want to run away. I press my feet down against the mattress and my back against the headboard. I’m not going anywhere.
‘What the fuck, Cass?’ At the sound of the hurt, the anger in Nick’s voice, I finally look at him. He rubs his face with his hands. ‘I’ve been sitting here trying to … thinking about the last couple of days and how I thought that we could … Did you do it on purpose? Is it like a revenge thing?’
My eyes fill. ‘No. God, no. I didn’t plan anything. I just … In the airport when I saw you I … I missed you. I mean, I already missed you, you know? I always missed you. But I made myself not think about it. And then when I saw you, I just … I wanted you.’
Nick runs a hand through his hair. I can’t read his expression.
‘And you asked about Adam. And I knew that if I said “Oh yeah, we’re still together” you’d say “Great” and that would be it. We’d have a polite conversation, you know? I couldn’t stand it.’
‘So, you just went along with it when I suggested coffee and then … ’ He gestures at the room and at me. ‘This?’
‘Yeah.’ I swallow back the massive lump in my throat. ‘I thought that was the answer, you know? I thought I could come to New York, step out of my real life, have a couple of days with you and get you out of my system for good … then go home and –’
‘Go back to Adam?’
‘No. I didn’t come on my own because he had too much work on. I came on my own because I didn’t want to spend a weekend in New York with him. I came to think about what I’m going to do. My life is completely fucked in every way and I wanted to take a couple of days to think about it, to try to work out what I’m going to do, because … ’ I have to stop talking because I’m crying too much.
Nick doesn’t move. I don’t blame him.
‘What’s fucked up?’ he asks, and his voice is gentle.
‘Everything. I’ve dropped out of my course.’
‘When? Why?’
‘A couple of weeks ago. I wasn’t enjoying it anyway and I’d missed loads of work, and then … ’ I take a raggedy breath and say the words I haven’t been able to say aloud since I heard them myself. ‘My dad’s been having an affair. For two years.’
‘Shit,’ Nick says. He looks at me for what seems like ages as I lose the fight with my tears. Then, just when I couldn’t feel any more pathetic or ashamed, he gets up. He crosses the tiny room and sits on the bed next to me. He puts his arms around me and I cry and cry and cry.
‘When did you find out?’ he asks me when I’ve finally stopped bawling my eyes out.
He’s called downstairs for coffee and even though my insides feel hollow, the coffee is definitely helping.
‘A couple of weeks ago,’ I say. ‘Mum told me. She’s devastated. I mean, I know people always say that, but she really is. She had no idea. She smashed his car windows. And his computer.’
‘Bloody hell,’ Nick says. ‘I can’t imagine your mum –’
‘No, I know. She wasn’t like my mum at all. She’s so angry and upset and humiliated – she knows the woman, she’s known her for years.’
‘So what’s happened? Has he moved out?’
I shake my head. ‘He said he didn’t want to. He did after she smashed his stuff. He’s staying in a hotel. But he didn’t want to.’
‘Have you spoken to him?’
I shake my head. ‘I can’t. I can’t believe he’s done it. Any of it. Not just that he’s been … you know. With someone else. But all the lying. And not just to Mum. He must’ve lied to me too. It’s been years. I keep thinking about times when I’ve rung him and he couldn’t talk or there was this time he said he was coming into Manchester and we were going to meet for lunch at Malmaison and then he cancelled. Said he was stuck at work. But maybe he was there. But with her.’
‘You don’t know that though,’ Nick says. ‘You’ll just fuck yourself up thinking like that. You need to talk to him and get things straight between him and you. Him and your mum is something different. What are they going to do, has she said?’
I take a deep breath. ‘Yeah. He says it’s over and he’ll … he won’t … ’ I can’t even say it.
‘He’ll never do it again? Shit, Cass.’
I laugh. ‘I know, right? I’m a Freudian nightmare.’