Adam

We’re having a party today, for Livia and Marnie. Josh has organised it. Everyone who was at Liv’s party last year is coming, plus Marnie’s friends from school and university. All the people who’ve become an important part of our lives during these last twelve months.

In the aftermath of Marnie’s death, and at her memorial service, the one thing people wanted to know was what they could do to help. We thought about it and decided that what we wanted, what would help the most, was for them to keep Marnie alive in our minds by keeping her alive in theirs, and talking to us about her. And it has helped, hearing stories about her that we never knew. It isn’t always easy, but it’s better than never mentioning Marnie at all.

That was one of my first mistakes, not mentioning Marnie to save people embarrassment. It’s normal for clients, while we’re talking about the piece I’m going to make for them, to show me photos of their house so I can suggest the best type of wood to use to harmonise with the rest of their furniture. Inevitably, talking about ‘home’ leads to talking about family and, if I was asked about my children I would only mention Josh. But each time, it felt like a terrible betrayal of Marnie. So now this is what I say:

My son, Josh, lives in London with his girlfriend, Amy. I did have a lovely daughter, Marnie, but she died some months back in a plane crash – the Pyramid Air one, perhaps you heard about it?

And when they look shocked and mumble that they’re sorry, I say:

It was terrible at the time, and it still is most days, but we try to remember how lucky we were to have her.

It’s usually enough.

For the first few weeks after Marnie’s death, Liv was definitely stronger than me. I was a physical and emotional mess. Crushed not just by guilt and grief, but also by Marnie’s affair with Rob. I couldn’t reconcile the Marnie I knew with the Marnie she had become. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep, and quickly lost a stone in weight. Whenever I thought about her last moments, I imagined her calling, not for Livia, or me, but for Rob.

We never made it to Cairo. The night Livia came to find me in my shed, when everything finally became too much, the thought of boarding a plane a few hours later filled me with such dread that I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do it.

‘I can’t go to Cairo,’ I murmured shakily, as the sun began to rise in the sky. ‘I don’t want to see.’

‘Then we won’t go,’ she told me gently. ‘I don’t want to see either.’

In the aftermath of the accident, it was Nelson who dealt with the official side of things and kept us up to date with the investigation into the crash. Trapped in a deep, dark tunnel with seemingly no light at the end of it, I was incapable of doing anything.

The turning point came about six weeks after Marnie’s death when I wandered down to the kitchen one morning, and found a note from Livia, saying she’d gone out. Josh didn’t seem to be around either and I vaguely remembered that he and Amy had gone away for a few days’ break. It was the first time I’d been on my own since Marnie had died, and although I’d retreated so far into myself that I barely spoke, their absence began to weigh on me until I couldn’t stand it any longer. I tried phoning Livia but each time, my call went through to voicemail.

I phoned Nelson.

‘I can’t get hold of Livia,’ I told him, feeling near to tears. ‘I don’t know where she is. What if she’s had an accident?’

‘She hasn’t.’

‘How do you know?’

‘She’s gone to the Park,’ he said, referring to Windsor Great Park. ‘Have you just got up?’

‘Yes,’ I admitted, because it was nearly midday.

‘Then have a shower and a shave and go and join her.’

‘No,’ I said, shrinking back inside myself. I hadn’t left the house for weeks, not since Marnie’s memorial service, and I didn’t want to go a place that held so many memories of her.

‘You have to.’

‘Why?’

‘What date are we?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘It’s the twenty-fourth of July.’

I knew that date. Marnie’s birthday. ‘It can’t be,’ I stuttered, unable to believe that most of July had gone past without me noticing.

‘You need to get a grip, Adam,’ Nelson said firmly. ‘You can’t go on like this.’

I felt a surge of anger. ‘In case you’ve forgotten, my daughter died,’ I said, my voice cold.

‘And so did Livia’s. Go and find her. She needs you, Adam. She can’t go on carrying you anymore.’

I hated him then. But when I went to the bathroom, my hate turned towards the shell of a man staring at me from the mirror. I barely recognised myself and that frightened me. How could I have let myself become such a mess? It wasn’t Nelson’s voice I could hear telling me to get a grip, but Marnie’s. She’d have been appalled to see me in such a state.

While I shaved for the first time in weeks, I thought about what Nelson had said about Livia carrying me, and felt a growing shame. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d looked at her properly, or had had a conversation with her. Consumed with guilt, Marnie’s death had become all about me.

I guessed that Livia would have walked into Windsor and used the Cambridge Gate entrance to get into the park. I kept my head down as I walked through the town, imagining that everyone recognised me as the man who had lost his daughter in the plane crash. When I reached the gate, I found myself faltering. We had always started the Long Walk with Marnie here, and I wasn’t sure I could do it without her. And then the strangest thing happened. As I stood hesitating, with memories of Marnie crowding my thoughts, I felt myself being propelled forward. I was so sure someone was pushing me that I turned my head to see who was there. But there was no-one. And yet there was, because I could feel this presence walking along beside me.

‘Hello, Marnie,’ I murmured. ‘Happy birthday.’ A gentle breeze stirred the air around me and for the first time since Livia’s party, I found myself smiling.

I wasn’t worried that I wouldn’t find Livia. I knew that if I kept walking, I’d eventually meet her as she made her way back to the gate. It was a while before I saw her coming towards me. I was shocked at how thin and tired she looked, and wondered how I could have been so selfish.

She didn’t see me as she trudged along with her head down. As she went to move around me, I caught her arm.

‘Livia.’

It took her a moment to realise it was me. And when she did, she slumped against me and burst into tears of relief and exhaustion.

From the kitchen, I hear Josh and Amy moving around upstairs as they get dressed. I left Livia sleeping but I heard the shower running, so she’ll be down soon. I open the back door and Murphy stirs in his basket. He comes to stand beside me and we go out to the garden to wait for Livia.

I miss Marnie every minute of every day. There’s an aching void inside me which will never be filled – how can it be when I’ve lost a part of me? But Livia and I have come a long way in a year, thanks to the love and support of our family and friends. She has Jess, Kirin and her mum, and I have Izzy, Ian and my parents, especially my dad. His sixth sense knows when I’m drowning and he’ll miraculously appear to throw me a lifeline, usually in the form of a drink in town, or a walk along the river with Murphy, whichever he feels I need most.

I also have Nelson, who came and stood in the doorway of my shed one day, and I knew from the look on his face that he’d found out about Marnie and Rob. He was heartbroken over their affair, furious that Rob was willing to risk everything he had, everything we had, for something that could never be.

‘What was he thinking?’ he kept repeating, the same question Livia and I had asked ourselves over and over again in relation to Marnie. ‘I’m so sorry, Adam, I’m so sorry.’

I tried to comfort him, telling him it took two to have an affair. I was glad he didn’t know about the baby Marnie had lost. I almost wished I didn’t, but Livia hadn’t wanted there to be any secrets between us. Sometimes, I try to imagine what it would have been like if Marnie hadn’t lost the baby and if she hadn’t died. It’s heartbreaking to think how it could have been. But I also know it would have been extremely difficult to adapt to such a situation.

Nelson asked what Livia and I wanted to do, saying he’d understand if we never wanted to see Rob again. Under any other circumstances, that’s what we’d have chosen, to never see him again. But we had Jess to think of. If we cut Rob out of our lives, she would want to know why. I also had Livia to think of. To lose her best friend, which she inevitably would, on top of losing her daughter, would be too much. And there was Cleo and Josh to consider. We didn’t want either of them to know about the affair.

In the end, it was Liv’s decision. She said she wanted us to carry on as before, as if nothing had happened, as if we didn’t know. So that’s what we do. It’s incredibly hard, and despite our best efforts, things aren’t quite the same when we meet up. If Jess, or Kirin – because Nelson preferred not to tell her – notice that Rob is more subdued around us, they probably put it down to the strain of Marnie’s death. Normally Kirin might have dug deeper, but she has her hands full with the latest additions to their family, Rose and Bertie, who are now six months old.

I think Livia finds it easier than me. There are days when the weight of the lie becomes almost too heavy; when I don’t know how I’m going to bear being in the same room as Rob, or breathe the same air as him. But I do it for Livia, for all that she’s been through, for the way she has coped with losing Marnie, for the way she carried me during those first weeks, putting her grief aside to get me through mine. And because I love her more now than ever.