Alex
"What?" I ask him just to be sure.
"It might be good to talk to him. When we last discussed him you told me yourself that you were scared to text him back, because it might mean a lot to you if he'd gone back to Palas for you."
"Well, yes, obviously."
"Why is that obvious?"
"Because he meant a lot to me, and New Year's Eve did too."
"That was when you decided to move forward with him, right?" He asks, looking through his notes.
"Yes," I answer, not letting myself go back to that moment. When we first discussed Thomas I realized it was hard, just like it is hard to think about him right now.
"Just like you were about to do right now."
"Yes, so why would I call him back? I was going to call Harry."
"Because I think you need to know why he wants to stay in touch with you. You were spare with your words about it him, but you were clear about that fact that he's too good for you. That's probably also why you didn't properly fought for him. You thought that you could let him go so easily because you didn't love him enough, but it might be because you can't believe someone like him might love you. That's why meeting him again and living around him was much easier than it was with Harry. You never gave him a second chance and protected yourself from him."
"I did try to kiss him later on though," I tell him, reminding myself from that embarrassing moment in my apartment in Palas where I tried to kiss Thomas, but he refused.
"And what would have happened if he kissed you back?"
"I don't know," I mumble, feeling the walls that doctor Collins described coming up when I think of Thomas.
I know he's only trying to make me see different sides of every story, just like he wants me to think positive of my mother, but I do find it difficult to think I had so much control over everything that went wrong in my life. That if I handled one thing differently, or someone else, I might not even be sitting here.
"He probably didn't do it because your ex was in town, someone he had trouble with already. He also had a girlfriend if I recall correctly."
"He told me later that he wanted to kiss me," I remember, and this is new information to Collins. It seems to excite him, although it is only visible because his lips curl up a little bit.
"Did he tell you why he didn't?"
"No, but I can imagine it had to do with the fact that he also knew we were a lost cause."
"Or that he believed you'd never return to England and that was the only thing he needed from you?"
Once that was exactly what I thought. When I'd been embarrassed after I'd thrown myself at him. I believed that getting back with Harry was impossible and that I still felt just as much at home with Thomas as I once did with Harry, but that I could never give him what he needed. Only months later I left Palas to live with Harry. Was that the wrong decision?
"You are playing with my feelings. I don't like it," I say, standing up and shoving my phone inside my pocket. "Me and Thomas are history. He came back to Palas to end it on a better note than we left it with. There was no indication that he wanted to get back with me then, nor is there now. So why let me think about him in that way? For fuck's sake, I'm just coming to terms with the fact that maybe Harry and I don't have a future no matter how hard I work on myself. That all I did was make mistake on mistake on mistake."
"I don't believe in mistakes," he tells me, wavering with his hands to let me sit down. "Why do you think he's calling?"
"Probably because he's angry that I don't text him anymore. Or maybe something's wrong with him or his family. I don't know."
"All negative things."
"You know me, so, yes."
"Maybe he just saw something fun that reminded him of you or maybe he has news about Palas that he wants to share with you. There's a million possibilities that don't necessarily mean bad news, Alex."
Feeling frustrated and pretty sure that after all this time there's no way his phonecall is to share good news, I take out my phone again and dial him back. Feeling stronger than I actual am I stare into doctor Collins eyes to prove a point.
"Hello?" Thomas's voice is music to my ears, momentarily choking me now that my mind is swirling with possibilities of what this could mean.
"You called?" I ask, hoping to sound as cold as I want to, but I know I sound hopeful instead.
"Well, yeah, I did. I didn't actually think you'd pick up," he says as if he too is doing this all without a plan.
"I did," I deadpan.
"Yes, thanks," he says and I can imagine him flustered, truly believing that I'd never answer the phone and only now is trying to find words for why he actually choose my number.
"What is it?"
"I, uhm, was just in the neighbourhood for the weekend. Thought maybe you wanted to meet up. You, Liam, Harry if he wishes."
"I'm not sure," I say, breaking eye contact with doctor Collins who is urging me to accept.
"It was just a thought. I know you are ignoring me and you have every right to. I don't know, maybe this was a stupid idea. Don't mind me," he says, finding a way to hang up, but it pains me to hear him embarrassed. That's not the Thomas I know and care for.
"It's okay," I breathe. "You can come to Liam's. He's free this weekend."
"And you?"
"I am too."
"Okay," he sighs, clearly relieved that I'm not blowing him off. "So, what would be a good time for you?"
"Somewhere tomorrow. Just text, I'm there," I tell him, letting out the fact that I'm always there. That Liam's place is my home.
"And you'll text back this time?" He asks and even through the phone and even after not seeing him for almost a year, I can hear that it pains him to ask this.
When Thomas left Palas I thought our candle had died down. He wanted to be there for his sister who was a new mother and we talked about meeting again, but I never thought he was serious. We spoke, texted and called here and there, but since he was always on the road and lived in Manchester, we never actually saw each other again. He must have thought that I was still in Palas when he returned for New Year's and he found out I moved back. If I were him, I'd be done with me. I did for Harry what I never got the chance to do for Thomas.
Since then I ignored him, because I truly believed that me and Harry had a future and I didn't want to use Thomas as bait for a fight with Harry. He's too good a person for that, but I realize now that he never deserved the way I treated him and that I was truly afraid that if I did text back and honestly told him what was wrong, the meeting would have happened a lot sooner.
"I will, promise."
He laughs at that, making me smile as well. "Okay, I'll try and believe you. See you tomorrow then."
"See you, Thomas," I say, his name rolling of my tongue like it is a foreign language.
"When life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade," doctor Collins says with a smile and I sigh, feeling jittery from going back and forth between Harry and Thomas, once again. Fuck Thomas for calling and fuck Collins for giving up my streak of ignoring him. How the hell is this going to help me in any way?
"How is this helpful?" I ask, feeling anger rise. "This is my life, you know. I'm breaking up piece by piece with a guy who I believed to be my soulmate and now you want me to meet with the guy who was the only one who ever got close to that sort of love?"
"I never told you to meet with him."
"You didn't stop me either."
"Because it might be good to see him, even if it is just for closure. Try and see it as something positive, Alex. Think of all the good things this might bring you. Use it to practise your skills, and then maybe you are prepared for whatever will happen between with you and Harry. And then, maybe if that is all behind you, we can go back to you," he says, emphasizing his last words to make clear that my love life is only a small portion of my problems and that if I don't work and heal myself first, it won't work out either way.
"You mean that this is just a detour from my real problems?" I deadpan, feeling like the reintroduction of Thomas and Harry accepting that we're apart are all very real to me, unlike my negativity towards my mother or basically everything in life.
"You know it is," he says, putting down his paper and pen, signalling me that our session is finally over. "Good luck tomorrow and we'll see each other on Monday."
****
Harry
There's not much to do around the house and I find myself bored after a week spent with my mother. Since I left home, now almost ten years ago, I haven't been around her for more than an evening. It is testing for the both of us, and on the outside we seem to manage, but on the inside I feel like I'm slowly dying with her.
To see her disease eat her up from the inside is painful. Although she has accepted her faith, I can tell that she's struggling and giving it all she has left to stay around for as long as possible. I know most of that has to do with how I'm feeling these days.
It's empty and terrifying without Alex, but the more time I spent inside my room, sketching or watching rowers in the lake, the more I realize that everything needed to happen just like this. And I was meant to end up here alone with my mother, without Alex and all that comes with her. That doesn't mean that I don't wish that she was here though. A fight with her would get my mind of things, that's for sure.
Ellie is very aware that I'm mourning losing Alex for the second time, but she is surprisingly quiet on the subject. There's one thing that I want to know of her before she dies and that is what she wants to do about the trusts. Especially the one she granted Alex. She still might have months to live, but it feels like time is running out when I saw her this morning. She looked so tired and as pale as her sheets. I need to ask her.
So after a cup of coffee, I feel brave enough to enter her room. In the twin bed, she looks rather tiny as she's reading the morning paper, still dressed in her night gown that she refused to get out of when I offered to help. We're still going back and forth when it comes to that.
"Hey," I announce my presence and she looks up for a brief second, then glances down the paper again. "I was thinking about going into town later, see if I can find some work for a while."
"You don't need to," she says. "I suppose you saved up?"
"Well," I look to my feet, embarrassed to admit. "I did, but it isn't enough, not for the long run. I'm still paying rent for the house in London and without an income, my savings are going to vanish soon."
"Didn't Alex pay half?"
"She did, until she lost her jobs."
"And, you asked her to give up the rent right?"
"Yeah, I called, she never answered."
"I guess that is all you need to know then," she says, pointing out the obvious. I had hoped when I left that voicemail that she would call back. Mentioning my mother and giving up rent should have been enough for her to at least give me the courtesy to call back. Apparently I fucked up so bad that I don't even deserve that. "Just give it up if you are sure you don't want to return to that house."
"I will," I tell her, knowing that whatever happens with myself or Alex, that neither of us want to live there again. "I'd still like to earn some money though. I'm not used to not having to do anything."
"You could help out Abby," she casually says, but I know that has been her plan for a while.
"I'm not going to babysit."
"She needs help organizing her household. It has been tough to lose her husband and to keep working. It would only mean picking up her daughter every so often, cooking and cleaning. I know you love to do that. The child is almost ten, doesn't need much babysitting anymore."
Abby is actually called Abigail and she's one of my mother's nurses. She works at the Cambridge hospital and does house calls for those who need it, like Ellie. They bonded apparently, and mother has been dropping hints about her for the past days.
"I'm not going to do it."
"Well, then you always have your fund," she says, cutting to the subject I actually wanted to talk about.
"I thought that was for me to start my own business."
"Isn't business work and income combined?" She counters back and I roll my eyes. "I'm not going to let you stay here if you are going to find job at a bar, serving drinks to the students. Do something good with your time here. Either help out Abby who I know is willing to pay you for it, or make a plan for your future. Time is precious, Harry, use it wisely."
I shrug my shoulders, knowing she's right, just not yet willing to give in. "What would Abby pay then? It would feel so wrong to help her out and then ask money for it."
"I'll talk to her about it, don't worry."
Abby is a few years older than me, I know that because she has been moaning about almost turning twenty-nine which means she's almost thirty much to her horror. She doesn't look like it, though, only the crinkles by her eyes give away some of her age as she smiles. Over this last week we shared a few coffee's after she put my mother to bed the times she wouldn't accept my help, and told me about her daughter. The two of them live alone after her husband passed away last year. It feels wrong to sort of do his job and getting payed for it, but it is better than finding a job in town or just living off my trust fund. The truth is that I don't really miss working that much, more having something to leave the house for.
"Okay," I finally agree and my mother smiles as she continues reading the paper, not once in the entire conversation blinking up to me. "What about Alex?"
"I'm not telling you to get together with Abby," she says, her smile turning into a frown.
"I know, that's not what I meant. I mean, what about her trust fund?"
She looks up, pain across her face from moving and I think because of me. Because she knows that I lost Alex again, and this time it feels final.
"I assume you haven't spoken about that with her either?"
I shake my head, thinking about the text messages that don't reach her and the phone calls that go straight to voicemail. She told me that she wouldn't change her number and I don't think she did. She blocked me, which is basically the same and even more painful because there is no one else to ask her number or call to get to her. Liam has me blocked too, and Nina doesn't pick up. She only texted back once telling me that Alex is alright, but needs space. It's what Alex told me when she came to get her stuff and I want to give her that. In the end it feels like the right thing to do, no matter how painful it is.
"Has she ever mentioned using the fund?"
"No, I don't think she knows what to do with it. If I ever speak her again I could ask her to give it back."
"If she wants it, she can have it."
"I don't think she wants it."
"Well, then I hope that you get to speak to her soon."
"I think we're through, done," I mumble, resting against the wall.
"Still, you'll meet her again," she says, looking me straight in the eye.
"Why would she? I betrayed her, lied to her."
"Because she's decent enough to visit you once I die," she speaks, not moving a muscle and letting my heart skip a beat, because I know that to be true. That's probably the only reason why she'd ever meet me again, because she knows like no other how painful it is to lose one of your parents and we might be falling out of love in a rapid speed, I know she'll always love me enough to help me then and it is making me feel twisted, wrong and hopeful at the same time.
****
"This is Maxime, or Max as she likes to be called," Abby says. "We both have a thing for shortening our name."
Max gives me a small smile and then looks over her messy room again. She looks the opposite of her mother, but they also looks similar. Maxime's hair is not as curly and wild as her mother's and her eyes are much lighter.
"She's a mixture of me and her father," Abby explains as if she can read my mind. I don't know what to say. Do I tell her she looks beautiful, is that okay to an almost ten year old or is that also a weird compliment for her mother?
"I can tell," I simply say and Abby continues the tour of their house.
It is almost as small as the one my mother is living in. Only it looks much more modern. Abby explains that she barely has time to clean or order anything and it is shown in the mess of some rooms.
"After John died, I haven't done much to the place. It might need some paint here and there. Ordening some of his stuff. I'd like for you to do that while I'm at work and Max is at home. She can fend for herself these days, but still is too young to be really left alone. Your mother told me you also like cooking?"
"Yeah," I mutter. "I don't know if I'm any good at it, but I can do that too if you'd like."
"Love it," she says with a big grin. "I'm just no good at it, so I'm sure we'll love your cuisine. So, what do you say, are you up for it?"
I nod, looking around the living room. Who would have thought that I'd end up and aupair in fucking Cambridge? I certainly didn't.