‘Thanks.’ He sat down on the chair facing her, sitting at a slight angle so that he could put his feet up on the edge of the bed. They both sipped at their coffee and then she said, ‘You’re up early.’
‘It’s half ten,’ he said, but he knew what she meant - up early for a Saturday, after a night out. ‘I couldn’t sleep.’
She took the explanation at face value, thinking nothing of it at first, and then without warning the memory of the previous night crashed back through the calm.
‘Fuck! I’d forgotten. How could I forget it?’ She was reeling. She’d woken up snug and content, and now she felt cold, full of lead, the way she knew she’d feel from now on. ‘Sorry,’ she said, feeling she’d been insensitive somehow.
‘Don’t be.’ He sipped at his coffee and added, ‘I wish we could just forget it. I’d love to fall asleep and not think about it. I couldn’t though. I don’t think I slept at all.’ She pushed her other hand out from under the duvet and rested it on his leg, nodding that she understood, that she felt the same way, and feeling like a fraud all the same because she’d slept well.
They sat in silence for a while, the fractured elements of the memory tumbling back into place. She still couldn’t see it from enough distance to make any sense of it. They’d been driving, that girl had virtually thrown herself in front of the car, and she was dead. It was too extreme.
‘I can’t believe this has happened to us.’
‘Nor me.’
He laughed then and she said, ‘What?’
‘I’m just thinking,’ he said. ‘What happened last night was horrible. I mean, I haven’t stopped thinking about it all night, but it’s a bit obscene isn’t it, to talk about it like something bad happened to us?’ She nodded, an admission of guilt, but he kept talking. ‘You know, we’ve had a bad experience but that girl’s dead. There’s a family out there that’s probably in free-fall right now because of what happened last night, devastated, and they’ll never know who did it or how it happened.’
She wanted to feel sorry for this unknown family that Alex was talking about but instead she thought of Matt, wondering what kind of night he’d had, how he was coping.
‘It’s gonna be tough on Matt too.’
Alex nodded and said, ‘That’s why we have to stick together. This wasn’t his fault.’
The phone rang and Alex jumped up quickly to answer it. He said only a few words - hello, hi, yeah, okay - then put it back down and said, ‘It’s Rob.’
‘Is he coming round?’ Alex nodded. ‘I’ll go and get a shower then.’ She got out of bed and felt instantly hungover, realizing for the first time since waking how drunk she’d been the night before. That’s why she’d forgotten about it, why she’d slept. She took another mouthful of coffee, pulled her jeans and t-shirt on, picked up her other clothes and her keys, lurching through each movement. ‘I won’t be long. I’ll come back along.’
‘Okay.’ She was about to leave but stopped at the door as one of the night’s details came back to her, a memory that made her feel sick and giddy.
She’d been sitting in the back between Will and Rob and she’d been cajoling Matt to go faster. He’d ignored her at first but then he’d given in and put his foot down, accelerating quickly. Maybe he’d been going too fast, maybe that had been the cause of it, and if it had, then it had been her fault.
She heard Alex say, ‘What’s up?’ She turned and he’d already crossed the room and was standing facing her. He smiled. ‘What is it?’
‘I just remembered, I told him to go faster.’
Alex’s smile grew warmer. He lifted his hand and smoothed her hair, like it was out of place and he was putting it right, his fingers delicate.
‘He was doing about thirty before you told him to go faster and about forty afterwards. It wouldn’t have made any difference.’
‘He was really only doing forty?’
Alex nodded.
‘A freak accident, that’s all. Nobody’s fault.’ She nodded, but was shocked by the thoughts sounding in her own head - relief for herself, but anger too, a feeling that it had been the girl’s fault, that she’d done this to them.
‘I won’t be long.’ She kissed him, grateful for his assurances, for being there.
She walked along to her own room then, trying to keep moving through the hangover. She put all of the clothes she’d worn in her laundry bag, even the jeans, put on her bathrobe, picked up her towel and things for the shower, concentrating on the movements, not thinking.
It wasn’t until she was under the hot water that she started to piece together her thoughts on what had happened. She was embarrassed now thinking about the way she’d panicked, the things she’d said. She’d been drunk - momentarily jolted sober by the accident, but still drunk.