‘We should kiss,’ Samira says. ‘Where’s the kissing?’ She reaches up and smacks a kiss on Julien’s cheek. ‘Happy New Year!’
Mark turns to me. I don’t want him to kiss me. When he leans in, I duck so that his lips barely graze my ear. I catch the flash of annoyance, even anger, in his expression. I think of his eyes last night, the menace of his tone.
I turn to Julien. His face is completely in shadow from this angle. I cannot make out his features, or his expression: just the dark gleam of his eyes. When I lean in to kiss him – on the mouth, of course – I have this … feeling that he, too, is a stranger. This man with whom I have spent so much of my life, with whom I have shared a house and a bed, beside whom I have slept most nights. How little it takes, I think, just some shadows, really, to make ourselves unknown to each other. Wow. Alcohol always makes me think deep thoughts.
‘Happy New Year,’ I say.
‘Happy New Year,’ he says. And I’m not sure, but I think he turns slightly as I reach up to him, so that my lips land on the very corner of his mouth. Just like I did, with Mark.
Nick is on my other side. ‘Nick!’ I say, with forced jollity. ‘Happy New Year again! Come here.’ I put out my arms; he lets me hug him. He smells amazing, like the Byredo counter at Liberty. ‘Why have we never been better friends, Nick?’ I ask. It comes out sounding pretty fucking needy. I didn’t quite mean to say it out loud.
He steps back, his hands on either side of my shoulders: to everyone else he might be holding me in an affectionate embrace. He looks straight into my eyes as he says, ‘Oh, Miranda, I think you know the answer to that.’
It’s the way he says it: so quiet, under his breath, so that no one else can hear. I suddenly feel cold in a way that I don’t think has anything to do with the freezing air. I take a step back.
I drink a bit more. Then much more, as the others go on partying around me. I want to get back into the swing of things. I want to get rid of this feeling. A kind of fear, deep in my belly, deeper, somehow, than anything I felt last night, in the bathroom. I feel I am clinging to a cliff edge and slowly, slowly, my fingers are loosening their grip. That beneath me is … nothing, the loss of everything … everything important.
Bo slides up to me. ‘You all right?’ He’s always been the one to notice when someone isn’t OK. It’s because he’s quiet – he observes, while the rest of us are busy making lots of noise. And he’s kind. He’s so unlike Nick, with all his sharpness.
‘Yes,’ I say.
‘Want to go have a drink of water?’
I know he’s saying I need it because I’m drunk, but, actually, I do feel a bit weird. ‘All right.’ I follow him into the kitchen and watch dumbly while he runs me a glass from the tap. When he hands it to me I say, ‘Thanks. I might just sit by myself for a bit, if that’s OK.’
‘OK …’ he says, hovering.
‘Go!’ I shoo him away.
‘All right,’ he says, and then, with a teacher-like waggle of his finger. ‘But I’m coming back in a little while if you haven’t reappeared.’
‘Fine.’ And then I remember to say, ‘Thank you, Bo.’
‘Forget it, darling. The number of times someone helped me out like this – I owe the universe a great deal.’
‘But Bo,’ I say, before I can stop myself, ‘I’m not a junkie. I’ve just had a bit too much champagne.’ Oops. I didn’t quite mean to say that.
Something in his face changes, his eyes going all narrow. I’ve never seen Bo look like this before. I’ve always thought there must be someone else in there: someone darker. And from what Katie told me once, someone capable of some fairly out-there behaviour. It’s like he’s been wearing this … mask, and I’ve just seen behind it. I suddenly feel a bit more sober.
‘I’m sorry, Bo,’ I say. ‘I didn’t mean it – I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’ve had too much to drink. Please …’ I reach out a hand to him.
‘It’s OK,’ he says, his tone light. But he doesn’t take my outstretched hand.
I wait until he’s gone, and then I click off the light and let my legs collapse under me like a folding chair, so I’m sitting on the floor. I’ll just rest here a bit, until I sober up … What the fuck is wrong with me? How could I have said that to Bo of all people, when he was trying to help me?
Katie once told me I was ‘careless’. ‘You say things off the cuff,’ she said, ‘without thinking. The only problem is people who don’t know you might think you mean them.’
She knows me so well. But I’m not sure even she knows how I hate myself, later on, after making one of these so-called careless remarks. The way, at Oxford, I’d lie in my bed the morning after a night out and think, think, think about how I’d behaved: everything I’d said and done.
‘Everyone falls in love with you,’ Samira told me, once. ‘They can’t bloody help it.’
But, I have often wondered, do they actually like me?
I’ll just let my eyes close here, just for a little bit …
I’m woken by the sound of a voice: low, urgent.
‘Miranda?’ It’s a man’s voice, little more than a hoarse whisper, as though he doesn’t want to be heard. Who is it? ‘Julien?’ I squint through the gloom. I’m confused by the dark. In the distance I can hear the rumble of voices … the others, I realise. My head’s swimming.
He steps forward, and finally, I see who it is. I’ve never seen him like this. There’s a strange, almost threatening, expression on his face.
DOUG
He’s sitting in the one armchair in his cottage. Every so often he reaches over and pours a little more from the bottle of single malt. His aim is to get so drunk that he simply passes out, or anaesthetises himself, but his mind is still obstinately clear.
New Year’s Eve. Another year clicking over. They say that time is the greatest healer, but it hasn’t done much good in his own experience. Events from six months ago are a blur – the days run into one another here, with little to differentiate them other than the slowly changing seasons. But that day in his past – three years now – is as clear as if it happened yesterday, an hour ago.
Beyond the window there is an explosion. He feels his whole body go rigid with shock; he almost drops to the floor, his heart feels like it’s going to punch its way out through his chest. Then he realises what it is. A firework. He fucking hates fireworks. Still, after all these years, they have this effect on him.
The day your life changes for ever. Does anyone see it coming? He definitely didn’t. It had been an uneventful few weeks. Things had settled into a pattern, had started to feel as normal as you can get in a place like Helmand Province. All the men had relaxed, perhaps got a bit sloppy. It’s impossible not to, even though you’re trained in how to keep yourself alert. But when you have to be more ‘on’ than the human body is ever meant to be, for four days in a row, it’s impossible not to switch off when the threat level lessens.
It was a routine excursion. As usual as a police officer’s beat. Just to check that everything was as it should be. The men making a patrol of the street, him up above as cover. Doug was one of two snipers; they had to take turns, shifts, to make sure that they were really focused, and this one was his watch.