Crunching my way across the shingle, I recalled the comforting weight of his arm draped across my shoulder and the way he dangled my shoes from his hand so I could walk barefoot. We had sat on the pebbles, me nestled between his thighs, looking out over the skeletal remains of the West Pier, hauntingly stark against the pre-sunrise sky.
The warmth of his arms around me had calmed me to sleep. He was my gravity, keeping me centred. I hadn’t considered how weightless, how un-anchored I would be without him by my side. Was I really that na?ve to have believed it would last forever? Of course I was; everyone falls in love believing, hoping, they have found the one person who will complete them until they draw their last breath.
Sitting down in almost the same place we had watched the sunrise, I looked out to sea and realised the enormity of what had happened. The tears started but, as I gave in to them, I felt the panic of being alone overwhelm me. What had happened to my life? I was miles away from everyone who cared, who loved me. I had lost the person who mattered most to me.
I was adrift.
Like a tight band around my chest, the pain was constricting. As I gulped mouthfuls of air around hiccups of tears, I knew I needed to stop myself from having a panic attack, out here, cold and alone on the beach.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
In. Out.
In.
Out.
I used the rhythm of the waves’ ebb and flow to regulate the heaving of my chest as I struggled to calm down.
Hugging my arms around my knees, I recalled my English teacher telling us about Virginia Woolf’s suicide: how she had filled her pockets with heavy stones and walked into the river. At that moment, I thought about how easy it would be to do the same: surreptitiously sneak handfuls of pebbles into the pockets of my parka and my bag, and then walk into the sea. Running my fingers over the smooth roundness of a pebble, I considered the impact on others. Sure, it would be painful, but they all had someone to rely on to help them get through: Mum and Dad, Flynn and Cass. They’d cope.
Looking round, I could see there was nobody close by on that windy, autumnal day. Nobody who would feel obliged to risk their own safety. Nobody to make a frantic 999 call.
Could I do it? Did I have the guts?
It was almost like a dare.
Opening my bag, I scooped up pebble after pebble, dropping them into its dark interior. Scoop. Drop. Shifting the bag closer to me, I revelled in its newfound weight and shape. Would it work? Scoop. Drop. I paused in my secret endeavour when someone walked behind me, my sea-gaze now concealing a deeper secret. As I waited for them to pass, I realised the enormity of what I was doing. Was I actually considering killing myself?
Shame flooded me. I wasn’t that girl, the one whose whole life revolved around her boyfriend. Was I? Maybe I was. Maybe I had been, at any rate. Shit. This was my life. My life.
My phone vibrated in my pocket as my brain tried to compute the last few minutes of madness. I looked at the screen: Cass. What was she, a bloody mindreader? Knowing she wouldn’t stop until I answered, I tapped the screen.
“Christ, Neve, you had me worried then!”
I gave a brittle laugh before replying, “What did you think I was doing? Finding a bridge to jump off?” Oh, the irony.
“Nah, that would be too messy. Doing a Plath would be more your style, babe. You know, something dramatic but less painful.” Although there was a smile within her voice, it was worrying how well she knew me; it was only the writer she had got wrong. “I’m only kidding. I just wanted to check how you were doing. You sounded so sad earlier, I couldn’t think of anything else in my lecture.”
“I did a stupid thing and came to the beach. All it’s done is remind me of him. We sat here one morning—”
“Stop that. It won’t do you any good. Get up and get walking. Now.” Why did everyone suddenly think it was okay to start bossing me around? “I can’t hear you moving.” Even though she was almost two hundred miles away, it was like she was right there with me. I stood, the weight of my pebble-filled bag making me lean to one side. “Okay, walk away from that place. Talk to me. About anything. Until you can’t see it anymore.” The band around my chest loosened as I walked, telling Cass about my classes, Kema, everything that I hadn’t yet shared with her.
The further I got from that spot on the beach, the easier it was. I stood at the bus stop, still telling Cass every minute detail of my life away from her. When the bus pulled up, I thanked her and promised to ring her that evening. Carrying the burden of my bag in both hands, I took a seat on the bus and vowed to keep the stones as a reminder to never let myself give in like that again.
After a quick detour to my room to drop off the pebbles, I grabbed a drink from the coffee shop and made my way to the lecture hall. Being early gave me a choice of seats and, after opting for an empty row near the back, I texted a quick thank you to Cass and drank my coffee. A shadow cast across my notepad alerted me to the arrival of a neighbour. Looking up, I found myself staring into a pair of aquamarine eyes, framed by the longest lashes I had ever seen.