He took a step backwards and glanced down the hall towards Ally’s room.
“Do you think she’s telling him what happened?”
“Get in here!” she hissed.
Reluctantly, he did as he was asked, sitting down at the table again. He picked up his coffee cup and took a quick sip.
“I feel like we should be doing something,” Maggie said, chewing on her bottom lip. “Don’t you feel like we should be doing something?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. It’s just this waiting around… I hate waiting.”
He set his coffee cup down on the table in front of him and stared at it. All was quiet, bar the noisy ticking of the clock in the hallway.
Jack felt like the floor had opened up beneath him and he was spiraling down into the bowels of hell. Her voice came at him as if via a tunnel, the words whooshing past him as he plummeted. He felt sick to his stomach as he stared at her tear-stained face.
He grabbed for her hand and anchored her to him, her silent plea for understanding as clear as any words she could have spoken aloud. He felt the pain that poured out of her, a whisper away from being tangible as it filled the air around them. Moving closer, he pulled her to him, holding her close against his chest in a desperate attempt to save them both.
Callum picked up the broken glass littering Ally’s studio, depositing it into a small cardboard box he found under the workbench. He glanced over at Maggie, who was picking up paint tubes and brushes on the other side of the room.
“Shit – holy freakin’ shit,” she mumbled under her breath. “Look at this.”
Callum sat back on his haunches as she lifted up a canvas, ripped in several places. She tilted it for him to see and he sighed heavily, blowing out air through his teeth.
“Is that…?”
“Yeah, it is.”
They both stared at the painting Ally had been working on for weeks, the final one for the exhibition. Maggie shook her head and fingered the ripped canvas gingerly.
“It’s trashed,” she said. “There’s no way to repair this.”
Callum shrugged helplessly. Was this some kind of a statement on Ally’s part, or just a tantrum that had gotten out of control? Either way, the painting was history.
A door opened and they heard footsteps down the hallway, followed by the back door opening and closing. They both sprang to their feet and made a beeline for it. Through the glass, they saw Jack standing in the back yard with his back to them, his fingers laced behind his neck.
“See if she’s alright,” Callum said. “I’ll go talk to him.”
Maggie threw one last anxious glance at Jack before heading down the hall. He took a deep breath, opened the back door and walked out onto the ramp. He stood for a few moments, waiting for Jack to turn and acknowledge him. When he didn’t, he cleared his throat.
No response.
Uncertainty buzzed through him. He tried to put himself in Jack’s shoes, and his stomach began to churn. Despite the obvious differences in him, he knew Jack well enough to understand that this would hit him hard. His presence here was tenuous, even though he claimed otherwise. How would he react? Ally needed him now, more than ever, but his past performance when it came to responsibility wasn’t exactly stellar.
He slid his hands into his pockets as he walked down the ramp towards him. “Hey, you okay?”
He waited several moments for an answer.
“Not really, no.”
“She told you, then.”
“Yeah, she told me.”
They stood in silence. A cool breeze sent a chill down Callum’s neck. “I found her, that day.”
He didn’t talk about this with anyone, not even Tom. He tried to forget about the events of that morning – to bury them – but despite his efforts, they refused to budge. Every time Ally didn’t answer her phone, they came rushing back to the surface like it had only happened yesterday. The panic, the horror, the disbelief. Even though he knew now why she did it, it didn’t help. She wasn’t bulletproof, despite what she wanted them to think.
“She was lying on her bed. I thought she was – “ He took a shuddering breath as the panic he had felt that day hit him anew.
Jack’s hands fell to his side as he turned to face him. The look on his face took Callum’s breath away. Tears rolled down his cheeks and he swiped the back of his hand under his nose roughly.
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
Callum shook his head, speechless.
Suddenly, Jack had him by the shirt, propelling him over the lawn and slamming him up against the side of the house, knocking the breath out of him.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jack hissed, face contorted into a heartbreaking combination of rage and fear. “Why didn’t someone tell me?”