Damn. I can’t leave this alone. I stare out the window some more for distraction, still astonished by the sight, and realise I’m shaking. I know I need to read the notes and put the final puzzle piece of my double-edged grief into place, even if it hurts like hell.
I take the notes carefully out of the jacket pocket and set them down on the table in front of me, in date order. And try to prepare myself for whatever I’m about to learn.
I re-read the first one: ‘Asked Hugh he gets Gen.’ It still makes no sense. Is this about Genevieve? It baffles me that Cam knew about her before I did. But what can she possibly have to do with this?
I turn to the next note, hoping for an explanation, and when I get it, the words make me gasp. Every cell in my body seems to cave in at once. This turns my entire world upside down.
‘Kate will suffer,’ Cam had written in shaky lettering. ‘Hugh might help end. Best for all.’
Understanding begins to seep into my blood and is conveyed to every extremity of my body. For long moments I am perfectly still. I know what Cam asked Hugh to do. I know why Hugh was so tortured by the decision, and why he couldn’t think straight with me around. I love that he, of all people, took three weeks away to properly consider it, given it would have been absolutely illegal. Cam was well beyond the point where he could have made the decision in any state the law would regard as ‘sound mind’. And at last I understand why it’s so important to Hugh that he doesn’t betray Cam’s trust and tell me.
The second-last note confirms my fears. ‘Hugh says no. Devastate . . .’
A single tear falls from my face onto the note, onto words already blurred by Cam.
I turn over the last note: ‘Thought he would say yes. Loves Kate.’
The attendant at the service desk at five-thirty the next morning speaks perfect English, thank you universe, because I can barely string any sensible words together.
‘I need to get home to Australia,’ I say. ‘Actually to Launceston. I can’t seem to work out the most direct way out of here.’
‘I want to see more lights,’ Charlie protests, while the attendant finds the information I need.
‘Charlie, there’s been a second solar flare. If we’re lucky, we’ll see the Borealis and the Australis in one week! The Southern version is just as gorgeous – or maybe even more beautiful. Pink, purple, green and gold. If we miss it this time, I promise we’ll go chasing it together, as long as it takes us.’
I am his leader now. Two parents rolled in one. I think back to the flailing mother Charlie can’t remember from when he was a baby and realise how far I’ve come. I’m still making mistakes by the bucketload. Still in the dark about a lot of things, and I can’t begin to describe how much I’m still dreading the teenage years, but there’s a new confidence now. After you’ve been through the worst, you can handle anything the world throws at you. Hopefully even a logistical arrangement as complicated as the one I’m attempting to pull off.
As soon as the tickets are confirmed, I phone Sophie at work.
‘Please don’t ask questions, and do not tell Hugh, but I need you to book me a room at the same hotel he’s staying at in Launceston this week for the conference. He’s still going, isn’t he?’
I was meant to be there too. My phone pinged with the reminder yesterday. I forgot to remove the event from my calendar.
‘This is the moment I have been training you for during our entire time together at work,’ I say.
Sophie loves a conspiracy and assures me she’ll get right onto it. ‘I’m giving this a code name,’ she confesses. ‘Project Harry Styles. Kate, you should know I am deeply invested in the outcome. The whole office is!’
‘Mummy, you seem wild,’ Charlie says, while I throw our belongings into our bags and drag him downstairs again for the bus to the airport.
I am, I think. Wild about Hugh.
The fact that he would even take the time to seriously consider doing what Cam asked of him speaks volumes about his principles. As does the fact that he couldn’t go through with it. Not helping Cam, potentially making things easier for me in a way that he thoroughly understood through his own loss, nearly destroyed him. Particularly if, as seems obvious now in retrospect, he was in love with me. Not telling me eventually meant losing me, even though every step of his conduct paints him in the very brightest light.
At the airport, I put my computer, phone and bag through the security scanner. No books this time. I’m writing one instead. I usher Charlie through first. Charlie, who has a shot now at having a mum who’s not only finding her feet but finding long-term happiness, just as his dad wanted for us.
Cam’s reason for wanting to end his life prematurely also speaks volumes about how much he loved us and didn’t want to see us suffer his drawn-out death. The ultimate sacrifice would have been the ultimate gift, in a way. The months from August onwards were increasingly heartbreaking.
What it must have done to Hugh to watch Cam deteriorate. Every step towards his death a reminder that – illegal though it would have been – he could have stepped in and cut short our suffering. All the frantic calls and meltdowns from me. At one point I’d even confessed to Hugh that I’d wished Cam was already dead, to spare him the indignity that he hated so much. Hugh will have held himself responsible for our ongoing misery – I know him. And even when I was throwing this secret back in his face, furious at him for not telling me, he kept his promise to my husband. I can’t even process the calibre of the man.
‘Grace!’ I say, ‘There’s not much time. I’m stepping onto a flight.’
I’m handing our boarding passes to a flight attendant and getting glared at by fellow passengers for being on the phone, as if nobody appreciates the urgency of this situation.
‘We’re all watching the live stream of the aurora here,’ Grace gushes. ‘It looks phenomenal.’
‘It blew my mind. But please listen. I need you to babysit.’
‘What? When?’
‘In about thirty hours. In Launceston.’
‘Is this a joke?’
‘Hugh will be there. Hopefully.’
There’s a brand of squeal on the end of the phone that I haven’t heard since the nineties. ‘About fucking time!’
‘Have some decorum, Grace, please!’ I suggest, imitating Mum.
‘Yes, Mary,’ she says, laughing. ‘But speaking of a lack of decorum, I have news about Justin.’
‘My neighbour?’ I ask, playing dumb. ‘Don’t tell me he’s sold that bike?’
‘My boyfriend! And no, Kate. I’m sure he’ll still take you for rides on it.’
I’m dizzyingly excited for her. And I’ve been away far too long. ‘You and Justin? Well, who could have seen that coming . . .’
She laughs. ‘Stop! I thought he was interested in you first, and he said I must be obtuse if I couldn’t see what was going on between you and Hugh from that first night with the grenade. Reckons it was you two who needed the bomb under you. Or the bike. Can confirm he is very much DTF, BTW. OMG.’