‘I’ll have to call a plumber in tomorrow to look at that leak. Not that he’ll be able to do much. My guess is that it’s the roof.’
‘Oh,’ I said, as I focused my eyes on the flames leaping from the logs on the fire.
‘Mind if I sit down?’
‘No. Can I get you a hot chocolate?’
‘No thanks. I . . . want to talk to you, Star.’
‘What about?’
‘Oh, all sorts of things, really,’ he said as he sat down in the chair opposite me, looking as uncomfortable as I felt. ‘Well,’ he breathed, ‘it’s been quite a ride since you first appeared in the bookshop, hasn’t it?’
‘Yes, it has.’
‘How are you feeling now about finding your mother?’
‘Fine. Thank you for taking the trouble to go to Cambridge on my behalf.’
‘It was no trouble, really. As a matter of fact, it did me good to go back to a place where I’d been so happy. It was where I met Annie.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes. I drove up to Cambridge a couple of hours before the lecture, and had a beer at the pub where I’d first spoken to her.’
‘That must have been comforting,’ I ventured.
‘No. It wasn’t actually. It was horrific. I sat there, and all I could hear were her thoughts on my behaviour since her death. And what a selfish and ultimately cruel human being I’d been since she left me. I’ve been wicked, Star, I really have.’
‘You were grieving. That’s not wicked.’
‘It is when it affects everyone else around you. I’ve almost destroyed this family, and I’m not exaggerating,’ Mouse added vehemently. ‘Then later that evening, I met your mother, and saw the love she’d held for you through all these years, even though she’d believed up until a few weeks ago that you were dead. And I imagined Annie, somewhere up there, looking down at me and what I’d done. Or hadn’t done,’ he checked himself. ‘I stood on the bridge by King’s College and almost threw myself into the Cam. I’ve known for a long time the chaos my behaviour has caused, but just like an alcoholic who knows he’s a dirty drunk, then has another drink to make himself feel better, I haven’t known how to put it right.’
‘I understand,’ I said quietly, and I did.
‘That night in Cambridge was seminal,’ he continued. ‘I understood that I had to put my past to rest and say a final goodbye to Annie. And stop wallowing in self-pity. What good was holding on to her memory when it had so negatively affected those still living? And then I drove home with a new determination to try and put things right.’
‘That’s good,’ I encouraged him.
‘And the first port of call is you. On the bridge that night, I admitted to myself that I have . . . feelings for you. Which have confused me – I honestly thought I’d never love again. I’ve been wracked with guilt; having spent the past seven years putting my dead wife on a pedestal, I felt I was somehow betraying her, that the fact I actually felt happy in your company was wrong. And I was – and am,’ he continued, ‘scared shitless. You might have gathered that once I love, it’s all-consuming.’ He gave me a small, wry smile. ‘And, Star, inconveniently, I’m sure, for you, I’ve realised that I do love you. You are beautiful in every way.’
‘I’m not, Mouse, I can assure you,’ I said hurriedly.
‘Well, to me you are, although even I realise you must have your faults, just as Annie did. Listen . . .’ He leant forward to reach for my hands, which I reluctantly gave to him, my heart beating so fast I thought it might burst out of my chest. ‘I have no idea how you feel about me. That calm exterior of yours is impenetrable. I asked Orlando last night, as he seems to be the one who knows you best. He said he thought that my behaviour towards you has been so erratic as I’ve slid between love, then guilt for feeling love, that you were probably as scared as hell of feeling anything, even if you did.’
Mouse, usually so eloquent and sparing with his words, was rushing on. ‘So, I decided that the first thing I should do on the journey to rehabilitation and to hopefully creating a new and better “me” was to man up and tell you. So? Do you think you might? Feel something for me?’
What I felt was that Mouse had an unfair advantage with his bridge epiphany. He’d had time to put his feelings – real or imagined – into some kind of order. Whereas I’d had none.
‘I . . . don’t know.’
‘Well, that was hardly a line from Romeo and Juliet, but at least it’s not an outright “no”. And’ – he pulled his hands away from mine, then stood up and began to pace – ‘before you decide whether you do or you don’t, I have something else to tell you. And it’s so dreadful that even if you do discover you have some feelings for me, it’s bound to finish them off immediately. But I can’t deceive you from the start, Star, and if we’ve got any chance together in the future, you have to know.’
‘What is it?’
‘Right . . .’ Mouse stopped pacing and turned to me. ‘The thing is, Annie was deaf.’
I looked up at him as he willed me to make the connection. I knew it was there, but I couldn’t grasp it.
‘In other words, Rory is our . . . my son.’
‘Oh my God . . .’ I whispered, as everything I hadn’t understood about this family finally fell into place in one stark moment of revelation. I stared into the fireplace as I heard Mouse breathe out and sit down heavily.
‘When she was pregnant, we were both so excited. Then she went for her first scan, and they found she had ovarian cancer. Obviously she couldn’t have any form of treatment, as it could harm the baby, so we were left with a horrific choice: continue with the pregnancy and take the consequences of a delayed course of chemotherapy, or abort, and have treatment immediately. Being the optimist she was, Annie decided on the former, knowing that whether she lived or died, it would be her one chance to have a child. The doctors had told her that everything would need to be removed as soon as she gave birth. Are you following me, Star?’
‘Yes.’
‘Rory was born, and they performed Annie’s operation almost immediately. But by then, the cancer had spread to her lymph glands and her liver. She died a couple of months later.’
I heard his voice break before he continued.
‘The truth is, when her illness was first discovered, I’d begged her to abort the baby and give herself the best possible chance of saving herself. You already know how I adored her. So when she left me, every time I looked at Rory, I didn’t see an innocent baby, but his mother’s murderer. Star, I hated him. Hated him for killing his mother . . . the love of my life. She was everything to me.’