My phone rings. Separate continents are not a barrier to thought transference yet I’m surprised to see Eleanor’s name on my screen.

‘Thank you for the book,’ she says. ‘It’s kind of you to remember those of us back home.’

I ignore the remark and watch a bird hovering against the grey sky. It’s a sullen day in Juneau and the bird is too far away to identify. I suspect it’s a sharp-eyed eagle checking out its prey.

‘I believe Stuart is unwell again,’ she says.

He’s dying, I want to shout the words out loud in the hope of lessening their dread.

‘He’s coping and is still very active,’ I reply. ‘Did you have a nice meal in Louisa’s Loft?’

‘The food was excellent, as always. But what used to be a grand occasion has now been reduced to two. At least that’s what I thought.’ A meaningful pause follows. I know these pauses. They usually proceed a meaningful announcement and Eleanor does not disappoint. ‘We were joined by a third party.’

‘Oh?’

‘Your friend, Karin Moylan.’

‘She’s not – ’

‘She’d been stood up by her boyfriend so I asked her to join us. She’s quite charming… and so knowledgeable about politics.’

‘Is there something you want to say to me, Eleanor?’

‘I saw the way Jake looked at her. It’s only a matter of time, Nadine.’

‘Is that what you rang to tell me?’

‘I’m not trying to make trouble.’

‘Then why are we talking about this?’

‘Please listen to me.’ Her usual brisk manner is subdued. ‘I’m worried about Jake. I can’t get him to slow down and think seriously about his future. That awful band, the guitar courses he runs, the sessions he does in that studio. It’s all piecemeal work. And tonight he was jittery, on edge all the time.’

‘You should be discussing this with him. It’s nothing to do with – ’

‘He’s still your husband. Don’t you have any feelings for him?’

‘Actually, no. I don’t want you to ring me again unless we can have a conversation that does not include his name.’

‘The fact that you’re so angry means you do have feelings. Your friend – ’

‘Karin Moylan is not my friend, Eleanor. I left her behind a long time ago. And I’ve left Jake. I’ve no intention of interfering in his life. Goodbye.’

I fill my mug with coffee and drink it black. The life I left behind seems alien, petty. Stuart is my only concern. A boat moves through the lake, the water so still it seems to have solidified into glass. The eagle drops to the water, talons razor sharp. The silence is absolute.

Oh, Jake, you poor, deluded fool. I lean my elbows on the table and rest my face in the curve of my arms.

Karin Moylan drew my image on a blackboard and I self-destructed. I came home from school that evening and locked myself in the bathroom. Sara was cooking in the kitchen. The sounds were familiar, the radio playing on the window sill, the television rumbling in the dining room. A bird warbled shrilly on a tree outside, a harsh, repetitive note that kept me strong as I removed a blade from the razor my father used for shaving. Sara had bought him an electric razor for his birthday but he’d never taken it out of its box. He preferred the precision of a sharp blade.

I cut lightly into my wrist, watched beads of blood rise to the surface and flow. The sting of pain, the red splash on the white ceramic basin, the sickly-sweet sense of relief, I’ve never forgotten it.

Afterwards, I vowed it would not happen again. I scoured the basin and stuck a plaster on my arm. Such secrecy and stealth. The broken promises. I wanted to stop and believed I could until the urge overwhelmed me once more.

One evening I cut too deep. I was almost unconscious when Sara’s frantic banging on the bathroom door brought me to my senses. I staggered to my feet and turned the key, allowed her to enter into my pain. Eoin was unable to understand why I would deliberately harm myself. It was beyond his ken, he said, and reflected my shame back at me. Self-hatred, it grew like a snowball on a steep hillside. Sara did her best to stop my belief that I deserved to be bullied. Nothing made any difference. What if… what if… that same question always lured me back to the blade. The warm trickle of blood, the escape route from guilt.

Stuart talks a lot about Sara. The childhood they shared and the years that followed until she was taken so suddenly from us. I remember the strength of her arms as she struggled to free me from my demons. The voices only I could hear. Unrelenting voices that demanded pain as their reward for silence.

At Stuart’s request I drive him to the Shrine of St Theresa on the outskirts of Juneau. The retreat centre is peaceful and quiet. He spends time in a small chapel and we walk together around the circles of stones that create the Merciful Love Labyrinth. He is silent on the journey back to the lodge. Daveth brings armloads of logs from the back of his pickup truck and I build the fires high.

We visit the Mendenhall glacier where ice as turbulent and textured as a flow of lava cuts through the rocky valley. It seems imperishable, indestructible, yet the slow drip of mortality is active here too. There is a skeletal starkness about Stuart’s photography. I know it’s my imagination but I see limbs writhing within the ice, as if bodies are struggling to be freed from their glistening tombs. Death is here with us, soundless and invisible. I sense it taking a step nearer each day yet we’re comfortable in the silence that has settled between us. I buy art materials in Juneau and, while Stuart works on his photography, I sketch the slumbering lake and forests.

Chapter 35

Jake

He adjusted Brian’s bow tie and ran a clothes brush over his son’s hired tuxedo. In a few hours’ time Brian could become the youngest-ever winner of the R.E. Spencer Ceramics Award. Brian’s love affair with clay began at the age of two when Nadine gave him a lump of play dough to distract him while she was feeding the twins. He was six when he told his parents he was going to become a potter. While Ali flounced around in a tiara and princess dress, and the twins raced each other up and down climbing frames, Brian filled the kitchen shelves with lopsided mugs and fantasy creatures with bulging foreheads. Fast forward to what seemed to Jake like only a skip in time and he, along with Eleanor, were Brian’s invited guests at tonight’s award ceremony where, if Brian was even luckier, he would be chosen from the category winners to win the overall, prestigious R.E. Spencer Craft and Design Award.

‘I reckon the goldsmith will get it,’ he told Jake before they left Sea Aster. ‘His work is awesome. But winning the ceramic category would give my work brilliant exposure.’

The reception room was already crowded when they arrived. A harpist struggled heroically to be heard about the babble of voices and waiters eased through the crowd with trays of champagne and canapés. Eleanor checked out the room at a glance, her political antennae primed for potential contacts.

‘Is that Jessica Walls over there?’ she asked when Brian was being interviewed by the media. ‘I do believe it is. Remarkable woman. All those magazines. I still don’t understand why Nadine gave up such an amazing opportunity to build a new career for herself. She won’t get that chance again.’ She moved towards a small cluster of people and eased skilfully into their circle. Jake never failed to marvel at her ability to infiltrate the most resistant group.

‘Isn’t this a wonderful opportunity to celebrate such amazing young talent,’ he overheard her say. ‘You must meet my grandson, Jessica. Unfortunately, Nadine is still in Alaska so I’m here in loco parentis, so to speak. I’m assuming he’s going to win but as a doting grandmother I’m allowed to be totally biased.’