Scented candles blazed on the dressing table. A bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice sat on the bedside locker. Karin was sitting up in his bed, pillows plumped behind her, the duvet pulled to her chin. She looked pale in the candlelight, defenceless as he closed the bedroom door. Her expression reminded him of a naughty child who expected to be punished yet the air was musky, vibrating with expectation. He had a sudden urge to shake her and demand his key back. What right had she to break into his apartment and assume everything would be okay with candlelight and champagne?

‘What a face.’ She shuddered in mock apprehension. The duvet slid from one shoulder as she uncurled her hand and revealed the key. ‘You’re mad at me again. But I knew Eleanor wouldn’t mind if I had my own key cut.’

‘But I mind – ’

‘Why? You claim to love me yet you lock your door on me. Are you angry because I took the initiative?’

‘Yes. This should be my decision.’ The sense of unseen strings pulling on him intensified. He had to keep thinking ahead, to try and anticipate what she would say or do next. Her moods veered from fun-loving and sexy to hurt and petulant. He never knew when an inadvertent remark would cause her eyes to harden, her lip to swell.

‘I want to celebrate our relationship, not hide it.’ She grasped both his hands and pulled him towards her. ‘It’s time you took the commitment we made to each other as seriously as I do.’

He filled their glasses with champagne but the feeling that he was participating in a ritual over which he had lost control persisted. She untied the ribbons at the front of her bustier. She stroked her breast, her fingers trailing from the nipple downwards. He responded, as always, a rush of blood, a hardening. Was she like an addiction, he wondered; the longing to consume greater than the satisfaction of consuming? Her lingerie was becoming more provocative. Ribbons strategically placed, heart shaped buttons straining to be opened, alluring slits within folds of lace or brazenly apparent. They drank champagne and made love slowly. Her eyes were pooled in blue but nothing he saw there related to the heat of her body, the promise in her seductive voice. The realisation that she was faking came and went, blunted by the force of his passion.

She fell asleep immediately afterwards. The room was stuffy, the bed too hot. His head ached from the champagne. It had fuelled their lovemaking. What alarmed him more than her possessiveness was the effect it was having on him. He felt as if he was ravaging her with the force of his desire, yet every moan and breathless gasp told him otherwise. He had seen her eyelids flutter and stopped, afraid he was hurting her but she had urged him on. Had the passion he believed they shared been an illusion? He must have misread that unnerving awareness in her eyes. The feeling that he was being observed. Circus tricks. The clown in the ring. No, he refused to believe their relationship was based on such a dangerous lie.

Chapter 37

Nadine

I awaken during the night, my senses alert. Stuart is rigid with pain. I administer morphine but it makes no appreciable difference. He is still coherent when he asks me to contact his oncologist in London. He hands the phone to me and I answer the oncologist’s questions. Stuart believes this is a glitch but I know by the oncologist’s voice that it’s the end game. I call an ambulance and fight back panic as I await its arrival. I knew this time would come but I’d hoped he would have another Christmas with me and sometime… way way down the line… I would deal with what’s happening now.

Stuart is hospitalised, hooked to tubes and monitors. The ward bleeps, pings and rings with sound: voices, footsteps, flickering television screens. Still resolute, he holds up his mobile and calls out the phone numbers of people I must ring to inform them of his death.

Jake snaps from sleep when I ring him. Over four thousand miles separate us but I can tell he’s alone.

‘I’ll catch a flight,’ he says.

‘You’ll be too late. I’m okay… really. I just wanted you to know. Will you prepare the children?’

‘Of course I will. Nadine… is there anyone there to support you?’

‘Daveth’s on his way. He and Stuart became good friends. He’s helped us a lot.’

The pause that follows lengthens. These days they punctuate our brief conversations.

‘I’m glad he’s there,’ Jake finally says and we bid each other a formal goodbye.

Stuart’s eyes are closed when Daveth arrives. I’m not sure if he’s in a coma or in a morphine induced sleep. Our breathing seems unnaturally loud, an affront to his ragged inhalations.

Three days pass before he releases a final shuddering sigh. The relief of tears, of letting go, is overwhelming. Outside the window seagulls lift into the frozen air and scatter into a drift of snow.

Little evidence of Stuart’s presence remains when Daveth drives me back to the lodge. He had arranged for a charity organisation to collect his clothes. Only his medicine gives any indication of the struggle he endured. I feel both grief and relief at his passing, freed from the responsibility of normalising an abnormal situation yet bereft. The space he left behind is too vast to fold over.

I find a letter on the dressing table.

My dear Nadine,

The last fight is the longest but now I’m at peace with myself. We’ve shared much together these last few months and I’ll always be grateful to you for bringing me such comfort. Thank you for all the Christmases we’ve shared and for making me part of your lovely family. Do you remember what the chaplain said to us when Sara’s life support machine was switched off? Her soul was free to fly to God. I’m about to take that flight and am comforted in the belief that she’s waiting for me.

I’ve left you a token of my gratitude. My solicitor will be in touch with you to discuss the details. I hope it makes a difference to the new life you’ve chosen.

Goodbye my beloved niece.

Stuart

The day is clear but cold when we sail down the Gastineau Channel and scatter Stuart’s ashes over the side of Eyebright. Daveth reads a passage from the bible and I recite a poem by Emily Dickinson. Because I could not stop for death. He kindly stopped for me…’

Unlike Jake, I lack the courage of the atheist or Eleanor’s self-assured convictions. I’m an agnostic, clutching at straws, and, so, I imagine Stuart’s spirit freed from all earthly yearnings as he floats towards my mother’s welcoming arms.

Afterwards, I enter the cabin where I slept alone during those weeks when we were immersed in ice. Daveth comes to me, as I knew he would. I’ve no sense of guilt that our passion should exist alongside the grey immobility of death. I don’t think of Jake or Karin. Nor do I sense Stuart’s presence. Nothing dents our pleasure and when it is over we rest in my narrow bunk, which should cause us some discomfort but manages to mould itself effortlessly around us.

Chapter 38

Jake

He was dreaming about snow, chasing Nadine through mountainous drifts that slowed his footsteps while she ran on ahead. He had no idea why she was in danger but he had to catch her before it was too late. The snow cracked and they fell together into a white crevasse. He moaned her name as they reached for each other but the snow heaved and she slid from his arms. He awoke with a start, unaware of where he was until he realised Karin was shaking his shoulder.

She lay on her side, her chin propped on her hand.

‘What’s wrong?’ He was filled with the relief of being released from a nightmare, aroused, also, he realised, but that desire was already fading.