Page 91 of Counting Down To You

“Yes,” I say, smiling as I remember Robyn demanding that we do several rounds of tequila shots one evening here, after she’d got her first job as an actress.

“To Robyn,” Arlo says, lifting his glass. He remembered her name. Something so little, yet it means so much.

“To Robyn,” I echo, and hear James murmur the same.

We all drink, the tequila burning the back of my throat.

“I will leave you to it,” Arlo says, picking up the shot glasses. “But you will let me bring you the best tapas, yes?” He takes our menus at that question, leaving us no choice in the matter.

When he’s gone, James and I look at each other across the table. The subject of Robyn is out in the open now.

“I wasn’t at the funeral,” James states. And, okay, at least he’s not dancing around it.

“You weren’t at the funeral,” I agree as the warmth of the tequila fades. “Why?” I breathe.

His expression twists into something that looks painful. “I’m so sorry, Ali.” His chest heaves with the next breath he takes. “I was going to come. I was on my way back from the U.S. to be there.”

I raise my eyebrows. “You were?”

“Yeah. I’d heard about it through Mum.”

Right, because we weren’t really talking, and I hadn’t told him. I don’t remember a lot about the time right after Robyn died. I’d helped Robyn’s mum arrange the funeral, but the details are hazy. All I’d been able to do was keep going through the motions, keep putting one foot in front of another.

“But…” James looks down at his sangria. “You didn’t invite me.” Before I can say anything to that, he’s speaking again, more quickly this time. “God, sorry, I don’t mean that how it sounds. I don’t mean it was like a party invite and that I was feeling left out or anything. It’s just…I heard about it through Mum, not you. And once I landed in the UK, I started thinking maybe you didn’t want me there. Maybe that was the reason you didn’t invite me. Especially after I left like I did and then, not being around while she was sick…” He shakes his head. “I didn’t want to make things worse for you.”

I’m quiet as I take a sip of my sangria. I hadn’t invited him. I don’t remember making that conscious decision. I told Mum to invite him, didn’t I? Because I didn’t want to tell people, over and over, what had happened. So I’d outsourced some of that. I hadn’t thought about how it might look. But then again…Adam had been there. He’d shown up, because he thought I might need someone, even after how he’d ended things.

I try to swallow down some of the bitterness along with the sangria. “You could have messaged to ask me.” Instead of the one message I did get. I’m so sorry, Ali. “Or just to ask how I was,” I add. And it’s that too. That he didn’t want to know how I was, after something as monumental as this. That he wasn’t the one to reach out to me.

“I should have.” I twist my glass on the table in response to that, because what is there to say? “I thought about what message I could send, deleted so many of them after I wrote them. I was stupid and insecure and I just didn’t know how to be there for you. Mum said you were in a bad way. And I felt so ill-equipped, because although I met Robyn while you guys were at university together, I don’t think I fully realized what she was to you. It took Mum explaining it to me. That’s my fault, I know,” he says, in that same hurried way. “Because I wasn’t around, because I didn’t try hard enough. But I felt like if I didn’t even know that, if I didn’t have a grasp on your life in that moment, then how could I possibly be there for you in the way you needed? So I ran instead. Again.”

His voice breaks on the last word, and though I don’t want to, though I want to keep my heart hardened to it, part of me feels for him. At the self-hatred buried there.

I think of Robyn’s mum, who hadn’t understood mine and Robyn’s friendship until the end. Because she was never really around and didn’t know what was going on in her daughter’s life.

I try to see it his way. Try to think about what I would have done in his situation, but I just can’t get there. Because I would always have made the effort to be there, for someone who needed it.

What about Stuart? asks a tiny voice in the back of my mind. Because I’m leaving him, when he needs help.

That’s different, I argue back. Stuart and I barely know each other. And I have a proper reason for running away.

Which makes me think of Leo. Of the way he moved around constantly from place to place, not wanting to make connections. Of his regret, when he talked about not having deep friendships. Because of his heart, I know now. He hadn’t wanted to make those relationships because he hadn’t thought life was a guarantee. I met him at a time when he was trying not to do that anymore, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that he used to—and that I’d never held it against him.

It’s different, though. Maybe because I wasn’t on the receiving end of Leo leaving. Or because James is my brother, and he should have always been there. For me, and for our mother.

“You left us,” I whisper.

“I did. I’m so sorry, Ali. I shouldn’t have done it like that.”

“You shouldn’t have done it at all,” I snap.

James looks directly at me, and I’m surprised to see his gaze is steady. Perhaps he’s been gearing up for this conversation for a while.

“I needed to leave,” he says. “I’m not saying I did it the right way, because I didn’t. But after Dad…I was upset he left too, you know.”

I want to snap I know, because of course I do. But I make myself listen.

“I didn’t know how to be there, after he did,” James continues. “Like emotionally there. He didn’t just leave you and Mum—he left me too. And I felt like the only way I could cope with that was to be far away. Not to watch what it was doing to Mum.” The self-loathing tone is back. “I know this is terrible, but I knew that she’d be okay, because she had you. And you were always the strong one. So I figured, I’ll leave. I’ll get my shit together. I’ll go and learn how to not be like him.”