Written in the Stars (24 page)

I drain my tea and stand up. ‘Shall we go somewhere?’

Kieran nods as he stands up too. ‘You always did hate being cooped up inside.’

We walk around to the front of the house and I see his bright yellow VW camper van parked in the road.

‘I can’t believe you still have this ancient heap of crap!’ I exclaim, laughing as I look at him and then running my fingers along the side. I close my eyes, feeling the summer at my fingertips. We did everything in this thing. And I mean,
everything
. I blush at the memories and turn my back on him.

‘Shhh!’ he chastises and then rests his hands over the passenger-seat window and leans his lips into it. ‘Don’t listen to her.’ He turns to me and grins. ‘She’s very sensitive about her age, you know.’ He strides round the other side of the camper van and slides into the driver’s seat before flinging open the passenger door.

He starts the engine and after a few hiccups she purrs into life. ‘That’s my girl!’ he murmurs, stroking the steering wheel. ‘She does it for me every time,’ he says and he winks at me. I cross my legs and fold my hands in my lap. I hope I’m not drawing attention to the shiver of longing I just felt down there. I uncross them and sit on my hands.

The sun is beating down on the van as we pull out onto the road, and casts a gilded glow on the fields and trees we pass, making everything look like it has been woven with gold. I feel I’ve been transported back to that summer when we’d drive along the coast, me squeezed between Elliot and Kieran, off on our adrenalin-fuelled adventures. Sometimes I’d drive as they slept, preparing themselves for the next base or cliff jump or caving expedition or set of waves to surf. Then there were the nights spent curled up in the back with Kieran as Elliot slept in a tent, or under the stars, or somewhere else entirely. Often we didn’t know where. It felt like we were having the time of our lives.

I shiver and Kieran brushes my knee with his hand. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Yes,’ I squeak. ‘I’m fine. This just . . . brings back some memories.’

He nods. ‘I know. It’s why I couldn’t get rid of the van. It’s everything I loved about that summer. When I’m in it I can access all the happy times . . . instead of the . . . Well, you know.’

I nod. ‘We had a lot of fun, didn’t we?’ It comes out more of a question than the statement I intended it to be. I realise Kieran’s hand is back on my knee and he squeezes it. I inhale and move my leg slightly. He takes his hand away, but his touch is still burning my skin. ‘Where are we going?’ I ask, my voice sounding unusually raspy. Suddenly it feels like a much bigger question than I intended.

‘I thought we could walk along Blakeney Point, for old times’ sake.’

We used to go there a lot. Just us, no Elliot, no collection of crazy friends. We’d lie amongst the grasses, Kieran reading poetry to me, telling me about his awful childhood in care and how he had realised at a young age that, with his background, books were his only passport to a better life.

‘Do you remember the twilight date we went on?’ I say with a smile. ‘You “borrowed”’ – I make inverted commas with my fingers – ‘a boat from Morston Quay and took me to see the seals.’

‘Oh God I did, didn’t I? I got in so much shit for that. Another part-time job I didn’t last a week at!’ Kieran throws his head back and laughs and I join him. I remember how much I loved his don’t-give-a-shit attitude. It made me realise I’d always cared about everything far too much. Especially since Dad left. I was sick and tired of thinking so much, worrying about everything, wishing, wondering . . . Kieran didn’t think, he just did. I remember now how he broke into the beach hut we’d spent weeks pretending we owned. The night we had in there was one of the most romantic and magical experiences I’d ever had. He didn’t wait for life to happen to him, he made my life come alive and I loved it. I love . . . loved him. Past tense.

‘So, er, tell me about the flower shop,’ he says to change the subject. I hate how suddenly it sounds more like a lowly part-time job than the start of a new life.

‘It’s great. But it’s not all I’m doing,’ I add defensively. ‘I plan to go back to university to finish my degree, too.’ For some reason I care what he thinks of me now. I feel like such a failure. I don’t want him to think that way too.

‘You didn’t graduate?’ he says, his voice full of surprise as he stares at the country road unfolding before us.

‘I never went back after that summer,’ I say quietly. ‘I missed my final year. I just couldn’t bring myself to go back after . . .’ My sentence trails off and I look at Kieran. He’s biting his lip as if he has something he needs to say. God, those lips. I remember now how, even in profile, I always found him hypnotic.

I wish I could tell him that my life ended when he left me. And then ended again when he came back on my wedding day. But I know how unfair that would be. None of this is his fault. I remember now how impossible it was to get mad at him or Elliot. They used to just smile languidly, their identically long eyelashes weighing down their eyelids until anyone’s frustration at them subsided. I was completely under their spell.

We arrive at blustery Blakeney Point, a national nature reserve which is a spit of shingle and sand dunes, but also salt marshes, mudflats and farmlands, and home to colonies of harbour and grey seals that tourists come to see. We park up the van and walk past the distinctive blue visitor centre with the curved roof, along the north-facing sea point. It’s unusually peaceful here today. The wind has picked up, but the sun is still burning brightly in the sky. I become aware not just of Kieran’s presence, but the
prescience
of our being here together, by this sea, today. The eighth anniversary of Elliot’s death. We walk along the shingle, and I find myself silently naming the wildflowers I spot on the dunes, just to calm my nerves.
Sea campion, glasswort, yellow-horned poppies.
All the flora my dad had pointed out to me as a kid.

‘Why did you contact me, Kieran?’ I say quietly when I run out of plants to spot. He doesn’t answer. I try again. ‘And more importantly, why did you come to my wedding?’

He stops and turns to face me. ‘My ship was just passing, I guess.’

I hit him on the chest with sudden, unexpected furious indignation. ‘Seriously? That’s the best you’ve got? You were
PASSING
!’ My hand burns and I try to cover up the fact that my face is doing the same by turning away. ‘You
pass
by a pub and pop in, Kieran, you
pass
by a beach and decide to go for a surf, you don’t pass by a church and decide to go in and watch a wedding!’

‘Better late than never, though, right?’ he says hopefully and I give a short, sharp, surprising burst of laughter before hitting him again. He grins and holds my wrists against his chest. ‘OK, OK!’ he says. ‘You got me.’ He takes a deep breath and I swallow. I feel a sense of both panic and relief as I feel his heart beating against my hand. I can’t breathe. Not just because I’m about to get some answers, but because I’m so close to him.

‘I – I saw on Facebook that you were getting married . . .’

‘How?’ I shoot back, not looking up. ‘We’re not friends on there.’

‘You don’t have your privacy settings set up,’ he says, ‘so I could always see your status updates. You’re not exactly a shy social networker, are you, Bea?’

I glance through my eyelashes in embarrassment and step away from him, thinking of the hundreds of status updates and photos I’ve posted over the years. Has he seen them all? Then I ask myself a deeper question – did I purposely not set my privacy settings because deep down, I hoped he would see them?

‘Anyway, I looked you up a lot, just to see how you were . . . if you were still the same or if, you know, you’d settled down.’

‘And there I was thinking you’d forgotten all about me,’ I say, bending down and plucking some sea-aster out of the grass and twirling it between my thumb and forefinger.

‘How could I possibly do that, Bea?’ Kieran murmurs. There is a pause. A beat. A look of understanding between us. ‘What did you do?’ he adds. ‘After I’d gone?’

‘Do you really want to know?’ I say and he nods. I stop mid-step, blinking up at the blue sky as a load of people pass by us. I wait until they’ve gone before I speak.

‘I waited, OK?’ I reply, turning to face him. He rubs the back of his neck with one hand and I see a sad mist has formed in his eyes. ‘For a really, really long time,’ I continue. ‘You said you’d be back after a year.’

Kieran sits down in the grass, resting his wrist on his knees as he gazes out to sea. ‘I needed more time. I was a mess after the funeral.’ He glances at me with such sorrow that I sit down beside him and take his hand.

‘This time of year is always hard.’ I look at Kieran anxiously. ‘You must miss Elliot so much.’ He hides his face with his arm then, before swiping a hand across his forehead.

‘I’m sorry.’ I instinctively put my arm around Kieran and then we fall into each other’s embrace and it’s like the years have melted away. Being held by him is exactly as I remember. It’s like we have one heartbeat. ‘I’m so sorry . . .’

‘I struggled too, you know,’ he says at last. ‘I realise now that running away wasn’t the right thing to do. I tried to justify my actions. I was so confused. I missed you so much, but I knew that us being together would have been much worse than us being apart. I was determined to do my own thing, to make up for what happened . . .’ We look at each other and I feel like my heart is breaking. After all this time, it is still so raw. ‘I just wanted to make up for what was lost by living this amazing adventurous life. We’d made a promise after all . . .’ He glances down at his ring – the ring he said he’d wear until he came back. And he did. I blink and look away.

‘I see you don’t wear yours any more,’ Kieran says softly.

‘You may have noticed that me and rings don’t seem to get on,’ I retort wryly.

‘I’ve never taken mine off,’ he says poignantly.

‘I wore it for an entire year,’ I say. ‘You can’t blame me for giving up . . . after
eight years . . .
’

He holds his hands up. ‘I know, I know. I don’t want to make excuses. I wanted to come back, so many times, you have to know that . . . but joining the Navy, it felt right. It was what I had to do.’

I feel ashamed then, for being petulant about him not coming back when he was doing such a positive thing. ‘I still can’t believe you’re in the Navy,’ I say, forcing myself out of the past and back into the present. ‘Isn’t it dangerous? Don’t you ever get scared?’

He nods. ‘Sometimes. But I like fear, remember?’ He smiles. ‘And this kind is healthy, it’s for the good. Besides, being scared reminds me I’m alive. I mean, what is a life without risks, eh? Or am I talking to the wrong person about that?’

‘You don’t have to tell me about taking risks! It was a pretty big risk running out on my wedding, wouldn’t you say?’ I stand up and begin to walk, stuffing my hands in my pockets.

‘Not if you knew it wasn’t right,’ Kieran calls matter-of-factly. I turn around and glare at him as he walks towards me, each crunch of shingle bringing him closer. ‘What about the rest of your life from now on? You’ve never really been one to live dangerously, have you? I mean, when was the last time you did something to push yourself . . .’ He brushes his hand over his head and raises an eyebrow.

‘When I left my temp job!’ I say quickly.

‘Ooh,
crazy
,’ he teases. And suddenly I snap.

‘Go on, mock me, go right ahead! But why do you think I’m so careful, huh? I spent a summer not caring about anything apart from you. I took a risk on
you
and then I took another stupid, irresponsible risk that night on the pier . . .’

‘Bea, come on, you’re not still blaming yourself for that, are you?’

‘Of COURSE I am! Your brother died and it was all my fault.’

‘I thought we’d dealt with that!’ Kieran says, reaching for my hand. ‘You couldn’t have stopped him jumping in that night any more than I could have stopped myself falling in love with you!’

I snatch my hand away. ‘Love? Is that what you call it?’ I laugh. ‘Yes, you said you loved me, but you also told me you’d be back in a year. What else did you expect me to think other than you couldn’t bear to be near me after what had happened?’

He tries to embrace me but I hold my hands up and shake my head, trying desperately to compose myself.

My hands are trembling, so is my voice. ‘So, you know, maybe you should revise your definition of the word “risk”. Because I’ve just walked away from everything, a whole life I’ve spent seven years building, and I’m sorry if that isn’t exciting or “risky” enough for you but . . . but it happens to be one of the craziest things I’ve ever done!’

He touches my shoulder gently. ‘I’m sorry.’ I try not to notice how gorgeous he looks when he’s apologising. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you. I don’t have any right to make a judgement on your decisions. I just hate to think that you didn’t finish your degree because of what happened that summer. You inspired me so much because you always knew exactly what you wanted. You made me feel so sure of everything I did. You knew who you were and where you were going in a way that neither Elliot nor I did. The version of you I saw at the beach after your wedding wasn’t the Bea I remembered. She wasn’t even remotely the same. I guess we’ve both changed though,’ he says softly, his fingers lightly grazing my wrist.

I don’t say anything; I’m too busy fighting back tears.

‘I think it’s time I went home,’ I say at last. ‘Okay,’ he sighs. ‘I’ll take you home.’

I don’t go home though. Kieran convinces me to go for just one drink with him. He always was incredibly persuasive. And then one drink turns into dinner, which turns into an evening drive to Sheringham and a long walk on the beach. After our tense conversation we have relaxed in each other’s company and it is nearly midnight when we pull up in front of Loni’s house. He switches the engine off and I’m about to get out when he grasps my arm. I turn to face him and see him gazing at me intensely; his green eyes are shining in the soft glow of the van’s lights. ‘Please can I see you again, Bea?’ he says. ‘I’ve loved being with you today so much.’