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Olivia passed over her bottle. ‘Penny for them?’
Janine smiled. ‘This landscape is just wild, isn’t it?’
‘I was just thinking the same thing. How inspiring it is. I can see what drew Yennin to paint here.’
‘Even the sounds were based off recordings he made down here,’ Janine said.
Olivia tilted her head. ‘You’ve heard them?’
Janine shook her head. ‘No – I wish.’ She smiled. ‘I was chatting to Lucinda at the showcase and she knew all about it. She played me some of them on her phone. He really changed your and Aaron’s life, didn’t he?’
‘In so many ways. Thanks to his artwork, I’ve been able to take some much-needed time out …’
‘You can live this incredible life, all thanks to his death.’
Olivia shivered. ‘What? No – it was a huge loss, not only to us and his family and friends – but to the wider art world. And my life is not so incredible.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just before coming here, I had to leave my job. I destroyed my closest friendship, pretty much ignored my mother in her care home. I fantasized about hurting myself so I no longer had to go into work. More than fantasized actually.’
‘What do you mean?’
Olivia blew out a long sigh. ‘It’s a long story.’
‘And? It’s not like we have anything but time here!’
‘That’s true.’ Still, something held her back. But Janine remained quiet, and Olivia found herself opening up. ‘It was actually the night of the big Yennin auction that ithappened. I had to work that day, but I was feeling extra anxious because I needed to leave early to get ready. Aaron had only asked one thing of me: that I pick up Yennin and take him to the auction.’ She paused, taking a breath. The guilt was so overwhelming; she could hardly speak. She took another sip of water. ‘It had been a bad year for me in general. I’d failed the final exam I needed to qualify, which meant I lost my promotion. I had some demanding clients I was trying to please, alongside my boss and Aaron too.
‘That day in particular, though, I’d dropped the ball on one of my biggest clients, and my boss had given me an ultimatum – step up or lose my job. I’ve never faced anything like that sort of pressure at work before. Aaron was also blowing up my phone, messaging me in a panic, saying how he couldn’t get hold of Yennin, how he was convinced he wasn’t going to show up at the auction, and that he needed me to go get him right away. I hadn’t realized until this cruise, in fact, just how much he had on the line. How much he needed the auction to be a success. But I couldn’t help him. He needed me, but I just wanted to lock myself away.
‘I was being pulled in so many different directions … but I felt numb. I left work without telling anyone. I just walked out the door. I didn’t even change out of my office clothes.
‘I can hardly remember the next hours passing – I was in a daze. A dense fog that wouldn’t lift. I knew I had to get to the auction, so I started walking towards Mayfair – in the pouring rain no less – but I was spiralling. All I kept thinking was that if I could have a bit of time off where no one could ask anything of me, no one couldblame me for missing deadlines or not doing favours, then maybe I could get back on top of everything that was threatening to bury me.
‘But how? A holiday wouldn’t do it. I would only end up checking my emails anyway. I couldn’t cut down my hours – I needed the pay cheque. Every penny. And a sabbatical? That seemed insane – I’d lose all the momentum I had with my career.
‘I knew what would do it. An injury. Just something small. Something that would buy me time, but I could recover from fully. A broken leg? Everyone knows you need time off after that; no one thinks it’s your fault. As I walked down to the Tube, I fantasized about taking a fall down the stairs.’
‘Yikes,’ said Janine.
‘I didn’t, of course. But then I got off the Tube, and I thought maybe if I was hit by a car? I didn’t want to die. Only to be injuredjustenough …’ Olivia drifted off.
‘You didn’t go through with that either.’
‘No. But I really thought about it.’
She closed her eyes.
She’d exited the Tube station a few minutes’ walk away from the auction. She wondered if it was a good idea to show up in her state. She’d flaked on picking up Yennin – hopefully Aaron had arranged a different driver, or he’d managed to get himself to the auction. She looked a disaster – her hair a bedraggled mess, her eyes swollen from crying, her carefully planned outfit still hanging up in her closet in her and Aaron’s bedroom.
Everything felt wrong. The noises of the city – the rain pounding against the concrete pavement, the cars whizzing past, the sirens of emergency vehicles – allsounded too loud in her ears. The street lights seemed to throb; her senses were swamped.
She desperately needed the world to stop, just for a moment, so she could catch up.Just a small bump.The cars weren’t going that fast here, after all, it was central London, not a motorway. All she wanted was some time.Was that too much to ask?She felt like a deer on the side of a country road, drawn towards the headlights – aware of the danger but unable to stop herself.
There was a gap between two parked cars. She stood in between them, wondering if she could go through with it.
Just a little pain. Then she could stop disappointing people.