Page 56 of High Season

FORTY-THREE

That night, Hannah finds herself going through the motions.

Those strange, half-familiar images of Hannah’s body as it was twenty years ago had been like seeing an old friend—or an old enemy—across the room.

After she told Imogen and Josie her story, she had risen unsteadily to her feet.

Made some excuse about Isla needing a nap, rounded up her children, murmured later when Eric asked if she was OK.

That promise, passed between them, of togetherness and truth.

A promise that Hannah has broken over and over again across the course of their marriage.

Josie had said that they would stay and wait for Nina, by then almost an hour late.

She had told Hannah that they’d give her time to absorb what she’d seen, had promised that she would message if there were any updates, but Hannah has not checked her phone.

Besides, there is something Hannah needs to do first.

She gets through dinner and bath and bedtime.

Negotiating another hour before lights out with Noah, and letting her dad and Eric take care of the washing up while her mother reads Isla another story.

With an unexpected schism of time to herself, Hannah escapes into the garden and turns her face to the pale night sky.

It has been impossible not to think about that summer ever since she heard Josie Jackson was back. Impossible not to think about the heatwave, and Blake, and the iridescent edges of girlhood. Impossible not to think about Tamara Drayton.

But now, Hannah is tangled up with other memories. The dinner with Blake’s dad; the taste of blood in Hannah’s mouth. What happened after, Hannah convincing herself that the whole thing was erotic, somehow; sexy. That it was proof of just how badly Blake wanted her, how much he needed her.

Those pictures felt familiar for a reason.

Not because Hannah has ever seen them before, or even knew about their existence.

She had no idea that those photographs had been taken.

But what was familiar—what sparked an agonizing, uncanny lack of surprise within her—was that, deep down, Hannah has always known what Blake Drayton was capable of.

She has always known, and she has let him get away with it.

Eric emerges from the house, his hands dug in his pockets, his face soft.

He lowers himself into the chair next to Hannah and reaches out for her, his hand finding the small of her back.

It’s a gesture he picked up years ago, when Hannah was pregnant with Mason.

When the lower curve of her spine was always aching, her hips perpetually sore.

When the pressure of his thumb against her muscles would ease the pain.

A small habit of touch that has never left them, even after Mason was born, even after they had convinced themselves that they would never have any more children.

Sometimes their entire relationship feels like a story of such small gestures—in-jokes and touches weighted with almost-forgotten meanings.

It means that Hannah can’t imagine being with anyone else.

There would never be enough time, enough love, to build a palace out of the small bricks of kindness and history in the way that she and Eric have.

A love completely unlike the heady infatuation with Blake Drayton that she experienced all those years ago.

The excitement and the longing. Falling for somebody because of what you imagined you might be when you were with them, rather than because of who they were themselves.

With Eric, it’s safety. Trust. Nineteen years of loving each other. Of making the choice to love each other over and over again, even when things felt exhausting, or boring, or hard. Eric always chose Hannah.

Now, Hannah’s going to have to ask him to choose her again.

“Eric,” she says.

He looks at her. His eyes are gentle in the dusk light. Kind. She is going to have to break his heart.

“I need to tell you,” Hannah says. “About the worst thing I ever did.”