Page 14 of I Know How This Ends

Lilac: the moonlit glow of agapanthus flowers.

I look down. My fingertips are purple too, my hands, my arms speckled with bright flecks, like bejeweled ceramic eggs. Bewildered,

I stare at them, turning them over slowly as a trickle of amethyst runs down my palm and over my wrist.

Then I look up again at the wall in front of me with a sway of déjà vu.

“Blimey, Megalodon.” A gruff voice from directly behind me. “I have never seen someone make such a mess with paint.”

I turn around and stare at the lilac speck on the end of his nose. “Henry?”

“Yes, my sweet Picasso?”

The waiter takes a few steps toward me, leans his forehead gently on mine and kisses my lips. I feel the warmth and when he

pulls away there’s a smear of purple left on his face like a tattoo. When I don’t answer, he grins widely, bops me on the

nose with his finger and picks up a roller.

Then Henry turns and continues to paint the opposite wall, humming.

Throat suddenly tight, I watch his gray T-shirt lift slightly as he reaches up: there’s a scattering of dark hairs across

his lower back, and three small moles like stars at the base of his spine. An abrupt wave of something sweet and hot through

my chest; I try to swallow but can’t.

“Stop perving at me,” Henry says without looking. “I can feel you doing it. I am not here to be objectified, thank you. I’m here to decorate.”

I hear myself laugh as I look around the rest of the room.

It’s my guest room, I realize in surprise. It’s tiny and the window in the alcove overlooking the garden has a curved, half-built seat beneath

it. A purple toolbox is still lying on the ground, covered in floral stickers. The hammer has a glittery purple handle, and

the screwdriver is adorned with a unicorn.

Another wave of intense sweetness, and without knowing why, I abruptly cross the room and wrap my arms around him from behind,

leaning my cheek against the soft, warm curve of his neck.

Henry smells beautiful: of pepper and lemon. Like a sexy cooked chicken.

“Hey,” he says, pausing and leaning his head back against me. “You OK, Meg?”

He called me Meg.

“Yes.” I smile and nestle in. “I’m OK.”

“Good.” Henry laughs, and I feel the chuckle vibrate through his T-shirt. “Then we don’t have time for these affectionate

shenanigans, I’m afraid. Pick up your paintbrush and work. It’s getting dark and winter is coming.”

I laugh and squeeze him tighter. “Alright, Jon Snow. But don’t forget that—”

The room disappears.

Blinking, I stare at my hand. I’m back in the cupboard, and the lilac paint has gone; I’m holding on to my grandmother’s coat

sleeve, a small pearl button pressing into my palm. When I pull my hand away, the shape it leaves behind is indented and pink.

How long have I been standing here? Have I been standing here? Or did I go somewhere else? If so, how the hell did I get back?

I say this with zero chill: what the fuck is happening to me?

“Margot?” Grandad’s voice comes from just outside the cupboard. “Is everything OK in there? Do you need a torch?”

I don’t even like purple: it’s an uncomfortable color, sugary and whimsical. Why on earth would I paint my own house a color I hate? Why would I even imagine doing that? What is this daydream trying to tell me?

Shaking, I climb back out from under the stairs. “I’m fine.”

I am so very clearly not fine. Admittedly my brain has been breaking for half a year, but this is the final, crazy straw.

Never mind blowing up at strangers, stalking and literally setting things on fire. I’m now so internally dismantled, so completely

unhinged, I’ve begun having full-blown visions complete with audio and sensory input.

My grandfather is leaning on his walking stick, peering at me in the low light.

“Um.” I rub my hand across my face, unable to meet his eyes. “Bit of a weird question, Grandad, but I was... in there the

whole time, right? In the cupboard? I didn’t... disappear, or anything?”

I sound completely insane, but Grandad takes it in his stride.

“As far as I’m aware, yes. You were.” He smiles gently. “Or has Narnia popped back up again?”

A tiny jolt of relief. Somehow, my inner child has resurfaced.

I’ve always had an active imagination, that’s all it is, and I’m still thinking about Henry because I feel guilty about how

I left things. Because it wasn’t OK. It doesn’t matter how upset I was; what I did to him was unkind and undeserved. All he

did was ask a stranger out for dinner and I blew him apart. Sometimes I feel like a hurricane: fierce air, spinning in the

same direction, destroying everything in its path, empty in the middle.

“You never did tell me what happened to Date Seventeen,” Grandad says quietly. “Is it something you want to talk about?”

My grandfather has always known what I’m thinking without being told.

“I screwed up.” I blow out, the hurricane inside me slowing down. “Badly. I got... upset, and I took it out on him.”

I don’t want it . I don’t want this .

“Then you should probably apologize.” My grandfather smiles, firm but kind. “We all make mistakes, Meg, but taking responsibility for them requires courage and strength. They are not qualities you have ever lacked. I wouldn’t like to see you start now.”

I am deeply unwilling to correct him; I wish I saw myself as my grandfather sees me.

The truth is, I am weak and scared of everything .

“You’re right.” I pull out my burner phone. “I’ll send him a text.”

There’s a silence and I feel my grandfather watching me. He’s not judging—he never judges—but I can feel his disappointment

in me. Or maybe I can simply feel my disappointment in me, bouncing between us like a ping-pong ball.

“ Fine ,” I sigh, putting my phone away again. “I suppose I should go and say sorry in person.”

Oh God, this is going to be excruciating.

“Good.” My grandad smiles. “That’s my girl.”

One of the most dangerous weather conditions is black ice.

As I walk as slowly as possible back toward Pasta La Vista, it feels as if that’s what’s directly underneath me: a world that

seems safe but is secretly coated in a thin layer of something that will result in me unexpectedly lying on my back, out of

nowhere, bones broken and skull shattered.

My jacket: that’s what I’m going to say I’ve returned for. I need my jacket and by the way, sorry I’m a demon in stripes.

Henry will say here’s your stupid jacket, now bog off .

And I will leave, at least knowing that my grandfather is proud of me again.

Except, as I stand outside the restaurant and peek in the softly lit window every few minutes, it suddenly seems too hard.

I can’t see Henry in there—maybe he has a night off—but I don’t want to see the way his face has changed overnight, from like

to dislike. I don’t want to see the consequences of my actions written all over him.

So instead I stand just out of sight, breathing heavily against a wall.

Like a total creep.

Tomorrow. (I close my eyes.) I’ll come back tomorrow, when I’ve built up enough courage. I just need one more evening to prepare

my speech and then I’ll—

“Hello, Margot.”

I open my eyes: Henry is standing in front of me, holding my jacket.

“Fuck,” I say flatly.

“You’re here for your jacket, right? I wasn’t sure how long you were going to stand out there, peeking in through the window

at intervals like Oliver Twist. So I thought I’d bring it out for you. Save you the final step.”

I’m studying his face, but there’s no like or dislike there.

It’s a completely blank expression, and I suddenly realize I miss the face I saw in my daydream: amused and affectionate.

How can I miss something I’ve never had?

“Thanks,” I say, taking the jacket. “That’s very kind of you.”

“No problem,” Henry says, turning to leave. “Have a great night, Margot.”

He’s so formal and something inside me suddenly hurts. I don’t want this version of Henry. All at once, I want the one who I imagined called me Megalodon and kissed me, covered in purple paint.

“Henry,” I say quickly. “Wait.”

He pauses and turns, face still saying absolutely nothing.

“I...” I’m sorry. I’m sorry for the way I spoke to you, I’m sorry that I blew this without giving you a chance. “I think maybe I’m a bit screwed-up

at the moment.”

Which is like saying it’s a bit drizzly in the middle of a thunderstorm.

Henry nods. “OK.”

“That’s why I’ve been doing a date every week, for four months.

” I’m speaking quickly now, as if trying to pull something dangerous out of my mouth by the tail.

“Not because I want to find someone, but because I don’t want to.

I’ve picked men I already know are awful, so that I can prove to myself that men are awful.

That it’s not my fault. I rigged the experiment so I can stay alone. ”

I think that’s the first time I’ve actually admitted that, even to myself.

Seventeen dates, and all I’ve found are Red Flags because that’s all I’ve been looking for. I ignored any other information

and entered the statistics that fitted the results I wanted. It’s basic data bias: a collection of skewed results, with myself

as the unreliable external factor. Date One: had a valid excuse for being late . Date Four: had a cold, hence eating with his mouth open, and only stole one mushroom that had fallen off my plate. Date Nine:

I was so cold, he didn’t want to pay for my olives, which is fair enough. Date Ten: was probably joking, ditto for Dates Seven

and Twelve . Date Thirteen: a nervous monologue, and who can blame him? I was sitting opposite, waiting for him to make a mistake so I

could destroy him.

Date Six: rude to the waiter? Pretty hypocritical, coming from me.

The other dates should objectively have gone in the bin, but that still left half that were exploded entirely by me.

In short, I have gone through the last four months building a List of Icks and Nos that covers two whole sides of A4, and

nowhere in my flat is there a list of things I do want. Honestly, I don’t need a therapist to tell me that I have a pretty serious avoidant attachment style: it’s written all

over me in neon letters like graffiti on a wall, no less real for being recently put there.

Henry frowns slightly. “A bad break-up?”

“Yes.” I wince. “But that doesn’t excuse any of it. You weren’t awful. And I needed you to be. So it scared me.” I take a

huge breath and bring down the barrier between us just enough to lob an apology over the top, as if I’m a neighbor with someone

else’s lost ball. “I am very sorry. You did not deserve that.”

We gaze at each other in silence for twenty seconds.

Suddenly I’m not sure why I didn’t find Henry immediately attractive. Side-lit by the candles in the restaurant, his face is kind, strong, solid. It’s an interesting face. Extraordinary, even. Maybe I just needed to see it again, in my own head, reformatted by my imagination and covered

in lilac paint.

“OK,” Henry says calmly. “Thank you for apologizing.”

Yet it’s also a familiar face: one I’ve seen over and over again, for months, without really registering it. Henry has become

part of my weekly routine, somehow infiltrating my subconscious until he pops up in daydreams too. Because that’s what’s been

happening, isn’t it? The waiter didn’t climb over the top of the barriers I’ve built; he wriggled under, and I didn’t even

notice.

“Anyway.” I swallow. “I should probably go.”

I turn and begin tugging on my jacket, somehow on the wrong arm. I can feel him watching me, so I swear again—more quietly—and

try to find the right armhole instead. Fuck fuck f —

“I’m just about to finish my shift,” Henry says from behind me. “Would you like to walk me part of the way home?”

I turn, jacket still on my arms. “Part of the way?”

“To the train station.” He smiles very slightly. “I live in Bath. I’m not going to ask you to walk all the way to Bath. But

you can walk me to the train station, if that sounds like something you might enjoy.”

Something tiny in me lights up: one fairy light on a long chain of darkness.

But all I can think is: Bath. He lives too far away. It’s on the list. Long-distance. Doesn’t work. And I know what I’m doing,

but I can’t stop it. Inside me, a war is being waged. I just don’t know who I want to win.

“A walk?” My cheeks flush and I turn away from the light so he can’t see it. “But definitely not a date.”

“Not a date,” Henry confirms with a small grin. “No.”

It suddenly feels like I can breathe, for the first time in months.

“Then, yes. I think I would like that a lot.”