Page 21 of Save You

Now her expression darkens.“What do you think?”

“Lydia, just because you’re having a baby, that doesn’t mean your entire future is screwed up.”

She lowers her eyes and runs her finger over the dents in the tabletop.“Babies,” she murmurs after a long time.

“What?”I say, confused.

“My future isn’t screwed up just because I’m havingbabies.Plural.”The smile is back, more restrained this time, but I can’t help returning it.

I don’t know what happens next, but suddenly we both start laughing, hesitantly at first, and then louder.Lydia claps her hand to her mouth like she can’t quite believe what she’s doing.But that just turns her laugh into a semi-muffled snort, which sets us both off again.

Just at this moment, Mum comes over with a tray.“What’s so funny?”she asks as she sets the steaming mugs in front of us, followed by the cake plates.

Lydia presses her lips together and shuts her eyes until she’s got herself back under control.Then she looks at Mum and says, perfectly calmly: “Ruby and I were just laughing at how weird life can be, Mrs.Bell.”She leans in to sniff the hot chocolate.“This smells divine, by the way.”

Mum blinks in surprise, then gives Lydia a gentle pat on her arm.She knows that she lost her mother not so long ago, and I’m sure she wishes there was more she could do for her than just bring her cake and hot drinks.“Enjoy it.”

Lydia watches Mum as she walks back to the counter to serve the next customer.Then she sighs softly, pulls the mug of hot chocolate closer, and wraps both hands around it.

“I always wanted to be a designer for Beaufort’s,” she says, answering my question after all.

“But surely you…”still can, I want to say, but one glance from Lydia is enough to cut me off.

She picks up her spoon and stirs the hot chocolate for a while.“Once upon a time, I dreamed of bringing my creativity to the firm, but Mum and Dad considered my ideas too modern, not traditional enough,” she goes on.“I kept getting into rows with them because I wanted a bigger role than they were planning for me.Unlike James, I really would like to take the company on.But for them, it was all about him.Ever since we were born.Regardless of what either of us wanted.”She pulls the spoon from the mug and slips it into her mouth.“Mm.”She sighs with delight.

“I hate how much pressure you were both put under.Still are.It must be so hard,” I mumble, turning my attention to my own drink.The warmth is doing me the world of good, and my cold fingers are gradually thawing out.

Lydia looks so sad and hopeless that I wish I could give her a hug.“Anyone looking at our family from the outside would get the impression that Mum and Dad love us more than anything, and just want the best for us.Wanted.Whatever.”She clears her throat.“I can’t complain about having grown up like that.I don’t have any right to.I don’t know how much James told you, but…there are things that just went wrong and can’t be put right again.”

I can’t help wondering if she means her father.And whether he only gets violent with James the minute he doesn’t get his own way, or if he’s rough with Lydia too.If so, then I’m even more worried for her.

“He only told me a few things,” I say evasively.

I know that Lydia knows him better than anyone else in the world, but I still can’t talk to her about the things he confided in me.Even after everything that’s happened, I couldn’t betray him like that.

“He’s doing better, by the way.He’s stopped drinking since the funeral.Now he’s working out obsessively instead.”

I remember the blank look in his eyes.James’s tears.The way he clung on to me.The cuts and bruises on his hand.

“And things between him and your dad…?”I ask cautiously.

“You know they had a fight?”

I nod.

“Dad acts like nothing ever happened.He’s practically never at home, and when he is there, he orders James into his office to brief him for Beaufort board meetings.”

On the one hand, I’m glad that James’s relationship with his father hasn’t escalated any further, but on the other hand, I know what James feels about the company and what a weight it must be on his shoulders to work for the firm.I’m so sorry for him, especially seeing that that’s all kicked in sooner than he was expecting.

“I hope you two can get through this, Ruby.”

I look into Lydia’s turquoise eyes.Her eyes that look exactly the same as James’s.

Wearily, I shake my head.“I don’t think we can.To be honest, I don’t even want to.”

It’s the first time I’ve said that aloud.But it’s the truth.I don’t think you can ever just get over a thing like this.Everything James and I have gone though.And I really don’t want to.Especially not when I think about everything I’m going to face in the future.It feels like there’s a shadow lying over all my dreams, and only because I confided them in James, and then he hurt me so badly.

“You could try,” Lydia suggests gently, but I shake my head again.