Before You Say Goodbye

Chapter 18

“Please, Autumn, let’s wait a bit longer?” Marley clamped his mouth shut stubbornly. Ben was six months old and adored by absolutely everyone, including Katherine and Lilly, who had visited Autumn and Ben at the Whittle’s home several times. Lilly adored her nephew. His existence had brought her and Autumn closer together. Katherine and Autumn were still not close, but were both eager to set aside their differences so Ben could know his northern grandmother. Katherine spoiled him rotten with her time. When she wasn’t at the house spending precious hours with him she was researching the best educational toys, the best schools in the area and ‘how to be the favourite grandparent’. Autumn — who cared only about giving her little boy as much love as she possibly could — had not been expecting such enthusiasm from her side of the family and was thrilled. Her son was the centre of everyone’s universe. Everything they did they did with him in mind, especially Marley, who had become her coparent before she’d known what was happening and had time to stop it.

Now, six months to the day since Benjamin had been born, Autumn was chasing the two of them around Bowie’s old bedroom. They’d eventually mustered up the courage to sleep there again because it gave the three of them the space they needed and shielded Benjamin’s midnight meltdowns from the rest of the house. Autumn was trying, albeit without much success, to get Marley to let her swab inside his cheek with a tool she’d received in the post from a DNA-testing company. Marley was not happy. “Please, Autumn, don’t make me do this yet.”

“I have to,” she said determinedly. “I need to know, Marley. For my son.”

It was also for Marley’s own good. He was completely besotted with Ben. She was concerned that he had already begun to raise her baby as if he were his own. She didn’t feel it was right to let that continue if he weren’t. She cornered him, but he folded his lips in on themselves and shook his head, not giving in. She poked playfully at his face with the swab. Reluctantly, he opened his mouth, eyeballing her resentfully as she scraped it around his mouth.

She faltered as she bagged up the equipment to send off, giving her head a little shake. She’d put this off far longer than she’d intended to by allowing Marley to successfully convince her she needed time to settle into motherhood. She’d given herself long enough. She needed to know. Marley needed to know. And, one day, Benjamin would need to know. That was the most important part of all of this.

Benjamin had become her everything. Just looking at him made her emotional. She couldn’t stand to be separated from him, missing him terribly, even when he was only sleeping. She’d loved Bowie, loved his family now too, but could never have imagined that she would love anyone as much as she loved this baby. She could stare at him for hours. His cries were enough to send her into a frenzy. It was as if he consumed her whole heart. She felt she might never need anyone else again as long as she had him. He was a generally calm, patient and good-natured baby. Emma insisted that his temperament was exactly how baby Bowie’s had been.

Autumn tried not to think about Bowie too much because it made her feel so incredibly sad. He couldn’t have had any idea of the adventure they would embark on in his absence. Emma had convinced herself that he’d have changed his mind if he’d known about the baby coming, that he’d have worked harder to somehow keep going. That was an incredibly painful potential truth for Autumn to come to terms with. His mother was particularly fond of telling Autumn how Bowie would have loved Benjamin with all his heart. Autumn couldn’t bear to let herself dwell on how terribly tragic it all was, not with a newborn to look after. Her therapist advised her not to, at least for now, and Autumn reminded Emma of that whenever she tried to strike up a conversation with her about the son she missed so horribly.

* * *

By the time the test results arrived, Autumn had begun to wonder if it might be better for everyone if Marley was his father. He had kept his promise to her. They slept together in their separate beds and when the baby cried in the night, Marley walked him up and down without a word of complaint. He changed his nappies, mopped up his sick and cooed him into fits of giggles constantly. Benjamin was as easily soothed by the touch and smell of Marley’s skin as he was her own. His eyes lit up at the sight of the man they all called ‘Uncle Marley’ and Autumn was quite sure Marley loved her son with the same intensity as she did. It scared her. If Ben wasn’t his, he’d be devastated.

Emma tossed the results envelope absent-mindedly at Autumn one morning at the breakfast table, turning immediately away to fuss over her grandson. Marley’s eyes searched for Autumn’s over his cereal bowl. She gave him the slightest nod and swept the envelope off the table with as much subtlety as she could. Despite Marley’s protests in private throughout the day, she insisted they wait until everyone else had gone to bed before reading its contents. The consequences of these flimsy sheets of paper were potentially calamitous and she didn’t want to risk anyone witnessing the aftermath by accident.

At midnight, she picked up her sleeping son from Marley’s chest and put him in his crib. Then, together, they sat side by side, on the end of Marley’s bed. He had once told her that baby Benjamin got to win, whatever happened, but that didn’t feel true to her anymore. The results would either break her dear friend’s heart, or they would open the most immense can of worms. They allowed themselves a few more moments of blissful ignorance and then Marley ripped open the envelope.

He stared at the results in shocked silence for a moment and Autumn concluded Benjamin was Bowie’s. She knew that hadn’t been what he was expecting, that it wasn’t what he wanted, but she was relieved.

“Marley—” She reached to touch him.

“He’s mine,” Marley whispered. “Shit. Autumn. He’s mine.”

Autumn shook her head. No. It couldn’t be. She’d had sex with Bowie twice and Marley only once around the time Benjamin was conceived, she’d been reminding herself of that the whole time. Autumn’s eyes darted to her sleeping baby. Marley’s did the same.

“He’s my son,” he gasped out. “I have a son.”

Autumn took the papers from him. He was telling the truth. He’d read it right. He was Benjamin’s father. They sat, motionless and emotionally charged, watching their baby in his crib. Neither said anything for the longest time.

“I feel like we’ve lost him again,” Marley said eventually. Autumn knew what he meant. Benjamin had been their last hope at keeping a little bit of Bowie. Now, that was gone. There was nothing left of the man she had loved, not even a little bit of him. She realised she was crying. Marley was, too.

“He’d be devastated.” Autumn spoke her mind.

“He’s not here,” Marley said. “He’s gone, Autumn.”

Autumn nodded, swallowing her sobs. Marley put his arm around her, pulling her into his chest. She held him. Marley. The father of her child. She was sure she’d never get used to that.

“I thought I’d be happy, but I’m not,” he said.

“Me either,” Autumn whispered.

“It’s better for Benjamin.”

“We have to tell everyone,” Autumn dared speak aloud the part of this they were most afraid of. “Oh my God.”

She had hoped their transgression would never be revealed. One by one, she ran the respective Whittle family members through her mind and tried to gauge their reaction. She started with Ben, then Maddie, then Pip, Bluebell, and, finally, Emma. Each was worse than the last.

“Can’t we just not?” Marley asked. Autumn recoiled, but immediately forgave his suggestion. He wasn’t thinking straight.

“We have to,” she said. She felt him nod, then shake a little bit. He urged her gently away from him and stood, stepping forward to peer into the crib. Autumn watched from afar. She was ashamed to note she felt a little bit possessive. Until now, Benjamin had been hers and hers only. She didn’t want to share him, even with Marley. But then she saw the way he looked at him, as though he were seeing him for the very first time, and she was flooded with love. Nobody could love Benjamin more than Marley loved Benjamin. Her little boy was lucky to have him. She gave them a moment and then she joined him, her baby’s daddy, beside her sleeping son.

“Congratulations,” she whispered, kissing him on his cheek. His lip trembled and he threw himself at her, burying his head in her hair. She held on to him, coaxing him eventually into bed, where they lay, sleepless, beside one another, all through that night. She held him to her, crying softly and trying to convince him they were going to be all right. She cried for Bowie and the son they’d never had, the one she’d thought she had carried and given birth to. She cried for his family, who would be so terribly pained when they heard how she and Marley had hurt him. Mostly, she cried for Marley, who, she knew, was in more pain than ever before.

* * *

They hardly touched their breakfast and it didn’t go unnoticed. When Emma asked them why, their eyes flickered to, and lingered on, each other.

“What?” Emma asked with unusual sternness. Autumn saw Marley go rigid with fear. He was incapable of speech, so Autumn spoke for him. There was no time like the present, after all.

“We need to tell you something,” she said. Her voice sounded stronger than she felt. She tried to avoid looking at Marley, but could see even from the corner of her eye that he was hyperventilating. She planted her gaze on her son, instead. He was sitting in his highchair eating a rusk. She ran her fingers through his hair, enjoying a few more moments of peace before inevitable carnage. Before she could say anything, Pip spoke.

“Are you two fucking?” he asked angrily. Autumn had already known that was the conclusion they would jump to, and she braced herself. The truth was so much worse. She trawled the table. They all looked furious. She searched frantically for a way to get out of telling them the truth, but there was none, so she set her face with a stern expression and spoke.

“No, we’re not, but what we’re going to tell you isn’t going to be easy for you to hear.”

She saw Ben’s eyes flick to baby Benjamin, then to Marley, then back to Autumn. They stared at each other, then he closed his eyes, and waited. She wondered if anyone else suspected, but she doubted it. Ben was the only one besides Bowie who’d known Autumn and Marley snuck around the house alone after dark. The others were oblivious. Autumn sighed.

“On the night of the ball, when you all went to bed, Marley and I couldn’t sleep. We were drinking in the living room and things got a bit silly and—”

Maddie gasped, dropping her fork with a clatter on her plate. She put her head in her hands and shook it.

“What?” Bluebell said, staring between her sister and Autumn.

“We had sex,” Autumn said. She forced herself to face her best friend when she said it. Bluebell opened her mouth to say something, then closed it again. She turned to Marley and did the same thing. Autumn saw her shoulders stiffen and her eyes fill with tears.

“You did what?” Emma looked furious.

“Wait,” Autumn said. She wished Marley would chime in and help her, but he was staring at Benjamin and she thought he might die if she tried to force him into anything else, so she left him be. “Marley is Benjamin’s father,” she added.

Bluebell wailed and burst into tears. Pip slammed his hands on the table and stood up, stepping threateningly towards a terrified Marley. He reached for the collar of his brother’s shirt.

“Pip!” Maddie screamed. Poised, Autumn picked up Benjamin and swept him from the room. She ran into their bedroom, the room she’d shared with Bowie, grabbing a holdall she’d packed just in case. She was putting her coat on when Emma caught up to her.

“Where are you going?” she shouted.

“Away,” Autumn said. Emma stepped desperately towards her, holding her hands out to her quiet and obviously startled grandson. Behind her, through the open door, Ben was pulling Pip off Marley.

“Come here, Benjamin,” she said.

Autumn held him closer. “Stop it.”

“You’re not taking him.” Emma’s tone was sickly-sweet.

“Yes, I am,” she said. She rushed around Emma and into the living room. Marley was standing against the wall, his hands raised in submission, while Ben tried to push a desperate and screaming Pip away. Maddie was standing bravely between her two remaining brothers. Bluebell was crying hysterically and hadn’t moved from the kitchen table. Benjamin’s little eyes watched the people he loved in dire distress and his bottom lip curled outwards and down. His cries pulled Marley out of whatever stupor he was stuck in and he dropped his hands and strode towards Autumn. She held Benjamin tighter, worried he would take him from her, but he didn’t.

“Let’s go,” he said, grabbing a set of car keys off the workbench.

“Marley!” Emma shouted, giving chase. Marley pushed open the front door, pressing the remote and directing Autumn and Benjamin to the car that flashed. It was Ben’s silver estate.

“Son.” Ben was following, too. “Please stay. Come on, we can talk this through.”

“Not now, Dad,” he said. “They’re too emotional. It’s not their fault, I know, but Pip will kill me and Autumn is terrified you’ll take the baby and kick us out.”

Autumn hadn’t told him that, but it was her fear. Even in the chaos, she felt immensely grateful to have someone standing beside her who understood her completely. They climbed into the car. Autumn watched Emma hit the bonnet with her fist and then dissolve back into Ben’s arms. Benjamin cried harder, holding his hands out towards where his grandma had been.

“Marley!” Maddie shouted, throwing herself at the car. “Don’t do this. Don’t walk away from your family.”

“Maddie, this is my family, too,” he said through a lowered window. He pointed at Autumn and Benjamin. “I’m coming back, OK? After everything has calmed down. Take care of Mum.”

“Marley, look at her.” Maddie sobbed. “She’s losing Bowie all over again. They all are. They can’t face losing you, too, or Benjamin, or Autumn. Please, don’t go.”

Marley put the key in the ignition and started the car, but Autumn stopped him before he could put it into gear. Above the roar of the engine, she could hear Emma shouting Benjamin’s name, over and over again. In the doorway, Bluebell was perched on the steps, hugging her knees to her chest and bawling. Pip was sitting on his haunches on the porch behind her, his head in his hands, his shoulders heaving. Marley’s hand twitched beneath Autumn’s palm, but she squeezed him tightly until he looked at her.

“We can’t go,” she said. “We can’t leave them like this.”

* * *

Ben collected his distraught family and ushered them into the living room, then came back to speak to Autumn and Marley about terms. They would leave if anyone got physical, they said, or if anyone shouted and upset the baby. Benjamin wouldn’t be sitting with anyone besides Marley and Autumn. At the end of the conversation, whatever happened, they felt it best they moved out for a little bit, until everyone came to terms with the enormity of what this meant. They agreed, so Autumn and Marley trudged back into the house. Benjamin was, mercifully, asleep by this point, otherwise Autumn would most certainly have had to wrestle to keep him with her. He loved his family immensely.

She sat on the seat of the cuddle chair and Marley perched on the arm. The family were sitting and standing in various positions around the living room: Bluebell, Emma and Maddie on the sofa, Pip by the fireplace, Ben pacing the floor behind the couch. Autumn and Marley waited for someone to speak.

“How could you do this?” Bluebell whispered.

“We never meant for it to happen,” Autumn said. Bluebell ignored her, glaring at her brother.

“How could you do this to Bowie?”

“I don’t know,” Marley said. “I’ll feel guilty about it for the rest of my life.”

“I can’t believe you let us think we still had a little bit of him.” Maddie shook her head. “All this time.”

“We thought Benjamin was his,” Marley said. “We really did.”

“And then what?” Pip said. “You’d just never tell us?”

“Well . . .” Marley faltered.

“No, we wouldn’t have told you,” Autumn said. “Because the only other person who needed to know about it was Bowie, and he did know.”

They turned, one by one, to stare at her.

“Bowie knew,” Autumn said. “We told him right away.”

“Oh, my poor boy.” Emma sobbed, holding her heart. “He suffered that all by himself. No wonder he was sick.”

Marley almost growled. “Don’t you dare.”

“He forgave us,” Autumn added.

“But he didn’t know there was a baby?” Maddie asked. Autumn shook her head.

“No,” she said quietly. “He didn’t know there was a baby.”

“Well, thank God he’s not alive,” Pip said.

“Pip!” Bluebell shouted.

“What? He’d be fucking devastated.”

Beside her, Marley shook. Autumn reached out to take his hand. They’d known this would be difficult, they’d talked about it lots in the night and her action was a purposeful reminder of their combined strength. Yes, this was awful, but they would be OK, whatever happened. Before her, Bluebell was seething.

“I can’t believe you have the cheek to touch him in front of us.”

“He’s the father of my child,” Autumn said.

Bluebell cackled nastily. “Only you could somehow manage to make this seedy little fuck sound somehow classy,” she said. “But, I suppose, coming from where you do, you’ve had enough practice at pretending.”

Maddie and Ben gasped Bluebell’s name.

“That’s enough.” Marley stood. “Autumn, let’s go.”

“Please don’t go.” Emma wiped fat tears from her face. “Marley, please stay.”

“I have to, Mum,” he said.

“I can’t bear it.” She sobbed as she stood before him to block his path, knotting her hands in his shirt. “I can’t stand it, Marley.”

“We have to go, Mum.”

Beside her, Autumn saw Ben uttering something audible only to Marley’s mother. She watched his mouth. He seemed to be saying, “Tell them, Emma, tell them.”

“Tell us what?” Autumn asked, loud enough to be heard above the rabble. They fell silent, turning to watch Autumn, who was staring at Ben. “Tell us what, Ben?”

Ben sighed, gesturing to the sofa.

“Sit down, all of you. Sit down now. There’s something Mum and I need to tell you all.”

“Let me put Benjamin in the bedroom?” Autumn said. The cuddle chair she and Marley had been sitting in was by the bedroom door. She’d be able to stop anyone who tried to take him and she felt as though he’d sleep longer in his crib, so she carried him into the bedroom, laying him down with a blanket of Bowie’s he’d been sleeping with since his birth. She stroked his cheek and took a moment.

“I love you, Bowie,” she whispered. “We all do.”

All at once, Autumn felt calmer.

“Bowie?” she said.

She let herself imagine how incensed he’d be by the idea that she believed the ghost of him was sending her strength from the afterlife.

“I know, I know.” She smiled ruefully and shook her head, letting a tear fall from her eye at the vivid memory of him. “I know, there’s no such thing as an afterlife. I know.”

She kissed her son, watched him for a few seconds more, then returned to the living room, where everyone had resumed their original position. She could tell nobody had spoken since she’d left.

“Right,” Ben said. “This isn’t how we do things in this family, fussing and fighting like this—”

“You said you had something to tell us.” Marley interrupted him irritably.

“And I do,” Ben said. “We do. Emma?”

Emma sighed and shook her head, her lips pursed stubbornly.

“If you don’t tell them, I will,” he told her.

“They’re going to use it as their excuse.” Emma rubbed her temples. Ben stopped pacing and sat beside her, taking her hand gently in his.

“Maybe it is the reason,” he said. Emma snatched her hand away, wiping a tear from her eye. She looked resigned. “You have to tell them.”

Emma sighed and then spoke, her voice small and gentle. “Bowie and I had a conversation about this once when he was very ill.”

“After the night of the ball,” Ben added. Emma glared at him. “It’s important they know all the facts,” he said, gesturing for her to continue.

“Yes, after the night of the ball,” Emma continued. “The night that you . . . I’d mentioned how very fortunate it was that you two got on so well and he’d smiled and raised his eyebrows in that way he sometimes did. When I questioned him, he told me he hoped the two of you might fall in love when he was gone. That you would be perfect for each other, but you’d both be too stubborn to see it for yourselves. He told me he’d been encouraging the two of you to spend time together, hoping you might find comfort in each other when he’d gone. I laughed at him; it was so preposterous. I couldn’t believe what he was suggesting. He told me that if it happened, I had to leave well alone. He said he loved you both and he wanted you to be happy. He’d forced you to spend time together, just the two of you. He engineered all this. He loved you both and he desperately wanted you to love each other, too. Really love each other. He wanted you to give to Marley what you had given him, Autumn, and for Marley to feel what he felt about you. He had come to believe, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that his purpose in life was to bring you together, to make sure you had each other when he was gone.”

Emma paused for breath.

“He had no idea how it would happen, I suppose,” Ben said. “But I’d say he achieved his objective, even if it wasn’t in the way he’d intended.”

“That’s the most fucked-up thing I think I’ve ever heard,” Marley said.

Autumn could barely believe her ears. She’d known Bowie had died believing she’d fallen in love with Marley, but she could never have guessed he’d wanted them to be together with such single-minded and selfless conviction. That was why he’d been able to forgive their betrayal of him so readily. He’d felt responsible, in part, for orchestrating a sequence of events that had contributed to it happening. Autumn found herself sobbing uncontrollably. Marley put his arm around her, kissing her on her head.

“I have something to add to that,” said Bluebell, her voice meek with shame. Autumn couldn’t bring herself to look at her friend, but she felt Marley move to give his sister his attention. “He said the same to me.”

“And me,” Maddie added. All eyes turned to Pip. He nodded, swallowing hard.

“So, who are we to rage against something Bowie wanted for you both?” Ben said. “How can we go against what he asked of us, when he’s the only victim here, and he wanted it for you more than anyone else?”

Autumn felt sadder for Bowie than she ever had. She wished she could’ve been his more devotedly. He’d deserved more from her than she had given him. Even now, even in this circumstance, she knew Bowie’s heart was so incredibly pure, and his love for her and Marley so endlessly deep, he’d be happy they’d created a little person they loved so much.

“Well . . .” Marley paused. “God, I don’t know what to say.”

“None of this excuses what you’ve done,” Pip said. “You should have kept your dick in your pants, Marley.”

“I know that.” Marley nodded.

“You didn’t deserve Bowie,” Pip continued. “Either of you.”

“None of us did,” Maddie said. “He was the best of us.”

They sat in contemplative silence, crying with varying degrees of violence. Autumn held on to Marley and allowed herself, for the first time in a while, to pretend he was Bowie. He rocked her backwards and forwards, the way Bowie used to, and she was fairly sure he knew what he was doing. She let him comfort her, despite the watchful eyes of his disappointed family. She didn’t care what they thought anymore. She knew what Bowie had thought and that was all that mattered to her.

* * *

They agreed to stay, though Autumn was quite sure they didn’t want her there anymore. She retired to her bedroom early and let them talk as a family, trying not to pine for Marley by distracting herself with some reading. It was after midnight before he came to bed. He forfeited his own mattress without invitation, throwing himself on hers instead.

“Hey,” he said softly.

“Hello.” She smiled sadly.

“Are you OK?”

“Not really. Are you?”

“Not really.” He shook his head. “They’ve calmed down, but they’ll never look at either of us in the same way again.”

“We knew it would be ugly.”

“I know.” He sighed. “How’s Benjamin?”

“He’s just had a feed.” She closed her eyes. “He’s apparently oblivious.”

“Good.” Marley sighed again. “Do you want to talk?”

“About this?” she asked. “Not really, but I will if you want to.”

“Let’s do it another day?”

Autumn nodded. She knew what he wanted to talk about and she didn’t know what to say. Things had been weird between them for a while and Emma’s revelation of Bowie’s wishes had confused her further. Bowie had been gone for fourteen months and Autumn had not shared a single sexual experience with anyone since her unsatisfying and unpleasant encounter with the coffee barista in her apartment a month after Bowie’s death. Recently, she’d found herself beginning to feel things she was uncomfortable feeling whenever she was lonely and longed for someone’s touch. Marley was featuring in her fantasies more often than he was not. Her feelings for him left Autumn confused and bewildered. She couldn’t tell him. She couldn’t tell anyone.

“I think I should move out,” she said into the silence. Marley, who had been snoring softly, snapped to attention.

“What? Why?”

“Because they’ll never forgive me,” she said. “Or you, if I’m here reminding them of what we did every single day.”

Occasionally, for fun, Autumn allowed herself to think back to the day they’d met. He’d seemed so different then, bouncing enthusiastically behind his brother after his gig, cocky and very clearly aware that the women waiting for him by the door expected to sleep with him. She could never have imagined then what she and this stranger would go through together. They had both changed so much. They’d grown up, and raised each other along the way, but they’d come to rely on each other, and it was time to move on. Fate, or whatever silly thing it was she was starting to suspect might control these things, felt the same way, it seemed, and it had intervened just a week or so ago.

Before he’d grown too ill to sing, Bowie had convinced Marley to record some of the songs they’d written together, insisting Marley would take comfort in listening to them one day. Between them they’d handled everything, the instruments, editing, production and singing. Marley had gone along with it largely because he’d wanted to make Bowie happy, considering it precious time he got to spend with his ailing brother before they were forced apart. In his turmoil after Bowie’s death, he’d forgotten all about the demos they’d created until not so long ago, when he’d received a call from an agent who said she’d been forced to listen to their songs via a Spotify link her assistant had been sending her over and over again for weeks. She thought Marley was wonderful and wanted to represent him. Bowie, they discovered as they hastily investigated, had uploaded their music to a profile bearing only Marley’s name. He’d commissioned a company to promote the tracks and tasked his theatre friends, Phil and Clara, with managing the account. He’d instructed everyone involved not to approach Marley or his family about the profile until the music had gained some traction, by which time he hoped his brother would be mourning his death less intensely. He was right about that. Luckily, he’d also accurately predicted that Marley’s reaction would be to demand Bowie’s friends remove the music immediately and to tell the agent to leave him alone. But the agent had been briefed on Marley’s situation, too. She went back to Phil, who forwarded Marley a voice note Bowie had recorded and sent in the final days of his life, alongside strict instructions on exactly when it should be passed on to his brother. Marley, who’d listened to it once in private, played it for the family one evening at the dinner table.

“Stop being stubborn,” Bowie said. “I know you’re angry, but you’re not punishing anyone except yourself. Not everyone is capable of creating things. If you have something magic inside you, you owe it to the world to set it free.”

Autumn reeled. Those words were familiar.

“I can’t take credit for the poetry,” Bowie continued. “Autumn said those words to me once. Remember, you’re not the villain in this story, Marley. You saved your little sister. It’s just that the system sucks. But things are changing — I can feel it in my bones.”

Bowie was right — things were changing. Brave women were coming forward and publicly calling out the conduct of not only Vincent, but other men in similar industries. The message was clear. Their time was almost up. Bowie continued.

“I know your life has probably ground to a halt. That pains me more than this damned cancer ever could.”

Autumn and the Whittles passed sad smiles around the table. Bowie had known somehow that his brother would still be here, but that he’d be languishing in some sort of purgatory, surviving for the sake of everyone else, refusing to really live. Marley still wrote, but rarely played his songs to anyone. He never saw friends, went to the pub or partied with Pip like he used to. Apart from one evening with a sex worker he’d admitted to hiring the day before he’d tried to kill himself in Autumn’s apartment, he hadn’t been near any women, in all that time. He did absolutely nothing for the sake of himself anymore. He was living for his family, none of whom could figure out how to pull him from the funk he’d settled himself in. Luckily, Bowie knew just what to say.

“Please, Marley, do it for me. Forget everything except how much you love making music and go for it. Nobody deserves it more than you do. You’re my hero, OK? I love you, bro.”

Marley hadn’t said much this past week in wake of the revelation, but he’d stopped insisting Phil and Clara take down the tracks, and Autumn knew he’d asked the agent to give him some time to think about it. She felt like this might be his shot and it was part of the reason she thought it was best if she and Benjamin moved out. Marley had been stuck for so long and she was confident her prominent presence in his life was holding him back. Now that he knew he was Benjamin’s father, it would get worse. How could they hope to meet other people, to have lives that did not start and end with their child, if they lived together while they raised him? Moving out would give Marley the time and space he needed to start creating things again, she was sure of it.

Autumn stood and went to Benjamin. She loved to watch him sleep. She wondered if anyone had ever watched her when she was at peace, the way she had her son. The way she did his father. Marley gave her the space she was seeking from him for only a moment, then clambered out of the bed and strode to her.

“Don’t do this.” He fell to his knees in front of her. She laughed, but he held on to her around her waist and did not smile. She pulled him up off the floor and into a hug.

“Marley, there’s a life out there for both of us,” she said, holding him tightly.

“You’re my life now, Autumn, you and Benjamin,” he said. She sighed, and her fingers sought out wrists she’d once held together. She stroked her thumbs over his scars delicately and, despite a dangerous proximity she usually tried hard to avoid, dared to look up at him.

“I’ll never do anything like that again,” he said. “I promise. But I still don’t want you to go.”

“I know you don’t.”

She looked deep into his eyes. They were bigger and bluer than she’d ever seen them. She forced herself to look away, but he put his hand under her chin and tilted her head so that he could look at her again. He was trying hard to read her expression.

“What’s going on in that complicated head of yours?” he asked her. She didn’t know how to answer. He watched her. “You look like the sky today,” he murmured. “All messy and perfect.”

Whenever there was uncomfortable silence between them, which there was much more frequently these days, Marley found something poetic to compare her to: the sky, the trees, the birds. It was an effective diversion tactic. She typically found some way to brush him off, but she didn’t have the strength tonight. She was trying hard to ignore how perfectly parted and inviting his lips looked when there was a knock on the door. They jumped apart a second before Bluebell appeared, her eyes small, her face crinkled and red.

“Autumn, can I talk to you?” she asked. Autumn nodded, bidding Marley goodbye with a squeeze of his hand and following her friend into the living room. She wondered fleetingly if this was an ambush, but the house was silent and she knew, somehow, everyone was in bed. They sat side by side on the sofa, their knees drawn up to their chests. Bluebell was trying hard to control her crying, without success. Autumn wanted to comfort her, but she didn’t know if she’d be shooed away.

“I’m sorry,” Bluebell said eventually. “For being such a witch.”

“Don’t apologise.” Autumn shook her head. “I deserved worse.”

“You didn’t, though, Autumn,” Bluebell said. “I know how hard the whole thing was for you. I know how much you loved Bowie. And I knew how he felt about you and Marley, what he was planning, before I said those nasty things—”

“It’s no excuse,” Autumn said. “Bowie didn’t deserve what we did to him. We were wrong. We did the worst thing we could possibly do, though I can’t say I regret it, not now we have Benjamin.”

Bluebell nodded. “He’s all everyone is living for now. His birth gave everyone hope. Without him, I’m quite sure Marley would be dead. Mum wouldn’t ever have gotten over it. He brought them back to life. I always said you and I met for a reason.”

Despite the seriousness of Bluebell’s comment, a little laugh escaped Autumn’s lips. It was just like her friend to bring this all back to fate. The insinuation no longer irritated her. She was willing to concede her friend might be right. She mused for a moment.

“You know,” she said, wondering even as she spoke if this was the right thing to say. “Bowie was special — so kind, attentive, clever and funny — but there’s no way I could have known that in the beginning, and I always wondered what it was about him that made me fall in love. I was his from the moment we met. Even after all this time, I still don’t know. I’ve racked my brain. There was no reason I can see or touch or feel. There’s no explanation. Of all the men I’ve ever met, and there have been a few, why him? Why Bowie?”

“Why do any of us choose anyone?” Bluebell asked. “Except that it’s written somewhere?”

They sat for a moment in comfortable silence.

“Perhaps it was to bring you to Marley,” Bluebell said. “So that you could have Benjamin. That little boy absorbed so much of our pain.”

Autumn faltered. Perhaps she was right.

“How do you feel about Marley?” Bluebell asked. Autumn winced. She didn’t know herself. “If you do love him, it might be a good idea to declare it now, while everyone is still reeling anyway.”

“I don’t know what I feel,” Autumn whispered. It was the closest she’d come to admitting aloud that Marley was not just her friend. Bluebell sighed and didn’t encourage her. Autumn stood. “I should go to bed. Benjamin will be up again soon wanting milk.”

Bluebell nodded, shuffling to the edge of the couch and standing to meet her. Autumn noticed for the first time that she was carrying a box.

“I wasn’t sure I was going to give you this, but Bowie made me promise I would. He said I’d know when the time was right. Well, it’s now.”

She gave the box to Autumn. It was about the size of a shoebox, with a metal clasp and intricate carvings on each side. It was made from solid oak, and smelt old. Autumn turned it in her hands.

“I love you, Autumn,” Bluebell said, pulling her into a hug. “And I always will. No matter what.”

* * *

Autumn considered opening the box in the living room, but she thought she heard Benjamin stir and hurried back to her bedroom. Marley was standing over the crib, stroking their baby’s hair. Benjamin was fast asleep again.

Without a word, Autumn perched on the end of the bed. She placed the box before her, opening it with great care. She knew Marley was watching her and was grateful for his silence. She thumbed through the tightly folded scraps of paper she found inside with curiosity. She recognised her own handwriting.

I’ll never know why boys with blue eyes are not my thing, unless those eyes are blue, and belong to you.

The words on the page took her breath away. She’d written them about Bowie, not long after they’d moved to England. She picked up another sheet.

If the words are yours, then the writer is yours, too.

And another:

Rip my heart out and hit me with it. It’s yours anyway.

And then another:

If you love him, love him with your whole heart.

She couldn’t take credit for that one, she’d seen it written on the door of the stall in the bathroom she’d used in the café that Bowie had taken her to on the night they’d met, and it had been all the encouragement she’d needed to pursue him. Keeping notes of words like this had always given her strength, or changed the way she thought about things, and Autumn was prone to leaving them all over the place. She had been too consumed in Bowie’s final weeks, and in the time since, to ever wonder what had happened to them. Bowie had been collecting them for her, dozens of them. Some she barely remembered writing. Suddenly shaky, it struck her he might also have left her a note. She opened the box properly, tipping it upside down on the bed. Something was taped to the lid inside.

I never read them, I promise. I did add one more though. It’s at the bottom. I don’t know when you’ll get this, but whenever it is, I still love you, Autumn. And if I can be with you from here, and you know I don’t believe that I can, but if I can, then I am. Always. Bowie.

She sank to her knees on the floor. It was just like him to do something like this and she had always wondered why he hadn’t. He had hidden it with his most volatile sister. The woman who’d be most hurt by what Autumn and Marley had done. Perhaps he’d known Bluebell needed to see it, too. Autumn closed the box and held it close to her heart for a second. Marley was still standing there, in the middle of the room, watching her.

“Are you OK?” he asked. She nodded, but couldn’t speak. “What is it, Autumn?”

“It’s a box of my scribblings,” she said. He frowned.

“Right . . . ?” He prompted her to elaborate.

“I never put them in here,” she said. “Bowie did. And he left me his own.”

Marley didn’t move and she was grateful. He stood where he was, letting her come to terms with her discovery. She pored over the notes on the bed, ignoring her own writing and searching for his. The last one she picked up wasn’t hers, and it wasn’t a poem, it was a list of six things. He had crossed out the first four and underlined the last two.

Rule Number 5: always tell people that you love them when you do.

Rule Number 6: do what makes you happy.

Autumn dissolved into floods of tears, slamming the box lid shut and holding it to her chest again. This man had known her better than she knew herself. She buried her head in the duvet on the bed in front of her, shaking uncontrollably. She knew that Marley would come to her and she knew what would happen when he did.

“It’s OK, Autumn.” He pulled her away from the covers she was clinging to and into his chest. Autumn let herself rest her head against him for a minute, then turned her face to look at him. He gazed back at her the way he always did these days, as though she was the best thing he had ever seen. Marley was in love with her. Autumn had known for a while. Sometimes he muttered her name when he was sleeping, and his eyes danced over her whenever she entered a room. She basked in his gaze these days and had been doing so for several months. Now, in the dim light of their bedroom, fresh from a declaration of undying love from Bluebell, Bowie’s biggest fan, the harshest critic she’d ever have to face, and riding off her lover’s encouragement from beyond the grave, Autumn was ready to be honest with herself. She wanted Marley. Every bit of him. For ever.

There would never be any doubt about who moved to kiss who this time. She pressed her lips to his. He groaned in surprise and obvious desire, and pulled away. He whispered her name.

“I’m falling in love with you, Marley,” she said. He stared at her, confusion written all over his face. She nodded, rising up to kiss him again.

This time, he did not resist.

THE END