Page 16 of One Last Thing
She looks unimpressed. ‘What?’
‘He has lured us here without the other one knowing. He concocted a clever plan to make sure that his ashes were split in two so he could force both of us into taking him on a final tour of his favourite things to do in his favourite place. Together.’
Megan shakes her head. ‘No. No, I’m not doing it. This is the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard of.’
‘It’s actually a rather genius manner of getting your way. No one can say no to you once you’re dead, can they? Then, of course, there’s the matter of the house.’
She looks at me wide-eyed. ‘He saidnothingto me about the house. Alan said he’d bought it last year.Last year. Why . . . why would he keep that from me? Why wouldn’t he want me to celebrate that with him? We could have come out here together and . . .’
She trails off. I watch her helplessly.
‘Henry would have had his reasons for all of this,’ I attempt gently. ‘Maybe he wanted to spruce it up a bit to give you a big surprise and then, with his treatment, he never quite . . . I don’t know. I’m amazed he managed to buy it. Whenever we came on holiday here, he’d always talk about that house and retiring there. It is idyllic.’
She closes her eyes, inhaling deeply through her nose.
‘It might be . . . fun,’ I say weakly.
She opens her eyes to glare at me.
I amend my statement. ‘It won’t beallbad.’
‘Why would he want you to do this, too?’ she mutters. ‘You divorced him.’
‘Henry and I had a special relationship. No matter what happened between us all those years ago, we found our way back to being great friends. You know that.’
‘This was meant to be my thing. Something I’d do alone. I wanted to be on my own when I said goodbye to him.’
I watch her, admiring the effort she’s putting in not to crack even for a moment.
So stoic and strong. So like him.
‘I understand, darling,’ I say, prompting her to look at me with her big glassy eyes. His eyes. She has his eyes. ‘And I am happy to let you do that.’
‘You already said you can’t say no to someone when they’ve died. And I can’t . . . bear the idea of this Collioure house being sold when he finally managed to . . . Look, his request is that you do all this stupid stuff, too,’ she says resentfully.
‘Yes, but the final goodbye, when it’s time to . . . let him go,’ I say, a lump rising in my throat. ‘You can do that bit on your own. I promise. He was your dad.’
She doesn’t say anything for a moment. Then gives a sharp nod of acknowledgement.
‘So, we’re doing this?’ I check cautiously.
A muscle twitches in her jaw. ‘We don’t have a choice.’
‘That’s the spirit!’
She glowers at me. Not the time for sarcasm, clearly.
‘I’ll go find Nico and tell him to contact Alan,’ I offer, bringing my tone down to an appropriately sombre one. ‘Then I suppose Nico can let us know the first activity on the list.’
She pushes her chair back and stands up straight.
‘I’ll be in my room,’ she tells me, before marching out, the door slamming shut behind her. I wince at the sound.
Megan’s right. This whole plan is a stupid fucking idea. Not the first time Henry’s had one of those. I’ll admit I’m impressed at his organisation skills and determination to bring us here again one last time and plan out a full itinerary. It can’t have been easy to piece this all together withouteither of us cottoning on to his scheming. But why he’s done this to us, I’m not sure I will ever understand. He knew better than anyone how things are between Megan and I. He must have known there was nothing to be done about it. You can’t force these things. Much like during our marriage, he either chose to ignore me or wasn’t listening.
The thing is, some secrets are better left alone. Did he not consider how difficult it would be for me to protect them when he’s brought me out here with her? And the worst thing of all is I can’t consult him for advice.
Oh, Henry, I think as I sit alone in glum silence.What have you done?
