I Know What I Saw

He looks at me, disappointed, before turning to the whisky and pouring an inch into crystal glasses.

‘I’ve reported a crime but the police aren’t taking me seriously.’

‘Anything I can do?’ he says, handing me a glass.

I shake my head and as I take the glass, I’m drawn again to the picture on the mantel. I stare at it as Seb stretches himself on the sofa, bare heels in the soft carpet. Grace peers out shyly from the image. Something about her expression, soft and smiling, is heartbreaking.

‘Do you remember that?’ Seb says, watching me. ‘Nina had just got herself one of those SLR cameras. You know the ones with the fancy zoom lenses.’

I shake my head. There is the frayed edge of a memory there but not much more.

‘Yes, you do,’ he says, taking the frame into his hands. ‘She wanted each one of us to take a picture of the other three. That’s the one you took.’

I get up and sit next to him on the sofa to look more closely at it. ‘I remember bits,’ I say. ‘But I have trouble clinging on to much from those days. It’s being outside, the exposure. Messes with the wiring, I think.’

Seb nods as if he understands but I’m not sure whether he does exactly.

‘I still see Nina from time to time,’ he says then.

‘Oh. How is she?’ I say. And then I wonder about Grace. Has he seen much of her? I want to ask but that thread, wherever it leads, is too sharp. Painful.

‘The same. You know what she was like, too clever for her own good.’

I smile. There is Nina at eighteen, out-talking and out-arguing a professor during a tutorial. ‘Too smart for you at any rate,’ I say. And then I realise I don’t know how long they’ve been apart. Or together.

‘I’m sorry,’ I say when I see his face fall. ‘I didn’t mean to.’

‘Oh, don’t worry. We all knew I was never going to be able to hang on to her for very long,’ he says, smiling sadly and taking a sip of his drink.

‘How long exactly did you?’ I say.

‘Actually, I didn’t do badly, all told. We agreed to go our separate ways about a year ago.’

I take a sip and clench my jaw as the Scotch burns the back of my tongue. Nina in those days struck me as a thing of ether. I remember her high cheeks and fashionable oversized earrings and the smell of rose that trailed her wherever she went. But she wasn’t defined by that as much as she was by how little she revealed. She was impenetrable, to me at any rate.

Seb takes a large mouthful from his glass and clears his throat.

‘About Grace,’ he says.

My heart leaps at her name. For a moment I argue with myself about it. I want to know about her and how she is and where she got to, but at the same time, I know that my body can’t contain the pain of hearing about her. The extent to which she has flown out of my reach. I hold out my hand to cut him off. ‘It’s okay,’ I say. ‘You don’t have to.’

He shifts on the sofa so that he can turn his body towards me. He sighs and nods.

‘Where did you end up, Xander? For all these years?’

I laugh, catching myself by surprise. The idea of trying to sweep up and assemble the shards of my life from thirty years ago seems suddenly absurd.

‘Here and there,’ I say at last with a smile.

He looks me in the eyes and attempts a smile in return, but it dies on his lips.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘I should have done more.’

For a second I don’t register what he is saying.

‘Done more? What do you mean?’

‘After Rory. You know. I should have tried harder.’

I turn my body so I can face him more squarely. ‘I don’t understand.’

He shifts again in his seat. ‘I don’t know. We should have – I should have tried harder to help you.’

This stills me. ‘I didn’t need help, Seb,’ I say. ‘I wasn’t your problem.’

‘I was supposed to be your mate, Xand,’ he says, shaking his head sadly before standing up. He takes a breath and shrugs away the memories. He rubs his eyes and it’s clear that he’s tired. ‘I can lend you some pyjamas if you like. I’ll leave them on your bed.’

I consider telling him not to bother but then wonder whether he would prefer it if I didn’t sleep on his sheets without clothes on.

‘Thanks,’ I say, getting up too. ‘I’ll be out of your hair in the morning.’

Seb stops as I say this and looks at me from the doorway. ‘Look, I don’t need to know what this is all about if you don’t want to say. But you should stay, at least until you get yourself sorted out.’

I laugh again and hope it’s not unkindly. ‘I don’t think getting sorted out is really for me, Seb.’

He hesitates and then finally he says, ‘I know you need the Bens and I know it’s been a long time. But—’ He has run out of words. He exhales loudly, his hands on his hips, and then adds, ‘I do worry about you being on the streets where anything could happen to you.’

Bens. I have no idea what he’s talking about. Is it me? Has my mind dropped this too or is it Seb? Instead I nod at him and then add a half-smile as if I know what this means. But I have no idea.

15 Saturday