It also feels like it might not even be a choice.
I see her watching me, and know that she senses a critical moment. That I am perfectly balanced, and could tumble either side of the fence.
‘Look,’ she says, holding her hands flat on the table, as though trying to show me she has no weapons and means me no harm. ‘I’m making this programme anyway, you know that. I’m flying out to Australia next week to do some interviews there. I’d like you to be in it, and I think you’ll feel better if you have some involvement, some control over it.
‘So I’ll make you a promise. Not one I’ve ever made anyone else, all right? I can’t say I’ll give you control over what I use in the film, because I won’t – that’s my job, and I’m good at it. But I will involve you. You can work with me on it, as much or as little as you like. You can even help with questions, or research, if you want.’
‘Are you offering me a job?’ I reply, amused. ‘Because I already have one.’
‘Call it a job if you like. Though I won’t be paying you, so maybe more of an internship. Mainly what I’m offering is access – you’ll know what’s going on. Nothing will ever sneak up on you. If anything that falls into the deep-dark-secrets category comes out, I can’t say I’ll hide it – but I’ll warn you. You’ll know in advance at least. How does that sound? And do you have any other questions?’
I have one big question. One thing I am desperate to know, but am fighting the urge to ask – I want to know if she has seen him. Talked to him. If one of her film clips is of him, and how I would feel when I saw it. I don’t ask – because this decision cannot be made on that alone. I have not seen Alex in years, and our last moments together were sad and difficult – I’m not sure I’m ready to think about seeing him again just yet.
‘It sounds … better. But you know I need to talk to Harry about it. And I need time to think.’
‘Okay,’ she says, grinning. ‘Fair enough. And whatever you decide, Elena, it’s been so good to see you again. I’d like to stay in touch. I realise I’ve already come across as obsessed enough during this conversation, but it really did help me back then – having you around. While I was focusing on you and your life, I could avoid my own, which was pretty sucky.
‘I still remember how relieved I was when they brought you in – we all were. It was like you gave us hope again. I’m glad we had the chance to talk, and I hope I haven’t dredged up too many unpleasant memories. Bizarrely, it wasn’t all bad, was it?’
She’s right. It was the worst of times, but it also holds some of my most precious memories. We are like older people who lived through the war, and still remember fondly the bright moments in a terrible era.
Dancing to the swing band before the bombs went off.
Chapter 19
It’s hard not to be impressed by Harry. It’s difficult not to be charmed by him. And it’s impossible not to be proud of him for everything he has achieved.
It is also, undeniably, hard to deny the fact that he is sometimes extremely annoying.
We are sitting in a café near the beachfront, across from a place called Barrelstock Bay near our home. We are waiting to meet Em and Ollie, her cameraman and partner, to start filming for the documentary.
Finding out who Em was, talking to her, had convinced me that taking part would be a good thing, and Harry agreed – and now we are here, about to plunge in. I am nervous, but Harry seems chock-full of his usual confidence.
‘See that waitress?’ he says, gesturing with his eyebrows towards the young woman who has just delivered our coffee. ‘She fancies me.’
‘Really?’ I reply, stirring my drink and glancing at her. She is about twenty-one, and carelessly beautiful in the way of the surfing and sailing girls who are often to be found in this part of North Cornwall. ‘How can you tell?’
He winks at me. ‘Animal magnetism. I’m devastatingly handsome but also tragically wheelchair-bound – possibly after a freak snowboarding accident – which is a big double whammy.’
Harry still uses a wheelchair for longer distances, but can walk and stand using leg braces that he claims make him look like Iron Man.
I notice that the waitress is indeed casting a few furtive looks in our direction, and tucking her blonde hair behind her ears as she does. Damn. He may be right.
He notices me noticing this, and grins at me smugly. I roll my eyes, but smile against my better judgement. Annoying, but amusing.
Harry has aged well, in all kinds of ways. He is still the kind of handsome that makes old ladies blush when he compliments them (which he does). He has worked hard on keeping as fit as he can, and has bulked up considerably, filling the form-fitting T-shirts he favours in a way he likes to call ‘Chris Hemsworth lite’. He does like hisAvengersreferences.
He still has charm to spare, is still vain, and still has the ability to mock himself that offsets it all.
The big changes, though, are the ones you can’t see on the surface. They’re the ones that have added a hidden layer of humility, a greater tolerance for anyone less than perfect.
He always had the charisma, the ambition. He was always going to succeed in life – but the way he did it changed completely that night.
Initially the company he worked for said they would do ‘everything it took’ to make it possible for him to continue his career. In the flurry of publicity that surrounded us, our wedding, our return back to the UK, the start of Harry’s rehab journey, it was always what we assumed would happen.
That somehow, by sheer determination, Harry would make it work.
But once the cameras stopped rolling, it changed. Emails from his bosses started to be copied in to the head of HR, coated in corporate arse-covering language.
