Chapter 26

ROWAN

I carry a brand-new chorus across the playground. A different drumbeat. A melody with lyrics I wish I had the balls to bellow because I know this place now and its acoustics—know how sound carries, and that not only hammer blows and music get amplified here.

I am too.

I feel solid instead of wispy, less hazy even with that fog bank in my past, and drumming isn't the only reason for feeling this grounded. What Noah said is another.

You were wicked brave.

Charles has to notice what that does to me when he takes back his bucket. "Hello, Mr. Happy. Now, how about you make good use of all those feel-good endorphins by?—"

I head off this conversation. "Stop making excuses for me to see Liam." Because that's been the real purpose of all his errands, and we both know it. "You don't need to. I'll see him when…" I don't actually know when. Between helping Charles and my stand-in duties, my timetable is almost full until the weekend. "He doesn't have time for interruptions. He's got work to finish."

"Exactly." Charles turns serious. It's a startling transformation, a grinning golden retriever turned protective sheepdog circling his herd. "He's going to finish soon, Rowan. Very soon, according to Austin, who heard it straight from Dom. Your Liam will be done by Friday, and then he'll…" He digs a tooth into his lip. "What will he do? Move on again?"

"Yes?"

I shouldn't sound this uncertain. He mentioned an offer of a big project in York, didn't he? One that would keep him busy for months. I heard him turn it down before we… Before we became more. Did he only postpone it? "I'm not exactly sure of his plans beyond another trip to Blackpool at the weekend." And I'm not sure if I fit into any of those plans going forward.

But I want to.

Charles verbalises that for me. "Go and find out. Better yet, give him a really good reason to stay for longer. Tell him how you're feeling."

"But I've only known him for—" I push my glasses up the bridge of my nose and count the weeks back to our clifftop meeting, but Charles isn't interested in numbers.

"All I can tell you is that it only took me a few minutes to know I'd met someone special in Hugo. One drawn curtain in the chapel, a joint hunt for a lost lamb, and I was all in. Speaking of—" He breaks off to wave across the playground at a little boy who holds hands between Dom Dymond and the padre. He's all smiles today compared to the first time I saw him in the library. He even shouts, "Charles Heppel, look!" His next roar echoes. "I've got a hard hat!"

He waves it just as Charles sketches a love heart in the air and follows it with a fork of lightning that he aims at me. His voice lowers. "I'm not saying the same has to be true for you. Not at all. I had plenty of flings and was perfectly happy, but I've never regretted falling for Hugo in a hurry. I only regretted running away from what was obvious to everyone around us. I should have run straight towards him, but I didn't trust my instincts."

There's that word he uses around me so often.

"Tell someone they're stupid enough times, and they'll believe it." He taps his forehead. "All part of the fun of being a bit extra, right?" he says, as if I'm an expert on any of those colours he sketched on the blackboard. "For all of its gifts, it can mean having blind spots, so if you ever aren't sure about your instincts, remember our tools. Look." He fumbles in his pocket, then digs through those cards made for children. "Here."

He thrusts joy in my face. "You look like this every time you see him. If you aren't sure, check in a mirror. If you see this looking back at you, believe that you're allowed to want more of it. With him or whoever else makes you happy. I'm not the boss of you, I'm just saying that you deserve to be happy."

That's his constant message, isn't it?

He repeats it in different ways for every kid here. Now he tugs on my lanyard and make the same promise to me as I've heard him whisper to them. "You're brilliant, and we're so lucky to have you. He would be too, so it's okay to ask him if that's what he wants with you for longer."

The wind must have changed direction. Either that or Liam's picked up his sledgehammer. Something pounds, and rubbing my chest doesn't make it any quieter, but that's where Charles looks. His gaze only slowly rises from my hand to my eyes. "Go and see him," he says quietly. "Then go look in a mirror. At the very least, you'll have a name for what you're feeling."

I don't mean to sound this wistful. "While we're both still here."

"While you're both here? You're not going anywhere, Rowan Byrn."

I carry that wishful, wistful thinking all the way to the library, where I'd stow it in a new time capsule along with Noah's wicked brave chorus if I could. Only I wouldn't cover it with dirt and concrete, burying it like I buried what happened when I was the same age as the kids around that table.

No, I'd keep it safe to preserve what hasn't let up even once since I arrived here. Being wanted is so powerful that even if I can't do what Charles suggested, I do want to share Noah's praise with Liam. He did all the real lamb-saving, not me, only he isn't where I expect to find him.

I lean over the barrier at the library, pushing aside the netting and peering, but the space behind it is empty, no sign of Liam or any more time-capsule surprises. There's no old desk or bookshelves, no sign of anything but this site being ready for the last stage of a process that will spell the end of his time here.

Maybe that's why I head upstairs before going back to the classroom. Not because I'm about to ask for glitter or for more drumstick money. It isn't Austin I need. It's Luke, who mentioned what I'd need to untangle if I really want to stay here.

I'd have to do that training. Have to relive every trip and stumble right up to where my path cut off in stormy purple.

Luke told me I could do this, said he believed I'd be an asset. The same old excuses of I don't know and I can't remember that I last made in a different headmaster's study won't cut it with him. But since jumping off cliffs and kissing? Since garden walks and singing? Since Charles and all of his children, and especially since Teo took off his headphones and started talking?

That wicked-brave chorus won't quit repeating, and I'm bolstered. Supported. Strong enough to at least ask some trauma-informed questions.

Today, even the shiny knock-and-wait sign outside Luke's study doesn't give me flashbacks. I don't need to wait outside for a red light to turn green while dread slowly and surely rises. I don't even have to knock. The door is already open, and I push it wider to find the only other person who has ever said I've got courage.

Liam.

He's midway through making his own gritty offer.

"I can do it."

Do what?

Luke's answer fills in one gap, at least. "I can't ask you to repair the bridge for me. I really can't. It needs a complete rebuild."

Liam silhouetted in the window. "Pretty sure you didn't ask. I offered. And I'm pretty sure that rebuilding bridges is what Royal Engineers do. You know, after conflict? During it as well." He describes working conditions that I hate to think of but also mean there's no arguing with his work experience. "Whatever's wrong with your bridge, I can figure out how to fix it."

"No," Luke says. "I didn't mean you wouldn't know how."

The man Charles sent me to beg cash from speaks up from his side of their shared desk. For once, Austin doesn't sound ferocious. If anything, he's apologetic. "Luke means we really don't have the budget." He can't have seen me in the doorway or I don't think he'd say this with so much feeling. "We can't even afford fully qualified teachers, can we? But maybe we should bump that bridge repair higher up the list, Luke. I do hate the thought of Hadi worrying about it." He addresses Liam again. "If—and I do mean if—we find the money in the future, when are you next in Cornwall?"

Liam moves out of the sunlight streaming through the window and sees me in the doorway. He speaks to Austin, but it's me he looks at, and it's me who stops breathing as soon as he says, "Fully qualified or not, I'm pretty sure your kids are getting brilliant teaching." He aims the rest at Luke while a shelf of trophies shows me exactly what Charles promised.

All that shiny silver reflects joy the moment Liam says, "I'm in no hurry to go." He flashes a look my way. I don't know how to decipher his rawness. "Just think about what else I asked, yeah? I can pull the Liverpool job forward, then come back to work through the whole break, no problem. I know the demo has a tight time limit. I'll make it happen and rebuild your bridge for you."

I grip the door handle at what sounds like him wanting the same as me, and there's no need to check a card or my reflection to name this feeling.

I'm so fucking happy.

Liam isn't done yet in more ways than one. He makes a second offer. "And you won't need to find any cash in your budget. At least, you won't for my labour or overtime for Dom's crew." Here he goes straightening up so he stands even taller. "I… Uh… I've got a specialist crew of my own." It isn't tough to describe what crosses his face. The moment he says, "Pretty sure they'd help me," I see it clear as crystal.

He isn't so sure of that.

Liam hasn't finished speaking, and fuck knows how he straightens even further. "But first, I need to take a look at the project, so…?"

Luke asks, "You really have the time to stay for an extra week?"

Liam's glance flicks to me, and I don't have to think before nodding.

Luke acknowledges that I'm in the doorway. "Rowan." He checks his watch. "Is it that time already?" He means for one of our regular catchups.

"No. I wanted to ask you about something different. It can wait."

Luke says the same thing as usual. "Let's walk and talk."

All three of us do that together as far as the outdoor playground. That's where I trip—not over my feet, for once. I stutter over asking, "Th-that training you mentioned." I don't name it while Liam is right there listening. I can hardly compare losing a contest to actual PTSD, can I?

Thank fuck Luke is perceptive. All of his stern lines soften. "You'd like to meet Reece?" Perhaps he second-guesses that use of like. "You're ready for that training conversation?"

Readystill feels like a stretch, but I'm surrounded by people who make trying harder seem worth it.

I want to nod.

I want to.

Instead, I wage a one-man battle right here in a school playground, fighting to find my voice and failing.

He must see that. "No pressure," Luke promises. "Reece will be back from France soon. Even by Saturday, maybe. It might be easier to make a decision once you meet him. You'll like him." He pauses one more time. "I'll need you to keep up the staffing ratio over the half-term break in case the others are delayed. After that…"

He'll need a definitive answer.

He heads off then, cutting across the playground to the edge of the woods where the footpath starts. The bell rings, lunchtime ending, and children line up at the gate. I let them in before closing the gate between me and Liam.

He doesn't take that as a signal to go. Not yet, and I'm hot under the collar at this much scrutiny, at this much interest in me. I'm even hotter when Liam still doesn't leave after the bell rings again. He does turn to see Luke across the playground, waiting. "You need to go." He still doesn't do that. If anything, he reaches for me, and I lean in, only it isn't me that Liam grasps.

It's my lanyard.

He reads a brand-new sticker that Charles must have added before sending me on another go-talk-to-him errand. He reads it. "‘I listened to my teacher.'" Liam's ghost smile flickers, his gaze rising, and all I see is concern, plain and simple. "What did your teacher tell you to do, Row? To go ask your boss for extra training?" He frowns, but this isn't his real one, and I don't know when I learned to tell the difference. "Hope it's for a health and safety course. Is that why you hesitated? You like living on the edge too much? Not ready to stop winning stupid prizes? How about you listen to your teacher even harder?" He murmurs, "Fuck knows I'd sleep better."

He'd freak if he knew Charles actually encourages me to chase danger—to welcome stormy feelings if that means lightning might strike for a second time here.

Even now, Charles calls the children inside, and doors that have been propped wide open all morning close. I turn at the sound of that click to see he's huffed on one of the glass panes to draw another love heart that I quickly look away from, and here I go, tripping all over again to change the subject. "Y-you're not sleeping any better? You don't look as tired."

"Better?" Liam shrugs. "Not saying brown noise and fiddling with app settings is anything close to a cure, but a change is as good as a rest. That Teo… he's a smart kid." He still holds my lanyard, and I'm aware of movement in the periphery of my vision, but maybe Liam is too. He doesn't pull me closer, even if it looks as if he wants to. Instead, he turns to see what I also notice—Luke is still waiting for him.

Liam does ask a quiet question before heading off to join him. "You really okay with me sticking around for longer?"

Okay with it?

I can't make myself say yes to that trauma training. Not yet. Maybe never if I still can't find words. But getting to keep Liam for a whole week longer?

Saying yes to that is easy.

He smiles, not before looking at my mouth like he'd kiss it if we didn't have an audience, but that's what the prospect of his old crew also raises—an audience I don't know how to prepare for.

"You think they'll come? Your friends?" Because that's who he misses, friends not just workmates, people who care enough about him to keep texting over and over. Of course they'll pay close attention to me.

Liam pays close attention as well, only to his phone. "Yeah." Here's a new tone, both soft and gritty. "I think they'd come if I call." He scrubs at the back of his neck. "Probably won't need them. A week's plenty to do the work myself."

I have to ask this. "But if they did come, you said one of them liked stupid games?"

"As much as you do?" He snorts. "Not playing them, but yeah, Twin Two does. He always was a TV addict." He dips his head, his hand covering mine on the fence for a too-brief moment, squeezing. "Just like his brother. They both watched no end of mindless shit together."

"That means he… It means he might recognise me."

That trauma workbook mentioned making baby steps alongside students. Slow and steady, small exposures right there with them.

This feels the opposite.

I make myself keep speaking.

"I told you about someone who played the same game as me. A soldier. The one I could have helped more. The one painted as…" I'm meant to have a good voice. A strong one. This squeak isn't anything like it. "Painted as too scared to keep serving?"

"And?" Liam turns in Luke's direction, taking a few steps backwards while showing me that granite profile.

I force myself to say this. "I'm who said it."

He's still in profile, still not looking at me after this confession. He raises a hand. Not at me. He's focussed on Luke, signalling to him that he's coming. The few more steps he takes away seem a withdrawal, and I don't blame him. I'm also falling again, only this time I'm going to hit rock bottom until he asks a question. "And what prize did you win, Row?"

"Guilt."

Don't ask me how I make it through my next music session.

Or through a game where children make naming emotions so easy that I have to excuse myself and ask for permission to go off duty.

"Only for a few minutes," I tell Charles. "I'll be right back."

I do manage to walk all the way across the playground until I enter the woods. I run then, feet pounding along with my heart until the woods stop me.

Luke wasn't joking about needing someone to manage them. The further I get, the more the pathway narrows, overgrown and indistinguishable from the wildness.

I'm soon hemmed in, lost until I hear water. I follow it to a bridge that's seen better days, and that's where I hear Liam.

Not because he's working on it. I don't hear the strike of his hammer. It's his footsteps that pound, coming closer, and he emerges from the woods to stand under a spotlight. Not a real one like I used to—this beam is made from bright and golden sunshine, and I've never been so pleased to see him. Never been more worried either, so I start with what I can't keep in.

"I love you."

I'm standing on one side of a bridge but I might as well be back on a ledge with nowhere to go when Liam advances.

He also touches his ear. "What did you just say?"

I take off my glasses. Rub at the lenses instead of looking at him. Put them back on. The world still blurs. "I love you, and I'm sorry."

Maybe he only heard one part of what I told him. He asks, "You're sorry?"

I've seen waves crash against rocks and wished they didn't. Held a wriggling lamb and wished it wouldn't. Fell for a hero and wished I'd been a better person who deserved the rope he threw me.

Now he throws a second.

"I just went back to find you."

"Back?"

"To your classroom, to ask you this. How long have you been feeling guilty, Row?"

"Since I was seventeen."

"What's that, six years?"

I nod.

"And are you the same person six years later?"

I shake my head.

"Me neither." He keeps advancing, planks creaking under his weight. That danger doesn't stop him. "Back then, I didn't have tinnitus. Could hear perfectly without all this constant bullshit background chatter. The only bullshit chatter was mine, taking the piss each time Twins One and Two settled in for a TV session in the mess. Six years later, do you know what I regret most about those evenings with Benji and Blake?"

He keeps advancing while speaking.

All I hear is static and a final sentence.

"That you sang, and I missed my one chance to really hear you."

I run again then, into his arms, and planks don't only creak, they splinter, but at least we fall together.