The Space Between Us

by Anna McPartlin

  ‘We’re all made up of either vata, air and ether, pitta, fire and water, or kapha, water and earth.’

  ‘Sounds amazing,’ she said, shaking her head, pursing her lips and rolling her eyes to signal scepticism.

  ‘It’s the mother of all medicine,’ he said. ‘Give it a go. If anyone needs to rebalance you do.’

  She was sitting in a hospital bed at the time, and assured him she’d had her fill of medicine.

  ‘Trust me, the massages are sublime and they’ll help you repair.’

  She laughed. ‘You should work for the tourist board,’ she said, then admitted that she was terrified by the notion of anyone massaging her – physiotherapy was still torturous.

  ‘Remember the summer we did our Leaving Cert?’ he said.

  How could she forget? That summer had come sharply back in focus in recent times.

  ‘The rugby game we played in August?’ he went on. ‘A friendly with the Dun Laoghaire lads?’

  ‘You dislocated your knee.’

  ‘Well, actually, it was a guy called David Sweeney who dislocated my knee. He did it because I’d met him in a gay club and we kissed and I wanted to kiss again but he was deeper in the closet than I was, if that’s even possible. We had words before the game.’

  ‘You went to gay clubs back then? I thought your first gay experience was in college.’

  ‘Not the point of the story.’

  ‘Don’t care.’

  ‘He was angry, and when he attacked, he really attacked. He did some damage.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘And I’ve been in pain ever since.’

  ‘Is that why you’re rubbish at tennis?’ she said, with a grin.

  ‘I have arthritis in the knee,’ he said. ‘And after one session with Dr Thomas, I kid you not, I felt no pain – it’d been years since I’d felt no pain. You have to be careful, Eve. Things could go badly for you if you don’t take your long-term recovery seriously. That doctor can help. I mean it.’

  ‘So the wedding is all about me,’ she said.

  ‘No, it’s all about us but you should capitalize.’

  ‘The new, open, sharing you is unnerving.’

  ‘Don’t get used to it,’ he said.

  ‘Whatever.’

  When Adam arrived into her room that afternoon, after he had left Clooney to look after Lily, he sat by Eve’s bed. She was looking forward to hearing the plans that were being laid down to bring her home, but he was quiet and pale, and he didn’t smile the way he always did when he saw her.

  ‘What?’ she asked. For a moment she thought they had discovered a reason she couldn’t be discharged.

  ‘It’s Lily,’ he said.

  ‘What about her?’

  Her heart beat faster because she had heard that tone before, when her mother was sick, her father was sick and Ben had become an organ donor. Tell me! her mind screamed, but she didn’t say a word, just waited for the worst. Adam was uncomfortable and unsure. He didn’t know if he should tell Lily’s old friend what had happened, but then again Lily was staying in her penthouse and obviously attached to her brother. Also, he felt bound to Eve, not just as her doctor but as her friend. If he was honest, he was maybe even a little besotted with her. He owed her the truth and the people living in her penthouse owed her the same, plus he wanted her perspective. She was always so clear-headed about everything. He just didn’t know how to report it. The words seemed to get caught in his throat and he could read the impatience on her face.

  ‘He …’

  ‘He what?’ she asked, knowing immediately that Declan had done something.

  ‘He …’

  ‘Have you got some sort of speech impediment all of a sudden? What?’

  ‘He raped her.’

  Eve blanched. ‘How do you know?’ She was a little hoarse and her voice shook, not so much that someone who didn’t know her would notice, but in the nine intense weeks they had spent together, Adam felt he knew her well.

  ‘He dislocated her shoulder, split her lip, and her face was swollen. He ripped her apart down …’ He was a doctor but he didn’t want to say it because Lily was his friend. Even though she was married, possibly in love with Eve’s brother, and he had developed feelings for Eve, he cared deeply for Lily. Thinking about her in pain made him heartsick.

  ‘Where is she now?’ Eve said, slipping into business mode.

  ‘Your place.’

  ‘Where are the kids?’

  ‘At home.’

  ‘They can’t all stay in the apartment,’ she said. ‘Where’s Clooney?’

  ‘With her.’

  ‘OK,’ she said. ‘I’ll take care of the rest.’

  ‘Aren’t you surprised? Aren’t you disgusted?’

  ‘Not surprised,’ she said, ‘and Declan Donovan disgusted me a long time ago. How is she?’

  ‘She says she’s OK.’

  ‘She’ll be back to herself in no time. If this is what had to happen to get her away from him, fine.’

  ‘He’s going to fight her all the way and she won’t use the rape to fight back.’

  ‘I understand. He’ll be dealt with,’ she said.

  When Adam had established that she didn’t intend to hire a hitman, he left her to make calls and take control. That was Eve’s gift. Getting knocked down had taken it from her, and nine weeks was far too long. The bitch was back.

  Watch out, Declan, here I come, you fucking prick.

  Eve was finally discharged four days after Lily’s attack. The neurologist came back and repeated question after question before Adam would finally sign her out. Mostly she spoke the truth, but in some cases she lied. She wanted to go home.

  ‘Do you ever feel dizzy?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Any double vision?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Muscle-jerking?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Changes in sense of smell?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What about the headaches?’

  ‘Always had the headaches,’ she said, fully aware that the entire file was full of her stupid headaches. ‘Just let me go.’

  Abby wheeled her to the door, and Adam walked with her. Clooney was on her other side and Lily was waiting at home. She was excited. We’re all back together, Clooney. Just like old times. She was also ready for war. Eve and Clooney were different in so many ways but he and Lily were so similar. Always taking the high road. Eve had become a multi-millionaire by being the exact opposite. Money didn’t interest her, the game did, and she never lost. Her jewellery was worn by every credible personality and star in the spotlight. Her high-end couture stuff was on every catwalk in Milan, Paris, New York and London, and that doesn’t happen by accident. It had taken years of hard work and a cut-throat attitude. When the economy had started its downturn she had spotted it before anyone else and created a line to be distributed by a major supermarket in the USA. The board had fought her every step of the way, but she had held firm. They had gone from a high-end million-dollar enterprise to a high-and-low-end billion-dollar enterprise. Eve was passionate about her art but she was also a cold and calculating businesswoman: nothing prevented her winning. Declan Donovan had won way back in the summer of 1990 and only because she had been naïve and wouldn’t hurt Lily any more than she had to. Now she would finally get one over on him, helping her friend at the same time. Patience pays.

  The day she left hospital was glorious. The glass doors opened and she rolled out on to the car park she’d spent so much time looking at. Part of her panicked a little that she was leaving the place where Ben had last lived and finally died. She was leaving the place where she had said her goodbyes to him. I’m getting out, Ben. I promise when the time comes I’ll make sure the Ginger Monster is jailed. It’s not much but it’s all I can do. Lily was at the apartment. She hadn’t seen her since the rape. She missed her, wanted to mind her and make it all go away. When she got to the edge of the pavement she insisted on using the crutches that lay across
her lap. She shambled from the path to the waiting car and got in. When she was finally settled she opened the window.

  Adam leaned in. ‘Don’t bully your physiotherapist,’ he warned.

  ‘Don’t be late for dinner,’ she said.

  ‘What dinner?’

  ‘The dinner to welcome me home,’ she said, and looked at Clooney. ‘You promised me a dinner?’

  Clooney smiled. ‘Of course there’s a dinner. Tomorrow night everyone’s coming and of course Adam’s invited.’

  Adam smiled. ‘Looking forward to it.’

  ‘By the way, you’re not my doctor any more.’

  ‘There are follow-ups,’ he said.

  ‘Screw you. I’m going private.’ She waved as Clooney drove off.

  As Adam waved back, he wondered what it would be like to sleep with her when she was less fragile. How long it would take, he couldn’t say. Everyone healed, mentally and physically, in their own time. I think we could really be something.

  When Eve finally made it home, Lily had the place full of flowers to add colour. Eve didn’t really like flowers but she understood her pal’s need to make the place more homely. To Eve the cool blue sea, the green grass, the yellow sun, the streaming rain or grey sky were all features of the apartment, but Lily favoured coloured walls, flowers, fridge magnets, pictures, photos and just enough clutter to suggest that a family lived there but not so much that it appeared messy. Eve liked clean lines, bare surfaces and strong architecture. There were some new cushions on the sofa and a brown-framed, faded picture of her and Lily on the fireplace that separated the kitchen from the sitting room. That’s got to go, she thought, then took a moment to consider why and where Lily had kept it all this time. When she picked it up and looked at the two of them on the old swing-set, it made her want to cry.

  When she looked closer she saw that Clooney was behind Lily, pushing her. Lily and Clooney wore their usual cheesy grins, but Eve was sitting with her arms folded and a face like thunder. Clooney was about seven, she and Lily were five. She remembered the day. Her mother was behind the camera and her dad had been jumping up and down, waving and acting the fool. Poor Dad. The memory of him pulling faces made her smile but only for a moment, and then she wanted the picture gone. Sentimental but hideous.

  She hadn’t made a fuss of Lily when the lift door opened and Lily had greeted her – she had just hugged her old friend and told her she was happy they were together again. Lily was sad and still struggling with her new reality. Eve reacted to complex emotions she didn’t understand by being practical. She dropped on to her hard white leather sofa and hugged one of Lily’s purple furry cushions because her limbs ached and her sofa, a work of art, seemed uncomfortable and unwelcoming.

  Lily handed her a cup of freshly brewed coffee and Clooney hovered.

  ‘I love you, Lily Brennan,’ Eve said, out of nowhere.

  Lily was caught off guard and tears filled her eyes.

  ‘And you’re going to be OK,’ Eve said. ‘I’ll make sure of it.’

  ‘You always took care of me,’ Lily said, ‘but I’m a big girl now.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, you’re tiny,’ Eve said, and grinned.

  Lily went to bed early, leaving Eve and Clooney alone. They sat on the balcony, and over a bottle of wine, looking out at a black sea, he told her in great detail what Declan had done.

  ‘Is Danny’s house still up for sale?’ she asked.

  ‘As soon as the buyers pulled out, the sign went back up.’

  ‘We need to take it down for a while,’ she said.

  ‘Lily?’ he said.

  ‘Lily and the kids.’

  ‘They think she’s the devil,’ he said. ‘He has completely manipulated them.’

  ‘They’ll get sense,’ she said, in a tone that suggested that if they didn’t, she’d do something about it.

  ‘Eve,’ he said, warning her.

  ‘He’ll get sense.’

  ‘Eve.’

  ‘Leave it with me.’

  ‘Don’t do anything Lily will regret,’ he warned.

  ‘I promise I won’t.’

  They sat together in the cool night air, with a blow-heater, watching the water lap and fold, and when the bottle was finished and Eve was drunk enough to allow Clooney to carry her, they went inside.

  ‘I can walk. It’s not sore. I wish I’d got pissed earlier,’ she said in her bedroom, shambling around on crutches and pulling a fresh nightdress out of a drawer. ‘Mmm, it doesn’t smell of hospital but it does smell of cedarwood.’

  She headed to her dressing table, Clooney following in case she tripped. She didn’t, and waved him away. ‘Goodnight, go to bed, I’m fine.’

  ‘It’s good to have you home,’ he said, closing the door.

  Clooney made his bed on the pull-out sofa in Eve’s office. Then he turned on her computer and checked Facebook. There were a few messages from people he’d worked with and friends he had made over the years. He left some comments and looked at a few photos that had been recently posted. Mark Grey, a guy he’d worked with on and off over the years, had taken an office job in Geneva. He and Mark had shared a place in Kenya while Clooney was going out with Barbara Cashin. When it became apparent that she was looking for more than just a fling, he had ended it. She had taken it badly and they hadn’t spoken for a while. Clooney had left Kenya, Mark and Barbara behind, and the next time he’d met them, in January 2005, when every NGO was in Indonesia in the aftermath of the tsunami, they were in Aceh. By that time Mark and Barbara were living together and engaged. Barbara had softened towards Clooney, and Mark was happy to see his old pal again and they’d been keeping in touch on and off since. Now they were married, with a baby boy, Laurence. They looked happy, and it was nice to see but a little unsettling.

  Over the years the majority of the people he had started out with had either gone back to work within the aid organizations in their own countries or in major cities across Europe and America. Few were still in the field, travelling from country to country and job to job. He would be forty in December and he was tired, but not tired enough to envy Mark and his new suburban nine-to-five life. Good luck but it’s just not for me, man.

  He checked his main email account and saw three messages. Two were from Stephanie. In the first one she told him that a British journalist they both knew had been diagnosed with cancer and flown home to London. The second was headed ‘Hello from Paris’: the final day of her last period had been 18 June – she had remembered the date because she’d run out of tampons in the desert and had had to use her favourite silk scarf. She had returned to the hotel on 2 July. They’d had sex that night and her coil had chosen not to work: she was ten weeks pregnant. She was in France. She had travelled there for an abortion and a break. Abortion was only legal until the twelfth week in pregnancy and she had to be there for a week before the procedure, for mandatory reflection. She had been there two days and her procedure had been scheduled for the following Thursday: if he arrived on the Friday they could spend a long weekend together at the Ritz before she returned to Afghanistan. The email was three days old.

  He sat in Eve’s swivel-chair, reading the email over and over again. It was so blasé. An abortion and a break? The message was short, matter-of-fact and didn’t give away any emotion. It was typical of Stephanie. He wasn’t judging her – and he didn’t want to be a father – but this was a baby, his and hers. Not wanted but there. Even if she did get rid of it in two days’ time, it was there now, growing inside her. His mind was racing. He wasn’t made for fatherhood. She wasn’t maternal. They were rolling stones. They had been careful not to conceive. She had the coil and he’d only stopped using condoms when they’d had blood tests and been declared clean. They were really fond of one another but they weren’t in love. She would have been a good mother but war was no place for a child and war was the only thing Stephanie understood. She didn’t belong at an American base any more than he belonged in a United Nations city office.


  She’s ten weeks pregnant. He Googled what a ten-week-old foetus would look like.

  Week 10: embryo is now a foetus. The foetus is now the size of a strawberry. The feet are 2mm long (one tenth of an inch). The neck is beginning to take shape. The body muscles are almost developed. Baby has begun movement. While still too small for you to feel, your little one is wriggling and shifting. The jaws are in place. The mouth cavity and the nose are joined. The ears and nose can now be seen clearly. Fingerprints are already evident on the skin. Nipples and hair follicles begin to form.

  She’ll be eleven weeks pregnant at time of termination. He was almost scared to look but he couldn’t help himself.

  Week 11: neurons multiply. The fingers and toes have completely separated. The taste buds are starting to develop. Baby has tooth buds, the beginning of the complete set of twenty milk teeth. Baby can swallow and stick out his or her tongue. Whole body except tongue is sensitive to touch. Cartilage is now calcifying to become bone. If it is a boy, the testicles are starting to produce the testosterone hormone.

  He read and re-read it. Whole body except tongue is sensitive to touch. Will it feel anything? He found a Yahoo answer site in which pro and anti women basically tore lumps out of each other. He looked at medical sites and saw the same arguments. Most in the medical field agreed that pain was more likely to occur in the third trimester. It was too soon for the baby to be aware and feel pain. Whole body except tongue is sensitive to touch.

  He started his reply on email. She hadn’t even left a phone number and she hadn’t sent another email since. He had stopped looking at email when Lily had arrived on his doorstep. He had focused on her and nothing else. He wondered if Stephanie was even that bothered. Three days had passed since she’d told him she was pregnant. The subject heading was interesting: ‘Hello from Paris’. Was she having a good time? He hoped so. Did she feel heartsick like he did? It was unlikely.

  Hi Stephanie

  He deleted it.

  Stephanie

  He deleted it.

  Oh Steph

  He deleted it.

  I’m so sorry.

  He deleted it.