WHAT DID I JUST COMMIT to? Doing the Countdown Challenge with Vi is going to be bloody painful, but shit do I want to prove to myself that I can do it. Maybe there’s even a part of me that wants to prove it to Vi as well. Either that or I’m thinking if I dump all my issues on her it’ll help prevent me from wanting to pursue her. Or, better yet, her wanting to pursue me.
I don’t need a love interest right now. I just need to stay clean and focused. Yes, that kiss was fucking memorable to say the least. Yes, I spent most of the night thinking that in another life I would have drug her upstairs, peeled her dress off her slim body, and made sure every bare curve and flat surface was touched by my lips.
Deep breaths, Hayden. Deep breaths.
But I stayed strong. I stayed the course. Because I’m not weak anymore, and I’m doing the Countdown Challenge one way or another.
I’m relieved when we decide there’s no time like the present to dive in. Delaying our visits would only make it easier for me to find excuses to get out of it. She suggests we run back to her place first to grab Bruce so we can go sit at a nearby dog park to talk. I’m both dreading and ready for my first countdown confession. It will be very telling what kind of person Vi is and how strong I am in my recovery to openly discuss this with a new acquaintance.
As we approach her flat, a younger Italian-looking bloke with a backpack stands waiting at her alley entrance.
“Hiya, Vincent! Sorry I’m late,” Vi calls, speeding up her pace toward the door.
“No problem, Miss Harris,” he says as I watch his eyes linger on her exposed torso and drift down her legs.
I glare at him and he looks at me as if to say, “Hey man, I’m only human.” Cheeky fucking wanker.
“Come on up. I’m going to pop out and take Bruce for a walk, so I’ll just leave you to it.”
The three of us slip into the small lift. Vi sticks a metal key into the slot, and my eyes widen in shock when I see the number eleven displayed as the only button on the control panel.
Without noticing my reaction, she looks at me and says, “Vincent tends the garden on my roof.”
My brows arch. “You have a garden on your roof?”
She looks down in embarrassment. “It’s only flowers and plants. Not like produce or anything.”
“It’s incredible. You should see it,” Vincent says, nodding earnestly. “The roses are beginning to bloom.”
“I can show it to you some other time.” She shrugs her shoulders nonchalantly.
When the lift doors open to the eleventh floor, I’m surprised to see we’re walking straight into her flat. Since I’m the first one out, my crotch is instantly pummelled by a wet mouth.
“Oi, Bruce!” Vi shrieks and stumbles over to grab him by the collar. She struggles to pull him back. “You disgusting creature. Go on and head up, Vincent.”
I don’t even attempt to help her with Bruce as I take in the stunning eleventh-floor penthouse. Vincent walks through her airy living room, out the large balcony door, and begins climbing a ladder on the building that evidently leads up to the roof. A huge flat-screen is mounted on one wall in the sitting area, and a quick glance through a pair of French doors to the left reveals a huge ornately, gothically decorated bedroom. The bed alone is a jaw-dropping piece of art.
Vi has a gardener, her flat is decorated immaculately, she was willing to spend six hundred pounds on a keepsake box, and she lives on the entire top floor of this building.
“Who are you, Vi Harris?” I ask, my gaze crashing on hers in accusatory curiosity.
She blows a puff of hair out of her face, still holding onto Bruce. “What do you mean?”
“You said your brothers are footballers,” I start, beginning to put two and two together.
“I did.”
My jaw drops. “Like professional footballers?”
She sighs heavily.
I inhale sharply. “Is your brother Gareth Harris? As in Manchester United’s starting defender?” My face is deathly serious.
She purses her lips. “Are you a fan?”
My eyes widen as she confirms my suspicions. “That means your dad is Vaughn Harris, the manager of Bethnal Green.”
“You’re a fan,” she murmurs.
“You could say that.” I blink my eyes slowly and run my hands through my hair. “Christ. Now I’m afraid.”
“Afraid of what?”
“Your brothers!”
She giggles and releases Bruce to pounce me. “Too late to back out now, mate.” Just as Bruce nearly reaches me, she says, “Come on, Bruce. Time for a walkies,” and he diverts his path toward a small basket in her kitchen to grab his own lead.
Still slightly star-struck by this very new information, Vi and I head out with Bruce in tow. Christ. I never would have guessed any of this about timid, quirky, and somewhat awkward Vi! I do my best not to fire a million questions at her because I assume she gets that a lot. And frankly, I’m more intrigued by watching her walk her enormous animal through the busy streets of Brick Lane.
She looks rather confident and at ease in her own skin. Bruce is actually quite manageable on a lead, which I’m grateful to see. One strong tug from him and he’d take Vi out and seriously injure her.
She leads us into a quiet little park oasis where a pair of poodles are prancing around proudly. They take one look at Bruce and freeze. Vi unclips his lead and he bounds over to them, immediately rolling over on his back to allow the two canines to sniff all of his wobbly bits until their hearts are content. One of his paws is the size of the pair of them put together. It’s comical, really. The three begin chasing each other and yipping playfully as Vi and I find a secluded bench beneath a magnolia tree.
Pink flowers cascade down all around us. I grow ill as I take in the stark contrast of the surrounding beauty and the horror within me.
“So where do you have to start?” Vi asks, breaking the silence, her eyes wide with interest.
“Day five,” I croak, shrugging. “Or at least that’s what Doc said.” I lean forward and rest my elbows on my legs, looking straight ahead as nerves shudder beneath my rib cage.
“What happened on day five?” she asks, her voice soft and probing. “Hayden, stop looking so terrified. I told you I am curious, remember? This is your challenge. I’m your helper. Don’t worry about me. I get what I’m in for. Out with it.”
I tsk my teeth and begin. “Day five was the first time in my life I had ever considered methods.” Getting it all out in one sentence is an immense relief. I had spoken about many of my days leading up to my attempt in rehab during group therapy. But here, out in a dog park, is an entirely different situation.
I turn my head to watch her reaction.
“Methods?” she asks confused. Then her eyes alight with realisation. “Oh.”
I clench my jaw and nod, looking away. Watching the dogs as I speak my entire truth seems a great deal easier than staring at her innocent face. “I actually Googled the best ways to kill myself. I’d never done anything like that before. Never even considered it. Not properly. But on day five, I had reached my breaking point in my personal life, and researching methods felt like the ultimate fuck you to the universe.”
“What caused you to reach your breaking point?” she asks quietly.
Frowning, I recall the intense night I had with Reyna in her flat. The one that resulted in me getting socked in the face by Liam. I close my eyes and reply, “Things were changing all around me. My best friend at the time was Rey and she was changing. Pulling away from me. I took it badly. That on top of everything else I had been dealing with was suffocating me.
“So I started Googling options. A great deal different than Googling a nice holiday, let me tell you. Once I got past all the self-help numbers that popped up like mad, I discovered that a gun is the quickest and most popular method, but I didn’t have one of those. Carbon monoxide poisoning from running a car inside a closed garage could have been an option, but I didn’t have a car either. Pills and booze could work, but I had seriously abused pills and booze in my past, so obtaining a prescription was and still is damn near impossible since my medical chart is flagged. And I’m not too keen on drug dealers.” I laugh self-deprecatingly and shake my head. “I had lots of access to sharp, circular saw blades, though…So—”
“You slit your wrists,” she finishes.
I nod woodenly, unsnapping and re-snapping one of my leather cuffs that conceals a horrid scar beneath. My throat constricts with anxiety. “I think I wanted to feel the pain. To watch the end. I wanted to choose the exact time it occurred. I couldn’t stomach the idea of hanging myself, but I considered it.”
I look over at Vi to gauge her reaction. Her face is frozen in a serious, sombre expression.
“You okay?” I ask, touching my finger to her cheek. Her eyes close at my caress, and the warmth of her skin reminds me that I’m not alone. That’s she’s right here. Heart beating, breathing, listening, absorbing, and enduring beside me.
She nods, her chin trembling. “It’s sad.”
No two words could better define such raw truth.
I nod in confirmation. “It is sad.” I look away again and my eyes zero in on an elderly woman sitting on a bus bench. Her tiny hands are peeling away at an orange, and something about the simplicity of that act—the beauty of her eating a piece of fresh fruit that this world offered—gives me the strength to continue.
“I felt relief once I decided how to do it. I had a plan. I could see the end of the tunnel that seemed so utterly painful and horrid. I hated my life. I hated everything happening around me. I had no control in any aspect. I was fucking up at work. I was fucking up with my mates. With my family. Every turn was another opportunity for me to fuck up. So day five was the first day that I thought, ‘All right. Now you’ve manned-up and have finally done something for yourself.’ It’s strange, but I felt brave. And I felt peace.”
“You seem so different from the man you’re describing,” Vi says as I pinch the bridge of my nose to stave off the tears I can feel pricking my eyes. “I can’t imagine that guy. So ready to give up. I know we don’t know that much about each other, but you seem so confident. Strong.”
“I was confident in my choice then. It didn’t feel like giving up in my mind. It felt like a solution. A permanent mute button to silence all the noise in my head.”
A thoughtful quietness stretches between us while we both absorb everything I just said. As if sensing our tense state, Bruce trots over, panting happily, and noses Vi’s crossed legs. She remains still, so he moves on from her and shoves his face into my hands and through to my face. I half smile and give him a hearty pat.
“Bruce, go on and run! Leave us be,” Vi reprimands.
“He’s fine,” I say. Then a man and his Dalmatian enter the closed gate and, without hesitation, Bruce trots off anyway to greet the newcomers.
Vi breaks the silence. “May I ask you about your sister?”
I lift my brows. “It’s funny you ask because that’s a lot of what day four was about.”
“Go on then,” she smiles sadly. “Was she pretty special?”
“She was the greatest,” I laugh. “She was loud, and opinionated, and passionate about everything. A proper know it all. She was vivacious—” My voice falters and I stop, suddenly overcome by emotions I can no longer hide as easily.
Closing my eyes, I envision Marisa’s body flinging backward the same way I had so many times before. I wish more than anything that I could block that image out, but it is forever on repeat in my mind’s eye.
“On day four, I couldn’t stop thinking about what happened to her. I went on a bender, drinking heavily and reliving the scene over, and over, and over.” I swirl my finger near my temple.
“What did happen?”
“A tragic, freak fucking accident. That’s what they taught me to call it in rehab. Maybe not the fucking part. I embellished there.” I swallow hard and exhale sharply to prepare myself for the painful retelling of Marisa’s death that is so poignant in my head.
“My parents live in the rural part of Essex. They have a large estate, and my siblings and I grew up riding quads all over the surrounding pastures. Even as we grew older, we did things like that together. It was always a good laugh when Theo, Daph, Marisa, and I went out on our adventures. My family had always been extremely close for as long as I could remember. The worst row I ever had with my parents was back when I told them I wasn’t going to attend University. It was an issue because my dad expected me to take over his furniture distribution plant. His policy was that his children couldn’t be management without proper education and experience. But I didn’t want to take over the plant. That was the thing.” I swallow hard, knowing that I’m stalling with ramblings about my childhood. But that’s not what Vi’s asking about.
I suck in a big gulp of air and continue. “Anyway, we were out on the quads and Marisa had to go inside to use the loo…She was riding with me.” My voice cracks at the memory of her gripping me around my waist and laughing. “Marisa was always laughing. Always happy.” I take a deep breath and place my head between my hands.
Vi’s hand touches my shoulder, and it feels like a warm blanket of comfort. I turn my watery gaze to hers and see such sincere compassion it gives me the strength to continue.
“I dropped her at the door and was doing laps around the house while I waited for her. She stepped right in front of me. Just like that. I was looking away and never even saw her.” A painful cough erupts from my throat and I turn my head. “It wasn’t the impact of the quad that did it. It was the impact of her neck striking a bloody landscaping paver.” My voice is pained and guttural. “My entire family was there to witness it. Theo. Daphney. Mum came running out of the house screaming. It was a fucking crime scene right where we grew up as kids. Right where we learned how to fucking walk. One piece of landscape fucked my family up for the rest of our lives.”
I hear a sniffle and look over to see Vi crying. Her face is pinched like she’s trying to hide her emotions but is failing miserably. Her blue eyes are rimmed red and tears are flooding her eyes, streaming down her face. Without pause, I open my arms and her face softens as she tucks in tightly to my side.
“I’m sorry,” she croaks, her shoulders shaking from her soft sobs.
“Christ, what do you have to be sorry for? I’m the bastard torturing your heart and making you cry,” I groan in frustration. This isn’t what she deserves. She deserves to be taken care of. “I told you this was a bad idea, Vi. I should have listened to my instincts.”
She sniffs loudly and pulls away. Then she shifts to face me on the bench, crisscrossing her legs. “No, Hayden. I want to be your person. The one to help you with your countdown. But, bloody hell, I’m going to be emotional. It doesn’t mean I want you to stop. It just means I have feelings. You need to be okay with me feeling sad about this.”
I frown at her and shake my head. “I don’t like doing this to you. It goes against everything inside of me.”
“Stop, all right. Come on. Tell me something happy. Tell me something sweet about Marisa. Or funny. Did you guys get on? Or did you fight a lot?”
I grin. “A bit of both. She and Theo were like the mummy and daddy of Daph and me. They always tried to boss us around and force us to do our chores because they were older, so I would try to manipulate Daphney to be on my side. We did things just to get up their noses.” Chuckling to myself, I add, “One time when we were kids, I got Daphney to hide in the barn with me because I knew Marisa was taking her boyfriend out there to snog. We had water balloons and waited until they were nearly half-naked before launching a water storm at them.”
Vi bursts into a full-on belly laugh, and it pleases me to see her smile push away her tears. It’s a gorgeous sight.
“That’s awful!” she exclaims.
I chuckle. “Daph couldn’t have been more than ten. She was so confused over what they were doing to each other and had all these awkward questions for me. I told her to ask Mum and that just got Marisa in more trouble.”
“You were a little sod, weren’t you?” Vi asks, swatting at my shoulder playfully.
I nod and my chest puffs out with pride. “I really was. Still am, mostly.” My hand finds its way to Vi’s face to wipe at some stray tears still lingering. “This feels good.”
She nods, obviously pleased. “I’m glad.”
“I didn’t think it would feel this good to talk about it with someone like you.”
“What do you mean someone like me?” She looks mock offended and a flicker of confusion streaks across her face.
“I just mean someone I don’t know all that well. It feels enlightening to see a stranger’s reaction to my story I guess. It’s all…surprising.”
Her brows lift. “A stranger?”
I shrug, feeling a bit disconcerted. “Mostly.”
Seemingly unaffected, she throws me a smile. “So, what’s your next day? What was day three?”
I shake my head. “I’ll get to it. But frankly, I’m shattered. Maybe we can get together another time?”
“You sure you want to hang out with me again, Hayden Clarke?” She wiggles her eyebrows, then quickly drops all playfulness and watches me warily. Affection and warmth radiate from her in a way that draws me in so acutely that it takes all the strength in my body to not cup her face in my hands and take her mouth with mine.
Her voice and smile are soft. “I have revealed my truth that I am an emotional ninny after all.”
My eyes twinkle at her confession. “It might be my new favourite thing about you.”