I watched Jack rise from the settee he had been lying on. He never looked over to me, not once. His feet met with the wooden floor as quietly as he could manage and I watched as he left the room, unable to tear my eyes away from him. I never in my wildest dreams thought I would be in the same room again.

It was all so much more than I could bear.

My body convulsed at the realisation he had turned into the very person my father told me he would most certainly become. I hated the fact that he had been right, when he had been so wrong about so many other things. I had always clung to the fact that leaving Jack when I did, would mean he could lead a different life from the one my father saw mapped out for him. I had known he was young and could easily be swayed. But I had hoped that once I was out of his life, all the awful things I brought to our relationship would leave too.

How wrong I was.

I don’t know how long I shuddered from the pain, or maybe it was shock leaving my body. I lifted a hand to my face as the spasms subsided, and touched my cheek. As ever there were no tears to be found.

I turned onto my side and faced the windows, slowly I began to see the colour in the sky outside changing. Wherever I was, I was about to watch dawn break. I wished I could appreciate the beauty in it. I had always loved the simple things in life, but now they generally gave me no pleasure whatsoever. I was so hell bent on surviving, accepting everything that was thrown my way, that I had shut down any feelings I had a long time ago. Only one person got to see the real me. I was convinced at times it was what kept us both alive.

I heard the door creak as it pushed back open. I didn’t move but concentrated on watching the kaleidoscope of colour as it danced in front of my eyes through the windows of the bedroom.

I heard Jack come back in.

I watched in my peripheral view as he walked in, still only wearing the dark blue jeans he had been wearing earlier. He made his way over the floor and placed a tray down on the marble top of the wash stand. The chink of the mugs as they jostled together with the movement was all that stood between us and the conversation I knew he was gearing up for.

Jack had always gone quiet when he was mulling something over.

I watched as he lifted the two floor-length nets from the windows, and draped them over a purposely placed hook to the side of each of the windows. Once they were lifted it revealed more of the stunning transformation that was taking place outside.

Without saying a word, he poured two mugs of tea and placed one on the shelf next to where I was lying. I didn’t meet his eyes but lay out prone staring through him when necessary.

‘Beautiful, ain’t it?’ I made no reply or movement to answer his question. ‘Drink your tea. You need the fluid.’

Was it possible to be in shock that I was here with him now?

I didn’t move a muscle, unable to comprehend what was really going on. I heard his mug bang on the tray as he placed it back down. I could tell he was as shaken as me, as my ears had previously picked up the unmistakable sound of a barely audible chinking, when he had held his mug against his teeth.

Slowly, I sat my pained body up and picked up the mug from the shelf and began to sip at the hot, sweet liquid I found inside. My eyes remained fixed on looking out of the window. I couldn’t look at him. The connection that was between us had been slumbering for the years we had been apart, but him being here with me now was reawakening everything I had ever felt for him, and it was reawakening fast. I couldn’t let it happen. I had too much to lose.

‘So, when are you going to tell me who told you… I was going to become something that you’re so convinced I now am?’

‘You lied to me, Jack.’ I made my voice come out as strongly as I could manage. He needed to feel the full force of those few words.

‘What the fuck do you mean?’ His tone heated up at the accusation.

‘You made me a promise and you broke it. You lied to me and he showed me exactly what you were going to become.’

‘Lily… You’re gonna have to give me more to go on… I ain’t ever knowingly lied to ya.’

I lifted the mug back up to my lips to sip at the tea once again. Of course, he would deny it. I wouldn’t have believed it was true, but I needed to remember that I had seen it with my own eyes. Silence once again took over. I saw him out of my peripheral view as he made his way to stand in front of one of the windows. He placed both hands against the window frame and rested his forehead on the window. I watched the muscles in his back flex as he spoke and his breath misted up the cool glass.

‘You didn’t turn up, Lils. What the hell did I do to fucking deserve that? I stood there like a fucking prick, waiting for you. I paced up and down looking for you, no… expecting you… to appear at the door.’ His muscles on his back tightened with the anxiety of reliving his pain. ‘Charlie and I waited inside the registry office. Then when our time slot ran out I was asked to leave the room as another couple were waiting to get married, and I was holding up their happy occasion. I saw them look at me with such fucking pity that, like an arsehole, I squared up to the poor guy in his best suit. Charlie pulled me outside. I have taken many a beating, Lily… but the pain of you leaving me there like that, was almost more than I could take… I rang and rang your mobile, you never picked up. Katy drove around searching for you, eventually she had to come and tell me that she couldn’t find you anywhere. Not so much as a fucking text to any of us. For days I rang, Lils, until finally your number went dead. I didn’t know where the fuck you were, I imagined every scenario possible.’ I watched as one of his hands lifted away from the window and he brought it down hard on the plastered wall.

The smack it made reverberated around the room.

Obviously not satisfied that he had released the tension building up inside him, he lifted both hands up and linked his fingers together. Placing them on top of his head he pulled his head to jolt backwards, his gaze lifting skyward.

A pained groan left his mouth.

‘Do ya know how much that hurt? The woman who I thought loved me, didn’t love me enough to show up for our fucking wedding? And even worse than that, she didn’t have the fucking guts to tell me why. What a fucking idiot you must have thought I was?’

I sipped the final few dregs from my cup. Looking down into the empty cup I realised that I no longer had anything to occupy my concentration.

‘I didn’t turn up, Jack, because I no longer wanted to marry you. It was all just a stupid dream thinking we could run away from my family, when really you were well on your way to fast becoming just like them. Out of the frying pan and into the fire was not what I wanted for my life.’

The speed in which he turned to face me took me by surprise. I let my guard down and moved my eyes from the sunrise outside until we stared at each other for the first time in over three years. I had often wondered how he would look now, all those times when I wanted to torture myself with thoughts of what we had meant to each other. I remembered in my dreams the tall, lean but muscular young man he was. The blond, messy hair he habitually wore. The bright blue, captivating eyes that danced around as he teased me and that tongue that pushed against the back row of the top of his teeth.

If I could paint, I could have painted him by memory alone.

The man he had grown into, had widened in stature. Every muscle on his torso was well-defined and visible. His face had matured, but only slightly. The boyish good looks were still there, he was very likely to be one of those men who would only improve over the years. The stubble he had occasionally worn before, was now no longer patchy. I could see that the scruff he now displayed on his face had been grown in just one night. His hair was styled shorter, it no longer presented the messy, carefree young man he was. But, his eyes were still a bright blue, although they held more than I was used to seeing in them. I could now see pain, and fury for the accusation I had just flung his way.

‘How the fuck can you accuse me of becoming like them? I don’t even know them. YOU never fucking told me anything about them!’ He pointed at me, then he forced both of his arms to his sides as he began to crack both of sets of knuckles in anger. ‘All I knew was they sounded dangerous, they sounded like some sort of Mafia. Only people like the Mafia would marry off their daughter for business.’

‘Precisely, only people like THEM would deal in women like they were a commodity… Have a think about it, Jack. How come I’m here now? Ask yourself just that, you run in the same circles as them and that’s just what my father showed me you would do.’

‘Your father? What the fuck does he know about me? He was wrong, very wrong. I fight but that’s where it ends.’

‘You accepted me as payment for a debt… You must have done, otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here now… and yet here I am. Come on, tell me… Didn’t you?’

Our voices were starting to rise with the pent-up emotions now being released. Jack sat down with a thump on the side of my bed and instinctively I moved away from him. I saw the flash of hurt as it sparked in his eyes. He placed his face down onto his palms and rubbed briskly at his skin, like he was trying to erase our conversation.

‘We need to backtrack, Lils. We need to calm the fuck down and backtrack. I need to understand why the hell you think I lied to you? Let’s start there, back at the beginning.’

I looked sideways at him, widening my eyes in question. I wondered what it was going to solve? Surely things were better this way? But maybe I owed him somewhat of an explanation? I had accused him and now he needed to know why.

‘Think back, Jack. What was the one promise you made me when you asked me to marry you?’

Our eyes once again found each other’s. His forehead set into a deep frown. I could see he was running the exact moment through his head. Resignation came over his features as he now understood what I was saying was true.

‘I promised not to fucking fight again, until after we were married.’

‘Exactly… but you broke that promise. Didn’t you?... DIDN’T YOU?’ I shrieked at him to make him own up to me and admit that he had lied. He stared blankly back and made no attempt to answer. ‘The last weekend I went home before we were due to be married, my father confronted me. My mum had told him under duress what our plans were…’ I stopped for a minute and took a deep breath. ‘He had beaten her black and blue when he found out she had lied to him. He had threatened to kill her unless she told him our secret. So, he knew about us. He had time that week to take a good look at you and had an offer made to you, that he knew you wouldn’t refuse. If you had kept your promise to me, there’s every chance we would have married. But instead, I watched you fight that fight, a fight that you promised wouldn’t happen again until after we’d married. I watched every punch you threw and you may as well have been hitting me, that’s how much pain I felt. I watched you win, and accept the cash. I saw all of this through a darkened window of my father’s car and through the last proper tears I ever shed… Was the money worth it, Jack?’

The door opened, breaking the fraught atmosphere in the room.

‘You’re awake.’ I turned to see Katy beaming at me as she rushed quickly into the room with her arms open wide. She was so excited to see me that her ever exuberant arms flailed around just like one of the Muppets. Despite the hurt in the room between Jack and I, a smile came to my face. She threw herself onto the bed next to me without another word and gathered me in her arms.

I felt the bed move as Jack stood and saying nothing he left through the same door.