Saving Amy (19 page)

“Yes it is. I figured you wouldn’t know what to pack at such short notice, so I had someone do it for you.” My eyes widened in shock. Was the extravagant bastard for real? I slowly rifled through the contents and found it fully stocked with clothes – tags still intact and designer, naturally – makeup, toiletries and lingerie…
Ooo.
He’d had a whole department store smuggled into there.

“Richard, this is absurd!” His eyebrow sprung to life quicker than he could take in a breath. “Don’t get me wrong, everything in here is perfect… but you have to admit, it’s a little extreme,” I said as politely as I could manage because I worried I’d offended him.

“You need clothes, Amy.” He sounded disappointed.

“Not designer ones I don’t. I don’t even want to guess how much this lot is worth.”

“Not as much as you,” he flattered and I could hear the smile in his voice. I didn’t hear him walk towards me and it momentarily startled me to feel his arms snake around my waist.

“I don’t mean to sound ungrateful,” I admitted as he spun me around to face him. “It’s just you have given me so much –
too
much – already. I just wish I had something to give back to you, that’s all,” I declared because I felt like a money-grabbing freeloader.

“You give me the world just by being here. You have given me more than I ever knew existed. You’ve changed me, baby. I wish you could see how much.” Before I could respond he was kissing me – my cheeks, my neck, my lips… The taste of him expelled any residual tiredness and soon enough the suitcase had been tossed to the floor with Richard taking its place, and I was naked and on top of him – working off some of that sleep.

4
:00
AM
and I was still wide awake. I was curled up into Richard’s arms, inhaling his skin as I twiddled the hairs on his chest between my fingers, in a four-poster, super king-sized bed that, wait for it… was
upstairs!
What kind of hotel room had
two
floors?

“I’m not tired,” I muttered sulkily, staring into his emerald eyes.

“Me neither.” He winked and we both knew
why
he wasn’t tired. Lying in blissful silence, the only interruption was the calming sound of his heart thrumming beneath my ear.

“Tell me what you’re thinking,” he asked and I was taken unawares. God knows why but I was actually thinking of his sister, Kate. Should I be honest with him and risk bursting this serene bubble we were floating in? Or should I talk about the weather…

“Tell me about Kate,” I murmured because it was on my mind and it was a part of him – a huge part – that I knew nothing about. The muscles in his chest constricted under my cheek and his breathing accelerated a little. Tightening the arm I had draped across his waist, I pulled him closer to me.

“She was beautiful.
And fun…
so
much fun.
She had the most infectious laugh.” His body began to relax as he described her. “What about
your
family? You’ve never mentioned anyone besides your parents.” He changed the subject abruptly –
too
abruptly. I sighed, disappointed. Why couldn’t he open up to me?

I bet he’s opened up to
her, my interfering, pain-in-the-ass subconscious narked. I mentally slapped the face behind the infuriating voice. Richard loved me – I didn’t need anything else from him.

For now.

“There is no one else. As far as I know my parents are both only children and my maternal grandparents died before I was born. I did have a grandma though – my dad’s mom.” My insides began to ache as I reminisced. “She was the sweetest lady. My dad would take me to see her once a month and she would
always
have ingredients set out in little glass bowls on the kitchen counter for us to bake cakes for afternoon tea together.”

A rogue tear escaped at the memory. Richard caressed it away with the edge of his thumb before it had chance to fall very far.

“I remember, I had this little pink notebook with a calendar inside and I would cross off the days until our monthly visit. It was the only thing I ever remember looking forward to.” Richard tightened his grip around my shoulders and kissed my hair. “And my dad, well he was the doting father in her presence. When I was
very
young, I was fooled every single time. He’d sit me on his lap and I’d think ‘at last, I’m being a good girl’, then we’d get back in the car and… Well, I’m just glad she died without knowing what a monster he is.”

I could literally feel
a physical
, fuzzy warmth radiating from my heart and tickling its way through my veins as I thought about my grandma. She was such a kind, loving person. I’d never be able to understand how my dad ended up like he was. It certainly wasn’t passed down from Grandma.

“How old were you when she passed away?”

“Nine, ten maybe. We hadn’t been to see her in a few months - though it felt like years to such a young kid – and my dad was bawling in my face over something one day and I cried out for her. ‘You’re grandmother’s dead. Now get up those stairs before you make me
really
angry’, he said so calmly – so… matter of fact,” I told him, mirroring the stern, unnerving tone of my dad’s voice. “To this day I don’t know how or when she died. The worst part is I don’t even remember the last time I saw her. I hope I told her I loved her.”

“I’m sure she knew, baby,” Richard consoled as he clutched me tighter. I’d never spoken about my grandma before – not even to Julie. I’d forgotten how much I missed her. I was getting used to this ‘talking’ business – enjoyed it even. In some ways it felt very cathartic, therapeutic.

“Why don’t you like to talk about Kate?” I pressed, willing him to unload his deepest emotions onto me as I had just done to him.

“Guilt,” he confessed solemnly after a long pause. I knew from eavesdropping that he blamed himself for Kate’s death and I’d always struggled to understand why. Was I about to find out?

“Richard it wasn’t your fault. She must have had problems far beyond your control. You weren’t responsible.” Releasing his hold of me, he hitched his way up the bed so he was sitting against the ornately carved headboard.

“But I was. I was responsible for all of it.” After hiding his troubled face away in his hands I tentatively reached up and pulled one away, exposing his red eyes that were burning with unshed tears. “ I was the person who offered her her first bag of heroin.”

Fuck.

“I was such an asshole back then. I was young and rebellious. I came from this perfect, wealthy, upstanding family and I resented it. We’d go to church every Sunday, a different charity event every Saturday… I was expected to follow suit – do something great with my life, give something back. Studying medicine ticked all the criteria I guess. But I just wanted to be like my friends. I wanted to go to college because I’d chosen to, not because I was expected to. I wanted to party, get wrecked, sleep around… do everything a teenage guy was supposed to do and not be some role model for the community’s messed up kids.”

He paused briefly and I struggled to understand where this was heading. So, he didn’t want to be a doctor so he got his sister hooked on crack instead? He was making no sense, but I didn’t push him. I was too afraid of what I might hear.

“Basically, I was just a typical selfish, egotistical teenager. I soon learnt the art of working hard through the week and partying even harder at the weekend. Like I said, I was young – I had all this money and it made me feel powerful, superior even. I enjoyed impressing people, showing off. I’d think nothing of buying a round of drinks for a bar full of complete strangers while other students were taking out crippling loans just to feed themselves.” He shook his head in slow motion and his words cracked as they struggled to leave his throat.

“Naturally people were soon queuing up to be my friend… and I loved every second of it.” His tone was oozing remorse and it was clear he was struggling deeply. I could also tell this was heading somewhere dark and my anxious heart was pounding.

“I know you know how easy it is to get something ‘that bit stronger’ pushed upon you and I was more than willing to accept. I knew exactly what I was doing.” My heart slowed to a near stop as I watched him hide his face behind his trembling hands. My mouth dropped open and I couldn’t seem to find the right muscles close it again. “Like I said, I was a selfish bastard.”

“No more than selfish than me,” I interrupted.

“Amy, you can’t possibly compare. You suffered a
harrowing
childhood. No one could blame you for trying to seek solace the way you did. Whereas me? I had
everything…
Loving parents, money, everything handed to me on a
silver fucking
platter. I chose that path out of some kind of pathetic rebellion.”

“Why get Kate involved?” I asked and instantly regretted it. He drew his knees into his chest and I knew he thought I was judging him.

“Kate was my best friend. We grew up doing
everything
together. We were even studying medicine together. Saying that, I knew she looked up to me. I was her older brother – she’d have done anything I told her to.” I felt my eyebrows furrow.

I thought you were twins?

“Older by twelve minutes,” he clarified, attempting but failing to smile. “I took advantage of that. You see, for me… the drugs, getting smashed… it was
all just
a bit of fun – a bit of escapism. I revelled in the confidence, the power, that odd wrap gave me and I wanted to share it with her. But… she took it too far.”

He was firing so many revelations at me and I struggled to assimilate the intensity of it all. My mind was bursting. My body was frozen solid and my arid mouth was rendered speechless. Yet impossibly, seeing him struggle, I was falling in love with him all over again. Ironically,
I
wanted to save
him
.

“I was always pretty confident though, so although I enjoyed the amplified version of that I could take it or leave it depending on what mood I was in. It was more than that for Kate though. She was a follower – my shadow – and I think the confidence part of it was her downfall. It became addictive to her. By then it was too late. That shit’d claimed her and I hadn’t even noticed.”

I raised my hand towards his agonised face which was shrouded in tears and tried to wipe them away as they fell… but they were falling too fast and I couldn’t keep up.

“I
should have
known! I could’ve helped her. She did anything I said… she would’ve stopped I
know
she would. But the first I knew about just how bad she had it, was when the police came knocking at my mom’s door at three AM one Tuesday morning.” A painfully long silence followed and I hitched myself up to his level and curled myself up against his trembling shoulder. I stayed silent. I doubted there were any words in the world that could’ve comforted him.

“A friend of hers approached me at the funeral. We went for coffee and she informed just how out of control Kate had gotten. Even now I feel sick knowing she confided in her and not me – her brother.
Her best friend.
I killed her, Amy.”

“Jesus, Richard,” I muttered under my breath as his whole body crumbled and fell into me. He was shaking and sobbing uncontrollably and I ached to comfort him but I was lost. Words just wouldn’t cut it – not that I could even find any. As he buried his face in my chest my fingers instinctively clutched the back of his auburn hair, squeezing him so tightly to me my knuckles turned white.

“I obviously never knew her but I know it would destroy her to see you like this. I know that because it’s destroying
me.
She was in charge of her own decisions, Richard, and I’m sure the reason she didn’t tell you is because she loved you too much to want to worry you.”

I knew from experience that guilt worked its way into your veins faster than any brand of heroin. And once its there it spreads like wildfire until it consumes you –
destroys
you. I feared that he would always carry this guilt, this gut-wrenching pain, with him for the rest of his life. The thought ripped through my heart until I was crying along with him.

“I’ve never told anybody that before,” he confessed as our entangled, naked bodies swayed back and forth together.

Not even
her… The voice deep in my subconscious was feeling extremely smug but I ignored it, realising what a selfish bitch that thought made me. This whole situation was nothing to feel any kind of pride or victory about.

“Is that why you tried to help
me?
Because you saw me
heading down
the same path as Kate?” I asked, possibly insensitively, because the question had been burning a hole in the back of my mind since I first eavesdropped on his conversation with Jealous Evil Shrink Lady.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, shrugging slightly. “I’ve met countless patients in your position before but none of them have ever affected me the way you did. I can’t lie, your situation
did
remind me of her… but then so have a thousand other patients. So no, I don’t think that’s why. I can’t explain it – I just felt…
drawn
to you, if that makes sense?”

It really does… because I feel it too.

“I kept telling myself to ignore it. Christ knows I tried, but the more time I spent with you… the more times I saw that tiny flicker of life ignite in your eyes whenever you saw me…” he trailed off, smiling contentedly as if reliving a fond memory. “And the first time I made you smile – do you remember?”