Eva smiled weakly but didn’t say anything, so he took her hand and led her into the water, close enough to keep an eye on the kids but far enough away to talk.
‘What’s up?’
She looked down at her feet. ‘I got my period this morning.’
‘Ah.’ Benedict rubbed his eyes. ‘Eva, I’m sorry.’
‘Me too.’
‘So that’s it, then.’
‘Yes.’
‘Unless you want to keep going.’
‘I don’t think so. Do you? It’s not like the odds aren’t stacked against us, what with my age and four failed IVF cycles under our belt.’
‘No,’ he said slowly. ‘I don’t want to keep going. I’d do it for you, but I don’t want it for myself. I don’t want to live under the shadow of it anymore, I feel like it’s suffocating us and sucking all the joy out of the other things in our lives. And there are lots of good things in our lives.’
‘There are, aren’t there? Maybe it’s time to start focusing on them again. Look at what we’ve got: each other, Allegra, Josh, Will, our friends, my business, your research. That’s a lot, right? More than most people have. Shouldn’t this be enough?’
Benedict slid his arms around her waist and pulled her body close to his. ‘I’m not sure there’s any “should” about these things. But I know it’s enough for me.’ He paused. ‘Eva, do you think it can be enough for you? Really? Because I have everything I need so long as you’re happy.’
‘It’s not perfect, but then, what is? I’ll get used to it. To be honest, I think I already have. I think I stopped daring to really hope for it quite a long time ago.’ She tightened her arms around him and rested her head against his shoulder, savouring the warmth and the salty smell of his skin. They stood leaning against each other up to their knees in the water, watching the children and swaying slightly with the waves.
After a while she said, ‘Yes.’
‘“Yes?”’
‘I can be happy with this, with what I’ve got. I’m happy right now, in fact.’ Eva turned her face up to his and smiled. ‘Now, you get back to your sandcastle. I’m going for a swim.’
Benedict looked at her like she was crazy. ‘You do realize the water’s freezing further out?’
But Eva was already heading away from him, out along the shore.
*
Faster and faster she runs, feet flying across sand and hair streaming behind her, until finally certain that the children won’t notice and try to follow her, Eva plunges into the sea. The cold paralyses her momentarily, pressing the breath from her chest so that she comes up kicking and gasping, but soon she has swum far enough out that her body is beginning to acclimatize. She loves the elemental feeling of the ocean, its vastness. The way a human is a mere speck within it, the way its sheer force and indifference is both frightening and compelling at the same time. Something washes past her leg and she shivers, because you never know whether it’s a skein of seaweed or a giant squid, and to quell that thought she swims further out, feeling her muscles straining pleasurably at the effort.
After a while she stops and bobs about on the surface, tossed and buffeted by the waves. Eva tries to look back at the others on the beach but they are tiny figures now, and her eyes are dazzled by the light. She spreads out onto her back and drifts, savouring the sensation of weightlessness. These days she has a knee that aches in winter and her back makes her groan whenever she tries to lift Allegra, but here in the sea all of that slips away. The waves wash against her and for a moment it feels as if Keith is there with her, and not just Keith but something that feels like maybe a mother would too, all around her in the water. She feels light and clean, like the past is sliding away from her. Just for a moment, it feels like coming home.
Acknowledgements
I am indebted to a number of people for their help in bringing Invincible Summer to publication: my early readers, Katie O’Rourke and Elspeth Leadbetter, for their enthusiasm and encouragement; my wonderful literary agents, Kerry Glencorse, Susanna Lea and Mark Kessler, for loving and believing in the book; and my brilliant editors, Francesca Main, Judy Clain and Amanda Brower, who let me get away with nothing and as a result made Invincible Summer twice as good as it would otherwise be. More generally, this book is dedicated to David, Mark, Diane, Catherine, Jessica, Adrian, Anabelle, Anne, Eden, Elspeth, Lila, Rachel and Zlatina.