Beautiful Broken Things(Beautiful Broken Things #1)(89)

Rosie’s fingers stilled on the keyboard, her eyes swivelling towards me. ‘Honestly? I think you should just take you.’

I frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Maybe save the presents this time. Just go and see how things are.’

‘Who wouldn’t want presents?’ I asked, confused. ‘I wasn’t thinking anything big, just something small from me. Us. Something from us.’

‘I think that’s probably the last thing on her mind, to be honest,’ Rosie said. Her fingers started tapping again at her keyboard.

‘You’re not still mad at her, are you?’ I ventured. It seemed like a ridiculous question, after so long, but still . . .

To my relief, Rosie laughed. ‘No, I am not still mad at her. What kind of monster do you think I am? When your friend almost dies, being mad at them seems kind of redundant.’ She shook her head. ‘Bloody Suze. Ruining my righteous anger by being all tragic and traumatized.’ She was grinning. ‘So selfish.’

I had to laugh. ‘You could have just left it at no.’

‘I could,’ Rosie agreed cheerfully. ‘But then I wouldn’t be me, would I?’

Saturday was one of the most beautiful days I could remember for months. The sky was cloudless, the sun hot and bright.

‘Hello, June,’ Tarin said, grinning. She’d offered to drive me to the unit and I’d jumped at the chance, the alternative being my mother. ‘What perfect weather to sit in a car in for an hour and a half.’

‘Could be worse,’ I said, pushing my seat as far back as it would go so I could stretch out my plaster-encased leg. On my lap I was holding on to a purple florist bag, containing a sunflower pot, a charm bracelet and a box of macarons. Despite what Rosie had said, I couldn’t imagine turning up to see Suzanne empty-handed. ‘You could be at work.’

Tarin slid her sunglasses up on to her face. ‘True, true.’ She turned out of our road, the satnav tracing a route for us. ‘So how are you feeling?’

‘Good,’ I said, smiling. There was no other answer to give on a sunny June day, in a car with my sister, being driven to see someone I loved and missed, someone I’d started to worry I’d lost. ‘Maybe a little nervous. But I’m good.’

Tarin glanced at me. ‘What’s making you nervous?’

‘The whole thing, I guess. It’s a weird situation.’

‘Yeah, but it’s still you and her at the end of the day,’ Tarin pointed out. ‘And think of it this way: she wouldn’t have asked to see you after all this time unless she was ready.’

‘That’s true,’ I said, feeling a jolt of relief for my wise, generous older sister and the fact that it was her in the car with me rather than my mother. ‘I guess I’m just not sure what I’m meant to say. What do you say to someone who’s so depressed they’re suicidal?’

‘Tell them you love them,’ Tarin said, like it was nothing. Like it was everything. ‘Be supportive. Look, what you need to understand is, you won’t be able to single-handedly stop her wishing she was dead, if that’s even what she still thinks, which I doubt. What you can do, as her friend, is make sure she knows you’re glad she’s not. Does that make sense?’

‘It doesn’t seem like enough.’

‘There is no enough.’ Tarin flicked her indicator on, the clicking noise filling the car as she merged on to the motorway. ‘You seem to be forgetting that she’s in a clinical facility getting professional help. Which is great, obviously. Let them worry about how to deal with depression. You’re going to visit your friend, remember? Yes, she’s a patient, but she’s not your patient. So for God’s sake, don’t treat her like one.’

We got to Gwillim House a little after 2 p.m. It looked more like a residential community centre than the hospital I’d been expecting, which made me feel much better about Suzanne living there. At reception, a friendly Scottish woman called Yvette signed me in, talking too fast for me to really follow what she was saying. She led me down a corridor of magnolia walls and propped-open doors, taking it slowly because of my crutches, until we came to an empty room furnished with aggressively bright sofas.

‘Make yourself comfortable,’ Yvette said, then glanced at my leg. ‘If you can. I’ll go and tell Suzanne you’re here.’

Suddenly alone, I stood uncertainly in the doorway for a few seconds before hobbling over to the window, which looked out on to a large, beautifully landscaped garden. I pressed my forehead against the glass, taking in the flowerbeds and ornate, mosaic path winding away from the building and into the distance, trying to figure out why this garden was such a surprise to me. I felt the wedge of my crutch digging into my skin as I stood, thinking of gardeners and flowers and Suzanne and unexpected things.

‘I planted the irises,’ a voice at my side said. ‘Those blue ones.’

‘They’re pretty,’ I said, even though I could see at least three different blue flowers and I had no idea which ones she was talking about.

‘It’s not exactly subtle, as therapy techniques go,’ Suzanne said. Her voice was casual, musing, as if we were picking up a conversation we’d been right in the middle of. ‘Plant something, watch it grow. But you’re right – they are pretty.’