Chapter 5: What Leo Left Behind
The handwriting was a child's — big, careful letters, the kind you make when you're concentrating so hard your tongue presses against your teeth.
*Dear Monica,*
*My mum says I have to write this down because I might not see you again.
I don't want to write it.
Danny is making me because he said a promise isn't real unless it's on paper.*
*I'm sorry we left without saying goodbye.
I wanted to come and knock on your door but Dad said there wasn't time and Mum was crying in the kitchen.
I stood at the window and I saw you come outside and look at our house.
I wanted to wave but I didn't because I didn't want you to see me crying too.*
*I promised you I would come back and marry you.
I meant it when I said it.
I still mean it.
But the doctors say my heart isn't working right and Mum cries when she thinks I'm asleep so I think maybe I won't be able to keep the promise myself.*
*So I'm giving the promise to Danny.
He's five and he's annoying but he's the best brother.
He said he'll do it.
He said he'll find you when he's grown up and tell you everything and make sure you're okay.*
*Please don't be sad.
You're the bravest person I know.
You never cried in front of anyone the whole time I knew you and I thought that was the most impressive thing I'd ever seen.*
*I buried my best marble in the tin under the tree so you'd have something of mine.
The blue one with the silver in the middle.
You can keep it.*
*Your friend always,*
*Leo*
*P.S.
Danny is a good person even though he's annoying.
You can trust him.*
I read it three times.
Then I sat on the altar step in my grandmother's veil and I cried the way I used to cry in the oak tree — with my whole body, quietly, so that no one would hear.
I don't know how long I sat there.
Long enough for the candles to burn lower.
Long enough for the light through the high windows to shift.
The door opened softly.
Not Daniel.
Diane.
She came and sat beside me on the step without a word.
She read nothing over my shoulder, asked nothing, said nothing.
She just sat close enough that our arms were touching, and she stayed.
After a while she said, "Do you want me to get your mum?"
"Not yet."
"Okay."
Another silence.
"His name is Daniel," I said.
"I know.
I heard."
"He kept his brother's promise for twenty years."
Diane didn't answer straight away.
Then: "Is that the worst thing he did, or the most extraordinary?"
I looked at the letter in my hands.
The careful child's handwriting.
The blue marble mentioned like a treasure.
"I don't know yet," I said.
"That's fair."
"I'm furious at him."
"Also fair."
"And I —" I stopped.
Diane waited.
"I need to find out who Daniel Marsh actually is," I said.
"Not Leo's brother.
Not the man who kept a promise.
Just — who he is.
On his own."
Diane was quiet for a moment.
"That sounds like someone who isn't ready to walk away."
"I didn't say that."
"You didn't have to."
I folded the letter carefully along its original creases.
I looked at the programme on the altar rail.
Monica and Leo.
A name that had never been his.
"I need to talk to his mother," I said.
Diane stood up and held out her hand.
I took it.
I got to my feet.
My dress rustled against the stone floor.
At the church door I stopped.
Through the small window beside it I could see the car park.
Most of the guests had gone.
A few clusters of people remained, speaking quietly.
Daniel was sitting on the low stone wall at the far edge, alone, still in his tuxedo, his jacket off and folded beside him, his face turned away.
His mother was sitting on a bench near the gate.
She was watching the door.
May you like
When she saw me appear in the window she stood up immediately.
I pushed the door open and walked out into the afternoon light.
