Free Happy Endings by Jon Rance Page B

weeks practically living together, I hadn’t broached the topic of his love life. I think because in my head I didn’t want to sound like I had ulterior motives. I didn’t want him to think I was interested in his availability. I was being typical me. Over-analysing, overthinking and making a nothing into a something. In a way, it was worse than not asking him before because in Bangkok we weren’t sharing a tiny bed in just our underwear. Two weeks before, we barely knew each other and still had a distance between us. Two weeks before, he was just Jez, the bloke who rescued me from Bangkok airport in my hour of need, but now he was Jez, the sexy young bloke I was travelling with and basically dating, but without the complication of sex.
    ‘You mean apart from my parents and a Labrador named Rusty?’
    ‘Yeah.’
    ‘Not really. I was sort of seeing someone before I left but I doubt she’s waiting for me.’
    ‘Why do you doubt it?’
    ‘Because I said, “Claire, please don’t wait for me,” ’ said Jez, causing us both to giggle.
    ‘And why didn’t you want her to wait for you? So you could sow your wild oats? Travel the world and shag lots of foreign girls in exotic locations?’
    ‘Hardly,’ said Jez quietly. I suddenly felt a tension between us I hadn’t felt before. He was looking directly at me, holding eye contact and looking as if he was about to tell me something really important. ‘The reason I came travelling, Kate, wasn’t to sow my wild oats or to avoid work, extend university or drink myself into oblivion. I came away because my brother died.’
    My heart sank and I wanted to hug him with everything I had.
    ‘Richard was at university in Durham,’ Jez started and his face changed. A deep sadness seemed to lay itself over him, shrouding his smooth skin and bright blue eyes with a vulnerability. ‘Even though he was younger than me, I always looked up to him, you know. He was funny, clever, brilliant really. I probably should have hated him. He was always everyone’s favourite, including my parents, but I never could.’ Jez took a long gulp of his beer and lit a cigarette. ‘He was driving down to see me for the weekend. It was late and wet and he probably should have taken a break, but he didn’t. A lorry jack-knifed in front of him and he was killed instantly, or so the police said.’ Jez stopped and I could see pools of tears beginning to form in his eyes. He wiped them away quickly and gave me a smile. ‘We’d always planned on travelling together when he graduated, so when he died I took off. I didn’t even wait around for the funeral. I couldn’t sit in a church or watch him being buried and so this is my tribute to him. One year to remember him, do everything we should have done together, before I go home and start over.’
    ‘Oh God, Jez, I don’t know what to say. Is this what you were going to tell me the other day at the beach?’ I reached over and held his hand.
    ‘I just didn’t know how to come out with it. It’s still pretty raw.’
    ‘Of course and if you don’t want to talk about it that’s fine, but I’m here for you,’ I gabbled. I didn’t know what to say. I’d had emotional upheaval in my own life, but nothing like this. I looked at Jez and he suddenly looked so young, so fragile.
    ‘It’s actually good to have someone to talk to about it who didn’t know him. Everyone back home is too close. That probably sounds crazy.’
    ‘No, not at all, it’s understandable.’
    ‘Is it though? Is it OK to just leave? Not say goodbye to him? Not go to the funeral?’
    ‘It’s death, Jez, there are no rules.’
    ‘I wish my parents felt that way.’
    ‘They will.’
    ‘They’re pretty pissed off. I left Mum in tears and Dad wouldn’t speak to me at all on the drive to the airport. They don’t understand.’
    ‘Give them time.’
    Jez looked across at me and smiled, a tear suddenly falling down his cheek.
    ‘Thanks, Kate,’ he said, wiping away the