The Things We Need to Say: An emotional, uplifting story of hope from bestselling author Rachel Burton

‘I know it doesn’t feel like we have much to celebrate,’ he’d said. ‘But we still have each other.’ She’d tried to let herself relax, to just enjoy his company for a few hours, to try to eat something.

Afterwards, they’d watched a film together just like they had this afternoon. She’d lain back against him and tried to concentrate on the future, tried to concentrate on the film. She’d let Will choose and it was full of action and loud noises and bright colours with an unnecessarily complicated plot that she hadn’t been able to follow. It had made Will happy though, and she had let herself sink back into his contentment, even if it was only fleeting.

Later, when the film was over, she had become aware of the sensation of his arms around her, the warmth of his breath on her neck. She had turned around to face him, felt his lips on hers. It had been six months since she’d last kissed her husband properly. She had wanted to feel something, anything. She hadn’t been sure she would be able to and, as it turned out, it was months before she truly started to feel anything again, but she wanted to try before the gulf that had opened between them became too wide to traverse.

He had carried her upstairs that night. It was the first time they had gone to bed at the same time since the previous summer, and while she wasn’t able to feel the things she used to be able to feel, at least her husband had been there with her.

But later, even later, when he thought she had fallen asleep, she had felt his arm slip out from underneath her, felt the mattress lift as he got out of bed. She had heard him slip back into his clothes and pad across the bedroom and down the stairs. She had heard the door of his study open and close and she knew she had lost him again, to his thoughts and to his sadness.

She had wondered if anything would ever be the same. They had kept trying, from that night onwards, to find a new sort of normal, but he had nearly always come to bed after her, always woken long before her, neither of them able to sleep more than a couple of hours at a time.

Until now. Now she understood that, deep down, under all the pressure and the pain, they were still just Will and Fran. They could still find happiness again. Now she began to understand how much he had been through as well.

The bathwater is starting to cool and she needs to finish her packing before Will gets back so they can spend the evening together. She pulls herself out of the water, wraps herself in one of the big, soft white towels, and walks across the landing to the bedroom.

It is then that she notices Will’s phone on his nightstand. It isn’t like him to leave his phone behind. She notices the light flashing, signalling a message, and for a moment she feels something shift – as though the atmospheric pressure has changed slightly.

If somebody had asked her, afterwards, why she did it she wouldn’t have been able to tell them. All she remembers is walking over to the nightstand, still wrapped in the soft white towel, and picking up Will’s phone, drawn to it like a moth to a flame. She’d never looked at his phone before, never checked his messages or emails, never answered a call. But that afternoon she is pulled towards the flashing light on the phone and she will never be able to explain why.

Later, looking back at this moment, she would wonder if she’d made the right choice. But sometimes life isn’t about choices. Some things are just meant to be.

Will has never been secretive about his phone or his laptop. He leaves his emails open in the kitchen all the time and everyone knows his PIN to everything is his birthday. He is just arrogant enough to believe that nobody will ever try to hack him.

Fran walks over to the nightstand and picks up the phone, tapping in 310170. She will remember the touch of her fingers on the phone screen for a long time afterwards. Almost immediately she wishes she had never looked.

I miss you so much, Will. I wish we could be together again like we used to be – just one last time. You know where I am. Kx

The number isn’t saved to his phone, and there are no other texts or calls to or from it. It is almost as if Will had gone out of his way to make sure they were all deleted. Fran knows exactly who ‘K’ is anyway.

She turns the text message back to unread, locks the phone, and returns it to the nightstand. It isn’t until then that she feels it: the sensation of the world tilting on its axis. Nothing will ever be the same again.

She thinks about Karen Barden, a woman who works in the village pub. Someone she barely knows. Fran had seen her flirt with Will sometimes; she’d seen Will flirt back. She hadn’t thought much about it. She’d had bigger things on her mind. She’d barely thought about Karen Barden at all until now.

She unwraps the towel from around herself, hanging it over the back of the door to dry, and slowly dresses. Then, carefully and methodically, she begins to work her way through her list, packing everything she needs for Spain.

One of the things that she has always loved about yoga is the way it has helped her to be aware of the present moment, to focus her mind on the task at hand. The reason she’d taken it up all those years ago, long before she’d even considered teaching, was to help her stress levels at university. Now, in her bedroom, the bedroom she shares with her husband who she suddenly feels she doesn’t know any more, she takes some deep breaths and focuses.

Inhale. Exhale.

Will has already brought her suitcase down from the attic for her, leaving it open on the bed. She feels the shudder of tears in her throat. The little thoughtful gestures, the things he does without having to be asked. She always thought he was perfect, even though she knows there’s no such thing as perfect.

Inhale. Exhale.

She slowly folds and rolls her clothes, feeling the texture of the fabric beneath her fingers. Yoga clothes, sundresses, bikinis, sarongs, shorts, vests.

Inhale. Exhale.

She notices the familiar smell of the fabric conditioner that she’s used for years, the one her mother used. She squeezes socks and underwear and sandals into stray corners of the suitcase.

Inhale. Exhale.

She remembers all the conversations she and Will have had about this retreat over the last few months – about whether or not she should do it. He constantly encouraged her, ignited that flame of excitement and adventure inside her that has helped her to feel alive again, told her how strong she is. Now she wonders if he wanted her out of the way.

Now she needs that strength more than ever.

Inhale. Exhale.

She picks up the small plush Piglet that sits by the side of her bed. She presses it to her face, the toy that will always remind her of everything she and Will have been through. Almost as an afterthought she puts it in her suitcase too. It feels as though she is leaving for longer than a week.

She pushes the suitcase lid down with the weight of her upper body and slides the zip around. Then she sits at the bottom of the bed and waits for her husband to come home.

FEBRUARY 2005

For months after Mum died, I missed her so much. We’d spoken on the phone three or four times a week after I moved to London and to not have those conversations any more left me empty. I didn’t really know anyone in Cambridge then and, after Mum, I found myself living a quiet, isolated life. I went to work, I went to yoga, I watched TV, I read, I went to bed. And then the next day I would do it all over again. The days seemed endless, pointless, always seeming to require too much effort – as though I was walking through jam.

Until Will came along.

The first time Will stepped inside my house was a Sunday morning in February. It was one of those days when the sky is the colour of slate and the air completely still. One of those days when it’s bone-achingly cold. A typical East Anglian winter. Will turned up on my doorstep with champagne and eggs to cook me brunch. I hadn’t invited him.

He looked out of place in my tiny house – too big for the rooms – but he brought life and happiness and laughter to walls that hadn’t known anything but my sadness since I’d moved in.

Will had been slowly bringing me out of my shell. I don’t think he knew it at the time, but he was helping me rediscover who I was. I’d always thought of myself as somebody who wanted a big life, who wanted to travel, to drink champagne, to fall in love. Until I met Will I’d never even left the country. He brought me out of my chrysalis, let me spread my wings. He transformed me.

After we’d eaten the eggs and drunk the champagne he cleared the dishes. I sat on the kitchen counter and watched him as he slowly dried his hands, not taking his eyes off me. He was looking at me in that way that made me feel as though I was the only person in the world. And then he walked over to me and kissed me.

It wasn’t our first kiss. That had been in his car the previous Wednesday. Since the Christmas party we’d taken to going out for dinner on Wednesdays. I don’t know why it was always Wednesdays; I don’t know why he never asked to see me at the weekend. When he kissed me the first time I pulled away before it turned into anything. I didn’t want to be that person. I didn’t want to be the secretary who sleeps with her boss and then afterwards, when everything gets awkward, has to leave.

I saw the fleeting look of disappointment cross his face as I pulled away, before he composed his features again. He had no idea how much willpower it had taken for me to do that. Neither of us had known where to look since it happened, our eyes sliding quickly over each other at work, not sure whether to say anything, not sure what to do.

But that Sunday morning in my kitchen when Will’s lips found mine, my willpower deserted me. I knew I couldn’t pull away again. I let him kiss me; I let him slide his hands down my back, finding the gap between my jeans and my top. I ran my fingers through his hair, wrapped my legs around his waist, pulled him closer.

‘I want you so much,’ he whispered in my ear. ‘Can I take you to bed?’

Afterwards we lay together, our foreheads against each other, limbs entwined, breathing each other in. I didn’t know what this was; I didn’t know where this was going. He was my boss. He was eight years older than me. This had disaster written all over it.

I moved away from him a little so I could see him properly. He lay with his eyes closed, those impossibly long eyelashes brushing his cheeks. Those eyelashes were wasted on a man.

‘Will,’ I said quietly. He blinked his eyes open and I watched his lips curve into a smile. His hand traced the bones of my spine.

‘I can’t do this,’ I said.

‘I think you already have,’ he replied. He was still smiling.

‘I can’t be the secretary who sleeps with her boss. I can’t afford to lose my job. I’m so sorry, Will – I should have stopped this before now. We need to stop this.’

He propped himself up on his elbow. ‘I can’t stop,’ he said. ‘I’m falling in love with you.’

I hadn’t been expecting that. I stared at him. I’d been trying to stop myself falling in love with him since the Christmas party.

‘I thought this was just—’ I began.

‘This isn’t just anything,’ he interrupted. ‘Well, not for me it isn’t. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to feel like this again. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to trust anyone else after my wife left me.’

‘But—’ I hadn’t known his wife had left him. I’d always assumed he left her. I was surprised to realise that during all those lunches, all those dinners, he’d never talked about his wife.

‘I know you’re my secretary,’ he interrupted. ‘I know that makes this a bit … complicated, but I wondered if you’d be my girlfriend?’ He smiled, pulled me a little closer. ‘Sorry that sounded really corny. But will you?’

‘I thought you just wanted …’

‘Just wanted what? To shag my secretary?’ He shook his head. ‘No, not my style.’

‘So why was it always Wednesdays? Why did you never ask to see me at the weekends before now?’

He laughed then, gently. ‘Because I thought you’d have better things to do at the weekends than be with me. Until last week I didn’t think I had a chance with you in a million years.’

‘Even after what I said at Christmas?’

‘I thought that was just the wine talking,’ he said quietly. ‘I didn’t want to take advantage.’

I stared at him, running my fingers over his jaw, over the stubble where he hadn’t shaved that morning. I couldn’t find my voice; I just leaned my head against his chest.

‘Trust me,’ he said, stroking my hair. ‘I promise I won’t let you down.’

JULY 2016

Will

It had turned into a longer run than he’d intended. He’d only meant to be gone about thirty minutes or so, but as he looks at his watch he realises he’s been out for more than an hour. He needed some space to think, away from the house, away from Fran. Time to think about the things he’d said to his brother that morning, the things his brother had said to him.

He’d looked up when Jamie had followed him into his study. He’d made the calls he’d needed to make and was sitting watching the rain against the windows, wondering what the future would look like, thinking about everything he and Fran had lost.

There are only eighteen months between the two brothers. They had always known what the other was thinking. And Will had realised – as soon as he saw the look on his brother’s face – that he knew the secret Will had been carrying for the last nine months, the secret he hoped nobody would ever find out. Just before Jamie confronted him, Will had realised that there was a sense of relief in being found out.

‘What the fuck were you thinking, Will?’ Jamie had spat at him, his hands on the desk as he leaned towards his brother. Will hadn’t moved; he had just carried on sitting there, staring out of the window.

‘Keep your voice down,’ he’d replied softly.

In the quiet moment that followed he heard the scrape of a chair being pulled up, the gentle sound of Jamie sitting down, a long exhalation.

‘Talk to me, Will,’ Jamie had said after a while and Will told him everything, their heads together like they used to be when they shared secrets as boys. The words fell out of him, jumbled together in their eagerness to be released. Will had been glad to finally share the burden of the secret, even though he had known that this was only the beginning and that sharing it would change everything for ever.

When he’d finished speaking he’d looked at his brother. ‘I’ve been a complete fucking idiot,’ he said. ‘But I thought I’d lost everything. Fran wouldn’t talk to me, as though it was all my fault.’ He paused, blinking back tears. ‘As though it wasn’t tearing me apart too.’

‘So you thought you’d fuck a single mum from the village instead?’ Jamie asked, his face white. He’d always had a soft spot for Fran.

Will had leaned his elbows on the desk, covering his eyes with his hands. If I don’t open my eyes, he thinks, maybe all of this will go away.

‘Is it over?’ Jamie asked.

Will nods, dropping his hands onto the desk in front of him. ‘It’s been over since Christmas Eve.’

Jamie had sighed. ‘Fran must never find out,’ he’d said. ‘After everything she’s been through, this would destroy her.’

Will had run his fingers through his hair.

‘Do you think I don’t know that?’ he’d said.

‘Not enough to make sure it didn’t happen,’ Jamie had replied.

He hadn’t banked on Jamie working out that he had cheated on Fran, but Jamie knew him too well. On Saturday night, while Fran had been getting the dinner ready, he and Jamie had gone to the pub. He’d bumped into Karen there – it had been months since he had last seen her, since he’d broken off their brief affair. As far as he was concerned it was over, in the past. But Karen had flirted with him and there must have been something about his reaction that had made Jamie suspicious. When he’d come out of the toilet half an hour later to see Jamie and Karen chatting, it hadn’t occurred to him what it might have been about.

But now Jamie knows, Will doesn’t feel as though it is something he can keep to himself any more. He isn’t sure if he can keep lying to her. He isn’t sure if he can keep lying to himself. And, now he’s had time to think about it, he’s sure that Jamie is wrong; finding out isn’t going to destroy Fran. Fran is stronger than most people realise and he owes her the truth.

He starts to slow his pace down as he circles back into the village, rubbing his temples where one of the tension headaches that have plagued him since law school is throbbing behind his eyes. Some days he can run them off, but today isn’t one of those days.

He thinks about what Fran had said before he left the house, about wanting to start again. He has wanted their marriage to work all along – even when he was sleeping with someone else it had never been with the intention of leaving Fran. He thought he’d lost everything. He never thought he’d hear Fran say she wanted to try again.

Initially he’d thought she was talking about something else, and he said he wasn’t ready. He wasn’t, and he was certain Fran wasn’t either. But it doesn’t mean they can’t talk about it. They’re not too old to try again. Not quite. Not yet.

But if they are going to try again, they have to build it on honesty and it has to start with him. He has to tell her the truth as soon as she gets back from Spain. He has to let her have Spain first; he has to let her see how strong he already knows she is. He knows that leading this retreat is going to help her so much and the strength she gains from it will help her make whatever decision she needs to make.

Because, whether he likes it or not, that decision has to come from her.

Will slows to a walking pace as he passes the row of cottages at the station end of the village. The station itself has been closed for years but the trains between Cambridge and Newmarket rattle past the back gardens of the cottages once an hour, making these houses less sought after, cheaper, mostly let to tenants who come and go. He comes to a stop outside the house at the end of the terrace. There is something he has to do.

*

He stands outside the door of Karen’s cottage remembering the first time he came here on that cold, wet October evening, soaked to the bone and distraught. He remembers how the candles in the jack-o’-lanterns had all gone out in the rain, how there were only a few straggling teenagers still out trick or treating. He remembers how nobody came to their house that night for treats, knowing better of it, knowing that Fran still needed to be left alone.

He remembers how he’d walked out on Fran, shouting at her when she was at her most vulnerable, slamming the door so hard as he left that he thought the glass panels would shatter.

If he could live through that night again, would he do things differently? Do we ever have a choice?

He knocks on the door remembering the last time he was here on Christmas Eve. He remembers how cold it was and how he thought his heart was never going to mend. After Karen had let him in he sat on the bottom of her stairs and wept like a child. And when he’d cried every last tear out of his body, he had told her it was over, that he had to try to make his marriage work, that the thought of being without Fran was more than he could bear. Karen had nodded and he’d walked up to her, stroking her cheek with the pad of his thumb.

‘I never meant to hurt you,’ he’d said. As though anybody could ever have come out of any of this without being hurt.

And here he is again, knocking on Karen’s door one last time.

‘Will,’ she says, surprise in her eyes, and something else. Hope, maybe?

‘Karen,’ he replies. He tries to remain as distant as he can.

‘I’m sorry about last night,’ she says, the hope in her eyes flickering for a moment before disappearing. ‘Sometimes I just get so lonely, especially when the kids aren’t here.’

Will sighs. He knows all about loneliness and the crazy things it can make you do. ‘I know,’ he says. ‘But you know I’m not the person who can help you. I should never have let you believe I was. I’m—’

‘You’re sorry,’ she interrupts. ‘I know. We’re all sorry.’ She looks away from him. ‘I sent a text,’ she goes on. ‘I know I shouldn’t have. It’s the last one – I promise.’

‘I’m going to tell Fran,’ he says.

‘About us?’

Will nods. ‘She’s away next week, teaching in Spain. But as soon as she’s back I’m going to tell her.’

‘I thought you never wanted her to know.’

‘She deserves to know. And you deserve to know that I’m going to tell her.’

‘Is that really the reason?’ Karen asks. ‘Or is this some sort of big act of contrition. Do you think telling her is going to appease your guilt or something?’

‘I don’t think anything will ever appease this guilt,’ he replies quietly. ‘But I have to do it for our marriage.’ He pauses for a moment. ‘For everything we’ve been through.’

Karen looks at him then, a flash of understanding crossing her face.

‘I can’t imagine how it feels,’ she says. ‘What it must be like to go through that.’

‘I hope you never have to.’

‘What if she leaves?’

‘I don’t know what will happen,’ Will says. ‘But I do know that I have to be honest with her. She’s my wife.’

He feels as though Karen wants to say more, as though she wants to reach out and touch him one last time, but he is already backing away down the path. He raises a hand as he shuts the gate behind him and starts running back up the hill towards his house, his wife, his life.

He wonders how much longer this will be his life.

Fran

She is still sitting at the bottom of the bed as he comes into the bedroom.

‘There you are,’ he says, his running shoes in one hand, wiping the sweat from his brow with the other. ‘What are you doing up here?’

‘Just finishing packing,’ Fran replies, trying to smile. She doesn’t know how she is going to do this.

‘Are you OK?’ he asks. She sees the tension in his jaw and knows instinctively that he has a headache and is pretending he doesn’t.

She nods. ‘Just a bit nervous about tomorrow.’ Why is she doing this? Why doesn’t she just come out and ask him?

He walks over to her, bends down, kisses her forehead.

‘You’re going to be just fine,’ he says. ‘I promise.’

Am I, Will? Am I? she thinks.

‘I’m just going to grab a quick shower and then I’ll start dinner – OK?’

She nods again, watching as he lifts her suitcase off the bed and puts it in the corner of the room. She watches as he picks his phone up off the nightstand, unlocks it, and frowns as he checks his messages. He strips off his sweaty clothes and leaves them in a pile on the floor, disappearing into the en-suite. Usually she’d pick them up, put them in the laundry basket. Today she leaves them where they are.

She waits, listening to the water running, the sound of her husband singing softly to himself. She feels a wave of nausea wash through her. She tries to stand up, but she feels as though she is going to faint.

She waits.

Eventually Will comes out of the shower, still humming to himself, his hair damp, the towel wrapped loosely around his waist. He looks so beautiful: her incredible, handsome husband. The man who saved her from her own loneliness all those years ago and taught her how to live again.

But suddenly he isn’t hers any more. Someone else has touched his skin, run their fingers through his hair, felt him against them, inside them. Fran has to blink back tears to stop him seeing how upset she is. He sees her looking at him and comes over to her, sitting on the bed next to her.

‘I love you,’ he says. The smell of his aftershave sends another wave of sadness through her. She doesn’t reply. She doesn’t know what to say.

‘It’s OK to start getting on with our lives, you know,’ he says gently. ‘You don’t have to feel guilty because you’re trying to move on.’