PROLOGUE

      ‘You need to get back out there, Cort.’

      ‘Leave it, Elise.’

      ‘I won’t leave it,’ his sister said.

      ‘Beth’s only been dead for a month—do you really think it appropriate that I start getting “back out there”?’

      And on anyone else his argument would have worked, but his sister was too matter-of-fact, and had been there through it all, and would not be swayed.

      ‘You’ve been grieving for her for years,’ Elise said. ‘You mourned Beth long, long, long before she died.’

      ‘So now I should suddenly start partying?’

      ‘You’ve never partied in your life.’ Elise grinned at her rather serious older brother. ‘So, no, I don’t expect you to start at thirty-two.’ Elise had come here not just to see how her brother was doing since Beth’s death but with intention too, and she was determined to see this conversation through. ‘But there is more to life than work. You need to start going out a bit, do something you haven’t done before, try new things …’

      Cort knew she was right—had it been Elise in his position he’d have said exactly the same, except he just didn’t know how to start. Cort had moved back to Sydney three years ago and had chosen not to tell his colleagues about his other life in Melbourne. He had moved back to Sydney to get away from the endless questions from colleagues, and pointless platitudes that did nothing to help.

      The last years had been spent working in Sydney and then travelling back to Melbourne on his days off to sit in a nursing home and watch a woman who had once been so educated, so dignified, dribble her food and strip naked at whim. He had watched endless seizures erode what had been left of her brain and, yes, Elise was right—bit by bit, over these past years he had mourned.

      ‘Say yes.’ Elise drained her glass and bade her brother goodnight.

      ‘Say yes to what?’ Cort asked.

      ‘Just say yes next time someone suggests something.’

      ‘Sure,’ Cort said with absolutely no intention of doing so.

      ‘For Beth,’ Elise said as she headed to his apartment door. ‘She’d hate both your lives to have been cut short that night.’

      She was right.

      Cort knew that. He crossed his apartment and could hear the ocean from the open French doors, but he closed them to shut out the roar and the noise, and the room fell silent. Not just from the sound of the ocean but from the roar and the noise in his head. Beth was gone.