Nathaniel, Nathan, Naz, Nate: he had a different name for each part of his life. Nathaniel to his immigrant parents, proud to vaunt their Christian heritage in the freedom of their newly-adopted country; Nathan to school friends who couldn’t have cared less about his origins or the colour of his skin so long as he was on their side in any sports team, which was usually a guarantee of winning; Naz to his workmates and drinking pals – she loved the fact that he enjoyed being one of the boys.
Nate to Jess, the name she whispered when they were in bed together, as she marvelled at the length of his limbs, or stroked his skin, soft as a child’s and deep chestnut brown except where it glowed almost blue-black from exposure to the sun. Nate, as she buried her fingers in the tough, twisted tendrils of his hair when he kissed her breasts. Nate, as they made love, and in that tumbling ecstasy of relief that sometimes left her crying with joy.
The first time she took him to Suffolk she’d glimpsed the two of them in a brief snapshot reflected in the window, as they waited on the doorstep of her parents’ house. Perhaps it was just heightened awareness, a level of anxiety about this ‘meet-the-folks’ moment, but she realised for the first time what a dramatic contrast they made. Though at the peak of fitness and a good five foot six, she appeared positively petite beside him, almost ghostly pale and insubstantial, with her freckly skin and ginger elfin-cut. At six three he cut a powerful, imposing figure, lithe and athletic in his smartest skinny jeans, shoulder-length dreadlocks neatly restrained into a ponytail.
As they’d negotiated the sluggish traffic wending its way to the seaside that day, he had asked tentatively how she thought her parents might react, ‘to … you know’, he’d said, leaving the word unspoken. She hadn’t told them in advance, she said, it seemed superfluous – the difference had barely entered her consciousness after the first few days of their relationship. So they’d probably be a bit surprised, she warned him, for the sole reason that there were very few non-Caucasians among their friends, if any.
As her mother, Susan, appeared at the other side of the glass ready to open the door, the smile seemed to freeze on her face for a fraction of a second. But within moments both parents had recovered; Jess was enfolded in her mother’s arms, breathing in the reassuringly familiar smells of talcum powder and fabric conditioner, and her father was shaking Nate’s hand – ‘great to meet you. Call me Mike’ – and steering him by the elbow through into the living room.
Of course Nate was the perfect gentleman and said all the right things: asking how long they’d lived here on the coast, enthusing about the pretty village, complimenting the house with its stunning views across the wide sweep of salt marsh and the silvery snake of the estuary in the distance. He greeted, without flinching, the flurry of furry delight which was Milly the mongrel, strolled into the garden with her father and submitted to a tour of the carefully tended garden and vegetable patch, his face intent with what looked like genuine interest.
She felt proud of him, even a slight stir of desire, as she watched them through the window, while fielding her mother’s questions – yes, they’d been seeing each other for six months or so; yes, he was a sports teacher; no, she didn’t think he’d ever been to Suffolk before; he was born and brought up in South London.
This had been her childhood home; she’d always thought the sixties-built mock Georgian house soulless, hated the isolation and having to be driven everywhere until she finally got her licence. As a teenager she could barely wait to get away. But now she began to see the place through Nate’s eyes: she could see how the house had matured, blending into the architectural mix of the old village, the wild beauty of the marshland and the beach just ten minutes’ walk away, the peace and the lack of traffic, not even a single streetlight.
Over coffee, she broke the news. Get all the difficult stuff over with at once, she’d decided. She’d graduated, with top marks, as a Combat Medical Technician, and would be going to Afghanistan in about three months’ time. Of course she’d warned them it was a possibility but the confirmation was obviously a shock: they both blanched but then managed to stumble out their congratulations. Her mother had muttered a vague ‘how lovely dear’ before collecting the cups and scuttling out to the kitchen – probably to hide her tears.
At his end of the sofa, Nate stroked Milly and kept his head down, saying nothing. He hadn’t been at all happy either, when she’d told him a few days before.
‘How long?’ He was cooking risotto in the kitchen of his tiny flat. She’d judged the moment carefully, knowing that he couldn’t stop in the middle of the critical stirring process to have a proper row with her.
‘Six months.’
‘Bloody hell. Six months. That’s an eternity.’ He turned from the cooker to face her. ‘Why the hell are you doing this, Jess?’
‘You know why. It’s for James. I told you.’ She pulled at the curl behind her ear.
‘But James is dead. He won’t know you’re doing it for him. Anyway, he wouldn’t have wanted you to put yourself in the same danger.’
He turned back to the saucepan. ‘Is there anything I can say to stop you?’
‘I don’t think so. I’ve committed myself to it now.’
In the silence that followed, she conjured up the image of beautiful, funny, sporty James, her brother Jonathan’s best friend, who had spent many school holidays staying with the Merton family because his parents were usually posted abroad somewhere improbably exotic. She’d treated him like another big brother until, with adolescence, everything changed and she began to feel an almost irresistible affinity – he too had curly ginger hair and freckles – and to fantasise about him as a boyfriend. In her diary she secretly scribbled soppy love poems and drew pictures of the three red-haired children they would have (two girls and a boy). Yet, despite her desperate hints, he remained oblivious to her growing attachment, and nothing happened.
James followed his father and older brother into the Army. When he came to say goodbye, even more heart-stoppingly handsome in his smartly pressed officer’s uniform, Jess never imagined it would be for good. So when he went and died in a bomb explosion in Iraq, it broke her heart. ‘Shrapnel injuries’ was the phrase whispered in hushed corners but, later, Jonathan told her he’d learned that James had bled to death while waiting to be rescued. The image haunted her still. Why hadn’t someone stopped the bleeding and saved him?
Throughout her volunteering days with St John Ambulance and her rookie period as an NHS paramedic, the idea had wormed its way into her head. As she learned the various techniques for stopping a bleed she’d found herself wondering whether she could have saved James, had she been there? She even dreamed about it: everyone else panicking at the sight of his blood leaching into the ground – weirdly, they were in a wood of pine trees rather than the sand of the desert – but her taking calm charge of the situation, applying a tourniquet, setting up a saline drip, watching the bleeding stop and the colour return to his face. She woke just as he stretched up to kiss her.
The dream transmuted itself into an idea which, over time, became an almost obsessive conviction: she couldn’t bring James back but perhaps by saving the life of another soldier she could somehow give meaning to that terrible loss of such a vibrant life.
Three years ago, just qualified and about to accept a full time job with the ambulance service, she’d passed an Army Recruiting office and paused to read the posters in the window. A young soldier with a number one haircut and a sweet, shy smile had poked his head around the door and asked if he could help. Would she like more information? Almost blindly, as if in a dream, she’d followed him in and replied obediently to his questions, watching passively as he filled in a form. After signing it, she wandered out into the street in a daze and never mentioned it to anyone until the invitation to basic training arrived on her doormat.
‘I can’t explain it. Just has to be done, Nate. I’ve been through hell and high water for this, all that shit on the Brecon Beacons and the parade