Me Before You: a novel

Knowledge is power, Will, I told him silently.
There were 3,290 results, the first three of which revealed a
“Michael Lawler, practitioner at law, specialist in wills, probate, and
power of attorney” based on that same street. I stared at the screen
for a few minutes, then I typed in his name again, this time against
the search engine of images, and there he was, at some Round
Table function, in a dark suit—Michael Lawler, specialist in wills and
probate, the same man who had spent an hour with Will.
I moved into Patrick’s that night, in the hour and a half between
my finishing work and his heading off to the track. I took everything
except my bed and the new blinds. He arrived with his car, and we
loaded my belongings into bin bags. Within two trips we had it all—
barring my school books in the loft—at his.
Mum cried; she thought she was forcing me out.
“For goodness’ sake, love. It’s time she moved on. She’s twenty-
seven years old,” my father told her.
“She’s still my baby,” she said, pressing two tins of fruitcake and
a tote bag of cleaning products into my arms.
I didn’t know what to say to her. I don’t even like fruitcake.
It was surprisingly easy, fitting my belongings into Patrick’s flat.
He had next to nothing anyway, and I had almost nothing from years
spent in the box room. The only thing we fell out over was my CD

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collection, which apparently could only be combined with his once I
had stickered the backs of mine and sorted them into alphabetical
order.
“Make yourself at home,” he kept saying, as if I were some kind
of guest. We were nervous, strangely awkward with each other, like
two people on a first date. While I was unpacking, he brought me tea
and said, “I thought this could be your mug.” He showed me where
everything lived in the kitchen, then said, several times, “Of course,
put stuff where you want. I don’t mind.”
He had cleared two drawers and the wardrobe in the spare room.
The other two drawers were filled with his fitness clothes. I didn’t
know there were so many permutations of Lycra and fleece. My
wildly colorful clothes left several feet of closet space still empty, the
wire hangers jangling mournfully.
“I’ll have to buy more stuff just to fill it up,” I said, looking at it.
He laughed nervously. “What’s that?”
He looked at my calendar, tacked up on the spare-room wall, with
its ideas in green and its actual planned events in black. When
something had worked (music, wine tasting), I put a smiley face next
to it. When it hadn’t (horse racing, art galleries), it stayed blank.
There was little marked in for the next two weeks—Will had become
bored of the places nearby, and as yet I could not persuade him to
venture farther afield. I glanced over at Patrick. I could see him
eyeing the August 12 date, which was now underlined with
exclamation marks in black.
“Um…it’s just reminding me about my job.”
“You don’t think they’re going to renew your contract?”
“I don’t know, Patrick.”
Patrick took the pen from its clip, looked at the next month, and
scribbled under week twenty-eight: Time to start job hunting.
“That way you’re covered for whatever happens,” he said. He
kissed me and left me to it.
I laid out my creams carefully in the bathroom, tucked my razors,
moisturizer, and tampons neatly into his mirrored cabinet. I put some
books in a neat row along the spare-room floor under the window,
including the new titles that Will had ordered from Amazon for me.

---

Patrick promised to put up some shelves when he had a spare
moment.
And then, as he left to go running, I sat and looked out over the
industrial estate toward the castle, and practiced saying the word
home, silently under my breath.
I am pretty hopeless at keeping secrets. Treena says I touch my
nose as soon as I even think of lying. It’s a pretty straightforward
giveaway. My parents still joke about the time I wrote absence notes
for myself after bunking off school. “Dear Miss Trowbridge,” they
read. “Please excuse Louisa Clark from today’s lessons as I am very
poorly with women’s problems.” Dad had struggled to keep a straight
face even while he was supposed to be tearing a strip off me.
Keeping Will’s plan from my family had been one thing—I was
good at keeping secrets from my parents (it’s one of the things we
learn while growing up, after all)—but coping with the anxiety by
myself was something else entirely.
I spent the next couple of nights trying to work out what Will was
up to, and what I could do to stop him, my thoughts racing even as
Patrick and I chatted, cooking together in the little galley kitchen. (I
was already discovering new things about him—like, he really did
know a hundred different things to do with turkey breast.) At night we
made love—it seemed almost obligatory at the moment, as if we
should take full advantage of our freedom. It was like Patrick
somehow felt I owed him something, given my constant physical
proximity to Will. But as soon as he dropped off to sleep, I was lost in
my thoughts again.
There were just seven weeks left.
And Will was making plans, even if I wasn’t.
The following week, if Will noticed that I was preoccupied, he
didn’t say anything. We went through the motions of our daily routine
—I took him for short drives into the country, cooked his meals, saw
to him when we were in his house. He didn’t make jokes about
Running Man anymore.
I talked to him about the latest books he had recommended: we
discussed The English Patient (I had loved this), and a Swedish

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thriller (which I hadn’t). We were solicitous with each other, almost
excessively polite. I missed his insults, his crabbiness—their
absence just added to the looming sense of threat that hung over
me.
Nathan watched us both, as if he were observing some kind of
new species.
“You two had a row?” he asked me one day in the kitchen, as I
unpacked the groceries.
“You’d better ask him,” I said.
“That’s exactly what he said.”
He looked at me sideways, and disappeared into the bathroom to
unlock Will’s medical cabinet.
Meanwhile, I’d lasted three days after Michael Lawler’s visit
before I rang Mrs. Traynor. I asked if we could meet somewhere
other than her house, and we agreed on a little café that had opened
on the grounds of the castle. The same café, ironically, that had cost
me my job.
It was a much smarter affair than the Buttered Bun—all limed oak
and bleached wood tables and chairs. It sold homemade soup full of
actual vegetables, and fancy cakes. And you couldn’t buy a normal
coffee, only lattes, cappuccinos, and macchiatos. There were no
builders, or girls from the hairdresser’s. I sat nursing my tea, and
wondered about the Dandelion Lady and whether she would feel
comfortable enough to sit in here and read a newspaper all morning.
“Louisa, I’m sorry I’m late.” Camilla Traynor entered briskly, her
handbag tucked under her arm, dressed in a gray silk shirt and navy
trousers.
I fought the urge to stand up. There was never a time when I
spoke to her that I didn’t still feel like I was engaged in some kind of
interview.
“I was held up in court.”
“Sorry. To get you out of work, I mean. I just…well, I wasn’t sure it
could wait.”
She held up her hand, and mouthed something at the waitress.
Then she sat across from me. I felt her gaze as if I were transparent.

---

“Will had a lawyer come to the house,” I said. “I found out he is a
specialist in wills and probate.” I couldn’t think of any gentler way to
open the conversation.
She looked as if I’d just smacked her in the face. I realized, too
late, that she might actually have thought I’d have something good to
tell her.
“A lawyer? Are you sure?”
“I looked him up on the Internet. He’s based on Regent Street. In
London,” I added unnecessarily. “His name is Michael Lawler.”
She blinked hard, as if trying to take this in. “Did Will tell you
this?”
“No. I don’t think he wanted me to know. I…I got his name and
looked him up.”
Her coffee arrived. The waitress put it on the table in front of her,
but Mrs. Traynor didn’t seem to notice.
“Did you want anything else?” the girl said.
“No, thank you.”
“We have carrot cake on special today. We make it here
ourselves. It’s got a lovely buttercream fill—”
“No.” Mrs. Traynor’s voice was sharp. “Thank you.”
The girl stood there just long enough to let us know she was
offended and then stalked off, her notepad swinging conspicuously
from one hand.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “You told me before that I should let you know
anything important. I stayed awake half the night trying to work out
whether to say anything.”
Her face looked almost leached of color.
I knew how she felt.
“How is he himself? Have you…have you come up with any other
ideas? Outings?”
“He’s not keen.” I told her about Paris, and my list of things I had
compiled.
All the while I spoke, I could see her mind working ahead of me,
calculating, assessing.
“Anywhere,” she said, finally. “I’ll finance it. Any trip you want. I’ll
pay for you. For Nathan. Just—just see if you can get him to agree to

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it.”
I nodded.
“If there’s anything else you can think of…just to buy us some
time. I’ll pay your wages beyond the six months, obviously.”
“That’s…that’s really not an issue.”
We finished our coffees in silence, both lost in our thoughts. As I
watched her surreptitiously, I noticed that her immaculate hairstyle
was now flecked with gray, her eyes as shadowed as my own. I
realized I didn’t feel any better for having told her, to have passed my
own heightened anxiety on to her—but what choice did I have? The
stakes were getting higher with every day that passed. The sound of
the clock striking two seemed to spur her out of her stasis.
“I suppose I should get back to work. Please let me know
anything that you…you can come up with, Louisa. It might be better
if we have these conversations away from the annex.”
I stood up. “Oh,” I said, “you’ll need my new number. I just
moved.” As she reached into her handbag for a pen, I added, “I
moved in with Patrick…my boyfriend.”
I don’t know why this news surprised her so much. She looked
startled, and then she handed me her pen.
“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”
“I didn’t know I needed to tell you.”
She stood, one hand resting on the table. “Will mentioned the
other day that you…he thought you might be moving into the annex.
On weekends.”
I scribbled Patrick’s home number.
“Well, I thought it might be more straightforward for everyone if I
moved in with Patrick.” I handed her the slip of paper. “But I’m not far
away. Just by the industrial estate. It won’t affect my hours. Or my
punctuality.”
We stood there. Mrs. Traynor seemed agitated, her hand running
through her hair, then reaching down for the chain around her neck.
Finally—as if she could not help herself—she blurted out, “Would it
really have hurt you to have waited? Just a few weeks?”
“I’m sorry?”

---

“Will…I think Will is very fond of you.” She bit her lip. “I can’t
see…I can’t see how this really helps.”
“Hold on. Are you telling me I shouldn’t have moved in with my
boyfriend?”
“I’m just saying that the timing is not ideal. Will is in a very
vulnerable state. We’re all doing our best to keep him optimistic…
and you—”
“I what?” I could see the waitress watching us, her notepad stilled
in her hand. “I what? Dared to have a life away from work?”
She lowered her voice. “I am doing everything I can, Louisa, to
stop this…thing. You know the task we’re facing. And I’m just saying
that I wish—given the fact he is very fond of you—that you had
waited a while longer before rubbing your…your happiness in his
face.”
I could hardly believe what I was hearing. I felt the color rise to
my face, and took a deep breath before I spoke again.
“How dare you suggest I would do anything to hurt Will’s feelings.
I have done everything,” I hissed. “I have done everything I can think
of. I’ve come up with ideas, got him out, talked to him, read to him,
looked after him.” My last words exploded out of my chest. “I’ve
cleaned up after him. I’ve changed his bloody catheter. I’ve made
him laugh. I’ve done more than your bloody family has done.”
Mrs. Traynor stood very still. She drew herself up to her full
height, tucked her handbag under her arm. “I think this conversation
has probably ended, Miss Clark.”
“Yes. Yes, Mrs. Traynor. I think it probably has.”
She turned, and walked swiftly out of the café.
When the door slammed shut, I realized I too was shaking.
That conversation with Mrs. Traynor kept me jangling for the next
couple of days. I kept hearing her words, the idea that I was rubbing