Me Before You: a novel

particularly brutal war. He was almost smacking his lips with
anticipation. I looked at my boyfriend and wondered if he was
actually an alien. I thought briefly that I had preferred him when he
worked in telesales and couldn’t pass a petrol station without
stocking up on Mars bars.
“You’re going to do it?”
“Why not? I’ve never been fitter.”
I thought of all that extra training—the endless conversations
about weight and distance, fitness and endurance. It was hard
enough getting Patrick’s attention these days at the best of times.
“You could do it with me,” he said, although we both knew he
didn’t believe it.
“I’ll leave you to it,” I said. “Sure. Go for it.”
And I ordered the cheesecake.
If I had thought the events of the previous day would create a thaw
back at Granta House, I was wrong.
I greeted Will with a broad smile and a cheery hello, and he didn’t
even bother to look around from the window.
“Not a good day,” Nathan murmured, as he shouldered his way
into his coat.
It was a filthy, low-cloud sort of a morning, where the rain spat
meanly against the windows and it was hard to imagine the sun

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coming out ever again. Even I felt glum on a day like this. It wasn’t
really a surprise that Will should be worse. I began to work my way
through the morning’s chores, telling myself all the while that it didn’t
matter. You didn’t have to like your employer anyway, did you? Lots
of people didn’t. The photographs were stacked carefully in the
bottom drawer, where I had placed them the previous day, and now,
crouched on the floor, I began laying them out and sorting through
them, assessing which frames I might be able to fix. I am quite good
at fixing things. Besides, I thought it might be a useful way of killing
time.
I had been doing this for about ten minutes when the discreet
hum of the motorized wheelchair alerted me to Will’s arrival.
He sat there in the doorway, looking at me. There were dark
shadows under his eyes. Sometimes, Nathan told me, he barely
slept at all. I didn’t want to think how it would feel, to lie trapped in a
bed you couldn’t get out of with only dark thoughts to keep you
company through the small hours.
“I thought I’d see if I could fix any of these frames,” I said, holding
one up. It was the picture of him bungee jumping. I tried to look
cheerful. He needs someone upbeat, someone positive.
“Why?”
I blinked. “Well…I think some of these can be saved. I brought
some wood glue with me, if you’re happy for me to have a go at
them. Or if you want to replace them I can pop into town during my
lunch break and see if I can find some more. Or we could both go, if
you fancied a trip out…”
“Who told you to start fixing them?”
His stare was unflinching.
Uh-oh, I thought. “I…I was just trying to help.”
“You wanted to fix what I did yesterday.”
“I—”
“Do you know what, Louisa? It would be nice—just for once—if
someone paid attention to what I wanted. Me smashing those
photographs was not an accident. It was not an attempt at radical
interior design. It was because I actually don’t want to look at them.”
I got to my feet. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think that—”

---

“You thought you knew best. Everyone thinks they know what I
need. Let’s put the bloody photos back together. Give the poor
invalid something to look at. I don’t want to have those bloody
pictures staring at me every time I’m stuck in my bed until someone
comes and bloody well gets me out again. Okay? Do you think you
can get your head around that?”
I swallowed. “I wasn’t going to fix the one of Alicia—I’m not that
stupid…I just thought that in a while you might feel—”
“Oh Christ…” He turned away from me, his voice scathing.
“Spare me the psychological therapy. Just go and read your bloody
gossip magazines or whatever it is you do when you’re not making
tea.”
My cheeks were aflame. I watched him maneuver in the narrow
hallway, and my voice emerged even before I knew what I was
doing.
“You don’t have to behave like an arse.”
The words rang out in the still air.
The wheelchair stopped. There was a long pause, and then he
reversed and turned slowly, so that he was facing me, his hand on
the little joystick.
“What?”
I faced him, my heart thumping. “Your friends got the shitty
treatment. Fine. They probably deserved it. But I’m just here day
after day trying to do the best job I can. So I would really appreciate
it if you didn’t make my life as unpleasant as you do everyone
else’s.”
Will’s eyes widened a little. There was a beat before he spoke
again. “And what if I told you I didn’t want you here?”
“I’m not employed by you. I’m employed by your mother. And
unless she tells me she doesn’t want me here anymore, I’m staying.
Not because I particularly care about you, or like this stupid job, or
want to change your life one way or another, but because I need the
money. Okay? I really need the money.”
Will Traynor’s expression hadn’t outwardly changed much but I
thought I saw astonishment in there, as if he were unused to anyone
disagreeing with him.

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