Me-Before-You-by-Jojo-Moyes

Nathan went to pack Will’s bag. I was working out what I could add about
how patronizing he was, when I turned and saw that he was still looking at me.
‘You look great, Clark,’ he said, quietly. ‘Really.’
With ordinary people – what Camilla Traynor would probably call ‘workingclass’
people – I had observed a few basic routines, as far as Will was concerned.
Most would stare. A few might smile sympathetically, express sympathy, or ask
me in a kind of stage whisper what had happened. I was often tempted to
respond, ‘Unfortunate falling-out with MI6,’ just to see their reaction, but I never
did.
Here’s the thing about middle-class people. They pretend not to look, but they
do. They were too polite to actually stare. Instead, they did this weird thing of
catching sight of Will in their field of vision and then determinedly not looking
at him. Until he’d gone past, at which point their gaze would flicker towards
him, even while they remained in conversation with someone else. They
wouldn’t talk about him, though. Because that would be rude.
As we moved through the foyer of the Symphony Hall, where clusters of
smart people stood with handbags and programmes in one hand, gin and tonics
in the other, I saw this response pass through them in a gentle ripple which
followed us to the stalls. I don’t know if Will noticed it. Sometimes I thought the
only way he could deal with it was to pretend he could see none of it.
We sat down, the only two people at the front in the centre block of seats. To
our right there was another man in a wheelchair, chatting cheerfully to two
women who flanked him. I watched them, hoping that Will would notice them
too. But he stared ahead, his head dipped into his shoulders, as if he were trying
to become invisible.
This isn’t going to work, a little voice said.
‘Do you need anything?’ I whispered.
‘No,’ he shook his head. He swallowed. ‘Actually, yes. Something’s digging
into my collar.’
I leant over and ran my finger around the inside of it; a nylon tag had been left
inside. I pulled at it, hoping to snap it, but it proved stubbornly resistant.
‘New shirt. Is it really troubling you?’
‘No. I just thought I’d bring it up for fun.’