Me-Before-You-by-Jojo-Moyes

He swallowed. ‘The day we go and I’m in this bloody contraption, all those
memories, those sensations will be wiped out, erased by the struggle to get
behind the table, up and down Parisian kerbs, the taxi drivers who refuse to take
us, and the wheelchair bloody power pack that wouldn’t charge in a French
socket. Okay?’
His voice had hardened. I screwed the top back on the vacuum flask. I
examined my shoes quite carefully as I did it, because I didn’t want him to see
my face.
‘Okay,’ I said.
‘Okay.’ Will took a deep breath.
Below us a coach stopped to disgorge another load of visitors outside the
castle gates. We watched in silence as they filed out of the vehicle and into the
old fortress in a single, obedient line, primed to stare at the ruins of another age.
It’s possible he realized I was a bit subdued, because he leant into me a little.
And his face softened. ‘So, Clark. The rain seems to have stopped. Where shall
we go this afternoon. The maze?’
‘No.’ It came out more quickly than I would have liked, and I caught the look
Will gave me.
‘You claustrophobic?’
‘Something like that.’ I began to gather up our things. ‘Let’s just go back to
the house.’
The following weekend, I came down in the middle of the night to fetch some
water. I had been having trouble sleeping, and had found that actually getting up
was marginally preferable to lying in my bed batting away the swirling mess of
my thoughts.
I didn’t like being awake at night. I couldn’t help but wonder whether Will
was awake, on the other side of the castle, and my imagination kept prising my
way into his thoughts. It was a dark place to go to.
Here was the truth of it: I was getting nowhere with him. Time was running
out. I couldn’t even persuade him to take a trip to Paris. And when he told me
why, it was hard for me to argue. He had a good reason for turning down almost
every single longer trip I suggested to him. And without telling him why I was
so anxious to take him, I had little leverage at all.