Esme had given her until Friday to decide. Between the contract negotiations, needing to get a visa sorted and filming schedules, there simply wasn't more time. It seemed ridiculous to Aurelia that she was supposed to make such an enormous decision so quickly; one that would completely turn her way of life upside down under, but getting compassion from a talent agent was about as likely as getting a London cabbie to admit they didn't know a shortcut.
On the Thursday morning, she was sitting at her little wooden desk, scrolling through pictures of Sydney on her laptop, as if Google would answer the question for her. In the background, London hummed on without her, the quiet of the flat punctuated by the sound of a car horn beeping and people laughing on the street below, but inside, everything felt suspended, like the moment before a tap dripped.
She wasn't exactly thinking about Sydney, though.
She knew that three days was not a long time. She knew that three days didn't alter the shape of a life. And yet… something seemed subtly wrong now, like she was existing through a slightly translucent pane of glass, and everything looked distorted on the other side.
She crossed to the kitchen and grabbed a fizzy drink out of the fridge, her guilty pleasure. She leaned on the counter as she drank, scanning the room thoughtfully. The quiet wasn't lonely, but she'd felt it more keenly. She'd grown used to a certain presence in an embarrassingly short amount of time, accustomed to somebody else moving through the spaces near her. She'd found herself turning to talk to him, only to see an empty seat
Her phone sat by the laptop where she'd left it. She'd been acutely aware of its existence in the same way one was aware of a blister- not painful until you knocked it, but impossible to forget once you did. She'd not been waiting for it to buzz.
She was a liar.
She retraced her steps and picked it up, her thumb hovering over the screen. There were no new notifications. No missed calls. No messages. Of course there weren't. He was currently on a plane, probably somewhere above Western Australia at this point, several thousand miles and time zones away. He wouldn't be checking his phone.
She set the phone face-down resolutely, and stood for a moment, almost forgetting what she had been doing before. This made her frown slightly- when she was supposed to be working, she didn't like to have distractions, but everything felt like one.
It seemed important that she hadn't rushed to erase him. With Matthew, it had been different, she'd been able to throw herself into her work with gusto, but the thing she'd had with Matthew had somehow never felt as real. He'd never got under her skin.
That's the problem, she realised. She sank back into her desk chair, eyes closing. She would give herself five minutes; five minutes to grieve something that wasn't meant to have been, and then she needed to let go. She wouldn't be able to make the right decision about Sydney if he was behind every choice she made. It wouldn't be true to herself, and it wouldn't be fair to either of them. She needed to decide for her.
Exactly five minutes later, she opened the email Esme had sent and forced herself to read it again. There were a few names she recognised; Iluka Warren and Jasper Rennick had crossed her radar somewhere, she was sure, but everyone else was unknown to her. The thing that stood out to her most, however, was that this proposal, and the attached contract, weren't about reputations or recognition. There was nothing here waffling on about "journeys" or "vision." It was to the point, the outline of the production, its intent, and what was expected of her, should she accept the role. Nobody was trying to woo her. There was no mug.
She liked it.
The filming would be based in and around Sydney for around twelve months, some of it studio-based but with a few on-location shoots as well. The series would be twelve episodes, and the plan was for a second series to film directly after the first, not included in the original timespan, episodes to be confirmed. The studio would sponsor her visa and provide proper accommodation for the duration of the shoot- this was standard.
It wasn't going to be a small project, and that mattered to her. It wasn't because it suggested scale- she'd learned the hard way that scale often came with noise- it was because it suggested commitment, time and attention. All the ingredients of a project that would allow the story to breathe.
There was an attachment detailing a long list of consultants, longer than it needed to be for appearances' sake alone. The language was precise, careful in the way of people who knew they were stepping into territory that required respect. The consultants were all listed by name. There were cultural advisors credited alongside writers and scientists. A paragraph devoted entirely to process; not just what they wanted to make, but how they intended to make it. Esme had made it clear there were risks attached to this project, but this eased her anxiety significantly.
She took a pencil and notebook out of the drawer and made a list.
For:
Steady work
The challenge
The project
Starting over somewhere new
Lovely weather
Against:
Distance
Time
Mum
Leaving Mum was the main thing holding her back, and she could picture her face now, not dramatic, just present. She could see her in the large, cottage-style kitchen in Devon, her sleeves rolled up, the radio on too loud. Aurelia had always been far too good at leaving that house, perhaps selfishly so. She'd built her life around moving from one thing to the next, calling it independence, but maybe this whole time she'd just been running away?
She stayed with the thought for a long while and then closed the laptop. She'd have to speak to Mum before she made any decisions.
She imagined what turning it down might look like. There'd be another role, of course there would, maybe even something as exciting as Dreamtime Protocol. She'd continue the same routines, visit the same cities when doing press- the things she was good at. It was safe.
Then she imagined accepting the offer. Going to Australia for a year, maybe more. It didn't feel like she'd be running away then, just choosing something different, unproven. She'd be learning something new, rather than maintaining what she knew.
She eyed her phone, still turned over on the desk. For a fleeting second, she thought about what would happen if they were in the same city again, but then her resolve took over. This couldn't be about anybody she might hope to meet on the other side of the world. It couldn't be about who she might miss, or who might miss her. It had to be about whether she could live with herself if she did or didn't try. The thought grounded her, solid and unmistakeable.
What she did know, with painful clarity, was what the answer would cost.
She stood up so fast her chair fell over backwards.
She needed to go to Devon.
xxx
Her childhood home was nestled on a sloping cliffside lane, a couple of miles away from the picturesque village of Clovelly. The last in a small line of terraced cottages, it looked like it had grown organically out of the landscape itself- the stone walls gleamed in the soft, salt-laden air, their rough texture offset by the colourful window boxes painted in soft pink. In summer, the boxes were full of geraniums and trailing lobelia, whilst wisteria twisted its way round the windows, covering the entire front of the house in a purple-blue curtain. The front door matched the pink of the windows, standing beneath a crooked wooden porch which had salt encrusted in the nooks.
Aurelia hated it. It represented everything she had been trying to escape.
She'd driven straight there from London, having left about an hour after deciding to go, arriving just after five that same afternoon. She could see the lights on through the curtained windows and realised too late that she probably should have checked her mother was home before driving non-stop for four hours. Her key was already in her hand, but she knocked anyway, her shoulder brushing against a delicate windchime hanging from the porch. She heard footsteps, and then light spilled out into the evening.
"Aurelia?"
Elowyn Hart was tiny, much smaller than Aurelia, who had inherited her father's height, but her aura was such that it made her fill an entire room. Now that she was in her early fifties, her features had softened slightly, but she was nonetheless striking, her posture still perfect from her West End days, auburn hair always immaculate.
"Hi Mum."
Elowyn pulled her into a hug, then held her at arm's length, studying her face closely,
"You look tired. And thin."
Aurelia let herself be led into the kitchen, trying not to look at her father's easel in the corner by the French windows, where his last ever painting, unfinished, still stood. Elowyn talked at one hundred miles an hour, pressing a cup of hot tea into her hands, throwing cheese, bread and pickles onto plates like her daughter was a special kind of hobbit.
"I would have got something in if you'd told me you were coming, love." She said, reproachfully, when she finally stopped bustling.
"It was kind of a last minute thing. I need to talk to you."
Elowyn gave the slightest of pauses as she raised her cup to her lips,
"Is it about that horrible TV appearance last weekend?"
"What? Oh god," Aurelia groaned, "So you saw that?"
"I thought the young man was very nice, but that presenter needed a good telling off. So this isn't about the show?" Elowyn had always been an expert at saying exactly what needed to be said without lingering.
Aurelia ran her finger around the top of her mug,
"I've been offered a role, but… its complicated."
"Complicated how?"
"It's a lead role in a TV series," She said, trying to keep her voice even, "If I take it, I'll need to go to Australia for a year. Maybe even longer."
Elowyn looked at her daughter for a long time, without words. Her face didn't betray a single emotion, but she seemed as though she was delving straight into Aurelia's mind, scanning for an answer to bring to the surface.
"Is it a good opportunity?" She asked eventually, leaning forward and clasping her hands in front of her. Aurelia nodded,
"Potentially the best."
"And do you want to go?"
"I don't know."
"Yes you do." The words were said gently, but firmly, and Elowyn reached a hand across the pale oak table, covering both of Aurelia's with a soft, scented palm, "Yes you do, sweetheart."
Aurelia found she was holding back tears,
"I think I'll regret it, if I don't. I… I don't think I'm very happy, Mum. Not deep down, anyway. I feel stagnant and sad all the time, like something is missing, and that I'm always running away from what it could be, but this feels good, somehow." The words came out in a rush, unexpected, "But I don't want to leave you alone." Tears obscured her vision.
She heard a scrape as Elowyn's chair moved across the flagstone tiles and felt the overwhelming comfort of her mother's arms around her shoulders; a tissue being pressed into her hand. Elowyn tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, like she'd done when Aurelia was a child.
"This isn't you running, darling. I watched you run for years after Daddy died, and this isn't it. I think this might be you finding yourself."
"But what about you?"
Elowyn scoffed,
"What about me? I'm fifty-two, not ninety. If I miss you, I can get on a plane. I don't want to be the reason you don't do this."
xxx
That night, lying in her childhood bed. Aurelia sent messages to three people.
The first was to Teo. He'd sent her a message an hour or so before.
Just landed. Hope you are okay. London feels very far away.
That wasn't supposed to rhyme
Her laugh, twinned with the little thud in her chest told her that it would have been so easy to keep the conversation going, to let the decision soften around the shape of another person's voice. She could feel how quickly it would happen, how her certainty would fall into becoming something shared, negotiated, diluted.
It took her a few minutes to type out her reply, deleting, rewording, deleting again, until finally, with a deep exhale, she pressed send.
Glad you got home safely.
I need to make a decision, and I don't think I can do it truthfully if I'm talking to you at the same time. I know I said you could message me, but I need to go back on that. I'm going to delete your number.
I just need space to think properly
He replied back almost immediately;
I understand.
If this needs to be clean, I'll delete your number too.
Let me know
Her answer was simple.
Thank you.
The next person she messaged was Lucy.
I need you to do something for me.
And then, finally, Esme.
My answer is yes