We were on the hills just outside town when I told him. Patrick was halfway through a sixteen-mile run and wanted me to time him while following behind on the bicycle. As I was marginally less proficient on a bicycle than I was at particle physics, this involved a lot of swearing and swerving on my part, and a lot of exasperated shouting on his. He had actually wanted to do twenty-four miles, but I had told him I didn't think my seat could take it, and besides, one of us needed to do the weekly shop after we got home. We were out of toothpaste and instant coffee. Mind you, it was only me who wanted the coffee. Patrick was on herbal tea.

"You what?"

As we reached the top of Sheepcote Hill, me puffing, my legs like lead, I decided to just throw it out there. I figured we still had ten miles home for him to recover his good mood.

"I'm not coming to the Xtreme Viking."

He didn't stop, but he came close. He turned to face me, his legs still moving under him, and he looked so shocked that I nearly swerved into a tree.

He turned back to the road and picked up speed. We had reached the brow of the hill, and I had to close my fingers around the brakes a little to stop myself overtaking him.

We went on another mile before he spoke again. It might have been me, but the pounding of Patrick's feet on the road seemed to have taken on a grim, resolute tone. We were high above the little town now, me puffing on the uphill stretches, trying and failing to stop my heart racing every time a car came past. I was on Mum's old bike (Patrick wouldn't let me anywhere near his racing demon) and it had no gears so I was frequently left tailing him.

"It's not the cost. I thought you were going to support me. You said you were coming to support me."

"I'm… working."

He could look quite sulky, Patrick. When we were first together, I used to tease him about it. I called him Mr Grumpy Trousers. It made me laugh, and him so cross that he usually stopped sulking just to shut me up.

"What? Why?"

"So when did you work this out?" Fine beads of sweat had broken out on his forehead, and tendons stood out on his calves. I couldn't look at them too long or I started wobbling.

"At the weekend. I just wanted to be sure."

"Oh, come on. I'm hardly not supporting you now, am I? I hate cycling, Patrick. You know I do. But I'm supporting you."

"But we've booked your flights and everything."

"It's only easyJet. I'll reimburse you the £39 if you're that bothered."

"It's not that simple."

He glanced behind, and slowed his pace a fraction so that I could draw level. "So why can't they get an agency person in?" he said.

I held my breath. This was quite hard given that I was completely breathless from cycling. "Because he needs to go on a trip."

"His medical carer. The guy you met when Will came to Mum's."

He slowed, and glanced down at the tarmac, until he was practically jogging on the spot. "What is this, Lou? Because… because it seems to me that there is a line being blurred here between what is work and what is…" he shrugged, "… normal."

"He needs to go on a trip. So they need me and Nathan there to help him."

"An agency person?"

"To come to the Traynors' house. I mean, if you're there for six months you must be entitled to a holiday."

I could see Patrick thinking about this. He wiped sweat from his eyes.

"And before you ask," I added, "no, I am not having an affair with Nathan."

"I don't see why not. You started work there knowing nothing, after all."

"Nathan? Who's Nathan?"

"What?"

"And you go running, I come running." I tried to smile.

He shook his head slightly, as if he couldn't hear me properly. Then he began to run down the road, away from me. I could see from the set of his back how angry he was.

His tone was mulish. "No. It will throw out my time."

"I don't think… I don't think it's about the job… I just… I think there's something you're not telling me."

"It's six months, Pat. Six months. You were the one who thought I should take this job, after all. You can't have a go at me for taking it seriously."

"Very funny." He turned away.

I hesitated, just a moment too long. "That's not true."

"That's different. He calls, you come running."

"But Will Traynor seems to take priority over everything these days."

"But you won't come to the Viking."

"Oh, come on, Patrick. Can't we just stop for a minute and discuss this?"

"Oh, and this doesn't?" I took my hand off the handlebars, and gestured towards his shifting feet.

"I've told you, I --"

"It's not a normal job. You know that."

"Say that again."

He began to run faster, as if he had gained a new momentum.

Patrick's stride shortened and then slowed. He stopped on the road ahead, his back straight, still facing away from me. He turned slowly. He had finally stopped jogging.

He was staring at me like he didn't know quite whether to believe me.

"Then let's stop the clock. Just for five minutes."

"Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"No. I have to do it in real conditions."

"Patrick?" I said, struggling suddenly to keep up with him. My feet slipped on the pedals, and I cursed, kicking a pedal back to try and set off again. "Patrick? Patrick!"

I stared at the back of his head and the words were out of my mouth almost before I knew what I was saying. "Okay. Will wants to die. He wants to commit suicide. And this trip is my last attempt to change his mind."

"He wants to go to Dignitas. In August. I'm trying to change his mind. This is the last chance I have."

"I know it sounds mad. But I have to change his mind. So… so I can't come to the Viking."

I swallowed. "Okay."

"Pat --"

He didn't answer. He looked crushed, as if I had done something terrible. There was a faint frown on his face, and he swallowed twice, hard.

He looked for a moment as if he had forgotten why we were even out there. Then he struck off again, and I watched him disappear on the road ahead of me, his head facing resolutely ahead, his legs eating up the road beneath him.

"I had to promise his family I wouldn't tell anyone. It would be awful for them if it got out. Awful. Look, even he doesn't know I know. It's all been… tricky. I'm sorry." I reached out a hand to him. "I would have told you if I could."

I had put the request out on the day after we returned from the wedding.

"No. Just… I just need to run now, Lou. By myself." He ran a hand across his hair. "Okay?"

Can anyone tell me a good place to go where quadriplegics can have adventures? I am looking for things that an able-bodied person might be able to do, things that might make my depressed friend forget for a while that his life is a bit limited. I don't really know what I'm hoping for, but all suggestions gratefully received. This is quite urgent.

As I logged on I found myself staring at the screen in disbelief. There were eighty-nine responses. I scrolled up and down the screen, unsure at first whether they could all possibly be in response to my request. Then I glanced around me at the other computer users in the library, desperate for one of them to look at me so that I could tell them. Eighty-nine responses! To a single question!

Busy Bee.

There was swimming with dolphins, and scuba diving with supporters. There were floating chairs that would enable him to go fishing, and adapted quad bikes that would allow him to off-road. Some of them had posted photographs or videos of themselves taking part in these activities. A few of them, including Ritchie, had remembered my previous posts, and wanted to know how he was doing.

There were tales of bungee jumping for quadriplegics, of swimming, canoeing, even horse riding, with the aid of a special frame. (When I watched the online video this linked to, I was a little disappointed that Will had said he really couldn't stand horses. It looked ace.)

Maybe. But I'm hoping this trip will really make a difference.

This all sounds like good news. Is he feeling better?

Ritchie responded:

Attagirl! If you've got the funds to sort it all out, the sky's the limit!

I typed a quick response:

Make sure you post up some pics of him in the bungee harness. Love the look on guys' faces when they're upside down!

I loved them -- these quads and their carers -- for their courage and their generosity and their imaginations. I spent two hours that evening writing down their suggestions, following their links to related websites they had tried and tested, even talking to a few in the chat rooms. By the time I left I had a destination; we would head to California, to The Four Winds Ranch, a specialist centre which offered experienced help "in a way that will make you forget you ever needed help", according to its website. The ranch itself, a low-slung timber building set into a forest clearing near Yosemite, had been set up by a former stuntman who refused to let his spinal injury limit the things he could do, and the online visitors book was full of happy and grateful holidaymakers who swore that he had changed the way they felt about their disability -- and themselves. At least six of the chat-room users had been there, and all said it had turned their lives around.

Scootagirl wrote:

It was wheelchair friendly, but with all the facilities you would expect from a luxury hotel. There were outside sunken baths with discreet hoists, and specialist masseurs. There was trained medical help on site, and a cinema with spaces for wheelchairs beside the normal seats. There was an accessible outdoor hot tub where you could sit and stare up at the stars. We would spend a week there, and then a few days on the coast at a hotel complex where Will could swim, and get a good look at the rugged coastline. Best of all, I had found a climax to the holiday that Will would never forget -- a skydive, with the help of parachute instructors who were trained in helping quads jump. They had special equipment that would strap Will to them (apparently, the most important thing was securing their legs so that their knees didn't fly up and bash them in the face).

I would show him the hotel brochure, but I wasn't going to tell him about this. I was just going to turn up there with him and then watch him do it. For those few, precious minutes Will would be weightless, and free. He would escape the dreaded chair. He would escape gravity.

"I have spoken to other quads about the skydiving thing. There's no medical reason he can't do it. And the bungee jumping. They have special harnesses to relieve any potential pressure points on his spine."

I printed out all the information and kept that one sheet at the top. Whenever I looked at it I felt a germ of excitement building -- both at the thought of my first ever long-haul trip, but also at the thought that this might just be it.

I showed Nathan the next morning, the two of us stooping furtively over our coffees in the kitchen as if we were doing something properly clandestine. He flicked through the papers that I had printed off.

This might be the thing that would change Will's mind.

I studied his face anxiously. I knew Nathan didn't rate my capabilities when it came to Will's medical well-being. It was important to me that he was happy with what I'd planned.

"The place here has everything we might need. They say if we call ahead and bring a doctor's prescription, they can even get any generic drugs that we might need, so that there is no chance of us running out."

He frowned. "Looks good," he said, finally. "You did a great job."

"You think he'll like it?"

She had just pulled into the drive in her car and I hesitated, out of sight of Will's window, before I approached her. "I know this is expensive," I said. "But… I think it looks amazing. I really think Will could have the time of his life. If… if you know what I mean."

I showed Mrs Traynor before I left for the evening.

"I'll pay for myself, if you like. For my board and lodging. I don't want anyone thinking --"

He shrugged. "I haven't got a clue. But --" he handed me the papers "- you've surprised us so far, Lou." His smile was a sly thing, breaking in from the side of his face. "No reason you couldn't do it again."

She glanced through it all in silence, and then studied the figures that I had compiled.

"It's fine," she said, cutting me off. "Do what you have to do. If you think you can get him to go then just book it."

I understood what she was saying. There was no time for anything else.

"Do you think you can persuade him?" she said.

"Well… if I… if I make out that it's…" I swallowed, "… partly for my benefit. He thinks I've never done enough with my life. He keeps telling me I should travel. That I should… do things."

She looked at me very carefully. She nodded. "Yes. That sounds like Will." She handed back the paperwork.

She didn't seem to want to wait for me to speak. She ducked her head, her slim fingers reaching for the chain around her neck. "Yes. Well, I'd better go in. I'll see you tomorrow. Let me know what he says."

I didn't go back to Patrick's that evening. I had meant to, but something led me away from the industrial park and, instead, I crossed the road and boarded the bus that led towards home. I walked the 180 steps to our house, and let myself in. It was a warm evening, and all the windows were open in an attempt to catch the breeze. Mum was cooking, singing away in the kitchen. Dad was on the sofa with a mug of tea, Granddad napping in his chair, his head lolling to one side. Thomas was carefully drawing in black felt tip on his shoes. I said hello and walked past them, wondering how it could feel so swiftly as if I didn't quite belong here any more.

"I am…" I took a breath, and then, to my surprise, I found that I couldn't speak. I swallowed hard, twice. "What you said before. I --"

She looked at me, then removed the glasses. "You okay? You look like shit."

She glanced over her shoulder at me. "Does Mum want me?" she said. She glanced up at the clock. "I thought she was going to do Thomas's tea."

Treena was working in my room. I knocked on the door, and walked in to find her at the desk, hunched over a pile of textbooks, glasses that I didn't recognize perched on her nose. It was strange to see her surrounded by the things I had chosen for myself, with Thomas's pictures already obscuring the walls I had painted so carefully, his pen drawing still scrawled over the corner of my blind. I had to gather my thoughts so that I didn't feel instinctively resentful.

"Yeah. Well… there's this bloke I like in Accountancy 2. I thought I might start making the effort. Huge hives all over your face is always a good look, right?"

"She is. He's having fish fingers."

"So do you."

"I know. I went on this stupid detox diet. It's given me hives." She reached a hand up to her chin.

"You don't need to diet."

"I don't know. It's just something Will said a while back. About… about what I should do with my life."

I sat down on the bed. It was my duvet cover. I had known Patrick would hate it, with its crazy geometric pattern. I was surprised Katrina didn't.

"But would they take people like me? People who don't have qualifications?"

She closed her book, and leant back in her chair. "So what's going on?"

"Retrain? As what?"

"I don't know. Something to do with fashion. Design. Or maybe just tailoring."

"Well… there are definitely courses. I'm pretty sure my uni has one. I could look it up, if you want."

"And?"

She threw her pen up in the air and caught it. "Oh, they love mature students. Especially mature students with a proven work ethic. You might have to do a conversion course, but I don't see why not. Why? What's going on?"

"Treen, do you think I could retrain?"

I bit my lip, until she asked me again.

"And I keep thinking… maybe it's time I did what you're doing. Now that Dad can support himself again, maybe you're not the only one capable of making something of herself?"

"I think it's probably a bit more than you've managed to save."

"You'd have to pay."

She rose from her chair and walked over to shut the bedroom door. She lowered her voice so that nobody outside could possibly hear.

"I could apply for a grant. Or maybe a loan. And I've got enough to see me through for a bit. I met this MP woman who said she has links to some agency that could help me. She gave me her card."

"I do, but…" I stared up at the ceiling.

"I know. I've been saving."

"It's complicated."

"Hang on," Katrina said, swivelling on her chair, "I >don't really get this. I thought you wanted to stay with Will. I thought the whole point of this was that you wanted to keep him alive and keep working with him."

"But what?"

"So's quantitive easing. But I still get that it means printing money."

"You think you're going to lose? You think he's going to…?"

"But…"

"No," I said hurriedly. "Well, I hope not. I've got plans. Big plans. I'll show you in a bit."

I stretched my arms above me, twisting my fingers together. "But, I like Will. A lot."

"I know." I dropped my arms.

"Including Patrick."

I could feel her eyes on me.

I felt my cheeks flood with colour. "Yes," I said into the duvet. "Sometimes, yes."

"Does he know?"

She lay down beside me on the bed, and we stared up at the ceiling. Downstairs we could hear Granddad whistling tunelessly, accompanied by the whine and clunk of Thomas driving some remote-control vehicle backwards and forwards into a piece of skirting. For some unexplained reason my eyes filled with tears. After a minute, I felt my sister's arm snake around me.

"It's what the other quads tell me. The ones who I talk to on the message boards. You can't be both. You can't be carer and…" I lifted my hands to cover my face.

"Oh, shit."

"You want a job. So that…"

And there it was, out there. The truth that I could barely admit to myself.

"No. I'm not sure I know. I just…" I threw myself down on her bed, face first. It smelt of Thomas. Underlaid with a faint hint of Marmite. "I don't know what I think. All I know is that most of the time I would rather be with him than anyone else I know."

She studied me. She was wearing her thinking face. There is nothing more terrifying than my sister's thinking face when it is trained directly on you.

"Don't…"

"So this is interesting," she said.

"Fuck," she said, after a minute. "And I thought I liked to make my life complicated."

"And you might go off Will again. I mean, I remember when you thought he was an arse."

"Good. Because the more I think about this, the more I think it's about the intensity of the situation. It's not real, it's about the drama."

"And you two have been together a long time. You're bound to get crushes on other people."

"I know. You're right."

We lay there, staring at the ceiling.

"But it is a bit mad, thinking about loving someone who can't… you know, love you back. Maybe this is just a panic reaction to the fact that you and Patrick have finally moved in together."

"Don't worry," I said, wiping at my face. "I'm not going to do anything stupid."

"Believe me, that is definitely not it."

"What?"

"Well, this is actual life or death, after all, and you're locked into this man's life every day, locked into his weird secret. That's got to create a kind of false intimacy. Either that or you're getting some weird Florence Nightingale complex."

"Especially while Patrick is obsessed with being Marathon Man."

"You fucking madwoman," she said, and we both began to laugh.

"You want to grab a quick drink at the Spotted Dog and show me these plans, then? I'll see if Mum will put Thomas to bed for me. Come on, you can treat me, seeing as you're now loaded enough to go to college."

Mum was calling Thomas. We could hear her, singing it beneath us in the kitchen. "Thomas. Tomtomtomtom Thomas…"

My sister reached for a tissue and dabbed at my eyes. Then she thumbed at something on my cheek.

"Sure he is."

"It's not going to go 'tits up', as you call it, with Will. He's… he's going to be okay."

Treena sighed and rubbed at her eyes. "You going back to Patrick's tonight?"

"Yes."

My holiday plans, astonishingly, had met with Katrina's complete approval. She hadn't even done her usual thing of adding, "Yes, but it would be even better if you…" There had been a point where I wondered if she was doing it just to be nice, because I was obviously going a bit nuts. But she kept saying things like, "Wow, I can't believe you found this! You've got to take lots of pictures of him bungee jumping." And, "Imagine his face when you tell him about the skydiving! It's going to be brilliant."

"All that said, the college idea is good. Because -- let's be blunt -- whether it all goes tits up with Will, or whether it doesn't, you're still going to need a proper job. You're not going to want to be a carer forever."

"I still do sometimes."

It was a quarter to ten by the time I got back to Patrick's.

And then I saw him. He was sitting at a table laid with two places, a candle flickering between them. As I closed the door behind me, he stood up. The candle was burnt halfway down to the base.

Anyone watching us at the pub might have thought that we were two friends who actually really quite liked each other.

"I'm sorry," he said.

I stared at him.

Still mulling this over, I let myself in quietly. The flat was dark from outside and I wondered if Patrick was having an early night as part of his intensive training. I dropped my bag on the floor in the hall and pushed at the living-room door, thinking as I did so that it was nice of him to have left a light on for me.

"I was an idiot. You're right. This job of yours is only for six months, and I have been behaving like a child. I should be proud that you're doing something so worthwhile, and taking it all so seriously. I was just a bit… thrown. So I'm sorry. Really."

"It's good that you're trying to help him. It's admirable."

He held out a hand. I took it.

His eyes were anxious and he smelt of cologne. Those two facts descended upon me slowly like a weight.

Then I smiled. "This is really nice," I said.

"Patrick…" I said.

"Thank you." I squeezed his hand.

When he spoke again, it was after a short breath, as if he had successfully managed some pre-rehearsed speech. "I've made supper. I'm afraid it's salad again." He reached past me into the fridge, and pulled out two plates. "I promise we'll go somewhere for a blowout meal once the Viking is over. Or maybe once I'm on to carb loading. I just…" He blew out his cheeks. "I guess I haven't been able to think about much else lately. I guess that's been part of the problem. And you're right. There's no reason you should follow me about. It's my thing. You have every right to work instead."

"I don't want to argue with you, Lou. Forgive me?"

I sat down and looked at the table.

"Sit down, anyway," he said. "Let's eat, and then… I don't know. Enjoy ourselves. Talk about something else. Not running." He forced a laugh.

My sister was right. My life had become strange and disconnected from everyone I knew -- Will's plight and his secrets had swamped me. I had to make sure that I didn't lose sight of the rest of me.

Patrick really could do 101 things with turkey breast.

We ate the green salad, the pasta salad and seafood salad and an exotic fruit salad that he had prepared for pudding, and I drank wine while he stuck to mineral water. It took us a while, but we did begin to relax. There, in front of me, was a Patrick I hadn't seen for some time. He was funny, attentive. He policed himself rigidly so that he didn't say anything about running or marathons, and laughed whenever he caught the conversation veering in that direction. I felt his feet meet mine under the table and our legs entwine, and slowly I felt something that had felt tight and uncomfortable begin to ease in my chest.

I began to feel guilty about the conversation I had had earlier with my sister. Patrick wouldn't let me get up, not even to help him clear the dishes. At a quarter past eleven he rose and moved the plates and bowls to the kitchenette and began to load the dishwasher. I sat, listening to him as he talked to me through the little doorway. I was rubbing at the point where my neck met my shoulder, trying to release some of the knots that seemed to be firmly embedded there. I closed my eyes, trying to relax into it, so that it was a few minutes before I realized the conversation had stopped.

I watched him flick through the paperwork I had shown my sister, taking in the itinerary, the pictures, the Californian beach.

"It's… the trip. The one I told you about."

I opened my eyes. Patrick was standing in the doorway, holding my holiday folder. He held up several pieces of paper. "What's all this?"

"I thought…" His voice, when it emerged, sounded strangely strangled. "I thought you were talking about Lourdes."

"What?"

"Well… it kind of is. But not for me. For him."

"Or… I don't know… Stoke Mandeville… or somewhere. I thought, when you said you couldn't come because you had to help him, it was actual work. Physio, or faith healing, or something. This looks like…" He shook his head disbelievingly. "This looks like the holiday of a lifetime."

Patrick grimaced. "No…" he said, shaking his head. "You wouldn't enjoy this at all. Hot tubs under the stars, swimming with dolphins… Oh, look, 'five-star luxury' and 'twenty-four-hour room service'." He looked up at me. "This isn't a work trip. This is a bloody honeymoon."

"It matters to me that Will wants to live, that he sees good things in his future."

But he wasn't having any of it. "How would you feel, Lou? How would you feel if I said I was going on some keep-fit convention with -- I don't know -- Leanne from the Terrors because she needed cheering up?"

"And those good things would include you?"

"So explain it to me." He thrust the papers towards me. "Explain this to me, Lou. Explain it in a way that I can possibly understand."

"That's not fair!"

"Oh. Oh yes, Nathan. That makes it all right, then."

"Patrick, come on -- it's complicated."

"But this is? You… you really expect me to just sit here while you swan off with another man on a holiday like this?"

"That's not fair. Look, have I ever asked you to stop doing the job you love?"

"Well, I don't mind if it does. You can have hot tubs with strange men! As often as you like! There!" I tried to smile, hoping he would too.

"Cheering up?" I thought of Leanne, with her flicky blonde hair and her perfect legs, and I wondered absently why he had thought of her name first.

"His carer is coming too."

"My job doesn't involve hot tubs with strange men."

"He's not 'a bit down', Pat. He wants to kill himself. He wants to take himself off to Dignitas, and end his own bloody life." I could hear my blood thumping in my ears. "And you can't turn it around like this. You were the one who called Will a cripple. You were the one who made out he couldn't possibly be a threat to you. 'The perfect boss,' you said. Someone not even worth worrying about."

"And then how would you feel if I said she and I were going to eat out together all the time, and maybe sit in a hot tub or go on days out together. In some destination six thousand miles away, just because she had been a bit down. That really wouldn't bother you?"

I sank my face into my hands and let it rest there for a minute. Out in the corridor I heard a fire door swing, and the voices of people swallowed up as a door was unlocked and closed behind them.

Patrick slid his hand slowly backwards and forwards along the edge of the kitchen cabinets. A little muscle worked in his jaw. "You know how this feels, Lou? It feels like I might be running, but I feel like I'm permanently just a little bit behind the rest of the field. I feel like…" He took a deep breath, as if he were trying to compose himself. "I feel like there's something bad on the bend around the corner, and everyone else seems to know what it is except me."

"Well, Lou… I'm worrying now."

He put the folder back down on the worktop.

"But I --"

"Nearly seven years, we've been together. And you've known this man, had this job, for five months. Five months. If you go with him now, you're telling me something about our relationship. About how you feel about us."

"It does if I can say all this and you're still going to go."

The little flat seemed so still around us. He was looking at me with an expression I had never seen before.

"That's not fair. It doesn't have to say anything about us," I protested.

When my voice emerged, it did so as a whisper. "But he needs me."

I realized almost as soon as I said it, heard the words and how they twisted and regrouped in the air, knew already how I would have felt if he had said the same to me.

He swallowed, shook his head a little as if he were having trouble taking in what I said. His hand came to rest on the side of the worktop, and then he looked up at me.

He lifted his eyes to mine. "I don't think I'm being unreasonable. But I don't want you to go. I don't care if you don't want to do the Viking, but I don't want you to go on this… this holiday. With him."

"Whatever I say isn't going to make a difference, is it?"

"Patrick, I --"

That was the thing about Patrick. He always was smarter than I gave him credit for.

He closed his eyes, just for a moment, and then he turned and walked out of the living room, leaving the last of the empty dishes on the sideboard.