Shattered 03

But did you ever really know him?’ Aiden asks. ‘How can you love somebody without knowing all of them, everything they’ve stood for, what they’ve done and not done?’

I’m silent a moment. His words are sinking in, settling. ‘What you are saying, really, is that no one who was Slated – who has no known past – can ever love or be loved. I was Slated.’

‘Then why do I love you?’

That’s not what I mean. I thought getting Ben back would make you happy. And that you being happy would make me happy. But I was wrong. Seeing the two of you together made me miserable

Ben was the past. I don’t miss him the way I do Aiden: with Ben it is more grieving for something that was. Not something that could have been.

She hesitates, then shakes her head.