by Lisa Swallow
“She doesn’t want too much stuff to move.”
“Why? Where’s she going?”
I close my eyes. Now I have to open up to Lucy too and acknowledge the reality. “She’s going backpacking. For a year.”
Lucy’s face lights up. “Cool! Are you going too?”
“Yeah, right. I’m at uni. And I have no money.” God knows how many times I’ve had the thought, attempted to hold in the frustration of the situation, and not let the irritation mar an evening with Ness. Sure, I could take a year off university, if I had the money, and if Ness wanted me to go with her. I don’t have the money, and now I’m unsure Ness would want me anyway.
“Good point.” Lucy stands and walks across the garden to the late daffodils, bending and touching their delicate yellow petals. She picks one, and twirls the flower in her hands. “Do you love her?”
My twin regards me with eyes identical to my own; a perfect reflection of myself looks back at me. I can’t reply. “Tell her how you feel. I can tell you don’t want her to go.”
“I did tell her. Kind of. But I can’t ask her to stay.”
Lucy sits back next to me. “Why not?”
Of course, Lucy would see the situation simplistically. Her raw emotions wouldn’t stand for something this complex. Life is black and white to her.
The realisation hits me. Lucy’s the reason. She pursued me when I escaped, tried to stop me living my life. She didn’t want me to leave and I don’t want to stop Ness doing what she needs in the way Lucy stops me.
“I’m not asking anyone to change their plans for me. Ness wants to do this. I’ll wait for her to come back.”
Lucy hands me the daffodil and wanders off to pick another. “Well, she doesn’t love you then.”
Her words are spoken in such a matter of fact way, but they twist my stomach. Our shared fear of abandonment, mine hidden so deeply I’ve never acknowledged the feeling, is the reason I can’t tell Ness. She’s rejecting me by leaving, and I can’t let her tear away a part of me and take it with her.
“I think she does, Lucy.”
“Think? She never told you?” Lucy straightens, daffodil in hand. “Then maybe she doesn’t.”
My mind runs through our times together, and the surging inside when I see Ness after even a few hours away reflected back at me in the warmth of her eyes. The way Ness touches me, holds me, and understands when to let go.
“People who love you don’t leave you,” says Lucy.
The twisting in my stomach moves to my chest. And in Lucy’s eyes, there’s a hardness I’ve seen before. A couple of years ago, at the bottom of her blackest hole, she cried like the five-year-old child who couldn’t understand why her mother left. The memory jabs at the wound in my own heart and the last hidden corner of my mind lights up.
I can’t give myself to someone who’ll leave.
29
NESS
After I speak to Abby about the situation, I try to contact Evan. He’s still talking to me, but he’s in Lancaster, and I’m irritated by the power Evan’s past has over him and how he still won’t admit to this. Evan has things in the ‘now’ that need his attention. He’s short with me on the phone, tells me he’ll call me when he gets back. I lie in bed, heart pumping unease through me, a physical sensation of everything shifting in my world.
We arrange to meet and the butterflies spin around inside as if we’re going on a first date. Dry mouthed, I wait for him in the park near the university buildings. His choice of neutral ground and open space, away from people, fuels my anxiety. I wait on a bench, shadowed from the spring sunshine by a large oak tree.
On the path close by, students walk towards the university. Couples. I scroll through Facebook, focus on other people’s lives so I don’t have to think about mine.
When Evan arrives, he’s jacketless, wearing a band T-shirt I bought him. The muscled arms I hide in for comfort are bare. My pulse quickens with a mixture of fear and desire for him.
Setting his bag on the ground, he sits then leans in and softly kisses me, warm mouth on my cool lips. I deliberately inhale his scent. Evan. Comfort. After a week apart, his absence feels like forever. The two can’t co-exist, my plans and my relationship. Travel and Evan. He rests a palm on my knee and I stroke the back of his hand.
“I missed you,” I say.
“You too.” His words are instant, an automatic response.
“How was poetry class?”
“I didn’t have poetry today.”
His words tighten my chest, our usual comical exchange of greeting cut short. “Oh. Okay.”
Evan rubs his face. “Ness, I don’t know what to say to you anymore.”
This hits me in my thumping heart. “Say to me?”
“I can’t open up to you any more than I have. Not when…” He inhales. “Not when you’re going to leave me.”
After all these weeks, he’s finally straight to the point. His decision has been made. Moving his hand from my knee, Evan rests both on his, rubbing his legs.
“Why haven’t you spoken to me about this until now? If my leaving was stressing you so much?”
“And say what? I held the words in, and then the other day I told you I didn’t want you to leave. It was a selfish thing to say. And then you hit me back with accusations I don’t feel enough for you.”
I stare at the side of his head as he looks at the ground and not me. “I didn’t say that. I just wanted to know why you didn’t…say.”
“One of the reasons I didn’t say anything is because of the amount I care about you. I didn’t want to spoil the time we had.”
“By hiding from the future?”
“No, by living in the present.” Evan leans forward to study the ground. “Maybe I have held more of me back than I should, but so have you. And what’s the point anyway?”
“The point in what?”
Evan turns his head to me, his cheeks pink and the intensity of his gaze knocks me more than anything he’s said. “The point in loving you.”
My tension dissolves into nausea, not the relief I expected. I asked him for this, but he’s telling me in such a negative way.
“See, that’s why. In your face.” He looks away again.
I reach out to him, move his hair so I can see the side of his face, but he won’t meet my eyes. “Evan, I’m in love with you.”
For a few heart-stopping seconds, Evan doesn’t react. Then he puts his head in his hands. “I know, and I feel so much for you it scares me. I don’t want you to hurt me.”
This is wrong. We should be saying the words as we hold each other, look at each other, and see the truth in our eyes. Evan’s eyes have held the truth so many times, when they’ve told me so much more than three stupid words.
“Evan…” I need him to look at me, so I can see this again.
Evan sits back hard against the bench seat, looking at the English summer sky. A crushing weight hits me. I don’t want to lose him.
He shifts and turns, intense eyes searching mine as he gently cups my cheek. “Ness, I love you and I shouldn’t need to tell you. But it’s true. You’re a huge part of my life, the girl who gives me strength, who I love more than I can ever express. But you’re leaving me, and I don’t want you to. I can’t cope with you taking part of me with you, or imagine a life away from you for so long. I’m scared you won’t come back. You’ll forget me.”
Tears sting my eyes as I try to blink them away, unsuccessfully as one escapes down my cheek. “I can’t stay here. In Leeds. Doing this job. I wish you could come too.”
He lets go of my face. “I can’t. It’s not possible.”
“Why? We could go together?”
“I can’t leave the country,” he whispers, “not so soon.”
“Lucy?”
“Partly. But also, financially. And I’m studying. This isn’t the right moment in my life to do what you’re doing.”
I hear only the part about Lucy. I fooled myself she’d retreated int
o the background. Now I understand. She’s the reason he’d never agree to come with me, even if he had the money and opportunity. Lucy’s strangling the life from him, still.
“Now I don’t know what to say, Evan.”
“Maybe we crossed paths at the wrong time. Like we were meant to fall in love with each other, but not be together yet.” He’s not touching me anymore, staring towards the trees, thinking aloud.
“So what do we do?” I don’t want to say the words. “Do we end things now? Or keep going until I leave? See what happens while I’m away then how things are when I come back?” My desperate heart pumps the words from my mouth, the thoughts that circle in my head finally spoken.
“I don’t know.”
The situation pushes my emotions to the edge of self-control, shaking through me. Evan finally says he loves me, but then says he doesn’t know if he wants us to be together anymore. The contradiction in his words spins me out.
“You love me, but you don’t know? Then you don’t love me enough. This would never work. You wouldn’t wait for me.” I stand, aware of the shaking inside moving its way to my arms and hands.
“No, I care about you too much. When I’m with you, it scares the hell out of me because you mean more to me than anybody has before. You’re everything I think about, everything I want, but I swore to myself I couldn’t fall in love with you.”
Evan stands and reaches out to me, but I can’t let him fold me into his arms, into his world. He drew me so tightly to him and now he’s kicked me so hard everything hurts.
“You’re not making any sense, Evan.” I step back and fold my arms.
He drops his arms and shakes his head. “I know. That’s why I’ve never spoken about this stuff before. I’m fucked up, Ness. So screwed up by the past, in ways you can’t imagine. I can’t get hurt again, not now.”
“I’m hurting you?”
“Yes.”
This is the last thing I want to hear. Nobody should be in a relationship which hurts them, put themselves through pain and for what? Me to leave him anyway? His pain at the prospect of being left is so great he couldn’t tell me about it until now. This is wrong. I’ve deluded myself everything will be okay, and having a here and now relationship, with no plans for the future, was possible. I turn away, walk towards the edge of the park. When Evan doesn’t follow me, I have the answer I need. My heart breaks and all the butterflies inside die.
30
NESS
I don’t see Evan again after our meeting. Everything stops. Suddenly. The afternoon in the park cycles around and around in my mind. One short conversation of contradictory statements and now this. Finished. I blame myself; I pushed him into a corner. Evan fought his way out, saying what he expected me to say, but hurting himself in the process.
I was too caught up in my own plans, perhaps should have considered the effect my leaving would have on our relationship. But I didn’t. Neither of us wanted to face the future, living the days as they came, which we thought was the right thing to do. We never realised how the more time we spent together, the closer we bonded.
Now the exact reason why I didn’t factor Evan into my plans has arisen. If I’d altered my plans for Evan, my resentment towards him if our relationship failed would be as bad as the hurt and anger I feel now. Why did I get involved when I knew I’d leave? Because I didn’t think I’d fall in love.
Three days later, a knee-jerk reaction and a bottle of wine finds me booking my flight ticket on the internet. Round the world. Starting in Europe.
The next day I post the date I’m leaving on Facebook, proudly showing everyone what I’m setting out to achieve. Some of my already travelling, backpacking friends send suggestions for meet ups. Excitement replaces my moping, as I return to my focus on escaping. I’m no longer escaping my parents, but the hurt and confusion,
Evan changes his Facebook status. We’re no longer in a relationship.
His immaturity stings. I call him but he doesn’t answer and my texts go ignored. How is this the guy who told me he loved me a few days ago? We’re too young. Too stupid.
I wish Lucy really had been an ex or a current girlfriend; I think I’d have coped better if he’d hurt me at that stage. I’d never have become involved with the broken boy who wants to stay that way.
* * *
EVAN
Slamming the laptop closed, I pick up my phone and call Matt. I don’t know why I expected Ness to tell me when she booked the flights, but the fact she didn’t seals things. This is over. I can’t let Ness hurt me anymore and I definitely can’t wait for her to come back next year. I’ve no idea why I ever thought I could.
All week, I waited and procrastinated, not knowing what to do, or whether she wanted to fix things after our argument. Our second argument in as many weeks. I decide it’s all too hard. Then she makes the decision for me anyway, confirming she’s leaving. I resist the urge to drown myself in alcoholic nights out, but the life from before beckons me back.
I love Ness. I told her what she wanted me to, but this still wasn’t good enough for her.
I’ll never be good enough for her, for anybody.
She was always going to leave me.
31
ONE MONTH LATER
NESS
The countdown clock on my blog greets me every day when I update my posts. I have everything worked out, meticulously planned. Three weeks to go. And one week only left in call centre hell. My butterfly brooch is pinned to my noticeboard and most days I look at it and consider Evan. Once I got through my anger at his behaviour, I filed him away in the ‘things I can’t deal with’ box. He’d become a best friend and splitting with him hurt like hell, but the timing wasn’t right. I guess he’s right, maybe at our age people fall in love, but are never meant to stay together. A tiny part of me still doesn’t believe this applies to us.
Abby is busy sitting end of year exams, and finally discovering her student union card doubles as a library card. This time last year, we were sitting A levels and moving along the education conveyor belt. At least I jumped off. She’s considering what to do with her summer: stay in Leeds or go home. Staying here would involve finding a job, I suspect Abby will return home and catch up with old friends who headed to different universities.
We need to vacate the house. As I’m leaving for the year, Abby decides she’s moving in with some friends next semester.
A week later, Abby finishes her exams and launches herself back into her original behaviour, a swan song before the holidays. Her attitude to relationships shifted over the year, moving from falling heavily to having fun. I should’ve taken a leaf out of her book. She’s had several other guys in her life since Kyle but, unfortunately, she’s ended the year back with Matt. I knew something was wrong. She became cagey even though the stress of her exams was over. The day she brought him into the house was when I found out. My heart raced as he came in, expecting Evan to walk in the door behind. Evan wasn’t with him and never came here with Matt and his friends. I skirted around the subject of Evan when I spoke to Matt. I don’t need ghosts from the past when I’m moving on.
Abby and company head to Blackpool for a weekend. ‘And company’ includes Evan. I push away the remnants of jealousy that fill my imagination with Evan and girls, and remind myself he’s not mine. Opening my laptop and focusing on foreign countries helps. Packing the contents of the house doesn’t. Funny how the mind wanders as soon as you start putting cups into boxes. Since Abby should be doing her share, I give up and go back to my laptop, and ignore the nerves starting to accompany my excitement at leaving.
I didn’t count on the fact staying alone in the house would worry me. Sure, I’m used to staying alone in the evenings when Abby goes out, but something about being alone for several days freaks me out. Nobody else I know lives around here, and what upsets me the most is the niggly voice, laughing at me, asking me how travelling the world on my own is a possibility if I can’t spend a couple of nights alone in Leeds.
* * *
I’m dreaming. One of those strange dreams where reality encroaches, but your mind tries to keep you asleep. Something is banging. Banging so incessantly my body leaps out of the dream into the night, heart thumping to match the noise. The sound comes from the front door. I scrunch the duvet between my fingers, scanning the darkened room. For what? A weapon? Like that’d help. We have decent locks, strong enough to prevent someone kicking the door down so that’s not a worry. I just need to wait for whoever is outside to go away. This has happened before, drunks mistaking our house for theirs. The row of redbrick terraces with identical frontages makes this entirely possible in the dark.
The banging doesn’t stop and I consider calling the police. And saying what? No one’s threatened me. I wish Abby were here. My clothes from yesterday are slung over a chair and I pull them on. I squint at my phone— 2 a.m.
Slowly, I walk down the stairs.
I hold my breath and listen when the knocking pauses. “Who is it?” Oh my god, I sound like I’m in a dodgy horror film.
“Ness! Ness! Is he there? Open the door.”
Blood drains from my face when I recognise the voice. “Lucy?”
“Where’s Evan? I need to find him!” Her voice holds an edge of hysteria, the same tone the day we first met outside the pub.
I slide the chain and unlatch the door. Lucy pushes past me and closes the door.
“Lucy? What are you doing here?”
“Evan. Is he upstairs?” She shoves me to one side, taking the stairs two at a time in bare feet. My bedroom door slams open and shut again. Lucy reappears at the top of the stairs. “Where is he?”
“Let me get you a drink.” I speak calmly, trying to recall how Evan spoke to his sister last time she came here.
Lucy’s appearance freaks me out. Apart from no shoes on, her face is pale and eyes wide. When she looked at me as she came in the house, I saw dilated pupils. Something’s happened.
