Somewhere Close to Happy: The heart-warming, laugh-out-loud debut of the year

by Lia Louis

  This PC/D: Lizzie Laptop/Roman/

  Roman signed in on 27/05/05 22:11

  Lizzie: been calling you.

  Roman: I know J. Sorry. lefft my phone hERe

  Lizzie: where’ve you been?

  Roman: ooooout :P

  Lizzie: I meant where did you go?

  Roman: chill

  Roman: popped out with ethan baby.

  Lizzie: why are you being weird?

  Roman: im not

  Lizzie: you are. you’re typing weird. you called me baby.

  Lizzie: are you OK?

  Lizzie: Roman???

  Roman: I am.

  Lizzie: I thought you said you wouldn’t see him anymore. after last month.

  Roman: I’m fine lizzie

  Lizzie: I’m just worried. I’m obviously going to be after what happened.

  Roman: I know. But pls stopppp.

  Roman: I’m fine

  Lizzie: you’re still being weird. Have you done something? please tell me the truth.

  Roman: No! I promise. I swear. I’m fine. Just a bit drrunk

  Lizzie: ok

  Roman: Don’t sulk with me J.

  Lizzie: I’m not.

  Roman: don’t make me paint you another willy in a fur coat and monocle. Just because you aren’t at the grove anymore doesn’t mean I can’t paint you penis masterpieces in art therapy

  Roman: i will not hesitate

  Lizzie: shut up.

  Roman: to prove that all penises are not sad ugly grub worms like you think they are

  Lizzie: Shut up!

  Roman: Hahahaha. I can feel you smiling from here.

  Roman: Meet me tomorrow before school?

  Lizzie: Ok. 8 :15? by post box?

  Roman: yeh. I’ll call you.

  Lizzie: you better.

  Lizzie: See you in the morning.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  ‘What are you, the robber from Home Alone?’

  ‘This is Scotland, J. It’s freezing.’

  ‘But fingerless gloves?’

  Roman laughs, grabbing one of my hands, and says, ‘And there are actual eyes on your gloves. Raccoon eyes. Like that’s normal.’

  We’ve been awake since eight, after four awkward, uncomfortable hours sleeping, sitting on the sofa, one at each end, under a thin blue throw. Roman got up first, and I woke to the distant clinking and rumbling of the kettle in the other room. It was dizzying, waking with him there; as if I was dreaming, or had woken up, age fifteen, after a nap in Sea Fog on Roman’s mum’s driveway. Things felt even better this morning – I had that fizzy holiday feeling, where the day ahead is a clean slate, and only yours to fill. I kept looking at him, over my tea, and I caught him doing the same. We kept laughing, like kids, kept grinning at each other in the silence, shaking our heads, eyes widening in disbelief.

  Roman took our mugs back to the kitchen and found me in the doorway of the porch, looking out to the sea, Barney at my side.

  ‘We could go for a walk. Unless you need to—’

  I shook my head. ‘No, that sounds perfect. Can you give me an hour? I’m gonna go back to the hotel, see P, take a shower, put on some clothes.’ I pulled on my hair. ‘Sort out my hair so I don’t look like Meatloaf.’

  Roman laughed. ‘Ten points if you can tell me his real name.’

  I crossed my arms. ‘Pete um … l … s …’

  ‘Clue: It doesn’t rhyme with loaf.’

  ‘Then I’m stumped.’

  I’d called Priscilla who answered the phone after half a ring and was at Roman’s within fifteen minutes. He walked me to the car, hands in pockets, ducking his head in the way he used to back then, where his hair would dangle down and hide his face. His hair is shorter now. Still wavy, still messy and deep chestnut brown, but nowhere near long enough to fall over his eyes. Priscilla squealed when she saw him, jumping out the car and putting her arms around him. They both laughed and hugged for ages. Priscilla kept holding his face and saying, ‘Fuck. Fuck! You’re a man. A huge, massive, grown man.’

  We went back to the hotel, and I showered and got dressed, while P sat on the loo and quizzed me, her mouth moving at the speed of light, answering her own questions, speculating excitedly about the day me and Roman would spend together. She packed my bag as I dried my hair.

  ‘Just in case,’ she said, stuffing a canvas tote bag with pyjamas, my make up-bag, a toothbrush, and a cardigan, ‘you want to stay again.’

  She dropped me back at the lodge and then told me she was going half an hour out of town to a second-hand book shop, then going back to the hotel to ‘read and eat everything’. ‘But call me any time and I will shoot back,’ she’d said, kissing my cheeks. ‘I’m proud of you,’ she said, and I told her she was the greatest friend a woman could wish for – the type I used to dream about when I was a lonely nine-year-old and read The Babysitters Club books in awe.

  Now me and Roman, wrapped up to the necks in coats, hats pulled down to our eyebrows, traipse up the hill we sat upon all those years ago. The wind sweeps into us, as if playing a game to see who it can knock over first, and Barney runs ahead, mouth open, as if grinning and in total ecstasy at being outside, in the fresh air.

  ‘Just a bit further,’ says Roman, breathlessly, into the wind. ‘Just up here.’

  My cheeks tingle, and my hair, from the bottom of my hat, whips around my face.

  ‘This feels like country mouse and city mouse,’ I puff, treading uphill. Roman turns and looks at me and laughs.

  ‘Who’s who?’ he grins.

  ‘Ha-ha.’

  ‘Come on, J. Put your back into it.’

  Roman turns, walking backwards, then takes my hand and twirls me under his arm, the way dancers do, until I’m facing the way he is. ‘Look at that,’ he says. And there it is stretching out ahead of us, dark, powerful, beautiful, and endless until the horizon.

  I smile, overpowered by the beauty, by the memory, by the wind. ‘The end of the world,’ I say.

  Roman looks at his side to me, and after hesitating, says, ‘Told you we’d be back.’

  For a moment, we stand side by side, looking out, in silence, the way we did on that school trip, with all that pain and mess left behind at home, and this day – in the future, where things were brighter – nothing but a distant dream. An impossibility, almost.

  Then Roman turns, lets out a loud whistle, and carries on walking up the hill. ‘Barney! Come on, boy!’ Then he stops and says, ‘And you, City Mouse. Little bit further.’

  We keep walking, and I stop, every now and then and look behind me, at the unfurling view, that gets larger, more breathtaking with each step. When we reach the top, both of us breathless and red-cheeked, Roman gestures with a hand to the ground. A rectangle of concrete, like a grave stone, where our bench once was.

  ‘The bastards took it away,’ he says.

  ‘No!’ I say, standing upon it and looking down at my feet. ‘How dare they!’

  ‘But they can’t take this away,’ smiles Roman. ‘Nobody can take this away.’ He stands tall, looking out to the ocean, and distant cliffs. The sea roars and sways for miles and miles ahead of us – a floor of deep blues and greens, boats, tiny, like models on the horizon, seagulls swooping, like kites above it.

  ‘The piss-angry sea,’ I shout against the sweeping winds. I open my arms, as if greeting an old friend. ‘I’ve missed you!’ I shout and Roman laughs and outstretches his arms too.

  ‘The piss-angry sea welcomes you back!’ he shouts. ‘Piss-angry sea has been waiting!’

  We both laugh, teeth white, cheeks tight, and stinging, out here in the cold, and we stand, beside one another, Barney sitting at Roman’s side, ears and fur blowing in the bluster. I feel high. Alive. I want to throw my arms around him. I want to scream. I’m here. I made it. I followed the white rabbit. I said yes to adventure, to facing the truth. I didn’t turn away and run. I was scared, but I came anyway, despite it. And this feels so right, this moment. Me and Roman, back beside o
ne another, being battered by Mother Nature, not a single other soul around. Just us, like we planned; planned as lost kids with the odds against us.

  And then it comes out of my mouth. Because this really would be such a perfect moment, if it wasn’t for all the questions hanging over us like black clouds. Because this isn’t a reunion of fizzled friends. He disappeared, and I had to find him, search for him, to get here. I need answers. I do. And up here, the world at our feet, I feel brave. Up here, I’m not afraid anymore. I am ready for the truth.

  ‘Why did you leave?’

  Roman looks at me, quickly, as if shocked I asked. His smile fades, and he opens his mouth to speak.

  ‘Where did you go, Roman?’ Wind fills my ears, whooshing, like metal sheeting being waved, like being plunged underwater. ‘Why? Why did you leave?’

  Roman’s face has changed. It’s pale, etched with sadness, darkening with shadows.

  ‘Lizzie, we should talk about this later. It’s bloody freezing up here—’

  ‘No, I want to talk about it now.’

  And he doesn’t try to persuade me like I expect. He just nods – once, like a bow. ‘Let’s find somewhere quiet. Then we’ll talk.’

  We are the only ones in the café. It’s part of a small hotel, near the seafront. It’s a bit dated and shabby, but the restaurant is bright and warm, and smells of hot bacon. Roman and I sit opposite each other, at a small scallop-edged pine table by a radiator we’ve laid our hats and gloves on. Barney slumps half under the table, his warm belly heavy on my feet.

  ‘Things were bad, Lizzie. Things were … fucking grim. Mum’s bloke was back, the drinking just got worse, I was—’ He stops and looks up at me. ‘Using again.’

  My stomach tightens. I don’t react, wanting him to carry on.

  ‘I was drowning.’ He stops again and rubs his face.

  ‘I didn’t know—’

  ‘I didn’t want you to,’ he says. ‘You were the one good thing in my life. You were … everything.’

  My heart stops at those words, and heat creeps up my back, to my neck, and ears. He still disarms me.

  ‘And you were getting on, J. You were better, and god, that’s all you wanted. More than me. More than anyone.’ Roman’s eyes don’t leave my face. ‘And you did it. You were back in school, starting college, you were … alive again, and I just couldn’t be the reason you fell off track. ’Cause you worried about me, Lizzie. You always worried so much about me, and when I went down, so did you—’

  ‘So, you just disappeared. A week after Hubble died, you leave without telling me?’

  ‘Things were worse than you knew.’ Roman’s voice cracks, and his eyes plead with me. A waitress walks by the table, and he waits for her to pass before he carries on. ‘When Hubble died, I …’ He just presses his temples with his fingers and closes his eyes. His face is white. ‘My mam’s cousin … it was a way out of that house, away from her, away from her bloke, that parasite. And I kept saying no. That I couldn’t leave, couldn’t leave her, but in the end … I couldn’t stay.’ Roman breathes in sharply, shaking his head. ‘The day of your Auntie Shall’s vow thing, after we legged it, and I left your house …’ He stops and looks at me, waiting for a prompt, a nod that I remember. I do. Of course I do. We were on the bed and I thought he was going to kiss me. Then Ethan called him and he left – summoned by him, like he always was. ‘I walked back home,’ he carries on, swallowing hard. ‘And Sea Fog was gone. I went inside and Mum was out of it. But he … Mum’s bloke, he was sitting there counting his fucking money. He’d sold it. All my stuff was inside and I just … I lost it, Lizzie.’

  ‘Oh, god,’ comes out of my mouth almost silently. My hands fly to my face. ‘Your stuff. Your clothes …’

  ‘Clothes, CDs, laptop. Everything. Everything that was mine. And the plant pot. Our money, Lizzie. I brought it inside to the caravan. I didn’t trust him not to find it in the porch of the house, but …’

  ‘Oh, Roman.’

  He rubs his eyes, the way he always did when he spoke in group therapy – as if to push the tears away. ‘I needed to leave, Lizzie. I needed to run away. And leaving without saying goodbye to you was …’ Roman’s eyes fill with tears and he drags his hand through his hair, hunching over the table. ‘I was desperate. I was terrified. Everything I touched I broke—’

  ‘My dad,’ I say, firmly, anger rising in my chest. ‘Did my dad warn you off? Did he force you to leave?’ Roman was vulnerable. He was desperate. It wouldn’t have taken much pushing to make him go.

  Roman’s eyes widen; his whole face drops. He goes as pale as snow. ‘N-no. Why would you— I—’

  ‘The letter you wrote me. It was on his headed paper, and he kept it in his van. I know he went to see you.’

  His skin has gone a shade of grey now; sallow. ‘Lizzie, have you asked him?

  I shake my head. ‘No. I’m asking you.’

  He lets out a deep breath and leans back on his chair. His arms fall limply, defeated, at his side. ‘He came over one afternoon. He found me. I was wrecked.’

  ‘Wrecked?’

  Roman pauses. ‘High. Out of it.’

  ‘The painkillers again.’ A sting flashes across my chest. ‘I mean, I knew you did stuff, with Ethan sometimes, but—’

  ‘I had a drug problem, Lizzie.’ Roman pauses to look at me, then smiles, sadly. ‘You just never saw what everyone else saw.’

  ‘So, I was, what, ignorant? Naïve ? Stupid?’

  Roman shakes his head. ‘No. No, not at all, J, no. You saw me. You saw me. Past all of that. In spite of it all. You made me feel normal. Like a normal seventeen-year-old boy.’

  There is a burst of laughter from behind us. I turn. Two waitresses behind the glass counter of cakes are giggling, looking down at a phone in one of their hands. I turn back to Roman, who is watching me, nervously. ‘What did Dad do,’ I ask, ‘when he found you?’

  ‘You really … you haven’t spoken to him?’

  I shake my head.

  Roman looks down into the mug of tea he hasn’t touched and leans forward, wrists resting on the table. ‘I broke down on him. I told him I couldn’t stay, that it was too much, too hard to live there anymore. And he helped me. I told him about my mum’s cousin at the farm, and he said he’d help me leave.’

  ‘Of course he did—’

  ‘No,’ cuts in Roman, eyes flashing. ‘He loved you. The guy … his eyes just lit up, talking about you. As if you were the most precious thing. This masterpiece or something. He wouldn’t have wanted to hurt you, Lizzie. Never.’ Roman ducks to meet my gaze. ‘Don’t blame him. He helped me. He was kind. He stayed with me, cleaned me up, made me a drink, we talked. He bought me clothes – all the things I lost in the caravan. He was good to me.’

  I don’t react. It sounds like kindness. It does. But I can’t help but think it suited Dad as much as it suited Roman. My heart settles in the pit of my stomach.

  ‘Lizzie, he owed me nothing. He’d just lost his dad, for Christ’s sake, face down in the park, and I was the last person he should have been helping but …’ His eyes fix on my face, unblinking for a moment, then he turns away, looking to the misty windows on the other side of the café. He says nothing else.

  ‘So, he helped you.’ My voice is tiny, like a child’s.

  ‘I begged him, Lizzie,’ he says softly, not looking at me. ‘And he helped me. He gave me another chance. He picked me up the next day, and I left.’

  Nobody says anything after that, for ages. We drink our tea. We watch a family come in, two teenagers, a boy and a girl, a mother and a father, stiff in tight, puffy coats, and faces pink and weather-beaten. The father gets up and goes to the counter, standing back admiring the cakes, and the teenagers slump at the table. The boy stares out the window, head resting on fist, finger drawing a face on the misty glass, and the girl looks around the room – her large eyes stop on me and Roman for a second. She smiles when I do.

  Roman meets my eye across the table.
/>   ‘It’s a lot to take in,’ I whisper.

  Roman nods. ‘That letter,’ he says. ‘I grabbed the paper from the van. I was gonna send it. I was. But every day that went by … I just couldn’t do it. So, I kept it instead, as a reminder. Proof or something. Of us. Of me and you.’

  ‘I wish you’d sent it. I’d have known you didn’t want to leave me.’

  Roman’s nostrils flare and he looks away. ‘I tried. I tried to come back – the funeral, I came down, but I— I couldn’t. I waited until later. I went back with Ram, left a plant for him. I always hoped you’d see it or something, and know, somehow.’

  I can’t speak or look into his eyes. I know I’ll sob if I do.

  Roman lowers his voice. ‘Not a single day has gone by,’ he says, and he says nothing more.

  Answers. I have the answers I have longed for for twelve years.

  He lives here, near Tongue, when he isn’t travelling around, ‘following his nose’, with the money his dad left him.

  He has used The Hartland for ten years, coming and going. No longer for painkillers, but ‘for his head’ – nightmares and panic attacks and insomnia. ‘Some things I can’t get past,’ he said. I asked him about the meds. He takes two types of anxiety medication, and three different types of vitamins.

  He stayed at Edgar Fields with Ethan, who got out of prison for drug possession and GBH. He was the only friend he had left. Roman stayed with him for two weeks, before he realised Ethan had no intention of getting better. Roman left with nowhere to go – that’s when Roman went to his dad’s. He was desperate. He had nothing left.

  His Dad died. He was left everything.

  And he left me because he was ill. More than I ever saw, and ever knew. Because I didn’t want to. Because he didn’t want me to. Instead, I saw him; his best version. I didn’t see addiction. I didn’t see struggle. I saw straight through, to him. To who Roman really was.

  The waitress drifts by the table a few times, eyeing our empty mugs, our empty, silent gazes. Roman stretches, sitting up in his chair. ‘The sun’s coming out,’ he says, hands pushing into his pockets, looking out of the steamed-up window.