Between Friends

by Hudson, Melanie

  I don’t mind that my best friend is a boy. I’m beginning to realise that special friends appear from nowhere just when you need them the most, a bit like angels. Some of them will stay for life and, sadly, some of them won’t, but you will always carry them in your heart. Do you think you could try to believe that the right friend is going walk into your life sometime soon? I discussed this exact issue a few evenings ago with my friend, Gethyn, and he said, ‘like attracts like’. So, for example, if you are feeling down and low, then you may attract the same type of person into your life (someone without much joy about them) but if you dig deep and find joy and start to transmit joy from your soul, you will bring something – someone - more positive into your life. Will you try a little experiment for me? Will you please try to smile (for no particular reason) several times per day, and then see if things start to change – I bet they will! My friend Agatha thinks that if you wish for something hard enough (and write your wish down to make especially sure) then the universe will eventually provide it for you, one way or another. Even if you don’t believe in my theory, isn’t it worth giving it a try? I’m being a hypocrite in writing this, because I’m smiling on the outside rather than on the inside at the moment, but smiling through the heartache is something I promised my dad I would do.

  I want to come home but I can’t. Once you are away with the army you have to stick it out.

  You said you wanted a dog - do you like animals? I haven’t got much time today as we have just set up a new base at the airport in Basra (a city in the south of Iraq) and it’s a bit hectic, but I’ll write again soon, and do let me know how the smiling goes (don’t worry if people think you look a bit daft).

  Polly

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Polly

  Date: 12th April

  Hi, Polly

  Guess what? I was right after all, our Isabella has indeed got a bit of history with the infamous Nathan Browne. Sadly, my idea that they may have slept together after some foodie shindig in New York (leading to the conception of her first child) was entirely unfounded (note to self – try to keep imagination in check).

  No, the truth (according to Isabella who I suspect could be a fairly unreliable witness) is this: ten years ago, at the height of his food-critiquing days, Nathan Browne criticised Isabella’s signature dish by saying (in a Sunday supplement) that he didn’t care a tot if her plums were smeared with amaretto and served with a sour juice, anything less than a mouthful not worth the bother. I think Nathan served this comment with a side order of harmless fun-poking, but Isabella did not see the funny side and Alice’s old friend Time has not softened the blow.

  The media had a field day with his comment and her insistence on wearing chicken-fillet bras now makes sense. I tried to limit the damage by insisting that, personally, I found small plums were often more sought after as they can be particularly juicy, but coming from me - the woman who personifies excess – my words didn’t help. Anya isn’t convinced by Isabella’s distaste of Nathan, and feels there is more to the Nathan Browne story than tiny plums, and she may have a point. The amount of blushing and stuttering issuing from Isabella when we told her Nathan was coming to Appledart, followed by a violent episode of cursing that her hair hadn’t been coloured prior to her rapid deployment, leads me to believe there may be more to this than she’s letting on. She asked Anya for a revitalising face treatment and has begun resting cold teaspoons under her eyes throughout the day …

  Anyway, we’ve put Hector (the boat man) on lookout duty, and have given him strict instructions to telephone from the pub the moment anyone called Nathan (or anyone who looks like

  Nathan because he’ll possibly travel under a pseudonym) arrives. When asked by Hector to describe Nathan, Isabella shrugged and said, ‘I suppose he’s ok-looking. A bit rough round the edges, though. He often wears a woolly green hat, and he’s got a bit of a limp. Oh, and the last time I saw him, he had an eye patch’. She glanced out of the window at the gentle ebb and flow of the sea kissing the sand and as her eyes softened she said, ‘Lovely smile, though’.

  On that basis, Shaun and Hector been told look out for a man who is a cross between Long John Silver and Benny from Crossroads, who is travelling alone. Hector thought this wasn’t much to go on (what the fuck?).

  Anyhow, the whole of Appledart (twenty people max) have been instructed to waylay any man with a nice smile and only arrange for his passage to the café once we have given them the go ahead by telephone. What can possibly go wrong?

  Ta ta for now, Aggie

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Aggie

  Date: 14 April

  Hi, Aggie

  How is the writing going? Should I even ask? Do you want me to drop asking about it or do you want me to nag you? Just in case you want me to nag, I’ll admit that I’m worried you are getting bogged down sorting out someone else’s business to the detriment of your own. You have always been so imaginative and able to dream up all kinds of wonderful (successful) schemes and when Casey comes back I’m sure her café will be on the road to being uber successful. But what about you? Will you be back at square one without having written a word? I’ll stop worrying because presumably at some point Isabella will shoo you away from the café and back to the house so you can write her next best seller (although she sounds to be a few whisks short of a meringue herself at the moment, so maybe not).

  You’ll be pleased to know I survived the helicopter trip and made it to Basra. Dad’s nightmare (the one where I’m guessing I died) was clearly a load of bollocks. I’m not particularly keen on travelling by helicopter anymore. Night time, low level, evasive helicopter transits are the pits, we all just sit there and pray that the pilot won’t hit an electricity pylon or get shot down. Bearing this in mind, you’ll perhaps understand why our arrival at Basra airport was a surreal experience. The ramp opened and we all walked off the back of the helicopter onto the Tarmac. Having seen nothing but sand for the past few weeks, it was odd to stand on firm ground and to see proper buildings rather than tents. I’m not sure I liked it. In fact I am sure, and I didn’t like it. We were anonymous travellers in the desert, like a nomadic tribe. But here at the airport, we’re fixed, firm, settled - trapped. The experience of arriving at the airport became even more surreal when we jumped onto the airport bus (which someone had either found the keys for or hot-wired) like tourists, which we are, I suppose.

  So, HQ is now established inside the airport terminal and what a mess this airport is. We’re working and sleeping in an air-tight concrete fortress in forty degrees of heat with no air-conditioning. Life was much more hygienic in the desert. The toilets leave a lot to be desired as they constitute a dug-out trench with a plank over the top. There is a waste-high screen between the gents and the ladies, but when I sat down for my ablutions this morning and looked to my right, a man was on the other side of the screen doing the same thing. I looked away quickly and said, ‘If we both keep looking forward and just get on with it, we’ll be OK.’ But I’m honestly not complaining.

  The heat is now like nothing I’ve ever known, but at least it’s predicable, which is handy for a met woman. Oh, but the good news is there’s talk of an RAF mobile met unit being deployed here from Ali Al Salem (an airbase in Kuwait). Can you imagine how frustrating it has been finding out that the RAF has had a met unit in Kuwait for all of this time and yet I’ve had no communication with them, at all? But, enough self-pity because more importantly, if the RAF come to Basra, I think I’ll be able to go home! No one seems to know much at the moment, but let’s pray they pitch up. Now we’re in Basra we seem to be in limbo. The war seems to have entered into a lull and I can’t help but wonder at what point someone will declare we have won and we can all go home.

  Lots of love,

  Pol

  P.S. We have email now. My address is pollyofarabia@yahoo.com. Gethyn is sitting next to me and asked me to say that his address is gethynofarab
ia@yahoo.com (we weren’t particularly individual in the creation of our email addresses).

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Mrs Day

  To: Polly

  Date: 15 April

  Dear, Polly

  I got your letter about how difficult you are finding your job at the moment and I want you to take notice and believe what I’m about to say.

  You have nothing to prove, my love. What I want you to do is to imagine your future self - the woman you want to be twenty years from now - and she’s looking back at you. Your future self (who is going to be an amazing woman) is calmly explaining that you need to be proud of yourself. She’s telling you to stay composed, graceful and feminine. To remember how much inner strength you’ve found already. She’s telling you that you DO have a role to play out there, but the bigger picture is yet to reveal itself.

  I’ve talked things over with Dad, and I’ve finally admitted you’ve been writing to me separately (he says to say, don’t be a daft sod, he’s stronger than you know). He also said to tell you he read something in a magazine at the doctors the other day and wants to pass it on - life is 10% what happens to us and 90 % how we react to it. Stay calm, stay strong, and above all else, stay safe, my love.

  Lots of love,

  Mum (and Dad) xx

  From: aggieb@yahoo.com

  To: pollyofarabia@yahoo.com

  CC: gethynofarabia@yahoo.com

  Date: 18 April

  Hello, you two.

  You have email! Fabulous. Be careful, you may become spoiled. This is my email address. More soon, off to the café.

  Love, Ag

  From: gethynofarabia@yahoo.com

  To: aggieb@yahoo.com

  Subject: Nirvana

  Date: 20 April

  Dear, Aggie

  That’s it! I just have to visit Appledart now. Ishmael and Anya sound to be exactly the sort of people I’d like to knock back a bottle of whiskey with and chat to in the wee hours of the morning.

  My news from here is uncertain. I may only have one more week with Polly because it’s likely I’m moving to Basra Palace, to work with one of the brigades for a few weeks, after which time an army doctor will come out to replace me. Now the heat of the war has dampened, my appointing officer says the Navy want me home, although, at the risk of sounding trite, when I say home, I have absolutely no idea where my home is anymore. It’s exactly a month since the war started but it feels like a year. Everything is different now. Based at the airport, I believe that we (the original Headquarters staff) feel our job is done here - that we no longer belong in Iraq. We fought a war in four weeks and we’re exhausted. Our uniforms are as tired as we are and it’s time for a new tranche of soldiers to come to Basra to make their mark, although God knows, I pity them. Unlike those who will replace us, during the war there was a forward line of troops – an objective - which was relatively clean-cut. Now we want to befriend the enemy. But this is the Middle East, not the West, and I can’t help but wonder about so many things, and worry. Back to my original point, that being the realisation that I have no notion of where to call home anymore. I will leave Iraq having found and lost myself in the desert. We have lived as a collective, thinking of nothing but survival – eating, sleeping and working. Tomorrow didn’t really matter, and although I had huge crisis of morality, I felt centred, and when busy, my mind did not think about anything beyond the present moment (especially when I was lost in one of your books, of course). But now we’re at the airport, my thoughts are confused and I have to dig deep and admit some truths. But that’s enough about me, you still haven’t given me any decent gossip on the customers …

  G

  From: aggieb@yahoo.com

  To: gethynofarabia@yahoo.com

  Subject: Re: Nirvana

  Date: 20 April

  Dear, Gethyn

  Email is great! It’s wonderful to be able to respond on the same day. I’m sorry you are feeling a little lost. I’ll send some sticky chocolate fudge brownies – it’s my go-to food in times of uncertainty.

  Aggie x

  P.S. Sorry for the short email, I’ll do better tonight. Shaun has just phoned and we have reports of a lone man with silver hair and posh shoes at the jetty and we need to go to action stations.

  P.P.S. I cannot possibly divulge the secrets of the confessional (did I say confessional, I meant café). But … we did have a woman in last week who I suspect may have murdered her husband - honest to God, not kidding. She said her husband went missing two years ago and it’s a real mystery. But I swear there was an evil glint in her eye (and almost a twitch) AND when she laughed with another customer, she had one of those evil villain, throw your head back laughs. And that is the case for the prosecution, me lud.

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Oliver

  To: Polly

  Date: 25 April

  Dear, Polly

  Thank you for your letter. Miss says I can’t use a laptop in class. I need to practise my handwriting because of spelling and all the other kids will want one and she can’t afford it. I type your letters by myself, now. My typing is very slow because I don’t know where all the keys are so Miss still helps. I like the idea of being a fisherman to make money but no offence, why do grown-ups always talk about what kids will do when they grow up? Why is it one of the first questions I’m asked by strangers? I do like animals. I once had a dog. Last year I lived in a house that had a little dog called Scamper. She ran out of the garden and I found her on the road squashed and now when I think of Scamper, I can’t breathe, so I don’t think about it at all if I can. I tried to smile this week like you said, but Matt in class said he’d kick my brains out if I kept smiling at him, so I stopped. I don’t think wishing works. I wish Matt was nicer to me but he never is and I wished I got an XBox for Christmas and that didn’t happen either. Have you used your gun yet? I prayed for you in assembly again. A woman is thinking of adopting me. It would be nice to stop moving around. Why would someone want to adopt someone else? Why would someone want me in their house all the time?

  Oliver

  From: pollyofarabia@yahoo.com

  To: percynmadge@hotmail.com

  Subject: Thanks

  Date: 28 April

  Hi, Mum and Dad

  Thanks for your advice. It’s really made a difference.

  No, you aren’t seeing things, we have email now. I’m in Basra, at the airport. But no need to panic. We’re safe as houses and snug as a bug in the terminal building. It’s becoming unbearably hot, but we have electricity and have been given electric fans to cool us down, although we decided to turn them off as they just blow burning-hot air into your face. Thanks again for all the parcels you’ve been sending – keep them coming. Aggie has been sending books, which I’ve passed onto my friend Gethyn as I don’t seem to be able to concentrate on reading a novel at the moment, but magazines are a nice, bite-sized respite. Are you having much rain? I would love to feel the rain on my face and walk barefoot on the grass and surround myself with the colour green - heaven. I don’t believe there is any place more beautiful than home in the Spring. Please enjoy it on my behalf by having some fabulous trips away in the caravan. Do you remember that trip we made to Tenby when I was twelve, or maybe I was a bit older. It was such a fabulous holiday. Maybe we could all go to Tenby when I come home? Maybe we could persuade Simon to take a special trip back, just so we can all be together again?

  Please don’t worry too much. I’m absolutely fine – get yourselves off to the caravan – life is for living.

  Love you all so much, Polly x

  P.S. I haven’t forgotten about the school, but I’m not sure about the best step forward.

  From: pollyofarabia@yahoo.com

  To: aggieb@yahoo.com

  Subject: Feeling Better

  Date: 29 April

  Hi, Aggie

  I’m feeling more upbeat today. I got an email from Mum saying that I should imagine my future self and imagine her talking me through my
life. I’m not sure this kind of thing works for me, but it’s promising that she feels positive enough to give firm advice.

  I’ve yet another favour to ask, but it’s on behalf of someone else – someone in need - so I hope you don’t mind. Do you remember lovely Mrs Cartwright, our headmistress at primary school? You may know this already, but she’s still the headmistress (she must be about a hundred and ten by now). The thing is, she wrote to me on the day the war started attaching a lovely letter from one of the kids at school. He’s called Oliver. He has learning difficulties and is in foster care. I want to get him a laptop but I think Mrs Cartwright is reticent. Can you possibly investigate so see if there are any specific typing programmes to help children who have writing difficulties? I will pay for everything. Can you phone Mrs Cartwright and ask, please?

  Lots of love,

  Pol