by Holly Bourne
I shook my head, flabbergasted but delighted. It didn’t occur to me as weird that he knew my timetable because…well, we’ve explained the whole idiot thing. I just laughed and thought it was romantic, put my guitar strap over my head, and perched on the stool. “So, now what?” I asked into the microphone.
“Now you sing, my canary.”
He waved goodbye and shut me in, before reappearing on the other side of the glass. He muddled with buttons while I watched and marvelled from the other side of the partition. How did he even get permission to take over a recording studio for the night? Where did he get all the fairy lights from? How did he know how to use a mixing deck? And finally, How can such a marvellous, spectacular, golden star of a person be interested in me? It felt like someone else’s life. Someone special, someone not like me.
His voice crackled into my headphones and I jumped a little.
“Alright. I’m ready for you. Sing that ‘Worth The Risk’ song from the show. It was brilliant.”
I felt the kick of betrayal before I’d even done anything. That was my Alfie song. Yet I found myself strumming the opening chord and I started singing somehow, and the guilt evaporated as I set eyes on Reese through the glass. He had his headphones on, both of us tuned into our own private frequency, and we watched each other as I sang, and I swear it was the most intense, intimate thing that had ever happened to me. If I could have paused that moment, I would have. I’d have paused it, and climbed into it and wrapped myself up in it like it was a blanket, pulling it over my shoulders.
I sang out to Reese – betraying the boy I swore I’d never betray – hardly even thinking about it. When I was done, he was suddenly not on the other side of the glass. He flung the doors open and strode into my booth before cupping my face with his hands and kissing me. I kissed him right back, no control over my instinct to respond. I dug my hands under his hat, running my fingers through his hair. He pulled away, smiling, and lifted my guitar over my head like it was a dress. Then he kissed me again. It was all tongue and tasting and gasping and his hands clawing at my back like kissing me would never be enough.
I’d never had a kiss like that.
I hadn’t been sure if they were even real. My first kisses with Alfie were lovely but they were also tentative and unsure. We’d clunked heads a few times, laughed and apologized. It took us a while to get the hang of one another. It was safe and cute and, as I said…lovely…but it wasn’t like this kiss in the recording booth. When I kissed Reese, I felt like a mammal. Like instinct was taking over as my body melted into his. He pushed the stool back and half folded himself on top of me, and I remember thinking, God, Alfie would never have the confidence to do anything like this, and feeling guilty for thinking it.
Our fusing wasn’t all physical though – the emotions were just as full-throttle.
Just when it veered into way-too-much-for-a-first-date, Reese gently pulled away. He stared into my eyes with complete wonder and leaned his forehead against mine, letting out a sigh of relief.
“I’ve wanted to do that since the moment I saw you sing.” He drew back and stared at me some more. “There’s something about you, Amelie… I can’t describe it.”
I laughed, because I didn’t know what else to do. I’d never taken drugs before but I guessed this was what they felt like – heady and racing towards euphoric, and like you were running too fast for your legs.
“This is some first date, Reese, I have to say.”
His eyes intensified. I could almost see flames flickering behind his retinas. “Well, I knew I had to bring out the big guns. Everyone at college is after you.”
I laughed so hard I almost fell off my stool, and he reached out to catch me.
“Steady now. What is it? What’s so funny?” he asked, stroking my cheek. I felt so powerful in that moment. So high on how into me he was. I felt that whatever I did or said, it would still be intoxicating to him. Even if I farted, he’d probably cradle my face and whisper, “That’s the most incredible fart I’ve ever smelled.”
I didn’t fart though. I just told him he was being ridiculous, and he swore he wasn’t. Then we kissed again and the second kiss was even better than the first.
We never listened to my song.
Instead we just kissed and kissed and kissed until my mouth was sore and my head was swimming and I was giddy and so happy but also confused and just stuffed with emotions, like I’d eaten an eight-course meal of them. Time passed faster than a roadrunner on steroids, and, after my phone went off for the third time, I had to extract myself and pick it up.
Mum: Hi Amelie. Just checking what time you’ll be back? x
Mum: I hope you’re having fun, poppet, but it is getting late.
Mum: Where are you, Amelie? It’s a school night remember.
I checked the time at the top of my phone. “Shit,” I said. “It’s almost ten o’clock. When did that happen?”
Reese wiggled his eyebrows in response and I laughed, shaking my head as I jabbed out a reply.
Amelie: Sorry! Got caught up. About to head home now. Won’t be long.
He watched me put my phone back in my bag. “I really have to go.”
“Stay,” he said simply.
“I can’t.”
“The world won’t end.”
“But my mum will worry.”
He shrugged. “So, let her worry.”
I carried on collecting my stuff – readjusting my dress, which was very much no longer on my shoulders, pulling up my bra strap. Reese followed me around the room like a puppy, undoing all my efforts. He slid my straps back down and kissed my bare shoulders, wrapping his hands around my waist. “Right, I’m ready to go…”
He twisted me around and started kissing me again. I resisted for a whole millisecond before we staggered backwards and collapsed onto the floor.
“I have to go,” I kept saying.
“I know,” he kept replying, as he kept kissing me.
It wasn’t just the kissing that made it so hard to leave. It was everything. It was the fairy lights and the thoughtful picnic and the way he’d pull away to stroke my face and look at me like I’d fallen from heaven. This time we were interrupted by my phone ringing. I twisted out of his grip. “Hello?”
“Amelie? Where the hell are you? It’s almost eleven!”
“Sorry, sorry. I’m almost home,” I lied. “The bill at the restaurant took for ever to come.” I sensed Mum about to explode and counter-attacked. “It’s been such a great night and everyone lost track of time. It’s so nice to feel like I’ve finally made friends down here.” I closed my eyes to block out the guilt and there was a pause as her own guilt sank in.
Her tone changed entirely. “It’s lovely you’re making friends,” she said sadly.
“I’m so sorry, Mum. I’ll be back as soon as possible.”
“Well, we’re going to bed now. I just wanted to know where you were. Don’t be much later, honey. And be quiet when you come in.”
We said goodnight and I hung up. Reese, who’d been kissing my shoulder the whole time, moved up to my neck. “Did I hear they’re going to bed?” he whispered.
“I really have to go now, Reese.”
I thought he’d fight it but instead he went stiff and straightened up. “Alrighty.” He instantly switched into ultra-efficient leaving mode – scurrying about, snatching down the fairy lights, and hardly speaking to me as he did so. I stood there awkwardly, crossing my arms and worried I’d somehow hurt his feelings.
“Do you need any help?”
He shook his head and spent a further ten minutes removing all the romantic touches in silence, until we were stood in just a normal recording studio again. Me with my bag, him with a pile of stuff – and the whole length of the room between us.
Are you mad at me? I thought. The first time of many times I would think that. It felt like he was angry I wouldn’t stay out, even though it was late when my mum rang and a school night. The woozy good feelings from the
perfect evening drained out of me, replaced with anxiety that somehow I’d messed everything up.
“Ready?” he asked curtly, picking up my guitar. Or maybe I was imagining he was curt? But he didn’t hold my hand on the walk home – he hardly spoke to me. And he walked a tiny bit too fast, so I had to scuttle to keep up. I worried and panicked and fretted the whole journey back, wondering what the hell I’d done to undo such a perfect evening. Nausea curdled inside me, until we reached the bus stop at the end of my road. He stopped and I stopped alongside him, watching him turn towards me.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Would it scare you if I told you tonight was the best night of my entire life?” Reese said, putting my guitar down. He reached out for my face to stroke my cheek. A complete one-eighty. The anxiety dispersed – totally forgotten – and love rushed in. Yes, love. I could feel it already, pulsing through both of us. Too soon, too powerful, too unstoppable.
“It wouldn’t scare me.” I leaned into his hand.
The moon was bright and the sky was cold and, to most people, it was just 11.45 p.m. on a regular Monday night – but not to us, as we stood there, staring at each other in utter wonder.
“So you had a good time?”
I burst out laughing. “I had an amazing time.”
He looked so proud of himself. He reached down and squeezed my fingers so tight. “Will you…will you be my girlfriend, Amelie?”
I nodded. I nodded so hard and so furiously – confirming the inevitable. What we already knew to be true, since the moment our eyes first met.
“Yes. Of course.”
Reese’s dimples practically jumped into his hat as his face ripped into an open grin. “This really is the best night of my life,” he said.
“Mine too.”
I giggled into his mouth and then he hugged me so hard. The hug was even better. The feeling of his arms tight around me, the scent of his neck. The sheer force of it, like he was trying to squeeze me into him so we moulded into one piece of clay. “See you at college tomorrow, girlfriend.” Then he was gone – leaving me standing there, touching my lips and giggling.
It was so perfect. I was so happy, so giddily happy. I couldn’t believe what had just happened. And it felt so amazing to have something here, down here in this strange town where I knew hardly anyone. I mean, Hannah was great but she was inevitably going to get all-consumed with Jack. But now I had someone too. A person with a life I could slip into. A person as brilliant as Reese. How incredible it was, how Hollywood, that we’d just met like this. How great and beautif—
Then I remembered Alfie.
Then, I broke.
My knees buckled and I found myself bent over, hardly able to draw breath through my grief. I staggered into the plastic bench of the bus stop, and that’s when the sobs arrived. They ripped through me so strong and I felt so faint I had to put my head between my legs. Alfie’s face swarmed behind my closed eyes and every good thing, everything I loved about him, bubbled up and frothed over and spilled out of me.
Because here was the undeniable truth.
Things were over between Alfie and me.
They had to be. I’d just severed something I never thought I’d sever. So quickly, so easily, and yet so drastically. I cried for us, I cried for Manchester, I cried for the guilt I felt. I cried in anger that it had come to this. The thing about undeniable truths is that the truth is never set in stone, so their undeniability always has a sell-by date. What is true morphs and changes as we turn the pages of our lives, morphing and changing ourselves as we inevitably lose control of what happens to us and the impact it will have. It was an undeniable truth that I had loved Alfie, with all my heart and soul and toenails, and was going to wait two years to be together with him again. I hadn’t lied to him when I promised that. It was true at the time. But time changes the truth. And, at this very bus stop, an undeniable truth was replaced with a new one. The new truth was: I could not still love Alfie if I felt the way I felt about Reese.
It hurt. It hurt so much and I cried so very hard for so very long – ignoring the empty night buses that hissed to a stop every twenty-two minutes.
Another thing I learned that night was that it’s entirely possible to feel powerful-yet-contradictory emotions at the same time. After my first date with Reese, I felt complete joy, and yet complete heartbreak. The first causing the second, the second ruining the first. The emotions battled in my brain, fighting to be the winner. I imagined telling Alfie about meeting Reese and hiccups of grief spasmed through my body and I sobbed like a guttural pig. Then, like the wind changing, I remembered the fairy lights and the taste of Reese in my mouth, and a smile of pure joy laced through my sadness.
It would be a while until Alfie did find out, of course. But that part of this wretched trip down Miserable Memory Lane will come later. Right now, I’m just sat here at this bus stop, looking out at the drizzle that’s just started, missing college and watching buses come and go. I’m not sure how to fill the rest of the day. I guess I could go home and stare at the ceiling some more – I’m getting really good at that…
I shake my head as it strikes me just how…naff my crying locations are. My memory map is the most underwhelming collection of compass points ever. But, I guess, isn’t that always the way with dramatic moments? They don’t play out like in the films, with stunning backdrops that reflect the drama of your life. Your heart can break at a regular bus stop, or on a grotty train, or on some crap patch of grass near your house. You don’t need dramatic settings to experience dramatic emotions.
I stare out at the drizzle and relive my memories from the rest of that night.
I stayed out too late, my sobs refusing to subside for so long and I didn’t want to wake my parents when I got in. Whenever I thought I’d got all my crying out of my system, I pulled out my phone and reread every lovely message Alfie had ever sent, and just set myself off again.
My phone vibrated with a message at one a.m.
Reese: Goodnight girlfriend xxx
There were three kisses. No build-up to the kisses. No One, if I’m lucky, after a certain number of dates. Building to maybe Two, in time, if things are still going well. To Three, after months of worrying they don’t feel the same way. Nope, Reese went straight into three kisses. I stared at that row of “x”s and smiled so hard, but then that set me off about Alfie again.
A mess. That’s what I was, at this lonely number thirty-seven bus stop.
And, here I am, still a mess.
A mess with no messages on her phone. Let alone a message with three kisses.
What’s more painful – torturing yourself with happy memories, or torturing yourself with bad ones? I guess I’m about to find out, because it’s Saturday and I’m taking myself for an unexpected detour. It’s sunny in that bright, wintery way that makes every bare branch glow gold and flirts with the idea of spring. I’ve packed myself a little lunch – a cheese sandwich, a packet of salt and vinegar crisps, an apple and a bottle of Diet Coke – and I’m taking myself on an excursion.
Oh, by the way, when I say “excursion”, what I really mean is “an exercise in ritualistic masochism” – because what better way of mending a spurned heart than ruining yourself with memories of the good times?
“You’re going out?” Mum can’t contain the disbelief in her voice. She takes in my coat being on and my hair being brushed and the bag over my shoulder. Very rare occurrences for me on a weekend, these days.
“Just for a few hours,” I say.
Her face melts into the sort of smile that would break your heart if it wasn’t already a pulpy mess. “That’s great, Amelie. Really great. You meeting up with Hannah? Going into town or something?”
I nod ever so slightly, and her smile stretches wider. Her shoulders drop a centimetre as she releases the subconscious tension she’s been carrying about how dysfunctional her daughter is.
“Well, have a great time. It’s lovely out there. I saw a few snowdrops co
ming up yesterday. It’s March now and spring is on its way.”
I nod again and try to smile back, before calling goodbye to Dad, who’s still eating toast in the kitchen. I emerge from the flat, blinking into the low sunshine, and I start walking towards all the Good Places.
Here I am, outside the closed college gates, staring into the empty grounds, which are usually spilling over with students. I grab hold of the railings, and the metal’s so cold I can feel it through my gloves. I can see hundreds of imprints of me, trapped in the memories of all the days I have spent behind these gates. The good days, the amazing days, and the days where I felt like my universe had fallen out. This is a nice memory though.
I was so nervous walking into college the day after our first date. The previous evening had felt like someone else’s life and I didn’t trust any of it had actually happened. I was exhausted, my eyes red and sore, from both the lack of sleep and crying about Alfie. My hands shook beneath the pulled-down sleeves of my cardigan as I wobbled into college, scanning for a sight of Reese’s trilby. There was fifteen minutes before the first bell, so I wound my way through the refectory for a coffee, thinking I just about had time. I smiled back as people smiled at me, still slightly recognized from the talent show. My varnish was fading though. Everyone was too worried about coursework that had been set and realizing the friends they’d made in those fearful first few weeks maybe weren’t their people after all, or reflecting on the depressing realization that, despite their reinventions and wardrobe full of new clothes, they were still themselves.
I spotted Hannah just as she spotted me. She and Jack were in deep conversation in the corner table, but she waved me over. I waved back and waited for my coffee to sludge its way out of the crappy college machine. Then Reese’s hands were around my waist, and his mouth was on my neck, and the brim of his hat dug into my head.
