by Julie Cohen
They were both poised to fall. Or step back safely. Unlike on the bus, he could think, this time. He could choose.
Experience told him that the most appealing choice would probably be the worst.
He got up, but he didn’t go to her. Didn’t sit beside her, didn’t take her head in his hands and kiss her.
‘You can have a blanket and a pillow from my bed,’ he said. ‘The sofa is pretty comfortable, and I’ll buy you a bacon butty in the morning. To thank you for saving my life.’
Chapter Twenty-one
‘IT WAS ON this corner,’ I say. ‘I’m sure of it. Look, this is the pub, and then there was a newsagent, and then there was a launderette, and then there was the café. Here.’ I point to a block of flats where the café used to be. A block of 1960s flats. Their architecture stubbornly insists that they have been standing here for a good forty years before I ever had a coffee with Ewan in this location. ‘Wasn’t it?’
‘It was on the other side of the road,’ says Ewan.
‘I was certain it was on the right.’
‘Look at the windows.’ I examine them: plate glass, wide and tall, framed in black. Yes, that’s where the gingham curtains used to be. But now it’s a chemist, with displays of sun cream and allergy medication.
‘So much for a bacon butty,’ I say.
I’m not hungry, to tell the truth. I feel a bit hungover: fuzzy-brained, vague, headachy. I didn’t get much sleep on Ewan’s sofa last night, and what I did get was fitful. Every time I moved, the leather cushions squeaked, and I could hear Ewan in the next room. I lay awake, dreading the scent of frangipani, something that would propel me off the sofa and into the bedroom, where I would either make a fool of myself or even worse, he would welcome me.
The scent didn’t come. I was awoken by a text from Quinn: Good night out?
Too much tequila, I texted back to him. Talk to you later.
It’s the first outright lie I’ve told to him. When Ewan came into the living room, rubbing his hair dry on a towel, I told him I needed a walk to clear my head before I had the breakfast he’d promised me.
But the walk hasn’t cleared my head. It’s hot already, though it’s before ten o’clock. I’m still wearing my going-out clothes, my hair bundled into an elastic. I’ve done the best I can with a wet flannel to erase the mascara trails under my eyes, but I feel as if I’m on what we used to call the Walk of Shame, where everyone can tell that you’ve been out all night. Perversely, this doesn’t make me feel like a mess; it makes me feel sexy.
Dammit.
I should not be allowing myself to feel sexy. I’m with Ewan because he needs my help. Last night, lying awake, it occurred to me that perhaps the memories I’ve been having are a different kind of sign than I’d thought. Perhaps they’ve led me to Ewan because he needed me there, in his life, at that precise moment. Perhaps it has nothing to do with attraction, or feeling in love.
And yet I’ve lied to Quinn.
‘There are plenty of other cafés,’ says Ewan.
‘I don’t think I even fancy a bacon sandwich,’ I say. ‘I’m too hot.’ And I should be getting back to Canary Wharf, to have a shower and wash myself back into my normal life. But I’m reluctant to leave Ewan. I don’t think he’s in imminent danger of committing suicide, not today; he seems more cheerful this morning, as if it’s helped him to admit what happened with Lee. It will probably get bad for him again, but today is a good day. And on a good day, he’s so much more like the man I remember.
‘I might have a better idea.’ Ewan starts striding purposefully down the road. Around the corner there’s a park, with a few toddlers playing in the sunshine while their mothers sit under trees with the buggies. An ice-cream van idles on the corner, the driver reading the Sun. Ewan goes straight up to it and in a few minutes he’s back with two enormous cornets, each with a Flake.
‘Ice cream for breakfast?’ I ask him, taking mine.
‘Why not?’ He licks his. ‘We’re grown-ups. Bench?’
We sit together on a bench, eating our ice creams and watching East London go by around us. Whippy soft ice cream is, in fact, the perfect breakfast on a day like today. And this is exactly the sort of thing that Ewan and I would have done ten years ago, with no jobs, no responsibilities. Except ten years ago we wouldn’t have been able to keep our hands off each other.
‘Let’s do whatever we want today,’ I say, and then realize that could be misconstrued as being sexual. My cheeks heating, I amend, ‘Let’s wander around London and look at whatever we fancy. Eat whatever we want, drink whatever we want. Just spend a day being alive.’
‘You’re trying to convince me that life is good, aren’t you? That it’s worth living?’
‘I don’t think I can do that with a day wandering around London. This isn’t a Christmas movie. I think you need to see a professional, Ewan. If you’re having suicidal feelings, you can’t mess around. You need to work out some stuff. Promise me you’ll do that?’ I turn and look directly at him; he’s mid-lick, but he swallows and presses his lips together.
‘Promise,’ I insist. ‘In words.’
‘Okay. I’ll see a doctor.’
I look hard at him. ‘I’m not certain I believe you.’
‘I’ll spit in my palm and shake your hand if you want, but you might get a bit of Flake in it.’
‘Call your GP right now and make an appointment. Then I’ll be satisfied.’
I watch him call and make the appointment for later in the week. I am aware that in some ways I am being a hypocrite.
‘Okay, and also put the Samaritans’ number into your phone. In fact, give it to me and I’ll do it for you.’
He hands it over, still warm, and I look up the number. When I open his contacts list I see that he still has Alana’s number, right at the top. I make a new entry for the Samaritans. ‘I’ll call them Sammy. And here’s my number too.’
As I’m keying it in, I think that this might be a dangerous thing to do. But I can’t imagine Quinn ever checking mine or anyone else’s phone. He’s far too principled and trusting for that; he doesn’t even have a lock for his bicycle, even though there’s a nine-year-old poised to steal it at any moment.
Of course this makes it much easier for me to betray him. I swallow and close my eyes for a moment, dizzy at the enormity of what I’m doing.
I send Ewan’s number to my phone. And because he’s not watching me, but gazing across the park, I send Alana’s number, too. In case anything happens to Ewan and I need to tell his next-of-kin.
‘There,’ I say, hearing my own phone dinging twice as it receives the numbers. ‘Done.’ I give him his phone back and resume licking my ice cream.
‘So, a day wandering around London,’ he says. ‘Don’t you have anything better to do? Job to go to? Husband to see?’
‘This is the most important thing I have to do today.’ I throw my slightly ice-creamy serviette into the bin, and stand up. ‘Ready to go?’
The day is hot, so we don’t cover as much ground as we might have done otherwise. We pop into a vinyl-record shop where Ewan educates me about the bands I’ve been missing all of my life. We jump on a bus and ride for a bit on the top deck, until the heat drives us off it. For lunch we buy cold samosas and chunks of watermelon from an Asian grocery and find another park so we can spit the seeds at each other. The juice runs down my arm and wets the sleeve of my dress. By early afternoon my feet are beginning to hurt in my going-out shoes, so I buy a cheap pair of flip-flops. The pavement burns through them with every step.
We look in bookshops and delis, sweetshops and museums. A Hawksmoor church where we linger, cooled by the shadows and marble. By instinct, we avoid any parts of London where we might run into someone we know. Or at least I do, and we don’t run into any of Ewan’s mates, so he may be doing the same. School has finished for the summer and the pavements are full of teenagers, riding scooters and skateboards and laughing into their mobile phones. Ewan tells me about a boat trip
he took in Thailand. I tell him about a waitressing job I had once, for two weeks, in Paris, before I was sacked. We talk about nothing of significance at all. When my phone buzzes, I ignore it.
One day. I can have one day with Ewan, before I think about my real life and my responsibilities. Before I think about who I could be hurting if I have any more than this.
I do not touch him.
We stop to sit outside a pub, at a table usually claimed by smokers. I drink a half of lager and lime, something I haven’t had since I was a teenager.
‘I met Petra a few times,’ Ewan says suddenly. ‘Lee’s wife. She came to some of the gigs. Lee could never stop touching her when he was with her. He always had his hand on her knee, or her arm, or was stroking her hair. It was as if he knew he only had so long with her.’ He looks at me with his bright blue eyes, the same colour as the summer sky. ‘Do you think that’s what love is like?’
It’s exactly the sort of question that I have been trying desperately to avoid. I cast around for something to say, a change of subject, and spot a toy shop on the other side of the road. ‘Wait here,’ I tell him.
Inside, I’m a bit stunned by the amount of toys on offer. So much plastic, so many boxes with names in shouty fonts, so much buzzing and flashing and squeaking, segregated into gendered sections. Guns and cars for boys on the right, pink everything for girls on the left. I pause in the shop, bemused at how different this version of childhood is from my own childhood, or the one that I’d envisaged for Quinn’s and my child.
It’s difficult to find anything that isn’t pre-gendered, but finally I find what I’m looking for, right near the back, in the section marked EDUCATIONAL. At the counter, I ask them to wrap it, but they only have plastic bags. I carry it out to Ewan, who has got us each another drink.
‘A toy,’ he says. He takes it out of the bag. ‘A ukelele.’
‘I thought it was a crying shame that you didn’t have any guitars left. So this is the start of a new collection. A small start, but a start.’
‘Well, I do have some guitars still in storage. I haven’t thrown them out of any windows yet.’ He strums it, fiddles with the knobs that tune it, and then strums it some more. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever played a ukelele before.’
He’s smiling. The instrument is too small for his hands, but he coaxes a tune out of it. Something jaunty; probably you can only play jaunty tunes on its plastic strings. It’s too small and ridiculous to play the blues on, which is one of the reasons I bought it. Passers-by hear him and smile. Like ice cream for breakfast, a silly tune on a ukelele seems like the perfect thing for a London summer day. The men sitting at the table next to us laugh, and give Ewan the thumbs-up.
‘I’d forgotten how good you are,’ I say.
‘I’ve had a lot of practice.’ He starts another tune.
‘Do you think your daughter is musical?’
He stops playing. ‘Oh, I knew this was too easy to last.’
‘Tell me about her.’
‘They moved to Manchester with her stepfather. She’s got a half-brother and sister. She probably talks like a Manc by now.’
‘What colour hair does she have?’
‘Red. Same as Alana’s. She doesn’t look much like me. I don’t know if she’s musical.’
‘Do you at least speak to her on the phone?’
He shakes his head. ‘No point. Rebecca doesn’t need me confusing her. She’s got a dad. Alana has a husband. They’re happy. I’m happy for them. That’s all.’
‘I never met my father,’ I say, tracing my finger around the wet circle left by my glass on the table. ‘He was married when he met my mother in Paris. They split up before I was born. She didn’t keep any photographs or sketches. She’s never told me anything about him, except that he was French, and she loved him. I had a happy childhood. I loved Esther and I never felt as if I needed anyone more than her. And still, every single time I went to Paris, I was looking for him. I expected to see him everywhere I went. I knew I wouldn’t recognize him, but I looked for him anyway. Any man of my mother’s age, or a little bit older, with dark hair or green eyes – I would look at him and hope I’d see something, anything, so I would know he was mine. Even when I was happy, even when I knew he couldn’t give me anything I didn’t already have, I wanted to meet him.’
‘Well,’ he says, picking up his pint, ‘that’s you.’
‘If Rebecca feels even the tiniest little bit like I did – like I do – don’t you think you owe it to her to keep in touch?’
He puts his glass down without taking a drink. ‘Flick. Listen. I know you think this will help me. But it’s complicated, okay? I can’t just pick up the phone.’
‘If you have her number, you really can. What’s the worst that could happen? Alana hangs up on you? At least you’ve tried.’
‘I thought you were trying to make me feel happier?’
‘I’m just trying—’
‘I know what you’re trying to do. It isn’t working. Do you want another drink, or should we go?’
He’s already out of his seat. ‘Let’s go,’ I say, and he walks off rapidly, in a seemingly random direction.
Well, that was an error. But I have learned enough of this new Ewan to know that this is what he does when he’s sad, so I walk silently along with him.
I remember how we broke up all those years ago. How, when he told me the news that Alana had rung to say she was three months pregnant, he seemed angry. Surly, close-faced. I’d been furious with him, even though I didn’t know Alana, even though I’d helped him to cheat on her and then break up with her. How could he be angry at her? It wasn’t her fault she was pregnant. It was both of them together. Something they’d both done before I met Ewan, planting the seeds that would take him from me.
‘If she’s going to keep the baby, you have to go back to her,’ I told him, choking, imagining already how I’d feel if he didn’t, how our relationship would become heavy and guilty. He’d turned to me, his blue eyes flashing. I’d never seen his temper before; I shrank back.
‘If that’s how much you care about me, then I will,’ he said. And he left.
And that was that. Both of us making our choices for what we thought was for ever. As I recall, it took less than ten minutes.
The memory and the rapid walking makes my lager and lime slosh in my stomach. We were so young and so dramatic. Now, we walk up a hill and into yet another park. London is alive with green spaces today; we have bounced from one to the other and all of them have been full of people. Dogs bark, children shout. A man on roller skates narrowly misses us. All of the shady bits have been colonized by families with picnic blankets; Ewan flings himself onto a sunny patch of ground and I remember what he said in Greenwich: ‘It’s a strange and wonderful day to be alive.’ Now I know he was being ironic.
I sit beside him and watch a football game. The children wearing shirts are drenched, and the ones without are sunburned. In the heat, their movements are sluggish. My phone rings, and rings, and falls silent.
The scent of frangipani coalesces around us.
‘I’m a prat,’ says Ewan quietly. ‘You were trying to help.’
‘Can you smell that?’ I ask him. Because maybe he does. Maybe it’s something meant for both of us. Sweet and spicy, heavy and exotic.
‘Smell what?’
‘I need you to help me,’ I say to him. I reach for his hand and it clasps around mine. His skin is even hotter than the air. ‘I need you to sit here and not let me move. Just for a few minutes. Don’t say anything, don’t look at me. Don’t touch me any more than this. Just sit here and hold my hand.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s … something like meeting you in Greenwich,’ I say. ‘You just have to do it without knowing why. I’ll be all right in ten minutes.’
‘Okay,’ he says, and I have barely enough time to draw my knees up and hide my head between them, hair dangling around my face, to keep him from seeing it or me from seeing him
. I sit there, on the hot dusty ground with the shouts and laughter around me, the sun beating down on my head. I will myself not to move, to stay rooted, to stay sane.
I hold Ewan’s hand and I love him. My heart is beating so hard that I can feel my body moving with every beat. I tense my muscles and let his hand hold me in place. I clamp my lips together to stop laughing aloud.
I don’t know if it’s ten minutes, or fifteen, or half an hour. Eventually I feel it ebb. My heartbeat slows. The sounds of the park begin to filter in. My back hurts. I stretch out one leg, then the other, and look up. True to his word, Ewan is staring straight ahead, not looking at me.
‘Thanks,’ I say. I feel there’s a silly smile on my face, but I can’t seem to get rid of it. Just like I can’t seem to let go of his hand, not quite yet.
He turns to me. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yes. Absolutely great.’ I’ve got through it without doing anything stupid. This proves something, though I’m not sure what – that I’m more powerful than fate? That I have the ability to choose what I do?
Yes. That’s it. I have the ability to choose. And despite all this elation buzzing through my body, I know what the right thing is to do. I drop Ewan’s hand and stand up, brushing down the skirt of my dress.
‘I’ve got to go home now,’ I say. ‘Thanks for a great day.’
He jumps to his feet too. ‘Are you certain? You look a little … woozy.’
‘I’m fine.’
‘Was it the lager? On a hot day it can go to your head.’
‘Yes, probably.’ I laugh. ‘I’m going to go now. Don’t forget to see the doctor, all right?’
‘But when will I see you again?’
I’m too light to answer that right now. I don’t know what the right answer is. If I can resist Ewan, then that’s the right thing to do. If I was only meant to see him to save his life, then maybe I’ve done that already.
‘When it has to happen,’ I say. And I head across the park, in a direction I’m not certain will lead me back home.
Chapter Twenty-two
