Growing Up Twice

by Rowan Coleman

  Josh tips his head back and laughs, nodding at the memory. ‘Janine Whitman. That was her name. She refused to see me again after that, so thank you very much. She might have been the one, you know,’ he says with a look of mock reproach.

  ‘Trust me, it wasn’t Janine Whitman,’ I say with conviction.

  ‘No, I don’t suppose it was.’ He smiles as another memory comes back to him and I feel pleased with myself that I started this.

  ‘What about the time she poured all of Mum’s best perfume over that stray dog she brought home? Or when she was nine and she decided to become a nun. Dad nearly had an embolism!’ We laugh again, both picturing her appearance one tea-time in a home-made tea-towel wimple and bed-sheet habit.

  ‘Your poor dad, he was ready to pack up and go back to Turkey!’ I smile.

  ‘She was a lovely girl,’ Josh says, the laughter and light gradually draining from his voice. I reach out and take his hand. He grips my fingers and looks away from me.

  ‘It just seems so arbitrary, Jen. So pointless.’ Threatened tears constrict his throat.

  ‘I know,’ I say, ‘I know.’ I shift down the sofa towards him. His arms pull me into a hug and he buries his face in my neck. Before long I feel his shoulders begin to shake and his tears dampen my shirt. Minutes pass and he gradually becomes still. As he raises his head he turns his face from me again and drops his arms to his sides. This is all so unbearably hard for him.

  I position myself in the crook of his arm, my back curved into the warmth of his chest, pick up his limp arm and tuck it over my shoulder.

  ‘Do you want to talk about something else?’ I ask after a short silence.

  ‘No, it’s good to talk about her, to remember and laugh. Mum can’t bear to mention her name at the moment. That house is so quiet and dark. Poor Hakam, I think he feels it worst. It always used to be Ayla he’d talk to, the rest of us must seem like pensioners to him.’ I feel his other hand brush the hair back from the nape of my neck in an absent-minded gesture and I settle my head back on to his shoulder. Without warning, my niggling worries about Selin spring to the surface again.

  ‘Josh? Is Selin angry with me?’ He moves abruptly and the bristle of his stubble grazes my ear and makes me shiver.

  ‘Angry? Whatever for?’ he says, reaching for the next bottle of wine and filling our glasses.

  ‘Well, I know it’s really selfish to think this at the moment but I get the feeling she is avoiding me because I was there, wasn’t I? Do you think she … do any of you blame me? Because I’d understand, I would. I’d just rather you didn’t pretend that you don’t.’ I twist round so that I’m looking him in the face, trying to read his thoughts in his eyes. He must be able to read the anxiety on my face as clear as day.

  ‘Jen, no one blames you. Mum and Dad don’t, Selin doesn’t and I certainly don’t. You were trying to help, everyone understands that. You mustn’t think anyone blames you.’ I sigh and turn back to my original position. As the warmth of more wine settles in my stomach, I realise I haven’t touched the pizza.

  ‘I think I blame myself then,’ I say finally and the warmth of my own tears burns my face.

  ‘Oh, Jen,’ Josh says softly, wrapping his arms around me. We sit in peace and I listen to the quiet rhythm of his breathing gradually lengthen. I relax, my tears finally stop, and my body gives in to the strains of the day, my eyes growing heavier.

  Josh has drifted off to sleep, and I carefully take the half-empty glass from his hand and put it on the floor. The video tells me it’s just gone ten. It doesn’t seem fair to wake him, not just yet. Putting my own glass down carefully, I settle back into the crook of his arm and turn my face to the back of the sofa. I’ll just doze here for a bit and then send him home.

  Chapter Forty-four

  A searing pain shooting down one side of my neck and biting into my shoulder wakes me again. For some reason it takes me a couple of minutes to open my eyes, and I wince and straighten my neck out, slightly alarmed by the loud crack it makes. At some point during my nap I have changed position and my head now rests just below Josh’s chin. I look at the video clock. 8.32 – well, that’s not too late then. Except it was ten something when I last looked, which means it’s 8.32 a.m. and not p.m. We’ve managed to sleep on a two-seater sofa, the pair of us, for ten hours. Blimey.

  For several moments I stare at the dim light that has managed to seep through the curtains, then at the cold and congealed pizza, which neither of us touched, on the floor, and then at the video clock again. I have a vague feeling of disconcerted unreality, I can’t believe that it is still possible for so many hours to escape me without my permission. The sort of feeling you get when you really do sleep through your alarm clock for once, or when you really can’t remember what happened the night before, or probably when you have been abducted by aliens and you lose a few hours and gain an implant, that sort of thing. We must both have been tired, very tired. Two adults on a two-seater sofa, ten hours, that’s tired.

  I let myself listen to and be lulled by the rise and fall of Josh’s chest for a few moments more before I gingerly extricate myself from him. The side of my face stings as I sit up and I’m fairly certain that right now I have the perfect imprint of one of his shirt buttons displayed on my cheek. As I carefully slide away from him I notice that I have dribbled on his shirt. Nice.

  Despite my efforts, I fail to not wake him.

  ‘Mmm, c’m’ere,’ he mumbles, maybe not quite awake yet, and with his eyes still closed he grabs my wrist and pulls me back towards him.

  ‘Josh!’ I squeal loudly, afraid that he is dreaming of someone else and that reality will disappoint him and embarrass me. He opens his eyes, blinks at me a couple of times and then a slow smile spreads through the even more stubble that he seems to have accumulated overnight.

  ‘Hello, Jen, sorry about that. What time is it?’

  ‘Morning. That’s what time it is, can you believe that we managed to sleep the whole night on the sofa?’ I want him to be as amazed as I am.

  ‘No way! Well, I did need to catch up on some sleep. The whole night on the sofa? That’s tired.’ He hasn’t let me down. I nod with satisfaction and walk stiffly to the kitchen; a quick stop at the hall mirror reveals my new facial button imprint and an array of sleep creases. That’s it, my skin is officially old. I never used to get sleep creases. Not until this year.

  A few seconds later Josh ambles in after me and we both look stupidly at the kettle as it rattles and boils.

  ‘Shall we go to the Sunshine Café?’ he asks and I nod gratefully, not trusting that I have the hand-to-eye coordination to make a cup of tea myself. I silently slip into shoes and a coat, somehow enjoying my day-old clothes, the hungover buzz between my ears and the easy known-him-for-ever joy of Josh’s company.

  ‘Josh, how do you define being old?’ I ask him as we troop down the stairs. ‘I used to think I’d be able to define it by wages, mortgages, number of kids, that sort of thing. But it occurs to me this morning that I identify it with the fact that my skin no longer has elasticity. I have an old woman’s skin, therefore I am old. I’m suing.’

  ‘Suing who?’ He shakes his head and smiles at me with quiet indulgence.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Boots, Oil of Olay, Clinique, Clarins. The celestial being who decreed that there should be no halcyon time of complexion perfection between spots and wrinkles. That sort of thing.’ Josh holds the external door open for me as I wander out into the damp air.

  ‘I think you’ve got lovely skin. Now see that?’ he nods at one of those telephone terminal things on the street corner. ‘That makes me feel old.’

  I frown. It hurts.

  ‘A telephone terminal thingy?’ I am nonplussed. Maybe he used to harbour a secret wish to become a BT engineer, but now believes the opportunity has passed him by.

  ‘No, not the terminal thingy, those fly posters advertising a new single by a new band.’ I look at the poster featuring an image of a pig’s head on a
doll’s body. It reads ‘Tomorrow Never Comes/Lacklustre’.

  ‘I don’t get it,’ I say. Admittedly this morning I’m not likely to get my own name, but still I want to know.

  ‘No, neither do I. What I mean is, I don’t know if “Tomorrow Never Comes” is the name of the single or the band. I don’t know if “Lacklustre” is the name of the single or the band. I’ve never heard of them, or it, whichever. There was a time, not so long ago, that I would have heard of them before they had heard of themselves. I’d have been at their early gigs. I’d probably have known the bassist. I’d have been their biggest expert fan, until they broke the charts and I ditched them for being too mainstream. Now I know nothing. Not knowing about new music is a sign of being old to me. Not knowing which is the band and which is the title of the single on the fly poster means I’m old.’

  I cover my face with my hands and wail.

  ‘What’s wrong now?’ Joss asks me with mock concern.

  ‘If that’s true, I’ve always been old!’ I cry, peeping out of the corners of my fingers to catch him smiling, taking his play punch on the shoulder like a man. I lean gratefully into his bulk and he swings a friendly arm around my neck.

  A couple of fry-ups and two milky coffees later I look at the grease-filmed clock on the Sunshine Café’s wall and remember that Michael is coming over. I’m overtired, emotionally drained and laden down with saturated fat but even so I think I should probably be feeling a bit more upbeat about his visit than I am. I sigh and drain the last of my coffee.

  ‘I have to go,’ I say to Josh, who for the last five minutes has been quietly attempting and failing to make a roll-up fag.

  ‘Oh, do you? I thought you might fancy a walk in the park after this?’ He finally cobbles together a thin and untidy creation, looks at it and then tucks it behind his ear. I smile to myself and think that an alcoholic weakness-fuelled walk through the park with Josh is just what I would like, safe in the knowledge that we’d make each other giggle, or be happy to be quiet together, that at no point would there be any pressure to feel one way or another or to struggle against some kind of display, no matter how mild, of something approaching Creeping Repulsion. Very many times during my life I have been accused of not picking up obvious warning signs, of sticking my head in the sand but even I, mistress of telling it like I want it to be, can tell; I’m not really looking forward to seeing Michael. I think the precarious reasons I invented not to finish it may just have completely evaporated.

  Either way, I’ve got to see him this morning.

  ‘No, I’ve got to go. I’ve got to meet someone.’

  Josh looks at me for a moment and says, ‘Oh. Well, OK.’ He seems a bit peeved.

  ‘Not a boyfriend or anything,’ I find myself saying. ‘Just a mate. Arranged ages ago.’

  ‘OK,’ Josh says, but I know he has picked me up in a lie and I can tell it bothers him in just the same abstract way that it bothers me. I feel as though I’ve let him down somehow. I push my chair back and stand.

  ‘So, well … tell Selin I love her and to call me if she wants me. And, um, why don’t you come round, you know, any time. Last night was really … well, it was really good to spend time with you. Despite the whole sofa incident.’

  ‘Yes, I will, it was. The sofa incident was the first time I’ve slept since the accident. And thanks, Jen. It’s good to have someone to talk to outside the family. You seem to be able to … well, what I’m saying is you’re a really good mate.’ I can’t help the little warm burst of pride in my chest and I smile shyly.

  ‘Oh well, no problem. So I’ll see you then?’ I sound like a needy girl in search of date two.

  ‘You’ll see me.’ He sounds like a lothario boy already in search of the next date one.

  I leave the café feeling jangled and confused. Josh. Maybe it’s because I haven’t seen that much of him for ages and then when I finally do it’s during a time of grief, of heightened emotions, but something seems to have happened to my perception of him. Now that I’m leaving him a little out of sorts in the Sunshine Café I feel a bit down, almost as if I miss him. I analyse these feelings for a moment longer. They do not compute. It has been a really difficult time recently, we are all jumbled and mixed up. Plus I’m hungover, I’m emotional, I’m almost thirty but still spending time with Josh is so easy. The next time I meet someone who might mean something to me I’m going to go for a bloke a bit more like Josh, I mean really, what more could a girl want? I let myself into the flat and turn on the bath taps. Someone just like Josh maybe, exactly like him. Maybe even Josh, I find myself thinking.

  ‘Jennifer Gillian Greenway,’ I say out loud to myself, ‘this is no time to rekindle an unrequited adolescent crush during a time of extreme emotional upheaval. It would definitely be the most stupid thing you have ever done. Oh, apart from initiate an affair with a teenager.’ As the bath fills I look at myself in the mirror which is clouding over with steam. My face retreats into the mist and with it any sense of self-recognition that I thought I had.

  Lying in the steaming water, I think about the last time I’d just got out of the bath to greet Michael at the door, dressed only in a towel. It seems like years ago, the frenetic rush into sex had seemed like a turning point to me, like a final page ushering me into a new chapter of my life. That weekend had seemed like a release, so why does the prospect of his arrival now make me feel like a prisoner?

  Yet again, I have wet hair and only a towel on when the doorbell rings.

  ‘Déjà vu,’ I mutter to myself as I pick up the intercom.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi, hi, it’s me.’ I buzz him in without speaking and hurriedly rush into my room and pull on my habitual pair of jeans and a jumper, sans underwear but slightly more respectable than just a towel.

  ‘Hello!’ He is panting when he comes through the door and suddenly my bedroom is filled with his large presence. I smile, unable to not be pleased to see him. He strides over and kisses me hard, his tongue taking possession of my mouth and his hands sliding up under my jumper.

  ‘Mmm, damp skin, no bra,’ he says, pushing my jumper up to expose my breasts to the cold air. As he holds the material up under my chin and looks at me I feel a detached, turned-on tingle in my gut, as if I’m watching a film of myself. I let him tug the jumper over my head and pull me on to his lap, watching him suck and kiss my breasts, listening in silence to his sighs and groans, but this time I’m not there with him, I’m far away, my own voyeur, intrigued by how removed I am from the whole process.

  He doesn’t seem to mind or notice my emotional absence and I let him remove my jeans, push an enquiring hand between my legs, flop me back on to my bed and hastily disrobe. I let him cover me with his body and his mouth. By the time he enters me I want sex, but I feel so far away from wanting him that I feel like a stranger in my own bed. He wants to be slow, but my own impatience finally prompts me to engage and I begin to move under him and push him to work faster and faster until I come in a quick aggressive spasm. My sudden apparent ignition of passion pushes him over the brink and he shudders, tenses and relaxes against me. A few seconds pass before he slides out of me and rests his head between my breasts.

  ‘That was fantastic,’ he says.

  I look at the grey sky outside the window and for the first time ever feel the power that comes with using someone just for sex. Immature feelings for Josh aside, I am now certain of how I feel for Michael. He is a wonderful, kind, funny boy, but all I have ever wanted of him has been to cheer me up, has been to turn me round from the gloom of Owen. All I’ve ever wanted is his adoration and his body. I have never really wanted to give him anything in return at all. I have treated him in almost exactly the same way as Owen treated me. Ayla is gone and life is all too short for something as wrong for both of us as this is. For once in my life I have to be decisive, to really do the right thing.

  ‘Michael,’ I say, knowing what I’m going to say, but not sure how to say it.

  ‘Wha
t?’ He raises his head and smiles at me.

  ‘Michael, we can’t see each other any more.’ He sits bolt upright and smiles at me, checking to see if I’m teasing.

  ‘What … What do you mean?’ he asks uncertainly.

  I brace myself.

  ‘Listen, you’re a fantastic person, a wonderful person, but …’ I watch his face begin to crumble but I swallow and carry on. ‘Michael, it isn’t you. It’s the timing. A lot of things have happened to put things into perspective for me. I’ve been lost and lonely and I wanted you to rescue me. That isn’t fair to either you or me. I’m sorry,’ I say and I mean it.

  His slow sweet smile fills his face.

  ‘I don’t mind. I don’t mind. That’s what I’m here for, for you.’ I withdraw my hand from under his and rub my finger across my forehead. I knew that this moment would come all those weeks ago in the Ye Old Parson’s Nose when I agreed to take him home that night. I knew that all the wrong turns I had deliberately made would bring me back here one day. To a place where I have to hurt someone for the sake of not getting hurt myself. The thought that I might have something, no matter how small, in common with Owen makes me wince.

  ‘Michael. I just don’t think we can see each other any more,’ I repeat. His face drops and he blinks hard twice.

  ‘Why not? I mean, we get on OK, don’t we? Is it … is it the sex?’ To have this conversation moments after sex must really hurt him, but I can’t see that delaying it any longer will help. His face is so open and vulnerable that I have to resist the urge just to push real life away once again with all my might in favour of the comfort of pulling him into my arms.

  ‘No! God, no. Sex with you has been fantastic, this morning was fantastic. It just makes me realise even more that I’m with you for the wrong reasons. Great sex isn’t enough. Michael, I’m thirty in a couple of weeks, I need to feel that I’m going forward, even if I’m going forward alone. With you I’m standing still. Standing still in a wonderful, sunny happy place, but standing still.’ I watch his face and search for the right words, some way to end this without hurting him too much. ‘You and I, we just aren’t right. We don’t fit together properly, not in an emotional sense. Every time I see you I have to rationalise what I’m doing. It’s all wrong, and I don’t want that kind of relationship, Michael. I want one that is part of my whole life, not an appendage to it. If I want a relationship at all it’s got to be the sort that will allow me to be myself and be free. Not the kind that’s going to have me worrying about “it” every second of the day. I want one that isn’t a secret from my friends or family, that doesn’t have me pretending to your mum to be a girl from drama club. I think maybe I just need to be on my own for a while.’ I shrug lamely and bite my lip. For the first time in my life I realise that there is no way, no place or circumstance that makes this kind of speech resonate with anything more than hollow regret.