by Hazel Hayes
‘I like it when you explain things in easy-to-understand metaphors,’ he says, and I can hear the smile on his lips.
‘I know,’ I say, smiling back in the dark. I hear Theo shuffling to face me. The sheets are scratchy and unfamiliar and I wish we were at home in our own bed.
‘I went out with Darren the other night,’ he says. ‘My mum was doing my head in and I needed to get out of there. But then we got trashed and I felt like shit the next morning. It wasn’t what I needed.’
‘What did you need?’
‘You,’ he says. He sounds frustrated that I didn’t know the answer already.
‘You could’ve called me,’ I say.
‘No, I couldn’t. Not after sending you home from Paris alone. And ignoring you like that. How could I just call and dump all my problems on you?’
‘I would have understood,’ I say. ‘I’m here, aren’t I?’
‘Yeah, I suppose.’
I can feel his breath right in front of my face.
‘I’m sorry,’ I blurt out, as hot tears trickle down my cheek onto the pillow, ‘I am so sorry for hurting you, Theo.’
He pulls me into him and our limbs instantly weave around one another’s like vines growing towards light.
‘I just wanted you to see me,’ I cry into his chest. I can feel him processing this for a little while.
‘I’m sorry you felt like you had to do that,’ he says, brushing the hair back from my face and resting his forehead against mine, ‘and maybe, if I’m being totally honest, I wasn’t really looking for a while there … But I see you now.’ There’s a pause before he adds, ‘Well, not now, obviously. It’s quite dark in here.’
I’m beginning to laugh through the tears when Theo’s hand finds my chin and lifts my face towards his to kiss me. His lips tenuously brush against the outer edges of my own, like he’s making a mental map of my mouth, reacquainting himself with the terrain. He eases me onto my back and climbs gently between my legs and I feel as though he’s discovering me all over again. We make love wordlessly, almost soundlessly, our other senses heightened in the dark, amplifying every movement and sensation. It feels like the first time, but better.
Afterwards Theo lies with his head on my chest and one hand resting on my belly, which rises and falls with my breath. I follow the air as it flows through me – filling me and leaving me empty, over and over – and I sit in the space between breaths, trying but always failing to stay there.
‘The doctor said I should maybe talk to someone about all this stuff,’ says Theo. ‘As in, like, a therapist.’
‘It couldn’t hurt,’ I say. I’ve felt for some time that Theo should try therapy – truth be told, I think everyone should try therapy – but I knew he’d have to reach that conclusion on his own.
‘I have to go back to Paris for another month or so, but I’ll look into it when I get home.’
He’s coming home, I think, and something in me releases, like a fist unclenching.
‘I’d like to see someone again too,’ I say. ‘I feel like the depression might be creeping back in.’ This is a massive understatement, but I don’t want to mention my deep bouts of existential dread right now.
‘All right, angel,’ says Theo, as his fingers idly draw circles around my belly button.
‘I want to be better,’ he adds. ‘I will be better. Because I want you. And I want to make you happy.’
‘How about we make each other happy?’
‘Deal,’ he murmurs into my chest.
‘Also, I’m thinking about quitting my job. To write full time.’
‘Wow. Okay,’ says Theo. ‘If that’s what you want to do, I’m here for you, all the way.’
A few minutes of silence pass. The next time Theo speaks, his voice startles me.
‘Thank you for saving my life today,’ he says, and for a moment I’ve no idea what he’s talking about. Then, like a long-forgotten dream, it comes back to me in fragments; the rain on the windscreen, the loud, popping sound, my knuckles on the steering wheel, that man’s ponytail flapping about in the wind. It doesn’t feel like it happened at all, let alone a few hours ago.
‘I’m glad we didn’t die,’ says Theo through a yawn.
‘Me too,’ I say, and I’m smiling as I drift off.
We stay this way all night, two bodies intertwined in the dark.
La Petite Mort
I saw the Mona Lisa yesterday. I stood in front of her and wept.
For most of the day I’d felt detached, as though I were floating just behind and to the left of myself, observing life rather than living it, and in an attempt to either outrun or catch up with my own mind I had traipsed for hours through the Louvre, aimlessly traversing its labyrinthine interior until I stumbled accidentally across this painting and was suddenly and inexplicably reduced to tears.
I had seen the Mona Lisa before, of course, but only facsimiles of her, and none of them had made me feel like this; even behind a wooden barrier and inches of bulletproof glass, she felt more like a person than a painting. It was like running into an old friend.
Occupying the entire wall opposite her, The Wedding Feast at Cana, a monumental work by any standard, seemed somehow small in her presence; the busy, colourful scene depicting Jesus’s first miracle unable to compete with the unassuming young woman across the way. People lingered there just long enough to be polite before shuffling away from him towards her. They spoke with the kind of hushed reverence reserved only for libraries and church, and all around me couples took it in turns to take photos with her. A scrawny man in a blue parka offered to take one of me but I declined.
My thoughts are interrupted by the sound of seatbelts clanging open, and a chorus of passengers all clamouring to retrieve their luggage from the overhead compartments. An air hostess loudly announces our arrival in Heathrow and, as I step off the plane, she smiles broadly, wishing me a safe and pleasant onward journey. I want to punch her in the teeth.
On the flight back from Paris I was happily trapped in a state of limbo, unaccountable, uncontactable. For ninety blissful minutes I ceased to exist, but now, trudging through Heathrow airport, with a full signal and no missed calls from Theo, reality sets in like milk, slowly souring in my stomach. I consider texting him, just to let him know that I’ve landed, but when I see my last drunken messages to him, I cringe and put the phone away.
I drag my suitcase onto a train with all the enthusiasm of a naughty child being marched to the principal’s office and, once again, I am without signal. As soon as the train surfaces overground, I check my phone. Still nothing from Theo. I’ve been doing this since I left the hotel and it’s beginning to feel a bit masochistic.
A few stops later the urge to call him overwhelms me and I just about manage to call Maya instead. This is our version of the AA sponsor system, except we don’t call one another when we’re tempted to drink, we call one another when we’re tempted to make a desperate phone call or send an angry text to someone.
‘Hey!’ shouts Maya into the phone. I can tell she’s got it wedged between her shoulder and her face.
‘Hey. Is this a bad time?’
‘No, no. Just putting out a small kitchen fire,’ says Maya.
‘Oh. Are you okay?’
‘I’m great!’ she yelps.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Just, fucking, Darren.’ Her voice is strained, like she’s lifting something heavy. I hear the rush of water, followed by an explosive sizzle. Then silence.
‘Where are you?’ asks Maya.
‘On the Piccadilly line.’
‘I thought you were coming home next week,’ she says.
‘So did I.’
I can tell I have her full attention now.
‘What’s happened?’
‘I fucked up,’ I say, fighting the urge to cry. ‘I really fucking properly fucked up.’
‘Okay, well,’ and I hear her inhale deeply before ploughing through this next part, ‘I’ve just made a cotta
ge pie, from scratch, for Darren, because his mum used to make him cottage pie, but she’s dead now, so she can’t do that any more, and apparently the mantle falls to me because I was bequeathed the bloody recipe, but he forgot we had plans and pissed off down the pub instead, so would you like to come over and tell me exactly how you fucked up and also eat some of Darren’s dead mother’s cottage pie?’
‘Yes,’ I say, as tears break free and stream down my cheeks, ‘I really would.’
A man sitting across from me averts his eyes, like me crying is somehow offensive to him. I throw a pointless scowl in his direction.
‘All right, pull yourself together,’ says Maya. ‘I’ll see you soon.’
By the time I get to Maya’s apartment, order has been restored to her kitchen. The whole place is immaculate in fact. I try to neatly stack my handbag, suitcase and coat in a little pile by the door, but Maya scoops them up and whisks them off to another room without saying a word.
‘It smells great,’ I call after her.
‘I know!’ says Maya, re-entering the room. She stands with her hands on her hips and a look of utter exasperation on her face. We stare at one another for a while, both nodding sympathetically, then we each take a deep breath and sigh it out in unison.
‘Wine?’ she asks.
‘Obviously.’
Maya and I talk the whole way through dinner, but she knows better than to mention Theo until I’m properly fed and watered. Instead she tells me about the new bakery on the corner, a subpar salad she had for lunch yesterday, her mother’s upcoming knee surgery, and the dilemma over whether to paint the living room coffee, oatmeal or biscuit. I also get the full story about Darren, which she tells me in one long, frazzled sentence. I struggle to keep up at times, but the short version is that Darren accidentally double-booked himself tonight and he didn’t want to let his friend down, so he called Maya to cancel on her, thinking she’d understand.
‘I was mid-pie at this point,’ she says, ‘and I got pretty upset, and he said he’d have some when he got home later, and I told him that wasn’t the point, and he asked me not to make him choose between me and his friends, and I told him not to be so fucking dramatic, and he said I was the one crying over a pie, and I hung up on him.’
‘Wow,’ I say.
‘I called him back of course. To apologise for hanging up on him.’
Without realising, I’ve started crying again.
‘Oh my God, what’s wrong?’ asks Maya.
‘It’s just. You had plans. He forgot. You made a pie. He didn’t appreciate it. So neat. So simple.’
I’m speaking through sobs, like an upset child.
‘He’ll come home,’ I continue, ‘and you’ll make up. And everything will be great again. Because you two are great together. You’re just. Fundamentally. Fucking. Great.’
‘Say great again,’ says Maya, and I laugh through my tears.
‘Are you all right?’ she asks, frowning at me.
‘No.’
‘Okay,’ she says, ‘what the hell happened in Paris?’
I arrived at Theo’s hotel on Wednesday afternoon. I was a little earlier than expected, but rather than call him and ruin the surprise, I decided to wait in the lobby until he got back from work. I didn’t mind, there were comfy armchairs and I’d brought a good book with me, so I settled in. I got chatting to the waiter – a lanky Spanish teenager named Donato, who fidgeted constantly and insisted I call him Donny. He told me he was working here part-time while he studied hospitality management. I told him I’d just flown in from London to surprise my boyfriend, who I hadn’t seen in over a month, and upon hearing this, Donny clasped his hands together and practically cooed at me. Then he took it upon himself to refill my tea all afternoon. He even stopped by from time to time with a tray of tiny complimentary cakes.
Two pots of tea and around six tiny cakes later, I was beginning to worry that Theo was out for the evening, when I finally saw him walk through the hotel’s huge revolving doors. I giddily gathered up my things and, as I made my way to where he stood by the lifts, I noticed there was a woman with him. She was wearing a crisp white blouse and grey pencil skirt with a pair of black stiletto heels. They looked positively torturous.
It was too late to turn back so I tapped Theo on the shoulder and in my most obnoxious French accent said, ‘Excusez-moi, où est la bibliothèque?’
The lady regarded me with a half smile and a cocked eyebrow. Theo turned toward me and I smiled cheekily, but instead of smiling back he just stood there, gawping at me like a dead trout.
‘So … you don’t know where the library is,’ I said, and the lady laughed. Theo appeared to be rebooting.
‘Oh for heaven’s sake, Theodore,’ she said, only she pronounced his name with a soft, French ‘r’, which made it sound far more sexy than I ever could.
‘Sorry, Sophie,’ he said, snapping out of it as he turned to me. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Surprising you,’ I said.
‘More like shocking the hell out of him,’ said Sophie, with a smirk. At this moment I remembered Theo telling me about the brilliant French woman in charge of the new Paris office and I realised this must be her. I extended a hand and introduced myself, saying I’d heard a lot about her.
‘All good things, I hope,’ said Sophie, shaking my hand firmly.
‘No,’ I said, ‘really horrific things, actually. Couldn’t possibly repeat them.’
Sophie cackled. Theo looked like he might actually pass out.
‘I like this one,’ she said to Theo. ‘You should keep her.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, laughing awkwardly.
Just then, the lift doors opened with a ping.
‘So lovely to meet you,’ said Sophie, sashaying into the lift. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a hot date with a bubble bath.’
We said goodbye and as the doors slid closed she called out to Theo, ‘Get that poor girl a drink!’
I notice Maya is staring at me, her face fixed in a grimace.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘Is he having an affair with Sophie?’
‘She’s his boss,’ I say.
‘So?’
‘She’s like, fifty.’
Maya takes a sip of wine and throws her eyes sideways.
‘They’re not having an affair, Maya.’
‘Fine,’ she says. ‘Then what the fuck was his problem?’
I shake my head.
‘I don’t know. He kept saying he missed me, and he couldn’t wait to see me,’ I say, like I’m retracing my steps after losing something. ‘He was the one who suggested I come visit, so I don’t get it.’
Maya mulls this over for a moment.
‘One Christmas,’ she says, finally, ‘my brother got a brand-new BMX bike. He’d been banging on about that bike all year. All, bloody, year. And then when he got it he was so overwhelmed by emotion that he just short-circuited. He was catatonic for about fifteen minutes actually, it was really weird. Anyway, this reminds me of that.’
‘Am I the bike in this analogy?’ I ask.
‘Yes,’ she says.
‘Right.’
‘So what happened next?’
Theo and I went to the bar for a drink, and although it seemed less like he wanted to have a drink with me and more like he was obeying Sophie’s command, I was glad to finally be alone with him. When Donny came by to take our drinks order, I introduced him to Theo and we shared a joke about all the cake I’d had that afternoon. As he walked away, Theo turned to me and said, ‘How do you do that?’
‘Do what?’ I asked.
‘Make friends with everyone you meet,’ he said, with a sort of incredulity.
‘Is that a bad thing?’
‘Just an observation,’ said Theo, shrugging it off and changing the subject to work.
He came alive when he talked about work, telling me all about the plush new Paris office with a view of the Eiffel Tower, and the keen young team of recruits he’
d been brought here to train. It was refreshing to see Theo this passionate about something, especially when he’d been so apathetic lately. It reminded of times, early on in our relationship, when he would gush about the plans he had for us – the places we’d go, the house we’d settle down in, the names we’d give our children. The memory brought with it a remnant of hope, like a bittersweet aftertaste in the back of my mouth.
‘I’ve learned so much teaching them,’ Theo went on, ‘and I’ve got ideas for a whole new training programme. Sophie wants me to meet with the other execs here next week.’
I was immensely proud of him, and I wanted to see him succeed here, but the subtext was clear; he wasn’t coming home any time soon.
‘That’s wonderful news,’ I said, clinking his glass with mine. ‘Congratulations!’
‘Thank you!’ he beamed.
‘How much longer do you think you’ll be here then?’
‘Another month or two. Maybe more. That’s okay, right?’
I didn’t know if that was okay. It certainly didn’t feel okay. Suddenly my ribcage seemed to squeeze inward and my heart began pounding back in protest.
‘Work is work,’ I said, ignoring my inability to breathe, ‘and you seem happy here.’
‘I am,’ said Theo, as Donny arrived with our drinks.
I had wanted Theo to tell me that he missed me too, or that he was just as happy at home as he was here. I wondered if he wasn’t saying those things out of forgetfulness or because he didn’t want to be dishonest.
Why was I finding this so hard, I wondered. We had lived long distance before – him in London and me in Dublin – and we’d made it work. But back then we talked for hours every night and Theo would text me all the time just to tell me he was thinking about me. Lately I was lucky to get a reply or have more than a five-minute conversation with him. Even when we did talk it wasn’t us talking, it was me nattering on while he grunted the odd response. I could handle the physical distance as long as we were emotionally close and vice versa, but not both at the same time.
