Chapter 34 Flynn
Five Years Ago
Tanya is sitting in the hallway of her house when I knock. It’s strange because I can see her there, legs stuck out, back against the wall, but she doesn’t respond when I ring the bell. I phone her and I see her silhouette move, lift something, stare at it and place it back down. I phone again. She repeats, only this time she presses something and I am sent straight to answerphone. Frowning, I bend down, lift the letterbox and say her name.
She says ‘Shit!’ and scrambles up.
My frown deepens. What has happened? This is not at all how I imagined this would go. She doesn’t even know I’m coming over this evening.
It takes her ages to open the door and the suspense is making my nerves jangle more. I know I need to get in and out and make a clean break of it. It’s better for everyone if I do this quickly, succinctly and promise to stay friends. It’s been almost a year; I don’t want an anniversary to remind me why I know I need to end things. We’re not right together.
She’s been crying.
This is not good news, because I was fairly sure what I was psyching myself up to say all the way over here was going to make her cry. So, I will be making a crying person cry more, which makes me feel even worse than I already do.
She must know it’s coming, though. We have barely spoken in the last few weeks. She has ghosted most of my messages, she has avoided phone calls, she cancelled this evening at the last moment with the most absurd excuse (she hurt her foot in the gym earlier).
I feel like she wants me to do it.
And as much as I want a relationship, as much as I hate the idea of being on my own again, I know this isn’t it. That she isn’t the person I’ve been waiting my whole life to meet. My memories of that kind of love are fleeting, but the feeling I get when I picture Dad, the way he held Mum and me, the way he looked at her, those feelings are intense and real and my whole body craves the person that will make me feel like that. I know it’s rare. Mum never had it with Patrick despite the big showy pretence: the long holidays, the renewal of vows, the gushing speeches at birthday parties. When Dad rested a hand on the small of her back she leaned into him like she couldn’t not.
So I know I have to do this: I have to break up with her. She’s pretty and my friends think she’s fun, she is fun. Her insecurity can be touching. I get it, I want reassurance too: I just never ask directly for it. She isn’t sure what she stands for, and I’m already half lost. But mostly I don’t want to be with someone who will contort themselves into something else for me, or for friends; I can’t be with a liar, even if they’re small lies, white lies. I can’t be with another me. ‘We’re late because of the traffic’ (there was no traffic, we were arguing and she had to reapply her make-up), ‘I told you I went out with him!’ (two minutes after telling me she had never met him), ‘I love action movies’ (our first date! She hates action movies). She isn’t sure what she stands for, and neither am I. Her truth rests on shifting sands and I feel unstable.
I want someone to stand for something. I want someone who knows who they are. I will know who it is when I find her.
‘How’s the foot?’ Maybe I’m wrong about the foot excuse, and that’s why she’s crying. I feel a flicker of guilt, ‘Are you in pain?’
Tanya looks at me as if I have two heads and then clearly remembers what she told me. I chalk it up to another small lie. She’ll say it’s harmless, better than telling me she just wasn’t in the mood to see me, but it solidifies the knowledge of what I want to do.
‘I wanted to see you,’ I say, taking a breath.
She glances at her phone again and I frown, wondering for a moment what has caused the strange expression on her face.
She really does look distressed.
‘I—’ I stop, realizing I can’t do this tonight. That it would be cruel. I might not cry, but I hate to see others hurting like this. I won’t ask what’s wrong; that isn’t my area of expertise. I cast about for something to lighten the mood, distract.
She cuts me off, not meeting my eye, and the words are so quiet I almost miss them.
‘I’m pregnant.’
‘Let’s turn that frown ups— what?’ My words screech to a halt.
‘I’m pregnant.’
I blink twice, three times. The door to the house is still open and a gust of cold wind swirls around us; the door bangs shut and I jump.
Holy shit.
Everything I was thinking about on the tube on the way over here disappears in a puff. All the overlapping thoughts in my head are silenced by this one sentence. Barely three words.
They change everything.
Where a few hours ago I was sure of my path, what I was going to do and why I was going to do it, now everything is topsy-turvy.
Tanya is going to have my baby. I won’t be listing the many reasons we’re not compatible, I won’t be seeing myself out. Tanya is pregnant and in that moment everything else melts away. Everything else feels surmountable. Because it has to be. Tanya is pregnant and there is no way I am going anywhere.
My shoulders straighten as she starts to sob, her body turning towards me. I shush her and step forward.
‘Hey, it’s OK. It’s OK. That’s a good thing, a good thing.’
Her chest heaves.
‘Hey, come here, come here. Stop, it’s OK.’
She closes the gap between us.
A baby.
As I glance in the hall mirror and circle her body with mine, I feel a strange jolt. Because for a second I see a flash of my own father looking straight back at me. Then he’s gone. And I am left.
And this baby will know their father. This baby will be so loved.
‘Ssh. It’s a good thing.’