Beth
Beth
Justin is coming over for dinner. He doesn’t know the significance of tomorrow’s date. But that’s not his fault. The university has done its best to quiet any noise. To pretend the whole thing never happened.
But there was one obstacle in their way. A literal obstacle, namely: the wreck of the building, looming large on the outskirts of campus. Beth had to walk past it once a week to get to one of her lectures.
For months after, she was convinced she could still smell smoke in the air as she approached it.
First, they’d covered it with scaffolding to make it safe. It remained like that for a few months, and then she watched as it was slowly dismantled by men in hard hats who shouted and whistled, leaving only a patch of black scrubland behind them.
Twenty-four students had needed to be treated for smoke inhalation, but only one student had died.
Anna.
Sometimes, Beth imagined the Important People at the university sitting around discussing the fire, saying things like ‘It could’ve been far worse’ or ‘The building was coming to the end of its life anyway’ and praising the quick response time from the emergency services, as though Anna’s death was a bit of a shame, but not all that bad, in the grand scheme of things.
What’s one student death in amongst the twenty-two thousand who are having the time of their fucking lives?
This year, she’s living in a tiny house, which is owned by the university, with just one other girl – Georgia – who’s doing French and Italian and is painfully shy. They lived together last year too, after the fire.
Apparently, Georgia had had some mental health issues in her first term. She didn’t ever clarify what they were and even after months of living together Beth didn’t like to ask. But Georgia had moved out of her halls too, and the university had found this house which was cold and draughty and had a basement full of slugs and here they were, part-way through the first term of their second year, muddling along. An uneasy alliance of headcases.
It must have been difficult to re-house everyone who had been living in Cecil Broad. The university didn’t talk much about that, either.
Beth wondered, sometimes, where they all went. Nearly 400 students lived in that building. But they had all been absorbed, somehow, into the fabric of the city.
She had looked out for Rosa every day, but the only time she’d seen her was in the canteen. Rosa had cut her off completely.
She had never seen anyone else she recognised around campus. Perhaps that was to be expected: after all, she’d barely got to know any of them in the brief time they’d lived there.
It made what happened to her, what happened to Anna, feel insignificant. Perhaps if more people had died, it might have been a bigger thing. Perhaps there would have been more fuss made, more care taken, more explanations given.
Her tutor referred her to the university counsellor, but she only went to one session. How could she explain that, of course, Anna’s death was devastating but what was also devastating were the feelings of survivor’s guilt, and then these other tasteless feelings for Nick? Feelings she wanted rid of but that had nowhere to go.
It made her ashamed.
Especially as Nick had moved on, quite clearly. She ought to do the same.
So she tried. The simplest solution, the easiest distraction, would have been to date Justin. He was always there, after the fire.
But she knew it wouldn’t be right. They remained friends, and he was a good friend to her, despite the fact she knew he wanted more. He was playing the long game.
She was lucky to have him but it niggled at her from time to time: the thought that she wasn’t being fair to him.
‘Maybe we should get out of the city this weekend,’ she says, as they sit together eating pasta in her small kitchen. Georgia is upstairs in her room, as usual. She doesn’t eat in the kitchen. Instead, every night she makes herself a sandwich and takes it up to her bedroom in the attic, closing the door behind her.
Beth has learnt not to take it personally. People have their own ways of coping with life.
Justin forks his pasta.
‘Where do you want to go?’ he says, looking up at her.
‘I don’t know,’ she replies. ‘Anywhere. It’s… it’ll be one year since the fire tomorrow.’
Justin sits back in his chair.
‘Shit, Beth, I’m sorry.’ He reaches a hand out across the table but she doesn’t take it. ‘I forgot. Are you OK?’
Are you OK?
How many times has she been asked that over the past year? On one level, she’s fine. On another, she never will be again.
You can’t fix trauma. That’s the most helpful thing she’s learnt this past year. You can only learn to live with it.
People don’t understand how deeply Anna’s death has impacted her, because she and Anna weren’t friends. Beth barely knew her. But there were so many complicated, entangled threads to the tragedy of Anna’s death, it was impossible not to feel as though she was being strangled by them.
On the darkest of nights, she wished it had been she who had died. And then, the crushing guilt would descend again. How dare she think that?
‘I just… don’t really want to be here tomorrow,’ she says, sighing. ‘I should have thought ahead. Booked something.’ She gives a bitter laugh. ‘A mini-break.’
‘But we have rehearsals tomorrow…’ Justin tails off. ‘Sorry. I mean, of course, that doesn’t matter. Whatever you need to do, we’ll do it.’
She blinks.
‘It’s fine. You’re right,’ she says. ‘Maybe I’ll go to the cinema in the evening or something.’
‘I’ll come with you,’ Justin says, too quickly.
She gives a short nod. Would it be better to be alone? She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know anything.
After all, this is all new to her.
*
After supper, Justin stays to watch a film but at 11 p.m., he kisses her on the cheek and prepares to leave.
‘I can…’ His eyes widen as he lingers on her doorstep. ‘I can stay over if you like? If you don’t want to be alone? Nothing funny…’
She smiles.
‘No, it’s OK. Thanks. I’ll see you at the rehearsal tomorrow.’
He nods and she sees the relief pass over him, ever so fleetingly. He doesn’t have the tools to deal with this either. Why would he? He’s a nineteen-year-old boy and he loves his life. It’s not his tragedy.
She’s alone in it, so totally alone.
‘Bye, Justin,’ she says, and she puts her arms around his neck for a hug. ‘Thank you for always being here.’
When she’s tucked up in bed, in her pyjamas, she picks up her mobile phone to set her morning alarm.
Perhaps she had expected this. Perhaps she had, somewhere, deep inside, hoped that this would happen.
But when she sees his name there, she drops the phone in shock.
Nick.
He’s sent her a message.
Tears fall immediately, and her fingers tremble as she thumbs up to open the message, to read what he wants to say to her.
But there are only three words there.
Are you OK? x
She laughs – an ironic, inappropriate laugh – that this is what he’s chosen to say to her. This , after all this time.
Her fingers tap out a reply on autopilot.
Never been better x
Sarcasm. She looks at the words and then deletes them. She remembers the easy banter they had during those few short weeks before everything went right and then immediately so very wrong.
None of that is appropriate now.
She stares at the phone for the longest time. Wondering what to reply. Whether to be truthful or whether to protect his feelings over hers. Trying to make sense of her feelings. Of what she wants to say to him.
But there’s simply too much and she can’t find a path through the labyrinth in her head.
He’s made her wait a whole year. Perhaps it’s only fair that he should have to wait a little now too.
So, eventually, she places the phone back down on the bedside table. And then she switches off her light and tries to sleep.