Natalie
The only time Josh and I nearly broke up was six months into our relationship. I could say it was the booze’s fault, but really it was mine.
‘I knew you liked her,’ I yelled. We were now in the university courtyard lit by streetlights and surrounded by smokers. Our friends began appearing from the bar, creating an audience for the fight that was about to unfold.
‘Amy, we were only messing about,’ he said with a laugh, and that laugh was like throwing petrol onto a fire.
‘Why don’t you just go out with her then?’ I shouted.
‘Amy, come on. You are drunk and being very dramatic.’
‘Fuck off, pug penis,’ I shouted. I could hear my friend Abi’s distinctive giggle amongst the sniggering behind us.
Josh’s face dropped. My words, cutting right into the sorest part of a man.
I had gone far over the line. He ran off, so I ran off after him.
Well, I tried to. I got to the corner of Cromer Terrace, and then it was my turn to be at a 90-degree angle, and not in a Natalie-sexy-way, but just because I was trying to get my breath back.
Even before his gym obsession, Josh was a speedy guy.
I walked to his house and knocked on the door again and again until his flatmate came out and told me to go away.
Josh ignored my calls and texts for three days after, and it was torture.
I felt disgusted in myself, and I looked disgusting too.
I lived on instant noodles and only left my room for a lecture on density, which I ended up crying in and had to leave.
The nights were the worst. It had been a while since I had slept alone, and the bed felt huge and cold.
All I kept thinking was, if I could go back to that split second before I said ‘pug penis’ and slap, gag, kick myself, to stop the words from coming out, then he would probably be here now.
Lying in my student bed, I was terrified I had fucked it up.
Dad had left Mum that year for Jean-Ivy.
Mum, broken, was offloading on me every day, wiping out my memories and replacing them with stories of ‘what actually happened’.
Turns out Mum had been miserable being Robert Elman’s wife.
My whole life felt like an illusion. The only person who was real was Josh.
He was the one who held me through it all.
He was my rock, and I had smashed him apart, publicly, in the most humiliating way.
On the evening of the fourth day, I was in bed, crying on the phone to Mum.
Her advice was to forget all men, as they will always disappoint you in the end.
But as she talked, a text came through. Josh wanted me to come over to his.
I immediately ended the call and made myself look the best I could.
I was certain he would finish it, so I thought if I got dressed up, then he would have a change of heart.
At every stage of getting to his house, I made a mental note of all the things I did that would be the last as his girlfriend.
This is the last time I’m leaving the house as Josh’s girlfriend.
This is the last time I am cycling as Josh’s girlfriend.
This is the last time I will walk towards Josh’s door.
We sat far apart on the bed, surrounded by his laundry and plates.
I was cross-legged, pulling my shortest skirt down to hide my thighs.
My heels were on the floor. My new look didn’t get the reaction I had hoped for.
The high ponytail and red lips seemed to puzzle him more than turn him on.
Josh was leaning against the wall with his knees up.
He was twisting and turning his striped blue and yellow football sock that needed a wash.
The silence was killing me, so I made the first move.
‘If you’re going to finish it—’
He cut me off. ‘I heard that The George and Dragon is starting a pub quiz next Tuesday.’
‘We could . . . Could we do that?’ He pinged the sock across the room, and it flew and landed sloppily on his Xbox.
‘Yeah, we could.’
And that was that. We never mentioned the ‘pug penis’ incident again, but we did have our first dry spell.
It was three weeks, and I felt so terrible that what I had said had knocked Josh’s confidence.
If he had called me flappy fanny or puffy pussy, I wouldn’t want to take my pants down in front of him again.
The dry patch was broken, thanks to a night of tequila.
As for Natalie, Josh continued to be friends with her like he was friends with everyone, and she carried on shamelessly flirting with him.
I kept all my thoughts about that to myself, only ranting to my lab partner Abi about it.
I was scared to rock the boat again, because I couldn’t think of anything worse than losing Josh.
It was a relief once we graduated, knowing I didn’t have to put up with Natalie.
But as it turns out, there is always a Natalie in some form.
After university, there was Caz, the other bartender at the pub Josh worked in briefly.
She had a tattoo of a tiger on her belly and could open bottles with her teeth.
And then there was Tara on his teaching training course who was, in Josh’s words, ‘fucking hilarious’.
Then there was Jude the English teacher in his first job, who used to ski for Great Britain.
Whenever Josh told me anything about them in his oblivious way, I wanted to shout WHY DON’T YOU JUST GO OUT WITH HER THEN?
But I kept my mouth shut – forever scared of rocking the boat.