Chapter Fifty-Five
‘You don’t need to worry about this picture,’ I say for about the tenth time while Romy and I are in my galley kitchen.
I’m making coffee, when what I really want to do is sleep.
I’ve been on the night-shift. I feel so broken.
I need sleep, not caffeine. ‘You don’t need to worry about Aury or me. Or anything.’
‘Aury,’ Romy says and rolls her eyes while she does so. ‘Why do you call her that?’
‘It just stuck from day one.’
‘Well, it’s pathetic,’ Romy says. ‘How you fawn all over her is pathetic.’
Oh, Jesus! It’s going to be that kind of argument.
‘I never see her,’ I say in my defence, but I know it’s falling on deaf ears.
The front door sounds and Ben walks into the flat, looks from me to Romy and back again. ‘Everything all right?’ he asks tentatively, shrugging off his jacket and draping it over an arm.
‘Yeah,’ I say stiffly.
‘OK,’ Ben replies uncertainly.
‘Where have you been?’ I ask, mainly because I want to slow Romy down for a moment. Even she won’t yell at me while Ben’s standing right there.
‘Ben,’ she asks, ‘I know it’s your flat, but could you give us a moment, please?’
‘Er, yeah …’ Ben says in surprise and looks longingly at the coffee machine. ‘I was sort of hoping I could …’ Then he sees Romy’s expression. ‘Do you know what? I’ll go back to the station and grab one from the café there.’
‘Take mine,’ I tell him and Ben takes it gratefully and makes a beeline for his bedroom down the corridor, like it’s an escape route. I hear his door close quietly.
‘We’ve made Ben lock himself in his room in his own flat.’
‘It’s your flat too. You’re allowed to have a discussion with your girlfriend in the kitchen without being interrupted,’ Romy replies.
I think she’s missed the point. I need to wrap this up.
‘Romy, what is it you want to achieve from this discussion?’
Her eyes widen and her mouth drops open. That was definitely not the right thing to say. Or in the right tone of voice. I’ve messed up.
‘What I mean is …’ I start.
‘Tell me you love me,’ she states.
‘Who … what?’
‘You don’t say it.’
Flashbacks to this very same argument with Liv rush into my head.
‘Yes, I do.’
‘No.’ Romy’s firm on this. ‘You don’t. Not like I want it.
I say it. You say it back, but it’s automatic.
It’s not real. You never say it first. Tell me now.
Tell me you love me, and that I’ve got nothing to worry about.
Tell me you love me so much you might want to marry me.
Tell me you might want children with me.
For fuck’s sake. How long are we going to do this?
Tell me something – something I can hold on to.
Tell me something that makes me not worry about this picture, about how you’re holding Aurora.
About how she’s holding you. About why you look so perfect together.
And I’m there, in the picture, watching and smiling like an idiot when the man I love is clearly in love with someone else. ’
‘I’m not.’ But as I say it, I know it’s a lie. It’s a lie. I don’t know what to do. I feel trapped in this discussion. Romy is great. She’s fun. We get on. We fit. I’ve always said that. I panic. ‘I love you,’ I go on, but I don’t think I mean it, although I could mean it. One day.
Romy’s shoulders drop away from her ears. I’ve earned some kind of reprieve, but I realise it’s temporary as she starts up again. ‘But this picture?’ she begins and then continues, wearing me down.
I can’t keep hearing the same thing over and over again. I’m so tired. I need sleep. I can’t remember what day it is. I can’t remember when I’m next back at work. I can’t even remember my own name.
Why am I fighting Romy about Aury? What are Aury and I to each other?
We go from best friends to absolutely nothing.
We go back and forth and, as the years go by, I wonder if I should just give up holding out hope.
I can’t have Aury anyway. I’m not allowed.
It’s so pointless hankering after someone I can’t have.
It doesn’t stop me doing it, though – a fact Romy clearly spotted, through ‘photographic evidence’ that simply shows two people blinking at the same time.
If it wasn’t for that, it would still be well hidden.
‘You’re in love with her,’ she says simply when she’s finished telling me everything that’s wrong with me.
And round and round we go, deeper and deeper into an argument that I’m not going to win – an argument I have no right to win.
I’m so worn down and the moment I say this, it’s all over.
I deserve to lose Romy. She’s too good for me.
She deserves someone better. And as she keeps talking, keeps telling me that I’m not present enough in our relationship, I look into her eyes and say what she wants to hear so badly, but doesn’t want to hear.
‘Yes. All right. I’m in love with Aury.’
Romy looks so triumphant that she’s got me to admit it, it’s like the reality of what I’ve said hasn’t sunk in for a few moments. When it does, she bursts into tears.
I’m a shit. I’m an absolute shit. I was a shit boyfriend to Liv and I was a shit boyfriend to Romy, and I’m destined to be a shit boyfriend to anyone else who has the misfortune to stumble into my path.
Perhaps it’s good that Aury and I will never happen.
I need to stay away from women. I only hurt them.