11
All the way to Catherine’s house, I think of Alex. It was much safer when he was a hostile and inconsiderate arsehat, but discovering that under the veneer of a robot is a human being after all, is unnerving. The possibility of Alex being capable of feeling pity and shame raises my own shame and guilt. It makes me hate him even more.
I arrive at Catherine and Richard’s house at ten past six. Their house is a 1960s red-brick semi with two tight parking spaces, one of which is currently empty for me to tuck into. All the lights are on, and heavy curtains are drawn over upstairs windows to block the bedrooms’ view onto the residential road crammed with identical houses.
A part of me wonders whether I should feel discontented with life because I don’t have any of this. A house, a husband and a kid, but when I visualise myself in that alternative reality, I can’t quite see myself there or the man next to me. Even when I was with Aaron and things were good, I didn’t really see us in that future. As much as I’m reluctant to admit it, maybe Aaron was right, and I never gave it my all.
Now, his future is going to look a lot like this, but I won’t be in it. With surprise, I realise that for the first time, it doesn’t hurt. There’s no feeling of betrayal or anger – only relief.
I ring the bell, but instead of Catherine, little Gabby opens the door and immediately jumps into my embrace; I’m the mangrove to her spider monkey. She mumbles Auntie as she detaches herself from me, leaving red-berry stains in the shape of her tiny fingers all over my top. But I’m prepared, and everything I’m wearing is shabby and threadbare, including me.
‘Where’s your mummy?’ I follow her in, hand in hand. Her skin feels warm and sticky as she pulls me in after her.
I abandon all my bags on the floor with a thud and breathe a sigh of relief. I’ve brought some games and sleepover stuff. Because it would be too late to travel home after, we agreed I’d go to work straight from here.
I can’t count how many times I’ve stayed in the tiny spare room overnight. If there’s anything like a home away from home, for the last five years it’s been this house. It’s the place where the three of us, Catherine, Lydia and I, put the world to rights when it seems like it’s falling apart around us. It’s the place I stayed when I found Aaron cheating on me and where Lydia spent a week drinking schnapps and eating Cadbury’s Creme Eggs after her mum died. It feels grounding and uncomplicated compared to my childhood home.
Catherine, rushing from the master bedroom and buttoning her white shirt while closely avoiding Gabby with the ease of an inflatable stick figure, breaks my train of thought. I laugh, and she rolls her eyes, but there’s a serious glint in her look that worries me. I watch as she pecks her daughter on the forehead.
‘Can I show Auntie Bing?’ Gabby asks with poorly disguised hope on her face, and it gets me all over again how much it was great being a kid. All the decisions were made for you, and all you cared about was showing off your favourite toys.
‘Only after you wash your jammy fingers, munchkin,’ I say and pinch her cheek. She rushes off to the kitchen after Catherine nods.
‘You’re a lifesaver.’ Catherine’s dark eyes are too big in her face, like she’s been close to tears this entire time.
‘Hey, what are childless friends for,’ I joke.
‘Holly, I’m so sorry if I upset you earlier.’ She breaks the playful atmosphere.
I interrupt her before she gets into it. I’ve been rehearsing this all the way to her house to make it sound at least semi-convincing. ‘You were right. I don’t know the person Alex has become, and people do change. I’ve certainly changed since I was seventeen. It’s alright.’
She squeezes my hand gently. Sometimes, she’s so sensitive, and I love her even more in that moment.
‘I hope I haven’t spoilt your plans for tonight.’ She bites her lip as she rummages through her bag abandoned on the closest sofa. She takes her purse and a lip balm out of it before she carries on rifling through it.
‘Actually, you were a great excuse to say no to drinks with John and some of the other teachers.’ I admit. ‘I needed to clear my mind anyway.’
She stops going through her belongings for a second and gives me a knowing smile. ‘How was your lunch?’ The grin her face spreads into looks lighter.
She swipes all the stuff on the armrest of the sofa into another bag before resolutely zipping it close. My lips twitch, she’s never been a particularly organised or tidy person.
Shrugging, I park myself on one of the comfy armchairs. ‘Predictable. The sandwich tasted of lies and deceit, the muffin had a hint of self-importance, and the juice was spiked with ill manners. You are what you eat, after all. Or buy what you are in this case.’
Now she has nothing to do, her eyes bore into me with an unblinking directness that forces me to add reluctantly, ‘I must admit it tasted OK. He even got me my favourite sandwich which even my mother gets wrong most of the time. I find it extremely frustrating.’ I sound like a petulant child, but I can’t help it.
‘BLT on seeded bread, no mayo?’ She pauses before she angles her head towards the small footsteps thudding upstairs. Then, her attention falls back on me.
‘That’s…’ she starts, but she must spot the red flags manically waving in my eyes because she restrains herself.
I draw my knees up, wrapping my arms around them in a protective cage. ‘Don’t say that’s nice. I know your default is to always be kind to people and see the best in them. Don’t get me wrong, I love that about you, but I don’t think I can cope with Alex and nice in the same sentence yet. Or ever. He was really awful to me in the toilet, so he bought me lunch to redeem himself, or maybe he just didn’t want me going snitching to Jane that he was unprofessional. Who knows. So now, we’re even-steven. What happened in the past stays in the past. There’ll be no more drama between us. No more Waterloo Road .’
She nods knowingly but can’t help herself and adds, ‘Somehow, I get the feeling Alex and you aren’t finished yet. The past sometimes has a way of leaking into the present.’
‘We both did some awful things ten years ago, and I’m not proud of myself and my actions back then. It’s better if we keep it untouched. We’re not teenagers any more.’
‘It’s not all your fault what happened back then.’ She tries to make me feel better.
‘I know that.’
‘It’s never too late to clear the air. You can’t carry on like this, being at each other’s throats – this is an important year in your career.’
I suppress an unhappy snort. ‘At this point we’d need a catalytic oxidizer to clear the air between us. You forget that to have a reasonable conversation you need two reasonable people who have a common desire to resolve their messy history. We’re beyond explanations; Alex doesn’t care about the past or me so there’s nothing to discuss. We’re just two strangers who happen to share an uncomfortable past and have to learn to navigate the present, that’s it.’
She reads my hurt expression but ploughs through, nevertheless. She must find it important to say the next words because she’s never been the insistent type.
‘I’ve never said this so please let me say it once, and then I won’t speak about it again.’ She tugs at her shirt, belying her confident words. ‘Someone who looked at you the way he did ten years ago doesn’t just forget and move on. He was smitten with you long before he wrote you that first message. He couldn’t keep his eyes off you whenever you were around. I noticed. Vicky did too. That kind of attachment can’t just vanish into thin air. I think he’s only pretending to be indifferent because nobody is completely immune to their first love. The sooner you two get past that, the sooner you can really move on.’
At the mention of Vicky, I can’t help but grimace. After what happened between me and Alex, I always assumed I was a passing fancy to him. The fact that Vicky knew he liked me long before I did is an unwelcome revelation, and I can’t quite fathom why it bothers me so much. It didn’t stop him liking other people at the same time though, I think bitterly.
I know she’s making a valid point, but because I want to make Alex the villain of my story after being decimated by his words in the toilet, I declare defensively, ‘I doubt he’s changed that much. Everyone’s saying that he’s sleeping with the principal and that’s how he got his job.’ I feel a little ashamed of myself for turning into one of the gossipmongers at my school, but I can’t help it.
‘Who’s everyone? John the guy who thinks you’re hot in a quirky way, like a kinky librarian?’ Her comment is infused with amusement.
I slide my hand off my knee and lift it in defeat. ‘OK. I must admit John is not the most reliable person. Last week, I caught him sticking used chewing gum under one of the tables in the staffroom.’
Little feet scatter down the stairs and effectively conclude our conversation. I feel almost relieved.
I laugh hollowly. ‘How have we ended up talking about me again? Aren’t you the one upset?’ We both laugh for real this time.
She stands and picks up her bag. ‘Well, talking about other people’s problems always makes me more objective of mine.’
Gabby bounces into the room with a strange-looking rabbit with a slightly overlarge head and jumps straight into my lap.
After that, Catherine rushes to the conference, leaving me and Gabby to our evening. But before she goes, we hug tightly and don’t let go for a long time. I’ve never been much of a hugger, my family not being a touchy-feely kind, but Catherine is the best hugger there is.
Later, I prepare milk and biscuits for Gabby, and together, we watch an episode of Paw Patrol . I tuck Gabby into bed not long after and mark books until ten thirty. When I get into my pyjamas, I mindlessly switch through programmes until I finally end up playing Return of The Jedi on the Disney Channel.
I get a link for a dating website from my mother that I ignore and a few messages from Vicky that I don’t. She asks me how I am, and for a few minutes, we chat on the phone about nothing. It’s always been so easy with Vicky because she makes me forget about things going on in my life. That is until she asks about Alex and whether there have been any new developments. For the first time, I decide to lie and text, No, we rarely see each other. It’s a big school .
My cheeks heating at my untruth, I realise that I want to keep what happened between me and Alex to myself for a little longer, even though I’m not sure why. The thought scares me because even though I was the one who broke up with Alex via text message without any real explanation and then ignored his pleas to tell him why ten years ago, he was the one who moved on a day later and found the first available female to make up with, effectively breaking my heart. By the time I found out I wasn’t even the only one who he tried it on with, the blood-pumping organ was ground to a pile of ash. Because the truth is I never mattered to him.
Despite all my earlier bravado in front of Catherine and dismissing words, I have not forgotten, nor have I let go of the past.