Jacob
‘You’re drunk.’ Olivia snorted.
drunk.’
‘Can we not both be drunk at the same time?’ Olivia’s scowling face reminded him of a wrinkled baby. He was about to tell her so when he decided otherwise. A comment like that could ruin a perfectly brilliant evening.
‘You do make a lot of sense, a lot of the time.’
‘A lot of the time? You mean, all
of the time.’ Olivia wrapped her arms around herself, unsuccessfully hiding her shivering body.
‘For the fifteenth time, woman, do you want my top? Because I’ll let you have it.’ He began unbuttoning his shirt, his fingers struggling to coordinate properly. ‘Olivia Jackson, you can have the shirt off my very back if you want!’
A young couple walking past them began to laugh.
‘Jacob, for Christ’s sake, will you please keep your clothes on.’
‘You’ve changed your tune.’ He raised his eyebrows and
stopped dead in his tracks. ‘Because that is not what you were saying last night.’
‘Oh my god.’ The horror on her face made his heart stumble over itself. ‘Will you be quiet
.’
‘Never! You can never silence me.’
Olivia pulled at his hand and tried to drag him along, but he was too heavy, and she was unsteady on her feet.
‘Come sit with me for a second.’ He plonked himself down on the damp sand. ‘I love watching the ocean, especially at night.’
He could see the ‘no’ making its bid for freedom from her mouth.
‘I know you have to be up early for your flight tomorrow; I just want a couple of minutes. That’s all. I promise.’
‘OK, fine.’ She came and sat next to him, snuggling her body close to him.
Her hair shone white in the moonlight; her skin prickled with goosebumps. She looked ethereal, almost ghostly. Like she belonged to a world other than his, which deep down he’d known all along to be true.
Sorrow pooled in his stomach, and his breath caught in his throat.
‘What time do you fly tomorrow?’
‘Around nine thirty, I think.’
‘You think
?’ He nudged her softly.
‘Fine. I leave Goa at nine forty and then fly from Delhi to Heathrow at one twenty.’
‘There we go, planned to a tee.’
‘What can I say? It’s my superpower.’
‘And are you ready to go back? To unleash your powers of organization on the miserable, soul-destroying western world?’
‘Kind of. It will be nice to see everyone and get into a
routine again, but I reckon it’s going to feel strange for a while.’ She dropped her gaze to the floor. ‘Stranger than I thought, anyway.’
‘That’s because you’re used to the beach and yoga life now. In a few days, though, this will all feel like a distant memory.’
And so will I.
The thought brought with it a deep sadness, but also an element of relief. Who had he been kidding the past couple of days? This wasn’t his life. It was never supposed to be his life.
‘I don’t think so.’ She rested her head on his shoulder. ‘How could I ever forget this?’
‘It was a pretty good dinner, if I say so myself.’
‘You know what I mean.’
‘I suppose they do have yoga back in London.’
‘Jacob
…’
‘I know.’ His voice was small, his body contracting. If he folded in on himself enough, would he be able to disappear, to avoid dealing with the question he knew was coming? He could feel it waiting to jump from her lips: the question that would ruin everything.
‘Why don’t you come back with me?’
The words were out; the bomb had been dropped.
‘I mean, I’m not going to say no to a sleepover.’ He laughed loudly. Falsely. ‘But I thought you had to be up early tomorrow?’
‘Not tonight
, Jacob.’ Her deep blue eyes locked on to his. ‘I mean to London. Come back to London with me.’
Silence. Deadly, crushing silence that seemed to suck the very air from his lungs. This was his fault. This was all his fault.
‘I can’t.’ He spoke at last. ‘You know I can’t do that.’
Her face crumbled. ‘Why not?’
Jacob dropped his head to his hands and clawed his fingers against his skull. He didn’t know what was worse: the disappointment in her words, or the devastation that was raging like a wild beast inside him.
‘I mean, it doesn’t have to be for long,’ she continued. ‘You could come and stay for a few days, catch up with people from home, and then go back on your adventures again?’
The hope in her voice was unbearable. It reminded him of how foolish he’d been.
How he too had allowed himself to be caught up in the dangerous clutches of dreaming.
The fantasy he had been playing out in his mind, the fairy-tale ending that felt so close and so very real, was crumbling down around him.
He had to face the consequences; there was no other choice.
‘Jacob? Say something, please.’
End it.
End it now.
His thoughts pulled him back to earth so fast he felt whiplashed.
‘Because that’s not what I do
any more, Olivia.’ His voice was firm and strong. ‘I don’t go back. Not for anything.’ He paused, waiting just a moment longer before delivering the final blow. ‘And not for anyone.’
The finality of his words punctured both of their hearts.
‘I see.’
‘I’m sorry.’ He ran his hands through his hair. ‘I really am.’
How had he created such a mess? This was supposed to be a nice evening. A fun
evening.
‘Oh God no, I’m the one that should be sorry,’ she spat,
her voice sharp and venomous. ‘I was the one who forgot that you’re going to play pretend for the rest of your life, avoiding everything and everyone
who takes you back to reality.’
‘Please don’t be like that.’
‘Like what? Like a normal person living in the real world? Like an adult taking responsibility for their life instead of letting a pair of dice decide their every move?’ She shifted away from him, the swell of emotion carving a divide between them.
‘Should I buy a house? Should I get married? Oh, how many kids should I have? I know, let me roll the dice and see. Woops, it’s an even number so, sorry, not going to happen this time. ’
The sarcasm was cutting, the contorted look of disgust on her face heartbreaking, but he held firm. She was angry, and she had every right to be. After all, he had brought this upon himself.
‘Can’t you see it’s pathetic
, Jacob? It’s pathetic and childish. When are you going to wake up and become an adult?
’ Her fists were clenched so tightly that the veins on her hands were popping out.
‘God, I don’t know how I let you convince me that you were anything other than idiotic, inconsiderate and completely and utterly selfish
.’
Selfish.
He knew he shouldn’t react, that he didn’t deserve
to react, but something inside him snapped, and before he knew what was happening, he started to laugh. Quietly at first, then gradually louder and louder, until his whole body was shaking with the force.
‘What?’ She slammed her hands down on to the sand. ‘What is so fucking funny
?’
‘You!’ he cried, unable to hold it in any longer. ‘You and
your notion of what everyone else should be doing with their lives, when you’re barely living your own.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘You sit there and preach to me about growing up and being responsible, but who says having a house and kids, and a marriage where two people never speak and probably end up divorcing and hating the sight of each other, makes you responsible? You live your life based on what society thinks you should do. What other people say is the right way to be. What’s wrong with doing it differently? What’s wrong with doing what I
want to do with the time I
have left on this planet?’
‘Time left?’ She looked incandescent, his words pouring oil on an already raging fire. ‘Don’t you dare talk to me about time left. My sister had no time. She had no time
.’
‘Yeah, and I bet she tried to live more than you ever will with how much time you have left.’
He was in dangerous territory now, but even if he wanted to, he knew he couldn’t stop.
‘It’s only because of her that you’re even here.
If she hadn’t died, I reckon you would have happily just spent your days clocking up more hours sitting in your office, working yourself to the bone.
Earning money that you have no time to spend, unless it’s to buy heaps of shit that you never get to enjoy, giving half of it away to a government that quite frankly doesn’t care about you in the slightest – as long as you’re paying for them to live their wonderful lives – until you finally retire and realize you don’t have anything else to talk about except how much you miss work, or how your body is breaking down because you’ve put it through so much stress it’s forgotten how to function. Am I right?’
Olivia’s face was mutinous.
‘Fuck you, Jacob. Fuck you and your simplistic view of the world.’
She practically jumped from the ground.
‘You sit there passing comment on my life. Judging
my life so harshly. And yeah, maybe I do spend too much time at work, and maybe I do earn more money than I need but those taxes that I give away so foolishly? The money I naively
hand over to the government? That money goes towards paying nurses and doctors, and running the hospitals that tried to save my sister’s life. In fact’ – she pointed her finger in his face – ‘they did
save her life, over and over again. So yes, I may be boring and a sheep, but at least I have family and friends and people who are there for me when I need them. People who stay around long enough to care about me and my life.’
Tears were streaming down her face, her tiny frame physically shaking with anger.
At him.
All because of him.
‘I’m sorry.’ He went to reach for her, to take his cruel words and stuff them back inside his mouth. ‘I didn’t mean anything about your sister, you know I would never—’
‘Save it,’ she hissed. ‘I don’t need your apologies and take-backs now. In fact, I don’t need anything from you, ever again. Have a nice life, Jacob, wherever the hell you end up.’
And without even a backwards glance, she left him, running off down the beach, swallowed by the darkness.
‘Fuck!’ He screamed, tensing his entire body and allowing the pain that had been building inside him to surge to the surface. ‘Fuck!
’
He shouted until his throat was hoarse and the sound no
longer came, emptied of everything except the sickening vortex of guilt and rage that swirled inside him.
Jacob reached into his pocket and felt for the dice. He wanted to throw them, hurl them into the ocean and never see them again. His two trusted companions were supposed to keep him safe. To keep everyone
safe – from him. What good had they done?
He raised his hand in the air.
One simple move and they would be gone.
But he wouldn’t. He knew he couldn’t.
He laid his weary body back down on the sand. The sky was achingly beautiful with its canvas of stars.
‘I’m sorry, Olivia.’ He began to sob. ‘I’m so, so
sorry.’