Chapter 34
Dear Adam
My fiancée and I have been together for four years. We really love each other and we’re excited about getting married and starting a family. There’s just one problem and I’d like you to tell me how major it is. I don’t earn lots of money – in fact, I earn minimum wage. I’m a teaching assistant in a school for children with special needs and I totally love the work – feeling like I’m making a difference to the kids means the world to me.
The money thing has never been a problem between me and my fianceé, apart from, obviously, that things have been quite tight recently, because she’s been studying full time. But now she’s finished her law degree and she’s got a training contract at a massive firm. I’m proud of her, of course – her career is on a great track and in a few years she’ll be earning good money.
And that’s my problem. I’m worried that when she’s working all day with men in fancy suits driving fancy cars, she’s going to start looking down on me and thinking I’m not pulling my weight financially and I’m somehow less of a man because of it.
What should I do?
Yusuf, Birmingham
‘Do you want the window seat or the middle?’ I asked, hefting my luggage into the overhead locker.
‘Don’t mind.’ Ross slotted his bag in next to mine. They looked good together, I thought – two battered nylon backpacks with no pretensions to style. I imagined them being friends already, looking forward to more adventures together. ‘You choose.’
‘I don’t mind either.’
‘You take the window, then. Window’s best.’
‘If you like it best, you have it.’
‘But I genuinely don’t?—‘
‘Excuse me please,’ snapped a woman behind us. ‘Some of us would like to sit down, even if you don’t.’
Apologising profusely, we slid into our seats, waiting until the woman had disappeared down the aisle before we allowed ourselves to giggle. Somehow, in the commotion, Ross had ended up in the window seat.
‘Why don’t you move to the outside in a bit,’ he said. ‘Then you can move back if there’s someone else in our row, and otherwise we’ll have more room.’
‘But then how will I hold your hand if I get scared?’
‘You don’t get scared on flights, do you?’
‘Not really. Only climbing down ladders in the dark.’
We looked at each other and smiled, already taking pleasure in the shared memory of the first time he’d touched me. I thought of building more memories together, and wondered whether there’s eventually be so many that one would be forgotten. I hoped it wouldn’t.
But the idea gave me a little lurch of fear, as if the plane was already airborne and going through a patch of turbulence. Where was this going? Where would it end? I liked Ross; as far as was possible, I trusted him. But what did I know? He was a man, and I didn’t have a clue about men.
It could all unravel, and I could end up being hurt. And I knew already that the hurt I’d suffered over Kieren would be nothing compared to how I’d feel if things went wrong with Ross, because my hurt then had been largely down to my having been used, made a fool of, let myself imagine something that hadn’t ever really been there.
What was going on with Ross felt real. I felt far more vulnerable than I had with Kieren. I cared; I wanted it to work. And I was scared.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked. ‘You look like someone just asked you to climb down a ladder in the dark.’
‘I kind of feel that way, to be honest. Like I don’t know what’s at the bottom. You know – with us.’
Was it even okay to talk about ‘us’ already, after just one night together? Was I building up a fantasy relationship the way I had with Kieren, with someone who thought what we’d had together had just been a bit of fun, two people who vaguely liked each other finding themselves together in a foreign city and hooking up?
‘Maybe lose the ladder analogy,’ he suggested. ‘It’s not exactly encouraging, is it?’
‘I mean, worst case scenario at least you find yourself with your feet on the ground,’ I joked.
‘Still, though. I reckon it’s more like climbing a mountain. You don’t know what you’ll see when you get to the top, but there’ll probably be an amazing view, and more places to explore.’
‘To explore together?’
He smiled. ‘I hope so. I don’t want to rush you, Lucy. But we like each other. I think this could be good. I’m – quietly confident.’
‘Even though I don’t understand men?’
‘Hey, don’t diss yourself. I’ve been reading Ask Adam every week for the past four months and I reckon you understand men a lot better than we understand ourselves.’
‘Maybe that was just GenBot 2.0.’
‘It wasn’t. Not the good ones, anyway. Those were you.’
‘Ross? Can I ask you something?’
‘Sure.’
‘What happened with you and Bryony?’
Now, for the first time since – well, since before what had happened between us happened – Ross blushed. I wasn’t sure what to make of that – had I lost the power to make him do that, but Bryony still had it?
But he said, ‘Oh God, Lucy. Not my finest hour, if I’m honest.’
I looked at him, waiting for him to carry on.
‘I mean, it was just a casual thing. I didn’t think anything would come of it, after – you know. After your sister’s hen night. But then we started seeing each other.’
I nodded. What if I’d got it all wrong, Ross was devastated by Bryony ending their relationship, and I was just a quick rebound fling? In front of me, I could see the last few people straggling on to the plane and taking their seats – if what he was about to say wasn’t what I wanted to hear, it was too late for me to run away.
‘We started seeing each other, after that,’ he went on. ‘It was just casual, really. On my side and on hers also. If I’m honest I kind of expected it to peter out after a few dates. And then I wrote that thing to Adam, so see what you’d say if you knew how I felt about you.’
‘And I didn’t say anything,’ I remembered. ‘I got the AI to write back, because I didn’t know what the answer was. I’d promised her I’d put in a good word with you, and I guess I never got around to doing that either.’
‘But when you didn’t – I mean, when I didn’t get the answer I hoped I’d get from Adam, I let it carry on. I shouldn’t have done that. I knew she and I weren’t right for each other. But it just seemed easier, somehow. Easier than telling you properly how I felt, and easier than ending it with her.’
I didn’t say anything for a moment. Ross was right – it wasn’t his finest hour. He wasn’t coming out of this particularly well. A few months back, I’d have written his behaviour off as yet another failing of the male sex – too cowardly, too passive, too willing to take no-strings sex when it was offered to him.
But what had he actually done wrong? He hadn’t cheated on her. He hadn’t treated her badly. She’d kissed other men; she’d ended things when she realised it wasn’t going anywhere. If there was one thing I’d learned in my months of being Adam, it was that men made mistakes. They weren’t perfect – they were just people. And Ross at least acknowledged that.
‘And now it’s over,’ I said.
‘Totally, one hundred per cent over. It was all totally amicable. In fact, I may have?—’
‘You may have what?’
‘When I asked Nush to deputise looking after Astro. I knew she’d be okay with it, but I had to give her an extra reason why, and I didn’t want to tell her about Dad. It felt like too much information.’
‘So you told her…?’
‘I told her you were out here and I wanted to see you. I told her how I felt about you.’
‘And what did she say?’
‘She told me to go for it. She said it was—’ he broke off.
‘She said it was what?’
‘She said it was obvious you had a crush on me.’
‘What? How did she know?’
‘So you did have a crush on me?’
‘Well, yeah. Course I did. A massive one.’
‘I’m glad that was mutual, then,’ he said. Then we laughed, and he reached across for my hand and squeezed it.
‘Cabin crew, arm the doors and cross-check,’ came the crackly announcement over the Tannoy.
While we were talking, the last of the passengers must have been taking their seats. But not all of them. From further up towards the front of the plane, I heard a familiar voice.
‘I’m sorry, you can’t possibly seat me in the exit row. You see, I’m pregnant.’