by L. Smyth
I stared at the letters on the screen, processing the text prickling under the glass.
Joe began typing, then stopped, and then started again.
Joe: lol that was a bit harsh
I just meant that she seemed to fit your description of the types at Northam
My fingers hovered over the glass. It is rare that you get the opportunity to see you as others see you – an unedited version of yourself, someone that neither matches your interpretation of who you are, nor a filtered reflection as told to you by your friends or family.
Until that point I had persuaded myself that being in Marina’s presence had enabled me to become like her. I wasn’t so delusional that I thought I was brilliant or beautiful, but I did think that in being around her, basking in her charisma, I had started to emit some of it too.
Now I saw that that wasn’t the case. I didn’t belong in her sphere, and I never would. It didn’t matter how much time I spent around her. Whatever I wore, whatever I did, however much I tried – I was average.
I put my phone in my pocket as the train pulled into the station. I put my head against the black glass, and as the shadow of Walford rose up behind it, I felt the familiar pangs of dread. I was home.
***
Looking back, my reaction to Joe’s message strikes me as laughably out of proportion. What had I expected him to do? Gush to Marina about how attractive he had found some random at the station? Clearly Joe had said those things not because he necessarily thought that they were true, but because he assumed that ‘Marina’ would appreciate them. Talking down other girls was a tactful ploy, like mentioning how he’d remembered my description of people at Northam. The irony of this tactic now makes me laugh. But at the time it got to me. It made me depressed and irritable.
iv.
I climbed out of my car and slammed the door behind me.
‘Where the hell have you been?’
The familiar shrill voice of my mother. Echoing over the rosebush, travelling up the road.
‘You’re grounded.’
‘Oh wow.’
‘You’re grounded.’
I walked past her silently, put a key in the lock.
‘I’m not joking this time,’ she said. ‘No car. No … car.’ Out of the corner of my eye I could see her little bob shaking from side to side. Her hands were on her hips.
‘We’re not American,’ I said. ‘You can’t ground me.’
‘What was that?’
I looked up. Her mouth was a tight white line.
I stabilized my features. ‘I said you can’t ground me, we’re not American. Why are you talking like that? I thought we’d banned soaps in the house.’
‘Wh— how dare you speak like that to me!’ she thundered. ‘How dare you march in without telling us where you’ve been!’
There was an awkward pause in the tirade, and my mother hiccupped slightly before adding: ‘Where have you been?’
I shrugged.
‘Nowhere,’ I said. Then I opened the door and closed it behind me.
‘You left the keys in the door! I’m taking them! For your information madam, you are absolutely grounded!’
She was right: I had left the keys in the door.
The next day they were missing from the rack. It was obvious she had hidden them somewhere – neither she nor my father would tell me the location. They smirked when I asked them, and widened their eyes at each other like, ‘Oooh.’
There was a note on the fridge, scribbled in my mother’s distinctive hand:
When you are ready to explain where you were yesterday we will tell you where the keys are. Mince in freezer can be defrosted.
That was it.
I paced around the house. I went on a long walk along the country lanes. I checked my messages: nothing from Henry, nothing from Marina. I messaged Joe and complained of my family’s unreasonableness.
I couldn’t stand being there.
When I got home after my walk I went straight to my room, bought a ticket to Northam online and packed up my things. I did not feel guilty about leaving my parents without saying goodbye. I texted them a quick explanation as the bus pulled up to the station. I ignored the buzzes as I heaved my bag up the steps towards the platform.
The train was full. Heaving. Men in grey suits were packed tight alongside each other, red faces, sweat oozing in dark ovals under lifted arms, gripping the rails above the seats they stood by. The train stopped, groaning to a halt with a stiff sigh that sounded like my own.
I elbowed my way onto the carriage, lugging my bag behind me, and waited for the train to start moving. My phone felt heavy in my pocket. The whistle blew and the wheels began rolling forward.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Late January 2014
i.
At Northam: no calls, no texts, no Facebook messages. Nothing from Marina. No response from Henry.
The reading week wasn’t due to start for another few days, and the only people who seemed to be back already were those who had never left. A girl called Phyllis had been there for the duration of the holiday. She was planning to stay in Northam for her entire three years, since her parents lived in China and she couldn’t afford to go home. She was pleasant enough but due to her limited English the conversation always petered out after three or four minutes.
I logged onto Facebook and sent Henry another message. He still hadn’t ‘seen’ the last one that I had sent.
Hey, when are you coming back to Northam?
Also is Marina OK?
Can you tell her I’m sorry
Once again without friends, family or anything to do, I spent my days on Swipe. Joe launched into one of his monologues.
Joe: I read Atlas Shrugged when I was 15
And I know it’s bad I mean it contains nothing that I agree with now in the way of ethics or politics and it has no literary value
But it had a really strong effect on me at the time
And now when I hear about it I feel a kind of adrenaline rush
I enjoyed responding to these rants with deflationary authority – in a way that I imagined Marina would respond. It was interesting to me how liberating it was to have confidence in my thoughts – the way that, if I voiced something with conviction, even if it was something I didn’t believe in, then it would lift a mental block. Just feeling confident would allow me to travel down wider mental pathways, to flesh out thoughts, to see ideas from several different viewpoints.
Me: well I’m sorry to hear that
Perhaps it’s your subconscious telling you that you really think it’s true
You’ve probably just adopted left-wing ideas because it’s what the people around you accept
You like art, you like novels, you like theatre …
You like trendy clothes so you can’t be conservative
You must like socialism too!
This is a question of following fashion, not what you genuinely feel or think
But Joe failed to notice my observations. He was unfazed by my dismissive tone – or didn’t detect it – and never fully engaged with the things I said. Eventually I’d give up and make a joke – something that would link me back in to his side of the debate.
Joe: I wouldn’t go that far
all I’m saying is that I think it’s had an effect on me psychologically
Like
Yeah
I know it’s not true
But there’s a part of me that has a strong reaction to it
Not a negative reaction
Me: And it’s that part which is the real you
you feel you can’t admit to it, like it’s a dirty secret, because you’re scared of the reaction
even from yourself
but it’s what you believe, deep down
Joe: No
It’s more like Later in life, I’m worried that it will come back and haunt me
Me: When you’re a sell-out property investor you mean
Joe: Ha exactly
Me: Yeah I can’t help you with that
Joe and I never had productive debates. They never reached conclusions, and I can see why – when faced with the question of what we talked about later – he hadn’t known what to say. But there was an openness there, and in speaking about nothing we could also speak about everything. Initially I’d thought that this was because we had a special connection of some kind – one that went beyond the digital. Now I was beginning to realize that it was because he loved to hear himself talk.
Since I was posing as Marina, I shouldn’t have been bothered by this: the lack of opportunity to talk about myself was, practically speaking, a free ticket. But as time went by I began to notice how little my confessional musings were addressed, how they were either completely ignored, or treated as mere springboards to Joe’s Genius Observations. His points were always discussed for at least five lines each, whereas mine were a conversational segue. He saw me as ignorable, I realized, like Marina had. My posing as her hadn’t worked: I was a doormat.
After I noticed this, I found Joe increasingly grating. A mental block that deadened my ability to discover new ideas. I tired of our conversations.
Joe: So when are we going for that drink?
Even though I knew that it was impossible, the idea of meeting him in real life, of having to compose my face to look interested, of having to listen to him drone on without being able to punctuate the boring bits by looking at other things on my phone – it made me feel exhausted. It was easy to rebuff him.
Me: We’ll have to see
Joe: Again???
Me: I have exams coming up
Yet perhaps that was not the overriding reason for my diminished interest. Put simply, I didn’t find him as stimulating intellectually as I thought I would – as stimulating as I found Marina. And as much as I liked being Marina, I wanted to be around her more. I missed her conversation. I didn’t have the patience to listen to anyone else.
I switched off Swipe and went back onto Facebook. I sent Henry another message – something I instantly regretted: it was not well thought through, it was excessively accusatory. I looked at the other messages in my inbox. Marina’s name was still frozen out.
Out of habit, I tried to click on it. I tried again, but nothing happened. My phone vibrated. I had a message from Joe.
Joe: You really are mysterious
Still playing hard to get
Why can’t you just make time for one drink? I’ll come to Northam?
Me: No, look I have to work
I’ll let you know whenever it’s convenient
Joe: Convenient?
Woah
The typed ‘woah’ – obviously not vocalized – tipped my patience from dwindling to zero. What did he expect? I flicked off Swipe and went back to my Facebook messages. Still nothing from Henry.
My phone pinged insistently: another Swipe notification.
Joe: Look, all I want is to see you in person
That’s all I’m asking
Seeing the Swipe account beside Marina’s frozen-out Facebook unnerved me. It felt weird to be continuing this when her social media presence was deactivated. I didn’t like it. Being blocked out of her online life made it difficult for me to remember what she had been like at all – as though our friendship had been a fantasy, a dream.
It was time for it to stop.
I tapped onto Swipe, ignored Joe’s latest string of messages, and scrolled to the account settings.
Profile. Edit. Location. Privacy. More.
I clicked on More. There was no deactivation option. A prickle of anxiety shot through me. To quell it I drew up the lid of my laptop. I typed into Google:
‘Delete Swipe account’
Thousands of results rolled up: a string of forums, spam adverts, news comments, even a few Buzzfeed articles.
WATCH: This guy spends 40 minutes trying to delete his Swipe account
Why is it impossible to delete a Swipe profile? 10 humiliating stories
Swipe CEO explains what he’s doing with your data.
I ignored the clickbait headlines and went onto a forum. Someone had written an answer:
It’s under ‘Privacy’ on a tiny box. Sometimes you have to download the app on a desktop because for some reason it’s extra tight on this sort of thing. Does anyone have a more detailed explanation?
I opened another tab, googled ‘Swipe, and downloaded the app on my desktop. As I waited for it to download I skim read some of the comments on the thread.
The thing about Swipe is that you can’t actually delete your profile. It circulates round the app for about a year afterwards, even if it’s technically deactivated. I’m not sure what the algorithms are or if you can alter this?
Someone else:
I was looking into this too yeah. But you can just delete your pictures off it and whatever. It tracks some of your location data but you can just alter that in settings.
The first commenter again:
What about name change though? Tracks through Facebook? I guess it’s just the first name that appears on the Swipe account but I’m surprised there hasn’t been more of a crackdown on this TBH. It’s a massive privacy issue
No problem, I thought. I could just deactivate the fake Facebook account. I logged out of my own Facebook and then put in the new email; the new password.
Access denied.
I typed again, this time pressing each fingertip carefully on the keys, making sure the ridge of each plastic square was separate, that it was definitely the right code. Still the passive aggressive response:
I’m sorry! Did you forget your password?
Shit shit shit.
How could I have forgotten the password? There must be a record of it somewhere – in my personal email drafts? No. In the notes on my phone? No.
I tried the original attempt at the password one more time, making sure caps lock was off, monitoring the movements of my fingers so, so carefully, one digit at a time.
You have been locked out of your account. To retrieve password, please contact an administrator.
I gripped the keyboard with both hands.
I thought back to the time I had created the password. I thought harder. As I did so, getting increasingly frustrated, I felt the plastic keys begin to give under the wrench of my fingernails.
I thought back to the moment I had created the account, tried to picture everything about the evening: the alcohol I’d consumed, the conversations I’d conducted. I relaxed my grip on the keyboard, ran one hand across it, and then found a loose key. I curled the corner under my nail, began to pick. Then I pictured the screen that night – the night I’d created the account. I pictured dragging Marina’s photo into the box; pictured typing the password. I thought about trying it again – then and there – and I was just preparing myself to start doing so when I felt a sharp snap, heard a ping and saw a piece of plastic fly upwards. It danced in the air and landed on the desk beside me.
I stared at it for a second.
Then I carefully picked it up between two fingers and attempted to push it back into the keyboard, into the space between U and O. But my fingers were too slippery with sweat, my vision too blurry. Finally I flicked it away.
I sat back. I told myself to think rationally.
If there were no pictures on the account, then there was nothing to worry about. After a year all evidence would disappear. It would be fine. There was no real reason to get angsty, to get worked up about the fake Facebook account. It didn’t matter. If I deleted the pictures, blocked Joe, deleted the app off my laptop and my phone – then I would be free of it. It would be like I’d never used it at all.
Having got this far I wanted the app to be gone. I wanted it wiped out of existence. And I had to get rid of it now.
When Swipe-for-desktop had downloaded, I logged in and immediately deleted all the photos. I blocked everyone I had ever matched with; deleted my bio; disabled location services. Then I went to the privacy settings and pus
hed the big red button.
Account deactivated.
Marina was gone.
ii.
I didn’t mind being on my own after that. I felt I had excised my creepier urges and, now of a clearer mind, I could return to a reclusive position without experiencing guilt or FOMO. I could do my washing every week. I could do my reading unencumbered by cigarette breaks with Marina. I could walk alone around the fields without worrying whether I’d make it back in time to pre-drink with the others. There were benefits to being lonely, I realized, and self-preservation was one of them. University was not the end point, but a stop-gap: an opportunity to train myself to be fit for wherever I went next. After two more years I wouldn’t have to be here anymore: I would be moving on to different places, different people. And by then, I was certain, I would have made myself so clever that no one from Northam would be able to keep up with me.
Even if the campus architecture was of an acquired taste, the surrounding town and countryside were pleasant enough. On afternoons I would go out to the moors without my headphones, raising my head up to feel drops of rain fall over my forehead and the end of my nose, strands of hair slicked down over my eyelashes.
Now the snow had stopped the winter in Northam was tolerable. I didn’t mind the sting of the wind on my cheeks. I didn’t mind even when sheets of rain slashed into my eyes. I shifted the wet sleeves of the anorak forward over my knuckles and ploughed on through long stalks of grass. It felt satisfying to have the water seep in through my socks, clotting in the corners of my shoes. It felt.
Those were the days I cherish now, when I look back on my university experience. I value them for the independence I felt. I loved being in an environment where I could go places and do things without being monitored – either by the voice of my mother or the interruptions of Marina or a phone insistently buzzing in my pocket. I could go to the shop and buy alcohol in the middle of the day. I could have a glass of wine or a spliff without feeling self-conscious. There were a few days still before classes started again, and I felt relaxed, on top of things.
Back in the libraries I buried myself in books, and in reading them I felt my face soften. My mind opened like a flower. The more distant I was from social media, the happier I became. It wasn’t the university life I had envisioned for myself, not the glamorous cocktail of parties and witty conversations. But I was stimulated, and that was enough.