by Sally Rooney
8.
Dear Alice. When you say you’re going to Rome, do you mean for work? I don’t want to be intrusive, but I thought you were supposed to be taking a break for a while? I wish you well on your trip, of course, I just wonder whether it’s a good idea to start doing public events again so soon. If you find it cathartic to write me histrionic messages about the publishing world where you say everyone you know is bloodthirsty and wants to kill you or fuck you to death, by all means continue to write them. No doubt you have met evil people through your work, though I suspect you’ve met a lot of boring, ethically average people as well. I’m not denying you’re in pain, by the way—I know you are, and that’s why I’m surprised you’re subjecting yourself to all this again. Are you flying from Dublin? We could try to see each other before your flight if so …
I didn’t think I was in a bad mood sitting down to write this reply but maybe I am. I’m not trying to make you feel that your horrible life is in fact a privilege, although by any reasonable definition it very literally is. Okay, I make about 20k a year and pay two-thirds of that in rent for the opportunity to live in a tiny apartment with people who dislike me, and you make about two hundred thousand euro a year (?) and live alone in a gigantic country house, but for all that I don’t think I would enjoy your life any more than you do. Anyone capable of enjoying it must have something wrong with them, as you point out. But we all have something wrong with us anyway, don’t we? I looked at the internet for too long today and started feeling depressed. The worst thing is that I actually think people on there are generally well meaning and the impulses are right, but our political vocabulary has decayed so deeply and rapidly since the twentieth century that most attempts to make sense of our present historical moment turn out to be essentially gibberish. Everyone is at once hysterically attached to particular identity categories and completely unwilling to articulate what those categories consist of, how they came about, and what purposes they serve. The only apparent schema is that for every victim group (people born into poor families, women, people of colour) there is an oppressor group (people born into rich families, men, white people). But in this framework, relations between victim and oppressor are not historical so much as theological, in that the victims are transcendently good and the oppressors are personally evil. For this reason, an individual’s membership of a particular identity group is a question of unsurpassed ethical significance, and a great amount of our discourse is devoted to sorting individuals into their proper groups, which is to say, giving them their proper moral reckoning.
If serious political action is still possible, which I think at this point is an open question, maybe it won’t involve people like us—in fact I think it almost certainly won’t. And frankly if we have to go to our deaths for the greater good of humankind, I will accept that like a lamb, because I haven’t deserved this life or even enjoyed it. But I would like to be helpful in some way to the project, whatever it is, and if I could help only in a very small way, I wouldn’t mind, because I would be acting in my own self-interest anyway—because it’s also ourselves we’re brutalising, though in another way, of course. No one wants to live like this. Or at least, I don’t want to live like this. I want to live differently, or if necessary to die so that other people can one day live differently. But looking at the internet, I don’t see many ideas worth dying for. The only idea on there seems to be that we should watch the immense human misery unfolding before us and just wait for the most immiserated, most oppressed people to turn around and tell us how to stop it. It seems that there exists a curiously unexplained belief that the conditions of exploitation will by themselves generate a solution to exploitation—and that to suggest otherwise is condescending and superior, like mansplaining. But what if the conditions don’t generate the solution? What if we’re waiting for nothing, and all these people are suffering without the tools to end their own suffering? And we who have the tools refuse to do anything about it, because people who take action are criticised. Oh, that’s all very well, but then, what action do I ever take? In my defence I’m very tired and I don’t have any good ideas. Really my problem is that I’m annoyed at everyone else for not having all the answers, when I also have none. And who am I to ask for humility and openness from other people? What have I ever given the world to ask so much in return? I could disintegrate into a heap of dust, for all the world cares, and that’s as it should be.
Anyway, I have a new theory. Would you like to hear it? Ignore this paragraph if not. My theory is that human beings lost the instinct for beauty in 1976, when plastics became the most widespread material in existence. You can actually see the change in process if you look at street photography from before and after 1976. I know we have good reason to be sceptical of aesthetic nostalgia, but the fact remains that before the 1970s, people wore durable clothes of wool and cotton, stored drinks in glass bottles, wrapped food produce in paper, and filled their houses with sturdy wooden furniture. Now a majority of objects in our visual environment are made of plastic, the ugliest substance on earth, a material which when dyed does not take on colour but actually exudes colour, in an inimitably ugly way. One thing a government could do with my approval (and there aren’t many) would be to prohibit the production of each and every form of plastic not urgently necessary for the maintenance of human life. What do you think?
I don’t know why you’re being so coy about this person Felix. Who is he? Are you sleeping with him? Not that you have to tell me if you don’t want to. Simon never tells me anything anymore. Apparently he’s been going out with a twenty-three-year-old for about two months and I’ve never even seen her. Needless to say, the idea that Simon—who was already a grown man in his twenties when I was fifteen—is having regular sex with a woman six years my junior makes me want to crawl directly into my grave. And it’s never some ugly little nerd with mousy hair and interesting opinions about Pierre Bourdieu, it’s always an Instagram model who has like 17,000 followers and gets sent free samples from skincare brands. Alice, I hate pretending that the personal vanity of attractive young women is anything other than boring and embarrassing. Mine worst of all. Not to be dramatic, but if Simon gets this girl pregnant I will throw myself out of a window. Imagine having to be nice to some random woman for the rest of my life because she’s the mother of his child. Did I ever tell you he asked me out on a date back in February? Not that he actually wanted to go out with me, I think he was just trying to boost my self-esteem. Although, we did have a very funny phone call last night … Anyway: what age is Felix? Is he an old mystic man who writes you poetry about the cosmos? Or a nineteen-year-old county swimming champion with white teeth?
I could arrange to come and see you the week after the wedding, if convenient—arriving the first Monday in June. What do you think? If I could drive it would obviously be easier, but it looks like a combination of trains and taxi journeys might work. You can’t imagine how bored I am of rattling around Dublin without you. I quite literally long to be in your company again. E.
9.
On Wednesday, Alice and Felix were picked up at Fiumicino by a man holding a plastic pocket with a sheet of paper inside, on which were printed the words: MS KELLHER. Outside, night had fallen, but the air was warm, dry, saturated in artificial light. In the driver’s car, a black Mercedes, Felix sat in the front, Alice in the back. Beside them on the motorway, trucks overtook each other at alarming speeds with horns blaring. When they reached the apartment building, Felix carried their luggage up the stairs: Alice’s wheelie suitcase and his own black gym bag. The living room was large and yellow, with a couch and television. Through an open archway was a modern and clean-looking kitchen. One of the bedroom doors led off the back of the living room, and another to the right. After they had looked inside them both, he asked which she would prefer.
You choose, she said.
I think the girl should choose.
Well, I disagree with that.
He frowned and said: Okay, the one w
ho pays should choose.
I actually disagree with that even more.
He lifted his bag onto his shoulder and put his hand to the handle of the nearest bedroom. I can see we’re going to disagree a lot on this holiday, he said. I’ll take this one here, alright?
Thank you, she said. Would you like to get something to eat before we go to bed? I’ll look online to find a restaurant if you want.
He said that sounded good. Inside his room, he closed the door behind him, found a light switch and put his bag on top of the chest of drawers. Behind his bed, a third-floor window faced out onto the street. He unzipped the bag and searched around inside, moving items back and forth: some clothing, a razor handle with spare disposable blades, a foil sheet of tablets, a half-full box of condoms. Finding his phone charger, he took it out and started to unwind the cable. In her room, Alice was also unpacking her suitcase, removing some toiletries from the clear plastic airport bag, hanging up a brown dress in the wardrobe. Then she sat on her bed, opened a map on her phone and moved her fingers with practised ease around the screen.
Forty minutes later, they were eating at a local restaurant. At the centre of the table was a lit candle, a wicker basket of bread, a squat bottle of olive oil and a taller fluted bottle of dark vinegar. Felix was eating a sliced steak, very rare, dressed with Parmesan and rocket leaves, the interior of the steak glistening pink like a wound. Alice was eating a dish of pasta with cheese and pepper. At her elbow was a half-empty carafe of red wine. The restaurant was not crowded, but now and then conversation or laughter from the other tables swelled up and became audible. Alice was telling Felix about her best friend, a woman whose name she said was Eileen.
She’s very pretty, Alice said. Would you like to see a picture?
Yeah, go on.
Alice took out her phone and started scrolling through a social media app. We met when we were in college, she said. Eileen was like a celebrity then, everyone was in love with her. She was always winning prizes and having her photograph in the university paper and that kind of thing. This is her.
Alice showed him the screen of her phone, displaying a photograph of a slim white woman with dark hair, leaning against a balcony railing in what appeared to be a European city, with a tall fair-haired man beside her, looking at the camera. Felix took the phone out of Alice’s hand and turned the screen slightly, as if adjudicating.
Yeah, he said. Nice-looking alright.
I was like her sidekick, said Alice. Nobody really understood why she would want to be friends with me, because she was very popular, and everyone kind of hated me. But I think perversely she enjoyed having a best friend nobody liked.
Why didn’t anyone like you?
Alice gestured vaguely with one of her hands. Oh, you know, she said. I was always complaining about something. Accusing everyone of having the wrong opinions.
I’d say that gets on people’s nerves alright, he said. Putting his finger over the face of the man in the photograph, he asked: And who’s that with her?
That’s our friend Simon, said Alice.
Not bad-looking either, is he?
She smiled. No, he’s beautiful, she said. The photograph doesn’t even do him justice. He’s one of these people who’s so attractive I think it’s actually warped his sense of self.
Handing the phone back, Felix said: Must be nice having all these good-looking friends.
They’re nice for me to look at, you mean, said Alice. But one does feel like a bit of a dog in comparison.
Felix smiled. Ah, you’re not a dog, he said. You have your good points.
Like my charming personality.
After a pause, he asked: Would you call it charming?
She gave a genuine laugh then. No, she said. I don’t know how you put up with me saying such stupid things all the time.
Well, I’ve only had to put up with it a small while, he said. And I don’t know, you might stop doing it when we get to know each other better. Or I might stop putting up with it either.
Or I might grow on you.
Felix returned his attention to his food. You might, yeah, he said. Sure anything could happen. So this lad Simon, you fancy him, do you?
Oh no, she said. Not at all.
Glancing up at her with apparent interest, Felix asked: Not interested in the handsome ones, no?
I like him a lot, as a person, she said fairly. And I respect him. He works as an adviser to this tiny little left-wing parliamentary group, even though he could make buckets of money doing something. He’s religious, you know.
Felix cocked his head as if expecting her to clarify the joke. As in, he believes in Jesus? he said.
Yeah.
Fucking hell, seriously? He’s weird in the head or something, is he?
No, he’s quite normal, said Alice. He won’t try to convert you or anything, he’s low-key about it. I’m sure you’d like him.
Felix sat there shaking his head. He laid his fork down, glanced around the restaurant, and then picked the fork up again, but didn’t resume eating right away. And would he be against gays and all that? he said.
No, no. I mean, you should ask him about that, if you meet him. But I believe his idea of Jesus is more friend-to-the-poor, champion-of-the-marginalised kind of thing.
Here, I’m sorry, but he sounds like a headcase. In this day and age a person believes all that? Some lad a thousand years ago popped out from the grave and that’s the whole point of everything?
Don’t we all believe silly things? she said.
I don’t. I believe what I see in front of me. I don’t believe some big Jesus in the sky is looking down on us deciding are we good or bad.
For a few seconds she surveyed him and said nothing. Finally she replied: No, maybe you don’t. But not many people would be happy, thinking about life the way you do—that it’s all for nothing, and there isn’t any meaning. Most people prefer to believe there is some. So in that sense, everyone is deluded. Simon’s delusions are just more organised.
Felix started sawing a slice of steak in two with his knife. If he wants to be happy, couldn’t he make up something nicer to believe? he asked. Instead of thinking everything’s a sin and he might go to hell.
I don’t think he’s worried about hell, he just wants to do the right thing on earth. He believes there’s a difference between right and wrong. I suppose you can’t believe that, if you think it all means nothing in the end.
No, I do believe there’s right and wrong, obviously.
She raised an eyebrow. Oh, you are deluded, then, she said. If we’re all just going to die in the end, who’s to say what’s right and what isn’t?
He told her he would think about it. They went on eating, but presently he broke off again and started to shake his head once more.
Not to harp on about the gay thing, he said. But would he have any gay friends, this guy? Simon.
Well, he’s friends with me. And I’m not exactly heterosexual.
Amused now, even mischievous, Felix answered: Oh, okay. Me neither, by the way.
She looked up at him quickly and he met her eyes.
You look surprised, he said.
Do I?
Returning his attention to his food, he went on: I just never really had a thing about it. Whether someone is a guy or a girl. I know for most people it’s like, the one big thing they really do care about. But for me, it just doesn’t make any difference. I don’t go around telling people all the time because actually, some girls don’t like it. If they find out you’ve been with guys they think you’re a bit not right, some of them. But I don’t mind telling you since you’re the same yourself.
She took a sip from her wine glass and swallowed. Then she said: For me I think it’s more that I fall in love very intensely. And I can never know in advance who it’s going to be, whether they’ll be a man or woman, or anything else about them.
Felix nodded slowly. That’s interesting, he said. And it happens a lot, or not that much?
Not that much, she said. And never very happily.
Ah, that’s a shame. But it’ll go happily for you in the end, I bet.
Thank you, that’s kind.
He went on eating, while she watched him from across the table.
I’m sure people must fall in love with you all the time, she said.
He looked at her, his expression open and sincere. Why would they? he said.
She shrugged. When we first met I got the impression you were always going on dates, she said. You seemed very blasé and cool about everything.
Just because I go on dates doesn’t mean people go around falling in love with me. I mean, we’ve been on a date together, you’re not in love with me, are you?
Placidly she replied: I wouldn’t tell you if I were.
He laughed. Good for you, he said. And don’t get the wrong idea, you’re welcome to be in love with me if you want. I would have to put you down as a bit of a lunatic, but I kind of think that about you anyway.
She was mopping the remaining sauce off her plate with a piece of bread. You’re wise, she said.
* * *
On Thursday morning an assistant from Alice’s publishing house picked her up outside the apartment at ten and took her to meet some journalists. Felix spent the morning wandering around the city looking at things, listening to music on his headphones, taking pictures and posting them in a WhatsApp group. One photograph showed a narrow, shaded cobbled street, and at the end a resplendent white church in the sunlight, with bright green doors and shutters. Another showed a red moped parked outside a shopfront with old-fashioned lettering over the door. Finally he posted a photograph of the dome of St Peter’s, creamy blue like an iced cake, seen in the distance from the Via della Conciliazione, sky blazing in the backdrop. In the group chat, someone with the username Mick replied: Where the fuck are you lad??? Someone with the username Dave wrote: Hold on are you in ITALY? what the fuck haha. You not at work this week. Felix typed out a reply.