by Jessica Fox
My sense of discomfort was growing, too. Euan’s sudden moody silence was a small hammer, driving cracks into my confidence.
“How do you feel about the NHS?” I asked after Radio 4 rolled around again to the story on neglect in the major hospitals.
“What do you mean?” Euan said, annoyed. He obviously wasn’t in the mood for conversation. The quieter he became, the more my mind filled with reasons for his silence, each more extreme than the last: he liked listening to the radio without interruption; he was worried about work; after three days he was tired of my company; a certified bachelor, he was regretting inviting me, and worse, he had realised he didn’t love me at all.
Outside, the fields shrank to make way for more houses. We were entering a larger city and in the twilight I could just make out people walking dogs, attending to their gardens and shopping. The roads became more confusing, jutting off into different directions, and Euan leaned forward to adjust the satnav, which was attached to the windscreen.
“Do you want me to be navigator?” I felt myself going into girl scout mode.
“No.” Euan sighed. “I already texted the guy for better instructions.”
When I first started working at NASA, they had made us take personality tests for group training and development. The test had specifically keyed in on how, as individuals, we approach conflict. It had never occurred to me that we differed so greatly in this area or indeed could even be classified into predicted systems of conflict behaviour. After reviewing all our answers in an exposed room, the differences had become perfectly illuminated.
I had fallen into the group Green Yellow Red. This meant, apparently, that at the first sign of tension I quickly went into problem-solving mode, doing anything I could to avoid further conflict by resolving the issues at hand.
The test had then gone on to say that if having gone “Green” did not work, I shifted to “Yellow”, ignoring any type of conflict in the hope that it would go away. If conflict still continued, I went “Red”, battling my corner to the bitter, bitter end. I had looked at my results with a sense of self-recognition that included pride. It held the same satisfaction as meeting a long-lost relative or seeing yourself for the first time in a clear mirror; it was self-affirming.
Most of the people in my group had been classified as Red Yellow Green, meaning if their stapler had been taken, the first course of action they’d take would be to argue for it back. How helpful would it be, on a first date, for couples to take this test? Euan, who I guessed to be Yellow Green Red, would probably not have mentioned anything was amiss with the stapler but simply gone out to find another.
As the silence reached a defeaning crescendo in the van, it occurred to me that I might not know Euan as well as I had assumed. At the festival, I had seen him only when he had wanted to be seen. Now, we were together all the time, revealing every mood and hiccup in our personalities. Nothing was hidden. This was a new way of seeing each other, perhaps less romantic, but all the more exciting as new bits of the person you loved were revealed. From Euan’s pensive expression as he drove, I wasn’t sure he felt the same way.
I looked at my own reflection, refracted, water-like, in the window of the van as we sped along. I wondered if self-awareness really changed things for the better. Look at the Lady of Shallot – the moment she gained perspective “the mirror cracked from side to side, the curse is come upon me cried”. And then she died alone. Of a broken heart.
Euan’s phone beeped. He eyed it but the phone was far from his hand, resting on the seat between us. “Here, can you answer that,” he asked, “and tell me what it says? I hope he’s sent better instructions.”
Reluctantly, I grabbed his phone and saw “One Message” appear on the screen. .
“Well, what does it say?” Euan looked at me.
“I’m thinking of you too darling X”. A lurching sensation rose in my stomach. I became flustered. “I don’t think it’s the bookseller guy.” I handed him the phone.
Euan quickly viewed the message and then looked at me concerned. “Oh, um, no, definitely not the book guy.”
I wished I hadn’t seen the message. What did that mean, “I’m thinking of you too”, and who would be calling Euan “darling” with a kiss afterwards? No matter how benign, it was now stained into my brain, and I couldn’t think it away, as if it was an “out, out damned spot” of doubt.
Euan turned onto a small road and I could feel the car slowing down. He was searching house numbers.
“So who was that?” I asked, feeling awkward. Was it rude to ask? After such a lovely three days, the last thing I wanted to do was sound paranoid.
“One of my exes,” Euan answered and stopped the car. I waited for more of an explanation but none came.
“You text her? You’re still friends?”
“No, not really.”
The satnav’s “you have reached your destination” blasted loud and clear. My heart was thudding.
“I just wanted to make sure she was okay.” Euan added, not looking at all concerned.
“Why wouldn’t she be okay?”
“Because you’re here.”
I followed Euan out of the car as we approached the house. It was dark now, and the light from the small cottage lit our way as we walked up a handful of steps. Adrenaline was flowing through me and my stomach was performing acrobatics. I really hoped the person selling books wouldn’t answer the door. I needed answers.
“Look, Jessy, she broke up with me years ago. It’s not a big deal.”
“Okay,” I breathed but my brain kept on tripping over a missing piece. “But why would she be upset?”
“I don’t know. It’s none of her business. It’s not anyone’s business, really.”
“Wait.” Suddenly the number of questions swirling in my mind doubled. “What do you mean, not anyone’s business?”
“Well, why should I have to tell her, or anyone, that you were moving in with me?”
The sound of a door latch opening interrupted my thoughts and an elderly man appeared, blinking through thick spectacles. Euan spoke to him for a few minutes while I lingered in the background in a cloud of confusion.
Euan turned back towards me and looked concerned when he saw my expression. “What? What’s wrong?”
“I don’t really know where to begin,” I mumbled. I could see Euan rolling his eyes as if to say, please God, don’t let her unleash a monologue. “Well, first,” I said, feeling embarrassed, “are you still in love with her?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.” Euan looked confused by the question. “I still care about her. I still care about everyone I’ve dated. Once you love someone, you love someone.” Euan ran his fingers through my hair. “Silly Fox, come on.”
I stood outside, numb. Grant would have said the same thing. I felt my heart ache. I had made another, terrible mistake. So much for lessons learned. What was wrong with me? Why did I have a hidden talent for picking the poly-amorous needle in the monogamous haystack of men?
“I’d like you to take me to Glasgow Airport,” I shouted suddenly. “I’m not interested in being part of your harem.”
“What?” Euan stopped and turned, looking genuinely surprised. “What are you taking about? What harem?”
“You seem to have a roster of women interested in you…”
Euan laughed. “Jesus! If only. There’s no roster of women, Jessy. What gets into you sometimes?” He walked back towards me shaking his head.
“I don’t want this to get more confusing.” I fumed, completely disoriented.
“More confusing? I’m not confused.” Euan, concerned, wrapped me in his arms, looking directly into my eyes. “There’s no one else for me but you. I was lucky enough to find my strange American and I’m not going to let you go.” He enveloped me in a hug.
As I sunk into his arms, I started to get my bearings again. I had overreacted, I knew it, but I couldn’t help myself. My emotions were all over the place. Perhaps I was experiencin
g a wave of delayed panic. I had just moved across the ocean to a new country to live with someone I had known only for a couple of months. There should be a grace period for acting irrationally. Making sure I was all right, Euan kissed me, then turned and disappeared into the house.
I was suffering from emotional jet-lag. There had been a reason I was single for so long in LA. No matter how much I had prepared myself, all the anxiety I had experienced in my relationship with Grant was coming back now as I faced this new relationship. Grant had never closed the door on any woman who wanted him and his lack of loyalty had crushed my sense of self-worth. Euan was different; he was motivated by kindness, not self-gratification. He truly cared for the people whom he had dated. They were so different, in fact, that I couldn’t believe I was confusing the two in my head. After all that Euan had done for me over the past couple of days, I was mortified. I looked down at my empty hands and was surprised by the amount of hidden baggage I had brought with me.
Euan’s voice echoed from the well-lit basement as I descended the narrow flight of stairs. I gently negotiated the steep wooden steps and looked up to see Melville, leaning against the banister in front of me. He had a walking stick in one hand, and proceeded to use it as a pointer, targeting it at my heart.
“That is not as indestructible as you think, you know,” he said.
“I thought our capacity to love was endless.” I crossed my arms. “I’m sure you’ve said those very words to me before.”
He shook his head. “That’s disinterested love. In this case, you’re interested.” Melville tapped his walking stick on the stair.
“Jessy, is that you?” Euan called.
“Yes, it’s me,” I shouted, leaning over the banister. When I looked up, Melville was gone.
As I descended the stairs, I could see the basement open up, full of books. The walls were covered in bookshelves and the floor was filled, like a fledging forest, with small stacks of old hardbacks.
“Anything good?” I asked, trying to sound apologetic.
Euan was kneeling next to a wall that had a massive heraldry shield and a piece of a stained-glass window hanging from it.
“Yes, I think I’m taking the whole lot,” he said without looking up. I looked around the room and realised the books had to be moved from here to the van, via the long, narrow flight of stairs. Though the man who owned the house was quite old, he sadly wasn’t Rumpelstiltskin, and there would be no magic solution other than for Euan and I to schlep every book out of there ourselves.
“So you’ll be needing my help then?” I knelt down and started to box up a handful of books by the door.
“Ah yes, Fox, help.” Euan smiled at me. There was no need to sound apologetic; he had obviously forgiven me, if he had been angry at all.
Ten boxes of books later, and 20 trips up and down the stairs, we were done. As we climbed into the van, I found myself tripping over something Euan had said earlier.
“You really didn’t tell anyone that I was coming back?” I asked.
Euan started the van.
“Nope.”
“Not even your parents?”
“Especially not my parents.”
I smacked Euan’s arm. “Really no one?”
“No one.” He was grinning but I knew he was serious.
I shook my head in exasperation and I looked out the window. It was completely dark now, and all I could see was my own reflection, clearer this time, staring back at me. Despite myself, I was grinning, too.
Chapter 29
“…when I was swimming far out, or lying alone on a beach, I have had the same experience, became the sun, the hot sand, green seaweed anchored to a rock, swaying in the tide… like the veil of things as they seem drawn back by an unseen hand. For a second you see, and seeing the secret, you are the secret. For a second there is meaning! Then the hand lets the veil fall and you are alone, lost in the fog again, and you stumble on towards nowhere for no good reason.” Eugene O’Neill, LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT: Drama section, Garden Room, second building out the back.
No drowsy jet-lag to greet me when I woke on my first morning back above the Bookshop. Our trip around the west of Scotland had quickly acclimatised my inner clock. I had expected to smell lavender, hear the faint horn-like sound of mooing and open my eyes to white walls with oatmeal curtains framing the view of the rooftops of Wigtown. Instead, I woke to bright-yellow walls and the faint smell of Euan’s cologne, which still lingered in the air. As I listened, I could hear the kettle flick on downstairs in the kitchen.
I rolled over in the large bed, enjoying the solitude. I was cushioned between marshmallow-white pillows and a massive duvet. The mattress seemed to extend for ever, compared to my small bed in my parents’ house. The air was crisp and I stretched lazily; cosy and safe inside my Scottish cocoon. In front of me I could see the indentation on the pillow where Euan’s head had been, and beyond, the clock came into focus. It was just before 9am. The shop would be open soon.
The faint echo of footsteps sounded from downstairs as Euan made his way into the Bookshop. I willed myself to sit up. I did not want to start my first day in Wigtown in an idle fashion. I had a chance to begin my life here with good habits. I would get up, go for a run, send out flyers to start a yoga class and finish my consulting work before my collaborators on the East Coast had started their lunch. Then, I would have the rest of the day to explore.
The wooden floor of the bedroom was ice cold under my feet, and I quickly hopped to and fro as I unpacked my things. Euan had more of a Laura Ashley touch than I would have expected from a typical bachelor. Everywhere I looked he had painted, renovated, decorated and demonstrated better taste than most people I knew. He had moved an extra small wardrobe into the bedroom, and had also emptied half of his closet, a gesture that meant a great deal to me. This was his home, after all, his man-cave, and even if he had just shoved his shirts to one side, he was carving out a space in it for me.
I hadn’t packed much. I carefully took out my dresses and hung them one by one in the closet. They looked sweet next to Euan’s plain, button-down shirts. Although dresses and tights were fine in a Los Angeles winter, I was now experiencing late autumn in Scotland. I was also living inside a large stone refrigerator of a house, with no heat and seven outward-facing gables. The clothes I packed would barely keep me warm even if I stayed surgically attached to the wood-burning stove. Emptying the rest of the suitcase, I wondered if I shouldn’t have packed more. My clothes only took up the first two drawers of the bureau. I would use the third drawer on the bottom as a laundry hamper, I decided. There was something highly satisfying in figuring out where everything should go.
I turned to a stack of drawers, like a little nightstand, near my bed, searching for a good place to put my face cream and hairbrush. The top drawer was a little sticky, so, with a good yank, I prised it open. Inside the top drawer, there lay – dust-covered – a pot of anti-wrinkle night cream, some hairclips and perfume. I guessed these items weren’t Euan’s, rather remnants of a former girlfriend, or lover. Why hadn’t he thought to clean these drawers before I came? Maybe he didn’t know they were still there. The sense that I was special quickly drained away.
I took out the bottle of perfume, examining it. In some haunting way, I felt like an archaeologist, finding evidence of prior civilisations, with feelings and stories that had lived before I existed. Everyone had a past, I reminded myself, although it was altogether different to stumble upon physical evidence of it. I scooped up the contents of the drawer in my arms and stood above the rubbish, unsure. It was not my job to clean up his past, but they were my drawers now. The lines from the folktale “Mr. Fox” echoed in my head: “be bold, be bold, but not too bold”. I lingered over the rubbish, debating the issue in my head, the moral implications of the scenario, but this was my day to start good habits. I dumped the contents into the bin without another thought.
As I walked through the shop, clad in my running gear, heading towa
rds the door, Euan gave me a quizzical look.
“What?” I asked, smiling.
“My God, what are you wearing?”
“My shorts? You know I always go running in them.” I looked down.
“But this is Wigtown – and it’s midwinter. You’ll cause car accidents.” Euan was incredibly amused and wrapped his arms around me. He was built for the climate and though he too was wearing shorts, he was radiating heat. “Crazy American.”
Wigtown was as beautiful as in my memory. Perhaps even more so. Under a bright-blue, cloud-filled sky, I ran along the main road, down past the church across from which held my favourite view over the fields, wetlands and the sea. Every cell of my being felt like shouting, I’m back, I’m home.
The early December air was cold, invigorating. I had debated bringing music along with me, to keep the beat as my sneakers hit the road in a slow rhythm, but for this run I wanted to hear just the sounds of Wigtown. I heard birds, and cows in the distance. I could also hear a horse neighing in a nearby field and the noise of houses waking up: doors opening, dogs being called in, morning greetings.
Curving down a bend in the road, I ran fast and breathlessly, my lungs stretching and singing in the clean morning air. The road then quickly levelled out and opened to expanses of fields. It was the most exquisite landscape imaginable and the distant haze softened everything like an Impressionist painting. My pace slowed and I tried to drink it all in – an impossible task. Even if every particle of my body was on fire with feeling, how could you truly appreciate the majestic?
A mile down the road I thought of L.M. Montgomery and her book The Alpine Path. In it she talked about how she always felt there was a world of ideal beauty, just beyond this one, and that between herself and that world there existed a veil. Sometimes, when the wind blew, the veil would lift and for a moment she’d glimpse that world and be transported. Ed Ricketts would call that moment “Breaking Through”, an overwhelming feeling of connection and awe. Here in Wigtown, there was no invisible curtain to veil the ideal; it was the most beautiful place in the universe.