This is a Love Story

by Thompson, Jessica

It was a warm Saturday morning. I slipped on a pair of stripy shorts, some flip-flops and a T-shirt, and made my way to her place.

  As the heat started to really take hold, girls were everywhere, wearing less and less. I loved it. The sun was doing that magical thing of giving women gorgeous little freckles on their faces and making them wear tiny dresses and skimpy tops. There was skin everywhere – long sexy legs swaggering down the high street, a defined back set off by a plunging dress. It was driving me nuts.

  As frustrated as I was by the situation with Sienna, I was really enjoying being single, even though I was twenty-eight.

  Nick, single, twenty-eight. It had a ring to it. I loved it.

  I’d been on a few dates, and some of them had been great. Nights of laughter and flirtation with pretty girls, occasionally ending in no-strings passion. I’d forgotten how much fun it was to be single. I hadn’t really felt anything deep for any of them, though – it was all just good fun at the moment.

  It was just two stops on the tube to Sienna’s place, although in the past year that we’d been mates I’d never actually set foot inside. This was something I found very odd, particularly when she seemed to be so tied to home. She dashed off there sometimes after hurried phone calls, never telling me why.

  Dan had gone to Amsterdam for the weekend with his equally silly friends and she’d mentioned something at work yesterday about spending the day watching old films, so I thought it would be a good time to surprise her and drop round that CD.

  I walked slowly up the drive to her building, hoping I was doing the right thing. The sun was beating down on me; my palms were getting a bit sweaty. I pressed the buzzer and waited.

  ‘Hello?’ came a male voice.

  ‘Er, hi . . .’ I started, instantly regretting what I was about to do. Who was this guy? Her father, maybe? God knows – it had always been such a mystery.

  ‘It’s Nick. I’m here to see Sienna.’

  There was a short pause. ‘Oh, hello, come on in.’

  There was another buzz and the heavy entrance door opened for me. I tucked the CD into the back of the waistband of my shorts and made my way up the stairs. The corridors were dark and smelled of bleach. It was all very clean, white and functional.

  The man was standing in the doorway, waiting for me. ‘Nick. So good to meet you,’ he greeted me with a warm smile. It was almost as if he knew me well. The greeting made me panic – I was about to have to ask a very embarrassing question.

  ‘I’m sorry, but who are you?’ I said, running my hand through my hair nervously.

  He looked slightly taken aback as he stood there in checked pyjama bottoms and a baggy jumper. ‘I’m George. Sienna’s father,’ he replied, a note of disappointment in his voice.

  He was nothing like I’d imagined. I was pleased to finally meet the guy who had brought up Sienna. If he had a daughter like her, he must be one hell of a good bloke. I was slightly shocked by what I saw, though. The man in front of me looked fragile, pale and older than his years. The skin on his face had a translucent, paper-like quality, as though he hadn’t seen the sun for a while. I couldn’t put my finger on why that could be.

  The little hair he had on his head was silver; his lips were small and wrinkled. I spotted a deep scar on his forehead. Maybe he’d had too many jars last night, or possibly I’d misheard his age when Sienna told me he was only forty-six. I’d expected him to be a tall, dynamic, powerful presence.

  ‘Sienna isn’t actually here, Nick, but come in. I’ve heard so much about you . . .’ He trailed off, obviously slightly self-conscious about how keen he was sounding. I felt suddenly aware that I knew precious little about him. Sienna had never volunteered anything.

  ‘I just brought her a CD as a surprise, thought I’d drop it by on my way into town,’ I responded, trying really hard to be casual.

  Way into town, my arse. Sienna and I only live two tube stops away from each other. It’s the kind of distance you can drive in ten minutes, or walk in forty if you’re feeling particularly energetic.

  George ushered me in, revealing the living space they shared. It was a typical London flat, all on one level, with a small corridor leading from the front door to a large living room and open kitchen. It was modest in size, and seemed to go on past the kitchen as another corridor led further back, revealing an open bathroom door and two other closed doors beside it. They must be the bedrooms.

  I looked back at George, who was standing by a running machine wedged against the wall near the entrance to the kitchen.

  I could see Sienna’s touches all over the main living space. Owl-shaped cushions lay on the chairs, stitched together with thick, black cord. They were beautifully quirky; they looked like they’d been found in a gift shop in somewhere like the Brighton Lanes. Her jewellery was scattered on a small coffee table, and a faint trace of her perfume filled the air. It all looked messy and warm and had oodles of personality.

  The sofa looked worn and loved, and there were large shelving units on almost every wall, packed full of books and films. The DVDs included everything from Pulp Fiction to Sex and the City. You could tell a lot about a person by looking at their books and movies, but this was a bit of a mess. A history book here, a celebrity biog there. The themes conflicted so much, you could easily tell what belonged to Sienna and what belonged to George.

  About ten black notebooks were stacked on the main coffee table, surrounded by small piles of pencils and their associated shavings.

  It was a beautifully cosy den.

  What looked like a black, padded crash helmet was sitting in the middle of the floor. It looked soft, not the kind you would wear on a motorbike, but the kind donned by boxers and rugby players with fucked-up ears. Surely he doesn’t box, I thought – not when he looks like this.

  ‘She’ll be back soon, Nick,’ George said as he made his way to the kitchen, slowly. Holding onto any available surface, he shuffled to the kettle and flipped the switch.

  It dawned on me that something was quite wrong here. His trousers sagged sadly over his bum, as though they’d once had a lot more George in them.

  ‘I can’t believe I haven’t met you yet,’ I said to him, then suddenly worried that he would think I was creeping.

  ‘It’s nice to finally meet you too, Nick. Sienna seems to be having a great time at work. I’m so glad she’s working with people like you . . . It’s been really hard for her over the years – but you know that . . . Tea? Milk? Sugar?’ He turned around, still gripping onto the work surface like it was a safety rope.

  Really hard for her over the years . . . What did he mean by that? But you know that . . . I didn’t know, she hadn’t told me. I started to remember all the occasions we’d been out and how she would just disappear sometimes, putting it down to a variety of reasons. I’d just accepted it as a quirk, just the way she was, but now it seemed like my questions were about to be answered.

  ‘Oh, just milk and one sugar please,’ I responded, sinking into the sofa. I was quite disappointed that she wasn’t here, but I just knew there was something going on. She’d obviously been holding something back from me. Something I needed to know about, and without her here I stood more chance of finding out.

  ‘So, what are you doing at the weekend? Anything nice?’ I questioned as the water boiled so violently it shook the kettle hard on the wooden worktop. Oh, that was original, I thought. Might as well have started talking about the sodding weather.

  ‘Not a lot, son.’ He laughed slightly, stopping himself by leaning over the mugs and holding his breath for a few seconds.

  This made me nervous so I perked up in my seat, watching him closely. I noticed several large bottles of prescription medicine on the side.

  He continued, ‘Well, you know, I can’t do so much these days. Just reading a lot, trying to learn as much as I can about the world from books. It’s not as if I can get out there. I write a lot too, in those black notebooks over there. I write about what it must be like to live, properly,
you know?’

  Something was clearly very wrong with Sienna’s dad. But why hadn’t she told me? Maybe he had cancer, I thought. I felt a wave of sadness rush over me. I wanted to run out, find her and hold her really tight, but at the same time I began to feel angry that she’d never told me. She can’t be that close to me, I thought, suddenly feeling like she was a stranger and I was imposing in a world I’d never been invited to explore. Maybe I had made a mistake by coming here.

  The sound of a teaspoon jangling inside a mug snapped me out of my panic spiral.

  ‘I’m sorry, George, but I don’t know what you mean by these days,’ I said quietly, unable to keep up the pretence that I knew something I didn’t – but should.

  He went quiet; the stirring stopped. Sadness crept over his features and he looked even more tired.

  I stood up and started to walk over to him. ‘Here, let me get those,’ I said, reaching out to relieve him of the duty. He turned to face me, both cups of boiling hot tea in his thin hands, and then suddenly, the most awful thing happened.

  As if in slow motion, the life seeped out of his eyes and his legs gave way beneath him, like buildings crumbling under the force of an earthquake.

  I tried, I really did, but it was too late. Every muscle in my body lurched forward to catch him, but I missed. I missed. I failed.

  The cups of tea flew into the air, milky brown water spraying all around us before the china smashed into little pieces on the floor. What must have been searing hot liquid ran down my face, but I felt no pain.

  His face was expressionless as he crashed to the ground. I feared he might break in half. The boiling hot tea was all over his legs, and he lay motionless on the lino. Silence swept over the room. Shit. Fuck.

  ‘Shit,’ I muttered, my whole body starting to shake. Chunks of vomit started to fill my throat. My vision suddenly became sharpened, my sense of smell heightened; I was experiencing everything in ultra-sharp technicolour.

  Fight or flight, Nick. Fight or flight.

  I dropped down to his side, my knees sliding through the tea all around us. I arranged his body into the recovery position, shaking so much that I felt as if I would pass out. He must have had a heart attack. Oh my God, what if he was dead? What the fuck would I say to Sienna, to everyone? Sorry, Sienna, I’m a meddling idiot who just couldn’t stay away. I spent five minutes with your father and killed him just by being near him. Fuck’s sake.

  I pushed my fingers into the soft skin of his neck; he was still warm, but I couldn’t feel his pulse. I tried to work out if it was just my fear and the blood rushing around my head that was rendering me useless at finding it. Tears started to slide down my face. What on earth was I going to do?

  Oh shit, I thought, what if George had a delicate condition that somehow I had disturbed? And if he died, then would I be the cause? I looked up to the ceiling, hoping that I could renew my faith in God. Last time I’d tried this was when I’d bunked off Sunday school all those years ago and spent the collection money on cola bottles. But praying was pointless. I had abandoned it for far too long.

  I pushed myself down towards his face again, whispering into his ear. ‘Please George, no, please. I love Sienna, she loves you, and she needs you. Don’t go anywhere . . .’ I begged his motionless body.

  ‘I love your daughter. Terribly,’ I said, my voice now a hoarse cry.

  I pulled my phone out of my pocket and tried to dial 999, but my hands were shaking so much I screwed it up. Twice. I was wasting valuable time.

  I’d always hoped that in moments like this I would be the comic-book hero, knowing exactly what to do, breathing life into the dying, sweeping the hurt and the danger away, applying bandages in the blink of an eye.

  I was a tit. A crying, shaking, useless lump.

  When I finally managed to dial the number I tried to explain what had happened to the operator, but the words didn’t flow as I’d hoped. ‘Please, just come now, I think he’s dead. Please hurry,’ I rasped, my throat dry as sandpaper.

  ‘OK, caller, please stay calm. Where are you?’

  ‘Erm, flat 10, Orchard Court, Great Westfield Road, London.’ Yes, that was it. I was being vaguely useful now.

  ‘What is the emergency?’ came the cold, calm voice at the other end of the line.

  ‘Look, I don’t fucking know. I’m with a man, he’s collapsed, I can’t feel a pulse, I think he’s dead. Just come NOW, please!’ I shouted, a little hysterical by that point.

  They told me later they had achieved a six-minute response time. Those next six minutes felt like an age. I sat next to George in the puddle of tea, holding his hands and weeping like a hysterical child. He didn’t move an inch the whole time. I was already wondering how I was going to tell Sienna. What if they thought I’d done something to him to cause this? Panic pulsed through my veins as I imagined myself behind bars.

  I was so glad when they turned up, flashes of fluorescent yellow and green and those sturdy, black laced-up boots. Bright red kitbags and the sound of Velcro ripping through the air reassured me that everything might just be OK.

  One of the paramedics pulled me away from George and sat me down. I felt like a small boy. I watched in silence while they worked away at him, feeling as though I was having an out-of-body experience. ‘He’s alive, mate,’ one of them said, turning towards me with a wide grin on his face. He obviously thought I was a dick.

  Then the same paramedic kneeled down beside me, his bald head shining under the strip lamp. ‘Are you running around after Sienna now, then?’ he said, looking at me with a half smile. ‘I hope you didn’t say anything embarrassing – he’ll have heard everything you said,’ he added, the smile spreading out even wider now.

  I said nothing.

  ‘She’s a nice girl, isn’t she?’ he concluded, rolling up a green mat and securing it with a black band.

  God, this bloke knows Sienna – he’s talking about her and George like he knows all about their lives, and I’m still in the dark. What happened back there? I wanted to ask but this bloke was getting on my wick. I shook my head, still unable to speak.

  ‘Chill out, he’s going to be just fine, mate,’ said the paramedic, slapping me on the back. Ouch.

  I remained silent, just trying to take it all in. I felt anger rising in me again. Why hadn’t she told me what the hell this was about? Did her boyfriend know and keep this from me? Did everyone know but me? Why hadn’t she trusted me with this?

  The paramedics knew George by name; they had obviously done this before. Many times, maybe.

  I had a flashback; a cold, horrible flashback. I love Sienna, she loves you, and she needs you . . . I love your daughter. Terribly. Yes, that was definitely what I’d said, wasn’t it? I’d told him I loved her. Oh dear God. This was so embarrassing.

  I imagined how silly I’d sounded when it was all happening. How my raspy voice had made these foolish love declarations while the tears of a frightened little boy gushed down my face.

  I’d thought we were so close and yet I didn’t know anything. Even now. Bollocks.

  Sienna

  Bread. Milk. Jam.

  I’d only popped out to get a few bits from the shop and I came back to utter chaos. I knew it was bad the second I walked round the corner because there was an ambulance outside our block of flats, blue lights flashing. From this point, although I couldn’t be sure they were here for my dad, I had a feeling in my gut which told me they probably were. They normally were.

  A few people had gathered on the grass outside the block, pointing up at our flat. They always did this. Village idiots . . . I recognised most of them. It was always the same people.

  Jack wasn’t there, though. Jack is our neighbour, a man in his early sixties who has helped me out a few times when Dad has fallen and I’ve struggled to get him up again. When I say helped, helped grudgingly is the best way of putting it. I’ve had to knock on his door at crazy times of night with no warning. I don’t think it’s gone down very well, but he�
�s the only person who’s ever really any use in these situations.

  To our left is a frail old lady. I can’t ask her for help, so it’s Jack by default. I don’t think he liked that at first. No one wants to be Jack by default, but I think he understands how hard it is for me now. He even brings food round if I’m away for the weekend, tubs of bolognese and risotto. Despite his initial reaction I’ve never really been embarrassed, because the most important thing at the time is making sure my dad is safe.

  My pulse started to race. This was not an unusual occurrence, but it never got any easier. I always feared that his next fall would be his last. There was only so much padding we could put up around the house.

  But nothing could have prepared me for what I saw when I made it through the door. Because there, sitting on the floor, was Nick. His face was puffy-looking, and he had clearly been crying. There was murky brown liquid everywhere. He was staring straight ahead, and patches of his hair were wet. He looked traumatised.

  My dad was being lifted onto the sofa by two burly paramedics. He looked exhausted.

  I didn’t know who to deal with first.

  ‘I’m OK, love,’ my father called quietly, waving his arms towards Nick. ‘Nick came round to see you. I passed out while I was making us tea. He did a great job though, Si,’ he added weakly.

  This was a disaster. I had managed to keep this from Nick for so long. I really didn’t want him to know about it. Anger rose in my chest. OK, I had been going to tell him one day, I really had, but I’d wanted him to get to know me for who I really was before any of these complications came into play.

  Suddenly I felt my anger transform into rage. Why was he here? Why had he been trying to catch me out? And on top of everything, the look of sadness on Dad’s face clearly showed that he was disappointed in me for not telling one of my best friends about him.

  It was a mess. I went and sat next to Dad, holding his hands in mine and trying to be calm, even though I wanted to shout at Nick. ‘No cuts this time, eh?’ I leaned forward, inspecting his head. ‘What did I tell you about wearing your helmet, though?’ I nagged. ‘You obviously didn’t have it on.’