Carry You

by Beth Thomas

  ‘Are you relaxed?’ I shout.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said, are you relaxed?’

  She nods enthusiastically. ‘Oh yeah,’ she yells, ‘very much so.’

  ‘Me too!’

  We give up trying to converse and wait for it to end. Eventually the timer runs out and abruptly the water drops and flattens out, stilling to a smooth calm within seconds. The room is suddenly very quiet. There’s a sense of the water flopping down onto a seat, closing its eyes for five minutes and breathing hard before it has to resume its frenetic activity.

  ‘Shall we get out?’ Abs says, making for the steps. I follow her without answering.

  In the steam room the atmosphere has been laced with aromatic eucalyptus oil, which immediately starts me off coughing.

  ‘Ah, isn’t this lovely?’ Abby says, inhaling deeply. ‘Really clears out your sinuses.’

  I’m coughing so hard my eyes are watering, but I manage to make one of my coughs sound like ‘yeah’. I wonder randomly if it’s possible to drown in steam. Whoever put the eucalyptus oil in there clearly had murder in mind.

  Eventually my windpipe accepts that this is as good as it’s going to get for a while, and I sit down with a squelch on the tiled bench. Abby sniggers at the sound, as if hers hadn’t made a sound at all.

  ‘Yeah, you get up and sit down again,’ I croak.

  She does. No sound. Rats.

  I lean back against the hard, scalding tiles and close my eyes. My throat tickles but I won’t let it start again. The atmosphere stills and the holes in the steam made by our entrance silently fill up again. Abby’s shape disappears into the mist.

  ‘Are you ready then?’ her muffled voice says from somewhere.

  ‘You want to leave already?’

  ‘No, no, I mean for the walk next Saturday.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ I think about that for a moment. We did twenty miles yesterday, which, while not effortless, was certainly not massively strenuous. I did have some pain afterwards, mostly in my hip joints, but it wasn’t severe and didn’t impede my walking at all or prevent me from finishing. Looking back, I’m absolutely positive I could have walked for an hour and a half more to do another six miles at the end. I turn to her. No, wait, that’s not her, that’s a big chimney or brazier-type thing. I think. I look around blindly so I can turn to her, but it’s hopeless. Doesn’t matter.

  I nod, but of course she can’t see me either. ‘Yes, I think I am. I mean, I know I am. I’m sure I could’ve done six more miles yesterday, so yeah. No worries. How about you?’

  There’s no answer. I wish I could see her expression but there’s nothing but mist, swirling mist. Eventually there’s a faint noise, like a strangled sob and a sniff, then a small cough.

  ‘Abs? You OK?’

  There’s still no sound, but I get the distinct impression she’s shaking her head.

  ‘Are you shaking your head?’

  Now I feel like she’s nodding. But she could easily have been nodding the first time and shaking her head now. Oh, this is ridiculous. I stand up, put my hands out in front of me and step gingerly forward, towards the place where Abs was last seen.

  ‘I’m here,’ she says, but her voice is wet and nasal, as if she’s got a streaming cold.

  I make my way towards the voice and at last discover her in the mist, like a gorilla. I sit down next to her. A bit more like a gorilla. ‘You all right?’

  Now I’m nearer I can see that she is, in fact, shaking her head. ‘Not really,’ she says, confirming it. ‘Oh Daze …’

  She collapses into me, wrapping her arms round my back, and sobs onto my shoulder. In spite of the suffocating and relentless heat, I feel a chill start to uncoil in my belly. She must have guessed or found out about two-timing Tom. At least in this smothering steam she won’t be able to see the look on my face when she tells me.

  ‘What? What is it? What’s going on?’

  ‘Oh, God, Daisy, I don’t know what to do. Everything’s gone wrong, it’s all terrible. It’s Tom.’

  I’m rubbing her back, which is not easy on damp sticky skin, and I can feel the hard bumps of her spine and her shoulder blades beneath the surface. She’s so thin, poor thing. Probably hasn’t been eating properly, or just burns it all off in nervous energy, with the stress of it all. Oh God, I wish more than anything I could take this away, make everything go back to how it was. ‘I think I know, Abby,’ I say quietly. ‘He’s having an affair, isn’t he?’

  She pulls back from me abruptly, holds me at arm’s length, and looks as near to my eyes as she can find in the steam. ‘No, Daisy,’ she says, then drops her gaze and looks down at her lap. ‘I am.’

  It hits me like a slap. I stare at her, not able for a few seconds to absorb this new information.

  ‘You are?’

  She nods.

  ‘Oh my God! Who with?’

  She hesitates, then sighs. ‘One of my clients. An idiot called Sean.’

  ‘Oh my God! Have I heard of him? Do I know him? How long has it been going on?’

  She’s shaking her head, making the steam swirl around her like vapour from aeroplane wings. She doesn’t want to answer, but I need to understand. ‘Not all that long. Couple of months.’

  ‘Oh my God! Not just a one-off then.’

  She shakes her head no.

  ‘Oh my God.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So … Tom?’

  She shakes her head. ‘Isn’t. I’m absolutely sure of that.’

  My mind starts buzzing. There are things I need to know, puzzles to solve, scenarios to think about and re-evaluate with this new factor. ‘Well … Fuck. When? I mean, how long? How did you …? Christ. Does Tom …?’ Thousands of questions flood my brain at once, all clamouring for answers, but there’s one that shouts more loudly than the rest. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  She doesn’t answer straight away. After a few seconds’ pause, she says, very quietly, ‘I didn’t want you to think badly of me.’

  ‘Why would I think badly of you? You’re my best friend.’

  She nods. ‘I know, I know, but I couldn’t bear the thought of you having a bad opinion of me. I couldn’t bear to … disappoint you.’

  ‘Did you think I would judge you, Abby? Seriously?’

  ‘Yes. No. Oh, I don’t know. I know you’re not judgemental; you get that from your mum. But what I’m doing, what I’ve been doing … It’s so terrible, how could you not hate me for it? I do.’

  ‘Oh, Abby. Of course I don’t hate you. I never will. You should know that.’

  ‘Thank you, Daze.’ She leans into me for a second, then meets my eye frankly. ‘Now you know the worst thing about me. Is it OK?’

  I’m reminded again of that old definition of love, and nod. ‘Of course it is, Abs.’ She breathes in deeply and releases it. ‘So. Tell me. Why are you seeing someone else? Are things bad with Tom?’

  ‘Oh God, I don’t know, I don’t even know, it’s pathetic. Things aren’t bad, exactly. Tom is … Well, you know what he’s like. He’s lovely. He’s so lovely, Daisy. He rings me from work to see if I need anything while he’s on his lunch. He sorts out the oil and the tyre pressure. He makes carbonara. Why would anyone do anything like this?’

  I shake my head. ‘I don’t know. How can I know, if you don’t? But there obviously is a reason, and I doubt it’s all down to you.’

  She looks at me sharply. ‘What? How can you say that? I’m the one doing it, Daisy. I’m the one being unfaithful, cheating, betraying my boyfriend. Potentially hurting him. Devastating him, his life. How can it not be my fault?’

  ‘Oh, Abby, I don’t know. I don’t understand. But I do know that no one person is ever to blame for a situation.’ I pause and rub her arm. ‘You told me that.’

  She smiles weakly. ‘OK, fair enough, I get that. But I still can’t justify it, can I? So he’s obsessively tidy, or mad about sport, or moans if I leave a single saucepan on the hob, so that makes it OK for
me to sleep with someone else? I don’t think so.’

  ‘I’m not talking about those kinds of things. Housework and stuff. I mean the important things. I’m saying maybe he doesn’t make you feel loved all the time. Or maybe he takes you for granted. Or … God, I have no idea. But if he’d been paying proper attention, he’d have noticed this. Except if he’d been paying proper attention, maybe you wouldn’t have done it in the first place.’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe. Oh God, I don’t know.’

  ‘Does he know?’

  She shakes her head. ‘God no.’

  ‘You gonna tell him?’

  She widens her eyes. ‘Why would I do that?’

  I shrug. ‘I don’t know. Because … I don’t know. Depends what you want to happen, I suppose.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, do you want to split from Tom? Do you want to be with the other bloke? Or do you want to stick and make a go of it with Tom?’

  She’s staring at me wide eyed. ‘Split from Tom? No. I love Tom.’

  ‘Well, I’m no expert but as far as I can see that means one of two things has to happen. You either tell him; or you don’t.’

  She blinks. ‘That’s it? That’s your advice? Either tell him, or don’t tell him?’

  ‘I did say I wasn’t an expert.’

  ‘Terrific. That’s incredible, Daisy. Thank you, thank you so much for helping me out of a terrible situation.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’

  She shakes her head and plonks it down on my shoulder.

  ‘Ow!’

  ‘God, yeah, that really hurt. Boneyhead.’

  We laugh, then hug. ‘Oh God, Daisy, what am I going to do?’

  It’s rhetorical so I don’t answer. I was only going to say ‘I don’t know’ anyway.

  After the steam room we sit and stare at each other in the sauna for a while. It’s a hard, dry heat that judders off the wooden seats like a physical presence and makes us feel like we’re going to implode.

  ‘This is the most unrelaxing spa I’ve ever been to,’ Abby says. ‘I’m so tense.’

  ‘I feel like I’m going to die.’

  ‘Swim?’

  ‘OK.’

  Two-thirds of the pool are cordoned off for aqua-aerobics, so we’re confined to a narrow strip down one side. We try resolutely ploughing up and down a couple of times but the water’s so rough and choppy from the bodies jumping up and down in time to Olivia Newton-John, we keep getting washed into the side. I struggle back to the shallow end to find Abby waiting for me.

  ‘Shall we go?’ she shouts. I nod wearily and we head for the changing rooms.

  ‘Thank you for that, Abs, it was lovely,’ I say as we’re getting dressed. ‘Such a treat.’

  She pauses in the towelling of her toes, raises her head and looks at me the way that teachers look at people who claim their dog ate their homework.

  When we get back to the flat, we hear the television on in the living room as soon as we open the front door. We both freeze in the doorway, then Abby looks at me meaningfully.

  ‘So you know what you said earlier about either buying the boots, or not buying the boots. Remember? You said either do it, or don’t do it?’

  I think wildly for a moment. Boots? Boots? I don’t remember any … Ohhhhh. ‘Mm-hmm.’

  ‘Well. I was just thinking. I think I’m going to buy them.’

  ‘Shit. Are you sure?’

  She nods solemnly. ‘Yeah. I think so. Because they’re … well, they’re perfect for me. And that other pair, that plastic pair … they looked nice but they were inferior quality. You know what I mean?’

  ‘Um, I think so.’

  ‘And really, something of quality may cost you a bit more initially, but then if it’s quality it’s more worth having. I mean, a good quality pair of boots can last you years, can’t they?’

  ‘I suppose so. Although I’ve never had a really decent pair. The best I’ve ever been able to get my hands on is those fake Uggs from the market. You know the ones that look like the genuine article, and you put them on and they feel perfect and you feel great in them, and you think you’ve got a bargain.’ I’m getting into it now. ‘But after only a couple of weeks, or a month or so, they start to come apart at the seams or sag over onto one side when you walk and let you down and then you realise you’ve been conned and all you’ve got is a fake imitation and you’ve spent all that time and money for something that you just need to throw in the bin.’

  Abby’s staring at me. ‘Shut up, Daisy.’

  She moves towards the living room door, gives me one last worried glance, bites her lip, then goes through it into Narnia. No, not Narnia. Narnia was quite nice in places. This is not so good. Maybe more like … Jurassic Park. After the dinosaurs have escaped. Only here the rampaging, bloodthirsty carnivores are cold and detached and more inclined to give you a stern frown than rip flesh from your bones.

  I’m guessing there might well be a scene involving Tom being devastated shortly. While no windows will be blown out, plates smashed or doors splintered off their hinges, there is likely to be an uncomfortable atmosphere, so I decide to make myself scarce. I change into my magic trainers and hit the streets. Or more precisely, Felix’s street, if I’m brutally honest. The sun is out, there’s a soft breeze and I can hear music playing somewhere through an open window. It’s ‘Biology’, by Girls Aloud, and I time my steps to the beat, swinging my arms and bouncing along energetically. It’s at times like these that I wish I knew how to dance.

  ‘What’s up, Queen Duck?’

  I start, and stop. I know that voice, and hearing it makes my heart beat faster and heat start to creep up my cheeks. It came from behind me somewhere but, when I turn, I don’t see him. I glance quickly from left to right and back again, feeling more and more foolish, but he’s nowhere to be seen. Oh God. Did I imagine it?

  ‘Up here, Dozy.’

  Too late I realise there’s a ladder leaning against the wall of the house nearest to me. And by ‘too late’ I mean I spot it long after any opportunity to appear cool and seductive has passed. When I see it, I instantly realise that he has been observing me from above while I repeatedly, and probably frantically, scanned the landscape for any sign of him, swivelling one-eighty degrees back and forth like a wind-up ballerina, culminating with a gasp of frustration and putting both hands on my head. I drop them to my sides quickly, but I fear the damage may already have been done.

  ‘Oh hi, Felix.’ I flick my eyes towards the ladder. ‘I hope you have a permit to put that ladder there?’

  He grins at me and starts to come down. ‘OK, lady, I’ve got all the necessary paperwork. Just give me a minute.’

  As he backs down the ladder, I do everything I can not to stare up adoringly at his large shape, but fail. He jumps the last two rungs and lands in front of me.

  ‘How are you doing?’ he says. ‘You look … lovely.’

  I touch the place where my hair used to be and find a hideous frizzy sauna-induced bird’s nest. Lovely.

  ‘Thanks, but I know you’re lying. No doubt you’re lying about that ladder permit too.’

  He smiles. ‘Ah, you got me. You probably need to issue me with some kind of fine now.’

  I wave my hand über-casually and shrug. ‘I could probably waive it.’

  ‘You could? Hmm, not what I was expecting from you, Miss Senior Ladder Inspectorate lady. You’ve gone soft. What’s changed?’

  I shake my head. ‘Ah nothing, no, I’m the same, see, I’m still the Head Ladder Inspector person.’ It’s very strange how finding out someone’s suffered a devastating bereavement suddenly makes any conversation or interaction with them very difficult. I try to smile but the difficulty apparently extends to non-verbal communication and my lips move outwards in an awkward spreading motion. Felix’s eyebrows flicker together for a nanosecond as he smiles at me, as if he experienced a fleeting terror. I know I need to bring the subject up, acknowledge that I know about it,
express my sympathy, be normal about it; but what is normal, when you’re talking about the sudden non-existence of someone you love? It’s unthinkable.

  I think back to how my friends reacted to me when they heard about Mum. Number one in the charts tended to be ‘Oh, I’m really sorry’, followed by ‘the look’ (brows up and together, head on one side); then loss of eye contact; and finally a hasty retreat out of there. Also very popular was ‘Was she ill for long?’ which always seemed irrelevant to me, although it did affect how they reacted subsequently. ‘No, she was killed under a tree’ usually shocks people into terrible silence. The sudden, unexpected cutting off of a life is so horrifying that there is absolutely nothing to say after that. Of course, that wasn’t my reply. I had to say, ‘Yes, ill for years, breast cancer, second time round, spread this time, been in hospital for months’, or anything from that selection. And the effect on the faces and voices of the listeners was immediate. They relaxed, they nodded, there was a definite appearance of relief there, and they became much more comfortable with the whole situation. ‘Years, you say? Oh, well, that’s all right then.’ Well, they didn’t say, that’s all right, but you could still hear it. And I wanted to scream, ‘How is it all right? Her end was drawn out, her suffering was gigantic, her agony was enduring. Her death was not a relief.’

  Felix is still looking at me. OK, I’ve got to say something. I arrange my features to make absolutely sure I’m not doing ‘the look’, then put my hand on his arm. ‘Abby told me about your wife. Felix, I was gutted to hear it. I’m so sorry. But at the same time, I’m massively impressed.’

  He looks startled to begin with and flinches a little. From his expression, I’m not sure that he’s all together happy with Abby for telling me his most private and painful secret. If he’d wanted me to know, of course, he would have told me himself. And frankly, should have done, right after I told him about Mum. But then he visibly relaxes when I don’t do ‘the look’ and one side of his mouth turns up.