I told my parents first. The main reason was that I was hoping to borrow some money and, also, they were easier to tell. My father thought it was a great idea; he kept calling me his ‘explorer princess’ and asked how long I’d be gone. I had thought this one out carefully and I told him about a year. I thought if I started talking about never coming back, it might cause problems.
My mother thought it was a little dangerous, but she was happy that Katie was going. I reassured them that going was the first step in finding out what career I wanted when I came back. I used phrases like ‘breathing space’ and ‘clear thinking’. My parents were happy and relieved. Before I could mention the word ‘money’, my mother offered it and my father agreed, straight away. Not ‘we should discuss this alone,’ but ‘yes, of course, we can help’. This help amounted to my feeling like a spoilt brat, and loving it. I told them they’d never have to buy me another birthday or Christmas present, but they just laughed.
Everything was starting to become real. My parents thought I was planning a trip and they were hoping that I’d come back all grown-up and career-minded. Maybe I would, if I got hit on the head by a sharp object on the way. Maybe I’d go somewhere and just know that it was the place for me and I’d stay there forever. Or, as I said earlier, perhaps what I was looking for was already here. I just needed to leave, think more clearly, then the answers would appear. I needed to get away, because at the moment I associated London with the place I was most unhappy, and although I shouldn’t blame London for my unhappiness, I needed to get far away before I could even think about exonerating it. I was leaving for good reasons, not bad ones. There was one thing I had and that was promise. This time promised to be a great, good and fulfilling time.
Out of my friends, I told Jess first. I don’t know why, perhaps because she had been my first friend at university. I told her when we were doing the washing-up. She just looked at me and said, ‘At last you’re moving on.’ She hugged me and she cried. ‘Ru, I’m proud of you, I know it hasn’t been easy and I probably didn’t always help, but this is what I wanted you to do, just something.’ She hugged me again and then looked at me very seriously. ‘You may never come back. You’re not going to book a return ticket, are you?’
I shook my head and started crying. ‘It’s not that I’ll never come back but, Jess, I’m such a head case, how do I know where the hell my future is? I know it’s not here at the moment. Maybe it’s with some primitive housewife tribe in Africa, or something like that.’
‘Ru, do you realise we haven’t been apart in four years? I love you, but I understand you need this and maybe you will come back. I’m sure you’ll come back and I’ll miss you, you old-fashioned pain in the arse.’
‘But I’m not going for ages,’ I cried, and we hugged again. It was a weird emotional scene and I have to admit this was the first time I had felt sad since making the decision.
‘Of course, if you do decide to stay out of England, I hope to God you pick somewhere nice. I don’t want to have to visit you in some jungle or forest or desert. Perhaps you could bear that in mind.’ The old Jess was back.
I laughed. ‘You can visit me wherever I am. I’ll miss you, Jess.’
She came with me to tell Sophie and Sarah. There was much of the same, tears, hugs, slaps on the back (Sarah nearly sent me flying), but the general opinion was that this was a celebration and we should, of course, get drunk. We did, and we talked about how we were when we first met. Jess the confident, Sarah the organised, Sophie the timid, and me a sort of Dorothy, always trying to find my way home. Later I called Thomas and he just said, ‘Nice one, Ru,’ which was enough. I realised a lot of things then. I was over Ben and not trying to replace him. I knew I had a future that didn’t look bleak and that one day I would find what I was looking for. Oh and hopefully I was no longer a monotonous bore.
I had grasped that I could be on my own and happy, that a relationship would be an added bonus but was not a necessary part of me. It had taken a year but I had finally got there. That’s one hell of a long time. When I’d leave I felt like I’d be a different person. Oh, I’d still be me and I’d still never want to be a career woman and I’d never think it’s great to be single, but I hoped I’d think it’s OK. Maybe leaving my three closest friends and Thomas would make a difference. Perhaps I depended on them too much. I was looking for them to let me wallow, or solve my problems for me. Now, although I’d miss them, I felt that I would become a better friend. I hoped so.
I put my head through the wall I had started to build a year ago. Ben was its foundation, then I added all the men I had met and all the bad jobs I’d had. My feelings were stronger than any bricks or mortar. It had taken a year to break through it. A year of banging my head against it. When I saw through it, I started to look back on the year and I felt silly. All the fuss I had made about Ben and my embarkation on a mission to self-destruct. There is nothing wrong in looking for love. Love is central to human happiness. My aim was still the same, but my methods would change. A year of being silly had some good consequences. So you see, I really did put my head through the brick wall. And the other side looked scary and a little big, but I thought I can do it. No, I knew I could.
Chapter Twenty
I was facing the biggest dragon I’d ever seen. This was a mean mother. He breathed fire at me, he singed my beautiful hair and I knew he just wanted to eat me all up. I cried, I screamed. I looked for my knight in shining armour, the one who was supposed to kill the dragon and rescue me. He was nowhere to be seen. The dragon was getting angry. He was getting closer. Still no sign of my hero. I stopped screaming and realised that in the twenty-first century the damsel in distress cuts no ice. I picked up my semi-automatic gun and showered the dragon with bullets. He fell down, defeated. I wiped the sweat off my brow and felt triumphant. Just then, up popped the handsome hero, who said, ‘Hey, cool chick, fancy a drink?’ I accepted. After all, things were different now.
***
Everything was settled, or almost. I had bought guides on practically every country that wasn’t England and I had planned and planned and planned. I was so excited. This was my new year, the one I had promised myself on Millennium Eve. Life was good.
I’d scarcely seen Sarah for a while and guessed her social life had picked up because she was never in and, in a way, I missed her. I noticed one Saturday morning that she hadn’t come home – her bed was unslept in – and I was intrigued. Had she broken her vow of celibacy? I told Jess, who told me that as usual I was letting my imagination run away with me. Of course Sarah was not having sex. But when she arrived home, smiling, in the afternoon, I just had to be sure.
‘Where have you been?’ I asked.
Sarah turned pink. ‘Out. Why?’ she answered, looking like I’d never seen her.
‘All night?’
‘Yes, I’m old enough. Are you my mother all of a sudden?’ With that she swept into the bathroom. Now I knew that Sarah had definitely had sex. I rounded up Jess and Sophie and we summoned a post bath Sarah to the sitting room. I told the others to be quiet while I sorted things out. I decided on the subtle approach. Jess, Sophie and I sat on one sofa. Sarah sat awkwardly on the other.
‘Sarah, have you had sex?’ Oh, well, subtlety had never been my strong point.
Sophie took over. ‘Sarah, what we mean is, well, have you been seeing someone?’
‘Yes.’ Sarah blushed.
‘Oh, my God.’ Jess jumped up. I was too shocked to move. Sophie smiled.
‘Who, Sarah, who?’ Sophie asked.
Sarah glowed even more, if that was possible. She was playing with her hair, avoiding our eyes.
‘Who?’ Jess repeated, as she sat down next to her. We all looked at her expectantly.
‘I guess you were going to find out soon enough. It’s Johnny.’
We were dumbstruck. After what seemed like ages, Sophie spoke again. ‘How?’ she managed.
‘It started after dinner. He called for a chat and I sugges
ted a drink’
‘You asked him out?’ Jess was excited.
‘Yes, I did.’ She giggled. Little-girl giggle not a Sarah snort. ‘I guess he didn’t think it was a date at first, but I told him that I really liked him and he said that was good and then it happened.’
‘What. What happened?’ Jess was practically jumping out of her seat again.
‘He kissed me.’
‘My God, I’ve heard everything now,’ I said, and I thought perhaps I had. But my head was back and things started to make sense.
‘How long have, you liked him?’ I asked.
Sarah stood up. She did a full circuit of the room with three pairs of eyes following her. She stopped behind me. ‘Ever since I first met him,’ she whispered, and went red again.
What a bloody surprise.
‘So the celibacy, all this time, the career, the I’m-going-to-fall-in-love-when-I’m-good-and-ready was bullshit?’ Jess said.
‘No, no, it wasn’t. I meant all that and I never thought Johnny would happen. I just hoped, dreamed. It was a hopeless crush, but not anymore. No man measured up to him, that’s why I didn’t want one.’
‘Like me and Ben,’ I said, and I knew it was true.
‘No,’ she protested, ‘no. I mean, we’ve never really been together.’ She went redder.
‘What do you mean, “never really”?’ Sophie asked.
Sarah sat down again.
‘OK. I slept with him once.’
‘Holy shit,’ I said.
‘When?’ we chorused.
‘Graduation.’ Here was something Sarah had kept from us for a whole year. None of us had had a clue.
‘But he went to the ball with Sophie.’ I was confused.
‘He didn’t leave with me, though,’ Sophie pointed out.
‘Oh, God, I knew you weren’t together. It’s just, you know, after the Ben stuff, well, I was worried and I asked him what he knew and then I slept with him.’ There was silence again. Sarah looked at us, pleading with us to understand. I broke up with Ben, Sarah slept with Johnny and while I spent a year getting over Ben, she spent a year in love with Johnny. The difference was that it might have been worth it for her.
So I laughed and Sarah did, then the others did. ‘Sarah, you’re a dark whore,’ I said, and we laughed even more.
After we had calmed down Jess spoke; ‘So we can hold a ritual burning of your vibrators now?’ Sarah hit her and we collapsed in laughter again.
***
I was distracted by Sarah’s love life only for that evening. I had to keep planning my trip. The next morning, I settled at my desk, looking forward to seeing Katie. She hadn’t heard the latest part of my plan and I had to tell her. I felt like I might burst. But she was late. Not Katie-late but late-late. I glanced at the clock and decided to give her another half-hour. I looked at the door expecting her to bound in swearing about the tubes like she had when I first met her. The door remained closed. I called her at home and got her answer phone. I left a message. I wanted to go round but I couldn’t leave the office without arousing Jenny’s suspicion. I told her Katie was ill and that was that. But I was worried.
At five on the dot I rushed round to her flat. There was no answer and I wanted to break the door down but wasn’t sure how legal that was. I went home and told Jess. Jess told me that if Katie was in trouble I would know. I called a thousand times without any answer. I finally went to bed at midnight, exhausted from trying to figure out what had happened.
The doorbell woke me. I looked at the clock. It was three in the morning. I jumped out of bed and opened the front door. Katie was standing on the step.
‘Hi’, she said.
‘Hi,’ I said. Remember with Ben how I knew that it was an end-of-the-world moment? Well, this was the same. She was glowing, and I realised that again my life was about to change.
‘Come in.’ I found my voice.
‘Ru, let’s go for a walk. It’s a fabulous evening.’ God, now I knew something was wrong. It was cold, it was three a.m. But, for some reason, I didn’t want to argue. Katie followed me into the house and I went to get dressed. We didn’t speak.
We left, me huddled in Jess’s coat, Katie wearing very little, considering, but she didn’t look cold. I remembered walking with her when we had first become friends and I wondered if this was the last time. I don’t know why, but it felt final.
‘You weren’t at work today.’
‘No.’
‘I was worried.’
‘Sorry.’ We carried on in silence until we got to a children’s play area. We both sat on the swings and I felt my heartstrings pull. How I would like to have known Katie when we could have played on the swings together. I felt like I had, in a way, as if I’d known her forever.
‘Have you heard from Ben?’
‘No. Sam the Hatstand called me to say thanks for dinner, but that’s it.’
‘How do you feel?’
‘About him?’
Katie nodded.
‘Well, I don’t feel very much anymore. Empty that’s how it feels when I think of him, empty. I’m still jealous of her, but that’s about me. I figured out that those are my feelings and they don’t belong to either Ben or Sam.’
‘So he wasn’t the great love of your life, after all?’
I scuffed the toes of my trainers on the ground. ‘I hope not, because if that was it, well, it’s disappointing.’
‘But all the mourning, was it worth it?’
‘Of course not. And I wasn’t mourning him. It was more about my inability to move forward. I just used Ben as a barrier to progress.’ I giggled. ‘He was an effective barrier.’ Silence again.
‘Ruth, if Ben had come home and declared his love for you, what would you have done?’
‘I don’t know. God, maybe I would have gone back to him and then I would’ve found out later that we weren’t right. Maybe I would have told him to piss off, I really don’t know. But I don’t think he’s right for me and I do believe that at some point I would have realised that, whether I was with him or not.’
‘So you still believe in fate and love?’
‘Of course. God, yes, that’s my foundation, my religion. When I fall in love I’ll know. I guess Ben was more like my dress rehearsal.’
‘If you fell in love now would you still go away?’
‘God, I’m not going to fall in love now. I mean, I don’t even know any men.’ I laughed then I stopped. Thud. It hit me. This wasn’t about me. This conversation wasn’t mine. I had neither masterminded it nor invited it. I was just here. It was Katie’s conversation.
‘He’s back?’ I said, amazed that the words came out from my lips and unsure how the knowledge got into my head, but now I knew and it all made sense.
‘Yes.’
‘When? How?’
‘This weekend.’
‘So when you said on Friday you wanted a weekend alone, you didn’t mean it?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘No, and you couldn’t tell me that the real reason was because you wanted to shag some man who abandoned you years ago.’ I was upset by this, but I didn’t understand.
‘No – God, Ruth. He came back. Can’t you see how that would make me feel? He tracked me down, though God knows how, and he came to the flat. He said that he’d met someone who knew of me and they knew someone and so on. He came round and I was ignoring the door so he left a note with his number on. That was Thursday night. I didn’t see him then and I didn’t know what to do and I really did need a weekend alone to work out what was happening to me. I went haywire.’
‘I’m sorry. What did the note say?’
‘It said that I’d be shocked to know he was here and that he’d found me and he was shocked himself. Then he said he hoped I was well and he asked me to call him. He left his number. That was it, nothing huge or dramatic. I read it a thousand times. Can you imagine? God, I didn’t know what to think – I couldn’t think. All I wanted to do was to feel normal ag
ain but I couldn’t. I cried, Ru, really cried all night, I couldn’t sleep or anything, I couldn’t make sense of it. He was there for me and then he broke my heart. Then, just as I get my life back together, he’s back and none of it made sense.’
‘I can see that. It must have been a shock’
‘It was, God, it was. I was just glad I hadn’t opened the door. I don’t know what I would have done. I thought about it on Friday night, then on Saturday, and Saturday night I decided to do it. I called him. I mean, I wasn’t sure if I should or not, but then I had to because I couldn’t sleep and I knew that one day I would need to sleep again and if I didn’t call him I never would.’
‘I would have called him,’ I whispered.
‘But, you know, I wasn’t prepared for my feelings. They were still all there, right here. As soon as I saw the note, when I was thinking, I knew I still loved him, really loved him. I wasn’t over him. That was scary. Not like with you. I mean, it was horrible for you but you were really over him. I wasn’t and I’d thought I was and now so many things make sense, like why I never wanted to have another relationship. That was because I couldn’t because I was in love with him. Can you see that?’
I swung gently backwards and forwards. It was like a gentle rocking. I thought about it and I could see it, I could see her finding the note, I could see her lighting a cigarette, standing, sitting, standing, walking from room to room, another cigarette, a bottle of beer, all the time the note in her hand. This had gone on all night. The next day she had come to work and she was Katie again, not lovesick Katie but my Katie.
Then she had done the same thing that night; she had resumed the pacing, the thinking, the fuddled head, the tears. I could see her crying. I could see her fear, but I knew she would call just as I would, and just as the panic and the fear subsided she would be pleased with her feeling of love.
I didn’t want to know what came next, but at the same time I did. I wasn’t being selfish, I understood how she felt, but I just wanted it to go back to how it was before, me and Katie, and now I knew that nothing would be the same again.
Rubber Gloves or Jimmy Choos? Page 34