by Louise Kean
‘Don’t worry, it’ll be fine!’ he says, as two kids are dragged off by their respective fathers who, I swear, are both smiling at me as they gesture for us to have a go. I take a deep breath and, fixing Charlie with an accusatory stare, I step up onto the trampoline. Charlie leaps on with a bounce, and springs high into the air straight away, shouting ‘Come on’ at the world, and laughing, waving with his arms. I feel the trampoline beneath my feet, bending as I take each step. I look around and see both fathers eyeing me at a distance.
‘Charlie?’ I hiss.
‘Come on, just bloody jump, it’s great!’ Charlie yells, as he lands on his arse, and bounces straight back up again.
I take another deep breath, and make sure I am in the middle of my trampoline. What if I bounce off onto the concrete? What if I have a faulty one, and it gives way – would I die from the fall, or from the embarrassment?
I watch Charlie bouncing away, making faces at the kids who stand with their dads watching us, who sneer back at the idiot having fun on something so childish.
I bend my legs and do a baby bounce.
‘Shit,’ I whisper, and stop myself. I am holding onto my bikini top with two full palms.
I try again, and bounce a little more, trying to let go of my self-conscious mind. I close my eyes to ignore anybody looking at me, and then open them again very quickly as I bounce a little higher, scared that I will drift out to the edges. And I bounce, for at least two minutes. I can’t get the height that Charlie gets, because I can’t use my arms – they are clamped firmly to my chest. But I laugh, at the unusual feeling, at Charlie, at the very fact that we are doing this. I watch the world bob up and down, and just as I feel myself getting too high, I tense my legs and bring myself back down to earth. You don’t have to let go all at once. Small bounces are fine for now.
‘I’m knackered,’ Charlie says, and I turn to see him lying on his stomach, staring at me bouncing about in front of him. ‘And I’ve hurt my balls,’ he whispers, and starts laughing.
I stop my bouncing and sit down in the middle of the trampoline. We stare at each other. Is it just because of the bouncing, the redness of our faces? I can’t pull my eyes away from him. We both know what happens next. We have managed, against all the odds of our cynicism, and our anger, and our mutual disappointment, to have fun.
I hear a kid behind me complain to his dad – I want a go, why won’t they get off? – and I say,
‘Shall we go?’
‘Yeah.’
We scramble off, and kids replace us immediately, and start bouncing straight away.
We pull on our shoes, retrieve sunglasses from our bags and force them onto our eyes, to shield us from the sun, and each other. We head for the exit, and start to walk quickly now, back towards the cottage. We stumble up the incline we edged our way down previously, and Charlie turns and offers me his hand to pull me up the final steps. I take it, and get tugged to the top. I am out of breath slightly, but Charlie doesn’t step back. Our chests graze each other, and I look down rather than look at him. He pulls my sunglasses off, and I sigh deeply, knowing I shouldn’t do this sober. Somebody in the wings should pass me a drink, some old farmer should whizz past on a tractor and pass me a bottle of red wine that I can neck in one. Because sober it’s going to hurt when it goes wrong. But my thoughts are stopped, my whirring mind distracted by Charlie’s lips touching mine. I feel my heart heavy in my chest, and try and catch my breath. It’s like he hasn’t kissed me for years. I can see his half-closed eyes, the blue and the brown, the light and the dark. I feel his hands – one in my hair, one on the bare skin of my back.
Starting Again
The sex isn’t like before.
The rain falls down hard outside, and we are so close in bed, but not touching. The closeness of his thigh to my thigh makes my skin tingle, makes his hairs stand on end. Still we are not touching. We both slipped into bed without speaking, under the pretence of sleeping, and then turned and rolled towards each other. My breathing is fast, his is slow. I can almost feel his lips against mine, but not quite. My body reacts to the heat, and my limbs shake with an involuntary current that presses skin to skin suddenly, and Charlie leans forward and presses his parted lips to mine, slowly moving them around my mouth, letting his tongue creep into my mouth, letting it slide against my own, as we twist heads and hands twist into hair. His lips move down my neck, along my breastbone, my hands cradling his head as he moves it around my breasts, and then everything becomes one. With Charlie’s hands in mine, and his legs between my thighs, and breast to chest, nipple to nipple, hands creeping around and holding my back, hands running down his back, nails slightly grazing the bottom of his spine, finding places to stop, and then moving on, with him on top and me on top and me on my side, and Charlie behind me, and slowly, slowly, with hands in my hair, and lips on lips again, eye to eye eventually, starting again, it’s all new.
As the rain pelts the window, and we lie thoughtfully side by side, Charlie says, ‘Are you alright?’
‘I’m fine.’
Back to Life
We could go to Sydney – a lot of people start there – or South America: Cuba has become very popular. We could go anywhere, do anything. We could go scuba-diving in the Caribbean, snorkelling in Thailand, on safari in Kenya, we could drive Route 66. We could leave our lives behind, leave the people we have become. We could go and sit on top of mountains, look out at oceans, at seas of buffalo roaming the plains, and palm trees, and deserts. We could wear shorts all year round; we could trek through forests; meditate with Buddhas; taste monkey brains; pick berries in foreign fields; hear languages that sound like symphonies. We could walk, and get the bus, get the train, hire bicycles, fly in helicopters over canyons, charter boats, swim, sail, dive. We could drink, dance, sing, skip our way around the world. We could get carried away.
The train is both exciting and depressing. I lean my head on Charlie’s shoulder and try to sleep, but I am too nervous. I am nervous that I will actually do it, that I will hand in my resignation. That I will phone my estate agent and place an advert to rent out my flat. That I will do all of this with a man I hardly know, not the man that I have been seeing for the last six years. Because Charlie is different now. I am convinced of that. He has his arm around me. He even smells different, tastes different. His eyes glisten, they’ve stopped dying, just in time, before it was fatal. He is clean and bright and full of hope. He wants to be with me again, and I want to be with him. I want us to be together, talking, looking at a picture postcard view.
There is something I have to do first, and I shift uncomfortably in my seat as I think of it. I need to see Dale. I need to tell him everything, sweep out the cobwebs that have been clouding my judgement, driving Charlie away. I need to resolve everything, before I go away, and now is the perfect time. The train speeds through countryside that seemed so alien to me just a few days ago. Before it was a world of pessimism, of cynicism, of people I would never know. Now I feel like every door has opened up for me – the places we can go, the people we can talk to, the dreams we can experience together are becoming a reality. In just a month we could be gone. I take a sharp breath, and Charlie holds me tighter. Charlie has realized our lives should be better thank God. Just in time. I was falling before, into a trap of monotony, of a dull average life experienced by too many people, but not me, not now.
We get back to London, and I feel elated.
‘I’ll see you later – I’ll get a cab over.’ Then I whisper something in Charlie’s ear, and he smiles at me, surprised.
‘I need to tidy up my flat!’ he says laughing.
‘Yes you do!’ I kiss him softly, and he kisses me, with his hand in the small of my back.
‘Nix, I can’t believe you did this for me. I can’t believe how … lucky I am to have you.’ We stand so close it is a crime not to keep on kissing.
‘You know what, Charlie, I feel like I should be thanking you. I feel like … I don’t know, like you’
ve woken me up. I feel like I’ve got something to look forward to! I can’t believe we are going to do this!’
‘We bloody are going to do it! You and me.’
‘Damn right, you and me. Against the world!’ I laugh and kiss him again, and pull away, picking up my bag, climbing into the taxi that has pulled up.
Charlie leans into the open window and kisses me goodbye.
‘I’ll see you later.’
As the cab pulls off, I feel so high, I barely even notice I am back in London, on the way back to my flat. The rain is coming down in sheets, the heat still hangs in the air between the raindrops. I wipe the sweat off my breastbone, and lean back, closing my eyes. I jolt upright as the taxi pulls outside my flat, and I hear thunder. My phone bleeps the arrival of a text.
Don’t be too long, Char xxx
Two hours later, after a long shower, an inspection of my post, a change of clothes, I phone Charlie’s mobile.
‘Can I come over now? I’m all done here.’
‘Of course. I’m just sitting here waiting for you to turn up, you fool!’
I hang up laughing. I’m smiling like a bloody school kid. I take the tube, and stop off at the market up the road from Charlie’s flat to buy flowers and wine.
I get to Charlie’s and let myself in with my key. He is sitting, naked on his sofa, staring straight ahead. I almost drop the wine. I stare at him mouth open, aghast.
‘Charlie?’ I ask uncertainly, ‘are you okay?’ I gulp back tears straight away.
He keeps a straight face for about a second, and then cracks the broadest smile.
‘Just waiting for you, honey!’ he laughs, and my shoulders droop with relief.
‘You bastard!’ I shout and laugh, as I hit him with the flowers, and he pulls me on top of him, kissing me forcefully on the mouth, unbuttoning my cardigan, reaching inside.
Closure, I Promise
Monday morning, and work is a nightmare, as I expected. I get in at ten, and Phil is already in his version of a panic as I walk in the door, but it’s his usual laid back panic, which amounts to a slight look of tension just above his nose, resulting in an ever so slightly furrowed brow. That’s why I like him as an assistant; he stops me worrying. Even when everything goes wrong, he never seems that fazed.
‘And how are you, Philip?’ I ask, as he slumps down in front of my desk and I shut the door to my office.
‘Fine thanks – are you feeling better?’ he asks, with no concern whatsoever.
‘Yes, thanks.’ I brush over it swiftly.
‘Any political bombs drop since nine-thirty?’ I turn on my computer and blow on my coffee simultaneously.
‘Nothing really. The scriptwriter called, I didn’t tell him about the old woman yet, in case we don’t use her. He wants to know what’s going on, and if he’s going to get fired. He said he spoke to José on Friday, and he just went on about hygiene, and the need to wash your hair every day.’
‘Oh for God’s sake. How many emails have I got waiting?’ I ask, flipping open my day book.
‘One hundred and thirty-five.’
‘Just from Friday? Jesus!’ I almost get annoyed, and then I relax, and think, not for much longer!
I tap the code into my phone for my messages – ‘your mailbox is full’. I can’t wait to get away from this.
‘Look, Phil, I’ve got something important to do first thing, so I’m going to close my door for an hour or so, and then we’ll go through everything, get it all ready.’
‘Yep’.
‘Is that okay?’ I ask – he seems a little weird.
‘Yeah, fine. Why are you grinning? You look like a freak.’ I realize I am smiling like the Cheshire Cat.
‘Oh sorry, yes I’m fine. Just happy to see you as always, my little ray of sunshine.’
‘Whatever,’ he says, and gets up to go.
‘Phil, one more thing, that guy that phoned, Dale – can you give me his number.’
‘Yep.’ And he walks out.
I look at my office, all the videos and scripts lying around, the old talent photos, the new talent photos, decisions that need to be made, piling high. I can’t wait to get out! I realize that Phil is not returning with the number, and I get up and open the door, leaning out.
‘Phil, the number?’
‘Yeah, I’m just trying to find it. I think I may have left it in my football bag …’ He is unconcerned. But I need it now. I feel a mild panic rise up inside my stomach. I have to have the number today, It can’t work without it, my plan will fall apart.
‘Phil!’ I shout, and then lower my voice.
‘Find the number,’ I demand, and slam the door behind me and go back and sit at my desk, drumming my fingers on the desk, blowing on my coffee, clicking into Word, and just staring at the blank screen in front of me.
My phone buzzes.
‘Yep?’ I say to Phil.
‘I’ve got it – do you want me to email it to you?’
‘Please.’
I hang up, and wait for it to appear on my screen.
It pops up, and I read it quickly. Dale. And his mobile number. I put my phone on hands free – it’s less personal, safer, from a distance. I dial in the number. The phone rings for ages, and just as I am ready to leave a message on an answerphone with a sudden relief, a lazy American voice answers.
‘Hello?’
The sound of his voice startles me straight away, the years almost fall away, and I am a student again. I feel my stomach lurch, and my voice, when it comes, is an octave higher than normal.
‘Dale, it’s Nicola.’ Silence.
He phoned me, how can he not know who it is? But then he speaks.
‘Nicola. Nicola. How are you?’
‘Yes I’m fine, Dale, how are you?’
‘I’m fine too. Just dandy.’ That is such a Dale thing to say, such a cliché. He says it like he is mocking me straight away, laughing at some private joke at my expense. I hope he hasn’t reverted back to arsehole mode.
‘You phoned! I’m returning your call! It’s been … years. Are you in London?’
‘Yes I am.’ He is not sharing a lot of information for a guy who called me. This isn’t what I had expected. I had expected nerves in his voice, not a smirk. I had expected a deep husky seriousness. Only now do I realize how long I have been imagining this call. How long I have been hoping or waiting to hear from him again. How I’ve pictured him, needing me, wanting me from afar. The one that got away! How I have romanticized the whole thing in my head. It is not going to be like that now, I realize.
‘So, Dale, what can I do for you?’ All of a sudden my feelings are on the wire, my defences go up, I back away mentally. I turn on him with professionalism.
‘Well, for a start, you could probably take me off speakerphone!’
‘Oh right, sorry.’ I pick up the receiver and I swear I feel it burn my hand.
‘What can I do for you?’ I ask again, hearing the closeness in the silence down the line. When he speaks I feel something rush down my spine.
‘Well, I’m in London, finally. And I thought I’d look you up, seeing as you’re the only person I know here.’
His voice sounds deeper than I remember. He sounds like he’s smoked a million cigarettes since last we spoke, and it’s probably not far from the truth.
‘How did you get my number?’
‘I phoned the number you gave me, it was your parents, they gave me this number.’
‘God, you’ve kept it all this time? That’s … organized of you,’ I say, but thinking, that’s devotion, that’s … love.
‘Well, it went into my address book, and I’ve always carried the names over. You don’t mind, do you, me phoning?’ But he doesn’t sound like he’d care if I did mind – he sounds like he’s enjoying himself, an old ghost creeping up on me, breathing down my neck, making me nervous.
‘No, of course not. I’m glad you phoned. How are you, are you married?’ I don’t know why I ask this rather than any o
ther question that could figure in the five years of his life I’ve missed out on.
‘Well, yes and no. I’m … separated.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ Am I?
‘Look, I was wondering if you’d like to have lunch with me. I was going to ask you to dinner on Friday, but now I only have today left. I’m off to Scotland tomorrow, and then over to Dublin for a few days, and then back to the States.’
‘Oh, right,’ I say, a little taken back. He just wants lunch. He doesn’t want to tell me he loves me. He doesn’t want to meet me at the Tower of London, or in the Dungeons, or under Big Ben, or anything else Dale-like. He just wants to have lunch?
‘So, Nicola, are you free for lunch today?’
‘Um, yes, well I’ll have to check my diary, no actually it’s fine, I’ll just cancel if I have something on. Yes, I’m free for lunch. Where do you want to go?’
‘You know London, not me. Can you suggest somewhere?’
I rack my brain and think of every restaurant in a two-mile radius of my work – nowhere too busy, nowhere too intimate, nowhere too expensive (in case he thinks it’s my treat): Luigi’s. Perfect.
‘How about Luigi’s – it’s just around the corner from my office. Do you like Italian?’
‘Yeah, that’ll be fine.’
‘Great, I’ll see you there at one, shall I? I’ll get my assistant to make the reservation.’
‘Okay.’ Silence. I am waiting for him to say goodbye, but nothing is forthcoming.
‘Well, okay, I’ll see you at one.’
‘Nicola?’ Still smirking at the other end of the phone. This whole thing is making me feel a little uneasy.
‘Yes?’
‘What road is it on? Or should I ask your perky little assistant? Having a man for an assistant! I always knew you were a feminist.’
‘Oh, yes, no, I know, I mean, it’s on Neal Street.’
‘Fine, I’ll see you there.’
‘Okay, bye,’ and I hang up before I get to hear him say goodbye.