Me and You

by Claudia Carroll

  ‘I think you’ll find everything’s here for you, all present and correct,’ Simon said, coldly this time, pointedly not asking her to sit down or, God forbid, even offering her a mug of tea. Again, very disconcerting, in a house so familiar to her. And which still felt so much like home.

  ‘If it would make it any easier for you, I’ll clear out of your way and head out for a bit,’ he added. ‘Give you what, say an hour to get your things out of here? That enough time for you?’

  ‘The last thing I’m here for,’ she said hesitantly, ‘is to pick up stuff belonging to me.’

  ‘You sure? Because no doubt you’ll be needing at least some of it, for your new life in Cape Town,’ he almost snapped the words out. Which again, caught her offguard. Just standing here, listening to Simon who was ordinarily so mannerly and polite being this cutting towards her, was far, far worse than she ever could have imagined.

  ‘All of your old clothes are all upstairs in the spare room, you’ll find,’ he said, standing well away from her, right over by the door, as if he couldn’t even bear to share the same airspace as her.

  ‘But if you’re looking for your car, I’m afraid we took a decision to sell it about a year ago. No choice; it kept getting clamped and eventually was towed. It was costing a fortune in parking bills and as we figured the chances of you ever coming back for it were slim to none, selling seemed like the best option. We kept the cash safely for you, though, in case you ever needed it.’

  ‘Simon,’ she interrupted, ‘if you think I’m here about my old car or looking for cash or, God forbid, a few mangy bags of old clothes, you’re much mistaken. All that crap is just so transient. It means absolutely nothing to me.’

  ‘Then why are you here, Jean?’

  She wasn’t mistaken. He’d almost spat out her name.

  ‘If I possibly can … to try to talk to you.’

  She’d walked over to him and was right beside him now. Standing tall, determined that she wouldn’t start falling apart, not when there was so much still to say. Plenty of time for that later on.

  ‘Well, let’s not expect the impossible, probably best not to,’ he said, tersely. ‘Besides, we already spoke yesterday. You explained exactly why you took off that night. Nothing more to say, I’d think. Wouldn’t you?’

  ‘I mean I wanted to talk to you, alone, and I’m not leaving here till you at least hear me out,’ she told him, and in a weird way, now that she was home, she could slowly feel like some of her old spirit was somehow seeping back to her. Now that she’d come face to face with him, she felt a bit stronger. More in control. Feck it, she’d come this far, hadn’t she? She wasn’t leaving now without saying her piece.

  ‘Simon, walking out on you and Angie was the single hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my whole life. You have to believe me! Not one single day has passed since when I’ve not thought about you, wondered how you were getting on, all the time knowing you must despise the sight of me for what I’d put you through. And I know it’s way too late in the day for apologies, and the last thing I’d ever expect would be your forgiveness, but if I could at least try to make you understand—’

  ‘Understand what, exactly?’ And this time he was actually raising his voice, something she’d never heard Simon do before, in all the time she’d known him.

  She looked blankly at him, momentarily stunned into silence.

  ‘I asked you a question,’ he fired angrily at her. ‘What is it exactly that you miraculously expect me to understand? I couldn’t bring myself to say this to you yesterday, not in front of Angie. It wouldn’t have been fair to drag up the relationship you and I once had with her there. But have you the slightest idea what it was like for me back then? You disappear off the face of the earth, we rip our whole lives apart trying to track you down, worried sick about you, then the police land in on us and we discover that, all this time, you’d been living a complete lie! You and I had been together for eighteen months and you never even thought to tell me that Kitty wasn’t even your real name! How exactly do you propose trying to get me to understand that, Jean? Please, I’m all ears! Very curious to hear you explain that one away!’

  ‘I was frightened!’ she almost yelled back at him, feeling a surge of elation now that she’d finally found her voice. ‘I was absolutely bloody petrified! You ask if I knew how things were for you, but have you the slightest idea of what that was like for me? I’d had my whole life ripped apart before and I wasn’t prepared to let that happen to me again! So forgive me for taking what I thought was the only option that I had open to me, so I could keep myself safe. And to keep you and Angie safe, too. Yes, I came to Dublin with a new name and I know I deceived you and that it was wrong of me. But I thought at least that way I’d manage to protect myself. Then I met Angie, so of course she only ever knew me by my new name. Same when I met you.’

  ‘So you thought it was acceptable to let us believe a complete lie? Or when you’ve lied as often as you have, does it become like second nature?’

  ‘Simon, just hear me out! I know it was a despicable thing to do, but in a funny way … it almost stopped mattering after a while. I figured, OK, so I happened to be calling myself something different, but at the end of the day, I was still the same person, wasn’t I? After all, my whole personality hadn’t changed; all I’d done was tweak a couple of official documents, that was it. At least, that’s how I saw it.’

  ‘You couldn’t have trusted me?’ he asked, really looking at her intently now, first time he’d done that since she’d arrived. ‘Couldn’t have told even me the truth? Didn’t you know that I’d have done everything I could to protect you? No one would have threatened you while I was around, no one. Surely you knew that I’d have taken care of you?’ His voice cracked a bit here and he broke off, as if emotion was finally getting the better of him.

  ‘It wasn’t a risk I could take,’ she answered simply, glad that at least they weren’t yelling at each other any more. ‘Besides, it wouldn’t have been fair to lumber the whole burden of my past onto you. You didn’t deserve that.’

  And anyway, she could have added, you couldn’t have protected me, no one could. Because Joe – Christ, how she hated even having to invoke his name! Well, he’d still managed to find her, hadn’t he? He’d still traced her all the way to Byrne & Sacetti. So no one could have kept her safe from then on. And the rest was history.

  ‘Oh, no, I may not have deserved that,’ Simon was saying dryly, sarcastically. Again, so unlike the old Simon. ‘Whereas my girlfriend just disappearing into thin air, leaving police to tell us the truth about her, was something that I did deserve? Or that Angie deserved? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘But it wasn’t like that! Believe me, I know what I put you both through is indefensible and if I had my time over, I’d do things so differently. I just didn’t want you thinking that it barely cost me a thought to do what I did, because you couldn’t be more wrong!’

  ‘But you’ve been gone for almost two years, Jean! And in all that time you couldn’t have picked up the phone to explain all this to me?’

  She shook her head, willing herself to lock her voice into its lowest register and, above all, to stay calm.

  ‘But where would I even have begun?’ she asked him softly. ‘And yes, when we were together, there were times … plenty of times … when I’d contemplated telling you. I hoped and prayed that you’d understand, but the thing was … well, the longer we were together and the more serious things got between us, the harder it became. It was wrong of me, I know that, but I honestly didn’t know how on God’s earth I could tell you that I’d been living a lie all that time. Besides, we were so happy together, so rightly or wrongly, I figured, why not just live in the now and enjoy ourselves? Then of course, after I’d gone, I knew that it was only a matter of time before the police would have discovered everything there was to know about me and I knew how deceived you’d feel. Best thing all round, I thought, was for me to just disappear, to dissol
ve like a Disprin. Believe me, I thought I was doing you a favour. I thought you were far, far better off without me.’

  ‘You know what the worst part of all was for me?’ he asked, all of a sudden looking so very tired and worn to a shred by all of this counter-accusation and bitterness.

  She knew exactly how he felt.

  ‘Tell me.’

  Now he was walking over to the sofa by the TV, then slumped exhaustedly down onto it, rubbing raw, red eyes with the palms of his hands. Almost like he’d had enough of this row and just wanted peace, wanted out.

  ‘Do you remember you and I were due to go away on holiday together, about three days after you disappeared?’ he said, sounding that bit softer now. Bit more like the old Simon.

  ‘’Course I do,’ she said gently, instinctively moving over towards him. ‘Skiing. To Austria.’

  Those first few days after she’d gone, there was little else she thought about.

  ‘Well, I had – oh God, where do I even begin? Let’s just say, I had a surprise planned for you. A very special one. At least it was special to me. At the time, that is.’

  She stood silently and let him talk on, glad that at least he seemed a bit calmer now.

  ‘I was planning to take you off on the Orient-Express,’ he went on, pointedly not looking at her. ‘Then on to Paris. Had it all worked out to the nth degree, worse eejit me. I’d booked us into the Crillion Hotel, I’d arranged a candlelit dinner at Maxim’s and then, the plan was— ’

  She found herself holding her breath.

  ‘Simon, please, you don’t have to …’

  And suddenly he was looking right at her. Green eyes boring into her.

  ‘I was going to ask you to be my wife,’ he said simply. ‘And what’s more, I think you may even have had some idea that it was coming.’

  She stood beside him and flushed, correctly guessing what he’d say next.

  ‘The ring, Jean,’ he said, looking coolly at her. ‘The engagement ring. You found it, didn’t you? Just before you disappeared?’

  ‘Yes,’ she nodded simply. ‘I came across it. Not on purpose, though. It was a complete accident; I wasn’t rummaging or anything like that at all. It was just that a pile of your clothes fell down on me from on top of a wardrobe and when I went to put everything back, there it was. I’m sorry … I know I shouldn’t have, but as soon as I saw it, just had to know what was in that beautiful ring box. And it was breathtaking, Simon, it really was.’

  ‘Glad to hear you thought so,’ he said curtly. ‘Certainly didn’t look that way to me at the time.’

  She looked keenly back at him, desperately wanting to sit down beside him and grip his hands in hers, so he couldn’t keep on avoiding her gaze. Not knowing what to say next. The speech she’d so carefully rehearsed was completely choked out of her. She’d no words left; she’d nothing.

  Say something, she silently willed Simon. At least throw me a lifeline here. For old times’ sake, if nothing else.

  ‘Jean,’ he eventually said, after sighing so deeply, it was almost like it was coming from the soles of his feet. ‘It seems your sole purpose in coming here was to try to make yourself feel better for what you’d put us all through.’

  Unfair and so wide of the mark, she thought to herself, but let it pass. Chances were she deserved it. Deserved a lot worse.

  ‘But you need to know,’ he went on, ‘that your actions had consequences. Did you ever once stop to think about how it must have looked from my point of view back then? One minute, you’re here and it’s Christmas and you’re all excited to be going on holidays with me, next thing you’ve vanished into thin air, leaving Angie and me like two headless chickens running around trying to find you, all the time imagining the very worst. Then out of the blue, I discover that you’d stumbled across the engagement ring. So three guesses what conclusion I jumped to?’

  ‘Please, you don’t have to—’

  ‘No, I heard you out and now it’s my turn. Up until you and I got together, you apparently were famous for running to the hills each and every time you as much as sensed that a guy was getting serious on you. I’d heard you and Angie telling so many stories together, giggling about the time one particular boyfriend wanted you to move in with him and what did you do? Bolted in the opposite direction, as fast as you could, apparently.’

  ‘That’s not fair! I had bloody good reasons for backing away when I did!’

  ‘So what was I left to deduce, Sherlock?’ he said bitterly. ‘That you’d found the ring and your old pattern had just repeated itself. As it had done so many times in the past. So just try and imagine how that made me feel, if you even can. I was about to put my whole heart on the line for you and what do you do? The minute you get an inkling of what’s coming, you just take off.’

  ‘But that wasn’t the case at all, Simon! Surely you know that by now! That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!’

  ‘Shame it’s coming two years too late,’ was all he said, eyeballing her coldly.

  Waste of time, she suddenly thought to herself. What was she even doing here any more? She’d tried her best to talk to him and got exactly nowhere. He wouldn’t listen, wouldn’t even try to. She’d expected a lot of things, but was never quite prepared for the level of anger he still held against her. There was nothing more to say, except goodbye.

  ‘I should go,’ she said simply, hoping for some kind of reaction, but getting absolutely none.

  ‘I’ll see you out.’

  He rose to his feet and led her on down through the tiny, dark hallway to the front door.

  ‘Where will you stay?’ he asked, politely enough. Like he was talking to a complete stranger whose welfare he wasn’t particularly bothered with.

  ‘I booked into a hotel in town. Cheap and cheerful, but then I’m not here for very much longer.’

  ‘How much longer?’

  ‘It’s an open-ended ticket, though I hadn’t even planned on staying this long. But I imagine I’ll be out of your hair by the end of the week.’

  Cape Town awaited. Serving fries and cheap beer to tourists and picking up manky towels from a hotel room floor awaited. Living the life of a student in a shared flat at the grand old age of thirty-three, while kids far younger than her effortlessly by-passed her in work, awaited. She had to go back, had no choice, she knew that. She’d made her bed and now had no choice but to lie in it.

  She just hadn’t banked on realising just how much she missed the pull of home and how hard it would be to leave, that was all.

  ‘Anything you want to take with you from here before you go?’ Simon asked coldly.

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘And what are your plans for the rest of your stay?’ he asked, holding open the hall door for her as she stepped outside into the street.

  Again, if you were eavesdropping, you’d swear she was some random tourist who’d stopped and hammered on the door, to ask for directions to the nearest pub.

  ‘There’s a lot of people I need to talk to,’ she told him. ‘With Angie top of the list. If she’ll hear me out, that is.’

  Did she just imagine a tiny change in his expression when she mentioned Angie’s name? Or was she imagining it?

  ‘I’m sure she will,’ he eventually said. ‘Angie is one of the sweetest, warmest human beings on this planet …’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘… And she never stopped caring about you or sticking up for you, you know. Not in all this time.’

  ‘Nor I about her.’ Or you either, she wanted to tack on, but couldn’t.

  ‘Probably something you should know before you meet her, though,’ he went on, and she thought she may have imagined it, but swore she sensed a slight gear shift in his voice.

  ‘Is it about her new business, with Sarah? The Chocolate Bar? Amazing news, but then I always had faith that she’d do well. I used to think the only person who didn’t have faith in Angie, was Angie herself.’

  Angie had told her all about it yes
terday, before they’d left for Dublin, and Jean had genuinely felt so thrilled for the girl, inordinately proud of her.

  ‘Now all you need is a good man in your life to complete the picture and you’re away!’ were the last words she’d said to her, not sure why Angie flushed a bit before driving off. Maybe there was someone on the scene for her? Jean hoped so. No one deserved it more. And it would be a lucky man who landed a gem like Angie, that was for certain.

  ‘No,’ Simon said, ‘it doesn’t concern work. As a matter of fact, it’s about her private life.’

  ‘I knew it!’ Jean smiled, actually sounding animated for the first time since she’d got here. ‘I knew there was a man on the scene for her!’

  And now she definitely wasn’t imagining it. Simon was looking at her differently. Almost a bit guiltily, she thought.

  Two minutes later, walking shell-shocked back down the street, she finally knew the reason why.

  Simon and Angie.

  The man she loved and her one-time best friend.

  And there was absolutely nothing she could do about it, bar go back to Cape Town and somehow try to battle on as best she could.

  Chapter Twenty

  My flat, crack of bleeding dawn

  Frenetic phone calls have all started, now that word’s gone round on the tom-toms. First call is from my buddy Jeff, at bloody six in the morning. (Jeff’s a v. early riser. Has to be, all the work he does applying slap on early morning brekkie TV shows, where he’s gigging as a freelance make-up ‘artiste’.) Plus I’m about the only person he’d dare ring at this hour, but then he knows right well I’ll probably be already up, washed, dressed, out the door and on my way to open up The Chocolate Bar by now.