The Man I Loved Before: A completely gripping and heart-wrenching page turner

by Anna Mansell

  A knock on the window startles me awake and my heart leaps into my throat. I fumble with the key to turn on the ignition enough to open the window, wiping dried spit from the side of my mouth because, obviously, I’m immeasurably attractive. ‘Hello?’ I groggily manage, my head banging.

  ‘This is not a campsite,’ says an officious-looking man in a parking attendant uniform.

  ‘I know, I know. Sorry. I just… I couldn’t find anywhere to stay then I sort of fell asleep. I didn’t mean to…’

  ‘Well, you can’t stop here unless you’re going to pay for parking and in which case, you need to do that now. In the machine.’ He nods in the direction of a black machine by the gate to St Ives Sailing Club. ‘Or on your phone.’

  I look down at my phone, now resting between the seat and the centre console, a knee move away from dropping between the two and being all but impossible to retrieve. I shove my hand beneath it to save the fall, scratching my finger in the process. ‘Ouch!’

  ‘Which would you prefer?’

  ‘Pardon?’ I say, sucking on the side of my pinky.

  ‘Phone or machine?’

  ‘Oh, right. Okay. Machine. I think. No, phone. I don’t know.’ My head hurts. I am not yet awake. He requires decisions that I don’t think I’ll be capable of until at least two coffees and possibly something that includes bacon.

  ‘You’ll have to do one or I’ll have to give you a ticket. This is your heads-up. I have a few other cars to check on first. You have five minutes.’

  He saunters off, peering in car windows, checking the little machine that hangs around his neck. I root around in the glove box for change and painkillers. Finding a couple of quid for the car park and an empty packet of Nurofen. The me that finished this pack and didn’t replace it is an idiot.

  Climbing out of the car, I stretch out, my neck clicks and my stomach waves with hunger. The gulls are noisier this morning. There’s a squabble over at the bins and a small fluffy browny grey thing – that is supposed to be a gull chick but looks like a medium-sized cat, such is its size – hops around Petula’s tyres. ‘Shoo. Go on. There’s nothing there.’ I wave my arms until my head hurts again and opt for sloping steadily off to the ticket machine instead of fighting the good fight with starving birds. Three hours. That should do me for now. Three hours to track Ben’s house down and see what happens next.

  Parking attendant satisfied, with a ticket stuck in pride of place in my windscreen, I pop a polo mint in my mouth for freshness and, grabbing handbag and phone, head up Fore Street. Starlings sing-song the morning as I follow Google maps along the cobbles in the direction of Street-an-Garrow, the road Mum’s phone book told me Ben now lives on. Shopkeepers lazily open up, hanging postcard racks outside, opening doors wide, smiling as I pass by. A young woman with a pink-flowered headdress loads box after box of rich red strawberries outside the deli, singing a good morning to someone she knows, before sharing a joke and a scream of insider secrets that I sort of wish I was party to. A woman changes books over in the window of the bookshop and the church bell rings. God I bloody love it here.

  I grab a coffee from Scoff Troff – which was my and Ben’s favourite breakfast café, on account of their scrambled eggs being the best we’ve ever tasted – before winding my way up the high street towards his house. Each step I take chips away at my mood. My love for this seaside wonder is fast being replaced by the fear that, in being here, I’ve just made another cataclysmic decision. My heart rate quickens and my mouth dries, though that could be last night’s vodka. And there it is. The house he now lives in. A slightly bent, terraced cottage with low windows and a tiny door, just like the ones we always liked. Did he sell a lung?

  The blind is shut downstairs, though upstairs is wide open, light on. I swallow. Suddenly terrified. And more than a little regretful about all events that have led me here. The second to last time I saw him it was as though I was a stranger to him, he was so disdainful, almost disgusted by me. Which, the benefit of hindsight tells me, was entirely justified. I had been out with my work colleagues. We’d been chugging Prosecco like the international shortage was entirely down to us. We had just won some team company competition and the big bosses were encouraging us to get absolutely off our faces in celebration. I had promised him I wouldn’t drink that day because the following day he wanted me to go with him to his nan’s funeral. He hadn’t wanted me to be green around the gills as they buried the last woman in his family. He wanted me sober and alert and there for him, as was his right. But I couldn’t manage it. I wasn’t coping. I felt pressure from all directions, pressure to perform, pressure to be the strong one, pressure to pretend I was okay when in truth I was anything but, yet I couldn’t possibly explain any of it to him because to explain that would be to explain everything. I couldn’t do that to him, I couldn’t do it to me. So instead, I was three bottles down, hanging, and inappropriately dancing with my boss’s brother because what harm could it do? Turns out quite a lot.

  I could reel off a host of excuses, a load of reasons as to why I did what I did, but not a single one of them would make any of it better. The truth was, I messed up. When he had specifically asked me not to. And this time, unlike all the other times I’d let him down and he forgave me because he understood that I had something of a self-destruct button that drowns out sense and logic, this time, it was too much. Even for him. The most generous, loving, caring, incredible man I ever met.

  ‘Morning, it’s ’ansum, isn’t it,’ says a woman dragging a shopping trolley behind her.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ I agree, gazing up at the denim-blue sky. And as I look back down, the front door to Ben’s house opens. A woman walks out, a baby in her arms. She pulls a buggy out of the door, placing in the baby who gurgles and giggles as she talks to it. She is tall. Stunning. Fresh-faced and wide-eyed. She is everything I am not and maybe they’re just friends. ‘I’ll see you later, babe,’ she shouts. ‘Love you,’ she adds and I wilt a little.

  Ben’s face, tanned and beautiful, leans out of the house to kiss the woman and I dart into a doorway, just out of view. Their kiss is soft, they linger, she touches his face like I used to do and my heart breaks.

  14

  I dart away from the house, dropping down to my feet in an alleyway. Someone walks past, so I pretend to do up shoelaces I don’t have. Casual.

  I always knew he’d move on. It’s not really a surprise. And yet seeing it with my own eyes is… well, it hurts more than I imagined it would. It stings, right in my chest. That could have been me. Everything about that scene could have been me, if I’d wanted it

  I pull my phone out. I need to speak to Mum but her phone just rings. What would she say? If I could speak to her now? After she’d said she told me so and that I should have stayed at home to watch Bohemian Rhapsody. She’d probably tell me to stand tall. To quit being a victim… which in this instance is fair, because I am not the victim… and then she’d tell me what food needed eating that she’s got out from the freezer and that I’d better hurry home or it’d go off.

  My phone rings in my hand and though I’m disappointed it’s not Mum, there’s an odd sensation to see that it is in fact Mitch. I think I’m pleased to hear from him. ‘Hi. Hello.’

  ‘Morning you. How’s your head?’

  I pinch the bridge of my nose. ‘Gah! It’s fine. You know, well… a bit tender.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. You sounded three sheets to the wind last night. I can hear gulls in the background. You’re still there then?’

  ‘I am. Yep. Still here.’

  ‘Done what you needed to do?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘You okay?’

  ‘Course! I’m in St Ives! What’s not to be okay about that?’ I push myself back up to standing, turning my back on the street.

  ‘I don’t know, I’ve never been.’

  ‘It’s beautiful. It’s the best! Blue skies and turquoise sea. Cobbled streets and—’

  ‘—great pubs
?’

  ‘Exactly. You’d love it.’

  ‘Maybe I would.’

  There’s a stiltedness in our conversation, I’m not quite sure why he’s calling. ‘I should go,’ I say.

  ‘Right. Yes. Okay. I was just… checking up on you.’

  The fact makes me smile. ‘I’m fine. Thank you. There’s no need.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘No! No, I don’t mean it’s not appreciated. It is. Thank you. I’m okay though. I’ll be back in my car and heading home very soon.’

  ‘You are hardcore. Or mental. I’m not sure which. Let me know when I can get you that coffee. Or beer.’

  ‘Yes. That’d be good.’

  ‘Have a pasty for me. Drive safely, eh?’

  ‘Will do. Talk soon.’

  ‘Bye.’

  He seems to care. Which is nice. Maybe I can appreciate that now. Someone checking up on me, someone giving a damn. Before, it always frightened me. Terrified me. I don’t know why, or where it comes from. Mum always said rejection, from Dad walking out when I was a kid. She said I grew needy overnight. Said I needed acceptance and craved attention, love, but when I got it, I’d wriggle away. I’ve always wriggled, but I don’t want to any more. Is it too much, too soon, to hope that I might get a second chance to appreciate someone kind and respectful?

  And how long until I stop wishing I’d learned my lesson before Ben got fed up of trying?

  I turn back to his house – just in time to see the postman delivering a letter. No! No, no, no, no! ‘Excuse me?’ I call after him. He’s shuffling letters for the next address, dropping stuff through the letterbox, eyeing me suspiciously.

  ‘Sorry to bother you… excuse me, erm, what did you just post there? To number ten?’ I’m trying to hover out of view of Ben’s, should he come out the door.

  ‘Erm… a letter.’

  ‘Yes, but what? What was it?’

  ‘Sorry, do you live there?’

  ‘No. But I need to know what you posted.’

  ‘I’m not at liberty to say. Sorry.’

  I do a little dance of frustration then try and turn it into something much less desperate and weird. Failing. The postman is now turning away from me, shaking his head. ‘I know maybe you’re not supposed to say anything, so I’ll just ask a question.’ I walk after him. ‘Nod or shake your head, that’s all you have to do. Then officially, you’ve said nothing.’ He pauses, a bunch of letters in hand. I’m in! ‘Were any of the letters you posted, handwritten, in a blue envelope…’ I pause, aware how ridiculous the next bit sounds ‘… with a picture of a Moomin in the corner.’ The postman stares at me. ‘You remember them; those cute white, Swedish things?’

  ‘I know what a Moomin looks like!’

  ‘Great!’ I clap my hands in delight, then glance over to Ben’s again. ‘I mean, okay. So, did any of the letters you posted have a Moomin on them?’

  The postman shoves a load of letters in a letterbox and moves on to the next address. ‘There was only one letter.’

  ‘And?’

  He sighs. ‘Yes. It had a Moomin on. Now, please, I have to get back to work.’

  ‘Thank you. Thank you!’ I say, disproportionately relieved to know it’s there. Then I pull up short. Ben has the letter. It is now sitting on the floor by his front door. Unless he’s already picked it up. And if he’s picked it up, has he opened it? Does he recognise my writing? He always said it was distinctive. Should I knock, try and explain myself? Or should I walk away like he asked me to do the night before he left?

  15

  I’m sat on a bench overlooking the harbour. There’s a gentle breeze and I should probably leave. I should go before I bump into him. And yet being here makes me feel closer to him. Just for a moment. I could almost forget everything that’s happened. It could be like nothing ever changed. We still share ice cream in front of the telly, both in our pyjamas. We still laugh at every episode of Parks and Recreation. We still bicker over who makes the better Yorkshire pudding. (Me.) Nothing’s changed. Until I remember the letter. I need to speak to Mum.

  Her phone crackles and rings before she picks up. ‘Mum? Mum, can you hear me?’ Her signal is coming and going. Or maybe it’s mine. ‘Mum, where are you?’

  ‘Pardon? Jem? Where are you? The signal’s not very good.’

  ‘I know, Mum.’ I check my phone, I don’t think it’s me. Full signal.

  ‘Did you get the letter?’ she shouts.

  ‘No. No, I didn’t. His postman delivered it when I wasn’t looking.’

  I’m not sure if the pause in conversation is because she feels sad about the fact or because her signal is so poor. ‘You should come home, love,’ I hear her say. ‘Come home.’

  ‘I will, Mum. I am. I just…’ I take in the view for what I guess will be the last time. It’s not my place any more. Boats lean to one side or another, the outgoing tide left them to rest on the sand. ‘I love it here, Mum.’

  ‘I know you do. I know, love.’

  ‘I don’t want to leave.’

  There’s some background noise. Voices. ‘I know. But you need to. At least for now. Look, I have to go, love. Come home. We can watch Bohemian Rhapsody. Come on.’

  A stunning blue greyhound runs the width of the beach, hind legs pushing it forward at speed. A gull swoops down, narrowly missing a toddler’s ice cream. Fishermen tend to boats, waiting for the tide to return. People walk behind me, chatting, laughing, taking selfies with the harbour as a backdrop.

  My eyes fill and spill onto my cheeks as a breeze whips up and my hair catches in the tears. I could be back with Mum by teatime.

  No good can come of second-guessing. What’s done is done. So what if he reads it. I can’t do any more than I have. Yes, he’ll hurt. And God, I wish it wasn’t so. But it is. When we were together, I always felt everything he felt: joy, disappointment, excitement, sadness. That stopped when we met up, days after his nan’s funeral, and he told me he was leaving; I could taste his defeat but somehow, I no longer felt it. He’d always believed he could help me be the best version of me. He never said as such, he never suggested I was anything other than brilliant, yet I know. He respected me. Even the worst bits. The self-destruction. He knew where some of it came from, I guess I’m a fatherless cliché, determined to reject before being rejected, or unable to reject for fear of rejection. A nonsensical, complex, impossible combination that always saw me making the wrong choices at the wrong times, terrified by the outcome of either case. ‘Protection,’ he used to say. ‘It’s for protection. If you hurt you first, nobody else can hurt you after.’ I’d never known anyone who understood me better than me. Apart from maybe Mum and Leanne. A man though, I’d never met a man that understood my complexities. Who forgave me my choices. Who saw through the bravado and didn’t want to hurt the vulnerable child I was still capable of being. ‘I am not your father. I am not your previous boyfriends. I am not the person who wants to strip you of you. I love you. Because of all of who you are and everything you’re capable of.’

  Somehow, I could never believe him.

  Somehow, the demons spoke louder than he ever could. They told me I wasn’t worth it. That nobody could possibly love me as truly as he did. And that even if someone did, why did I think I deserved it. Him.

  And I proved him right.

  I close my eyes, turning my face to the sun. A cloud passes in front of it, casting a cool shadow across my face. I dig deep, push my hands on my knees and stand.

  And there he is. Ben. In front of me. His frame casting the shadow across me, not a cloud. And I can’t speak, I don’t know what to say. I’m lost.

  16

  ‘Didn’t expect to see you on my commute to work.’ He nods down at the boats in the harbour, carrying a bag of his tools. Is he working on the boats, just like he always wanted to? ‘I thought I saw you earlier. I tried to kid myself it wasn’t, that you’d never come all the way down here when you knew I didn’t want to see you. Then the post arrived.’r />
  ‘I…’ I stop before coming out with something untruthful or lame. Instead, I look to my shoes because to look at him hurts. I want to sit down, not sure if my legs can carry my weight with him stood before me.

  ‘I recognised your handwriting and then I knew it had to be you I’d seen. Though, if you were planning to come down, I don’t know why you had to write too.’ He turns to rest against the railings. The sea, clear to the sand below it, glistens in the morning sun. The tide has come back in just enough for one of the fishing boats to tack out, leaving a gentle ripple in the creamy, flat waters. ‘The envelope, the Moomins, that’s from the pack I bought for you, isn’t it?’ I nod, my head pounds. ‘You were supposed to write, then burn. That’s what we said, didn’t we?’

  ‘Yeah. That was the plan.’

  ‘Apart from the one you posted.’

  ‘I didn’t post it. Mum did. I left it on the side in my room. She was trying to help.’

  He shakes his head as if he expects nothing less. As if I am so incapable of anything, I can’t even get that right. ‘How is she?’

  ‘Mum? She’s good. Amazing, in fact. Doing really well. Thank you. Your card, she appreciated it.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘I know you mean a lot to her.’

  ‘She means a lot to me.’

  We fall into silence. He watches the world before him, his attention drawn to a small concrete jetty to the left of where we’re stood. A woman takes her curly-haired child down it to look at the fish that swim around the edge of the harbour wall. The child squeals with excitement, pointing and clapping with glee. Her smile is broad, open, joyous. The harbour seal pops up nearby and it’s like the child’s birthdays have all arrived at once. As they chat, enjoying the moment, no photos, just watching and being, living for what they can see, I detect a delicate Black Country lilt. Ben watches, smiling gently as the pair climb the steps, calling out for Daddy to come see. And now he’s looking back at me. He’s studying my face and it hurts my heart. ‘Sit down,’ he says and my legs all but give way as I fall into the bench, leaving just enough room so we don’t touch. I couldn’t bear it if we touched.