My Great Ex-Scape

by MacIntosh, Portia

  ‘None that I know of,’ I joke awkwardly… I’m not sure that joke works when you’re a woman… unless that’s what makes it funny? Kevin isn’t laughing though.

  ‘Married?’ he asks.

  ‘No, I’m—’ I’m interrupted by a voice behind me.

  ‘That’s her,’ the girl from earlier says. ‘The one who got dumped on TV.’

  ‘I got dumped on TV,’ I tell Kevin. Well, he clearly didn’t watch it, and the brunette has let the cat out of the bag.

  ‘Oh…’ He pauses for a moment. ‘Were you on Catfish or The Undateables or something?’

  ‘Was I on The Undateables?’ I squeak. I don’t think he’s ever watched The Undateables – at least I hope he hasn’t. ‘No, I wasn’t.’

  ‘Oh, OK, well… I’m sorry.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I reply.

  ‘You’ve always had such a colourful life,’ he points out.

  I raise my eyebrows. I really haven’t. Suddenly, Kevin seems like a stranger. Someone who knew me when I was kid, but as an adult there’s just no connection there.

  OK, so maybe it wasn’t Kevin who sent the flowers. And after today, I’m not sure I’ll be hearing from him again – not even when he hits his midlife crisis and fancies an affair with an old flame.

  I suppose there is a silver lining here, hidden away in all the continued embarrassment: if David didn’t send the flowers, and Kevin didn’t send the flowers, then there are only three possible people who could have. Only problem is, I have no idea where they are.

  7

  After an awkward encounter with Kevin I decide to talk a walk to clear my head.

  I stroll down the local high street. Well, what’s left of it, anyway. A few of the shops I grew up with have stood the test of time – Argos, Poundland, New Look. But the hole where Woolworths used to be tugs at my heartstrings. I used to bloody love going to Woolworths when I was little, picking out toys (or CD singles when I got a little older). For a while, when I was a kid, I would swear that the happiest day of my life was when my mum took me to Woolies to buy a VHS copy of the Spice World movie. I remember it came in a limited-edition tin (which I’ll hazard a guess is in storage somewhere with the rest of my childhood stuff) and my mum took me for chicken nuggets after. I felt so grown-up.

  It’s kind of chilly but really sunny, so I’m wearing an oversized padded coat with my aviator sunglasses. The sun is behind me now, but I’ll keep the glasses on. I like to hide behind them, they give me a self-confidence I absolutely don’t deserve.

  I’m also trying to put my awkward lunch not-date with Kevin behind me. I can’t believe I thought, for a second, that he might have sent those flowers. It really was just coincidence that I bumped into him. Still, I wish I’d noticed his wedding ring before I let my imagination run away with me. This flower business has really rattled me, I feel so off the ball.

  Amidst all the mobile phone shops, pawn shops and empty units, an old-fashioned sweet shop shines like a diamond in the rough. I pop in and buy myself a bag of jellybeans for my stroll home. I could get the bus, but I’m in no hurry to get back. Well, Mum and Dad will only start giving me jobs to do again and all this hard work is tiring me out. I’m not used to any physical work or activity at all – unless you count the few stairs at my old office that I’d sometimes have to carry bundles of newspapers up and down.

  I rank the different flavours of jellybeans as I walk. Popcorn is obviously up there as one of the best, whereas the root beer one is like pure poison. This is important work that I’m doing right now, a definitive ranking is needed.

  I am snapped from my hardcore time-wasting as I realise where I am. I’m outside Wilson’s mechanics, where my ex-boyfriend Eli worked – he probably still works here actually, it’s his family business and it was always the plan that he would take over from his dad.

  Kevin might not have been fate – and this might not be fate, as such, but I must have walked this way on autopilot at least?

  I hover outside for a moment. Do I really want to embarrass myself in front of another ex? Why not, eh?

  I walk into the waiting room – it’s a lot different than it used to be. Before, it was an empty shell of a room with a couple of foldout chairs and a calendar of topless women straddling tyres on the wall. Now it has carpet, a comfortable sofa, magazines without a breast in sight – there’s even a plant, for crying out loud. A real, living, plant. It’s nothing like the macho chauvinistic hellhole I used to hate waiting in when I was meeting Eli, it’s positively modern.

  The receptionist is a woman, which I’m not sure is progress or not. On the one hand, they didn’t used to have any women working here, but now that they do, she has the obvious job.

  ‘Hello,’ I say brightly. ‘I’m looking for Eli Wilson, I think he works here.’

  ‘Eli Wilson?’ she repeats back to me.

  ‘Erm, yes…’ I reply cautiously. ‘He works here? He did when I knew him…’

  ‘Just a second,’ she says.

  She disappears into the workshop for a moment before returning with two men. Big, burly blokes in blue overalls covered in oil. Well, I say oil, I don’t know cars. I don’t know what oil looks like. I don’t know what other liquids cars can leak. I am a thirty-one-year-old baby who has always been a little too scared to learn to drive. Scared of the massive responsibility that comes with driving around in a heavy, fast, metal death machine, but also kind of scared of the financial burden too. Cars are expensive. Parking is expensive. Petrol is expensive. Insurance and tax and MOTs and repairs are all oh-so expensive. It’s a commitment I’m just not ready for yet – mentally or financially.

  ‘She’s looking for Eli,’ the woman practically bursts. ‘She thinks he works here.’

  ‘He used to,’ one man chuckles. ‘You looking for him for something specific?’

  ‘Just a catch-up,’ I say. ‘He was my boyfriend when I was eighteen, he—’

  Fantastic, all three of them are laughing now. How wonderful, an in-joke. An in-joke everyone is in on but me.

  ‘He lives not far from here; do you want his address?’ the man asks.

  ‘Please,’ I say through gritted teeth.

  I take the company-branded post-it note with Eli’s address on and leave as quickly as possible. It might be positively progressive now, but it’s still uncomfortable in there.

  I punch the address into my phone and see that, wherever it is, it’s only five minutes away. I’ve come this far, I may as well drop in on him.

  I know you shouldn’t have favourites, but Eli is maybe my favourite ex. I’m not saying my feelings were stronger for him than they were for the others and we weren’t even together that long, but I just had so much fun with him whenever we were together. Unfortunately, because I was at uni for most of that time, we didn’t get to see each other all that much.

  All of a sudden, I happen upon the apartment building where he lives. It’s a tall building with big windows and balconies all the way to the top, where the penthouse sits, entirely made of glass.

  I punch Eli’s flat number into the intercom. Eventually someone answers.

  At first there are a few seconds of silence and then…

  ‘Is that… Rosie Jones is that you?’

  ‘Hey Eli,’ I say awkwardly. I didn’t realise he could see me.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here? Come in! Get in the lift, I’ll bring you up.’

  He’ll bring me up? What is he going to do, step outside his apartment and call the lift? Does he not think I can handle being told a floor number?

  The door pops open in front of me.

  ‘OK, see you in a sec,’ I say nervously and head into the waiting lift.

  I feel like I’m at a weird disadvantage because he’s seen me but I haven’t seen him. As the lift doors open after the ascent, I’m about to step out when I notice something strange. Straight opposite me is a bathroom. The door is ajar, but that’s a bathroom for sure, I can see the heated towel rail on the wall. St
ranger still, the hallway is full of ornaments – plants, vases, art.

  ‘Rosie!’ I hear Eli call out.

  I glance to my left to see him emerge from a huge open-plan living room.

  ‘Hey,’ I say, a little taken aback. ‘Am I… in your flat?’

  ‘Yep, penthouse, baby,’ he replies, grabbing me for a hug, squeezing me tight. ‘Look at you, you look amazing.’

  ‘I look amazing?’ I reply as he finally releases me from his tight embrace. ‘Look at you, you look like a statue.’

  Eli is ripped. I can see his muscles rippling underneath his perfect white shirt. He’s wearing a suit and tie that absolutely doesn’t look like it’s from Primark, and his hair is perfectly coiffed. He has a light dusting of stubble that looks both careless and intentional and he smells simply incredible. There isn’t a pair of overalls or an oil stain in sight.

  ‘Did you just sniff me?’ he asks.

  ‘Yeah, you smell amazing,’ I blurt.

  ‘Creed Aventus,’ he says, for my information.

  Perhaps he’s telling me this in case I genuinely do want to know what that incredible scent radiating from his perfectly gorgeous person, or maybe he’s casually dropping into the sentence that he wears aftershave that costs over £200, because everyone knows it’s pricey, right?

  ‘You don’t work at your dad’s garage any more, do you?’ I say.

  ‘I don’t,’ he laughs. ‘Well, I do occasionally, but I gave up on being a mechanic, that was never for me.’

  ‘I always felt like you were destined for bigger things,’ I point out. At the time, I never would have said anything, if he wanted to keep the family business going and follow in his dad’s footsteps, I wasn’t going to tell him not to. But Eli has just always had so much about him and so much ambition.

  ‘Come in, sit down,’ he insists, taking me by the hand, leading me into his living room.

  ‘Eli, this place is incredible,’ I say, twirling around like a kid at Disneyland. ‘What do you do?’

  ‘I’m an image consultant,’ he says.

  ‘Who for?’

  ‘For anyone – for anything. I run my own consulting business from here, I have an office in the back. My first project was my dad’s garage.’

  ‘Oh my gosh, I just stopped by there, it’s so different – it’s better, so much better. More female-friendly.’

  ‘Well, exactly,’ he says as he runs a hand through his hair, almost victoriously. ‘I just had to convince my dad that half the people in this town are female, and females drive cars too. Well, that’s not strictly true… I waited until he and my mum went on holiday and then I just went in and pretended he’d commissioned me to sort the place out.’

  ‘Oh God… how did that go down?’

  ‘Initially, not well,’ he laughs. ‘But it worked and I just went onwards and upwards from there. I work with businesses, individuals – lots of unruly Manchester footballers who need a kick up the arse, image-wise.’

  ‘Wow, Eli, that’s just amazing.’

  ‘I know,’ he says with an immodest but completely charming nod. ‘What do you do?’

  ‘Oh, I’m just a journalist,’ I say. ‘One probably in desperate need of an image consultant but one that absolutely could not afford you – are your sofa cushions Versace?’ I don’t know why I’m asking; they blatantly are. They’re a light gold colour with a massive Medusa logo embossed on the front.

  ‘Are you OK?’ he asks me.

  I look at him, wondering if people aren’t usually impressed by his cushions (or at least have the good grace to be inwardly impressed) before realising he’s referring to my image consultant comment.

  ‘Oh, yeah, I’ll be fine,’ I insist.

  ‘Let me make you a coffee,’ he says. He removes his jacket and rolls up his shirtsleeves before heading into the kitchen area. I’d say he fiddles with his big, complicated-looking coffee machine, but he masters it. Pushing buttons, twisting knobs – he knows exactly what he’s doing.

  For a moment I just look around again. His penthouse is gorgeous. So, so gorgeous. The view out of his floor-to-ceiling windows is breathtaking, even if we aren’t in a city centre. This is easily one of the tallest buildings around. He’s like the king in the castle up here.

  ‘I can’t believe this apartment exists,’ I say. ‘How long have the flats been here?’

  ‘Since I built them,’ he says.

  My eyes widen – I didn’t think I had any room left on my face for them to widen any more, but I’ve made some for that reply.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ve had a really good run over the last decade,’ he says. ‘The business took off, I made some good investments, which led to these apartments… So many people don’t want to live in the city, or can’t afford to, so I give them a city life in the suburbs, for much less money per square foot.’

  ‘You’re brilliant,’ I tell him. ‘I always knew you’d do amazing things.’

  I glance at Eli’s coffee table, where a bouquet of fresh flowers sits – not unlike the ones I received.

  Could Eli have sent me the flowers?

  I remember when we went on our first date. It was the start of the summer holidays, before I went to university. We met at a gig, at a pub in town – awful local band, way too loud, the kind of act that leaves you so disappointed with their performance that the tinnitus you have from the music being too loud for days after is actually a welcome sound. We struck up a conversation at the bar, bonded over alcopops and a mutual dislike for the trumpet player. By the end of the night we were a little more than tipsy and snogging outside in the car park. I didn’t think I’d hear from him again, but the next day he called me up and asked if I wanted to go on a date with him. He turned up looking dapper as hell, with a huge bunch of flowers for me – no one had ever given me flowers before. Come to think of it, no one has given me flowers since. All signs are pointing to Eli now.

  ‘Here you go,’ he says, placing two lattes down on the table in front of me. ‘One is caramel, the other is hazelnut. I didn’t want to give you choices because I know you always struggled to decide what you wanted. I also remember that you’d always wind up wishing you had what the other person was having, so I made one of each. You can have first pick.’

  I smile.

  ‘Gosh, why did we ever break up?’ I joke. ‘You’re a dream.’

  ‘If I remember correctly, I broke up with you because you went to university and we didn’t see each other much. I had all these big ideas of what I wanted to do and I thought a long-distance girlfriend would get in the way of that… and, you know, I’m gay, so there’s that.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘OK, sure, I know wherever it was in Wales wasn’t that far away, but I did throw myself into my work ideas and look at me now.’

  ‘Not that bit,’ I squeak. ‘You’re gay now?’

  ‘Yes, well, I mean, that’s not quite how things play out, I’ve always been gay… it just took me a while to realise. You helped me realise.’

  ‘Oh OK, just, give me a second,’ I babble. Oh God, is that why everyone at the garage was laughing at me? ‘I know that people don’t turn people gay, but it sounds kind of like you’re saying being with me was the thing that made you realise you didn’t like women…’

  ‘Oh, shit, no, sorry,’ he says. Eli grabs my little paper bag of jellybeans from next to me, empties them out onto his coffee table and hands me the bag. ‘Breathe into this,’ he insists. ‘Get your breath while I explain. Rosie, I loved you so much – I still do. I loved being with you and hanging out with you. I suspected I was gay long before we met, but I wasn’t exactly brought up in the most tolerant family – everyone is fine with it now, but I wasn’t brought up thinking everyone would be chill with me dancing my way out of the closet in a pink leotard to Liza Minnelli or whatever…’

  I cock my head. ‘Are you making this up to spare my feelings?’ I ask. ‘Because it kind of sounds like you’re just spitting out gay stereotypes.�
��

  Eli laughs. ‘I don’t know what to tell you. People always expect me to very camp – I’m not very camp. I am very gay though.’

  Eli seems almost amused by the situation, but for me, it’s a lot to take in.

  I feel my phone vibrating in my pocket. I pull it out and see that it’s my mum.

  ‘Oh, God, not now,’ I say to myself. ‘It’s my mum.’

  ‘I’ll talk to her,’ Eli says, snatching my phone from me. ‘Evie! Hello! … It’s me, Eli! … Oh, I know, it’s been forever…’ There’s an extra-long gap while my mum talks his ear off. ‘She hasn’t told me that yet, no. I’m sure she was getting round to it, we were just catching up… Will she be in for dinner?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Yes, she will,’ he says. ‘Oh, Evie, I would love to… see you then… OK, bye.’

  I glare at him.

  ‘Your mum has invited me round for dinner.’

  ‘I gathered,’ I reply. ‘I'm guessing she told you… stuff?’

  ‘Oh, she did,’ he says. ‘Live TV? Really?’

  ‘I told you I needed an image consultant,’ I say.

  ‘OK, well, let me go and get changed.’ Eli jumps to his feet. ‘We can talk about it on the way to your parents’ place.’

  ‘You’re actually coming for dinner?’ I laugh.

  ‘Of course,’ he replies. ‘Rosie, I would love it if we could go back to being friends, like we used to be?’

  ‘I mean, I didn’t realise we used to be friends,’ I point out. ‘The sex really threw me off.’

  Eli laughs. ‘You have always been sexy,’ he points out. ‘I’m only human. Just, you know, a gay human, who would rather have sex with men.’

  ‘I understand how gay works,’ I say. ‘Friends would be great. I could certainly use one right now.’

  ‘Great,’ he says. ‘You drink both of those coffees; it sounds like Evie is in full Evie mode. I think you’re going to need them.’

  I just smile at him. ‘I’m so happy I looked you up,’ I tell him. ‘Thank you.’

  He might not have been the person who sent the flowers but I’m so glad that they led me to his door.