eulogy to a rosebush
If ever I should be so lucky as to see You again, I would dearly like to take out a fifty-cent coin. Hold it between my fingertips.
Grin at your bemusement, or perhaps you'd be annoyed. Laugh.
Then I'd skew the flip
- Heads.
Always Heads. For You.
"She would be so touched if she saw all this..." (sic)
Somehow, I think not. I rather think She would run screaming for the Hills... and right over them, and cross, still screaming, into another dateline.
... perhaps I'll show all this to Her one day, when She's eighty, has a hip prosthesis and can't run up hills anymore. Laugh.
*****
"Hello, X...?"
My God... "K...!"
Every word a laugh, or a precursor to a laugh....
A doorway of light and laughter so very unexpectedly opens in my darkness which has been steadily growing, and turning me to the night.
Unexpected - I was expecting a somber shot at a halfway-apology. Dispassionate discourse between two strangers. Hello, Goodbye.
Not You, sounding the way You always did, that same concern, that same wit.
I don't need to remember the exact details of our conversation.
Save for that in those ten brief minutes, all the troubles of my world melted away and I didn't need to talk to You about them... the dingy consultation room evaporated, the apology came and was dismissed, and it was so much easier to breathe, and laugh, and laugh again.
And when reality finally tried to bite, it didn't really hurt that much anymore.
Sitting on the bed transcribing the last vestiges of a dearly departed simcard's soul to the pristinely blank slate of a newborn, or rather newbought chip, His fingers recoil slightly at the once-familiar sight of a series of numbers now foreign to Himself.
He remembers :
Shivering in the chilly, unheated corridor outside his room (or rather, personally customised refrigeration unit) at the cheap Residence phone, which strangely resembled an armoured personnel carrier, dialing in the frustratingly long sequence of numbers of his calling card, so that he could complete it with Hers . The frustration of any number of misdialed attempts was worth the final reward of her always faintly-surprised, but warm "hello?", and the inevitable laughter that invariably accompanied the (level four!) communication after.
Waiting for that inconsiderate American Visitor from Upstairs to get off His (public) payphone, and inadvertently overhearing through his closed door the details of the latest guy she'd slept with, but she still loved him on the Other side of the Atlantic loads and loads, and it was okay with her that he was sleeping with someone else, as long as they loved each other. He even remembers their Final Call, and feeling just a little bit sad that the Great American Dream had ceased to be - predictable as it had been right from the start.
Sitting at his desk tentatively pressing, with some small misgiving the "magic numbers" into that hideously expensive ACC 'phone keypad on days when the chill outside would have simply been too much to bear.
Her laughing about having to hide her 'phone bill from her dad, and thinking, well it's a good thing my parents never visit... And feeling grateful that She had a 'phone bill to hide - and that He did, at least in principle, as well.
Standing under a dying sunset by Coogie Bay at a sleek, shiny-grey public telephone, talking to Her, and arranging to meet up. The queue of uncharacteristically un-laid back ozzies building up alarmingly as he spoke on his unlimited 40 cents credit. He remembers wishing he could call everytime he walked past a telephone. But holding himself in check - She had Exams to clear. Better this way.
Nebulously, (and nervously) telephoning her at her student union - why, and how that was so he doesn't remember. He thinks he was at his cheap backpackers at the time. That bit's gone a bit fuzzy around the edges.
Meeting. Laughing. Sadness. Anger. Joy. Silence. All in the span of an evening - and then being alone again. And looking at that shiny grey telephone for a while, wondering. Hoping. Not daring. (And, somewhere in the future, discovering that She'd been trying to call through then, almost desperately, with no success. Thank You Wizard of Oz Backpackers.)
The days when they kidded around that now their Companies had merged, the world was theirs for the taking. Post traumatic event. Another telephone, another day.
Seattle Coffee Co, and her ribbing him about being fooled by the fake Irish Cream. They laughed to each other with their eyes as he mock-petulantly sniffed that it tasted good, anyhow.
He lays the phone back down to rest. It is Done.
Striding across Tower Bridge against the full force of the wind, looking out upon the Thames on a surprisingly mild, and calm evening after the tumultous chaos of a day gone horribly wrong, he wonders how She got on in the end. How she's feeling, who she came here with - if they're happy. He wonders how the story ended for her.
And He realises these stories here have come to a close.
Make what you want to, stranger, out of these entries. He's still trying to make sense out of them - not what he wants to - it's too hard to face up to the reality that all that once was, is lost. But just to make sense of them.
And if You ever wander across these pages - as unlikely as that seems - then this is the Other side of the Coin. These are the words I kept silent from You; These are the realities that would have confounded Rachel (and proven conclusively that You weren't dealing with someone in possession of all his marbles), and these are the myriad memories I could neither pen to paper, nor verbalise a confused evening a long time ago. Nor even when I had second chances, on the telephone across the world, on the internet, and in person. You told me a lot about what You'd felt then. I held my peace, damn that Y chromosome.
This is how I felt, about You; these are the things I thought.
This is how I remember You.
This is how I tried to bury Your memory.
This is how I failed.
Make what You want to out of this. Or don't. Hate me for them, or forgive me. I ask only a lack of apathy - and a bit of empathy.
Know that I remember You well.
That afternoon when She was an hour forty-five minutes late for lunch, He wasn't angry, or irritated. He'd felt by turns sad, and a bit resigned. Then a little confused, and maybe a touch of agitation, then he settled down to stare morosely out over the scene of kids playing in the pool downstairs.
When She finally appeared - and He stayed out of hope, not stupidity -- He felt only joy. And relief. And everything just melted away the second those glass doors slid open and She grinned apologetically.
Everything melted away, the second She smiled, striding down the corridor of a particularly ugly shopping complex.
Everything melted away, the second her face lit up when She lifted Paddington out of his holding cell.
Everything melted away, the second She opened the door to his hesitant knocking (and answered the unspoken question playing in his mind : "Oh my God, what do I do if someone else opens the door?")
Everything melted away, the second he caught her gaze as he turned around.
That's how it always was. For him.
******
This land is mine
but I'll let You through
I let you navigate on demand
Just as long as You know, this land is mine
It's been so very long since he remembered what She really looked like. Not just a vague feeling, or scent, or shape; a random activated synapse between adjacent neurons. Nor a half-remembered glimpse from yesteryear - but "real", tangible memories from Before. Actual freezeframes, real-life stills of Once Upon a Time. He wrote once, a long time ago about moments captured for all eternity in his mind.
Sitting in his underheated refrigerator-cabinet, eyes closed, not-quite listening to Dido meandering on, and on about her Life for Rent, he reaches for a pen and rediscovers, much to his surprise his ability to sketch. And discovers as well, that moments forever lost in the mists of time yet remain preserved in the chaos of not-quite purged memories after all. He remembers. He remembers the black and brown streaked hairclip. He remembers Her turning back in her mother's car. He remembers Her sitting beside him in some random bus. He remembers sitting opposite Her in a cafe somewhere with ? vines. And bad coffee. And cold water.
He never had a single alcoholic drink in Her presence, but was always somehow completely intoxicated.
He remembers the curve of Her smile and the shape of Her eyes. He remembers how he used to think (She's really not all that pretty. She's beautiful.)
He remembers Her flooding his mailbox, although his biro is at an utter loss to remember that along with him.
And when he is done remembering he is tempted to crumple up the memories and hurl them into the bin.
But he does not.
To Her, he writes : Trust. Trust, or the lack of, was the real reason. The rest were just cheap excuses, or weak rationalisations.
And if she who visits him daily from Warwickshire be Her, then he would like dearly to hear from her again. Unless she didn't want to, of course. He'd understand.
Just when it seems he needs an ear, or a shoulder the most, he is reminded how alone he truly is. Or perhaps the recent reminder of how alone he has been opens his eyes to the fact that he has no ears, no shoulders anywhere about him. None that he would care to speak to, or lean on anyhow. And those that he could do with, previously for some reason, he can't anymore.
Listless anhedonia. Staring out the window chewing on barely palatable cheese and potato. Standing by the forest's edge at daybreak contemplating a pre-work aimless wander. Watching the waterfowl motoring along the water's edge.
And, dammit, the theme for Final Fantasy X running ceaselessly through his head. (thanks to Stoneforest)
He cannot sleep.
So instead he writes, to nobody.
After the Holocaust
Framed as always by fate, he feebly protests his innocence. He knows She'll never believe him, but he writes in his defence anyway. He didn't track Her down, didn't arrange to just-so happen to do his elective at Her hospital. His friend organised it all, after their grand scheme to trek to South America, be kidnapped, and be rescued by Russel Crowe went tits up.
He didn't relentlessly trace her UK GMC registration. He'd just learnt from a colleague too lazy to check his own GMC number that the GMC website offered the feature, could you please check my number for me. So he did. Then, on a whim (and he still doesn't know why) he idly keyed in Her name. And his self-derisive laughter and cynicism - you're too old to act like this, you've never been this stup... died in his mind on the second click.
101 reasons why we do what we do
He made the most monumental mistake of his entire lifetime, because :
He wanted to remember her well, before it was too late in the day. It was too late for her to remember him well, already.
He didn't know what else to do, and if "these things always seem more important at the time" was to have a chance - this was his only way to find out. It didn't.
He would rather bear a lifetime of emptiness than be teased repeatedly by the cruel fate of uncanny coincidences, and near-misses bent on reminding him almost, almost - not quite. He would rather a lot of nothing than many small slices of almost, maybe, somethings. He would rather a lifetime of quiet, pastel solitude than an eternity of walking in the bright shadows of impossibility.
He couldn't bear the bittersweet, schizophrenic hypocrisy of well-wishes at her lifetime-attachments, when they occured - which would flood from his own numbed mouth one day.
He did it, because it made sense.
In retrospect, it was the wrong thing to do.
He knows that given a chance, he'd do it all over again.
Then why is it, given a chance he'd do anything to hear her mind again?
Today is different. Today, he is not. He feels himself walking into the waiting room. He hears himself for the umpteenth time calling out names, he watches himself shepard people into cubicles, he listens as he opens with his sombre Hello there, I'm so-and-so, what brings you here today. His hands explore and probe tender areas, his stethoscope finds areas of dissonance. His pen documents.
But he feels depersonalised. He watches himself, distractedly. His heart is not in it - where usually he never watches himself, and his moment is the here and now. Or rather, where usually has become the usually he has crafted, painstakingly retaught himself how to think.
He doesn't know what to think anymore today. He feels that hurling himself into his work would salve, instead it becomes a burden. His specatators notice his weariness and tell him they find it funny.
There's so much he doesn't know what to - do, to think, to feel. He doesn't know, where he stands.
Except that it is not here, and not now. And it must not be yesterday. (Yesterday, he remembers her discussing her plans to visit for her elective, to work at GOSH, and he remembers imagining the things he would want to show her, the places to go. The laughter he might bring her.)
Perhaps, just perhaps it is outside, in the cold by the lake, watching the ducks cavort.
He glowers over his cheap ASDA brunch mulling about how strange it was he never said the things he wanted to, nor asked the questions that bugged him, but would rather quietly listen to her talk.
He would have told her that he thought it was wrong that anyone could tell her to shut up for a while and listen, or else they wouldn't get a word in edgewise. Part of her magic was her thoughts, and her (pressure of?) speech. And her eyes. He would never have wanted to stem that flow of raw, unbridled humour for anything.
He would have confessed to being a dog person too in response to her rant that he had to choose! He thought dogs and cats were cute, sure. But she never asked, so he never said that dogs are beautiful - they've got eyes that laugh, or cry. They... hover expectantly, they gambol. They're Funny. They win, paws down.
He would tell her about the countless numbers of times he thought, "hey, yeah, I so agree. I've always thought that, too!" but for some reason he always kept his peace. He would tell her what he was thinking so that she could have a taste of her own medicine, she could be the one thinking Oh. That's exactly what I would have said. But for some reason, he was always the one who asked her what she thought.
He would have asked her why she pronounced her name the way she did?
He would tell her that she was right, these things Do always seem important when they happen, but in retrospect they weren't. Except perhaps, for him, just once in a lifetime.
He would tell her how he walked down the road in blustery wintertime, arms akimbo feeling - happy. Despite the dark, cynical, violent grey city around him. Despite being the proverbial fish out of water.
He would have told her he really did miss her in the end, but, well. that would have been mushy. and mush is bad.
He would have told her that he never really expected anything from her. He could never have dared expect. He didn't play the ball when it was in his court, because he didn't want to live a pipe-dream, which he ended up doing anyhow.
He would reassure her that he never saw it as her fault, he led himself on. And he would never have held her to task or tried to blame her.
He did what he had to, so that he would remember her well.
And he does. And that he never did meet anyone even remotely like her, but with slightly under three quarters of his natural lifetime remaining (barring unexpected scientific augmentation) who knows, he might do someday.
And most of all, he would tell her :
that he thinks it's really pathetic that she only ever had a pet turtle that got flushed down the toilet by her brother, and that he was so glad someone else existed who made his own childhood look normal by comparison.
They pass along a gentle incline and turn the corner towards the car-park. There's a white tower-of-sorts here, contrasting garishly with the green metalwork that litters the establishment, and comprise two of the three mismatched colours that contribute to its identity.
He remembers : windswept hair. A slight sobriety on her face, shoulders held, as always, slightly hunched. Eyes bright and twinkling. She's wearing a not-particularly-flattering T-shirt and shorts, and carrying a rather oddly decorated inverted mop. Somewhere, the knights of the round table are rolling in their graves. She looks slightly sad, as they speak briefly, and in his own sadness, he wonders why. silently.
She walks past him on the green-railed stairs, he, heading down, and she, up. They pause for a while and he makes some lame comment about the large, carved staff that she's incongurously carrying. It's apparently a gift. An older, slightly more Anglicised Him laughs in retrospect, and wishes he could have made a wittier joke about "giving you stick, huh". They pass on.
He stops by the rails in the cafeteria. Surely they were taller, once. He distinctly remembers her leaning back against them, but cannot reconcile their lack of height with his memory. She was as tall as, if not slightly taller than himself. He doesn't even attempt to lean against the rails, he'd just fall over backwards. He remembers her eyes, laughing, and almost mocking him as he drifts slowly and dreamily towards her, hand on his sword, all eyes in the canteen upon - her, probably, rather than him.
He steps outside onto the shop floor, back into the mundane everyday battles of life and death that now occupy his waking life, and eclipse the fading memories that still surface from time to time. He doesn't - know - what to feel, anymore.
So he doesn't.
He steps out of the quiet calm of church, into the enveloping warmth of a summer's day.
Head down, slightly cocked. He walks past a dumpster distractedly and is transported back to another time. He stops. He can smell the night air.
Shadows lace the street richly, obliquely giving way grudgingly to the dim, gentle orange halos of streetlamps. There's a cold crispness in the air, a suggestion of spring. He stands before the dumpster and picks up a cardboard box in delight. "Normal saline, for intravenous use".
The bus lurches, and around him people fall to the floor. He notices it distantly, grasping the vertical standing-poles a little tighter by reflex. There's a faint smell of candles in the air.
They're walking along the Rocks in the fading light of dusk. There's a scent, no, a taste of salt in the air, the faint tang mingled with the mishmash of smells a teeming city invariably harbours. Not much, not as much as you get, say with the sea, just enough to make you aware of it. She's taken his jacket off his shoulder, the ridiculous blue bomber jacket with its almost-boa lining the collar despite his blank no-thank-you's to her subtle requests if she can help him carry his jacket. He's got both hands full at the moment, carrying a cardboard box considerably lighter than it appears.
She points out a restaurant on their right, down a slight stairway; the place where everyone goes after their exams to celebrate, which he glances at with interest.
Flickering red light illuminates her face, casting soft shadows around the curves of her smile and highlighting the sparkle in her eyes. The scent of pine mingles with the odour of lit candles. She pulls the chilled bottle by it's base, out of his hands which grasp it's neck, thumb on metal, and they laugh. He feels the box being pushed against his knees.
Cobblestones, and the slightly moist, promising scent of parks and trees relishing the last days of summer. Speckled shadows dance in the greyness at their feet. She's a shadow at his side, matching his strides with hers. Or perhaps he is matching his strides to hers. He feels her look up at him before she speaks.
An aftertaste of... paint thinner? Acryllic? (He worries irrationally that it might be lead or asbestos) Something unpleasantly synthetic, as he tries to savour the slightly overdone korean barbeque. Time dwindles.
The cacophony of smells of a foodcourt, as they compare hand sizes.
Apple turnover, turned from the smells of it over some time ago within its crust, smelling of almost-freshly-baked pastry. A waitor tries halfheartedly to edge into the narrow gap between seats before going around to the side.
Sunlight streams low off the horizon into his downcast eyes, warming the bridge of his nose and his cheeks. A haphazardly coloured dog meanders its way past, nose to the ground an eternity in the future, a million miles away.
He's sitting down, trying to remember her.
It's been five years since he saw her last.
He's leaning against a railing, his weight on both elbows talking to a friend and waiting. He feels two light taps on his right shoulder and turns his head. There's nobody there. He turns around to the left, and she's there, smiling.
He's standing at a bookshop in a posh shopping centre with a grand piano on every floor, eyes peeled, waiting. He's early, and soon, she will be late. He leafs through some random pamphlet things, puts them down and looks up, and she's striding towards him, smiling.
He's running, running late, for the first day of induction of his elective. A face flashes by, but he's so late he doesn't break stride. A few seconds later he realises, with a shock, that he'd just run past Her. Standing, eyebrows creased, talking to another doctor. He wants to wheel around and run back to say hello, but his heart is too full of misgivings and fears, and he's late, and all the excuses come together, and he keeps running in confusion.
The sun is setting over Hyde park, a dusky red globe hanging low on the horizon, rays of sunlight streaming almost horizontally, almost painfully, skimming the ground into one's eyes, and the sunset is coming off in reds and golds off the water, mingled with the dramatic black shadows of dusk. She decides to feed the swans with some bread which she's pilfered off some random enchanted waiter from Belgos. The swans gather around her, and she holds out her hand, palm up, bread in it. They gingerly snatch the bread away. Swans, and girl, bonded in trust, sillhouetted in black against a blood red sky. The moment is so beautiful he feels his heart about to break.
He's in the middle of his exams, but he's happy. He paces himself amongst the mess of books he's created, absorbs himself fully in the stuff. He's about to do ridiculously well in these exams, but he really doesn't care, because in five, four, three, two, one minutes he dashes down to the communal computer room and checks his email, and there is a new email, everytime, waiting for him. Occasionally, he telnets with her and laughs quietly to himself, oblivious to his hallmates who are searching for pornography to print out and stick to the walls.
She ushers him to the door of the train; perhaps she senses that, in his heartbreak he is extremely confused and even less orientated to his surroundings than usual. This is your train, she says, looking at him. A while ago, in the aftermath of her gentle rejection, he's babbling to her about laptops to buy although he doesn't have a clue about laptops. The harsh backlighting makes her look like a grey shadow, a disembodied voice coming from a person-shaped figure. Maybe that makes it easier to keep talking. He's grateful that they're still friends, and it feels like nothing's changed, much to his surprise.
He steps through the doors and looks at her looking at him, as the train pulls out. Turns around mutely, back against the door, and slumps slowly to the floor, not caring who sees him. Half an hour later, he realises that she's put him on the wrong train, and he's going quite the wrong way.
He's standing across the train platform from her, waiting for his train. She's wearing her school uniform, with that silly stripey tie and the frumpy skirt. His train arrives first, and he raises his hand in farewell.
He stops for a while to wonder if it's true that the further back he goes, the fuzzier the memories become. It's been an unbelievably quiet night so far.
He's deep in sleep when the phone rings. He rolls over and picks it up, eyes bleary, tries to enunciate with some difficulty the word Hullo. He hears a warm burble of laughter, and she tells him to get up! it's saturday and first years should be up by 8.30... he laughs, squints against the sunlight, rolls back over and keeps talking to her with his eyes closed, but his mind suddenly wide awake, and brightly lit.
She's playing with some toys in a toy shop, and suddenly her reservations, that coldness he's sensed all day melt away. She's playing, with him, and they're laughing again. She tries to undo some magic rings, her eyebrows knit and face a mask of concentration, and can't do it. She passes them to him, and he quite accidentally does something right and they fall apart. She looks cross and asks him how he did that! with mock petulence. They play a while more, with a balancing game (he seems to be at least as good as her!) and suddenly she realises the time; she's late meeting her parents. A muffled oath and they're hurrying off.
They're eating dinner at some cheap food court, the table keeps rocking beneath the weight of their elbows. He asks, on a whim, how large her hands are? Someone always used to say her hands were larger than his. She puts out her palm, and they touch, palm to palm, and she claims victory by half a digit's length. He doesn't point out to her that she'd been cheating and they hadn't started with their palms aligned.
He's getting some basic fencing instruction when a girl walks by and asks casually if he'd been invited to Her farewell. His heart stops. Farewell? He'd heard rumours, but she hadn't confirmed them. Didn't she tell you? the girl asks maliciously. He nods absently, his head in a whirl.
She's playing phantom of the opera with mock fury, a twinkle in her eye and a small smile about her lips as her best friend walks in, late, to her final moments as a full-time singaporean, at her house.
She's delivering her farewell speech to all the people who used to know her, some of whom have burst into tears. Everyone's sitting in a ring and she's pacing the outside of the ring, forcing people to turn to look at her as she goes past. She walks behind him and he can't see her anymore, his range of movement at his atlanto-axial joint well exceeded. She's saying something about how she shows her affection to her friends by being nasty to them, the more she insults someone, the more she likes him. He's lost in his own melancholic world, thinking that these may be the last moments he'll ever see her, again, and how he can't imagine never seeing her again, never hearing her again. How he'll miss her. She stops and kicks him, and says softly, "right, XZ?" and he's hauled back into the present, in shock. He's saying goodbye to her, and wants to say that he'll miss her, but instead he sticks out his hand formally, and says "shake?". As she reaches for it, he pulls back and shakes his hand convulsively, making her glare at him in exasperation. It's how she sees him, not as some sentimental sap, and that's how the script is written. He feels like crying but he smiles and laughs as he turns on his heel to leap into his parent's car. His mother observes that she's a very tall girl.
She's decked up in her Prefect's uniform, and walking towards him. He growls menacingly that the production better be good, he's missing German for this, and she smiles uncertainly. She'll never know that his mum dropped him off for German class, and he waited till she was out of sight before sprinting off; possibly the first and last time he ever plays traunt.
He's pacing up and down, waiting. She's well over an hour and a half late, and his better sense is telling him that she hasn't come, she's stood him up. Maybe she didn't want to come, maybe something cropped up, and he's uncontactable anyhow, so maybe she just isn't coming. But he can't imagine her acting out of malice, although he concedes that he's not that important or attractive that a girl would be compelled to meet him. He waits, and she appears through the glass doors, striding rapidly down the brown walkway towards him, smiling, but eyes apologetic. His heart lifts, and he's just happy to see her.
They're eating lunch. She's struggling to use her chopsticks on her hainanese chicken rice, with her thumb bandaged. But she still painstakingly de-skins it all. They're talking, and laughing, and he thinks that he'll remember this afternoon forever. Time seems to be standing still for him, and suddenly the waitor is bringing the bill, in a gentle but firm, subtle reminder that lunches lasting more than three hours are unacceptable.
They're chatting long-distance, on the telephone, random snippets as usual about their mundane lives made animated by flamboyant adjectives and verbs, and a lot of laughing. There comes a pause, and his mind flits back to the past for no good reason; he wonders why one of his letters from three years ago went unanswered, and he remembers the mornings he spent waiting hopefully for post in the common room; and how he gradually gave up waiting; he remembers standing and watching the sunset silently, next to an extremely pretty girl, and her turning to him and telling him that she could see the sadness in his eyes; he remembers giving her an apologetic smile and turning around to go back into the common room, to wait a little more. And then, unexpectedly he hears her saying "do you remember those letters you sent me? I was away then, living with my aunt in B." and he laughs and says it's okay, but he's shellshocked, in his heart. He doesn't, of course, ask her how she knew what he'd been thinking; its even a little too freaky for him.
He turns back to the computer screen from looking out into the blackness of the night. There are too many memories, and each memory brings with it another cascade of memories. And each memory makes him feel imperceptibly, a little more sad.
He stops and heads out to the ward, to find more jobs that might need doing, that might distract him from the flood of yesterdays.
She opens the box, and her apprehension melts away into pure and spontaneous joy. She takes out Paddington squealing girlishly. He is mildly surprised and rather attracted as she bubbles and babbles over Paddington. He hadn't figured her for the type to lose her head over a stuffed toy, although he must confess that Paddington is remarkably cute.
Half an hour ago, they'd been laughing and fooling around over coffee, dinner, credit cards and a bottle of mineral water. Her face, lit by the soft, flickering glow of candlelight, her eyes, as always sparkling with barely surpressed laughter and emotion. So, so alive.
Right now, she's alive as well, with her whole being. She's forgetting to mute down her enthusiasm for life in front of him. She's breathtakingly beautiful. She finally remembers, and looking him in the eye, thanks him almost formally, saying its the bestest gift in the world.
They walk in silence along the pavement, now past a darkened park - there seems to be a fountain in there somewhere - then turning off eventually into the driveway up to her uni. Bemused, mutual silence sits heavily but calmly on their shoulders, shoulder to shoulder on the steps of the park, waiting for her mum to show up to take her home. They're both a little shell-shocked, for completely different reasons. Retrospectively, he realises this might have been the perfect moment to take her hand, or lean over and kiss her. Right now, he just wants to sit next to her, and feel the warmth she's giving off, hear her breathing. Right now, he is content to enjoy the silence of the night with her. Before he flies away. He's still trapped in the "last moments" mentality, the impact of what he's done hasn't hit him yet, and he's feeling slightly surreal. Things seem bittersweet, and he's extremely lost and confused.
Headlamps shine on them, and her mom steps out of the car. A puzzled, almost suspicious glance at the two kids sitting close to each other waiting for her. He's about to excuse himself and leave, walk back alone when she offers him a lift back.
Moonlit car-ride in silence. She doesn't say much, her mom is a statue of silence. She reaches back and undoes the clips holding up her hair, and the braids come apart. The car stops, and she turns back, long hair straggling wildly over her face, framing it lovingly on both sides. There's something in her eyes which he hasn't seen before, and it's sadness. Almost a wistfulness. And he realises that maybe it's a reflection of his own sadness and wistfulness. He wishes he could reach out and touch her face, frozen for that moment in time in his mind. A moment of utter beauty, and utter sadness. His heart breaks as he steps out of the car and shoulders his silly blue bomber jacket. Earlier in the day, she'd offered to carry it for him despite his feeble protests. Paddington-in-a-box is gone now, though, and everyone seems to have grown up a little.
He spends a long time sitting by the window in his cheap, higher-level bunk bed later that night, looking out at nothing in particular, and trying to clear his mind to stop it being overwhelmed by sadness.
He reaches in his pocket, takes out a fifty-cent coin and holds it between his fingertips.
Heads, I stay; and be everything you want me to be, hide my feelings from you, stay your buddy, pine away for a lifetime. Heads, I die a day at a time, for you.
Tails, I turn around and walk away; I run from this ridiculous urge to tell you how much I love you, and attempt to ruin your life and your relationship, with Him. Tails, and I die in an instant, for myself.
He isn't, of course, about to tell her that he can skew the coin flip, and that he's planning to skew it so that it comes up tails. He isn't going to tell her, ever, that he had to do it, because he thought it would make her happier.
(A minute ago, they were laughing as only old friends can do, when he told her he had something important to say. He saw her sense the change in mood, saw the slight crease form in her eyebrows as she waited. He struggled for a bit, then said, I'm so sorry I'm doing this. Okay, let's do it this way, and reached into his pocket.)
That's how it has to be then, just as he's planned it; a skewed coinflip to oblivion.
So he looks up from the coin and meets her eyes, opens his mouth to tell her "Heads, I stay, Tails, I go". But before he can even begin, she, never breaking eye contact, takes his hand in both of hers, the hand with the coin, and says, "Don't".
He sits back, stunned, and doesn't voice the question that's begging to be asked : How did you know what I was going to do?
And so instead, he begins Once upon a time...
Once upon a time there was a boy, who grew up too early. Left to his own devices amongst books such as Agatha Christie and Far from the Madding Crowd at the age of eight, he developed into a rather dysfunctional and cynical child, who didn't believe in the intrinsic goodness of people, who watched wars start and stop and didnt feel surprised or moved, and who didn't believe in love.
Then, one unforgettable evening, during one of the less memorable government-sponsored young-people's collectives events (read : dating service), whilst playing a particularly unmemorable game involving water pistols, socks and assassins, someone put a pistol into the small of his back, and said, bang, you're dead, man.
He spins. Eyes meet. Silence.
Painfully jerks himself back to reality. Are you sure that thing's working? She hadn't pulled the trigger. Heads bend to examine the malfuctioning pistol. He runs.
Fast forward a few minutes. He's standing on her doorstep, heart pounding, wondering how the hell he ended up here. He doesn't remember, doesn't want to remember, asking random people "who's that girl in purple?". He doesn't remember walking to this doorstep. And for the first time in his life, he is afraid. And, for the first time in his life, he doesn't have a ready one-liner waiting, he doesn't have a cynical comment as a back up if the one-liner fails. He's blank... the door opens. From afar, he hears himself, and cringes at the sheer sadness of it all. "Don't move, I'm memorising your face; I'll never forget your face".
Silence. Eye contact. An eyebrow raised in bemusement. A twitch of a smile, between two mouths. 180 degree turn, and walk, calmly, calmly. Don't trip. Damn that was cool.
Fast forward a few months. They're talking, on the phone. They're laughing. He's happy. Truly happy, from the heart. The cynic, is happy. The cynic has nothing cynical to say. He says something silly, she laughs, the night melts away.
Fast forward a few years. She's gone. A brief farewell ceremony, she kicks him gently in public and says... what? Does he remember it wrong? Was she expressing her affection for him in public to everyone? He convinces himself he remembers it wrong. It doesn't make any difference anyway, she's going, going, gone.
She's gone. Too far away to talk to. Near enough to write, but everyone knows what happens as you grow up; writing? Dream on.
Fast forward a few more years, she's back, she's gone, she's back. Everytime she's back, he laughs. He realises he's fallen in love with her, his best friend. And he realises it started the second he felt the gun in his back. And he realises that the trigger was pulled after all, the second he looks at her, head bowed in prayer, and wants to spend a lifetime protecting her, by her side, making her laugh, laughing with her.
Fast forward a decade.
He's lost her to someone else, lost her to distance, won her? through irrationality and a six thousand mile, forlorn, pointless flight - against all odds, against the advice of her best friend. And lost her, again, to distance, and common sense. Her common sense, not his. He played along with that, because she wanted him to. He does so much because she wants him to, but he feels something snapping.
He feels cynicism setting in, even when she talks to him. He feels his soul slipping away.
He has to run. He tells her never to speak to him again. She's upset. She doesn't want to. And he says it again. She's hurt, he can see it in her eyes, as she talks on the phone to someone else to tell him to call back later, her world is crashing down around her.
His heart breaks. He wants nothing more than to hold her close and tell her how sorry he is, that he's so selfish, that he's such a rotten friend. If there's one thing he's really wanted to do between them, its to hold her and apologise. You'd think it would be to kiss her on a balmy, barmy, bewildered night, sitting on the steps of an esteemed institution - but it's not. It's just to hold her close, maybe for a fragment of eternity, and press his sincerest apologies into her, through his costal cartilages.
But he doesn't.
Fast forward half a decade.
And he's lost her. So, so completely and utterly.
And he remembers her still. He remembers her laugh; he remembers those eyes. He misses them, almost every day. He revisits places that remind him of her. He's tried and almost succeeded to fall in love with other girls. But he still hears her voice and mind in his head.
And it feels like he's lost. He's got a good 60 years left to live, and he knows it will be good. He knows it will. But part of him is sad, because he knows she won't be in the picture. and the days of laughing, and laughing, and laughing, have died.
