Chapter 31

CHAPTER 31

The next day, I woke up feeling sick. It was partly the usual apprehension at it being Wednesday and having to talk to my mother, but it was also because I needed to talk to Ruth.

I told her that I was in the neighborhood, but I wasn’t. I was wearing the T-shirt that she had bought for me for Pride: THIS IS WHAT A FEMINIST LOOKS LIKE . We were really happy that day. I wanted her to remember that day when I told her.

As I turned the corner into the community, she was on the swinging seat wrapped in a blanket. She put her mug on the ground, and we went inside. She put the kettle on and waited for it to boil.

Go on then, she said.

I asked her how she knew, and she said that she could just sense it, like the seasons shifting.

God, is it that monumental?

I just know you , Enola.

I took a deep breath and explained that being with Virinder had made me think about things. She told me that she didn’t know where to start. I asked her to please not judge me, and she said that she wasn’t judging , she was worrying . I played with my hands. Roo, sometimes your worry can feel like judgment. She looked at me incredulously.

It’s true, I said. I can tell what you’re thinking.

Okay. What am I thinking?

That I’m a shit feminist who gets lost in my relationships.

That would make you a shit friend , not a shit feminist.

The kettle clicked, and it was only when she added milk that I realized she wasn’t making two cups. Aren’t you having one? She shook her head and left the tea on the side for me to pick up.

Ruth’s room was a white rectangle with a white mattress on the floor. There was no other furniture apart from a metal clothes rail. The walls were covered in Polaroids, sketches, and clippings of things that she found interesting. She had plants by the window, and a hanging ivy reached her pillow. It looked more like the room of a writer than mine.

She sat on the bed, but I stayed by the door. My coat was still on because I had missed the moment to remove it. Ruth was looking at me, and so I started the conversation by saying that she saw the best in everyone apart from him. She responded that it wasn’t about him. We don’t have to like each other’s partners as long as they make us happy. Does he make you happy, Enola? I thought about the way he had dropped the bath bomb with a childish “kaboom.”

Yes, I answered. He does.

And the times when he doesn’t?

I told her that she was just remembering the bits she wanted to remember, and she said that I was hardly one to talk. She rubbed her forehead. I can’t have this fight again, Enola. Just tell me what you’ve come to tell me. I explained that I had been soul-searching and that, in hindsight, I realized I had been oversensitive. She shook her head and said that, if anything, I wasn’t sensitive enough. He was abusive, Enola.

Abuse is subjective.

Someone’s intentions aren’t subjective. He made you feel like shit.

Or did I make myself feel like shit? Because when I was with Virinder, I felt suffocated and—

The world isn’t made up of two men! It is possible for both of them not to be right for you! And, Enola, he is not right for you. Until he sorts his shit out, he isn’t going to be right for anyone.

I left my tea on the floor—I hadn’t really wanted it, I had just wanted things to feel relaxed—and sat next to her on the mattress. Ruth, I think perhaps I’ve been going through something these two years and maybe I projected that onto him?

She took my hand and said that she thought that was true. Kenya must have brought up a lot, and I know that your dad could be—

I snatched my hand back and returned to the door. Why would you bring up my dad?

I’m sorry, I thought that’s what you were saying!

That’s literally the opposite of what—

I took a steadying breath.

I was saying that the relationship wasn’t —Look, my dad was incredible, okay?

Ruth ran her tongue over her gums the way that she did when she was uncomfortable. But I was uncomfortable too. Fine, Enola. I shouldn’t have mentioned your dad, but stop lying to me. Going back there was hard. And you’ve admitted that much. You got back and fell apart. That can’t have all been about him. I’m sorry, but it can’t have been.

That’s exactly what I’m saying—that he wasn’t to blame.

No. That sounds like what I’m saying, but it’s not.

So, what are you saying?

I’m saying that maybe you should try and think about yourself. You’ve literally gone from one relationship to another and now you’re telling me that you’re getting back with him. With him. The man who made you cry every day, who made you so anxious that you started hurting yourself—

I was not hurting myself! Don’t be so dramatic!

She cried out in frustration and said that she was so sick of hiding her feelings about this. I laughed.

Come on. Ruth, when have you ever hidden your feelings?

She said that she hid her feelings all the time when it came to him. She said that he lied to me, manipulated me, played on my emotions, and then made me feel guilty for having them. She told me that deep down I knew it but that I loved him so much I didn’t care. Then she inhaled sharply and said: Your dad—

No! Stop it!

I told her that I was sick of hiding my feelings too. I said that she made me feel like a shit friend for not talking about her life, but then whenever I tried to, she pushed me away. I said that she wasn’t upset about him . She was scared because her life was changing. She looked hurt and said that it was unfair to use what she had told me last week against her. I said that she was using my childhood against me. She shouted that it wasn’t against me, it was for me. I said that I didn’t realize her latest career was in psychology.

Don’t… she said, shaking her head.

Don’t what?

Be a bitch.

Oh, can we use that word now?

Stop! Ruth shouted, her voice squeezed through a straw. She put her hands over her face, and the blood drained from my own. I rushed to her side and put my arms around her. She was hurt. I had hurt her. I’m so sorry, I repeated over and over. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it. She wiped her nose on the back of her hand like a toddler.

Enola, she said, he breaks you, and I’m worried that I won’t be able to put you back together again.

All the king’s horses?

Don’t joke.

Sorry.

Ruth ran her hands back through her hair. You won’t listen to me, but will you please just do this one thing? Ask yourself what you really want and what makes you happy. Promise me that you will look inward and think about it, Laa. Think about how he makes you feel.

When the police dropped me off at Catherine’s house, Jon was on the phone and Catherine was cleaning the cupboards. But Ruth was showing me what went first: lettuce and then beef and then cheese. I couldn’t lose her but I loved him.

I asked what would happen if, when I looked inward, all I found was him, and she told me that what I felt wasn’t love. I asked if she would still be my friend if she was wrong. She went silent and then, staring at her palms, asked: Is that all I am to you?

What do you—

Nothing.

She stood and went to the door. She said that she needed to get sorted for Bath tomorrow.

You need the whole day for that?

Yes, I’m leaving tonight and staying over, she said, like I should have known. Then she added, more generously, that she was giving a presentation in the morning. I asked what the presentation was about, but she said that she needed to get on now.

Ruth, I—

Forget it, okay?

I N THE COURTYARD , THE blanket was bodiless on the swinging seat, and there was a full cup of tea on the ground. My tea was still on the floor of her bedroom. I wondered if Sally knew how Ruth liked her tea, and then I wondered if he knew how I liked mine.

I called him, and he answered like my name hadn’t appeared on his phone. I told him that I was just coming from Ruth’s and wanted to see him. He said that he was packing because he was moving tomorrow.

You’re moving?

I am.

I asked where he was moving to, and he just said, “North,” like we were in Game of Thrones . I asked him if I could come to his. He paused and then said: Fine, but I don’t have ages. Pat’s having a birthday dinner later.

T HE BUS WAS SEVEN minutes away, and so I went to the tube station. I took the Piccadilly line to King’s Cross and then changed to the Hammersmith and City, where the next train was due in three minutes. I went to put in my headphones, but something felt off. People were moving down the platform. I followed the glances and saw a man meandering close to the yellow line, wearing cream tracksuit bottoms with brown suit shoes, no socks, and a T-shirt that didn’t cover his belly. He was cumbersome and, as I watched, drunk.

I walked up to him and saw that he was crying. Excuse me, are you okay? He looked at me like he had previously thought himself the only person on the platform, then said something that I couldn’t understand, but I heard the words “prison” and “son.” I told him that he should move away from the tracks. He lifted one foot and hovered it. My stomach dropped. No! Don’t do that! But he laughed and dangled the other.

I looked back, and the platform was empty apart from a man with a red beanie who gave me a look that knew how this ended: London Underground apologizes for the delay to your journey. This is because of a person on the tracks at King’s Cross.

The train was now two minutes away.

I edged closer and held out my arm. The man mumbled something, and I thought about grabbing him, but he was a big man. If he decided to jump, he could grab my hand and pull me with him.

The train was one minute away.

I told him that everything would be okay. He looked at me like he knew that it wouldn’t be. His brown eyes were stained red. Oh god. I heard the train, a low rumble that would become a rip. Please, I said, please just move away from the edge. My heart was racing. He laughed again. I opened my mouth but no sound came out. Our eyes connected.

Just then, two members of staff arrived with the man in the red beanie and they maneuvered him against the wall as the train arrived.

M Y HEART WAS STILL hammering when I arrived at Whitechapel. I called him, and he answered the same way as he had before. I told him about the man on the platform, and he said: Do you just want to go home, then?

What? No, I want to see you.

Okay.

I said that I would be there in ten minutes. I wanted to call Ruth and tell her about the man, because she would understand. I even considered going back the warehouse, but that old switch had been activated and I couldn’t go anywhere else.

H E GREETED ME WEARING the gray T-shirt that Karen gave him last Christmas. I wanted him to hold me, to erase what had happened with Ruth, to erase what had happened on the tube platform, but he continued throwing items into boxes. I took off my coat, and he laughed at my T-shirt: Congratulations, very woke. His room smelled the same. Damp. Coffee. Aftershave. I never returned after we broke up because there was never anything to collect.

I asked him why he was moving, and he replied that last month he had found his flatmate staring into the cutlery drawer in the middle of the night. I said that we wouldn’t be neighbors anymore. No borrowing that cup of sugar.

Or having that quick shag?

Well…

He arched an eyebrow. There’s no time for that , Enola.

I sat on his desk chair, swiveling counterclockwise. I wanted to talk about our relationship, but his body language suggested that it wasn’t the right time. I skated my fingers over his laptop: he would pack that last.

And what were you and Ruth up to? he asked with his head in a box.

What you feel isn’t love.

Nothing, I said, explaining that she was preparing for a team-building day for her new job. He said that he hated those. I asked when he had done one, and he said that it was for a marketing job but it was stupid because he was a freelancer. I smiled at the thought of him working in a team. He continued derisively: We had to draw road maps as a metaphor for where we wanted the company to go.

I said that we did that in primary school once but for a different reason. Dad told me that people would die on my roads. He once told me about this insane accident where someone’s head came clean off!

He turned over his shoulder and grinned. Is that why you’re so jumpy? You thought that drunk man’s head was going to come clean off?

That’s not funny.

He sighed. Yes, I’m sorry. I’m an insensitive prick.

No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.

His phone vibrated on the desk, and he opened and closed his fist to indicate that he wanted me to pass it, so I did, and as he read, his face darkened. Fuck, he breathed, before dropping the phone on the bed. I asked if he was okay, but he erupted. No. Enola, I’m not fucking okay. I’ve edited this chapter a thousand times and he’s still not happy.

Simon?

He’s insisting on opening with one of Charlie’s columns, like a prologue. If I had known that getting an agent meant changing everything, I’d have self-published. Fuck. I want a fucking cigarette.

He sat down on the bed and lifted his hands to his forehead. I hesitated and then sat next to him. I circled his back and told him that he should trust his instincts but that he should trust Simon’s too. He said that he wasn’t looking for advice and left the room. My hand dropped onto the bed, warm from where he had been sitting.

I felt a pain as familiar as the joy I’d felt in the bath yesterday. It was like pressing on an old bruise: how hard it was to make him happy. And there would always be something, a prize that he wasn’t shortlisted for or a book cover that he didn’t like. I remembered Ruth’s words when we broke up: Sometimes the good bits of people aren’t the rule, they’re the exception. But I had argued that it was different. And so it had to be. He was the rule and the exception. The flaws that made him short-tempered made him brilliant. Just then his phone lit up. I didn’t mean to look.

B, please can we talk. I miss you… x

I stood and backed away from the bed. What did it mean? The words could be innocuous, but the ellipsis? Mat had seen him with Steph that day, but were he and Steph…? I recalled the joy in her eyes when she told me the story of their meeting. And even though we were a terrible couple, we stayed mates.

The door handle hit my spine. Well, why were you right there? he said, cross. But then he saw my face and asked what was wrong. He looked at his phone and then back to me. He charged to the bed and read the message. You have to be fucking kidding me. Then he moved to the desk like I might open his laptop next. How dare you, he said. How dare you . I asked if something had happened with Steph. He said that he didn’t appreciate being treated like a villain in his own bedroom. Everything in my body went on high alert, and it felt like I was back on the tube platform. We have been here before . I tried to be different, clearer, more assertive. Ruth wouldn’t be afraid to ask for what she wanted. Amy wouldn’t be afraid of saying how she felt. I told him that if we were going to be a couple again, then we needed to be honest with each other. His features settled into a smile. Who said we were a couple, Enola?

I just assumed because you said—

What did I say?

But I didn’t know how to finish.

Go on, Enola. What did I say?

What had he said? No, it wasn’t what he had said but what he had written: I want you. But was that all he had done? When he wrote those words on my leg, I imagined the pronoun stressed: I want you . But what if it was just that he had wanted me. Hadn’t he then moved up the bath and taken what he wanted?

Oh my god.

My eyes filled with tears. I thought about Ruth’s cold tea.

He told me that he wasn’t interested in watching me cry. He had packing to finish and a chapter to reedit. Then he continued putting things in boxes to demonstrate how little he cared about the argument. Fuck him. FUCK him. I asked what this was if not a relationship, and he turned, Christmas jumper in hand, and snapped: Look at yourself, you’re in tears because you read a fucking message! I told him to answer the fucking question. He looked startled, but then he waved the jumper and said that we had hooked up once. Yesterday! We’re having fun. Or we were before you demanded to know the state of our relationship.

How can you even—

But I couldn’t finish because tears were streaming. I hated that this was my body’s response to pain. At a sleepover in Nairobi, a boy punched me in the stomach to demonstrate how strong he was, and all I could do was double over onto his superhero rug. But I had wanted to hurt that boy then the way that I wanted to hurt this one now. There was a stack of hardbacked books by the desk. I thought about hitting him over the head with the Oxford English Dictionary and watching the blood drip, the life drain. But then he threw the Christmas jumper across the room and sunk onto the bed like I had made him as stressed as Simon Longman had. That urge to comfort him kicked back in, and the dictionary remained on the floor. I asked why he found it so hard to let me in.

Me let you in, Enola? Ha. That’s rich.

What does that mean?

He gave me a look.

No. Stop changing the subject. Did something happen between you and Steph?

He said that he didn’t owe me that. You don’t see me demanding to know who you hooked up with, Enola.

His name was Virinder. Please just tell me!

He looked at me like he was surprised that I had said that and then answered: No, okay? Nothing happened between me and Steph. Christ .

I closed my eyes and caught the lights speckling. Outside, the wind moved the branches of a tree. I heard his voice, soft yet grave: Maybe this is a bad idea.

I opened my eyes, and he was shaking his head. My stomach turned. What is?

This , he said, gesturing to me. Clearly nothing has changed. And I get it. I can’t imagine how hard it was to lose your dad, and your mum sounds like a piece of work, and so you have issues with trust, I guess. I don’t know. I’m not a therapist and—

I don’t want a ther—

He put his hands up and said that it didn’t matter because he just didn’t have the time. He said that he had worked so hard to get to where he was with his book and he couldn’t lose momentum now. He buried his face in his hands, and my own thoughts flew from my head, leaving only that paralyzing desire not to lose him. I rushed to him and pressed my face to his shoulder. The softness of his gray T-shirt and the warmth of the blood beneath. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I ran my fingers through his hair and said things that I wasn’t sure I meant but they came as easy as breathing.

The Steph thing is just an old insecurity, but I’m not that person anymore. I promise. Let’s just have fun and see where it goes, okay? That’s what I want. I just want to have fun and see where it goes. Okay?

He listed all the things he had to do on his fingers and then said: The thought of going through all that drama again, honey…

I assured him that we wouldn’t. I said that I was just worked up because of what happened on the way here. He looked confused, and I reminded him about the man on the tube. I mentioned it like it was nothing but recalled the man’s bare ankles appearing from polished shoes.

He rolled his eyes. Oh that. Jesus, Enola, it was just a drunk man. When you called, I thought you were going to say something actually bad.

I felt a whisper of anger again; he’d used similar words in Kenya when I admitted that I was struggling. Why was his instinct to belittle? I told him that it was scary at the time. He said in that case I was stupid to have gotten involved. I told him that I overreacted. About everything. He smiled and I was a baby bird again, featherless and helpless. I rested on his shoulder until he scratched my head and said, in a babyish voice, that he really had to keep packing. But then he added that, if I wanted, I could come to Pat’s later.

Really?

He nodded.

This was huge. If he was inviting me to meet Patrick, then he must be serious about us. But was this what he actually wanted? I refused to put myself in another situation like when I met Steph. I needed him to want me there.

Do you want me to come?

He breathed in and out sharply. Enola, I’ve just told you that you can come if you want.

Yes, but do you —

Enola, stop it!

He said that he would be there, Pat would be there, and if I wanted then I could be there too. Like a maths teacher trying to explain subtraction: if Abdul takes two and Martha takes three, how many bananas does Jonathan have? He said the party was at Baker Street and suggested we meet on the platform at Aldgate in an hour.

As we said goodbye and I left his flat for the last time, two feelings permeated: the first was happiness that he was inviting me to the party and the second was how much I wanted to kill him.