Page 20 of What It's Like in Words
Fuck off.
He reached for his glass, but it was empty, so he finished the wine in mine and then left. I assumed that he’d gone to the bathroom, but then the front door opened and closed. Minutes passed, and I started to feel uneasy, like I might never see him again.
WhyhadI told him about Amy? Because I wanted to hurt him? Because it was a normal thing to tell someone? Because I wanted him to know everything that I knew: my favorite color, Ruth’s middle name, how I liked my tea?
I went to the front door. My keys were gone from the monstera tray, which meant that he was coming back. I waited until the handle was pushed down and then ran back to the sofa like I had never moved.
He started explaining straight away: Look, I’ve just been working on this book for fucking ages, and when I finish it, I’m going to be told by every agent that it’s great but it’s not what they’re looking for. And then I’ll watch while every Gen-Z with a laptop gets handed a six-figure deal. Celebrity memoirs.Fuck, don’t get me started on celebrity memoirs.
Gary Neville? I joked softly.
He smiled at my joke and rested his head on my shoulder; his hair smelled like cigarettes and rain. Enola, he said. I know I can be a fucking nightmare. You wouldn’t be the first girl to say that. But you don’t understand how stressful it is. He lifted his face and his eyes looked heavy. I didn’t know anything about the other girls he had been with, but I wanted to be different. If they found him a nightmare, then I would understand him.
Listen to me, I said. You are the most amazing, talented, funny, honest man I’ve ever met. Agents are going to jump to sign you when you’re ready to query.
He told me that I hadn’t read his book. I told him that I had read enough. He told me that I hadn’t even read three chapters. I told himthat I knewhim. Then he asked me to hold out my hand and placed a chocolate egg in my palm. Let’s go on holiday after Christmas, he said.
I looked down at the egg and then up at him.
I really need a fucking holiday. And look, I know it’s early days but I’m pretty confident I’ll still want you to be my girlfriend. If you still want me?
Girlfriend.
The word ran through my body. I wanted to squeal and kiss him and tell him how happy I was to be his girlfriend. I wanted to call him my boyfriend and tease him about being too old for that word. But I couldn’t let him think that mattered, so I hummed to tease, to lighten, to minimize that which I felt profoundly, and said: I’ll still want you to be myboyfriend.The word tumbled awkwardly off my tongue, but he smiled when he caught it. He kissed my cheeks, my neck, my lips, and I was coming up from a drug.
Later, we had sex like a couple who just had their first fight: without foreplay. After, I asked him what he was thinking, and he said that he wasn’t thinking anything, he was just happy. I told him that I was happy too. And I was. But it was a different kind of happiness, the kind that made me question if I had ever been happy before. And it meant more, I thought, that we were people to whom happiness didn’t come easily.
CHAPTER 6
It was a month into the new year. I had spent Christmas with Ruth’s family. Emily had her new baby. Ruth was an aunt again. (And so are you, Enola, Catherine said.) Ruth had a brief hiatus as an admin assistant for a gym company, but she was now back at the café. My novel was the same length as it was before the bells rang in 2015, and when they did, Ruth and I had celebrated in the warehouse. He had celebrated with Steph and Pat, whom I still hadn’t met. But we were still together, and we were still planning a holiday.
We lay in my bed as the thumping of someone else’s Saturday night bled through the walls. He was scrolling social media, and I was picking at my novel. His eyes drifted to my screen.
Try Wingdings, honey.
I pushed his face, and his smile curled. He was adorable and endearing and frustrating and I couldn’t focus on anything.
What? he said, sensing my thoughts.
Nothing…
We continued with our separate activities, and then he picked up Otter.
No! Leave her alone!
I tried to grab her, but he hid her behind his back and said that otters were pieces of shit.
They are not! They collect rocks!
I hate to break it to you, but otters are violent rapists who bite thefemales’ noses to stop them from escaping and hold their children hostage. They are fucking pieces of shit.
That can’t be true! And anyway, Otter is female.
I seized her back, and he grabbed my hand. Why are your nails so bitten, honey? What is wrong with you? You’re like a child…
No, I’m not. I just don’t like them long.
Like a grubby little child.
