Page 7 of What It's Like in Words
He was, I mean, he is.
Right…
I can’t explain it. But we’ve been texting. Every time I get a message, I panic. You know like when you eat a sour sweet? How you immediately want another one? That’s weird, right? It’s probably a bad sign that it doesn’t feel… effortless?
Loads of life-changing things aren’t effortless. Jumping out of a plane, or rock climbing, or—
Camping with lions?
Swimming with hippos?
Don’t exaggerate. The hippos were on the other side of the lake. But I feel butterflies, you know?
Ruth sipped her drink and said: I read this thing that said butterflies are our body’s fight-or-flight. We think they mean love or attraction or whatever, but they actually mean danger. It’s your body warning you to run.
Roo!
But, she added, danger isn’t always bad.
She explained that it was in my nature to hold back, because I liked things neat. I reminded her that I was trying to be a writer. Can you think of a more chaotic career than that? She said that I was also the person who double-cleaned the coffee machine. I protested that no one cleaned it properly, and she laughed and said that I was both chaos and order.
Ruth always made words sound like they should be printed on cushions.
Well, I think you should go for it, she said turning back to her drawing. But please focus on what you think of him? You’re great. Ishegood enough? Then one side of her mouth lifted into a smile and she added: Jump out that plane, Laa.
AFTERWARD,WE WENT TORuth’s parents’ home in Islington. The house was warm, and there was a selection of miniature pumpkins next to a witch made of twigs in the entrance. Jon, her dad, was already in bed, but Catherine greeted us affectionately in her faded flower-print dressing gown.
Once, I was staying with Ruth and we were making peanut butter cookies. Catherine had come in and kissed Ruth as we were shaping the dough. It was such a normal moment for them, but I cried myself to sleep in the spare room. Catherine always kept the spare room for me, but she didn’t like when I called it spare.It’s your room, Enola.
We showed Catherine our drawings, and she pinned them on the fridge next to the scan of Emily’s new baby and a photo of us from last Christmas. I’m not sure why I had chosen a cream dress; you couldn’t tell where the fabric ended and my skin began. Ruth, as ifpreparing to be stuck on a fridge, was making a face like a disruptive toddler, and Emily was smiling nicely.
How is Emily?
Oh, you know. Working up until the wire, Catherine answered proudly.
Ruth made a noise and then pretended that she hadn’t.
Part of the reason that Ruth lived like she was being chased was because her sister, Emily, didn’t. A doctor in Maidenhead. Her husband, Samson, worked in finance. All her appliances matched. Her walls were shades of beige.
There’s some food on the stove for you girls.
Catherine looked to me. Enola, please do not let Ruth go at it with a spoon. It needs to be heated. She said that our rooms were made up, and I knew there would be a book on my bedside table—a poetry book or something obscure and Russian or a contemporary prizewinner that she would pretend not to have bought new.
She kissed us both, tightened her dressing gown, and left, calling: Lights off when you’re done. I turned back, and Ruth was perched by the stove, swinging her legs and eating out of the pot with a spoon. Texted him yet? she asked, mouth full.
WHENIARRIVED OUTSIDEthe tube, he was already there, and he made a joke about lateness. He walked ahead but didn’t seem to think that was rude. When I questioned it, he said it was so that he could smoke. I trotted behind, dress riding up and a sheen appearing above my lip.
I had been anxious all day remembering his arrogant gait, his lined face, his unpredictable smile. I had also changed my outfit five times.You clearly want to be there, Ruth pointed out.Fight or flight. I had asked her if there was a third option. She said:Fuck?
Entering the pub, I relaxed, because nineties music was playing. I commented that the song reminded me of school discos, and heremarked, dryly, that it reminded him of Freshers Week. I tried to think of a witty retort, but the moment passed.
He sat us next to a bookshelf of board games and went to the bar. I checked my phone to give myself a task. There was a message from Ruth:
Need rescuing?
I looked to where he was waiting to order. There were people on either side of him who were there first but he was taller and his elbows were splayed, as though being served were a competition.
I replied that I wasn’t sure, and Ruth said that she was having dinner at the warehouse. She suggested that I join later if I wasn’t otherwise engaged, and then sent the plane emoji.
