Page 69 of Easy
He doesn’t want you, my mind intones.He just doesn’t want anyone else to have you, specifically Julian. You’re the toy he played with and cast aside. Kicked under the bed, soon to be forgotten about.
The irony is, Julian is of no interest to me at all. Seeing him again was a mixture of curiosity and fear. I wanted to make sure it actuallywashim. You know, and not me.
Turns out I was correct. His excuses were hollow and our chemistry kaput. So I’m currently screening his calls, too. I’ve also asked George, the porter, to tell him if he calls that I’m no longer in the building. I’d even promised I’d go and sit on the terrace so George doesn’t feel he has to lie.
The same textbingsagain. And I still ignore it. Just like I promised myself I would. Because no good can come of it.
And like Will said, neither he nor Julian are any good.
I take a bite of my croissant and wipe the crumbs from my fingers. Vacation calories don’t count. And neither do those incurred from eating your feelings.
I’m sorry I’d gone AWOL, comes his next attempt.
‘The term is ghosted,’ Will, I mutter, dropping my phone on the wooden table and making it clank. The old dear on the table next to mine physically jumps.
‘Sorry,’ I murmur.
‘You gave me a fright, hen,’ she says, though not unkindly, her Scottish accent giving her words a mild sing-song tone. ‘But I’ve seen that expression before,’ she says, pulling her mint coloured cardigan over her thin chest. ‘If you want my opinion—the voice of experience, mind—you need to speak to him. Ignoring your phone won’t help at all.’
‘Oh, no. It’s not like that,’ I say, waving my hand. But then I stop because,fuck it. I’m sick of keeping this all to myself. I have no one in my corner currently. I can’t tell my mum because we don’t have that kind of relationship, and I can’t tell Kallie as she’s currently being driven crazy by her own mother’s visit. Which leaves Sir Lancelot, who isn’t a great deal of help.
‘Actually, it’s exactly like that,’ I say in a rush. ‘I probably should speak to him, but instead I’m hanging out in a café because when I went home a while ago, his car was outside. He lives in the apartment above me. And when I see his car in the parking bay, I worry he’ll knock on my door.’ As I speak, the old dear’s white head bounces as she tries to keep up with my information dump. ‘And I worry I’ll open it, and he’ll kiss me, and we’ll start all over again.’
‘Kissing is good!’ she says with relish. ‘Why don’t you want to see him?’ She places her dainty cup back on the saucer, reaching for her tea pot top up her cup. ‘Sounds like a bit of all right to me. I used to love a bit ofhow’s your fatherwhen I was married.’
‘How’s your what?’
‘How’s your father! You know—a bit of rumpy-pumpy!’ She adds a little hip action from her chair for the sake of translation. ‘It’s what makes the world go ’round.’
I thought that was love, but whatever.
‘Because, when he’s in front of me, I don’t know whether I want to kick or kiss him.’
‘Passion,’ she says, nodding knowingly. ‘That counts for a lot. Take my advice; cram as much excitement as you can into your young life.’
Chance would be a fine thing. ‘But he’s been sort of ghosting me,’ I say with a sigh.
‘He’s a ghost?’ she asks a little too excitedly. Her cup clatters as she drops it to the saucer. ‘I saw a woman on morning telly last week who said the exact same thing.’
‘No, he’s not a ghost,’ I say frowning slightly. One of us definitely misheard the other, and I don’t think it was me. ‘Ghosted. Like, he’s sort of pretending I don’t exist.’
‘Oh.’ She picks up her cup by the dainty handle again. ‘That’s a bit disappointing.’
‘But you said—you saw a woman on TV say what?’ Because, how can I not pull that thread?
‘Oh!’ Her expression lightens instantly. And though the café has been empty but for us the last hour, she looks furtively over both shoulders before beginning. ‘She said she’d had...intimate relations with ghosts.’ Her watery blue eyes shine with the scandal of it all, her tone betraying her excitement. ‘She said her fella caught her cavorting with one of them in bed. Can you imagine!’
I’d rather not.
‘Oh. That’s a little indelicate.’
‘That’snotwhat she said,’ she replies seriously. ‘Yon woman said ghosts have cold penises that work just like the real thing. Not delicate at all. Unless you’re thinking of lopping the thing off with a pair of scissors I suppose.’
By this point I’m struggling not to laugh and not at all tempted to pick up my phone as itbingswith a text again.
‘Such an odd duck, she was.’ She clucks her tongue. ‘But I suppose you’d have to be to let a ghost in your bed. I mean, you can’t even see them. What if you get an ugly ghost or one who’s into dirty stuff? You might roll over during the night and feel a cold finger up your bum. No thank you,’ she says, swallowing a final mouthful of tea before beginning to gather her things.
‘I have to get on, but just you think on this. Men need keeping in line. Keeping in check. Their heads are up their backsides half of the time, and the other half of the time they’re thinking aboutyourbackside. If you want something to happen, or you don’t want something to happen, it’s up to you. Not them.
