Page 14 of People In Love
A moment of quiet, post-toast, the rush of a distant train.
Bren, you repeat. As in, fridge magnet Bren?
Yes.
What! Nora! Why didn’t you introduce us?
She drinks more coffee, then shrugs as though she is sad; her shrugs have emotions, you have learned.
I don’t know, she says, and you can tell it’s the truth. I was so thrown, she admits. And kind of drunk. And there were so many people around, and we didn’t talk much, and then when we could’ve said hi, you were passed out on the sofa. Wearing only one shoe.
Oh gawd, and she says it’s fine, rubs your arm, vaguely, with sympathy. Looking at the bedroom wall now.
You could’ve woken me, you say, and she says sorry,yeah.
He’s come home, then?
I guess, she says, pressing her coffee mug to her cheek. I don’t know how long for, though.
You didn’t ask?
It didn’t come up. He just sort of … ate pizza, and talked to people.
I guess that’s what you do at parties, you say, and she makes a noise of agreement, though you’re not sure she actually does. More coffee, swallowed. Mug put down on the toast plate as she gets out of bed, pulls on a sweatshirt she’d left hanging on the radiator, for warmth.
It’s just soBren, she says, with her head beneath the fabric.
What is? Turning up at engagement parties?
She emerges without answering, picks up her hairbrush and tugs it through her hair.
He flew all the way from Queenstown to come to our party, she says, when he’s not been home for twelve years. Didn’t even come back for his mum’s sixtieth.
But you’re close, you remind her, you’ve always said so. Far closer than he is to his mum.
Yeah, she says again; all these yeahs, and no certainty in her voice. Keeps brushing. A car drives past the window, drone of the engine fading into the Sunday morning quiet.
Maybe, you venture, he just wanted to surprise you?
He did say that, she admits, swapping the brush for a scrunchie and gathering her hair into a bun. She’s next to the Sophie Derrick painting you bought her for her thirtieth birthday, and there is a moment where you realise you will always get to see her like this, in themornings, beside that painting, strands of hair by her face, bed-creases on her skin. And it is so familiar but almost profound, in that familiarity. Like the painting itself. Because to take home a piece of art, your grandfather once told you, you have toreallylove it, Robin: you have to want to keep it around, forever. Want to be with it, every damn day.
Well I’d have liked to have met him, you tell her.
Yeah?
Yeah! I’d have thanked him for all of the magnetised objects he’s sent us over the years, you say, stretching your arms above your head. Without him, there’d be nowhere to stick our shopping lists or takeaway menus. No outlet for our undying love of pineapples wearing sunglasses.
It’s a pie wearing the sunglasses, Nora says.
And where would we be without our pie that looks like a pineapple?
She turns to you, hair up, sweatshirt over her pyjama bottoms. Feet bare, blush of colour in her face. Love, you are sure, in her two-tone eyes.
Right here, she says. Probably.
Right answer, you say, swinging your legs out of bed now too, to start cleaning up from the night before. Speakers on, music playing, you love this song, youcall to Nora who is still in the bedroom, Ilovethis song! Humming because you don’t really know the words, something about clear minds and best things and coming a long way as her phone begins to ring. You hear Josie’s ringtone and Nora’s voice, the lilt and fall of it through the baritone and trumpets; so jubilant, this track, definitely one for the wedding playlist, you’ll write that down, when you’re done, Nora’s voice carrying through the open door saying I know, I know, Josie. Don’t thank me, I did nothing.
FOUR
