‘It’s me, Jemma.’
They bite their lip and look up at the ceiling, which is covered in square polystyrene tiles. ‘Sorry, yeah. Thank you.’ Their voice quivers.
‘Would you like a tea or a coffee or to talk or something?’
‘I would like to not be here. Can we not be here?’
Gavin is not giving me the vibe they would be capable of walking very far without collapsing from emotion. I think through our options.
‘TIME? We could go there?’ TIME is a coffee shop a few doors away. The forcefulness of the capitals of its name has always stopped me giving it a try. TIME is ticking, TIME is slipping away, TIME is forever against me.
Wordlessly, Gavin takes an aged brown leather satchel from beneath their desk and gets up. I follow them onto the street where they lock up the shop. The sign on the glass door still declares the agency OPEN; I don’t mention it through fear of setting off the next round of tears.
Inside TIME I coax Gavin to sit at a table in the back corner while I order the cappuccino they asked for, and then, because Nicol banned me from drinking them, I order one for myself, too. The barista says they’ll bring them to me, so I sit across from Gavin, not sure what to do next. The screech of the milk being frothed fills the space where we could speak and so neither of us says anything until the drinks arrive.
Almost immediately, I regret my choice. Nicol was correct; I cannot be trusted to consume this or any drink with a frothy topping in public. There’s a lot of chocolate powder on the foam, and I am clumsy by nature. I anticipate already the brown marks I will make on my face, shaming myself in front of Gavin.
After a few sips, I wipe my mouth and the tip of my nose with the back of my hand. Gavin hasn’t said anything, hasn’t touched their drink. I move things along. ‘Look, I get this is a less than ideal turn of events with Colin passing but, if it makes it any easier to deal with, he was a real arsehole as a landlord, which makes me think he was probably not a great guy generally. Not that him being dead isn’t sad, but maybe notthatsad.’
Gavin takes a sachet of sugar from a little bowl on the table and shakes it between their thumb and index finger before ripping the top off of the packet. ‘Did you know Colin, then?’
‘No, but he’s a landlord. You work with them; you know how shitty a person you need to be to be a landlord. They’re all pricks. Colin was a prick.’
They pour a stream of brown sugar into the foam of their coffee, then pick up another packet and add it in, too. ‘I did find him to have some prickish qualities, but I’m sure he was fundamentally a very average man, neither very good nor very bad. That’s how it goes with most people.’
Gavin stirs the sugar in their coffee until the froth of their cappuccino ceases to exist. It provides a pause in chat I could use to formulate a new topic of discussion, but instead I plough on with the landlord stuff because it’s been building in me for weeks with no release. ‘Colin is the reason my life is ruined, so maybe we will have to agree to disagree on whether he was nice or not.’
Coffee stirred, Gavin takes the teaspoon and delicately rests it on the saucer, the little tinkle it makes landing is the last noise before they say, ‘He ruined your life?’ They rest their head on their fist, relaxing into a listening pose. ‘How?’
‘The quick version: he kicked my friend out of her flat, she moved in with me, stole my boyfriend, now I have no best pal and no boyfriend. Then he decided to die in front of me, which I can only imagine is going to cause some issues somewhere along the line.’ Gavin nods, but not in a way that leads me to believe they have been overwhelmingly convinced by me. I begin to backpedal. ‘I’m sure my life would have been ruined eventually; I think I’m the kind of person who isn’t meant for a chill, happy life. Colin is just who got to ruin it before anyone else.’
I cannot justify to you why I am still talking but I am. Subjecting this gorgeous person to my tales of woe, which have nothing to do with them. While they are also, let’s not forget, freshly grieving.
‘I’m sorry. I came here to try and make sure you were OK and here I am trauma dumping.’ My apology sounds truly sincere, because I want Gavin to like me and, if possible, fancy me. Not that that is likely. I am the sort of woman a man can realise, after seven years, that he doesn’t want to be with, because another woman, one he told you repeatedly was ‘funny looking’, is in his proximity for a few weeks.
‘Don’t apologise. You’re having one reaction to Colin’s death, I’m having another. We’re all individuals, all processing the world in different ways. Your reaction is valid. If you don’t mind me saying, you must be quite shaken up by it. I can’t imagine what it’s like to see someone die out of the blue.’
Colin’s dead face breaks into my mind’s eye, and a shiver of pleasure passes down my spine as I realise – for a change – I have an interesting story to tell that is mine alone. ‘I didn’t actually see him die. By the time I found him he was already dead.’
‘Was it quick?’ Gavin rotates their cup around in its saucer so the handle is facing their left hand. The ceramic squeal from the movement sets me on edge. Still, they do not drink it.
‘Very.’
‘That’s something, I suppose.’
Gavin finally drinks their coffee, draining half of the cup before placing it back in its saucer. Some colour has returned to their face, which makes it difficult for me to look at them and keep my composure. Terrible, awful thoughts for a time like this flood my brain. Gavin’s moustache tickling my labia as they go down on me, being held in their arms as they fuck me against my hallway wall, my head over their shoulder staring at the floor Colin died on as they thrust in and out of me.
It is clear this is not where Gavin’s thoughts are. They are attempting normal conversation while fighting the urge to cry; they do not blink as they speak. ‘So what is it you do?’
Good question, Gavin. What do I do? ‘I’ve recently become freelance’ pops out. I like it. It gives the impression of me having some get-up-and-go, an entrepreneurial spirit.
‘A freelance what?’ Another good question. I toy with saying ‘model’ because that is how I earned my last bit of money, but am aware it will result in many more questions, the root of them being ‘you do not look like a model’, and then I’d have to get into the feet stuff and I think Gavin has had to deal with enough already today.
I opt for: ‘Administrative assistant work, receptionist, office manager, that sort of thing.’
‘Does that keep you busy?’
The answer is surely obvious. With no notice I was able to come to them in the middle of the working day. ‘You know, it comes in waves.’
