She nodded. So it was his mother she had seen in the window. A woman who under different circumstance might have been important in her life. It was an odd thought.
‘Tawrie—’
‘Look,’ she cut him short. ‘I’ve come to see you because it felt rude not to and I think we need a goodbye that’s calmer, and final. I didn’t want you pitching up at the café and it being awkward or anything.’ Her words carried the tang of realisation that he could turn up at the café whenever he felt like if she no longer worked there. ‘So yes, I thought it would be good to say goodbye properly. To wish you well.’ The tremble to her mouth said more than her words, and a glance at his face told her he felt the same.
‘I’ve been in limbo; I can’t sleep, I can’t eat.’ He didn’t seem to be listening.
‘That’s really nothing to do with me,’ she countered, recognising her own behaviour in his confession. ‘I just wanted to see you one more time and leave things ... neatly.’
‘It’s everything to do with you, though.’
‘It’s not, Ed. Not any more.’ To say his name was electrifying; an image of the two of them in that big bed in the attic flashed into her mind. She blinked furiously. ‘You were the only one holding all the cards.’
‘I know that’s what you think.’
‘Because it’s the truth,’ she countered calmly.
He nodded, his expression mournful. ‘I guess so. It’s just that ...’
‘What, Edgar?’ She used his full name, putting distance between them; this one word indicative of a formality she neither felt nor wanted.
‘You only see the world through your lens.’
‘Doesn’t everyone?’ She glanced at him and he was beautiful. She hated the disloyalty of her gut that folded in want.
‘I don’t think so, and what I mean specifically is that you’re immersed in your own world, safe, small, and I’m not knocking it, not in any way—’
‘Sounds like you might be a bit.’
‘No, it’s just that it seems to me ...’ His tone was measured, his turn for defensive action. ‘... that you’ve been hurt, that you have a lot going on and so you keep your drawbridge up, never deviate from your routine, head down, eyes low, trying to get through life without getting bumped into or pushed off track.’
‘Again, Edgar, doesn’t everyone?’
‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘Some people want the challenge of things being shaken up a bit; they don’t want to tread gently or predictably, they want to take the rough road and learn as they go.’
‘Maybe I’m just different to you. Plus, your observations are based on knowing me for a nanosecond.’ No matter that it felt like a lifetime.
‘I do know you. You know I do.’ She felt an upturn in her mood at this. His defiance, his insistence. ‘I think we have a pretty similar outlook; I just think it’s easier to live your best life when you’re open.’
She pulled her knees up and held her arms around her legs. ‘I was open to loving you. I was open to it all.’
‘Taw, we can’t say goodbye, this can’t be it.’ He looked close to tears and it killed her.
‘I think it has to be.’ She cursed the crack to her voice. ‘I’m agreeing with you. It’s easier to live your best life when you’re open.’ She spoke earnestly. ‘I only came here to say goodbye. Closure.’ Her throat hurt, the longing for him made no allowance for this truth. She bit her lip, not wanting to remember nor remind him of that beautiful encounter when they’d got merry and laughed their way up the stairs to the room where she had woken feeling desired, happy, whole.
‘You have every right to feel the way you do.’ He held her eyeline. ‘But I’m not a liar.’
‘I think ... I think you’ve lied by omission, not giving me the full picture is lying,’ she whispered, her eyes gazing out to sea.
He nodded, and this was agreement enough. ‘I’m sorry.’ He twisted to face her. ‘I’m so very sorry.’ His words were warming, welcome. ‘But I didn’t know what to say or how to say it. Have you ever got caught up in a situation that you wanted so badly to last forever that you kind of believed it and to shatter it felt too painful, so you went along, hoping the universe might help put everything in place? Even though you know deep down you’re ballsing things up spectacularly, and it’ll come and bite you eventually.’
‘Funnily enough I do know how that feels.’ He was describing their whole, brief relationship. ‘And actually, Ed, I don’t blame you, not really. I’d choose Petra,’ she joked, even though the words were like glass in her mouth. ‘She’s probably from a loving family and her mother is not living at the bottom of a bottle of vodka, and she was probably conceived in love; she knows how stuff is supposed to work! I’m not like that. I’m damaged. I come from damage. I’m pretty sure my own dad went out alone to escape my mother’s shite. He never stood a chance, did he?’ She cursed the tears that pooled. ‘I’m not going to end up like him or her. I’m making changes to my life. I understand that I can’t fix things here, can’t continue to be the sacrificial glue that holds everything together. People are still going to fall down steps and get lost at sea no matter how much I smile or make tea or quietly tiptoe up the stairs night after night. I have to build my own life. As do you. I don’t wish you any harm, Ed.’ Her voice broke. ‘The opposite, actually; I hope you and Petra will be happy together.’ It was hard to say, but no less genuine for that.
‘Taw—’ He tried in vain to interrupt, but she had found her stride and was not going to quieten her voice in case she lost her nerve.
‘I’m sure she knows about being loved and loving someone, and what to do and how to act, and I’m sure her drawbridge is lowered. I bet she didn’t drop her pants on the floor the moment she met you, and if she had I bet they wouldn’t have been her old grey, never to be seen, usually saved for a period pants, that she keeps meaning to throw out! I bet they’d be pale and lacy! I can’t even get my knickers right!’
Her chest heaved with all it expelled. Her speech was fast, her breathing irregular and her desire to cry strong. It was as if someone had pulled the plug out of her emotional tank and out it all came. All of it, whether she wanted it to or not.
