I’ve read this five times already, my stomach fluttering each time. In part, I want to tear it up, claw the paper, and leave it on the floor. Yet my eyes well up, I yearn for it, wish to smell the ink so I can taste her taste once more. Why did she write this? How could she write this? What does she want from me?
“You going to reply?” Joey asks, sitting on the arm of his couch, flicking through the TV channels.
Perching on the edge of the cushion, I lean on my knees, the handwritten letter shaking in my fingertips. Her handwritten letter. Her handwriting. A letter from her, a special ritual we’ve kept alive since we were thirteen. Text and email and technology be damned, we wrote. We put pen to paper and it meant something. But what does this mean?
“I don’t know,” I say, my throat dry. “I can’t. But…I don’t know.”
“Notice how she didn’t apologise?” he says, his gaze unmoved from the television screen.
“What do you mean?”
“She never said sorry. The first time she’s reached out to you after everything she’s done, and she doesn’t apologise. If you ask me, there’s something seriously fucked up about that.”
“No, I suppose she didn’t.”
“I’ve thought about this a lot recently. How she’s never said sorry.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Really?” he says, switching the TV off. “When? Name a time that girl ever apologised for anything.”
“I don’t know. She’s apologised to me, though.”
“I don’t think she has. She turns things around and makes you think she’s sorry without ever saying it. Remember the time she tried to set me up with that awful friend of hers, Brit? I begged her to leave it alone, but she pushed and pushed and pushed, until I finally went out with her. Remember how dreadful it was?”
I nod, recalling the ranting and moaning as he described every dull moment.
“I was so angry at her. “I told you,” I said. “I told you I didn’t want anything to do with her, but you insisted I’d have a good time. Why do you set me up with your friends? Why do you try to fix me?”” He goes over to the kitchen counter, picks up a glass and opens the half empty bottle of whisky. “The amount of times I’ve apologised to her for messing around with some girl she knows, or getting you into trouble…
“She’s a nice girl, Joey,” she said. “Every guy I know fancies her, so I think this says more about you.”
“Not the point,” I told her. “I asked you to leave it alone,” I said. I’d had enough, and do you remember what she said to me? “Fine. If you want to be angry at me, do so. But I think we both know this is about you and your issues. Not mine.”
“That’s what she always does. Not just with me, with you, too. The time she broke the neck of your guitar, and instead of apologising, smiled and made fun of the situation; how you needed a new one anyway. Or when she lost your wallet. Did she say sorry? Because I remember that day, and all I remember are smiles and puppy-dog eyes.” He punches the TV remote and turns it back on. “I’m telling you, that girl’s never apologised in her life. Not once.”
“Maybe,” I say, picturing the spring afternoon in the park when she accidentally kicked my guitar against a tree. Sun-soaked grass, and beams of light snaking between the branches, I kneeled beside it. “Johnny Marr signed this guitar,” I whispered.
“We’ll get you a new one,” she said. “You loved that one you saw in Manchester a few weeks ago, remember?”
“But…but…Johnny Marr…”
“I know, sweetie, but this is a sign you should buy a new one. I mean, when a tree breaks it…it’s a sign, right?”
“The tree?”
Looking at me with those eyes…that smile…noticing the way the spring light lit her face… I laughed, venturing to Manchester the next day.
“She didn’t explain anything, either,” I say, folding the letter in half. “She has no idea that we know her little secret. Why send this letter, other than to make herself feel better? There’s no other reason.”
Joey shakes his head.
“Maybe this is how she kept so many secrets. In her eyes, maybe there’s nothing wrong with it. She’s not wrong. She’s not sorry. It’s someone else’s fault. It’s life. It’s…” I trail off, unable to finish the sentence as I picture her face. This isn’t anger or hate. I don’t know what this is, pity maybe. Her smile isn’t as bright and warming. Her face, no longer as beautiful and perfect. She’s human, just another person, and I didn’t think that was possible.
“Nobody’s perfect, brother,” Joey says. “I’m not saying she did it on purpose and went out of her way to never say sorry, but as I look back on all those long days we’ve spent together, and everything we’ve been through, I don’t recall a single apology. That’s not normal. There’s something wrong about that picture. When you break a guy’s guitar, you say sorry. When you do someone wrong, you say sorry.
“You don’t write a letter like this to someone you apparently love.” He sighs, turning the TV off once more and dropping the remote to the floor. “Letter or no letter, B isn’t the girl we thought. I don’t know what happened to her. To be honest, I don’t care. I’ve got my own problems. You’ve got yours. Life is shit. It’s no excuse for being what she is.”
I nod because I can’t argue. I’m tired and clueless as to what I feel and think, but I no longer feel the same for her. I suppose I haven’t for a few days, but this letter…it does answer questions, although it doesn’t provide the answers I thought I wanted.
“You’ve been thinking about her a lot then? Thinking about this?” I ask.
“She’s all I think about,” he says, clenching his fists and bunching them into his thighs. “I trusted her. I never thought I’d trust a girl. I promised myself a girl would never make me doubt myself again, or question who I am, or make me wonder if it was my fault. I trusted her. She broke me down.” He faces me. “She gave me hope that maybe one day I would find someone and let them in, but this…it’s like she’s left all over again. Only this time, it’s worse, because I’m old enough to know better.”
The wind rattles against the windows, Joey’s sky-high apartment in the midst of Yorkshire’s wintry elements. Falling into silence, the room becomes part of the outside, the pair of us out in the cold, naked and bare. We’re out there, scared and fragile, and all I want to do is reach over to my best friend and huddle him, hug him and hold him, not just to keep me firm and standing, but to keep him upright, too.
Vague memories of his mother are all I have, hazy sketches of her face my mind pulls from long ago moments. I remember how quiet she was, not unlike B’s mother. The way she whispered rather than spoke. Soothing in many ways, and caring and nice and warm. I haven’t seen a picture of her in over a decade, not after Joey burned every one he could find. I don’t remember her, but I remember Joey afterwards, his tears, and how he seemed to live with us after she left.
“You have to be a brave boy for Joey,” my father said, kneeling in front of me, palms caressing my cheeks. “Your friend needs you to be brave. Can you do that, kiddo?”
Nodding, I cried because I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand why my friend no longer had a mummy, and why my mummy couldn’t be his mummy, too. I still don’t understand how a woman can leave her little boy behind. I don’t understand how anyone could leave anyone they love behind.
I remember Joey’s smile when we were younger, how it’s so different now. Maybe the day she left, she took his innocent, boyish grin, and replaced it with the smouldering smirk that leads him in and out of trouble today.
“I’ve thought about her more these last few months than I have in the last ten years,” he says. “I didn’t even think I hated her anymore. You can’t hate someone you don’t think about, right? If you feel nothing whatsoever, they no longer have the power to make you hate them. Or love them. Or miss them. They’re nothing. They’re nobody.
“But I still hate her. Whenever I think about her, I feel it. I remembe
r that scared, confused, guilty little kid who figured it was his fault that his mum left. That she couldn’t love him because he didn’t deserve to be loved. A little boy, so naughty and bad and worthless, his own mother couldn’t stand to be around him.
“But I was wrong. It wasn’t my fault. I was just a little boy, and for whatever reason she gave up on me. She gave up on my dad, and I don’t know why. I don’t care why. Understanding why would mean she’d have to come back, but I don’t want her back. She doesn’t deserve to come back. Some things are unforgivable, and I promised myself a long time ago that no girl would ever make me feel like that worthless boy again.
“But B found a way. All the while, I made sure I saw each girl as some silly little object I could do what I pleased with. I didn’t take a girl like B into consideration, a girl I looked to like a sister.
“I never understood how you loved her so much; how you let your guard down in the hope she wouldn’t trample all over it. I used to think you were weak and stupid, and that I’d have to pick up the pieces one day. But as time went on, I saw it. I saw little glimpses and would say to myself, ‘Maybe one day you’ll have that, Joey. Maybe one day you’ll find someone you can let in. Someone you can trust, just like Aus trusts B. Maybe you can trust Harriet one day, and finally let her in…’
“The memories of my father rubbing my back as I cried and sobbed vanished, replaced with a future of kids and a family and smiles. I think that’s why I hated her so much, because she destroyed my dad. He’s a good man, brother. I know he loved her and treated her right. He didn’t beat her. He’s never once laid a hand on me. He’s a good man, but she took everything. He had no idea how to soothe me. All I wanted was my mother to read me stories about Bugs Bunny again, and calm me before bed.
“How do you explain to a little boy why his mother left? How do you explain she left for no real reason? And how do you do this whilst you mourn yourself, heartbroken that the woman you loved…married…promised to look after and care for…woke up one morning and said, “I quit”?
“I’m reliving it all over again, only this time around I’m my father, trying to comfort you and come up with answers when there are no real answers to be had. There’s no good reason. There’s no sense in any of this, and I keep thinking about her and how much I still hate her. How she stays with me each fucking time I see a girl…sleep with a girl…like a girl for a second and think it could lead to more…but no. How can it? How could I possibly let someone in and expect them to love me when my own mother couldn’t?
“But I fell in love with B. I cared for her, and trusted her, and placed my faith into her, because so long as I had her, I had someone. A smidgen of hope in an otherwise swirling black hole of utter distrust and despair. I honestly thought it would be okay, that she wouldn’t be like her. That she wouldn’t only love you and give you the life you deserve, but build up my faith, hope and love.
“But she left, because that’s what women do. She tricked us, because that’s what women do. She let us down, because that’s what women do. She’s gone and she’s never coming back, and a fucking letter like this makes no difference.” He picks up the paper and scrunches it in his palm. “No fucking difference,” he says through gritted teeth, spitting each syllable as a line of tears runs down his left cheek.
I haven’t seen him cry for a long time, the tears for his mother dried up many years ago.
“Joey…I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for?” he says, wiping his hand across his eyes. “You’re the last person to be sorry. You, brother, are real. You’re true.”
“I can’t remember the last time we spoke about your mother…“
“Don’t,” he snaps, standing up. “Don’t finish that sentence. I didn’t want to talk about her. I don’t want to think about her, and I’ve done well over the years to block any and all thoughts about her.”
“But maybe you should, Joe. Not everyone will be like her.”
“B’s like her. I’ve let two women into my life and they both fucked me over. You’ve let two women into your life, and half of them have destroyed you. What does that tell us?”
“We’re due a good one,” I say.
He moves to speak, but holds back. A slight smile. An almost invisible smirk. The anger within him rescinds, but the pain remains.
“Maybe,” he sighs. “Or maybe that’s how people are.”
“My mum isn’t like that. Harriet isn’t like that. I know it’s hard, and trust me, I understand you better today than I ever have, but I refuse to accept this is it. That this feeling of utter shit is it. It can’t be, Joe. It just can’t be.”
“Don’t you see, that’s how I’ve felt. That’s what I wanted to refuse, too, and B helped me. She helped me push down far enough that I could dream. I could see a future of maybe. But what am I supposed to think now? Do you honestly think you’ll be able to trust the next girl?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “I don’t know anything. A few hours ago I was on the mend. I felt better about myself, and I was laughing. We were laughing, but right now, I feel like I’m back to square one. This entire year has been one horrendous rollercoaster. Maybe it never gets any easier or happier, but I can’t accept that, because it means I have a lifetime of this to look forward to,” I say.
“I look at my parents and see happiness, love and an easier life. They found it, and if they can, we can. Maybe not today. Maybe not with B. Maybe not with Harriet. But there has to be something, right? I mean, what’s the point in living for so long if it feels like this? What’s the point if you drag a boulder behind you each goddamn day?
“You’re a good guy, Joe. Your mother did the shittiest thing a mother could do. I get it. I understand why you’re afraid. I don’t think I used to, but I do now. You’re too good and brave and strong to bow to her knees, though. If what you’re saying is true, you’ve given up. You don’t give up. You’re Joseph-bloody-Johnson. You’re the guy that guys like me look up to.”
“Then maybe you should find someone else to look up to,” he says, wiping his face once more. “I’m not brave. I have no answers. Every time I think I do, someone comes along and rips them up.”
“Have you ever tried to look for answers?”
“Like where?”
“Like your mother?”
He laughs, a choked cough more than anything. “My mother? You mean, look for her? Try and hunt her down?”
I nod, wary to mention her name like I always have.
The anger in his face melts, sadness replacing it as more tears drip down his cheek. “Not for years. Like I say, I promised myself long ago I wouldn’t let a girl hurt me. That includes her. She’s done it once. She won’t do it again.”
“But what if she can explain?”
“And what if she can’t?”
“At least it’ll create closure.”
“And what if she doesn’t want me? What if, after all these years, she rejects me again? What would I do? What would you do, Aus?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “I want you to let go of this at some point. I feel terrible right now, but I want to feel better. I like to think I’ll find happiness somewhere along the line, but you…it’s like you’re happy here…in this place…this place of pain and sadness and darkness. This place of hate and frustration. You deserve better than this, Joey.”
He sinks back into the cushion as sobs escape him. Years of pent up cries breaking through his mouth and nose, the squawks and squeals so similar to my own. My own eyes fail me, and more tears trickle down my cheeks. So many tears of late. So much reality.
What happened to the dreams? What happened to the time we fantasised about being anyone and doing anything. Is this life? Is it one heartache followed by another, with constant question marks littered in-between?
Placing my hand on his shoulder, I lean into him and whisper into his ear. “It’s okay. We’ll get through this. Together.”
I hold my best friend as the letter th
at sparked this sits between us. Her handwriting. Her I love yous and empty words. I refer to her like Joey does his mother. I can’t imagine holding on to hate and frustrations like this for so many years, but maybe this is how it is.
I don’t know what I think. I don’t think I care. I’m too tired to, and all I wish to do is help my best friend get through this, so he can help me get through it too. At some point, I must face B’s letter and choose to reply or not. Choose to forget, or to cling with tight fingers. Choose to care if she writes again.
Choose to believe our love was real, and, if everything else was a lie, that this, at least, was true.
NOVEMBER 27th - LEEDS’ TRAIN STATION:
A few months ago, I hated this place. Open spaced and far too vast, I froze and shivered on the platform most evenings, desperate to return home. Each morning, I pushed and forced myself in-between shoulders, bags and rolling suitcases. Everyone rushed. Everyone had to get to where they were heading in an instant. I hated this place. I loathed it.
Yet I’m here right now because I can be, and in some weird and strange way, I miss it.
Even when I lived in Leeds, I knew each platform well, and each departure time, too, for I always had reason to return home, if not for my parents, to strum away in the band room. For the first time in years, I don’t need to be here, and for this reason alone I want to be. I need to be, as I hold this thin envelope between my fingers, rubbing the stamp she licked, pressed and prodded.
Maybe I’m here because I’ve always found this station a lonely place. I don’t think I can read this surrounded by others. Hordes of folk pass me by, but no matter how busy and hectic this bland station is, it remains lifeless and worthless. It isn’t the first time I’ve read one of B’s letters here, or a book, or written a letter of my own.
Drowned in echoes, I’m a quiet hush in a sea of shouts. Loud ding-dongs as another train fails to arrive on time; moaning and groaning passengers, sick and tired of the same old excuse; rattling suitcase wheels, and squeaks of rubber shoes on concrete floors; gusts of wind trapped under the roof, as they swirl and hurl their way towards me, under me, through me.
White noise, the lot of it. Where I should struggle to focus, I find it easier to lose myself here than alone in a quiet room. Somewhat peaceful, but not, and the perfect setting to hate every word she has to say.
Stroking my finger over my name, I picture her writing on her desk, strands of hair overlapping her eyes, as she huffs and blows them back into place. Never a quick writer, but a steady and purposeful one, full of poetic swoops and consistency.
“I wish I had your handwriting,” I used to say, frowning at my own messy attempt.
“It wouldn’t be the same if you had different handwriting,” she’d say, acting out a perfect portrayal of the perfect girl, but how long was this a lie? Was it ever the truth?
I close my eyes and grasp the letter, tearing the lip open in an instantaneous swipe. “Just get it over with,” I whisper.