13 dates, p.14
13 Dates, page 14
‘No – that’s what she said.’
‘What?’
‘Me too. After I told her I had feelings for her.’
‘And then she did a runner? You’re sure?’
‘I’d assumed I’d misheard her. Because she did a runner. But yes. Now I think about it. Definitely. “Me too”, she said.’
‘And we’re back in the game!’ announces Marlon. He’s holding his hand up, and though I think he wants to ask a question, it’s actually for a high five.
‘So what should I do?’ I say, half-heartedly clapping my hand against his, then trying not to wince at my stinging palm.
‘Get her back,’ he says, as if things are as simple as that.
But in the end, of course, things turn out to be a lot more complicated.
13.
The next few days are some of the worst of my life. Getting out of bed, getting dressed and going to work take the greatest of efforts, as does resisting the temptation to change my regular running route to go past Angel’s flat (or even stake-out her street 24/7 from the comfort of my car), and while Marlon tells me I should give her a bit of space – in truth, I’d give her the whole universe if it would help get her back.
On the Thursday morning I send her a text, just saying I’d love to talk when she’s ready, and when she doesn’t respond straight away, I spend the rest of the day analysing what I’ve written for flaws. That evening, when my mum and dad phone because they’re worried that they haven’t heard from me, I end up mumbling something about being busy and put the phone down on them. And by the Friday, I’ve decided if I ever meet the person who coined the phrase ‘better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all’, I’m going to punch them squarely in the face.
After almost a week of no communication whatsoever from Angel – which, to paraphrase Marlon, is about as clear a message as I can imagine – Saturday morning finds me back at the hospital. Mary’s having her cast removed – and even though my mumbled reply of ‘I should be so lucky’ to her ‘If you’re sure you’ve got nothing better to do?’ when I insist on going with her is hardly the most gracious of responses, it’s all I can muster up the energy to say. Though as we’re sat in the waiting room, hoping the screen will display Mary’s number before we both lose the will to live, it turns out that ‘lucky’ is exactly what I am.
‘Isn’t that your young lady?’
‘Pardon?’
Mary leans towards me, raises her purple-plastered arm and points towards the far end of the corridor. ‘There. Walking towards us.’
I peer along Mary’s cast, like you might a gun sight (albeit a purple one), and nearly fall off my chair: Heading in our direction, glued to her phone, is Angel. But instead of leaping out of my seat and going over to talk to her, my first instinct is to pick up the discarded magazine from the chair next to me and hide behind it.
‘Aren’t you going to talk to her?’ says Mary, peering at me over the top of what I now realise is this month’s Mother & Baby.
‘Um . . . no.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because she made it perfectly clear to me she’s not interested.’
‘Whatever makes you think that?’
‘Apart from the fact that she cold-heartedly abandoned me at the hotel, and has maintained a frosty silence ever since?’
‘She doesn’t look that happy.’
‘That makes two of us. Besides, I wouldn’t know what to say.’
‘“Sorry” might be a good start?’
‘Pardon?’
‘That always seems to me to be the traditional thing to say after a falling-out. And that’s what the two of you have had, isn’t it? A falling-out?’
‘You could say that.’
Mary sighs. ‘So just go over there and apologise.’
‘What for?’
‘Whatever it was you did.’
I open my mouth to start to explain, but I’m not sure Mary will understand, though thinking about it, maybe I do owe Angel an apology. At least it would be a conversation-opener. But just to march across and say sorry . . .
‘I’m not sure she’ll want to hear it.’
‘She’s not that heartless, Noah, surely?’
‘I don’t know about that.’ As Angel pauses by the door to type something into her phone, then heads quickly outside, I sigh. ‘Too late now, anyway.’
‘Not if you get a move on, it isn’t. And all those runs you’ve been going on must be good for something . . .’
‘But I’m here with you.’
It’s a lame excuse, and I know it. And so does Mary, bless her. ‘You go and talk to her. I’ll be fine.’
‘But . . .’
‘Honestly. My appointment’s not until . . .’ She peers up at the clock on the wall. ‘Half an hour ago. So I’m sure I’ll still be here when you get back.’
I frown at her, but Mary’s stern ‘Noah!’ reassures me, so I get up from my seat and head towards the exit, wondering what on earth to say. Though I’m on the back foot almost immediately, as Angel, still staring at her phone, suddenly walks back through the door and crashes straight into me. And in the end, it’s me who apologises for this as well.
‘Sorry!’
Startled, Angel looks up from her phone and beams at me, before she remembers we’re not speaking. Then she suddenly looks concerned, and it seems as if we are speaking, as she tenderly puts a hand on my arm and says, ‘Noah! What are you doing here? Are you okay?’
‘What? Oh, yes. What are you doing here?’
‘Just . . . a check-up.’
‘You weren’t answering your phone. I was worried.’
‘I know.’ Angel stares down at the floor. ‘I didn’t know what to say.’
‘Why did you leave like that? Things were going so well. Weren’t they?’
‘That was the problem.’
‘Huh? All I said was that I had feelings for you. It wasn’t like I got down on one knee or anything. And you can’t think that was out of the blue? I mean, we’ve been having a great time, and some really fun dates, and then there’s the’ – I lower my voice – ‘physical side, where I think we really connect, you know? And then, the moment I say something emotional . . .’ I stop talking, because I’m actually feeling pretty emotional myself, and besides, the more I talk, the less chance Angel has to actually say anything.
She looks at me for a moment, as if waiting to be sure I’ve finished, then she sits down in the nearest chair, grabs my hand and pulls me down onto the seat next to her. ‘There’s something wrong with me,’ she says quietly.
‘What?’
‘Medically.’
I stare at her for a second or two, then say ‘What?’ again, and Angel takes my other hand, as if she’s about to give me some bad news. And while it turns out that it is bad news for me (from a purely selfish point of view), it’s really bad news for her.
‘I’ve got something called . . . well, the actual technical name wouldn’t really help you. But in layman’s terms, I’m suffering from congenital heart disease. Well, not suffering, exactly. I’ve got it. But it’s not like I can’t get out of bed in the morning or anything like that.’
‘Ri-ight,’ I say, in that elongated way that means ‘go on’, not knowing how else to respond, and Angel takes a deep breath, then exhales slowly, as if she’s had to explain this a thousand times.
‘So . . . my heart . . . it has a fault.’
‘A fault?’
‘Think of it like a crack in a dam wall. Or a tyre with a thin bit that could go pop at any minute.’ Angel puts her index finger into her mouth, then pulls it out against the inside of her cheek, making a popping noise like I used to as a kid, and although it strikes me as very childish, it’s also more than a little scary. ‘Not that it would actually make that noise.’
‘But how does it – I mean, what does it . . . ?’
‘Well, it means that any moment, if I’m really unlucky, my heart could just . . . stop.’
‘Stop? As in . . .’ I pause, mid-question. It’s pretty self-explanatory, really. ‘Stop stop?’
Angel nods. ‘’Fraid so.’
‘But that’s . . .’ I shake my head in disbelief. ‘How long have you . . . ?’
Angel shrugs. ‘I was born like this, so I’ve been living with it for as long as I can remember. And I mean living, Noah. When I first found out, of course I was a bit pissed off, but then I thought, what can I do about it? I mean, you play the hand you’re dealt, don’t you? The worst thing would be not to live my life, or to keep myself wrapped in cotton wool just in case. Which is what my parents wanted to do with me.’
‘Past tense? You’ve never mentioned them.’
‘Oh no, we get on fine, most of the time. They live here in Richmond. It’s just . . .’ Angel takes a deep breath. ‘Every time I see them, it’s only a matter of time before my mum gets that look on her face, or my dad says something, and it drives me mad.’
‘What look?’
‘The one you’re doing right now.’
‘I’m not doing any look.’
‘Yes, you are. People can’t help it.’
‘Help what?’
‘Feeling sorry for me. Wondering whether I’m about to drop dead. Staring at me to check I’m still breathing, just because I haven’t spoken for a couple of minutes. Thinking there’s something they should be doing to minimise my excitement levels, just in case . . .’ She sighs. ‘And that’s exactly why I don’t tell people. And can’t commit to anything, long-term. And it’s why I hardly date. And I certainly don’t tell anyone who I do date.’
‘But . . . that’s not fair.’
‘Not fair?’ Angel snorts indignantly. ‘What’s not fair is being born with a condition that makes you feel like you’re walking on a tightrope for your whole life. But that’s what’s happened to me, so I can either stand still, do nothing and try desperately not to fall off, or I can keep moving forward, knowing I might lose my balance, but at least I’ve gone somewhere.’ She sits back as a small child who’s been circling the waiting room on a scooter comes barrelling past us, closely followed by his exasperated mum. ‘The only thing I can control is who else this affects. By not letting anyone get too close.’
‘Oh,’ I say, followed by a much longer ‘Ohhh!’
‘So Margate—’
‘I get it,’ I say, realising my second ‘oh’ wasn’t quite as self-explanatory as I’d thought. ‘Is there not a—’
‘Cure?’ Angel shakes her head. ‘Not really, no. I manage the symptoms with drugs for the most part, but the only real cure, if you can call it that, is a heart transplant.’ She makes the ‘scary’ face. ‘In the meantime, as long as I come in here for my monthly check-ups, and make sure I don’t overexert myself . . .’ She looks at me, as if trying to decipher my expression, then obviously decides I need things simplified. ‘Think of it like driving a car around that you know has a fault. You don’t take it straight in and replace the engine, not when you suspect it might have a good many more miles left in it if you drive carefully. So you keep going, and then, if it breaks down, that’s when you take it into the garage.’
‘Assuming you get it there in time.’
Angel nods. ‘There is that, yes.’
‘But . . . we went rock climbing! And horse riding!’
‘We did.’ She squeezes my hand, then lets it go, and it’s only now I remember she’s been holding it the whole time. ‘And it was fun. Exactly the kind of thing I don’t want to miss out on. And admit it – you wouldn’t have suggested either of those things if you knew.’
I lean back in my chair and stare up at the ceiling. ‘Wow.’
‘So there you have it.’
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Angel looking at me as if she’s expecting a response, but to be honest, I’m a little shell-shocked, and, ‘It’s a lot to take in,’ is the best I can do.
‘Take your time. I’ve had a lot longer than you to get used to this, and there are days I still don’t believe it.’
‘Wow. That’s . . .’ My head’s spinning, so I puff air out of my cheeks, wishing the world would slow down a little. An announcement like this is something you need a while to process – but as I’ve just found out, time is the one thing Angel might not have. Besides, as announcements go, this one’s pretty momentous: the woman I’m in love with – and I realised this is still the case within approximately half a second of seeing her – has just admitted that we may not possibly have a future, though that’s because she might not have a future. And while everything about Angel suddenly makes sense, everything about the two of us – my desire to get married, start a family, plan for a life together – suddenly doesn’t. Or at least, it wouldn’t, if I wasn’t absolutely crazy about her.
I can’t think of the right thing to do, the right thing to say, so I stand up, pace anxiously around in front of her for the best part of ten seconds, then sit back down again. ‘I’m so sorry . . .’
‘I don’t want your sympathy,’ snaps Angel.
‘Sorry.’
‘And you’ve got nothing to apologise for.’ Her expression softens. ‘I just want – no, need you to understand.’
‘Understand?’
‘Why I’m like this.’
I smile to myself. I’ve a feeling understanding Angel is always going to be a work in progress. ‘When you didn’t answer my calls, I thought . . .’
‘What would I have said?’
‘What you’ve just told me would have been a start.’ I shake my head. ‘I thought you were . . .’
‘Dead?’
‘Ignoring me. Though, of course, now I know that was a possibility too.’
‘Perhaps . . . Well, maybe it was wrong of me.’
‘Which bit?’
‘All of it. To behave like I did. To leave you in Margate. To not tell you in the first place. And I’m sorry.’ Angel holds a hand out for me to shake. ‘Friends?’
I blanch at the word, and stand up again. ‘I don’t want to be just your friend, Angel. That’s the problem.’ Though a bigger problem might be where else we can go from here.
She stares at me for a moment, then nods towards the vending machine in the corner. ‘Can I at least buy you a coffee to apologise?’
‘I can’t. I’m with someone.’
Angel raises both eyebrows. ‘Well, you didn’t waste any time.’
‘Not like that.’ I point to where Mary is doing a bad job of not watching us. ‘That’s Mary. My landlady. She broke her arm. I’m just keeping her company while she gets the cast removed.’
As if reinforcing her part in our little play, Mary raises her bad arm, points at the bright purple cast and makes a sad face.
‘Oh,’ says Angel, then she glares at me. ‘Noah!’
‘What?’
‘Every time I try to convince myself you’re not right for me, you go and show me a side of you that . . .’ She gives a little shudder and a grimace, as if someone’s dropped an ice cube down the back of her shirt.
‘Right,’ I say, not quite sure whether what she’s just said helps my overall cause or not. ‘But if that’s the case, then surely you owe it to yourself to spend more time with me? Just to see how it goes. Where it goes.’
‘Noah, I can’t promise—’
‘I’m not asking you to promise anything. Especially now.’
Angel meets my gaze for the longest time, as if we’re in a ‘blink first’ competition, and then, to my delight, she ‘blinks’ spectacularly. ‘Well, how about dinner? This evening. On me. So I can apologise properly for not telling you. And so we can talk – properly. About this. About us.’
At the hint there might still be an ‘us’, I almost want to do a somersault in delight. And while the pre-Angel, boring, sensible, plan-for-the-future me wouldn’t have dreamed of getting involved with someone who a) tries to convince themselves I’m not right for them and b) apparently might not even make it to dinner this evening, trouble is, I am involved, and I already know if Angel offered to punch me in the face to apologise, I’d still say yes. So ‘Yes’ is what I say. Followed by: ‘But I want dessert.’
Angel leans across and kisses me in a way that makes me suspect that dessert might not be the only thing I’ll be getting. Which, in turn, is something else I need to think about.
‘Hold on,’ I say. ‘You could drop dead at any moment?’
‘Well, I’d get a bit of notice.’
‘How much notice?’
‘Somewhere between none and . . .’ She grins sheepishly. ‘Well, I’m not sure, really.’
‘Right. So is, you know, it . . . safe?’
‘Is what safe?’ says Angel innocently, though her expression suggests she knows exactly what I’m talking about.
‘You know.’ I lower my voice and lean in, in case scooter kid comes back, though when I check on his whereabouts, he’s in the corner, flailing around in full tantrum-mode, like he’s doing some weird interpretive dance. ‘S-E-X.’
Angel nods. ‘Weren’t you listening earlier? It’s excitement that could kill me . . .’
She fixes me with a blank stare for a second or two, then bursts out laughing as if she’s just made the best joke in the history of comedy, and while I suppose it is quite amusing, and Angel has one of those infectious laughs (a few people sitting near us – including Exasperated Scooter Mum – start to snigger too, despite having no idea what Angel’s just said), all I can do is smile weakly back.
Because the truth is, right now, I don’t find any of this the slightest bit funny.
I don’t say much on the drive home, partly due to the fact that Mary’s insisted on having the roof down and the subsequent wind noise makes conversation almost impossible, but mainly because – for the second time today – I don’t know what to say. On the one hand, it’s great news that Angel is prepared to talk – but on the other, there’s nothing great about her news at all. And while I’m really pleased she was able to tell me, I’m also really wishing there wasn’t anything to tell in the first place.
‘Are you all right?’ says Mary, as we make our way up the garden path.
‘I should be asking you that.’
She holds her hand up to show me her cast-free wrist, though I’m shocked to see just how thin her arm’s become. ‘All good. Though they’ve advised I give up the arm-wrestling for a while. Or at least, use my other hand.’
‘What?’
‘Me too. After I told her I had feelings for her.’
‘And then she did a runner? You’re sure?’
‘I’d assumed I’d misheard her. Because she did a runner. But yes. Now I think about it. Definitely. “Me too”, she said.’
‘And we’re back in the game!’ announces Marlon. He’s holding his hand up, and though I think he wants to ask a question, it’s actually for a high five.
‘So what should I do?’ I say, half-heartedly clapping my hand against his, then trying not to wince at my stinging palm.
‘Get her back,’ he says, as if things are as simple as that.
But in the end, of course, things turn out to be a lot more complicated.
13.
The next few days are some of the worst of my life. Getting out of bed, getting dressed and going to work take the greatest of efforts, as does resisting the temptation to change my regular running route to go past Angel’s flat (or even stake-out her street 24/7 from the comfort of my car), and while Marlon tells me I should give her a bit of space – in truth, I’d give her the whole universe if it would help get her back.
On the Thursday morning I send her a text, just saying I’d love to talk when she’s ready, and when she doesn’t respond straight away, I spend the rest of the day analysing what I’ve written for flaws. That evening, when my mum and dad phone because they’re worried that they haven’t heard from me, I end up mumbling something about being busy and put the phone down on them. And by the Friday, I’ve decided if I ever meet the person who coined the phrase ‘better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all’, I’m going to punch them squarely in the face.
After almost a week of no communication whatsoever from Angel – which, to paraphrase Marlon, is about as clear a message as I can imagine – Saturday morning finds me back at the hospital. Mary’s having her cast removed – and even though my mumbled reply of ‘I should be so lucky’ to her ‘If you’re sure you’ve got nothing better to do?’ when I insist on going with her is hardly the most gracious of responses, it’s all I can muster up the energy to say. Though as we’re sat in the waiting room, hoping the screen will display Mary’s number before we both lose the will to live, it turns out that ‘lucky’ is exactly what I am.
‘Isn’t that your young lady?’
‘Pardon?’
Mary leans towards me, raises her purple-plastered arm and points towards the far end of the corridor. ‘There. Walking towards us.’
I peer along Mary’s cast, like you might a gun sight (albeit a purple one), and nearly fall off my chair: Heading in our direction, glued to her phone, is Angel. But instead of leaping out of my seat and going over to talk to her, my first instinct is to pick up the discarded magazine from the chair next to me and hide behind it.
‘Aren’t you going to talk to her?’ says Mary, peering at me over the top of what I now realise is this month’s Mother & Baby.
‘Um . . . no.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because she made it perfectly clear to me she’s not interested.’
‘Whatever makes you think that?’
‘Apart from the fact that she cold-heartedly abandoned me at the hotel, and has maintained a frosty silence ever since?’
‘She doesn’t look that happy.’
‘That makes two of us. Besides, I wouldn’t know what to say.’
‘“Sorry” might be a good start?’
‘Pardon?’
‘That always seems to me to be the traditional thing to say after a falling-out. And that’s what the two of you have had, isn’t it? A falling-out?’
‘You could say that.’
Mary sighs. ‘So just go over there and apologise.’
‘What for?’
‘Whatever it was you did.’
I open my mouth to start to explain, but I’m not sure Mary will understand, though thinking about it, maybe I do owe Angel an apology. At least it would be a conversation-opener. But just to march across and say sorry . . .
‘I’m not sure she’ll want to hear it.’
‘She’s not that heartless, Noah, surely?’
‘I don’t know about that.’ As Angel pauses by the door to type something into her phone, then heads quickly outside, I sigh. ‘Too late now, anyway.’
‘Not if you get a move on, it isn’t. And all those runs you’ve been going on must be good for something . . .’
‘But I’m here with you.’
It’s a lame excuse, and I know it. And so does Mary, bless her. ‘You go and talk to her. I’ll be fine.’
‘But . . .’
‘Honestly. My appointment’s not until . . .’ She peers up at the clock on the wall. ‘Half an hour ago. So I’m sure I’ll still be here when you get back.’
I frown at her, but Mary’s stern ‘Noah!’ reassures me, so I get up from my seat and head towards the exit, wondering what on earth to say. Though I’m on the back foot almost immediately, as Angel, still staring at her phone, suddenly walks back through the door and crashes straight into me. And in the end, it’s me who apologises for this as well.
‘Sorry!’
Startled, Angel looks up from her phone and beams at me, before she remembers we’re not speaking. Then she suddenly looks concerned, and it seems as if we are speaking, as she tenderly puts a hand on my arm and says, ‘Noah! What are you doing here? Are you okay?’
‘What? Oh, yes. What are you doing here?’
‘Just . . . a check-up.’
‘You weren’t answering your phone. I was worried.’
‘I know.’ Angel stares down at the floor. ‘I didn’t know what to say.’
‘Why did you leave like that? Things were going so well. Weren’t they?’
‘That was the problem.’
‘Huh? All I said was that I had feelings for you. It wasn’t like I got down on one knee or anything. And you can’t think that was out of the blue? I mean, we’ve been having a great time, and some really fun dates, and then there’s the’ – I lower my voice – ‘physical side, where I think we really connect, you know? And then, the moment I say something emotional . . .’ I stop talking, because I’m actually feeling pretty emotional myself, and besides, the more I talk, the less chance Angel has to actually say anything.
She looks at me for a moment, as if waiting to be sure I’ve finished, then she sits down in the nearest chair, grabs my hand and pulls me down onto the seat next to her. ‘There’s something wrong with me,’ she says quietly.
‘What?’
‘Medically.’
I stare at her for a second or two, then say ‘What?’ again, and Angel takes my other hand, as if she’s about to give me some bad news. And while it turns out that it is bad news for me (from a purely selfish point of view), it’s really bad news for her.
‘I’ve got something called . . . well, the actual technical name wouldn’t really help you. But in layman’s terms, I’m suffering from congenital heart disease. Well, not suffering, exactly. I’ve got it. But it’s not like I can’t get out of bed in the morning or anything like that.’
‘Ri-ight,’ I say, in that elongated way that means ‘go on’, not knowing how else to respond, and Angel takes a deep breath, then exhales slowly, as if she’s had to explain this a thousand times.
‘So . . . my heart . . . it has a fault.’
‘A fault?’
‘Think of it like a crack in a dam wall. Or a tyre with a thin bit that could go pop at any minute.’ Angel puts her index finger into her mouth, then pulls it out against the inside of her cheek, making a popping noise like I used to as a kid, and although it strikes me as very childish, it’s also more than a little scary. ‘Not that it would actually make that noise.’
‘But how does it – I mean, what does it . . . ?’
‘Well, it means that any moment, if I’m really unlucky, my heart could just . . . stop.’
‘Stop? As in . . .’ I pause, mid-question. It’s pretty self-explanatory, really. ‘Stop stop?’
Angel nods. ‘’Fraid so.’
‘But that’s . . .’ I shake my head in disbelief. ‘How long have you . . . ?’
Angel shrugs. ‘I was born like this, so I’ve been living with it for as long as I can remember. And I mean living, Noah. When I first found out, of course I was a bit pissed off, but then I thought, what can I do about it? I mean, you play the hand you’re dealt, don’t you? The worst thing would be not to live my life, or to keep myself wrapped in cotton wool just in case. Which is what my parents wanted to do with me.’
‘Past tense? You’ve never mentioned them.’
‘Oh no, we get on fine, most of the time. They live here in Richmond. It’s just . . .’ Angel takes a deep breath. ‘Every time I see them, it’s only a matter of time before my mum gets that look on her face, or my dad says something, and it drives me mad.’
‘What look?’
‘The one you’re doing right now.’
‘I’m not doing any look.’
‘Yes, you are. People can’t help it.’
‘Help what?’
‘Feeling sorry for me. Wondering whether I’m about to drop dead. Staring at me to check I’m still breathing, just because I haven’t spoken for a couple of minutes. Thinking there’s something they should be doing to minimise my excitement levels, just in case . . .’ She sighs. ‘And that’s exactly why I don’t tell people. And can’t commit to anything, long-term. And it’s why I hardly date. And I certainly don’t tell anyone who I do date.’
‘But . . . that’s not fair.’
‘Not fair?’ Angel snorts indignantly. ‘What’s not fair is being born with a condition that makes you feel like you’re walking on a tightrope for your whole life. But that’s what’s happened to me, so I can either stand still, do nothing and try desperately not to fall off, or I can keep moving forward, knowing I might lose my balance, but at least I’ve gone somewhere.’ She sits back as a small child who’s been circling the waiting room on a scooter comes barrelling past us, closely followed by his exasperated mum. ‘The only thing I can control is who else this affects. By not letting anyone get too close.’
‘Oh,’ I say, followed by a much longer ‘Ohhh!’
‘So Margate—’
‘I get it,’ I say, realising my second ‘oh’ wasn’t quite as self-explanatory as I’d thought. ‘Is there not a—’
‘Cure?’ Angel shakes her head. ‘Not really, no. I manage the symptoms with drugs for the most part, but the only real cure, if you can call it that, is a heart transplant.’ She makes the ‘scary’ face. ‘In the meantime, as long as I come in here for my monthly check-ups, and make sure I don’t overexert myself . . .’ She looks at me, as if trying to decipher my expression, then obviously decides I need things simplified. ‘Think of it like driving a car around that you know has a fault. You don’t take it straight in and replace the engine, not when you suspect it might have a good many more miles left in it if you drive carefully. So you keep going, and then, if it breaks down, that’s when you take it into the garage.’
‘Assuming you get it there in time.’
Angel nods. ‘There is that, yes.’
‘But . . . we went rock climbing! And horse riding!’
‘We did.’ She squeezes my hand, then lets it go, and it’s only now I remember she’s been holding it the whole time. ‘And it was fun. Exactly the kind of thing I don’t want to miss out on. And admit it – you wouldn’t have suggested either of those things if you knew.’
I lean back in my chair and stare up at the ceiling. ‘Wow.’
‘So there you have it.’
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Angel looking at me as if she’s expecting a response, but to be honest, I’m a little shell-shocked, and, ‘It’s a lot to take in,’ is the best I can do.
‘Take your time. I’ve had a lot longer than you to get used to this, and there are days I still don’t believe it.’
‘Wow. That’s . . .’ My head’s spinning, so I puff air out of my cheeks, wishing the world would slow down a little. An announcement like this is something you need a while to process – but as I’ve just found out, time is the one thing Angel might not have. Besides, as announcements go, this one’s pretty momentous: the woman I’m in love with – and I realised this is still the case within approximately half a second of seeing her – has just admitted that we may not possibly have a future, though that’s because she might not have a future. And while everything about Angel suddenly makes sense, everything about the two of us – my desire to get married, start a family, plan for a life together – suddenly doesn’t. Or at least, it wouldn’t, if I wasn’t absolutely crazy about her.
I can’t think of the right thing to do, the right thing to say, so I stand up, pace anxiously around in front of her for the best part of ten seconds, then sit back down again. ‘I’m so sorry . . .’
‘I don’t want your sympathy,’ snaps Angel.
‘Sorry.’
‘And you’ve got nothing to apologise for.’ Her expression softens. ‘I just want – no, need you to understand.’
‘Understand?’
‘Why I’m like this.’
I smile to myself. I’ve a feeling understanding Angel is always going to be a work in progress. ‘When you didn’t answer my calls, I thought . . .’
‘What would I have said?’
‘What you’ve just told me would have been a start.’ I shake my head. ‘I thought you were . . .’
‘Dead?’
‘Ignoring me. Though, of course, now I know that was a possibility too.’
‘Perhaps . . . Well, maybe it was wrong of me.’
‘Which bit?’
‘All of it. To behave like I did. To leave you in Margate. To not tell you in the first place. And I’m sorry.’ Angel holds a hand out for me to shake. ‘Friends?’
I blanch at the word, and stand up again. ‘I don’t want to be just your friend, Angel. That’s the problem.’ Though a bigger problem might be where else we can go from here.
She stares at me for a moment, then nods towards the vending machine in the corner. ‘Can I at least buy you a coffee to apologise?’
‘I can’t. I’m with someone.’
Angel raises both eyebrows. ‘Well, you didn’t waste any time.’
‘Not like that.’ I point to where Mary is doing a bad job of not watching us. ‘That’s Mary. My landlady. She broke her arm. I’m just keeping her company while she gets the cast removed.’
As if reinforcing her part in our little play, Mary raises her bad arm, points at the bright purple cast and makes a sad face.
‘Oh,’ says Angel, then she glares at me. ‘Noah!’
‘What?’
‘Every time I try to convince myself you’re not right for me, you go and show me a side of you that . . .’ She gives a little shudder and a grimace, as if someone’s dropped an ice cube down the back of her shirt.
‘Right,’ I say, not quite sure whether what she’s just said helps my overall cause or not. ‘But if that’s the case, then surely you owe it to yourself to spend more time with me? Just to see how it goes. Where it goes.’
‘Noah, I can’t promise—’
‘I’m not asking you to promise anything. Especially now.’
Angel meets my gaze for the longest time, as if we’re in a ‘blink first’ competition, and then, to my delight, she ‘blinks’ spectacularly. ‘Well, how about dinner? This evening. On me. So I can apologise properly for not telling you. And so we can talk – properly. About this. About us.’
At the hint there might still be an ‘us’, I almost want to do a somersault in delight. And while the pre-Angel, boring, sensible, plan-for-the-future me wouldn’t have dreamed of getting involved with someone who a) tries to convince themselves I’m not right for them and b) apparently might not even make it to dinner this evening, trouble is, I am involved, and I already know if Angel offered to punch me in the face to apologise, I’d still say yes. So ‘Yes’ is what I say. Followed by: ‘But I want dessert.’
Angel leans across and kisses me in a way that makes me suspect that dessert might not be the only thing I’ll be getting. Which, in turn, is something else I need to think about.
‘Hold on,’ I say. ‘You could drop dead at any moment?’
‘Well, I’d get a bit of notice.’
‘How much notice?’
‘Somewhere between none and . . .’ She grins sheepishly. ‘Well, I’m not sure, really.’
‘Right. So is, you know, it . . . safe?’
‘Is what safe?’ says Angel innocently, though her expression suggests she knows exactly what I’m talking about.
‘You know.’ I lower my voice and lean in, in case scooter kid comes back, though when I check on his whereabouts, he’s in the corner, flailing around in full tantrum-mode, like he’s doing some weird interpretive dance. ‘S-E-X.’
Angel nods. ‘Weren’t you listening earlier? It’s excitement that could kill me . . .’
She fixes me with a blank stare for a second or two, then bursts out laughing as if she’s just made the best joke in the history of comedy, and while I suppose it is quite amusing, and Angel has one of those infectious laughs (a few people sitting near us – including Exasperated Scooter Mum – start to snigger too, despite having no idea what Angel’s just said), all I can do is smile weakly back.
Because the truth is, right now, I don’t find any of this the slightest bit funny.
I don’t say much on the drive home, partly due to the fact that Mary’s insisted on having the roof down and the subsequent wind noise makes conversation almost impossible, but mainly because – for the second time today – I don’t know what to say. On the one hand, it’s great news that Angel is prepared to talk – but on the other, there’s nothing great about her news at all. And while I’m really pleased she was able to tell me, I’m also really wishing there wasn’t anything to tell in the first place.
‘Are you all right?’ says Mary, as we make our way up the garden path.
‘I should be asking you that.’
She holds her hand up to show me her cast-free wrist, though I’m shocked to see just how thin her arm’s become. ‘All good. Though they’ve advised I give up the arm-wrestling for a while. Or at least, use my other hand.’
