‘This,’ he says, pointing in my direction, ‘is my long-lost, best friend, Rachel Sweetie. Rachel and I haven’t spoken in a while,’ he says. ‘Because she didn’t miss me. She left town without waking me up. She left my Gaiman out in the rain.’
It’s hard to believe that even drunk, Henry’s still carrying on with the lie, I think as the couple leave, and he sways his way to me and the bench. He keeps opening and shutting his right eye like he’s trying to get a clear picture. ‘You’ve come back rude and gorgeous,’ he says, and leans his head on my shoulder.
‘Not gorgeous,’ I say, moving my hand over my hair.
‘It makes you look like Audrey Hepburn. If she’d been a surfer.’
‘I don’t surf.’
‘Neither did Audrey Hepburn,’ he says, and leaves the bench to lie on the nature strip. ‘I just need to rest a while. You can go. I’m nearly home.’
I consider leaving but the thought of going back to the warehouse isn’t all that appealing so I decide to lie next to him. His arm touches mine, and there’s that familiar warmth.
I never planned on ignoring Henry forever, just until he wrote saying he was sorry he’d ignored my letter. I just needed him to tell me he was flattered, but he didn’t feel the same way. My plan was to forgive him, as soon as he told the truth.
‘Why?’ he asks again tonight. ‘I mean we were best friends. And I know for a fact that you wrote to Lola.’ He turns his head to the side so our faces are almost touching. ‘Why?’
‘Why do you think?’
‘You didn’t miss me.’
Henry’s a terrible liar and even if he wasn’t, he’s so drunk that only truth is spilling out of him. ‘You didn’t get the letter,’ I say, wondering how that’s possible since he looks in the Prufrock almost every day, and even if he didn’t, I left a note in his book.
‘What letter?’ he asks, and I know that however it happened, that letter went missing. It’s possible Henry picked up his book and the letter dropped out. It’s possible someone took the letter from the Letter Library before he got to it.
He’s drunk and thinking slowly, so it’s not hard to stall for time. I stare at the sky, pick at the grass, all the while I’m thinking of the right thing to say. He wrote me so many letters, long and Henry-like letters, and I wanted to answer every one but I didn’t. Instead I imagined how hurt he’d feel when he found out I was writing to Lola and not him.
‘What letter?’ he asks again.
I almost tell him. I should tell him, so he knows I didn’t forget him. But I have a second chance to save face and it actually doesn’t matter anymore. We’ve moved on. ‘It was just a goodbye letter. I left it for you at the counter of the bookstore but I guess it went missing.’
‘What did it say?’
‘Goodbye, the way most goodbye letters do, Henry.’
‘But, why didn’t you reply to my letters?’
‘I got busy. I met a guy – Joel.’
‘What kind of a name is Joel?’
‘It’s a fairly common one, actually.’
‘And he became your best friend?’
‘Look,’ I say to end this whole line of conversation. ‘I got busy. I fell in love. I was preoccupied with school and new friends. But I should have written, Henry. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.’
‘Did you miss me at all?’ he asks.
‘I did,’ I say, and at the same time I tell myself not to do something stupid and cry and tell him how desperate I was to see him at the funeral. I try not to think about how I could have had him there with me if I’d listened to Cal and not been so stubborn.
‘So we’re friends again?’ he asks, and I tell him we are.
‘Good friends?’
‘Good friends,’ I say, and as proof, which he seems to need, I tell him I’m taking the job at the bookstore.
‘For as long as it’s there,’ he says.
I ask what he means, and he tells me that tonight, he voted to sell. ‘It solves all my problems. We sell the shop. I get some money. Amy and I travel, and when we move back I can afford to rent my own place. No more making-out in the self-help section.’
‘You make out in the self-help section?’ I ask.
‘I’ll study and become something.’
You’re something now, I think. ‘Be sure,’ I say, and he says the one thing he’s sure about is Amy.
I know it’s time to get up because Henry starts reciting poetry again. I get my poetry from two places – school and Henry – so I haven’t heard any for a while. The last poem I heard in Henry’s voice was ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’. Tonight it’s one I don’t know.
The words drop, drunk and heavy, and I see the poem as Henry speaks it– a raining world, a hiding sun, a person fighting to love the terrible days. He tells me it’s called ‘Dark August’, and it’s by Derek Walcott.
‘Are you still searching for Frederick’s book?’ I ask, and he nods.
Henry believes in the impossible, the same way Cal did. He thinks he can find the copy of that book against all odds.
He recites the poem one more time because I ask him. There’s something in it that I need to find. An answer, maybe, to how it’s done, how a person starts living again. I don’t find it. All the poem does is make me ache, in places unlocatable.
‘I need to go home,’ I say, but Henry’s too drunk for me to explain to him why that’s no longer possible.
There’s still a light on inside the bookstore and it gives the place a soft glow. I’ve always loved it here. I loved the polished floorboards and the deep rich wood of the shelves. I loved the way the spines of the books looked, neatly aligned, one next to the other. I loved it because here I could always find Henry.
I ring the bell and, while I wait, I look at the front window. There’s the seat where George always sat reading with Ray Bradbury on her knee. The books in the window form a new display – Zadie Smith, Jeffrey Eugenides, Jonathan Safran Foer, Simmone Howell, Fiona Wood, Nam Le – and I’ve read none of them.
I look closely at the book in the centre of the window – Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. At the bottom of the pink cover is a small typewriter with paper flying out, the paper turning into clouds as it rises. I can’t name what it makes me feel; sadness, maybe, at the pointlessness of an atlas for clouds – an atlas for things that move from minute to minute.
Michael comes to the door with Frederick. ‘Lucky I was here playing Scrabble,’ Frederick says, as they take Henry off my hands. I follow with the wallet and keys that have fallen from his pocket.
‘My father,’ Henry says as they tumble through the door.
‘My son,’ his dad replies, helping him towards the fiction couch.
‘Amy’s going out with Greg Smith,’ I say to explain why Henry’s drunk. ‘I found him in the girls’ toilets.’
‘In my defence, I was too drunk to know it was the girls’ toilets,’ Henry says.
‘Go to sleep,’ his dad tells him. ‘It’ll seem better in the morning.’
‘No offence, Dad,’ Henry says, ‘but unrequited love is just as shit in the morning as it is at night. Possibly worse, because you have a whole day ahead of you.’
‘No offence taken,’ Michael says. ‘You’ve got a point there.’
‘They should just kill the victims of unrequited love,’ Henry says. ‘They should just take us out the second it happens.’
‘That would certainly thin the population,’ Michael says, as he tucks a blanket around him.
Henry calls me over. He beckons as I’m walking towards him, waving me down to face level when I arrive. His breath smells of beer. ‘I wish I’d gotten the letter.’
‘Forget the letter.’
‘Okay,’ he says. ‘But I want you to know something.’
‘What?’
‘I missed you,’ he says, and then he kisses me on the mouth, before he falls back on the couch, asleep.
I don’t like admitting it, but I can feel Henry’s kiss all
the way home. It was a drunken kiss, a mistaken kiss and he’s so out of it he probably thought he was kissing Amy, and I don’t like him anyway, but still, I think about it just the same.
I’ve parked and I’m sitting in the car, angry with myself for feeling it, and telling myself at the same time that it’s not my fault, telling myself that anyone would feel weird after a friend kissed them, when Rose walks out of the warehouse and gets into the passenger seat.
‘You’re avoiding me,’ she says.
‘I’m avoiding myself,’ I tell her. ‘I’m sorry. About before.’
‘Me too,’ she says, and takes a breath. ‘So I called Gran. She suggested the value of compromise.’
‘Translated: she said you’re stubborn and you might try listening to other people once in a while?’
‘That’s quite close to how the conversation went, yes. I’d do anything for you,’ she says. ‘Even call my mother.’ She shifts around so she’s facing me. ‘Want some good news?’
‘I would really love some good news.’
‘I think I might have found you a job cleaning at the hospital.’
‘We’re in some serious fucking trouble if that’s the good news,’ I say.
‘Don’t swear. Gran’ll think you got it from me.’
‘We’ll blame Henry. For a guy with a wide vocabulary, he leans heavily on the word shit.’ I say. ‘Don’t think I’m not appreciative of the cleaning job, but I’ve decided to work at the bookstore.’
‘This is why I don’t have kids,’ she says, getting out of the car. ‘And remember, the offer of travel still stands.’
I lie in bed thinking about tonight, thinking about Henry and the kiss, which leads to thoughts I don’t want. Thoughts about Joel, the last person whose kiss meant something to me.
We met in Year 10, on the beach over the black rocks, where the sand is flat and unshifting. He was looking in the tide pools, and Cal went over to see what he was doing. I stayed to the side and watched Joel pointing things out to him. They were crouched by the pools for ages, Joel reading the tiny details of the beach – small shells housed in the rough texture of rocks.
I knew Joel from school, so I walked over eventually. I could feel his look on my skin. I’d spent years with Henry barely noticing I was a girl, and then there I was, visible to someone.
We kissed at a party later that year. Joel smiled and I knew what it meant. We went to a quiet place near the water. The moon was a floating yellow light. We stripped off our clothes and swam right through.
‘You can come back,’ he’d said on the night we broke up. ‘When things get better.’
I told him not to wait.
I close my eyes tonight, and dream about Joel and the sand, about clouds and unstoppable rain. And Henry.
Great Expectations
by Charles Dickens
Written on title page: Dear Sophia, for you, on the first day of our new life in the bookshop. See page 508, Michael
Markings on page 508
Out of my thoughts! You are part of my existence, part of myself. You have been in every line I have ever read since I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every prospect I have ever seen since, – on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets.
Letter left between pages 508 and 509
12 January 2016
Michael
As you’re not returning my calls about the sale of the bookstore, and as you disappear when I stop by, it seems there’s no other way to talk but by letter. I hope that I have a better chance of reaching you through this book than through the ordinary postal service.
I’ve chosen to go with Bernadine and Saunders Real Estate. I rent my flat through them and I’m happy with the service.
The most likely buyers are developers who’ll want the building but not the business. Should we start running down the stock? Selling it to other stores when we can?
Please let me know what you think.
Sophia
Henry
the quality of the kiss was not discussed
I wake on the fiction couch deeply hungover, my head cracking, with Rachel telling me to get up. She’s holding my eyelids open like she used to do in high school when we’d stayed up all night talking and then slept through the morning alarm. ‘Get. Up. Henry.’
‘What time is it? I ask, batting off her hands.
‘It’s eleven. The shop’s been open for an hour. There are customers asking for books I can’t find. George is yelling at a guy called Martin Gamble who’s here to help me create the database. And as a separate issue, Amy’s waiting in the reading garden.’
‘Amy’s here?’ I sit up and mess my hair around. ‘How do I look?’
‘I decline to answer on the grounds that technically you’re my boss and I don’t want to start my new job by insulting you.’
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘I appreciate that.’
I pull the blanket tight around my shoulders and the customer looking in the classics section gives me a sympathetic look. I give him one back because, as much as I love books, if you’re in the classics section first thing on Saturday morning then there’s something not entirely right with your life either.
As I walk towards Amy, who looks fantastic in a pale blue dress, I’m thinking about the strange dreams I had last night. In the first, Amy was invisible. I knew she was there, but as hard as I tried, I couldn’t see her. In the second, I was talking to Rachel in the girls’ toilets, and in the last, I was kissing Rachel on the mouth. The dream kiss was very good and the memory of it is highly unsettling. God, I hope I didn’t kiss her. What if I tried to kiss her? The more I think about it, the more I think I did kiss her. I can feel her lips in a way that doesn’t feel like dream lips.
Amy touches my arm as I sit next to her, and we stare at each other for a while. ‘You smell like beer,’ she says eventually, which is true but not encouraging. I move a little away and try to breathe in the opposite direction.
‘I’m sorry about last night,’ she says eventually. ‘I should have told you about Greg, but it happened so quickly. And, I guess, if I’m honest, really honest, I’ve always been a little bit in love with Greg Smith.’
There should be a disconnect button you can push when someone leaves: you’ve fucked me over; therefore I no longer love you. I’m not asking for the button to be connected to an ejector seat that removes them from the universe, just one small button that removes them from your heart.
‘Are you listening?’ Amy asks.
‘It happened so quickly, but if you’re honest, you’ve always been a little bit in love with Greg Smith,’ I say.
I should tell her to leave. I should maintain what dignity I can, which isn’t much considering I’m wearing a blanket and the smell of last night’s drinking. But my family is pretty shit at dignity as well as love, so I think: fuck dignity. Dignity is not in my genes.
‘See, this is why I’m confused. Because when you told me you loved me, in this bookshop, you didn’t say, “I love you but if I’m honest, I’m also a little bit in love with that moron, Greg Smith.” I’d remember that. You just said, “I love you, Henry.” And when we bought the plane tickets, and I used all my money, you didn’t say, “Keep in mind, I’m also a little bit in love with Greg Smith.’’’
‘You used all your money and some of mine,’ she says, and this feels pointed and I know I’m right and she’s choosing Greg over me because I’m broke. ‘It’s because of where I work, isn’t it? It’s because of how much I earn.’ Or, how much I don’t earn. ‘Is it that I live with my family? Is it because I drove you to the formal in the bookshop van?’
‘Henry,’ she says, like I’m being ridiculous.
But I know her. I know her expressions. I know the one she’s wearing now: it’s pity. I’ve seen it on her face when she’s watching documentaries about stray ani
mals that no one wants. I’m a hundred per cent right about why she chose Greg Smith. He’s richer, he’s neater, he’s going to university.
‘You’re a great friend. But we’re not in high school anymore.’
‘So I am right.’
‘No,’ she says, when clearly she doesn’t mean it. She shakes her head, trying to find the answer for me. ‘He’s the one I always saw myself with. You know, at university. Doing things.’
‘What things?’ I ask.
She puts her hand on my arm for a second, lets me feel the warmth of her. She looks past me into the bookshop, and says, ‘There’s always Rachel.’
‘Rachel and I are friends. Just friends. It’s you,’ I tell her. ‘You.’
She smiles and holds my arm a little tighter.
‘What if I changed?’ I ask, and she hesitates before she answers.
‘I don’t think it would matter. It wouldn’t matter,’ she says, but it’s the first part of that answer that’s the truth. She doesn’t think it would matter, meaning it might matter. It could matter. Before she leaves I make her promise that if I change, and it does matter, that she’ll come back.
She kisses me goodbye and I decide to take it for a yes.
There’s not one part of me that doesn’t hurt this morning: my teeth, my head, my heart, my pride, my eyeballs. The backs of my eyeballs hurt. I put my head under the water stream and try to wash out the thought of Amy always being a little bit in love with Greg.
I get out and dry off, then sit on the edge of the bath, and let the leftover steam clear my head. Dad walks in as it’s clearing and asks if he can use the mirror.