New York was cold, but my apartment was warm when I got home and the first thing I did was light up the Christmas tree. There. Now nothing could be wrong. It glowed reassuringly in the corner as I went through the motions of unpacking. Put the kettle on, strip off my plane clothes, plug in my phone charger, even though I didn’t have a phone. It was late but I wasn’t ready to go to bed. Maybe because I’d taken caffeine tablets the night before. Maybe because I had a bundle of fifty-dollar bills in my handbag that amounted to more money than I’d ever had in my entire life. Maybe because when I went to bed I would fall asleep, and when I woke up it would be Monday. Monday was one day closer to D-day. As in D for deportation. But now I had my plan. My plan and fifty thousand dollars. I was staying in this bloody country whether they liked it or not. I just hoped I still had something to stay for.
All unpacked, suitcase hidden under the bed and my dirty clothes strewn across the bathroom floor, I collapsed on the sofa in my favourite flannel PJs. Alex claimed they didn’t offend him, but I tried to save them for nights he wasn’t around. I’d worn a lot of button-up pyjamas in my last relationship, and that had not ended well. I stared up at a picture of the two us on the fireplace and hoped I wouldn’t be wearing them too much in the near future. And by too much, I meant all the time.
Jenny had taken the photo at Erin’s wedding. It was out of focus, a little bit blurry and set at a weird angle. It was my favourite. We were hiding out on a balcony overlooking the reception, and Alex was whispering something to me, his hair falling down, green eyes flashing while I pressed a hand to my face and laughed. I couldn’t quite remember what we were talking about, but I was fairly certain it wasn’t something to be shared with the wedding party. Le sigh. For the want of something else to do, I grabbed my laptop and opened up my blog. Might as well start getting everything down on paper while it was fresh.
Adventures of Angela
What Happens in Vegas …
If there’s one thing we can all agree on as a people it’s that ‘what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas’ is the most stupid saying ever uttered by man. Fabulous marketing campaign, terrible idea. Believing you can behave in whatever way you see fit and suffer no consequences just because you’re in Sin City has less merit than a baby covering its eyes and thinking it has become invisible.
And, having just spent four very educational days in the notorious city I’m almost certain that not only is it a silly saying, it’s also very untrue. A more accurate statement would be ‘what happens in Vegas comes right home with you and cocks up your entire life’. There is an argument for ‘what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas as long as you’re an unconscionable knobhead’, but that’s not nearly as catchy. I can see why my alternatives might not catch on.
Having said all this, on reflection, I did some things in Vegas that I would never have done in New York. Stepping out of your life for a moment always makes some ideas seem more permissible, just like being drunk. Before you know it, you’re lashed on Las Vegas and you lose your usual frame of reference. That’s when the bad decisions kick in. Like taking a handful of caffeine pills, doing tequila shots then swapping clothes with a stripper so you’re dressed up as an elf. Or, you know, you might do something really stupid. In reality, most people don’t do anything too crazy, they just get drunk, gamble away money they don’t have or marry Britney Spears.
But that would have been too simple for me. On a scale of one to ten, I managed to find an eleven. Instead of a regular Vegas cock-up (example – putting $100 into theDirty Dancing slot machine) I went for a big old life-altering fuck-up. The difference between a cock-up and a fuck-up is epic. A cock-up is something that happens in aCarry On film or when your dad brings the wrong thing back from the supermarket. A fuck-up, on the other hand, is what happens in a Guy Ritchie movie or when your dad brings the wrong baby home from the hospital. It invariably ends in tears, if not the loss of a limb.
As I’ve already explained, what happens in Vegas does not stay in Vegas. It follows you home and continually pokes you in the shoulder while you’re sleeping, while you’re showering, while you’re walking down the street until you turn around and confront it. So I’m getting ready to confront my Vegas vagaries with a huge apology and possibly some sort of bribe. Because wherever you are, what happens, happens, and that’s not a cliché, it’s a fact.
Alex never read my blog. At least he claimed never to read my blog. I had to imagine he flicked over it from time to time. Usually it didn’t make a lot of difference – I never wrote about us any more; I’d learned that lesson the hard way – but this wasn’t so much a blog about us as a practice acknowledgement of just how stupid I had been before I could bust out my face-to-face moves. Everything seemed very clear now I’d got Las Vegas out of my system. Sober Angela knew what a bad idea it was to ask Alex to marry her for a visa. In truth, I’d known it all along; I just hadn’t known why it was such a bad idea. My motivations had been entirely selfish: I was scared he’d say no. I was scared I would end up alone. At no point had I put myself in his shoes. The look on his face during the world’s worst proposal was something I would have to live with for ever. He was hurt. I had hurt him. And now I had to fix it. And I would, if he wanted to let me.
The relief of waking up in my own bed the next morning was short-lived. There was too much to be done to wallow in sleepy self-doubt so I fumbled for my non-existent phone on the night stand, knocking books, a bottle of nail polish and my empty pill packet onto the floor. Our bedroom was really still Alex’s bedroom – nothing had changed since the first time I’d visited. The low futon had the same white bedspread, the acoustic guitar lay by the bed, books were still stacked all around and tea lights skittered around every surface. Only now, sometimes, under Alex’s patient tutelage, I played that guitar, some of those books were mine, and when they burned out, I replaced the tea lights from the giant sack of Ikea candles that we kept under the sink. It wasn’t that I didn’t have stuff in the apartment; I did. Closets full. But as far as this room was concerned, it was my shrine to our relationship – I’d kept it this way on purpose. Whenever I came in here, I wanted to feel the same way I had the first time. His damp, fresh-from-the-shower hair brushing against my skin. His lips on my lips. His fingers entwined with my fingers. I shivered just thinking about it.
James’s telling off echoing in my mind, I got up and went through to the living room, logged onto Facebook and clicked through my messages. Hmm. Nothing knocked morning horn on the head like a missive from your mum. Was I really sure I wasn’t coming for Christmas, because she was in Tesco looking at turkeys and they only had big ones or crowns, and if it was just her and dad she was going to get a crown. She’d sent it five hours earlier, at four a.m. New York time. Presumably she was high at the time. I tapped out a quick response to say I hoped she’d gone for the crown and then set to on my emails. Jenny’s horror at being back in the office. Louisa’s horror at her belly button popping out. The edges of my mouth quirked up in a smile as I tapped out my replies. And then on to The Plan, arch nemesis of The Letter. Today was going to be a good day. Whether it liked it or not.
As the reigning queen of procrastination, I made a list of everything I wanted to do before Alex got home. I needed to write some emails, call Lawrence the Lawyer and start putting together a presentation. I also needed to do some Christmas shopping before I spent my fifty gees on Jimmy Choo over-the-knee boots and pedigree kittens. I wasn’t a total shambles – I sent my emails first before layering up to hit the shops and pulling on my boots, aka Erin’s hand-me-down Haider Ackermann from last season. She wouldn’t be seen dead in last year’s over-the-knee boots, whereas I would happily be seen dead, alive or mid-zombie apocalypse. They were amazing.
No one had told Manhattan about my ridiculous weekend away and so business was going on as usual when I emerged from Union Square, and my heart soared at the sight of the gingerbread house stalls set up for the holiday market. Christmas in Vegas was intense. It was Slade
turned up to ten with a dubstep remix. It was that guy from finance who always wears mistletoe on his belt at the office party. New York was different. It was Miracle on 34th Streetand Bing Crosby. It was proper Christmas. Chestnuts were roasting on a licensed and approved open fire, Jack Frost was nipping at my nose and I didn’t even mind.
My shopping plan was simple. Start at Urban Outfitters on Sixth, head straight down to the village to the Marc Jacobs shop, pop into Alex’s favourite guitar shop on Bleecker, short stop at Manatus to refuel and then wind up at Bloomingdale’s in Soho to get my last bits and pieces. Then home to finish work on my presentation and wrap everything. By the time Alex got in, whenever that might be, the house would be full of freshly baked sugar cookies, beautifully wrapped gifts and me wearing an apron and a smile. And other clothes too; I’d learned that lesson the hard way as well.
‘Hello? Angela?’
‘In here.’
Alex walked into the living room and dropped his bag on the floor, frozen with fear.
‘What happened?’
I glanced around helplessly. I was surrounded by piles of wrapping paper, reams and reams of ribbon, tape, scissors, metallic markers and gift cards. Various hats, scarves, bottles of perfume, sweaters and boxes of reindeer-shaped chocolates punctuated the shit tip. Somewhere, my laptop was hidden, playing ‘Now That’s What I Call Christmas’. I couldn’t find it, so I couldn’t turn it off. Christmas had got the best of me. I’d been beaten. Trying not to cry, I desperately kicked at a long, black box, trying to shove it under the settee without attracting Alex’s attention. I’d had a very long and involved conversation with the man in the guitar shop who had shown me a beautiful vintage sky-blue Fender that had a fantastic something I couldn’t even remember and an awesome black flying V that was bedazzled with a Batman logo. The Fender was expensive. The Batman guitar was very expensive but the strap doubled as a utility belt. It had been a tough choice.
‘What’s in the box?’
I promptly burst into tears.
Alex skipped over the sofa in one leap with a devil-may-care level of concern for Converse on cushion covers and dropped down to the floor to hold me tightly.
‘I was wrapping,’ I explained tearfully. ‘But I lost the scissors and then the tape dispenser ran out and I was out shopping for hours and my feet hurt and I’m so, so tired.’
‘This is why people kill themselves at Christmas,’ he said, rocking me gently and wiping away my tears. ‘You idiot.’
He sounded and smelled and looked just like himself again. Which made me cry more. ‘I love Christmas,’ I sniffed.
‘It’s an abusive relationship,’ Alex said. ‘You need to walk away.’
‘It only does this to me because it loves me,’ I argued. Sitting there, cradled in his arms, the smell of cold air still on his coat, made everything better. If only everything was so easy. Wrapping handbags was too hard. ‘What time is it?’
‘A little before midnight?’ He pulled his phone out of his pocket to check. ‘How long have you been doing this?’
‘Some time?’ It was all I was prepared to commit to. ‘You’re going to have to go in the bedroom while I wrap yours.’
I looked up, giving him my serious face. Somewhat compromised by streaks of mascara and a bright red nose, but still, it was serious.
‘Mine?’ He started scanning the love song to consumerism on the living-room floor. ‘Something here is for me?’
Suddenly someone wasn’t quite so anti-Christmas.
‘Yes, and you’re not allowed to see it.’ I pushed him away. ‘If you see your presents before Christmas day, baby Jesus cries.’
‘We’ve established I don’t do religion?’ He scooted up onto the sofa and kicked off his shoes. ‘And neither do you.’
‘I like to hedge my bets in December.’ I peeled off a layer of jumper until I was down to my T-shirt and knickers. Wrapping presents wasn’t nearly as fun as I’d remembered. I’d lost my jeans during a fit over trying to fit my dad’s bong into a packing tube. I’d thought it hilarious when I was passing the smoke shop in the East Village, but now it was safely wrapped up and addressed, I was worried I was just giving him ideas. Hopefully he’d be satisfied with his packet of Peeps.
Somehow we’d fallen right back into our happy place. Me having a neurotic meltdown on the floor, Alex passed out on the sofa with a seasonal addition of Mariah Carey. But that didn’t mean we didn’t need to talk.
‘Have you got my Christmas present yet?’
We needed to talk about something very important.
‘Baby Jesus doesn’t want me to tell you,’ he said with closed eyes.
I looked around at all my shopping splendour and rubbed my eyes dry. If there was a baby Jesus, he would use all of his magical powers to help me look half-decent right now.
‘So, you had fun last night?’ And please let my voice not be quite so squeaky. And please let him bring up the wedding nonsense first. All my resolve had gone out the window when he’d walked in on me crying, trying to wrap a scarf and mitten set without readily available sticky tape.
‘Yeah,’ he replied without moving. ‘The wolf pack fell apart a little so I just played some cards. Checked out the venue at Cosmopolitan. We might play a show there.’
‘Did you talk to Jeff?’
Alex blew out a long breath. ‘Yeah.’
‘Is he OK?’
‘He’s fine.’
Of course he was. Jenny was at home, sobbing into the box set of Game of Thrones, dodging Sigge’s calls and inhaling Häagen-Dazs. Jeff was probably two doors away from me, snuggling with his fiancée and pretending everything was A-OK. I picked up a NARS gift set and started wrapping with righteous indignation. Righteous indignation gave much sharper corners.
‘This is going to be a lot quicker if you just say it.’ Alex rubbed a hand over his face before turning to look at me. ‘Whatever it is you’re thinking.’
‘I wasn’t thinking anything.’ Lies also made baby Jesus cry.
‘He didn’t mention Jenny, if that’s what you wanted to ask,’ he said. ‘He mentioned Shannon. A whole bunch of times. But no mention of Jenny.’
If I ever met a woman who claimed to understand what went on inside men’s tiny minds, I would punch her in the face for lying. How was it even possible that Jeff hadn’t mentioned Jenny? There was a whole chain of he-knew-I-knew-he-knew-that-Alex-knew-that-Jeff-knew-that-we-all-knew-about-everything, and it was blowing every fuse in my brain. Were men that capable of pretending difficult things hadn’t happened that they just erased the entire event?
‘So what do you talk about?’ I asked. ‘For four whole days, what do men talk about?’
Alex groaned and gave me his sleepy eyes. ‘Sports. Music. Ass. Can we go to bed?’
‘How could a girl resist a seduction like that?’ I didn’t make a move to get up.
‘We can talk about kittens and rainbows and ribbons if that helps?’
‘Alexander Reid.’ His name wasn’t actually Alexander, but I found it useful to extend it when I was giving him a telling-off. The more we didn’t talk about what had happened between us two nights before, the more it was a Thing. ‘Don’t make me beat you up.’
‘So you don’t want to run down to City Hall and get married?’
I turned sharply towards the sofa. He was still laid flat out on his back, head back, eyes closed.
‘I think they’re probably closed.’ I was careful with my tone. This was my in. Gently, gently catchee hipster. Or something. ‘Look, I know I went about everything the wrong way—’
‘You think?’ He cut me off before I got to my fabulous apology.
‘Yes, I do – that’s why I’m trying to apologize.’ I gave him a moment to jump in, but this time he kept schtum. ‘It was a stupid idea. I was stupid. Everything about it – stupid.’
Still no reaction.
‘And I’m so, so sorry. I never meant to –’ gulp – ‘hurt you.’
This was probably
the worst time in the world for Cliff Richard, but I still couldn’t find my laptop, so the scariest silence of my life was filled by ‘Mistletoe and Wine’, like it or not.
‘What makes you think I was –’ Alex echoed my pause – ‘hurt?’
Well, I wasn’t expecting that. ‘Um, you weren’t?’
‘Yes, I was.’
Oh good. We were playing games. My favourite.
‘I freaked out. You actually scared me,’ he continued.
Not really any better.
‘All that shit you started coming out with,’ he went on. ‘I mean, what was that?’
I took my hair out of the attractive on-top-of-the-head-and-out-of-the-way ponytail I was working and fingered the ends. It was getting long again.
‘I didn’t mean it,’ I said. I was going to get it right this time. And I was not going to mention the post office. ‘Of course marriage is a big deal. A huge deal. Epic. I knew it was a bad idea when I was saying it, that’s why I didn’t suggest it before. That’s why I was trying everything else.’
‘So you don’t want to get married?’ Alex said slowly. ‘You’d rather go back to the UK?’
‘No! Of course not.’
Alex sat up. ‘No, you don’t want to get married? Or no, you don’t want to go back to London?’
I stared at him staring at me. How had I managed to talk myself into this corner again? ‘It wasn’t even my idea.’ In the dictionary, there was a picture underneath the word ‘exasperated’ and that picture was of me. ‘I just didn’t know what else to do and I panicked. I don’t want to leave.’