Another Love (3 page)

Romilly had never been that sort of girl. Being clever was her thing, her nose always firmly inside a book as she crept from the library to lectures and back again. The boys that courted her were the ones who also studied science and who also wore specs and who knew every word to the entire series of
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
and weren’t afraid to spend an entire coach journey to Dartmoor and back again proving this. David was in another league entirely and it was a league in which she wasn’t even a minor player.

‘It’s Romilly.’ She nodded.

‘David Wells.’ He smiled.

They continued to sit close to each other in the library, getting to know each other little by little via whispered exchanges, some gentle teasing and the scrawling of information and ideas in gel pen across each other’s notes and files. They would then stroll back to halls together, down the steep pavements of Park Street or up towards Whiteladies Road, meandering and chatting, whatever the weather.

‘How can you spend all day, every day, studying one tiny creature?’ he asked one afternoon as they ambled nonchalantly along. ‘Don’t you ever get bored?’ He prodded the textbook in her arms, whose cover displayed various pictures of the mayfly, her insect of special interest, about which she would write her dissertation.

She wrinkled her nose beneath her glasses and took her time in forming a response. ‘Quite the opposite. The more I learn, the more I want to learn. I don’t think there can be anything as fascinating in the whole wide world, absolutely nothing, as a creature that is born knowing it will catch only one sighting of the moon. Just one! A creature that seeks the sun, knowing it has to live an entire life in a day! That’s incredible, don’t you think? The very opposite of boring. And that question is actually comical, coming from you, Mr Numbers. I mean, accounting and finance? Now that’s proper boring! I mean, God, if I had to look at numbers all day, I’d just say, shoot me now.’

She glanced up at him uncertainly. Had she gone too far?
Shut up, Romilly! Just shut up! You’re rambling because you’re nervous. He’ll think you’re a loser.

His suggestion of a date came a whole month later, as they stood on the steps of the Wills Memorial Building. It left her speechless, quite literally staring at the space above his head, wondering if it was a joke or whether it was even worth it. The disappointment of him rejecting her after one date was possibly more than she could bear. She figured that if there had been any romantic intentions on his part, he would have made his move a while ago.

His expression was searching. ‘So, is that a silent “Yes, I’d love to come for a light supper on the docks,” or a silent “Sod off”? I can’t tell.’ He laughed, that easy laugh that showed his beautiful teeth.

‘I’d love to,’ she squeaked.

‘Yes!’ He punched the air, and for the first time in her life, Romilly felt like a prize.

Tessa, a girl in her halls, had insisted that she have a drink before she went off to meet him. Dutch courage, she called it, although there was nothing Dutch about the Russian vodka shot that she hurled down her neck. Romilly wasn’t fond of booze, didn’t like the taste much, apart from sickly sweet cocktails, fizzy wine and Pimm’s and lemonade in the summer. But this was not the time to be picky; booze flowed in every room on campus and she needed something to give her confidence, anything that might loosen her tongue and enable her to shine a little in front of this beautiful boy.

It was just the one measure, but as the alcohol glazed the back of her throat with its heat, she felt her eyes widen and her cheeks flush. She smiled at the warm glow, which, she had to admit, took the edge off, just a little. She had ditched her glasses and positively shimmied out of her halls.

From that night on, she and David fell effortlessly into coupledom. They were always invited out as a pair and referred to as a unit. It felt great.

The day she took David to her parents’ house in Pewsey, Wiltshire was one she wouldn’t forget. Nerves had rendered her silent. Trying to control the quake in her gut, she wondered what he would make of her ordinary family in their ordinary house. Her dad, who grew enough tomatoes to keep Heinz in production; her mum, who scoured the hob until the shiny surface lifted; and her sisters, who lounged on the sofa in their tiny shorts and vests, sending pheromones out into the atmosphere with their utter, utter gorgeousness.

Carrie and Holly did a double-take at the sight of their sister’s catch. He was far, far from the dorky, scrawny bibliophile that they’d been expecting. Her mum went into fussy overdrive, telling him just how clever her oldest daughter had always been, while force-feeding him Victoria sponge, homemade of course. She had whispered to Romilly through a sideways mouth as they ferried plates and cups to the kitchen, ‘You should have told me!’ Romilly was perplexed. Should have told her what? That David was good-looking? Well mannered? Smart? What would that have meant, two Victoria sponges? Her dad had packed him off with an old Raspberry Ripple container piled high with ripe, earthy-smelling ‘tommyatoes’, as he called them.

Romilly waited for David to end their relationship, convinced that it would only be a matter of time before she, like her mum’s hob, lost her shiny veneer and he got distracted by something newer, glossier and less timid. She woke each day with nervous anticipation that today might be the day he came to his senses and binned her. A couple of glasses of wine before they saw each other became the salve that ensured she could cope with whatever occurred. She soon discovered that if she topped herself up with a couple more glasses when they arrived at their destination, and downed the odd tequila slammer chaser, she became someone else entirely. And that someone else was the kind of girl no man could resist, particularly the fabulous David Wells.

With the syrupy booze flowing through her veins, she felt taller and sexier and was not averse to hitching up her skirt and dancing where and when the mood took her. David would sit back in slack-jawed admiration, a little the worse for wear himself but delighted and enthralled by the smart, sexy girl who garnered appreciative looks from other Bierkeller drinkers.

Cocktails flowed and became the backdrop to their social life. Sometimes the evening would end with Romilly doing the honours, propping David up like a sack of spuds, his arms dangling forward, his speech slurred. She would manoeuvre him in and then out of a cab, then dump him onto the single bed in her room. As he lay there, pissed and snoring, she would stare at his profile and touch her finger to his cheek, feeling wave after wave of love for him, before pulling the duvet up to his chin and tucking him in.

One night, when it was her turn to be ferried home in an inebriated state, she lay with her arms crossed above her head on the pillow and told him for the first time that she loved him. ‘I really, really, really, really do. Like proper love, not just sexing love, not just one-day-Mayfly love, but proper love.’ She grinned as he sank to his knees and stroked her hair away from her face.

‘I love you too, even when you’re pissed. I just hope you remember this in the morning.’ He laughed.

‘Write it down for me!’ She reached towards the bedside cabinet, knocking a half-filled glass of water onto the carpet. ‘David, David, write it down!’ she insisted, waving her hand in the general direction of her desk, cluttered with books, pens and biscuit crumbs.

‘Okay! Okay!’ He stood with palms upturned and found a pen and stack of Post-its. On the top one he wrote,
I love you, Bug Girl, and you love me. We are joined forever. Proper love. Do not forget this!
Then he stuck it on the shade of her lamp and budged her into the corner to make room for him to sleep.

When she woke up, shivering and smiling at the duvet thief who had hogged not only the majority of the inadequate bed, but also the bed cover, her eyes fell upon the yellow square fluttering on her lamp. She felt a jolt of joy that left her breathless. These were happy, happy times.

Romilly worked hard at her studies, arriving at the lab full of enthusiasm, throwing herself into every experiment and reading her textbooks late into the night, determined to get the First she knew she was capable of. Whenever she was on top of her workload, she would down her syrupy dancing juice and vamp it up for her man.

On occasion, her nagging insecurity still reared its ugly head. Any message that went unanswered or any apparent distraction on his part would send her reeling to a dark place. Fearing the worst, with muscles coiled in tension, she would wait for the inevitable ‘It’s not you, it’s me….’ conversation.

One evening they’d strolled across the Downs and along Ladies Mile, hand in hand under the full-canopied trees whose leaves had begun their transformation into shining golds and russets. The air was Bonfire Night bright and the blue-grey sky seemed to accommodate more stars than usual. The two walked along the footpath that skirted the Avon Gorge, breathing in the cool night air and chatting as they went.

Eschewing the lure of the bustling pubs, they made their way along the Gloucester Row. Romilly hesitated, taking tentative steps out onto the suspension bridge, trying to quell the leap of fear in her gut. She looked up at the magnificent structure as night closed around it, the cliffs of the gorge blurring into shadow behind the bright light of the bulbs illuminating it. It mattered little that this incredible feat of engineering had held fast for the last one hundred and fifty years; she still pictured the taut stays snapping and the tons of Meccano-like metal collapsing into a twisted pile two hundred and fifty feet below, with her buried somewhere beneath.

Halfway across the bridge, David stopped suddenly and stood in front of her. He took her hands inside his and drew a deep breath.

Romilly held his gaze. This was it.
Don’t cry. Don’t give him the satisfaction. It’s okay, I knew it was never going to last.
As her thoughts whirred, she watched him struggle to start, the wind licking his face, lifting his dark fringe. His lips were dry and he swallowed, as if he had a lump in his throat.
I always knew that someone better than me would come along and steal you away, so just say it, get it over with and don’t patronise me, just give it to me straight.
She remained silent, not wanting to make it easy for him.

‘Rom…’ He exhaled from bloated cheeks and shook his head, looking into the distance.

This was clearly harder than he’d thought and that gladdened her, made her feel a little less disposable.

‘It’s okay. I know. I know what you’re going to say.’ She blinked, trying to keep the catch from her voice, looking down at the river far below and imagining flinging herself into it. Was it true that you died or lost consciousness before you hit the water, she wondered? Or was that just a white lie, trotted out to ease the pain of the bereaved?

‘You do?’ He stared at her.

She nodded.

‘Okay then.’ He released her hand, ran his fingers through his hair and waited, breathing out slowly.

After an interminable pause, he raised his voice. ‘So, come on! Tell me, Bug Girl! Is it yes or no? Don’t leave a guy hanging.’ He peered over the edge at the twist of the River Avon beneath them.

Romilly glanced across at the cars scurrying along the Portway like rows of common ants, purposefully following the same meandering path in two opposing, evenly spaced lines.

‘Come on, Rom! I don’t like this pause. It was bad enough when I first asked you out. Is this also a silent “Yes, I’d love to,” or is this one meant to be a silent “Sod off”?’

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘I mean, are you going to marry me or not?’

‘Am I going to… what?’ She needed it repeating as she gripped the side of the bridge for support.

Despite the other pedestrians, mostly tourists coming from the Leigh Woods side of the bridge, who giggled at them, their cameras poised, David dropped down onto one knee and took her hand inside both of his.

‘Romilly Jane Shepherd, you are amazing. I’ve never met another girl like you. You make me laugh, you look after me when I’m sloshed and you are the smartest, most interesting person I have ever met. I love you and you love me, proper love that lasts forever, so will you marry me?’

Romilly stared at him and felt her mouth fall open as her knees bobbed with weakness. He wanted to marry her. David Arthur Wells, who could pick anyone in the whole wide world, had chosen her. She leapt into his arms as he held her fast and kissed him passionately on his beautiful mouth.

When I was little, I used to pore over their wedding photos. I think it gave me reassurance that there had been this wonderful, romantic time and that it wasn’t all bad. I find them hard to look at now, for obvious reasons. They’re lovely actually. Mum and Dad seem so young! My mum looked ecstatic, wide-eyed and slightly shocked, as though the whole affair had taken her by surprise, like those brides you see on the telly whose other halves have arranged the whole thing and they just have to turn up on the day and say ‘I do’.

She wore a huge meringue-type dress that dwarfed her frame. And she held a stunning bouquet of lilies and trailing ivy that did the same. She has the stance of a little girl who’s playing dress-up and has slipped into her mum’s frock. Her shoulders are slightly hunched in every shot and she’s always peeking upwards, as though she’s an imposter who’s afraid she might get turfed out of the cream taffeta creation at any moment.

The thing that stands out to me is the brooch on her bodice. My dad gave it to her on the morning of the wedding and it’s the most stunning thing – a mayfly. The body is made up of tiny little jewels and the large wings are slivers of turquoise shell, almost transparent and edged in silver. When the light catches them, you can see all the blues and greens of the rainbow. It was her most special possession.

God, suddenly I really miss her. The number of times I used to sit on her lap and she’d show me the brooch and tell me about how Dad had given it to her. I asked her once why she loved it so much and she told me that these beautiful creatures weren’t on the earth for very long which made them all the more precious. I got upset, asking,
who looks after their children?
She told me that the mummies might not be on the earth any more, but that it didn’t matter, they were always able to watch over their babies, however far away they went.