The Single Girl's To-Do List (4 page)

‘I’m not coming home.’ He shook off my arm and stepped backwards. ‘This isn’t a break, Rachel.’

Simon looked pale and awkward and it didn’t really matter how cold it was any more.

‘I don’t want to be on a break because I want to be with you,’ I said softly, staring steadily at his shoes. ‘It’s just a break. We’re not, you know, we’re not. Not on a break.’

For a few moments, he didn’t say anything. I didn’t say anything. Across the street, I could hear people talking, laughing, even some shouting a couple of doors down, but it seemed as if it was miles away. I coughed, just to check I could still make noise.

‘Simon, I love you.’

Nothing.

‘Simon?’

Still nothing.

I pressed my lips together to try and stop the tears that were tickling the corners of my eyes, blurring the bright red postbox into a red slash to the side of me.

‘Simon, please.’ I tried to keep my voice even but I was having enough trouble getting the words out at all. ‘You’re my boyfriend.’

Simon took one last drag, dropped the cigarette butt and ground it into the pavement with a brown leather shoe I didn’t recognize. Looking up at the sky, he blew out his breath loudly.

‘You’re not the one.’

I folded my arms tightly, pressing my fingernails into my bare arms.

‘I’m sorry, Rachel,’ he said, looking quickly back down at the street. Anywhere but at me. ‘I’m wasting your time. You’re not the one.’

‘I’m not …’ I cleared my throat and started again. ‘I’m not the one?’

‘No,’ Simon replied.

‘Is someone else the one?’ I asked, afraid to hear the answer. ‘Are you … is there …?’

‘No,’ he said, finally looking somewhere just to the right of my nose. Still not quite at my eyes. ‘Honest. It’s just, I thought about it and I care about you, I do, you’re just not the one. We’re not going to work out in the end.’

‘Any reason in particular?’ I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘What did I do?’

‘You didn’t do anything,’ he shrugged. ‘I just woke up one day and I knew. I thought the break would help but …’

‘You thought the break would be easier than out-and-out breaking up with me,’ I revised for him. ‘And that I would get the hint or something?’

‘I’m sorry, I haven’t done this very well.’ He went back to his pocket for the cigarettes but they were still in my hand. Impetuously, I threw them into the road and under a car. ‘Rachel, I just don’t, I’m not, god this is shit. I’ll always love you, I’m just not, you know.’

‘I don’t know actually.’ I shook my head and felt my hair fall around my shoulders. ‘Because I love you.’

‘Jesus, Rach.’ Simon reached an arm out towards my bare shoulder and laid his hand against my skin. It should have felt warm and reassuring but instead it stung. ‘I’m sorry.’ He pulled his hand away and shoved it back into his empty pocket.

I took a step backwards, blinking until the tears slipped over my eyelids and ran down my cheeks. At least I wasn’t wearing any mascara. Nothing like panda eyes to make a girl look utterly pathetic. I looked at him. His short dark-blond hair was darker in the streetlight and his eyes were red and tired. The strangest thing was looking at his lips. And letting the fact that I wouldn’t be kissing them ever again settle in my mind. They were off-limits. He was off-limits. No longer mine. Another step back and I took him in completely. All five feet nine of ex-boyfriend. Ex. What a horrible sound. This wasn’t my Simon; this was a stranger. I stepped back again, stumbling off the kerb and into the road.

‘Rachel!’ Someone shouted sharply and I turned around just in time to see a black cab whirr past me, beeping his horn, the driver shouting something like ‘stupid cow’ out of the window. Even though I was still standing in the road, I couldn’t seem to move. Instead, I sat down. Which seemed like a sensible idea.

‘Rachel,’ another voice said, softer this time but closer. I felt several arms wrap around me and pull me to my feet before hearing raised voices and scuffling behind me.

‘Get her in a cab,’ Matthew’s voice commanded someone. ‘I’ll sort these two out.’

I was more interested in my shoes. I loved these shoes. How long had Simon had those brown shoes? How come I hadn’t seen them before? He’d probably bought them earlier – only a boy would go out dancing on a Friday night in new shoes without knowing whether or not they’d rub. Which of course they would; all of his shoes rubbed.

‘Rachel, are you OK?’ Em’s voiced asked.

I nodded.

‘Me and Matthew are coming home with you.’ Her voice was coming from somewhere above me but I couldn’t quite focus on it.

I shook my head.

‘Yes, we are.’

‘No,’ I said steadily. ‘I just want to go home and sleep. Really. Just come over in the morning. I’ll need you in the morning.’

‘I really think we should come home with you, just me or just Matthew, whoever you want. This is not open for discussion.’

I shook my head again and stretched my arm out to an approaching black cab. ‘I’m fine.’

Before she could do anything, I shook Emelie off and opened the cab door, slamming it shut behind me, hitting my leg in the process. I didn’t feel it.

‘Amwell Street, Islington?’ I leaned forward until I saw the driver nod and then slouched back while he did a U-turn. Out of the window, I saw Emelie throwing her hands up at Matthew who was holding his own hands over his face. Behind them, Paul was holding his nose but I couldn’t see Simon. Until we stopped at a traffic light. Then I spotted him. On the floor at Paul’s feet with Mark the Stranger at the side of him.

Well, would you look at that?

By the time the cab dropped me off at home, I’d replayed our conversation over in my head so many times, it felt like something that had happened to someone else, or that I’d seen on TV. The exact words used were hazy, each gesture exaggerated or traded in for something that didn’t happen, but the end result was always the same, no matter how many times I ran through it. I’m not the one. He doesn’t love me. He doesn’t want me.

It took me far too long to get my keys in the door, and when I finally managed to force my way in, I flipped on the lights only to illuminate five years of happy memories lining our hallway. Holiday snaps, concert tickets, napkins from restaurants, postcards from holidays, everything we’d collected over the duration of our relationship, mounted, framed, hung, down to the receipt for the drinks on our first date. He’d kept that and given it to me the day we’d moved in together. There was no way this was actually happening.

Exhausted, I turned the light out and turned into the bedroom, kicking off my shoes and scrambling out of my vest and jeans as I went. I’d made the bed before I left, hoping to be falling into it with Simon and not tearstains and a scraped knee. Despite the fact that I’d been sleeping on my own for a few weeks, this was the first night since ‘the break’ that I’d felt lonely. This was the first time I was alone. I swapped my uncomfortable underwear for an old T-shirt of Simon’s that I kept hidden inside my pillowcase along with a dodgy old pair of boxer shorts that had no elastic left. I lay on my back and stared at the ceiling, Simon’s words buzzing through my brain as if I’d left the TV on. Sleep wasn’t coming but the most ridiculous things kept popping into my mind. My credit card payment was due. I still had two episodes of
Glee
to watch on Sky Plus and it was running out of memory. Tonight would be the first night I hadn’t washed my face in over four years. This was why I had to write lists. Regardless of my relationship status, no one wanted to work with a spotty make-up artist. I slid off the bed, hitching up the baggy boxers as I went.

In the hallway, I reached out to touch my favourite photo of us, taken at Emelie’s birthday the year before. Simon was laughing at something Matthew had said and I had my arms linked around his neck, my face leaning into his shoulder. He looked handsome, I didn’t look fat and we were happy. The perfect picture. I could feel the sobs building in my chest when I heard scuffling at the front door. Turning on the lights, I peered through the glass. It was Simon. I waited a couple of seconds, my mind completely empty, before I flipped the lock and swung the door open.

His left eye was already turning purple and, although someone had tried to clean him up, his nose was bloody and his lip was bust. Between his messed-up face and my seductive ensemble, this was so far removed from the perfect picture, I could have smiled. Could have.

‘The lock needs some WD-40 or something,’ I muttered, one hand holding up my shorts.

‘I’m sorry,’ Simon was still hovering outside the door.

‘Not your fault,’ I shrugged. ‘It’s been sticky for ages.’

‘No, I’m sorry,’ he said again.

I moved away from the door to let him in, my back pressed against the wall of photos. He paused right in front of me and opened his mouth to say something before changing his mind.

‘Simon?’

He stopped, turned around and looked me up and down.

‘Is that my T-shirt?’ he asked.

‘Yeah,’ I pulled at the frayed hem. ‘It’s comfy to sleep in.’

‘I thought you’d thrown it out,’ he replied.

Feeling my bottom lip start to tremble, I shook my head. I squeezed my toes and feigned a yawn so I could push back the tears.

‘Right,’ he said, his hands deep in his pockets.

I nodded. He just stood there, battered, bruised, miserable and staring at the shoes I’d never seen before. I knew I had to say something and say it now. By the morning, it would be over. Relationships like ours always died quietly in the night; we weren’t ones for violent, bloody deaths played out in public. Far too English for that. But my tongue was tied up with too many questions and my heart was already playing dead. Swallowing hard, I opened my mouth, no idea what was going to come out.

‘New shoes?’

For a moment, I really didn’t know what was happening, I was still staring at Simon’s shoes as they came over and then his arms were around me, his hot, damp face on mine. It wasn’t until I felt a picture frame digging into my shoulder blade that I realized we were kissing, that his hands were running up and down my back and then tangling themselves in my hair and back down again.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said into my hair. ‘I’m so sorry.’

Instinctively, my arms went up around his neck and my lips took his kisses on autopilot, but the sharp corner of the photo was still cutting into my back. It was only when he moved the kisses from my mouth down to my throat that I realized my eyes were open and my mind was completely quiet. What was wrong? This was the plan. Simon paused and looked up at me with a new expression on his face, half confused and half desperate to get his end away. I’d seen them both independently of each other enough times over the last five years but this was a new combo.

‘Rach?’ he panted. His concern was reasonable: firstly, kissing my neck was the surefire way to get into my pants, as he well knew; and secondly, I’d wanted this so badly for so long, I ought to be responding at least. Something was just off. ‘Rach, honest, I’m sorry.’

‘Stop. You can stop saying that,’ said a voice that sounded like mine. If he apologized, that meant he had something to apologize for and I couldn’t deal with that right now.

‘OK.’ He reached around my neck and scooped my hair over one shoulder, a gesture so familiar my stomach dropped through the floor. ‘OK.’

I nodded and closed my eyes when he leaned in to kiss me again. I kissed him back, trying not to hurt his split lip. But he didn’t care about his split lip. For the first time in a month, he wanted me, so I let him turn me towards the bedroom door, push me onto the bed and I felt the comfortable weight of his body on top of me. I didn’t need to think, I didn’t need to act, his hands started on their regular route around my body, lips making their way across my collarbone, my left leg curling up around his waist. I’d missed this so much. I’d missed him so much. My body should be screaming for him, not just reacting. It was just weird because it had been so long, that was all. And so I ignored the little voice in my head, intent on chanting ‘not the one, not the one, not the one’ over and over and over. Instead I closed my eyes and began playing my part. I had him back. And that was what I wanted. He was what I wanted. And he was mine again.

The next morning came like any other, the sun streaming in through the too-sheer curtains on the bedroom window that I never bought blackout curtains for, because Simon liked to wake up to natural light. And, as though he’d never been away, there he was beside me, that natural light illuminating his dark blond hair until it was almost golden. I lay on my side, a few inches away from him, just watching him sleep. Last night had been strange, I hadn’t been able to quite shake off the feeling that we should have talked before Simon jumped back into my bed, but this morning everything felt right. We were back on track. Whatever madness he’d been suffering, he was over it.

I turned onto my back, trying not to wake him and smiled to myself while I thought about my daily chores. Perhaps I could let myself off the list today: the post could wait at the post office until Monday and I’d get Matthew’s birthday card tomorrow. But I did need to go to the supermarket – we were out of everything. I slid off the bed, not budging the mattress, and grabbed last night’s jeans and tank top that were still lying in a sad puddle on the floor. I got dressed in the hallway, grabbing my phone, cash card, keys and a cardigan on my way out through the door, pausing just for a second to straighten the frame we’d dislodged the night before. Nothing was really aligned, but to see it there, cockeyed and nudging the next photo, made me come over all OCD. I put it back where it had been before but it still didn’t look right. Instead of fannying around and making too much noise, I took it down and propped it against the wall, making a mental note in my temporary to-do list to put it back up later on. After breakfast. After whatever Simon wanted to do today. I’d rewrite the list for tomorrow. OCD assuaged.

It was super-early for a Saturday and London was mostly still asleep, but buses bustled by and weekend workers walked on, heads down, earphones in. I dabbed on lip balm, tenderly touched my chafed chin and wrapped my hair around itself into a relatively controlled knot on the back of my head as I wandered down the street. I really had to get it cut; I really had far too much hair for just one person. But Simon liked it long. And I was used to it. Even if Dan did call me Cousin It whenever I wore it down on set.

I couldn’t believe Paul had punched Simon. It was the nicest thing he’d ever done for me. Totally made up for the time he’d cut the hair of every single one of my My Little Ponies. Well, maybe not all of them. I should call him and let him know we’d worked things out, otherwise it was going to be incredibly awkward at my dad’s wedding in a couple of weeks. Right now, I needed to think about getting pastries, coffee and cream. And probably some stain remover to try and get the blood out of Simon’s shirt. And they say romance is dead.

The supermarket seemed strangely busy, full of people on their way to work, buying tuna sandwiches for their lunch break, early risers doing their shopping, and more than one creased-looking gentleman with a terribly self-satisfied expression on his face.

‘All right?’ Something reeking of YSL Kouros nodded at me over the croissants. ‘Heavy night?’

‘Something like that,’ I said, without eye contact. Didn’t he realize he was in London? We didn’t talk to strangers. We didn’t even talk to our neighbours for the first five years unless it was to complain about the noise or errant pet shitting in our garden.

‘Yeah, trick is to get out before the ‘wake-up,’ he said, filling up a plastic bag with cinnamon Danishes. ‘But I always leave a note. You’ve got to leave a note. Just out of order not to.’

‘Right,’ I gave him a tight smile and backed away slowly towards the queue for the till.

And he followed.

‘Always felt bad for girls,’ he went on. ‘You know, you see a bloke on the walk of shame and everyone thinks, “Get in there, son!” but you see a girl walking down the street at six a.m. on a Saturday in last night’s clothes and everyone just thinks “slag”.’

‘Yeah,’ I said, flicking through the items in my basket for a moment before I realized what he’d said. ‘Sorry, what?’

‘Not me though,’ Kouros Man flung out his hands, spilling his already opened can of Red Bull. ‘I do not judge. And it’s not like you’ve got your skirt up your arse and tits hanging out like some of them, is it? Good outfit.’

Brilliant. Not only was this charmer still drunk, he thought we were one-night-stand kindred spirits.

‘You should probably give me your number, you know, in case you ever need company.’ The stale stench of whatever he’d been drinking/spilling down himself last night combined with the overabundance of intense aftershave came closer, making me gag.

‘I have a boyfriend,’ I said quickly, holding the basket between us. ‘So no.’

‘Right, course you do,’ he replied, fingering a packet of Durex for a moment before adding it to his booty. Double gag. I turned my back, hoping he would just go away, but I could still smell him. I had a feeling it would be a lingering odour. Thank god Simon had come to his senses. That was the first man in five years to ask for my number and I really didn’t feel like he was a keeper.

I paid for my breakfast bounty and vamoosed back out onto the street, so enthralled by my iPhone that I couldn’t even hear Kouros Man muttering loudly after me. Muttering something that sounded suspiciously like ‘bitch’. No, he didn’t judge.

August never guaranteed good weather in London, but that morning was beautiful. Bright, cool sunshine and a clear blue sky. I bounced back along Upper Street, scanning text messages from Matthew and Em. They wouldn’t appreciate a blow-by-blow phone call pre-seven a.m., so I tapped out an ‘everything’s fine’ text, deleted the torrent of abuse aimed at Simon, and kept the effusive messages of love. Never hurt to have them around.

I locked my phone and slipped it into my back pocket. I wasn’t particularly good at expressing emotion and I had never been particularly free and easy with the ‘L’ word. I loved my parents, I loved my brother, I loved Matthew, Emelie, Simon, Galaxy chocolate, Alexander Skarsgard and Topshop Baxter Jeans. And I really, really loved my flat. I’d lived in a wild assortment of shitty bedsits and tolerable house-shares since university but this, our beautiful two-bedroom first-floor flat, snagged for a song in the middle of the recession, was my home. The last eighteen months had been spent feathering our nest. Mostly with piles of clothes I never got around to ironing, but still. Home. I climbed the five steps up to the royal blue door and paused for a moment. I was nervous. What if Simon was awake? Maybe I should have attempted to make myself look half decent before I left. What was I going to say to him? Maybe we could just pretend last night never happened.

‘At least he won’t be wearing Kouros,’ I said to myself, and sort of to a passing dog walker, as I stuck my keys in the lock.

The flat was still quiet when I passed through the door and I slipped off my shoes so as not to wake Simon. OK, I would brush my teeth, make coffee and then whatever would happen, would happen. Setting breakfast down on the kitchen countertop, I made a beeline for the bathroom. Whatever would happen
would
happen. And so what? I thought as I splashed my face with cold water. One awkward conversation and then back on the road to marriage, babies and bliss. Everyone had bumps in the road; everyone had their little moments of madness. What relationship was perfect? I grabbed my toothbrush and reminded myself that the happily-ever-after myth was just that. A myth. Hmm, no toothpaste. Automatically, I reached into the cabinet beside the sink for a new tube. Real relationships were difficult and required work. They needed understanding and compromise. You couldn’t just run away when things got tough, you had to …