The Year I Met You (23 page)

For this you are deadly serious. Perhaps emotional even, and I can’t take that.

I chew my toast slowly and swallow. ‘We were both wrong,’ I say, finally. I want to move on.

This isn’t what you want to hear. You are hoping for an apology from me.

‘Well, Jasmine, I was reacting to what
you
said.’

‘Yes, and I accept your apology,’ I say. Why is it I can’t bring myself to apologise to you, when I know that I should?

‘You said some shitty things,’ you say.

‘Have you come here looking for an apology?’

‘No. To apologise.’

I think about it again. ‘Like I said, we were both wrong.’

You stare at me intently while your mind works overtime. You make a decision not to fire yourself at me, for which I’m thankful even though I know I deserve it. I am being horrible. I offer you a little bit more.

‘I was disappointed you let my sister down.’

‘I’m sorry about that. I didn’t think she would be so upset.’

‘She doesn’t break promises. She trusts people easily.’ Unlike me; I don’t trust people at all.

You nod, digest that. ‘You know I didn’t say it could
never
happen, just not in the immediate future.’

‘What are the chances?’

‘Right now it’s looking slim,’ you say, grimly.

I should be thinking of the repercussions of you losing your job, what it will mean for you and your family, not of Heather and her lack of a trip to the station. I have been described as sensitive because of my feelings about Heather, but when it comes to others it seems I am utterly desensitised.

‘Because of what you said, I’m off the drink,’ you say.

I stare at you in surprise. I am surprised more by the fact that I could have said something to influence you, but I’m not at all surprised by the admission you’ve given up drink. Because I don’t believe you. I don’t believe you mean it or that it will happen. It is as though you are a cheating husband and I am numb to your declarations of how you can change. We are, oddly, that comfortable with one another.

‘I really am,’ you say, reading my look perfectly. ‘You were right – what you said about the kids.’

‘Oh please, Matt,’ I say, exasperated. I give up. ‘I wasn’t right about anything. I don’t know you. I don’t know your life.’

‘Actually,’ you stall, as if trying to decide whether to say it or not, ‘you do. You see it every day. You see more than anyone.’

Silence.

‘And you do know me.’ You look at me thoughtfully. ‘I think you think you know me more than you do, and you’re wrong about some things, but that’s just one more thing to prove to someone.’

‘You don’t have to prove anything to me,’ I lie. I wish that I could mean what I say, but I don’t. Every single word that comes out of your mouth I analyse for confirmation that you’re the bad egg I’m convinced you are.

‘Anyway, I want you to take this –’ You hand me the crumpled envelope containing your wife’s letter.

‘You still haven’t read it? Matt!’

‘I can’t,’ you say simply. ‘I don’t want to know what’s in it. I can’t.’

‘Is she speaking to you yet?’

You shake your head.

‘Because she’s said everything she wants to right there, and you’re ignoring it! I don’t understand you.’

‘Read it to me, then.’

‘No! Read it your bloody self.’ I throw it on the coffee table.

‘What if it says she’s never coming back?’

‘Then at least you’ll know. Instead of this … waiting around.’

‘I’m not waiting around. Not any more. I’m going to prove it to her.’

‘Prove what?’

‘Prove myself.’

‘I think you have already. That’s why she left,’ I say this half-joking, thinking you’ll smile, but you don’t.

You sigh. You look at the letter and I think I’ve finally gotten through to you. You pick it up and stand. ‘I’m putting it with the lemons.’

I smile and am glad you can’t see me.

A car pulls up outside your house.

‘Visitor,’ I say, relieved that this conversation has ended and that you will go. My head is spinning and the toast is sitting on top of vodka and cranberry juice, surfing an indigestion wave.

You examine the car from the window, hands on hips, face in a scowl. You are handsome, still. Not that you’re old – you’re in your early forties – but despite your lifestyle, the late nights, alcohol and concoctions of anxiety pills, sleeping pills and whatever else you do, it hasn’t affected you on the outside as much as it should have.

‘I don’t think it’s for me,’ you say, still examining the car. ‘He’s just sitting in the car.’

‘Why didn’t you ever work in TV?’ I ask suddenly. Usually, successful DJs with an audience like yours and a fan base such as yours make the transition, and it occurs to me right now that you are quite handsome, to some people, and TV being TV, handsomeness is as high up on the list as intelligence – often higher.

‘I did,’ you say, turning around, surprised as I am that I’ve asked you a question about yourself, about your life, about your job. ‘About five years ago I had a late-night talk show, a discussion show like on the radio. Wednesday nights, eleven thirty.’

You are looking at me as if I should know this, but I shake my head.

‘We sat around a table with a bunch of people someone else booked, talking about things I wanted to talk about, but not talking about them properly. I packed it in. You can’t say anything on TV. Far more freedom on radio.’

‘Like orgasms to ring in the New Year.’

You sigh and sit down. ‘Women aren’t the only people to talk about things, you know that.’

I’m confused.

‘I have a friend. Let’s call him Joey.’

‘Or we can call him you?’

‘No. Not me.’ And I believe you. ‘One day Joey tells me that he and his wife are having fertility problems. They’ve been married seven years and never had kids. Over a pint one night he tells me that he’s been faking it when they’re in bed. First I ever heard of it. Of a guy doing it, anyway. No harm comes of it when a woman fakes, obviously, but it’s different when it’s a guy and his wife wants kids – then it becomes a problem. He can’t tell her he’s been faking. He’s really got himself backed into a corner, you know? She’s had herself checked out and everything seems okay from her end …’

Really, the way you phrase it is inspiring.

‘So she wanted him to get his thing checked. For fertility. But he didn’t want to because he knows he’s fine. Or presumes he is. So instead of admitting that he’s been faking it most of the time, and that he’d rather do things in bed maybe a different way that would help him, you know, he tells her he doesn’t want kids. Which he does, but he panicked and didn’t know what else to say. Anyway, they broke up. All because he couldn’t tell her.’ You shake your head. ‘Thought that was worth talking about on air.’

‘Well, it is,’ I say. Personally I wouldn’t particularly want to hear five people shouting and arguing over each other on bad phone connections at midnight talking about it, but I can see his point.

‘So Tony has this idea to ring in the New Year with the woman. I said, okay, whatever. I didn’t really care. Thought it was funny. It tied in with the discussion. No big deal.’

‘Who’s Tony?’

‘Producer. He arranged it. Brings this woman into the studio. She starts making sounds down the mic. No, it wasn’t real,’ you say to me. ‘Contrary to tabloid reports. But she was a prostitute. That’s the problem. Tony paid her.’ You shake your head. ‘Jesus. Tony’s fucked as well. He’d been having girlfriend problems for a while. She took off, he’s … well, he’s not doing as well as me.’

‘Sounds to me like a lot of this is Tony’s fault.’

‘No. It’s my show. I should have known what I was doing. To be honest, I was so fucked that night, that whole week, I didn’t know what was going on. I’ve done that plenty of times and gotten away with it, but this time …’ You stand up and look out the window again. ‘What’s this guy doing? He’s just gawking at my house.’

I finally stand up from the couch and look out the window. The car is directly outside your house, the man is peering in. ‘You get many fans?’

‘Yeah, this one girl was so mad about me she moved into the house across the road from me. Redhead. Big tits. Couldn’t get enough of me.’

I actually smile. ‘Maybe he’s waiting for you because he knows you’re not at home.’

‘And how would he know that? Unless he’s been watching me. I’m going over to him.’

I can hear the anger in your voice and I know that this won’t go well.

‘Wait, Matt, he’s getting out of the car.’

You come back to the window and we watch him. He has something in his hand, something black. A camera. He lifts it up and starts taking photos of your house.

‘The little …’

It’s a delayed reaction. The photographer has taken quite a few shots before you realise what’s going on. We watch as he examines them on the camera’s LCD screen, then he moves along the road to get another angle.

‘Don’t do anything stupid, Matt,’ I warn. ‘You’ll only get yourself in more trouble,’ I shout after you, but my advice goes not on deaf ears but on absent ears as you fire yourself out of my house. It’s as though my words have given you an idea, because you do exactly what I cautioned against: you charge at the photographer. He turns and sees you, sees the aggression on your face and smiles with delight at the photo opportunity. But you don’t stop charging. You reach for the camera, grab it, throw it down the road, then you manhandle the photographer into the car. I don’t see it all exactly as it happens, because I’m watching from behind my hands. Besides, something tells me it’s better that there are no witnesses.

As a result of your behaviour, one hour later I am still in my dressing gown and there are three more photographers camped outside your house, facing my house, while you pace up and down my living room, blocking my view of
Diagnosis Murder
and shouting down the phone to your agent. The news that you’ve been fired has been leaked to the press before the station informed you, and they’ve put you on six months’ gardening leave so that you don’t immediately sign up with a rival station – which is what you are ranting about doing.

I know exactly how you feel, but I also see that your wanting to work for another station is purely a way of getting back at your current employers and not because you genuinely want to get back to work. It occurs to me that perhaps taking six months out to think about what your next move should be is the best thing for you. This is an interesting concept, one I had not thought of before. While you feel you are imprisoned, I see opportunity for you. Perhaps I am moving forward.

I am unable to work in my garden because of the photographers outside, though the water fountain is calling me to finish it, and my hangover desperately needs some fresh air. I’d hoped they would leave for a mid-morning snack, but instead one of them disappears and comes back with a carrier bag full of EuroSpar rolls and they all lean against the car and snack outside. I did attempt to go outside while they were taking this break, but as soon as I opened the door, ham, egg, coleslaw and brown paper bags went flying as they discarded their food and grabbed their cameras. Despite my protestations of being a private citizen, they kept snapping at me. Only when they finally realised their memory cards would run out of space and I’d still be on my knees gardening did they eventually stop. However I was feeling too self-conscious to keep working under their gaze, especially given that I don’t know what I’m doing, so I retreated back into the house.

‘Sorry,’ you say when I slam the front door on them all and turn to you, red-faced. When the heavens open for the rest of the day and they all retreat into one car, huddled together with their enormous cameras on their laps, I shout ‘Ha!’ in their faces. ‘I hope your cameras rust!’

You look up from your own silent fury to watch me with amusement.

Dr Jameson calls over, pretending to be annoyed but secretly loving the dilemma and excitement. He wants to discuss the paparazzi problem on our street and what we can do about it. I go upstairs to lie down.

Unusually, my friend Caroline rings and asks if she can call around. I’m surprised to hear from her for two reasons: she works in a bank, repossessing people’s homes and possessions and is never available midweek, and even when she is free she is busy having sex with her new boyfriend who is eight years younger than her and whom she met after discovering her husband had had multiple affairs. I have been happy not to be seeing her, knowing that she is now in a better place. Literally.

She calls over, so excited she is fit to burst, and the only place we can talk is in my bedroom because you are pacing the floor and talking to your solicitor because the paparazzo whose camera you grabbed is threatening to press charges against you for criminal damage. These charges will not stick because he has already made money selling the photos he took. They’ve surfaced on the internet, on a variety of gossip and entertainment websites, and he’s captured you charging at the camera, looking as if you’re going to kill someone. He’s shot you from a low angle, so you look like King Kong with two double chins and a bulging belly, intent on crushing everything in your path.

Dr Jameson and I huddle around the laptop screen to examine them.

‘Jesus fucking Christ,’ you say. ‘I’m glad my kids aren’t there.’

‘My rockery looks nice,’ I say, zooming in on my garden in the background. ‘Wish I’d finished the water fountain though.’ I pout.

I head upstairs before you can do a King Kong on me, and Dr Jameson goes back to watching
Homes Under the Hammer
.

‘That flat looked better before the makeover,’ he says as I leave the room.

‘This house is a madhouse,’ Caroline says, taking the cup of coffee I’ve brought her.

‘Welcome to my new world,’ I say wryly.

‘So, where was I?’

‘You were at the popping candy bit.’

‘Oh yeah.’ Her eyes light up and she resumes the account of her and her new boyfriend’s bedroom shenanigans, which have long since left the bedroom. ‘So anyway,’ she takes a breath when she’s finished, ‘the reason I’m
really
here is because I’ve come up with an amazing business idea … and I want you to work with me on it,’ she squeals. ‘All I have is this mega idea and no clue where to take it. You’ve done this loads of times. Will you do it? Please?’