“Oh, ages. I mean…look at her,” George riffs.
“You two are so cute,” she says.
—
Later, George and I are curled up in bed and, as I’m drifting off to sleep, Miranda sends me a message:Paul and I LOVE him,she enthuses.He’s so great.
I smile at that.
And then she sends a follow-up text:The perfect rebound to take your mind off Davey.
The message strikes a sudden hit of nausea into my stomach and I frown at it. Why would she say that? Why would she suddenly bring that up now? I text her back, to ask her in the least passive-aggressive way possible.
Oh, I didn’t mean it!she texts back, lightning fast.I was joking. I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I said that. He does seem perfect and…Shit, can I call you? I’m so sorry.
No,I text back.I’m in bed. Don’t worry about it. No big deal.
I put my phone down. Beside me, George has drifted off to sleep, his breathing heavy, his chest rising and falling to a slow beat. I blow air out of my cheeks. Now I can’t sleep. I get out of bed slowly, not wanting to wake George, not wanting to have to get into a discussion about why I can’t sleep. What can I tell him? I’ve not mentioned anything about Davey since the day I told George I wasn’t coming on holiday because I’d been dumped.
I’m propelled back toward my phone and I take it from the bedside table into the sitting room, where I scroll down my messages, past the one that Miranda just sent, past messages to and from Mum and Dad, George, Clare, Joan, an ongoing thread with my old uni friends and toward the last communication I had with Davey. He still hasn’t replied to the message I sent in Thailand.
I take the phone with me into the kitchen, turning on the little table lamp in the hall as I go, which casts a faint light into my small kitchen. I roll up the blind and look out into my garden. I’venever done much with the square of concrete, but I decide when the weather’s a bit warmer I might buy some benches, garden cushions, actual pots. I don’t like change for change’s sake, but I think I could bring myself to admit that I’ve been here a few years and I’m not leaving any time soon. I should make this place look nicer; invest a bit of myself into this garden. Summer’s only around the corner. Mad, really, when I think how quickly time has flown since Christmas, since the start of December when Davey misdialed me.
I have this sudden urge to watchA Room with a Viewagain—more for comfort. Maybe I’ll drift off to it. Maybe I won’t. Watching it with Davey might have ruined it for me, actually. I need to find out. My cup of tea in one hand, I turn on the TV with the other, quickly whip the volume down so I don’t wake George, and locate the film, letting it start in the background. I’m restless, so I unlock my phone, intending to look at the news, but it opens on the last screen I was on. The one where I sent a message to Davey telling him I’m with someone, that I’m happy, that I hope he is too, and that I’m still here if he wants to be friends with me. I intend to click off it, open the news, but the message shows Davey is online and he’s typing a message to me. I act on impulse. No time to think. Only to type. I dive straight in:I can see you typing. Whatever it is you write, please hit send this time.
Chapter 15
Davey
I drop mycellphone as though it’s on fire. Shit! She’s been watching me type. For how long? And then I reread her message:please hit send this time.She’s seen me do this before. How many times has Hannah seen me do this? Every time? More than once, that’s for sure. Oh God, I’m mortified. I can’t risk continuing to type. I can’t risk deleting everything I’ve just written, either. Does it say the word “typing” even if all you’re doing is deleting? And I’m sure as hell not hitting send on that outpouring. My phone is still lit up, staring at me from its position on the couch. It’ll lock any second. It’ll show me as being offline. I’ll look like a coward, like I’ve seen her message and chickened out from replying. Which is exactly what I’ve done. Predictably the screen locks. Problem solved. I’ll log back in later and delete that rambling stream of consciousness.
Since Hannah sent me that message I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. I’ve compiled reply after reply, and they go on and on. I tell her everything that’s been happening to me because I want to tell her. And yet I said I’d let her go, and so I don’t hit send. But it feels good. It feels good to let it out, and the more IknowI’m not going to send it to her, the more I type; the more I tell.
I speak to Grant daily. And then there’s Mom and Dad. Dadclenches his jaw, looks like he wants to cry but can’t. Mom does cry. A lot. And then there’s Hannah…so far away and feeling even further each time I think about her. But this way I can tell her how much it hurts, how horrific I look, how the skin on my head is now so smooth it’s softer than my ass, how my eyebrows have almost disappeared, which I did not see coming. And then, because it sounds like I’m a total freak, I delete all of it…every time.
Hannah and I parted as friends. So I should be able to tell her this stuff. But now it all feels so much worse than before. I feel so much worse than before. And I’m angry. I’m kind of angry with her that she’s seen me type and that she’s called me on it. This was really all I had. Writing to her, not sending it, logging in later to stream out yet more crap. And now I can’t. Now I have to stop. Thanks, Hannah. I pick up my phone and throw it, watch as it smashes. The relief I felt as it flew through the air, the satisfaction of watching it fragment from something strong to nothing—like me.
They call testicular cancer, cancer with a little “c,” because the survival rate is pretty high since they finally nailed the dosage of drugs during trials about fifteen years ago. But it’s Chemo with a capital “C.” It’s not the cancer making me feel like this, it’s the chemo. This is why I can’t hit send on those messages. They all contain the story of a healthy, strong man who is being taken down, day by day, and this isn’t the version of me I want Hannah to see.
I don’t even bother to get up and pick up the expensive pieces of my phone. I don’t have the energy. I stare out the window of the living room. Any second now my mom will come in, and she’ll panic about why I’ve done what I’ve just done. So I force myself to get up, all energy zapped from my system. On hands and knees, I begin picking up the pieces of what used to be my phone. Thisdoesn’t look fixable. I can’t even stand up, I’m so tired. I crawl into the kitchen, throw the fistful of phone into the trash, saving only my sim card. Then I crawl into the living room, climb back onto the sofa, breathe deeply, regain my breath, open the laptop next to me, and begin to order a new phone.
Chapter 16
Hannah, March
George and Iare in the garden one Sunday morning. It’s time to introduce him to Joan. I feel about as nervous as I would be introducing him to my mum and dad, and I realize I see Joan as my London mum. It dawns on me that I haven’t told Joan not to mention Davey, not to mention that he’s been messaging but not sending. I don’t know why, but I feel the subject of Davey should not be broached. I didn’t remind Miranda not to do it yesterday, but I haven’t told Miranda what I’ve seen Davey do. I haven’t told her that I’ve messaged him, either.
Regardless, it’s an unwritten rule between friends, isn’t it?—don’t mention other men who’ve once featured in your life. Unless they turned out to be bastards, which Davey…didn’t. But Joan, is she up to speed on things like this? Maybe I’m overthinking it. I pull my phone out of my dressing-gown pocket, quickly type a little note to Joan—Don’t mention Davey—and pocket my phone again. I lean over the fence a little way, see her in the kitchen, notice her glance at her phone as it lights up next to her on the countertop. OK, good, she’s seen it. Joan shakes her head a little, throwing off confusion, and now I feel a little bit stupid. Of course she wasn’t going to mention Davey. Why would she?
Next to me, George glances at his watch.
“You OK?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, planting a kiss on my cheek.
“I still don’t know why you have to do this in your dressing gown?” he asks.
“It’s just…our thing. It’s what Joan and I have always done.”
