‘Excuse me?’
‘My mug,’ I repeated firmly, trying to ignore the fact that I was 99% certain I’d broken my baby toe. ‘Star Warsmug. Quitefaded. Crack down one side?’
Luca just stared at me as though I’d admitted I wanted to personally commandeer theMillennium Falconand fly it to a galaxy far, far away. When I showed no signs of moving, he ran his fingers through his hair again with an impatient sigh. LikeIwas ruininghisday. Relinquishing his weight on the door he turned, padding barefoot into the kitchen without so much as a backwards glance. I nudged the door further open with my shoe, my eyes roaming hungrily over the familiar details.
Part of me felt relieved it was all still there – the fraying wicker bench by the front door that Joe would stub his toe on every day without fail; the faded circle on the floorboards where our beloved cheese plant, Big Kev, had lived for years, gradually demanding more and more space; the black scuff marks on the wall where Joe used to lean his bike. Proof that our time here together was real. That it had happened. But that comforting familiarity was shattered by the unfamiliar pair of black Nike trainers kicked carelessly to one side, the guitar case leaning against the wall, a pizza box from that place down the road sitting in Joe’s spot on the sofa, the dip in the cushion making the box tilt precariously. I bit the inside of my cheek, tears of a thousand emotions pooling in my eyes at the idea of someone else’s stuff where ours used to be.
I blinked quickly as I heard Luca returning.
‘Is this what you mean?’
He was holding Joe’s mug in one hand. It had been used. The ring of dried coffee residue at the bottom told me as much.
‘You drank out of it?!’ I snatched the mug from his outstretched fingers, hugging it possessively to my chest.
‘Err, yeah? It’s a mug, what else was I supposed to do with it?’
‘It wasn’t yours to use,’ I hissed angrily, my cheeks burning with irritation.
‘Well, excuse me for thinking that something left inmyflatwhen I moved in was fair game,’ he snapped back, his eyes flashing with a similar anger. ‘Take it, I’m more of aStar Trekguy anyway.’
‘Of course you are,’ I snorted, hitching my bag further up my shoulder. That explained so much.
‘As much as I’d love to stand here and enlighten you as to all the reasonsStar Trekis superior, some of us have jobs to get to.’ Luca looked deliberately at his watch as he spoke, then took an intentional step forward, forcing me out into the hall.
‘I have a job too,’ I added pettily, even though he already knew as much. For some reason I wanted to stress that I had at least a modicum of my shit together. But he’d already closed the door in my face.
6
‘OK, that’s it,’ Mum announced mid-way through the following week, snapping shut the library book she’d been pretending to read with a crisp flourish. ‘I can’t just sit by and watch this anymore.’
‘Watch what?’ I frowned, absentmindedly stirring my coffee as I continued staring at the spot in front of the fridge that, until Mum’s arrival twenty minutes ago, Joe had been occupying. The two of us, dancing in the dim glow from the open fridge door, bodies almost but not quite touching as we swayed together, his hand hovering over mine, my head over his shoulder, oblivious to the repetitive beeping of the open fridge door.
‘This. You.’ She gestured in my direction, her hand falling with a frustrated smack on the trouser leg of her dungarees. They were bright yellow denim with little embroidered flowers spilling out the top of the pockets. If positivity had a designated uniform, that would be it.
‘What are you talking about?’ I sighed, a wave of tiredness sweeping over me even though it was only 8 a.m. I’d stayed up too late talking to Joe, hushed whispers under the duvet so Mum wouldn’t hear, like when we were teenagers.
‘Trust me when I say this comes from a place of love, sweetheart, but you look .?.?. well, terrible,’ she admitted, placing her warm hand over mine as though that might soften the blow. I’m not sure if it was the shirt I’d been wearing for threedays straight or the diabolical state of my roots that made her physically wince, but her mouth and eyes puckered tightly at the seams. ‘By the looks of it you’re barely sleeping, I don’t even want to know the last time you showered, and you spend all your time holed up in your bedroom. It’s not healthy.’
I fidgeted in my seat, the creaking wicker giving away my discomfort as I struggled to find the words to tell her this was it. This was my best. Every day I got up, I washed (sometimes), I put on clothes as if I cared what I looked like, I tried to breathe, to live, even though I had absolutely zero desire to do so.
‘This isn’t living, Jenny,’ Mum added softly when I failed to respond. ‘It’s existing at most and, to be honest, you’re barely doing that. Honestly, it pains me to see you like this. Alice and Jacob are worried about you too; they said you barely see them these days?’
I scowled into my lap, misplaced anger bubbling up inside of me at the thought of the three of them conspiring behind my back. I could see the look of concern on Mum’s face, her forehead wrinkled with worry and I reminded myself it was coming, as she said, from a place of love. But it did little to comfort me. If anything, it just reminded me what that felt like – that unconditional, I’d-do-anything-for-you love – and my heart squeezed with memories of the past.
‘I’m fine, Mum,’ I said, plastering a smile on my face but it clearly looked about as fake as it felt.
‘Jenny—’ Mum paused in a way that made me stiffen, ‘—you know, deep down, this isn’t what Joe would want. He’d want you to be happy, to find your joy again. Whoeverthisis—’ she said, gesturing at me, ‘—it isn’t you. It isn’t my Jenny.’
I felt a familiar knot tighten in my stomach the way it always did whenever someone mentioned Joe. The legs of my chair jarred harshly against the linoleum floor as I made to leave, but Mum’s hand on my thigh stopped me.
‘Please, Mum, I can’t do this,’ I whispered, a quivering ball of emotions lodged in the back of my throat, threatening to detonate at any moment. My eyes met hers for the first time since she’d sat down twenty minutes ago, a look of silent understanding passing between us as she simply nodded, her grip loosening.
‘You need to break this cycle, Jenny, try something new.’
I hid my face in Joe’s coffee mug, not having the heart to tell her that I’d had enough change in my life recently, and ‘something new’ was the last thing I wanted. ‘I’m going to a spin class at the gym tonight, you should come!’ Her eyes lit up at the idea.
‘The last time I set foot in a gym was three years ago and it was purely to use their showers when our hot water wasn’t working.’
