Remedy at the back of theirs. Not very tantric.’
I looked at the clock on his bedside table. It was ten minutes to ten on New Year’s Eve and I already knew that Jay Fairport was one of the best things that had ever happened to me. We had already covered a lot of ground: why Stuart Tovey took his brother’s Ritalin to help him revise for science tests; how dogs and wolves share almost 99 per cent of the same genes; why waves in the Pacific were better for surfing than those in the Atlantic; how my recently acquired best friend at school, Marnie Hall, fancied his brother, Marley; whether it was better to be a good person who has done a bad thing or a bad person who has done a good thing.
I
had been in his bedroom for one hour and forty-seven minutes but it seemed like five minutes, and yet it felt as though we had known each other for years. I understood why physicists argue that time doesn’t exist. I thought about how we might have missed this moment if I hadn’t been freezing in my skirt and boots because Luke had thrown snowballs at me on the way through their garden. If I had gone outside with the others for a snowball fight instead of accepting Jay’s offer to go and watch series two of
Breaking Bad
we might never have got to know each other.
‘Life is really random,’ he said, and I wondered if he could actually read my mind.
Even a couple of weeks later, I could almost make myself cry thinking about the possibility that our paths might never have crossed. I regretted the six weeks that we had been living next door to each other, travelling on the same bus to school and getting on and off at the same stop without talking to each other. I tried to calculate the lost hours. I wondered why we had never spoken before when the pull towards each other was so irresistible.
We finished the cigarette. Jay slammed the window shut and carried his laptop over to the bed. He kicked a pair of crumpled underpants under his bed and I knew that this was all unplanned. He settled down cross-legged on a pillow and the springs of the mattress shrieked. There was a wooden box beside the bed that acted as a table, and I recognized the paraphernalia of
teenage boy, the spot cream, the crumpled tissues, the overlapping circular stains from coffee mugs like the potato prints that Ben used to do. He smoothed the duvet and plumped the pillows beside him and indicated that I should come and sit next to him. Apart from my brothers’, I had never sat on a boy’s bed before. This was his kingdom and I was being asked to enter it. I must have hesitated.
‘You can keep your boots on,’ he said, in case this was my dilemma. Then he added, ‘The sheets are clean,’ as if I might be worried about sitting on a tiny damp patch of sperm, which I was actually, because girls don’t make as much mess. I remembered Mum saying something about how if you feel uncomfortable with someone you should mimic their body language so I sat down cross-legged on the throne of pillows beside him.
‘Will you listen to something?’ he asked.
‘Sure,’ I said.
‘I mean really listen and tell me what you think. You can close your eyes if you like.’
I nodded. A piece of music started playing. I didn’t recognize it. The first part was instrumental. A guitar, some drums in the background and sad strings, possibly cellos. I closed my eyes, glad to have something to focus on so I didn’t think about our proximity. A man began singing. I could hear the lyrics clearly. It started slowly. The first verse was about a man walking blindly through a wood. He was lost but unsure if he wanted anyone to find him. He wondered if he should give love a chance
to drive out his darkness. The singer had a mournful, gravelly voice. The bass guitar and drums built up in layers to the chorus, angry and passionate, but catchy, like something Deaf Havana might do.
You are the best of times. You are the worst of times.
And I know if you show me my better self then you
I looked at the clock on his bedside table. It was ten minutes to ten on New Year’s Eve and I already knew that Jay Fairport was one of the best things that had ever happened to me. We had already covered a lot of ground: why Stuart Tovey took his brother’s Ritalin to help him revise for science tests; how dogs and wolves share almost 99 per cent of the same genes; why waves in the Pacific were better for surfing than those in the Atlantic; how my recently acquired best friend at school, Marnie Hall, fancied his brother, Marley; whether it was better to be a good person who has done a bad thing or a bad person who has done a good thing.
I
had been in his bedroom for one hour and forty-seven minutes but it seemed like five minutes, and yet it felt as though we had known each other for years. I understood why physicists argue that time doesn’t exist. I thought about how we might have missed this moment if I hadn’t been freezing in my skirt and boots because Luke had thrown snowballs at me on the way through their garden. If I had gone outside with the others for a snowball fight instead of accepting Jay’s offer to go and watch series two of
Breaking Bad
we might never have got to know each other.
‘Life is really random,’ he said, and I wondered if he could actually read my mind.
Even a couple of weeks later, I could almost make myself cry thinking about the possibility that our paths might never have crossed. I regretted the six weeks that we had been living next door to each other, travelling on the same bus to school and getting on and off at the same stop without talking to each other. I tried to calculate the lost hours. I wondered why we had never spoken before when the pull towards each other was so irresistible.
We finished the cigarette. Jay slammed the window shut and carried his laptop over to the bed. He kicked a pair of crumpled underpants under his bed and I knew that this was all unplanned. He settled down cross-legged on a pillow and the springs of the mattress shrieked. There was a wooden box beside the bed that acted as a table, and I recognized the paraphernalia of
teenage boy, the spot cream, the crumpled tissues, the overlapping circular stains from coffee mugs like the potato prints that Ben used to do. He smoothed the duvet and plumped the pillows beside him and indicated that I should come and sit next to him. Apart from my brothers’, I had never sat on a boy’s bed before. This was his kingdom and I was being asked to enter it. I must have hesitated.
‘You can keep your boots on,’ he said, in case this was my dilemma. Then he added, ‘The sheets are clean,’ as if I might be worried about sitting on a tiny damp patch of sperm, which I was actually, because girls don’t make as much mess. I remembered Mum saying something about how if you feel uncomfortable with someone you should mimic their body language so I sat down cross-legged on the throne of pillows beside him.
‘Will you listen to something?’ he asked.
‘Sure,’ I said.
‘I mean really listen and tell me what you think. You can close your eyes if you like.’
I nodded. A piece of music started playing. I didn’t recognize it. The first part was instrumental. A guitar, some drums in the background and sad strings, possibly cellos. I closed my eyes, glad to have something to focus on so I didn’t think about our proximity. A man began singing. I could hear the lyrics clearly. It started slowly. The first verse was about a man walking blindly through a wood. He was lost but unsure if he wanted anyone to find him. He wondered if he should give love a chance
to drive out his darkness. The singer had a mournful, gravelly voice. The bass guitar and drums built up in layers to the chorus, angry and passionate, but catchy, like something Deaf Havana might do.
You are the best of times. You are the worst of times.
And I know if you show me my better self then you
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