Exciting Times(11)

I wondered what Julian told other women about me.

Madison tried to kiss me. Her tongue tasted cheap, like something from a can.

‘You still haven’t told me if you like girls,’ she said.

I said: ‘There’s lots of things I don’t tell people.’





8

‘Mam thinks there’s a guy,’ said Tom on the phone.

‘Why?’ I said.

‘She says a mother knows and that’s how she knows. Circular, but sure look.’

He told me about his degree. He was studying philosophy without much gusto, but was getting his essays in and going to lectures and everything. A lecturer had told him he was destined for a mid-2.1, and he wasn’t offended like I would have been. Mam kept asking what he’d do after.

‘Listen, I’ve been meaning to tell you,’ I found myself saying. ‘Don’t tell Mam, but there actually is a guy.’

‘Okay.’

‘It’s not serious. But it’s been good so far. He’s posh, though. Not Dublin posh, British posh. He says “shall”.’

‘I’d say you like that,’ Tom said.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Ah now, Ava.’

It was true that Julian conformed with my record. My two ex-boyfriends from home had gone to South Dublin private schools and knew all about rugby. (That they had no personal interest in it only made this a clearer mark of status.) It was the sort of theory I could form very easily about someone else: Ava is drawn to wealthy partners as a means of quieting her class anxieties. In practice, having sex with rich people only heightens her awareness that she herself is not rich, and yet she keeps on doing it.

But it felt robotic to conclude something like that about myself. I couldn’t help feeling it had to be more complex than that.

‘What about you?’ I asked Tom.

‘There’s no one right now,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you if there is.’

‘You always say that. Then three months later, you’re like, oh, there was someone but it’s over now.’

‘I don’t tell you till I know it’s a thing. Then when I do know it’s a thing, we break up.’

‘Do you get a say in it?’

‘Sometimes I’m even the one to do it. But I never see it coming. Self-awareness for you.’

‘You’ve more of it than me,’ I said.

‘No, you’re too self-aware. You can talk yourself into anything. Then there’s no talking you out of it.’

‘Is that why you’ve not said anything about Julian?’

‘Is Julian the Tan?’

‘Don’t call him a Tan.’

‘He’s still a Tan.’

I agreed this was factual.

‘Look,’ Tom said, ‘I can’t tell you what to do.’

I wished he would. My stance amounted to: I am glad Julian does not demand intimacy, and annoyed at him for not offering it. I stay in his apartment for free and complain it’s done strange things to our dynamic. I hate needing him and address this not by taking responsibility for my own happiness but by playing his games, which could equally be my games because I’m unsure who started it.

I wanted to tell someone that and have them say either: Ava, you are being unreasonable, or: Ava, we all bear our crosses but yours has the most nails. Anything but: sounds complicated.

‘I’ll let you go,’ I said.

Tom had more than one person he actually liked seeing.

*

At work I imagined nice things that might happen to me if I were a different person. When I realised I’d been daydreaming, I’d start correctively listing things I disliked about myself. The children wrote essay plans and I thought: flat feet, doughy hands, clumsiness, moral cowardice. When Matthew Yim asked a question, I felt rudely interrupted. The poster opposite said PREPOSITIONS OF MOVEMENT. It had frogs in different locations: on the table, under the table. I thought: pale, hostile to people who have shown me nothing but kindness, probably bad at sex.

In the staffroom the others were talking about adoptive versus biological children. I said: ‘I’d adopt. I wouldn’t inflict my gene pool on anyone.’

‘Aw, don’t say that about yourself!’ said Madison from Texas.

To the list I added: sense of humour not for everyone.

*

Three weeks into December, the day before Julian’s return, I messaged him.

hey so i want to say sorry for how i’ve been treating you. i’m really unnecessarily mean to you and i justify it as socialist praxis when it literally isn’t. i don’t want to call myself a horrible person bc i know i do that so you can’t say it. but i like having you in my life.

I sent it on the balcony. If I threw my phone over the railings, I’d never see if he replied. The patio in front of the lobby looked like a small mosaic tile from overhead. Ant-people played out their personal histories with the same degree of immersion in which I was experiencing mine.

Julian replied a few hours later.

Thanks for the message. I know it can’t have been easy to write. I’ll see you soon.

It could have meant anything, including what it purported to.

I surprised him at the airport. The arrivals section was huge, but his height made him easy to spot. At passport control he had everything ready so as not to waste time. He met my eye from far away. I ran to meet him.