Authors: J.E. Warren
Fear and regret set in as she feels the urge to ask Charlie if he thinks it’s a good idea to still call each other from time to time or if he’d allow them to stay friends—if that is even possible.
Would he understand if she sometimes needs to just hear his voice or see his face? Would it be breaking the rules for her to ring late at night to moan about her day or ask him to sing her to sleep?
Charlie speaks up before she can verbalise them all. “I know you probably don’t want to hear this or it’s not going to help, but I do still love you. That’s what drives me crazy, insane even, because I do and it would be easier if I could just forget, pretend not to.”
“I know. Me too.”
“I’m just a mess right now, Anna, you have to understand that. It’s not good for both of us to keep pretending everything’s perfect. Really it’s anything but.”
“You’re right. You deserve better. To be happy.”
“We both deserve to be happy. All we do is argue. I mean, look at Christmas and New Year’s, and even just a few weeks ago. It’s all a mess.”
She silently agrees.
“I know you have no intention of coming back to London and that hurts.”
“I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep anymore, but I do want to come back, soon. I just can’t, not right now.” She feels a hard lump stick in her throat that won’t budge.
He sighs and it’s an all too familiar sound. “It’s been like that for months and even if it hurts to admit it, I really think you’re happy there. Better off.”
“But Charlie—”
“You’ve got a whole new life, and really there’s nothing here for you anymore. Your heart belongs elsewhere.”
And there’s silence and she can hear that he’s trying hard to keep his composure and voice steady. Anna tries to do the same so he won’t hear the tears rise up in her throat.
“I don’t want to have to say any of this, didn’t think I would need to, but a lot has changed.”
As Charlie sighs again, she wants to ask a question even though she knows that she’ll likely find out the answer in the days and weeks to come, once she can’t ask anything of him anymore.
And when it sounds like he’s about to say goodbye, Anna does.
“Charlie, what happens now?”
Charlie
October 18
th
2010
Eight months, two days and twenty-five broken guitar strings later…
Passing the crowds and bracing against the cold October winds on the high street, Charlie wraps his jacket tight and ducks his head into the restaurant to find that Eddie’s already got them a seat right by the window.
“All right, stranger,” he shouts, with a wide grin that Charlie can just about make out from under his familiar bushy beard. “Grabbed myself a drink but didn’t know what you wanted, I’ll call someone over.”
“Cheers dude, think I’m in need of a stiff drink after the day I’ve had.”
Eddie laughs, pulls out a seat. Pats him hard on the back and tosses over a menu as he continues to sip from his tall glass of ale. Charlie settles in and scans it over before a waitress comes to take his order. When he’s regained feeling in his hands, he takes off his jacket, slings it over the chair, and asks Eddie how he’s been.
“Same old, really. Got a few more gigs next week, which is good. You know that little place they were planning on pulling down? That pub on the corner of Brick Lane? Well, they didn’t. Still there.”
“I think I’ve been once or twice, years ago.”
Eddie fumbles in his pocket to retrieve a crumpled flyer, which he hands over. He points proudly to his name written in tiny font at the bottom. Charlie thinks that it’s a good thing he does because otherwise he would have missed it. Still, he’s chuffed for his friend.
“That’s amazing. I’ll have to swing by and check it out.”
“To heckle me, I know.” He laughs loudly and when Charlie’s drink arrives Eddie raises a toast, clinks the top and bottom rim. Tells him it’s his special way of saying cheers—
tits and arse.
“So how’ve you been? How’s work treating you?”
“Not too bad. Rushed off my feet today setting up one of the new studios,” Charlie replies, licking the frothy beer that spills over his glass. “Had to do a long inventory check too because the students are a bunch of kleptomaniacs.”
“Think you can pinch any sweet guitars for me?” Eddie jokes. “I’m in need of a new baritone.”
He shakes his head. “Sorry mate, not going to happen.” Carries on talking about his relatively new job in a local college’s music department and how satisfying it is to be working full time again, with a decent salary.
He pretends to take offence when Eddie sarcastically grumbles that he’s become old and boring, what with his steady job and new flat. “You’ve changed, mate. Gone up in the world. I mean, look at you—that jacket looks like it was made for a forty-year-old, not a guitar-wielding genius-slash-rock star.”
Charlie jokingly gives him a little shove. “Hey, lay off. You know I’ve got to be a bit smart now, for work at least.” He looks down at his black duffel jacket and thinks that even if Eddie is joking, he actually might be right. Maybe.
Because a lot has changed. From his attire to the busy and responsible life he now leads. His luck has turned round in the past few months and he really is thankful. It’s good to finally have a sense of purpose and the means to live above the breadline. Charlie is proud to have gotten to the point where he can say he is a fully functioning, working member of society, with a fancy new jacket and money in his pocket.
And a small
now hiring
advert on the back of a soggy newspaper someone tossed into his guitar case whilst he busked had made it all possible.
“Just pulling your leg, of course. You still don’t look a day over eighteen.”
“Working on my beard, can’t you see?” Charlie says, stroking his stubble. “Probably won’t be long before I’ve got one like yours.”
Eddie puffs out his cheeks and rolls his eyes. “No chance. Been cultivating this bad boy for years.”
“In prep for the Christmas season? Think Selfridges are looking for a new Santa for their winter grotto.” Charlie can’t help but tease his old friend, enjoying the easy, natural banter between them.
Eddie keeps up the friendly goading too. “At least I don’t look like I belong in some cheesy boy band, you ever-youthful-looking prick.”
“All right, you win with that one.” He puts his hands up. “I’m waving the white flag, you bearded bastard.” Raises his glass and knocks it against Eddie’s empty one. “Shall we get another round in before we order food?”
Scratching away at his impressive facial hair, Eddie nods and says he’s starving. Whilst he tosses up the idea of steak versus bangers and mash, Charlie feels a vibration in his jean pocket. He’d forgotten that he’s left his mobile on silent, and he wonders who it might be or if he’ll even be able to find out because he still hadn’t gotten to grips with it yet.
“New phone?” Eddie asks as he taps away at the screen.
“Yeah, it’s a nightmare. Not enough buttons for my liking,” he sighs. “My fingers are completely ruined from years of guitar so the touch screen doesn’t seem to even recognise them.”
“Everyone’s got one these days. You’re just behind the times.”
As he swipes across the screen a message flashes up, as does a small red dot in the corner of it. Charlie’s not sure what he’s supposed to do with it, so he turns a blind eye and concentrates on following the words he’s been sent.
Eddie asks, “Anyone important?”
“Just Emily.” He raises an eyebrow, and then comes the teasing sound of Eddie making sloppy kissing noises against the back of his hand.
“Is this the one with the dog, or piano?” he says between mocking smooches and playful jeering.
“Piano,” Charlie replies. He knows he should really expand on this new potential love interest of his, but he finds that he doesn’t really know what else to say other than Emily, with the long legs, face and blonde hair, was, well, just
nice
.
It seems to be the most appropriate description when he finds himself thinking of her. Actually it was the first word that popped into his mind when a work colleague had introduced them during drinks at a weekly pub quiz night.
Emily, it turned out, was a classically trained pianist with a master’s degree in English Language who rented out a swish flat in Notting Hill. She owns a Siamese cat called Edgar and has a baby grand piano set up that takes pride of place in her living room. Which she’d demonstrated her talents on during their second date when she invited him up for a coffee.
Charlie thinks about how her voice almost matched his, as does her height, and how eloquent she can sound when discussing her job in the charity sector. Emily is interesting and knowledgeable, well-spoken and nice.
Which is exactly how he remembers their first kiss as being too—on her sofa whilst they listened to
Fur Elise
, Beethoven, and Bach as her lips met his in a nice, pleasant embrace. He remembers too how his stomach stayed oddly calm, and how the ground didn’t really move all that much. He chalked up the fact that nothing stirred below his waist to being tired from a long day at work, and not because nice didn’t excite him fully. Even when eventually it did and their kiss progressed to her bedroom, something didn’t quite feel right even though it was, as always,
nice
.
For Charlie it was a first to have to mutter the words, “I’m sorry, it’s not usually like this,” when he couldn’t quite rise to the challenge, not even when Emily had slipped out of her dark silk robe, letting it fall to the floor to reveal her slender naked body.
It took a lot of coaxing and gentle foreplay to push out thoughts of how different her lips and hands felt washing over him. How he was at a complete loss as how best to please her, because he had been so used to the gentle curves of another for so long.
Emily had been sweet about it, and patient. And when he finally managed to cooperate, will himself to stop living in the past and block out memories that so often plagued him, he found that being with her felt pretty good. And warm and soft, but something was missing. It still didn’t quite light his fire, even if it was nice for a moment to have the company, to blow away the cobwebs of loneliness and fall asleep with someone.
It makes Charlie laugh to hear Eddie respond the same way. “Nice, dude.”
“Yeah, she’s nice,” he replies, doesn’t mention how hard it still feels to look for love in another’s eyes, to find it missing beneath messy sheets and limber legs.
“Cool. That’s good. Glad you’re getting back into the swing of things again, pal.”
Charlie shrugs, knows what he’s referring to but can’t even begin to think about it because then he’ll just fall into a rabbit hole full of old feelings and lost memories. He takes another glance at the phone in his palm and thinks that Emily’s actually quite sweet to enquire about his day and to ask if he wants to go for drinks during the week.
Eddie interrupts as he sends back an equally pleasant text reply to say:
That sounds nice.
“Do you know what Thingy’s up to these days? Do you speak to her still?”
Caught off guard, he feels the phone slip from his hand onto the table with a loud thud. “Speak to who? Who’s ‘Thingy’?”
Watching Eddie shift uncomfortably in his seat, eyes cast down as he fiddles with the cutlery set laid out, Charlie asks him again just what he means and waits for the answer.
“Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring it up. Force of habit, not thinking before I speak.”
Charlie feigns ignorance, feels it’s easier to pretend he has no a clue about whom he’s referring to.
“Just wondered if you still spoke, if she’s back in London or not.”
“Why would you want to know that?”
“Just curious, that’s all.”
Charlie can see that Eddie’s clearly trying to hide something because his face lights up in a hot flush. He knows too that it’s more than just innocent curiosity, because Eddie would never drag up the past unless he had good reason to.
It’s weird and unlike him to be bashful and quiet, so he asks him, “Seriously, what’s going on?”
Eddie tries to change the subject, unsuccessfully. “Right I’m starving. Where’s that waitress got to, eh?”
“Why are you acting strange? Why on earth would you be curious to know if
she’s
back here?” His voice wavers and wobbles as he looks his friend straight in the eye, not budging or falling for his change of tack. “Eddie, what’s up?”
“It’s just…I think I saw her, the other day. Waiting for the Tube at Green Park.”
“Who?”
“Anna.”
Charlie thinks there really isn’t enough gravity in the world to hold him down, stop him from falling off balance, because it feels as if the ground had been pulled out from under him without warning. And it takes him a long while to regain composure. When he repeats her name, it feels like a splinter that lingers on his tongue.
Anna, a ghostly reminder of what once was.
He finds himself asking Eddie over and over if he’s certain, sure about what he’s saying. “It can’t have been. It was probably just someone that looked similar. Must be, right?”
Eddie’s looks as if he’s more than aware that Charlie is trying to convince the both of them that it can’t possibly be true.
When the waitress passes by, he raises his arm to ask if they can get the same round again, hands over the pint glasses, and gives Charlie a firm squeeze on the shoulder.
“Looked very much like her, mate. Not very tall. Dark hair, although I think she’s cut it or something. She was wearing a scarf with, what do you call them—”
“Polka dots,” Charlie interjects.
“Yeah, those. She was with a woman. Anna didn’t see me but I am ninety-nine percent sure it was her, buddy.”
Instinctively Charlie finds his hands reaching for his phone to search for her number, only to realise for what must have been the hundredth time that it isn’t there anymore. Because he deleted it a couple of months back. When he thought it was time to try and clear away the cobwebs from his mind and heart, especially since her sparse, polite
how are you
messages ceased to exist past the summer.
“Charlie, what are you doing?” Eddie peers over to see why he’s cursing at the glass screen and jabbing his fingers at it fruitlessly.
“Fuck…I…Do you have her number? Did she ever give it to you?”
“No.”
“Fuck. Well, that’s just great.”
“Why don’t you have it?”
“Because I deleted her number a while back and now I have no way of finding out if it’s true.”
Eddie shakes his head and he mutters under his breath, “Thought you were over her. For good this time.”
“I am…just think I deserve to know if she’s in London again.”
“I can ask Daisy if you want? I still have her number tucked away, she’d probably know,” Eddie offers.
“She’d definitely know. Yes, that’s a great idea. Can you? I know it’s stupid but I’d appreciate it. Really.”