Rush
by Gemma Corden.
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I was peering over the edge of nightfall, gazing at the traffic on the motorway whooshing almost silently under the bridge below me, when I heard the soft pad of canvas shoes on tarmac. There she was, walking towards me, the door of her stationary red Renault Clio wide open. My mouth too gaped in surprise. I closed it for fear she would float in like a moth.
This was the first time I’d been alone with her, ever, in our 6 year history.
I was in love with her, and married to her sister.
She wafted over like some hazy grown-up ex-Lolita, siren red lipstick the only remnant of her somewhat chequered past life.
“Hello Oliver.” said the lipstick, surprised.
I detached my eyes from her mouth. “Jasmine! Hello!” I bellowed like a ham actor, all exclamation marks. A pasty-faced jogger on the other side of the road turned to look at us. I feared he was a member of the thought police, and felt immediately guilty. “Fancy seeing you here!” I continued to shout.
She laughed gently, as she does. “You’re not going to jump, are you?”
I pondered this. “No, I can’t say I have the urge. I walk often around here, actually. It’s a good spot for dog walking.”
“How is Bergerac?”
“He died.”
“Oh. I am sorry to hear that Ollie.” She sounded genuinely sad. I heard a few sentimental tears catch in her throat. “How long has it been since I last saw you, then?”
“Oh, I didn’t know - about a year, maybe?” It was 372 days exactly.
“Gosh. Time flies, doesn’t it…”
She was wearing the same Pulp t-shirt and dark green beanie hat she always wore. The hairs on her arms were on edge. It was as if no time had passed at all since I had last seen her on that god-awful night - blight on my pointless existence.
“I went to Bergerac, once.” She said, distractedly.
“Oh really? Was that with Philip?” Husband and pompous Porsche-driving bastard. “Yes.”
Bastard, my eyes said. Time's funny isn't it? And I don't mean funny ha ha. It's like one of those friends you're not quite sure about. Maybe friend is taking it a bit too far - an acquaintance, the kind who never fully reveals themselves. Thinking about it now, as I find myself doing above the rush of traffic, staring my last chance in the face - the reason I've never seen eye to eye with time is because I just can't see myself having a future with time. There are no long-term relationship prospects there. This is probably why I find it impossible to make any kind of life-affirming decisions. My wife does all that for me.
“We’re moving to Portugal, did you know?” she cut into my head.
Oh, I knew all right. That bastard, taking her away from me.
“Yes, Joanne told me.” I’d married the wrong woman. “Best of luck.”
“Thank you.” She smiled, tucking her hair behind one ear.
“When do you leave?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed, making a mental note to take this up with fate at some point. “Well, this is good timing isn’t it!” I was stricken with the motion of the remaining seconds zooming past my ears like bullets. Tell her how you feel, Oliver, try again. As ever, the time seemed to rush past as it does whenever I’m with this woman, just like the cars below us. There's never enough. It's rushing again now. And, again, I found myself unable to make a decision. If only my wife was here...oh no, hang on...
“I remember the last time I saw you, now.” I heard her saying. “If I’m honest,” she blushed “I hadn’t forgotten.”
My heart was ready to burst through my chest and escape the impending embarrassment. “It was at our New Year’s Eve party” she continued.
I think we can safely say, I’d had a little too much to drink. The intoxication of the wine and her perfume that lingered over the dinner table like a dream had convinced me of the fact that that was the night. I had to tell her that I loved her. I would leave my wife for her. Sisters forgive each other. Everything would be wonderful.
I was giving myself a pep talk in the bathroom mirror when I heard a body push against the locked door.
“Hello?!” I slurred.
“Oh sorry Ol.” It was she. “I’ve got to get some towels, George’s walked into the punch bowl.”
My mind raced. “I’ll be out in a second!” I called over-casually.
I had the answer. I would write I LOVE YOU, loud and clear, on the mirror. I exhaled generously onto the glass and scribbled hastily. It all happened so fast. I took a step back and glanced at my masterpiece for a second and yelled “I’m coming out now, Jasmine!”, wrenching open the bathroom door.
She had morphed into him. The bastard. It was utter slapstick. He stared at my declaration with his inquisitive eye.
“I never realised you were that way inclined, Oliver.” He queried, ominously. “I think we better get that mirror cleaned, don’t you?” He guided me with an iron arm to the scene of the crime and watched as I wiped the words away with my sleeve, heart worn there woefully.
“I think we’ve all had a bit too much to drink” He said after I’d finished. “I won’t bring this up again if you don’t...”
“I won’t.” I winced like a naughty schoolboy, hating myself - but mostly hating Philip. I slunk over to the kitchen like a wet blanket in search for more wine, but was accosted by my merry wife in the hallway, who insisted we dance to Sinatra in the living room.
We left shortly afterwards, Joanne hanging off my arm singing carols, and the four of us haven’t been seen in the same room since. Well, there was that one time in Sainsbury’s but that was purely coincidental. I saw Philip whisk Jasmine off down the canned goods aisle as soon as he caught sight of us. As far as I know, relations between the sisters are just as they always have been - but then of course I am a man, and therefore am most likely to have missed the point entirely.
“I know, you know.” Jasmine in her current form said, enigmatically. Oh Christ, I thought.
“Excuse me?” I feigned confusion.
“I know what you did that night.”
“Umm…”I lost any grasp on articulation I may have possessed.
“I know it was meant for me.” There was a tear in her eye. It could have been the November wind that was coming at us from all angles. “I came to get the towels as soon as you and Philip had left, and there it was.” She treated me to that gentle laugh again, “Men don’t make very good cleaners you know.”
I was battling a seesaw of humiliation and jubilation. “I guess not.” I said, not knowing what to say.
She turned to lean over the bridge. “I was pleased.”
My insides somersaulted, the rest of me felt impotent. I remained gob-smacked and let a longer than obligatory pause develop. Jasmine faced me again, blushing furiously. “God, what an awful choice of word! Sorry, I didn’t mean pleased - I meant, er, I meant I thought I felt the same.”
The rumble of wheels on tarmac below drifted up towards us. It felt like a slow caress of the spine.
“I came to find you,” she continued quietly “to tell you I felt the same, but I found you in the arms of your wife - my sister, more importantly - and in the next second I had changed my mind completely. And that was that.” She tucked her hair behind her ear again matter-of-factly and laughed the whole tortuous year off. “Isn’t it funny how time changes everything?”
“Hilarious” I mumbled, numb. A poignant sensation of unsatisfied satisfaction was enveloping my body. The knowledge that she would soon be exiting my life for good compounded my great sense of loss.
“Well, this is awkward.” She said, tugging on her hair again. “I just had to tell you. You know, seems as this is probably the last time I’ll see you. I just want you to know that your words did not go unheard.”
And with that it seemed my grown-up Lolita had nothing more to say, for she pressed herself to me swiftly in some excuse for an embrace and then was gone. The soft pad of canvas shoes on tarmac became softer and softer as she retreated back to the safety of her little red Renault and home in the sun with a man on a good income.
Moments later she drove off into the hum and left me to re-live the past and digest an outcome which was no longer valid. Our one moment alone together had passed it’s expiry date. On the road below, life moved on.
©2007 By Gemma Corden