Page 41 of Wish You Were Here
‘In London, yes, no, maybe, I don’t know. It’s statistically unlikely.’
‘So, you’re going to move?’
‘I think I have to, or resign myself to a loveless life of celibacy and porn.’
‘Like I said, you could move here?’
‘But you have Bondi Brad,’ I say, and despite being on our phones, so far away from each other, I can feel the flickering, scintillating tension between us. The thing we don’t really talk about because it’s weird and there is nothing we can do about it. So, we just sort of let it sit there, and do our best to ignore it, until after a moment she says.
‘Only because you’re so far away, Beno.’
Just the fact she says the words makes me excited and I get a momentary head rush, and I know I am going to spend the morning at work researching flight prices and daydreaming about flying to Sydney and seeing her in person, even though I know I won’t do it – absolute fucking coward that I am.
‘Now you’re just being cruel.’
‘Sorry.’
‘It’s okay. It is what it is. You live there, I live here, and—’
‘There’s nothing we can do about it?’
‘Right, exactly.’
‘Unless …’ says Saskia.
‘Unless?’
‘You decide to risk everything for love, Beno?’
Risk everything for love. Is that even possible? It’s definitely not something that is a part of my DNA. I am not a risk-taker by any stretch of the imagination. I make decisions using spreadsheets, best and worst-case scenario role-plays and taking my time to get to the right decision. The idea of jumping on a plane for a girl I have only ever met online feels ridiculous. Plus, I’ve already used all my holiday days this year, so I don’t have any time to take off work.
‘Do you think that’s something I’m capable of?’
‘Do you?’
‘I have no idea. What about you? Would you jump on a plane for love, Sas?’
‘Honestly, I think I would, but at the moment I don’t have a brass razoo to my name.’
‘By which you mean?’
‘I’m skint, Beno. Broke as.’
‘Oh, right,’ I say, laughing, which seems to get rid of some of the sexual tension between us, and we keep talking until eventually I have to get ready for work. We talk, laugh and it’s always so easy with Saskia. She thanks me for listening and tells me she’s feeling so much better, and we both repeat the same phrase we have repeated over and over again since the beginning of our relationship: Wish you were here. But the reality is we aren’t. I don’t have the courage – or the annual leave – to jump on a plane, and she doesn’t have a ‘brass razoo’ to her name. So we are stuck in this weird place, where she is dating Bondi Brad, and I’m searching for love in London, but we both wish things were different.
As predicted, I spend a large portion of my morning checking on the cost of flights to Sydney, and wondering what would happen if I took the time off unpaid. I quickly realise that I don’t have the courage to ask my manager whether this is possible becauseshe is quite scary, and also flights to Sydney over the winter period are ridiculously expensive. I would have to fork out for the flights, plus various sundries, and I wouldn’t get paid for the days I was off. All of this means a week’s holiday to Sydney to visit Saskia, would cost me in the region of three thousand pounds, which I do have in savings, but is a week even enough? What if I go there and we have an incredible connection and it’s clear we are destined to be together, then what? Could I move there? Could she move here? It’s mind-bogglingly difficult to comprehend, and so after a morning of little work and some heavy daydreaming, I head outside to get some lunch.
I leave the office and walk to the nearest branch ofGail’sbecause I love their coffee, and they have some delicious lunchtime options. It’s actually a nice day, windy but warm for the time of the year, and I am almost there when I stop dead in my tracks because standing in front of me in the middle of the pavement is Jemma.
‘It’s you!’ she says.
‘It is me. And it’s you,’ I reply.
‘It is me,’ she says with a huge smile, and then before I know what’s going on she is hugging me, my face is pushed into her hair, which smells like a delicious combination of vanilla and sandalwood, and then we stand in front of each other in complete and utter shock. It has been eight years. Almost nine, actually.
Jemma Shelby is my university girlfriend. We went out for two wonderful years, then university ended and so did we. We had different life goals, felt too young to be tied down and so we took the rather grown-up decision to break-up. I remember how mature and civil it all felt at the time, meeting in the pub, two meals for ten pounds, a couple of drinks and we felt like we had just made the best decision of our lives. Looking back now, we were both clearly out of our fucking minds. It’s the stupidity ofyouth because for some reason, you assume that falling in love is easy, and if one comes and goes, another will be along soon – like London buses. How wrong we were – also like London buses.
‘How are you?’ I say after we have both recovered from the shock of seeing each other.
