Page 74 of Wish You Were Here
I am about to walk away and head home, my tail between my legs, when I decide not to. Why should I let him get awaywith being a cheating arsehole without saying something? Why should men like Brad get away with murder just because of their looks and ridiculous abs? I march across the road, get to the front door of Brad’s building and push the button for his flat.
‘Yeah?’ says Brad after a moment.
‘Hi, Brad, it’s me!’ I say into the intercom, and immediately he sounds flustered.
‘Oh, hi, babe. I didn’t know you were coming over.’
‘I was just in the area. Can you come down here?’
‘I can buzz you in. Just give me five—’
‘Actually, Brad, I need to see you outside now!’ I say with a hint of menace in my voice, and then I add with a softer tone because I don’t want him to get suspicious. ‘I have a surprise for you!’
‘Okaaay,’ says Brad, and then I wait. I don’t really have a plan, other than to shout at him, and call him some quite undignified names in public, but when he appears in the same towel as before, something happens inside me and I know exactly what I am going to do. What I must do for women everywhere. For me, Jess and especially poor old Caroline.
‘Hey, babe, how ya going’?’
‘Actually, not great, mate. I just saw you with that girl.’
‘Girl? What girl?’ says Brad, but even he can’t muster up enough balls to sound convincing. ‘It was just a one-time thing, babe. I’m sorry. I promise it won’t happen again. You’re the only girl for me.’
‘There was me thinking that you and I were exclusive, because you said that, remember? Girlfriend and boyfriend.’
‘Yeah, I know, babe, and I’m sorry. It was just a stupid mistake, that’s all.’
‘I guess Jess was right about you all along, Brad. You are the fucking devil!’
‘I’m not, I just … I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Maybe I’m addicted to sex.’
‘That’s what you’re going with? Sex addict?’ I say in disbelief. ‘Like it’s an actual addiction and you can’t help it, and all you need is someone to understand you.’
‘That’s right. It’s a disease, babe.’
Then he comes towards me, trying to hold my hand, but I’m not falling for it. Instead, I reach down and whip the towel off him. I imagined that he had some underwear underneath or maybe some swimmers, but instead he’s completely naked. His hands immediately go to his penis, trying to cover his modesty, and while he’s doing that, I run behind him, toss the towel inside his building, and then slam the door shut so he’s locked out.
‘Babe! You can’t leave me like this!’ shouts Brad. ‘Babe!’
‘Actually, I can, Brad, and also, don’t call me fucking babe!’
I walk back towards the bus before I head back to Glebe, knowing I don’t have to worry about Brad anymore. I take one last look at him as I am walking away. He’s naked, and some people are laughing, pointing, some are avoiding him, and he doesn’t look like the confident, handsome man who whisked me off my feet. Actually, he looks kind of pathetic.
Brad and I are done, and now I just need to arrange my flight to London. I am terrified, nervous and second-guessing the whole thing, but I keep thinking of Lou lying there on his deathbed, and the thing that keeps coming back to me is that I don’t want to have any regrets. It’s always the thing you hear people say when they are dying. You will be more disappointed by the things you don’t do in life than by the things you did. I don’t want to look back and regret not flying to London because I was afraid. What if it changes my entire life? What if it’s just the beginning of my big love story?
31
Ben
I am on the train heading from London to Cambridge, and during the fifty-minute journey, all I am thinking about is what I am going to say to Jemma when I get there. I know that jumping on a train and going to her parents’ house is very unlike me. It’s spontaneous, reckless and perhaps a terrible idea, but once I made the decision, I knew I had to do something. I needed to act before I changed my mind and chickened out like I always do when it comes to matters of the heart.
When I think back on the first time that Jemma and I broke up, it was essentially because we had different life plans. She asked me to go travelling with her, and maybe if I had, we would have stayed together and been married already. What if I had stayed with Natalie Hartman before I even dated Jemma? Natalie was amazing, but I got cold feet and ended it before it got too serious. My entire life has been a catalogue of relationships where I have been too afraid to commit, adapt, or in the case of Saffy, get out before being attacked with a soft Italian cheese. It has been one mistake after another, and so it’s no wonder I am in the situation I am now, but something Will said made everything click together in my mind. For once, I just listened to my heart without letting my head get in the way with its million ‘what if’ scenarios, questions about the practicality of the situationand a hundred ways in which following my heart would lead to financial ruin and emotional heartbreak. I simply listened, and my heart spoke to me.
I walk from the train station to Jemma’s parents’ house and before long I am standing outside a pretty double-fronted Victorian terrace on a gorgeous tree-lined road. Memories from nine years ago come flooding back to me. I message Jemma that I’m outside and I wait. I don’t know exactly what I am going to say, but I care a great deal for Jemma, and I want to do this the right way. After a minute, the front door opens, and a very confused Jemma appears.
‘Benji, what are you doing here? I thought you had work to get done,’ she says with a bright smile, walking out and giving me a kiss. She looks gorgeous, and for a moment my brain tries to start a fight with my heart and begins spiralling with its usual list of demands and questions. I have to tell it to shut the fuck up because I have made a decision, and I need to stick to it.
‘Can we talk?’ I say, and for a second, I see a flicker of doubt and uncertainty flash across her face because she can obviously detect the rising notes of tension in my voice, but before she can respond, two people appear from behind her.
‘Ben!’ says her dad, Gordon. ‘I thought it was you. What are you doing here?’
