Page 49 of The Reboot
He was as handsome as ever, the smattering of freckles across his broad nose and high cheekbones still giving him a boyish air. She studied his face wonderingly. He seemed almost a stranger now, yet she used to kiss that wide mouth, those full, pouty lips. His thick dark hair was cut shorter now; his curls didn’t flop over his forehead in the way she used to love. She could still feel its softness brushing against her fingers.
‘It’s great to see you again, Ella. I was glad to hear from you.’
‘You didn’t think it was weird, me contacting you out of the blue like that?’
‘No, not at all. It was a surprise – a nice one. I’ve often thought about you – considered calling you. But I wasn’t sure how welcome that would be, so I could never get up the nerve.’
She smiled, startled by the admission.
‘So, what are you up to now? Tell me everything.’
She told him about her job at Citizens of the Wild, their dress-up Fridays and karaoke nights, the climbing wall in the break room…
‘Sounds like your worst nightmare.’
‘I know, but I’m actually really enjoying working there, and the people are so nice. It pays well too.’
‘What do you do there?’
She shrugged. ‘A bit of everything – general admin, some book-keeping. I work on marketing a lot, running ad campaigns and managing the company’s social media accounts. It’s interesting.’
‘So you’ve sold your soul to Mammon,’ he said with a smile.
For fuck’s sake! ‘No, I haven’t. There’s no pact with the Devil involved. It’s just a regular office job with regular people that allows me to pay rent and stop living on benefits.’ He’d always done this, she remembered now. When they were students, he’d made a virtue of being broke, not only scrounging money off her, but trying to shame her for having it to give in the first place. For some reason he thought being skint automatically gave him the moral high ground, even if it meant leeching off someone else’s hard work – just as long as he wasn’t the one ‘selling out’. It had always pissed her off.
‘Being sick has given me a different perspective. It’s made me more appreciative of—’
‘The superficial things in life?’
Oh, grow up!Instead of rising to his bait, she said ‘Yeah, maybe it has. Because the superficial things in life can be pretty great – being able to buy some new clothes or to go out for a meal, not having that constant nagging worry about how you’re going to pay your bills or buy your next cup of coffee.’
He wouldn’t know about that, because being broke was just a posture for Andrew. It was something he played at. He had no idea what it was really like to live with that constant background hum of anxiety that intermittently escalated into full-on panic, like intervals on a relentless treadmill. He’d probably never experienced the dizzying feeling when you logged into your bank account and held your breath as you checked the balance. ‘Being high-minded and above all that is a luxury some of us can’t afford.’
Maybe Andrew had done all the growing up he wanted to do. It occurred to her that he’d pursued an academic career partly because he couldn’t let go of the student life he loved. He’d wanted to stay in college so he could carry on as he always had, being nobly skint and flirting with undergraduates.
‘Sorry. I’m not having a go. I’d just hate to see you waste that first-class mind of yours.’
‘I’m not. I do intend to go back and do my PhD eventually.’ She was being unfair. She knew working in academia wasn’t about an unwillingness to grow up. After all, it was what she had wanted for herself. If things had been different, she’d be in the same place he was now. Andrew had always been her biggest supporter, spurring her on to achieve more, encouraging her to keep her eyes on the prize and not let herself get side-tracked from her goals. He’d pushed her to fulfil her potential, and she’d felt like a better version of herself when she was with him.
‘But it’ll be a while before I can afford to do that.’
‘Well, just don’t get too used to the money or you might find it hard to go back to being a student.’
‘It’s not just about the money, though. I want to do something less intense for a while, to ease myself back into work.’
He nodded. ‘That makes sense.’ He took a gulp of coffee.
‘Really? You’re not going to give me grief about it? Even when I took a summer job at Top Shop, you gave me a load of shit about acting in bad faith and being a “slave to the man”.’
‘I was a young idiot, in love with Sartre and the sound of my own voice.’
She smiled, surprised at the self-mockery. Maybe she was wrong, thinking he hadn’t grown up at all. He didn’t use to have that kind of self-awareness.
‘Honestly, sometimes I’ve fantasised about doing that myself – just getting some mindless clerical job for a while and taking a break from all the pressure.’
‘So, what about you? What have you been up to?’
‘Still pounding the hallowed halls of academia. I have a temporary lecturing post and I’m doing a lot of research at the moment on theories of punishment and social control in relation to social media. I’m presenting a paper on it at a symposium next month.’
