‘No I fucking didn’t!’
‘Laura! Keep your voice down,’ I say, casting a glance across the café to see if any management are in the area.
‘You said they were being open and honest with each other about everything,’ says Mal. He looks awkward. Genuinely upset. Laura glares at me again.
‘She and you weren’t even together at the time anyway. I don’t know why she thinks she can get all upset about it if she’d dumped you—’
I shake my head. No, no. I don’t want her turning her fire on you.
Laura turns to Mal. ‘He’s spent his whole life blaming other people for choices he’s made. It’s time he started taking a bit of responsibility.’
‘Fuck off!’ I surprise myself, feeling the shout coming out of me. I catch a tut from a customer at a nearby table. ‘Will you leave me alone? Do you think I want to sit here and listen to all your bullshit? Look at you! Look at your own life for a change and sort that out before you start doling out sage advice to me about mine.’
I think for a moment Laura’s going to laugh as the words ring in the air around us. This is a game, right? Neither of us is really taking this seriously.
She fixes me a stare with her wonky face, and with typical extrovert silence, she suddenly gets up and sweeps off, leaving a big stupid empty space behind.
Making it all about her. Now she’s the one who’s been wronged. So typical.
So here’s me and Mal.
Two bodies adjacent in the same space.
Not looking at each other.
I’m looking at the trolley lined up waiting for customers’ empty trays. I should maybe help the kitchen staff with that, perhaps wheel it through to them.
Mal’s voice comes to me first.
‘She’s about to become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.’
He’s absolutely deadpan.
I snort, lightly.
‘Don’t I know it.’
We sit and just — I don’t know. Here we are. Again.
‘Listen, man,’ he says, ‘she’s only trying to defend me. You know what she’s like.’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m no good at all this, and I say the fucking — the wrong thing. But, I mean, it’s coming from a good place, man. I’m just on the lookout for my mate. I just want to look after him when I see he’s doing a lot of changing.’
I look at him now, and he flicks a nervous glance at me. I’ve never seen him quite like this before.
‘We’ve been through a lot,’ he says. ‘And I mean, it’s true, I should have been a lot better of a mate about your health. You know what it’s like, I like to look after my mates. But I didn’t step up to the mark there. I didn’t know you were having blackouts and all that. I didn’t look after you. Diabetes and everything — it’s serious news. You need to take care of that. Be a little bit strategic, like. But you’re not an easy fucker to tell, you know what I mean?’
‘No, I know. It’s not that bad. I don’t want to be treated any differently than anyone else. I’m not some like major special case.’
Mal nods, reflectively.
‘Just so you know, if I’d thought you’d even wanted telling, I would have told you and made sure you looked after yourself.’
‘I’m fine, I’m fine. I can look after myself. I just need to — not do quite so much shit to my body, you know?’
‘Yeah, of course, man.’
He stirs his feet and contemplates. Maybe he’s waiting for something from me, but I’ve got nothing. I don’t want a scene.
‘There was a moment back there where I thought — you know. We could get a place, move in together. Be a laugh.’
I stare fixedly at my empty cup of Fanta. It sounds kind of pathetic, what’s coming from him now.
‘But you never got back to me when I said it. So I’m thinking, maybe he doesn’t want to be friends any more?’
It’s true, I never did get back to him. But that’s because–
‘It gets pretty lonely when your best mate’s vanished without a trace. That’s no good, man, is it? Disappearing like that overnight.’
As I lie here now, going over that scene after all these years, the danger is I think of his clear eyes and honest intonation, and I think, maybe I had more of an effect than I thought by simply not being around. Maybe you can’t just switch yourself off from people’s lives. Maybe I could be persuaded that he was being reasonable.
But no. No way.
It makes all the difference to be sitting here by the window, looking out at the magnolia tree and the lawn beyond. The robin’s back, flittering around. There’s something deeply comforting about seeing her little eccentric moves.
‘So—’ I say, taking a small sip of water and swallowing it down with some effort, ‘how did it go? Your mum—?’
Amber cannot keep the warm smile from spreading across her pale face.
‘There was standing-room only,’ she says, with glittering eyes. ‘It was really, really moving, Mum would have been totally amazed at how it went.’
‘Ah, Amber, I’m so pleased.’
‘A whole load of people she used to work with came along, and all the people she went to church with, and all her drama friends. And there was this group of men from a place she used to work at like ten years ago, and they were saying to me, Your mum was so proud of you, and she always used to talk about you when she was working with us. People really loved her, you know?’
‘How about your dad? How did he do?’
‘Oh, he did brilliantly. He couldn’t think of a reading, but he stood up there and he spoke in front of all of those people, and he was as brave as anything. He was telling them all about how he and Mum met, and how people didn’t take to him because he was Japanese and she was English, but how she stood by him with all their friends, and won them over, and how he was proud to call them all friends now, and it was just the warmest possible send-off.’
‘Brilliant,’ I say. More water. ‘I’m so chuffed. You made all that happen.’
‘No, it was you. You got me to think about it differently. Thank you.’
‘People can go through their whole lives without rethinking something.’
She goes a bit shy, and — well, so do I. It feels strange to tell someone you’re proud of them. But I am proud. And I’m pleased she thinks I’ve helped.
She smiles, coyly, and begins to gather her things together.
‘I think I’d better get going. We’re planting a tree for Mum this afternoon. I think she would have liked that.’
‘Well, that’s lovely,’ I say.
‘Would you like me to do anything for you — for Mia?’
I look down at my blanket, turn a corner, and inspect the neat edging. Take a sip of water.
‘If you want — you could get your crochet going. Do a yarnbomb.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Do it properly. That would make me really happy.’
Teeth, tongue, tonsils, tastebuds, throat
Teeth.
Tongue.
It’s all mouth. Teeth, tongue, it’s taste. Taste and texture. Taste and touch. Tastebuds. Teeth and tongue, tastebuds, throat, tonsils. All in there together. All T.
So dry. My teeth and tongue now thirsty. They’re tacky and clicking dry. I need a drink. I want to flood my mouth with an ocean of relief.
Grandma: old as her tongue, not as old as her teeth.
Your tastebuds change, don’t they? As you get older. They change. When I was a little boy Grandad gave me a sip of his whisky. Awful, awful. Couldn’t conceive of why anyone would want to drink that. Stomach bile. Awful. I knew that when I grew up I would only eat sweets. When I was old enough to eat what I bloody well wanted. Sweets and cake mix. Couldn’t stomach it now.