going home

I’m lying in bed drinking coffee and dreading another flight and all that goes with it. Soon I’ll have to get up, have a bath, wash my hair, and pack the last of my stuff before checking out and finding something to do until I have to go to the airport. Not much probably: the weatherman said it would be really hot again today.

I couldn’t sleep last night. I was tired, but sleepless, so I turned the television on. There was something called Public Broadcasting – a miracle channel with no horrific advertisements. American TV normally has them every two minutes – it is irritating in the extreme.

It’s so hot even now at six o’clock. I am really looking forward to being somewhere cooler – where I can open a window and feel air coming in. I am looking forward to seeing my sons. There won’t be time to think for a while. Thursday is results day, which will mean an impromptu party for my youngest son and fifty of his closest friends. He only ever does things impromptu – planning is not something he understands – and I will have to walk past every five minutes to make sure none of them have drowned in the pool. Hopefully if there are that many, they will prop each other up – it’s not that big. Last year he did the same, and I had to ban alcohol – they are all such high achievers, and none of the girls looked like they’d slept for a week. I could almost see them floating face down in the water as they trooped past me into the garden.

Anyway – that’s for the day after tomorrow. I’ll miss the peace and quiet of my room in New York, and the noise of the streets, and the smells of the fumes when I open my balcony window. I won’t miss the stench in my corridor. Honestly, until you get to the stairs, I really think there is a dead body behind one of those doors and they just haven’t found it yet. The thing I’ll miss most of all though, is the room I spent the shortest time in – just one night, and one long morning.

The homes of the newly separated – T is so neat it amazes me, but when he explains, it all makes sense – it’s the neatness that comes with the joy of being free of a long shared life started as a mistake and regretted ever since. I know because I have felt the same, and I will do so again before long but this time I won’t fuck it up. The calm emptiness, the clean surfaces, they symbolise the freedom you cherish after the bitterness of moving out – the space to breathe is so precious when you have missed it for so long.

T is making full use of his new space. He looks years younger than the photo I saw. He still has the marks of all the sadness on his face – like me – we are neither of us glowing, healthy people. A bit of botox here, a few sunbed sessions there - that’s not us. He’s still the most attractive man I ever saw, but in a French way perhaps - interesting, with a hint of the disreputable about him which I like a lot. He is very thin, and his hair has hardly lost any of its black. He wears wonderful clothes – he collects old mod designers – Ben Sherman and the like, and he wears his sharp two tone suits to work, to outface the chino uniform of the American office. It’s a battle that makes me laugh. He does everything with joy and he is lovely.

I keep stopping to remember how it was after the night we spent talking. T didn’t sleep at all, and I finally collapsed in his bed for a few hours in the afternoon. I still didn’t have a clue how he felt. I mean, I knew he liked me – we had said all the stuff – asked all the “how do I compare to the emails” questions – given all the right answers, but nothing had happened. It was so frustrating. I didn’t want to be totally direct. I felt so awkward about it. It didn’t diminish in any way how lovely it was just being with him, and I didn’t want to fuck that up, but as time passed I began think that maybe he was just unable to tell me that I didn’t attract him – that he wasn’t saying because he couldn’t bear to hurt me.

Despite that though, there was a feeling – a closeness despite being apart – that wouldn’t go away; so maybe, maybe it wasn’t all over. But it was Saturday night and I was leaving the next day. We did some more smack that night and sat up talking. I felt so close – only inches away – but also miles apart. And the elephant was still there. Then finally, finally - T said he was going to bed. There was a futon in the sitting room, but his bed was clearly for two. Those big unspoken words were a great huge silent space between us.

I honestly didn’t know what I ought to do. I didn’t want to push, or say something crass. I felt stuck for words. I said “would it make you uncomfortable if I slept with you?” God, I felt stupid – like he was a total stranger or something. There was a muffled “no” from the bathroom. I could tell he was as embarrassed as me, but I thought it was the awkwardness that comes with the reluctance to reject someone. I also knew he hadn’t slept for three nights and that we were both off our faces on smack. Not very romantic. It was so difficult.

At least I knew where I was sleeping anyway – and there was no way I was going to keep my clothes on in bed in Las Vegas just for anyone’s fucking sensibilities. T had seen me in every way possible over the years and I wasn’t going to die of heatstroke to protect his modesty or save him any embarrassment. So I took them off and got into bed, and then he got in, and we lay there watching the big fan whirl around above our heads, blowing its delicious breeze on our faces and the thin sheets that covered our bodies. Despite the elephant, it felt so good – it was years since I’d been in bed with someone so comfortable to be with, so I told him, and he took my hand and said he felt the same way, and then he fell asleep, holding my hand, and I did the same a few minutes after. We were both exhausted.

When I woke up, I looked across at his body, and I thought there was a real possibility that we would get to the end of this time and be no nearer to any answers. If it hadn’t meant so much to me, I would have laughed. It was getting to be like a bad situation comedy – one where the script is so unbelievable; it never gets beyond the pilot show. I put my hand on his back and stroked his skin gently. It felt so soft. He didn’t move.

I got out of bed, found a towel, wrapped it around myself, and went upstairs to his kitchen. I worked out his coffee machine and made myself some and took it out onto the balcony to drink it, smoking a cigarette, feeling the metal already burning hot under my bare legs, watching Las Vegas on a Sunday morning.

I thought, “This is fucking ridiculous. I am forty-nine years old. Maybe he just doesn’t fancy me. Maybe he does. Oh help. I don’t know what to do. I could let it carry on. I could stay up here, wait until he wakes,” but somehow I knew if I did, that we would go into leaving mode – showering, dressing, packing – and the moment would be over – the chance of finding out.

I had another cigarette. I am so bad at things like this. It would have been so easy to leave it. Then I thought about time, and how quickly it passes these days, and all our lost opportunities over the years, and all the things we had grown to love and how wonderful it would have been to share them; how fucking stupid it had been to waste all that time and how criminal it would be not to say anything – how much I would hate myself afterwards if I didn’t.

So I took a deep breath, went back downstairs, sat on the edge of the bed, woke him up, and told him so. I said “this is so embarrassing for me – I have never propositioned anyone in my life before” and he smiled and said “yeah, right”. I swear he and Joel must have thought I jumped on men every day of the week, but I never did – they were so wrong. I was the shyest person they knew – and I still am. It’s just unfortunate that T is too. And then T looked at me and said " I love you", and everything was okay – more than okay, and we finally relaxed, and said and did all the other things we hadn’t yet done, and the elephant left the room.