This is the first relationship you’ve been in since you two were together, isn’t it?
I guess so, I said. Do you think that’s why it’s weird?
Well, you didn’t really seem to separate that much after you broke up. In the sense that you still spend all your time together.
She was the one who broke up with me.
Nick paused, and when he spoke he sounded like he was smiling curiously. Yes, I know that, he said. Is it relevant?
I rolled my eyes, but I was enjoying him. I put down the cup of tea on the table. Oh I see, I said. I see why you’re calling me, okay.
What?
You want us to have phone sex.
He started laughing. This was the intended effect and I basked in it. He laughed a lot. I know, he said. Classic me. I wanted to tell him about the hospital then, because he was in such a nice mood with me, and he might say consoling things, but I knew it would make the conversation serious. I didn’t like cornering him into having serious conversations. By the way, he said, I saw a girl on the beach today who looked like you.
People are always saying someone looks like me, I said. And then when I see the person it’s always someone plain-looking and I have to pretend not to mind.
Oh, not this woman. This woman was very attractive.
You’re telling me about an attractive stranger you saw, how sweet.
She looked like you! he said. She was probably less hostile, though. Maybe I should have an affair with her instead.
I took a mouthful of tea and swallowed. I felt silly for not replying to his email for so long and grateful that he didn’t dwell on it or act hurt. I asked what he had been doing that day and he told me he was avoiding his parents’ calls and feeling guilty about it.
Is your dad as handsome as you are? I said.
Why, are you thinking about going there? He’s very right-wing. I would point out he’s also still married, but when has that stopped you before?
Oh, that’s nice. Now who’s hostile?
I’m sorry, he said. You’re so right, you should seduce my dad.
Do you think I’m his type?
Oh yeah. In the sense that you greatly resemble my mother, anyway.
I started to laugh. It was a sincere laugh but I still wanted to make sure he would hear it.
That’s a joke, said Nick. Are you laughing there, or weeping? You don’t resemble my mother.
Is your dad actually right-wing or was that a joke too?
Oh no, he’s a real wealth creator. Hates women. Absolutely detests the poor. So you can imagine he loves me, his camp actor son.
I was really laughing then. You’re not camp, I said. You’re aggressively heterosexual. You even have a twenty-one-year-old mistress.
That I think my father would actually approve of. Happily he’ll never know.
I looked around the empty kitchen and said: I cleaned my room today in advance of you getting back from France.
Did you really? I love that. I think this actually counts as phone sex now.
Will you visit me?
After a pause he said: of course. I didn’t feel I had lost him exactly, but I knew he was thinking about something else. Then he said: you sounded really out of it on the phone the other night, were you drunk?
Let’s forget about it.
You’re just not a big person for phone calls usually. You weren’t upset or anything, were you?
I heard something in the background on Nick’s end of the line, and then a little crackling noise. Hello? he called out. A door opened and then I heard Melissa’s voice say: oh, you’re on the phone. Nick said: yeah, give me one second. The door closed again. I said nothing.
I’ll visit you, he said quietly. I have to go, all right?
Sure.
Sorry.
Go ahead, I said. Live your life.
He hung up.
*
The next day, our friend Marianne came back from Brooklyn and told us about all the celebrities she had met. She showed us photographs on her phone over coffee: Brooklyn Bridge, Coney Island, Marianne herself smiling with a blurry man who I privately did not believe was actually Bradley Cooper. Wow, Philip said. Cool, I agreed. Bobbi licked the back of her teaspoon and said nothing.
I was happy to see Marianne again, happy to listen to her problems as if my own life was going exactly how it always went. I asked about her boyfriend Andrew, how he liked his new job, whatever happened with his ex messaging him on Facebook. I boasted to her about Philip’s internship in the agency, how he was going to become a predatory literary agent and make millions, and I could see I was pleasing him. It’s better than the arms trade, he said. Bobbi snorted. Jesus, Philip, is that your gold standard? she said. At least I’m not selling arms?
At this point the conversation slipped away from me. Before I could direct another question toward Marianne, Philip started to ask us about étables. Nick and Melissa were still over there, they weren’t coming back for another two weeks. Bobbi told him we’d had ‘fun’.
Any luck with Nick yet? he asked me.
I stared at him. To Marianne he added: Frances is having an affair with a married man.
No I’m not, I said.
Philip is joking, said Bobbi.
Famous Nick? Marianne said. I want to hear about him.
We’re friends, I said.
But he definitely has a crush, said Philip.
Frances, you temptress, said Marianne. Isn’t he married?
Blissfully, I said.
To change the subject, Bobbi mentioned something about wanting to move out and find an apartment closer to town. Marianne said there was an accommodation crisis, she said she’d heard about it on the news.
And they won’t take students, Marianne said. I’m serious, look at the listings.
You’re moving out? said Philip.
It shouldn’t be legal to say No Students, Marianne said. It’s discrimination.
Where are you looking? I asked. You know we’ll be letting the second bedroom in my place.
Bobbi looked at me and then let out a little laugh.
We could be flatmates, she said. How much?
I’ll talk to my dad, I said.
I hadn’t spoken to my father since I’d visited his house. When I called him after coffee that evening, he answered, sounding relatively sober. I tried to repress the image of the mayonnaise jar, the noise of bluebottles hammering themselves against glass. I wanted to be speaking to someone who lived in a clean house, or someone who was only a voice, whose life I didn’t have to know about. On the phone we talked about the apartment’s second bedroom. He told me his brother had some viewings arranged and I explained that Bobbi was looking for a place.
Who’s this? he said. Who’s Bobbi?
You know Bobbi. We were in school together.
Your friend, is it? Which friend now?
Well, I really only had one friend, I said.
I thought you’d want another girl living with you.
Bobbi is a girl.
Oh, the Lynch girl, is it? he said.