Not A Usual Love Story - Part 1

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If I’d never met her, where would I be now? I’d asked myself that question so often. But of course, it was impossible to answer. So many times a day we make choices that could lead us to entirely different lives. We turn left instead of right, walk rather than take the car, we say yes instead of no. And each time, we shape our futures almost without a care. I had moved to Ireland at the start of the millennium.

I lived there still. Alone now, in a large stone house on the west coast, with a wide and impressive view across Mulranny

Bay towards Croagh Patrick Ireland’s ‘holy’ mountain. That great dark rock was often moody and somber, but as a solid and reassuring presence, I also felt it watched over me the way a stern grandparent might watch over a child playing before an open fire. I still didn’t quite know how coming from a tough sink estate, I’d ended up with a mountain on my doorstep.

Many years earlier I had left school with just one low-grade pass in woodwork and with nothing else on offer, I had gone to work in a car factory in the English Midlands. The beginning and end of a career for tens of thousands of men before me. But I’d escaped. And despite the foul air, grime, and sheer boredom of that place, I’d learned a lot there, both good and bad, and some of it had certainly helped me to find my own way in life.

Years had passed since then and today, somehow, I was self-employed and financially very secure. Working from home or wherever I was with my computer, I had major clients in Germany and Scandinavia who were continually offering me work. I could pick and choose which jobs I took. So it wasn't a lack of success or empty hours that were making me unhappy and yet, unhappy, I knew I was. I leaned back in my chair, sighed, and stopped typing up my thoughts. Kate, my daughter, would have laughed to see me sitting in my hotel room on my first night away from home, trying to make sense of myself. Laughed?

Either that or told me off. Most probably both. A few days earlier, she had arrived unexpectedly at the house in Ireland, to find me searching frantically for something, almost in a state of panic. “What have you lost, Dad?” she’d asked, standing among the chaos of the living room. “A photograph”, I had replied, hauling cushions off the sofa and checking underneath, with Kate following along and replacing them as I moved on to the next chair. And then the bookshelves.

And then to rifling through the drawers again. “What photograph?” Kate picked up a few paperback books that I’d just pulled off a shelf and stacked them neatly back in their place. My reply was not much more than a grunt. “Shall I make us both a cup of coffee?” Kate suggested. “Yeah, please”, I said. I sat down heavily, temporarily giving up my search and slumping into an armchair as she went off into the kitchen. I peered through the window as a sudden shaft of sunlight illuminated the dark water of the bay, the Irish sky offering a panoramic mixture of ragged grey clouds and mustard-colored light. It was beautiful here. Often stimulatingly so.

But today it just struck me as melancholic. It was more than just a photo. It was our only photo. I had begun searching for it because I’d given myself some time off the previous evening, rather than begin work on some hugely complicated scaffolding diagram for an important engineering project in Stockholm. It was late and the job was going to be exacting. Long and intense. But there were probably only three or four people in Europe who could handle it.

So my deadlines could be flexible, up to a point. There was no pressure. Not yet. Setting the project to one side, I switched off two of my three monitors and listened to some music on YouTube, letting my thoughts wander as I did so. Then I watched a film. A biopic, set in the 1980s. As soon as it began I knew I ought not to have watched it. It would be painful. Yet I just couldn’t switch it off. I’d felt the inevitable sadness welling up as I watched but tried to ignore it.

Paused the film, got up, poured a glass of whiskey. Told myself not to care, not to be so soft, all that kind of thing. But it was no good. There were too many reasons, too many connections, between the images in that film and events in my own life. So I gave up. I let myself feel sad and sat back in front of the rest of the movie, with the wild dark night outside, filled with black and whispering rain, doing little to alleviate my mood. The film had ended, and then I had gone in search of the photograph. And I hadn’t been able to find it. When had I last seen it?

I couldn’t remember. But I knew I would have put it somewhere safe. It was very precious to me. In the end, I had gone to bed much too late and felt pretty sorry for myself. And it was the next day that Kate had arrived. Because life can be strange like that. Singing to herself tunelessly as she always had, she showed up out of the blue, planning to spend some time with me and visit some of her former school friends who still lived nearby. “So tell me about this photo, then”, she said, putting a mug of coffee down in front of me.

I stared at my coffee for a moment. Searched for a reply. “It’s the only one I have of someone”, I began. “Someone very special. It was taken in a photo booth. You know, those things where you get four pictures for 50p or whatever” Kate began to make a face implying that these days they cost a lot more than 50p, but I cut her short with a quick shake of my head. “No, I know. I know. I’m sure they cost a lot more now.

Anyway, we were out together one day having a great time, and we went into one of those booths with the last of our money. And of course, we picked the wrong option and ended up with a strip of four identical pictures. Later we cut them up so that we each had two, and promised to always keep them. And I’ve always kept mine.

Always. Only now I can’t find it. Them.” Until then, Kate had been standing, but now she sat on the sofa facing me. “Is that the girl you and Mom split up because of? I remember there being a big row about a photo.” I laughed a small laugh and shook my head. “No. Not really, darling. There were lots of things. Mainly she couldn’t settle out here.

It was too isolated for her after the big city.” Kate nodded but said nothing. That bloody film. It had brought so many things back to the surface. Not just the whole breakup with Lisa my ex, and Kate’s mother but it also reminded me that I had made a big mistake back then. I’d left a part of me behind. As if I had needed reminding. For many reasons it had always haunted me, affecting the whole of my life. “Well”, I continued, looking into Kate’s piercing blue eyes. “Yes. A bit. Yes.

That did play a role too, I suppose. The girl in that photo. ” Kate already knew some of it, what had happened and what hadn’t. We’d talked it over before. She had been 16 when Lisa and I had split up. We had tried to keep her out of it as much as possible, but of course, she had picked up on much more than we realized. And after the separation she had spent two more years here with me before moving to her mother’s place and attending university.

All the same, I guess I deliberately understated the role ‘that photo’ had played in our breaking up. In part that was because I didn’t want Kate to feel antagonistic towards the girl. In part because it just wasn’t her fault. One day, when things were already fraught between Lisa and me over of all things a small but unpaid phone bill, she had come across the photograph by chance and turned on me. “Who’s this?”  She had held it out to me.

I shrugged. “It was years ago.” Lisa had then said something else, something wholly inoffensive but feeling guilty, I guess I had nevertheless taken offense, and I had suddenly blurted it all out. From there the ‘phone bill’ row had escalated. I remembered it well.

I had gone over the whole thing countless times. So yes, as I had just told Kate, and had told her before, although there were many other deep-rooted problems in our relationship, it was nevertheless true that the photo which I couldn’t now find was at the heart of the argument that finally drove her mother and me apart. “What was she like?” Kate asked suddenly. “I mean, what did she look like?” By way of answer, I showed her a bit of the film. “She was very much like that,” I said. “Sure. Unsure. Mature, yet so young. And alone too.” I paused the film on one image.

Kate tilted her head to one side. “And was she that pretty?” I smiled. “Yes”. I stopped the film. “And I’ve always known that I should have done more than I did for her,” I said at last, speaking as much to myself as to Kate. “We reached each other. I understood her strengths and weaknesses. I had seen where and how she was vulnerable. But in the end, I failed her. And me too.” I wanted another whiskey, but because Kate was there I didn’t have one.

We talked a little longer. Eventually, I reached the point which I had done before of saying that I ought to go to the UK and revisit some of my old haunts. To try and free myself up a bit more, maybe, for the life I was now living. “Look, Dad”, Kate said at last. “You haven’t been back to Birmingham for the best part of 20 years now, as far as I know. You should go. Stop saying you might and actually do it. Go. Take your laptop.

You can work from any cafe. I can stay here for a week or two and look after the place. You never know, it might help you stop feeling so sad about it or whatever. I’ll even try and find your photo for you assuming it’s still here somewhere.” I hesitated. “Just do it!” she’d insisted. And so, only a few days later I was on a plane to the UK, to take a train for Birmingham and a very comfortable hotel. And it was sitting there, that first evening, a little tired from travel, unable to think of work, that I had tried to get some of my thoughts down in writing. How was it all so long ago?

We first met in 1981, on a cool day in mid-August. I had just turned 18. I was good-looking, with dark eyes and thick dark hair. At the time I was seeing a girl, but we were going nowhere. I knew that was largely down to me.

I had a public face, a persona, which girls found very attractive. Outgoing, talkative, with an almost arrogant charm. That was how I appeared. I dated any girl, every girl, as and when I chose. But in private, once we were alone together, I was much less sure of myself. Quieter.

More reserved. Shy really. And that, I knew – but couldn’t easily change was less attractive. We were teenagers, and life was supposed to be fun. Back then, I was still living in Birmingham, my home city. But on that day, a day I will never forget, I was in London, on a dreary work-related visit to the southeast, traveling on a local train slowly making its way back into the city center.

Then at some anonymous suburban station, voices caught my attention and I looked up from my book to see a group of punks or something on the platform. They were just talking, laughing. Fooling around a little. Doing nothing in particular. I watched them for a few seconds, focusing mainly on a slender girl with strikingly blonde hair and a short pink mohair jumper. She did a little dance and seemed to be making all the others laugh.

For some reason, I found it impossible to even look at her without smiling. Then I went back to my reading: ‘There are moments in life that are given to us. Moments where we can make a choice. There is much more to the world than we realize, and those moments should be treated with special care when they do arrive. They are often crossroads or junctions.

A clear choice between action and inaction. Sometimes mundane. Sometimes and often, and we do not see it one of them will be very precious. A chance to change a whole life. To act or not to act. If only we make the right decision, we might be able to change a whole story.’ Suddenly, just as the train was about to leave, someone jumped on board, opened the door right next to me, and then dropped into the seat directly opposite.

That felt a little odd. It was one of those open carriages with lots of woodwork and as many doors as there were windows. Strong smells of dust and warm moquette. But the train was almost empty too, so there was no need for them to sit so close. And as we moved off, I half looked up. It was that same girl.

Other than the pink jumper, she was mostly wearing black. She had also scattered a half dozen glossy magazines on the seat next to her. Then, once again, I returned to my book. What happened next? A misunderstanding. That was all. The train slowed down for the next station and I felt a strange sensation.

I didn’t look up, because I could tell what it was. And I was embarrassed by it. I even felt myself blushing. It was the girl's opposite. She appeared to be periodically rubbing her shoe against mine, against my boot. The train stopped. And then she did it again. Very lightly, but to me at least it was quite definite she pressed her shoe against mine. I tried to ignore it.

Sure, it wasn’t much, but it wasn’t the kind of thing most strangers did on a train. Then it happened once more. Still, I didn’t look up. At least, not fully. But I did glance over the top of my book, past the words I was no longer able to read or think about, and notice that she was wearing a longish, black, tight-fitting skirt and leather high heels.

I guess because it was daytime and August, albeit a cool day, those clothes surprised me. And maybe that was why I looked at her legs for longer than I ought to have done, as she later assured me I had. In any case, from her, I went back to staring at the pages of my book, turning them slowly to make it look as if I was reading. Not sure what to think. I hoped that staying quiet would make her stop. The train moved off. And then it happened again.

I didn’t know what to do now. Should I say something? I’d never had anyone sit opposite me and do that before, and it felt strange. Why would she keep doing that? As we approached the more urban parts of London, I glanced out of the window, first to my side and then across her to the other window, as people do, by way of an excuse so I could look at her without being too obvious. Not obvious? Well, that’s what we tell ourselves.

Oh. Fuck. I don’t know why, but I hadn’t expected her to be so attractive. There was not only the startling bleached blonde hair, which I’d always loved, but above night-club-red lipstick, she had high, fine cheekbones which gave her an almost sculpted appearance, and narrow almond-shaped eyes, outlined heavily with eyeliner, the lashes darkened to black with mascara.

There was a coldness in that face too, yet at the same time, a vibrancy, a liveliness that bordered on the insolent. I could see all that immediately. But there was also something else there that I couldn’t place. Not then. Nor could I study her for too long, because those almond eyes flashed a sudden glance at me and a bright smile passed across her face.

I couldn’t tell what color those narrowed eyes were, but I could see that they sparkled, that they shone. I turned back to my book. The train stopped again. And we were stuck at another nondescript station for quite a long while. I knew the girl was watching me now. I could feel her gaze on me. Then she lit a cigarette, took a few drags on it, and seemed to blow the smoke straight at me. “Ooo, sorry, is that bothering you?”, she said immediately.

The accent was a little strange, but where exactly? I couldn’t place it at first. It was also, somehow, not an ordinary girl’s voice. “Nah”, I said, making myself smile at her. “It’s fine. Really. I smoke myself sometimes.” “Mmm”, she said quietly. “I thought it might be bothering you. Sorry.” I didn’t reply. And she picked up one of her magazines and, very quietly, began humming to herself as she flicked through it. Maybe even singing a little.

Then she tossed the magazine back down onto her seat. “People can be rude like that, though, can’t they? With smoke.” She spoke quickly. The voice was nervous and I found myself watching her mouth, and those very red lips. “Sorry”, she said again. With a shy but wide smile. “I am. I’m sorry.” That was it! There, in that final apology. That was when I realized. Those few extra words. They had given it away. The something about her.

The something about her face. About her body language. About her movement. Everything. We made proper eye contact for the first time and I froze as we did so. The girl opposite me wasn’t a girl. She was a boy! That was what I’d finally picked up from that last ‘sorry’. She was a boy. Maybe my age. Maybe a little younger. It was hard to be sure.

I saw all that and I guess it shocked me. It must have done, because I wanted to speak but couldn’t open my mouth and get any words out. But there must have been an expression of some kind on my face. By way of response, she smiled at me again. She knew that I knew she was a boy. But it was a gentle smile, with no hostility in it. Her face may have been finely chiseled and almost perfect, but there was something very gentle in there too. Definitely.

And yet... and yet... also something quite deliberately provocative.  “You’re not from round here, are you?”, she asked. He asked. “Erm no”, I replied, the words coming out by themselves. “No, I’m not. I’m from Birmingham.” “Mmm”, he said, smiling another quick smile at me and fanning a cloud of blue smoke out the window with a lively flourish of one hand. “I could tell. I could. Your accent.” He pinched a small piece of tobacco from his upper lip.

Then the train finally started up again. “I am. I’m more or less from around here. Well. I am. And I’m not. Not really.” I didn’t know what to do. What to say. Nor what to feel. And, at first, I told myself that it was just out of politeness that I kept the conversation going, “Oh, whereabouts are you from, then?” He waved the cigarette a little.

Another flourish of the hand. “Here. I live in London.” He glanced out of the window. Then back at me. Straight into my eyes. “No. Guildford originally. So I’m not really from around here either. But I do live in London now.” I looked again at his face. Bleached blonde hair, challenging red lipstick, boy or not, I could hardly take my eyes off him. He was stunning.