really like you,’ he starts. It’s how this always starts. ‘You’re pretty and you’re smart and you’re funny and you’re kind.’ I nod. All of those things are true. They don’t seem to make me lovable though – too unchill and broken for that. I wait again for the second ‘but’. The ‘but’ that’s been the butt of all my misery my entire adult life. ‘But, to tell you the truth, I’ve not been feeling it …’ he trails off.
I close my eyes. I count to three. I take deep breaths. I let the rejection, once again, soak through me.
He can’t handle the pain he’s caused me. Simon thinks he is a nice guy. Maybe he even is, to women who aren’t me. He’s started scrambling around for modifiers to make himself feel better. ‘You’re great, you’re so great. Last night was just … well … Again, I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s going on with me.’
I manage to look up at him. ‘For fuck’s sake, stop lying.’
He jerks back, his demeanour switching into defensive-mode right away. ‘I’m not!’
‘You are, and it’s boring. Just tell the truth. God.’
‘Look, stop making me into a villain! As I said, I’ve not been totally feeling it, but I thought there was enough there to see where it went. And, well, last night … I’m just not sure I’m the right guy to take on something like that, April, OK? I’m not evil for wanting a normal sex life rather than …’
The word ‘normal’ hits harder than a bullet. It explodes on impact. He doesn’t finish his sentence. He’s made it clear: I’m the problem, not him. He crosses his arms. He can’t physically look at me. Bottom lip stuck out. All ‘look what you made me do’.
I stand. I can’t, I just can’t any more. I will cry I will cry I will cry, but I won’t give Simon the satisfaction of seeing that. ‘Goodbye Simon,’ I say, putting my sandals on with as much dignity as it’s possible to muster.
‘We can still get breakfast,’ he tells the floorboards hollowly.
As I stuff my belongings back into my handbag. I can practically hear him whinging to his mate.
She was acting like I was such a jerk, but I was the one offering to take her out to breakfast! I was the one trying to be mature about the whole thing! Nightmare! She’s just taking whatever happened out on me which is so unfair. I’m not a bad guy. I was just being honest.
Or even worse, he won’t mention me at all. I’m not significant enough.
I bend over, my heart feels like it’s going to tumble out of my mouth. I’m thirsty, and hurting, humiliated, and done.
He doesn’t follow me to the door. He just sits with his face in his hands, concocting a way, I’m sure, to make himself the victim in all this.
‘Have a great life!’ I shout over my shoulder as I leave, wincing as I say it, because it sounds like a line in a really crap movie. I wait for the lift, playing out one last desperate fantasy. Imagining him chasing me out, catching the lift before the doors close, telling me it’s all a big mistake, that he will do anything to have me back. I want him to want me, even though, if I give myself time, I know that I don’t want him. Not really. Not the real him I wasn’t given the time to get to know.
The doors slide open. I step inside. They slide shut, without any chases and dramatic revelations. I pull out my phone, seeing if there’s a message from Simon, telling me to wait.
Instead I have five messages from Megan:
Megan: You’ve not come home. IS TONIGHT THE NIGHT?
Megan: What’s sex like? I’ve forgotten.
Megan: I’ve eaten your leftover lasagne. Sorry, but not really. If you didn’t want me to, you should’ve come home tonight and stopped me. You know what I’m like.
Megan: Yes, I’m totally victim blaming you right now.
Megan: I’ve eaten your Gü pudding too …
Even she isn’t able to make me smile. I blink and blink and blink. The lift doors ding open and I’m spat out onto the dirty, littered streets of London on a Saturday morning. I lean against the wall of Simon’s new-build beside a couple of pigeons pecking at a patch of splattered vomit, and watch the buses lurch past, joggers jog, and cyclists cycle, and wait a moment or two before I reply. These are my