Boxing Day.
1997.
Liz. Where do I start? I suppose the end is as good a place as any. After that dreadful first date - sitting in a near empty pub, trying to conjure sparks of conversation out of the void between us whilst simultaneously ignoring her tuts and disapproving glances at my choice of drink, choice of clothes, choice of shoes - I realised that Liz was not the girl I’d hoped she would be, and any fantasies I’d had of ‘romantic beginnings’ quickly gave way to a cast-iron certainty that I never ever wanted to see this girl ever again.
And five years later I’d finally got around to telling her.
On Christmas Day.
Yesterday.
Right after she’d proposed marriage.
I hung my head in shame at the thought of it, and tried very hard to blend into the background. But the Tulip, with its garish Christmas decorations hanging from every horse brass and mock Tudor beam, its antler-wearing bar staff, and ‘Now That’s What I Call Christmas’ thumping out of the juke box, was really only adequate cover if you were a high-spirited festive drinker. Right now I was struggling to look like a drinker, let alone high-spirited or festive. I hadn’t touched the pint in front of me. It was as lonely and dejected as I, which made it all the more annoying when a hand appeared in front of me and swept it away.
“This mine?” asked Alex, bringing the pint to his lips, and I watched as he drained almost two thirds before I could utter a word. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, let out a satisfied belch, and sat down next to me. “Where’s yours?” he asked, after a moment or two. I stared at the odd fleck of melting snow caught in the stubble on his cheeks and the few pathetic strands of damp hair glued to a forehead that had once sported that impressive quiff.
“That was mine!” I said.
“You only bought your own?” asked Alex. “You selfish bastard.”
“I didn’t know how long you’d be, did I!” I exclaimed. “Happy bloody Christmas.”
“Yeah,” said Alex, “you too.” He glanced in the direction of the barmaid and gave her a nod to indicate that one of us required another beer. “Look - can’t stay long. I only got out by volunteering to walk the dog. Poor little sod’s tied up outside. Weren’t you supposed to be spending the day with Liz’s grandmother?” I let out a long, tortured sigh.
“Yes,” I said eventually. Alex stared at the side of my head.
“What? Did she die or something?”
“We broke up.”
“You and Liz’s grandmother?”
“Me and Liz!”
“Oh right,” said Alex, nodding sagely. “Yeah, that can happen. Christmas gets them all worked up. Really brings out the bitch. I broke up with Tracey.” He picked up his glass and drained the remains of the pint.
“You and Tracey broke up?” I asked, turning to face my friend.
“Yeah,” said Alex. “Not this year. Last year.”
“You never told me that,” I said.
“Well, it wasn’t for long.” My eyes narrowed.
“How long?” I asked. Alex curled his bottom lip, his dark eye brows furrowing together whilst he gave this more thought than he’d given anything in the past twenty four hours.
“Couple of hours, maybe.”
“That’s not breaking up!” I said, turning back to face the front. “That’s - a ‘tiff’! Something you and Tracey have on an almost daily basis!”
“Still,” said Alex, “the worst ones happen at Christmas.” I shook my head, then rested it between my hands. Alex slapped me on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “You’ll get home tonight and she’ll be standing on your doorstep, dressed in nothing but a raincoat, holding a four-pack of beers ...” He tailed off and stared into the distance, still holding the empty pint glass in front of him. I let out a single, humourless laugh, as I massaged my eyes with my palms.
“Now you know that isn’t Liz,” I said. Alex frowned, then let out an exaggerated sigh.
“Ok,” he said. “I give in. What the hell happened?”
We'd just left my parents. The first few flakes of snow had started to fall. As I drove, eyes fixed ahead, Liz broke the silence.
“Jason,” she said. “I think we should get married.” Then, when I didn't react in any way, she added: “Or break up.”
Alex’s frown deepened.
“So?” he asked.
“So what?”
“What did you say?”
I blinked. “You know what I said.”
“No I don’t,” said Alex.
“Well, you can probably guess!”
“Let’s assume,” said Alex, “that I can’t.”
I said nothing. Not immediately. Not until I realised that this was it. This was the moment I’d been waiting for, for five years.
“Then we should break up,” I said.
The rest of the journey felt like a bad dream. I stared forward, gripping the wheel, mesmerised by the way the flakes swarmed in huge silent clumps, right before they rushed at the windscreen. Rushed at me. Occasionally I'd steal a glance at Liz, sitting there with a hand to her mouth, her sleek jet black hair shielding the side of her face. Every now and then her body would jolt and shake as if someone in the waking world was using a defibrillator to bring her back from this nightmare.
And when we finally got to her place, I switched off the engine and we sat in the car for what seemed like a lifetime.
“Want to come in?” she asked eventually. Just as she had done a million times before.
“No,” I said, “No, I think I ought to make a move.”
“Jason Smith!” said Liz, still facing forwards but raising a good inch and half in her seat. “I believe you owe me an explanation!”
“Ok then,” I said
“Fine!” said Liz, getting out of the car and slamming the passenger door behind her. I watched as she marched up to the communal entrance of her flat and started attacking the door with her key. Then I put my hands back on the wheel and took half a dozen deep breaths.
“You didn’t go in?” asked Alex. I waited for a moment or two whilst the barmaid put two fresh pints before us. Alex dug around in his pocket for some change, and whilst he did so I handed her a five pound note.
“Of course I went in,” I said, once the barmaid had wandered back to the till.
“Are you mad?”
“What was I supposed to do?”
“Drive home!”
“She’d have only phoned!”
“Unplug it.”
“- Or come round!”
“Change the locks!”
“In the middle of the night? On Christmas Day?” Alex raised a finger, but when no further words of wisdom were forthcoming, he lowered it, picked up his pint, and brought it to his lips.
By the time I'd followed her in, put down the bags, removed my coat and hung it on my allocated hook, Liz was in the kitchen. And for the first time in many months, possibly years, I took a good look at my now ex-girlfriend.
Only now did I notice she was wearing one of my sweaters. And though it was gigantic on her petite frame, it looked good on her. Certainly better than it did on me, although any hint of a bosom was lost within its deep woollen folds. Still, I liked the way her hair fell long and straight to the centre of her back, and though I’d long since given up on seeing her in some sort of skirt or dress, those skinny jeans were very flattering. I could almost fancy her if she wasn't – well, if she wasn’t Liz.
“So, that’s it then?” she asked, as I walked into the kitchen. She was putting teabags in mugs in much the same way someone might load a gun.
“What do you want me to say?” I asked. She stopped what she was doing and turned to face me, one hand perched high on her hip, the other gripping the edge of the kitchen worktop like she might break off a chunk and use it as a blunt instrument.
“I want to know why you want to break up!” For a moment I didn’t know what to say. It hadn’t occurred to me that this was something I still ‘wanted’ – I’d assumed the deal was done.
“Because ... you gave me a choice,” I said.
“But you didn’t even have to think about it,” said Liz. “It was like your mind was already made up.” I said nothing. “It was, wasn’t it!” continued Liz, but all I could do was shrug. She turned back to the cups, reached for the kettle, then thought better of it. “How long?” she asked.
“A while,” I said.
“What - a week? A month? A year?” My mouth opened, but when no words came out, I snapped it closed. Liz frowned. “Longer?” she asked. I took a deep breath, then blew it out through puffed out cheeks, and somehow that told her everything she needed to know. “Jason! That doesn’t make any sense! You can't have spent the whole of our relationship waiting for the right moment to break up!”
“I wasn’t,” I said. “I was ...”
“What?”
“Waiting for things ... to get ... better.”
“Better? What does ‘better’ mean? How can our relationship get any better? I love you, you love me – at least I thought you did. We get on with each other. We like the same things, sort of. I cook. I put up with your mess. We don’t even argue that much! I don’t see what I could do to make it ‘better’! Other than magically transform into bloody Kylie, of course!”
“Don’t be silly,” I muttered, but the blood was already rushing to my cheeks. Liz stood there. Her jaw clamped shut, her lips thinned, her eyes flickered with rage. Then she pushed past me and marched out of the kitchen. A second or two later I heard the sound of her bedroom door slam with such force the whole flat shook.
Alex shook his head.
“You should have dumped her years ago,” he said.
“Probably. But I didn’t want it to end that way. This way.” Alex’s face contorted into a mixture of confusion and disbelief, like I’d just spouted the most absurd twaddle he’d ever heard.
“How did you expect it to end?” he asked.
“I dunno. I kinda hoped that she’d meet someone else.”
“That’s pathetic,” said Alex, shaking his head again. “That was never gonna happen. She’d pegged you for a keeper right from the start.” I turned and gave Alex a long hard look.
“She didn’t even like me at the start,” I said.
“Probably not,” said Alex, working on his drink, “but she saw potential, and thought she could change you. Women think like that. That’s why we’re such a fucking disappointment when we stay exactly the same.”
“That’s just cynicism,” I said.
Alex shrugged. “It’s true,” he said, and drained his second pint. I turned back and looked at mine, still untouched. I picked it up and put in front of my friend. Alex took it without question. “So?” he asked. “Then what?”
I sat on the floor in the hallway with my back against the bedroom door. I’d given up trying to continue our conversation, and the various sounds of Liz punching pillows or sobbing into them had long since stopped. For all I knew, Liz had climbed out her bedroom window and was slashing my car’s tyres, whilst I sat holding the watch she had given me for Christmas, watching the seconds tick by.
“Are you still there?” she said eventually.
“Yes.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Of course,” I said.
“If it's not me, just what is it that you do want, Jason Smith?”
I said nothing for a moment. “I dunno,” I lied. “I’m really sorry.”
“Jason,” she said after a moment. “Just leave.”
I crunched through the fresh snow to the car and somehow summoned the courage to glance up at her flat, just in time to see her step away from her window and draw the curtains.
And that was it. Five years of my life. With Liz. Over.
“Stupid,” said Alex. I looked over my shoulder to see if Alex had been talking to someone else, but the revellers behind me had their backs to us.
“What's stupid?” I asked. He stared back at me for a moment, then shook his head.
“Mate, I know I’m your best friend and everything, but when it comes to women, you really don’t have to be a genius to know what you want.”
“How can you say that?” I asked. “I’m not even sure I know what I want!”
“Don’t talk crap. It’s bleedin’ obvious,” said Alex. “Your problem is that as soon as you’re single you lose focus and take the first thing that’s on offer. And five years later you find yourself in this mess. To be frank I’m surprised it took so long.”
I stared, mouth open, at the side of my friend’s head, ready to defend myself – but before I could think of anything to say I was already mentally replaying every relationship I’d ever had during my entire twenty nine years. And I realised he was absolutely right.
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