‘I admit I didn’t go out with dark-skin girls when we met.’ He was trying to deny it without denying it. ‘I may have changed my ways since then.’
‘Really? Been out with any dark-skin girls since college?’
‘I go out with you all the time,’ he replied.
‘Yeah, thought so,’ I told him, cutting my eyes at him. This was not the time for this conversation, although when would be was never quite clear. ‘You asked why we never got together and that is the reason.’
‘Hey, back up there, sister, you said you weren’t interested in a relationship, don’t be putting all of that on me.’
‘Howie, if your fine self had asked me out, I would have said yes in a heartbeat. Why do you think I came and sat down next to you at college on the first day? There were other black guys in the canteen that day, but even when you were goofy Howard I was . . . I didn’t fancy you so much as completely fall in love with you at first sight. You were like my soulmate from the moment I talked to you. I mean, I wasn’t interested in going out with anyone or having a relationship, but if you, the person I could talk to, just chill with, laugh with, cry with, had showed any indication that he could fancy me, that he thought of me in the way he saw white and mixed-race girls, I would have been there for it. No messing.’
My best male friend, my soul mate, stared at me, his unbattered eye wide with shock. He had no idea what to say because he had had no idea that I was completely in love with him. He was probably also shocked that he’d been called out on his particular type of misogynoir by me of all people.
‘Don’t get me wrong, Howie, I wasn’t pining for you or anything like that, and I haven’t put my love life on hold for you, but up until quite recently, if you had asked me out, I would have said yes before the words had finished leaving your mouth. But that wasn’t in our story, was it?’
He shook his head, still a little discombobulated.
‘And don’t worry, my mother and father brought me up to see how beautiful I am. So I have more than enough self-esteem to see my beauty and not worry about why you don’t fancy someone as dark as me. And I can still be your friend as well.’ I rested my hand lightly on his shoulder. ‘Your best friend at that.’ I lowered my face to his level. ‘And as your best friend, I am going to say again – she’s going to kill you.’
‘Vee, don’t—’
‘I have to, Howie. That’s what best friends are for. I need to tell you this. I don’t know what to do but I have to tell you that she’s going to kill you if you don’t get out.’
‘Thing is, Vee, I love her. And I know she loves me. It’s just things are difficult for her right now. It’ll be fine. She doesn’t mean for things to get out of hand. It’ll be all right. I just need to try a bit harder. Romance her a bit more. It’ll be fine. It’ll be fine.’
I nodded because I couldn’t co-sign that nonsense he was talking. I couldn’t pretend that she wasn’t going to do anything except get worse until she did kill him.
Now
I keep watching my phone receive message after message from Beccie. Logan was nothing like her. He was nothing like Marcus Halnsley. He wasn’t abusive. If there was one thing I was sure of, it was that Logan wasn’t abusive.
poppy
Now
I hate her.
I actually hate her. I can’t believe she’s done this. She’s been doing this.
You see her, with those cheekbones, those eyes and that smile. When they’re together in the photos, they look so happy. Joyful. I think that’s what Alain and I would want to look like if we did loved-up selfies.
But it wasn’t how they made it look. Maybe those were the easy times, the happy times, the times when being together didn’t hurt.
I have read his diary and I hate her. I just hate her.
verity
Now
I keep thinking about what Darryl said to me about me.
‘Women in your situation.’ Was I really in a ‘situation’?
I didn’t feel like I was. I had seen abuse. I had seen when someone had their lives limited, when they’d been hit and couldn’t leave. I could have left any time. Did I need to leave? Or was what I had with Logan part of a normal relationship, part of the peaks and troughs a woman had with her significant other? That’s what it felt like. Normal.
Logan didn’t control me. He didn’t isolate me. He didn’t stop me doing what I wanted.
November, 2019
‘From the state of the place, I think your brother was here earlier,’ Logan said to me over dinner.
I’d come back late from work and found Logan in the flat. He’d borrowed my spare key to let himself back in that first Sunday morning when he got breakfast and had sort of kept it. I didn’t mind too much and it seemed petty to keep asking for it back when he made the same trip every week. He had originally only used it on Sundays, but lately I’d come home to find the alarm off and Logan in my flat.
I still hadn’t worked out how I felt about that. It felt, in an odd way, like an invasion; him pushing us into something I wasn’t sure I was ready for. But it wasn’t unpleasant. Especially if, like this evening, I came home and the flat had been tidied, the washing-up done, dinner cooked and lowlights were on with soft music.
‘Yes, he was definitely here earlier. He went out with his mates in town and wasn’t going home to deal with Mum and Dad in that state so he crashed here.’
‘Has he always had a key?’
‘Yup. He’s my annoying little brother but, you know, mi casa su casa and all that.’
Logan nodded. ‘OK.’ He carried on nodding, avoiding my eye and concentrating very hard on the ribbons of pasta he’d made from scratch using the pasta maker he’d brought from his place, and the red sauce he’d also made from scratch. I’d got to know him these last few months and it was obvious that he had something to say but knew I wouldn’t like it so was staring at his delicious meal instead.
‘What’s the problem?’ I asked. I was concentrating on my food now, too.
‘No problem . . .’
But . . . I thought rather uncharitably.
‘But,’ he obliged, ‘he left the place in a mess.’
‘I know, he does that. I saw it this morning and knew I’d be tidying it later.’ I shrugged happily. ‘But turns out I didn’t have to cos you did it for me.’
Logan was not happy. Or amused. Not even in the slightest. ‘He should really be tidying up after himself. Especially if he’s staying in someone else’s house.’
‘He does, usually. He just had to dash off to school this morning.’
‘OK.’
It was not OK, clearly. ‘If you’ve got something to say, I really wish you’d say it.’
‘Look, it’s not my flat, not my life and not my brother . . .’
But . . .
‘But I could smell drugs when I came over. Someone had clearly been smoking weed in here.’
Is that it? Is that what he was so bent out of shape about? ‘He smokes a little weed every now and again with his friends. It’s really no big deal.’