‘No, no,’ I objected, genuine relief at my short-term solution making it harder and harder to hide my gratitude. I might actually be able to sort this all out before Sam found out after all. ‘Helping out CreateSpace – it’s an honour.’ Only a half-truth. ‘Thank you for suggesting it.’
‘You’re so welcome.’ She turned away from the painting to me. ‘As I said, any friend of Sam’s…’
She sure seemed to like Sam, even though they were on the rocks. If we were going through a rough patch everyone would know about it. And Sam would be living a nightmare until he bought me flowers, made me dinner and kissed me on the neck and…
‘Well, I really appreciate it.’ I smiled in return, going to look at the next painting, which was just under a metre wide and a metre high. I studied the fine brushstrokes of the geometric shapes – orange, yellow, red and gold in squares and shards and jagged marks. ‘All of it.’ I smiled again. She had been so cool about everything, even having me stay in the spare bedroom, in spite of it all. I took a step forward until the painting was all I could see, savouring the unfamiliar safety of immersion, a feeling like a memory I couldn’t quite recall. I actually had a job. Temporary, yes. Clipboard-holding, absolutely. But a job in CreateSpace nonetheless. The turn of events made me dizzy. ‘It kind of feels like fate bumping into Sam yesterday,’ I mused out loud before stopping myself, turning to face Jamie, forgetting for a second she wasn’t my friend. For a moment there, it kind of felt like she was. ‘Not like romantic fate, just fate, fate,’ I backtracked as she looked at me with the same bemused expression Sam had worn the day before.
‘I don’t really believe in fate,’ Jamie said, shaking her ponytail ever so slightly.
‘Of course you do.’ I shook my own head to less effervescent effect. ‘Everybody believes in something.’
‘I didn’t say I don’t believe in anything,’ she said, her eyes wide with wonder.
‘What do you believe in then?’ I asked, my voice echoing around the spacious studio.
‘I’m a Christian.’ She smiled proudly.
Oh, crap. She even had God on her side.
‘You’re a what?’ I asked, taken aback by the thought. The only practising Christians I knew were called Mavis and Doris and had a combined age of one hundred and fifty.
‘A Christian,’ she repeated, looking equal parts amused and confused. ‘Sam didn’t tell you?’
I shook my head. Maybe that’s why they broke up? Their inability to see eye to eye on the man in the sky? Sam always had to know he was right, making little room for doubt, no space between his facts and figures for something as ‘flimsy’ as faith.
‘No… it didn’t come up.’
‘I thought he must have when you didn’t question why we’d decided to sleep in separate beds.’ She laughed. ‘That usually leads to lots of questions!’ It did; it had. But not those sorts of questions. I guessed they weren’t having sex – any more. But never in a million years did I think they would be choosing not to. That Sam would be choosing not to. Sam, who I had lost my virginity to. Sam, who definitely, definitely didn’t lose his virginity to me. Sam, whose friends carelessly joked that he was going to ‘shag his way around his swim club’ after our break-up. That Sam? That Sam couldn’t be living with a girl and not sleeping with her – especially not a girl who looked like Jamie.
‘I, erm… I thought…’ I stuttered, losing the ability to form a sentence once again. My mind had just about made sense of their arrangement, their relatively recent separation, her moving out, my undeniable moving in…
‘You thought we were just friends?’ Jamie asked, turning from the painting she was now fixed on to study me, her expression open and kind. My heartbeat started to rage in my chest as I felt panic wash over me anew. They weren’t breaking up? They were saving sex for marriage? Sam was saving sex for marriage? Sam was happily dating a girl who believed in everything his own medic mind had refused to understand?
‘Yeah… maybe,’ I said, cautiously.
‘Oh honey.’ She smiled, looking down at me and putting a light hand on my shoulder. ‘We’re more than just friends.’ She smiled again. ‘We’re engaged.’
26 September 2013 – Nottingham, England
‘You’re engaged?’ I could hear Austin’s voice bellow from the end of Sam’s phone even though it was glued to his face. His accent could be loud at the best of times but when Austin was drunk it was like he was trying to shout across the Atlantic. I looked across from the laptop, perched on the broken coffee table before us, next to the half-eaten Domino’s. I watched Sam laugh openly, shaking his head and replying, ‘No, dude. I said, “We’re otherwise engaged.” You know, as in busy.’
‘Oh, right,’ I heard Austin say, before adding, ‘You might as well be. Dude, you’re whipped. It’s a Thursday night. Come out.’ Sam rolled his eyes, holding the phone away from his ear as we heard his best friend rant on. ‘You’re flipping married, bro.’ I looked at my slippers, resting on the armchair across from the stained sofa. It wasn’t normal behaviour for two students, I’d give him that, but between Sam’s shifts and sports commitments it was becoming harder and harder to spend time just the two of us.
‘Not yet.’ Sam laughed. ‘Mate, we might come out later.’ Sam shook his head in my direction, leaning even further into the sofa. ‘I’m just going to spend a bit of time with Jess.’
‘Fine dude, fine,’ Austin said in a way that suggested it was clearly not fine before hanging up. Sam leaned forwards to put his phone face down on the coffee table and took another slice of pizza, putting his other arm back around me.
‘You’re sure you don’t want to go out? I’m happy to, you know,’ I said, already half asleep but still not wanting to be the reason Sam’s friends would give him shit.
‘Seriously, Jess, there’s no place I’d rather be.’ He leaned in to kiss my shoulder tenderly.
‘What a line.’ I laughed, pulling away.
Sam grabbed me back, engulfing me in a hug. I feigned a struggle but we both knew he’d already won. ‘You love it. Anyway, you cancelled your painting class for me; the least I can do is say no to that fool.’ He laughed at the thought of whatever Austin would be getting up to now. I didn’t want to know. ‘I still feel bad you had to cancel. It’s just hard because I have swimming and shifts…’ Sam’s sentence trailed off as he kissed my shoulder again.
‘It’s okay,’ I said. More than. ‘I haven’t seen you properly all week.’
‘Yeah, I know.’ Sam looked apologetic. ‘They said this year would be a step up, but I never thought it would be this hard.’ I looked across at him, his familiar face a little more worn than the fresh-faced fresher I’d met the year before. ‘Is the class the same time every week?’
‘Yeah.’ I nodded. ‘But I think I’m going to stop,’ I continued before he could interrupt. ‘It’s been hard enough finding time to see each other as it is. Something’s got to give, right?’