Page 80 of I Love You, I Love You, I Love You

Well … NEWS … I’m engaged.

Hey, so, Lowe … My boyfriend, Jackson and I are engaged.

So, guess who’s getting married … ?

Once I say it. That’s it. It’s done. It’s all over.

I thought if maybe I don’t say Jackson’s name it might not come up. Don’t worry, I know that’s not good. I know that’s bad. It’s a bit like a challenge, a game, to see if I can tell every story I’ve experienced in the past few years and casually leave my partner’s name out, but I must get the pronouns right, remember to say I instead of we. I know I can’t keep it up forever. I know that Lowe will know the truth eventually; I just want to keep the hope alive, somehow, just for this one sweet coffee – just today – to live out the dream, make it a possibility, that I’m free and then go back to my life. I know nothing is going to happen, I just don’t want to give it up. Not yet. Not when I’m sitting here imagining what our baby would look like.

And what about him? What about Heather? Or someone else? He could be married; he could have a kid?!

‘Where are you living?’

‘Peckham.’

Aoife was right! What’s so bloody good about Peckham?

‘Just renting, temporarily.’

WITH WHO?

‘Still South then?’

‘Course.’

Don’t course me when you were the one off recording albums in LA – but I’m careful what I say because then he’ll know I’ve been searching his socials and I don’t want to slip up.

We have to order at the counter so up we go. The bar is lined with jewels of coloured bottles like the windows of a church, a sobering reminder that we’re meeting before 10 a.m. That this is definitely not a date. It’s hard coffee in the morning. I order and the waiter smiles at us like, you guys make a cute couple, or maybe I just made that up. Or maybe it’s because even the waiter knows how in love I am with Lowe; he can smell it, it’s that obvious. My vulnerability, my weak spot – Lowe is what would get me killed in the wild – and the waiter pities me. Where’s my personal growth? My development? My progress? What do I have to show for myself? Maybe he just recognizes Lowe and can’t wait until he’s made the coffee so he can run off and text his mates: GUESS WHO I JUST MADE A FLAT WHITE FOR?

We find the sofa again. Flashes of cinema surround us – images of other lives of lovers and families. How I wish we could just press pause on today like a film, rewind back to the beginning, to when we first met, and this time not fuck it up. This time I would play it out to the end. I imagine Jackson walking in right now, how quickly I would spring up, and that’s how I know that I still have feelings. Oh. This is awful. I should probably make an excuse and leave. JUST BE HIS FRIEND.

Our coffees arrive on a silver tray; mine is basically frothy milk and tiger lines of chocolate. I reach for the sugar pot, stuffed with coloured paper sachets. And that’s when I see him spot my ring. BULLSEYE. Glinting like a bullet. A gold filling at the back of the devil’s mouth. I quickly hide it underneath my bum again. But I know he’s seen it. I should have left it in the little soap dish by the side of the sink and pretended I’d forgotten to put it back on but that would have been deliberately deceptive. That, I couldn’t live with.

I change the subject. ‘I’m sorry to hear about the band splitting up.’ Has his mood changed since he’s seen it? I can’t tell.

‘Thanks, yeah, it’s shit but it was time.’ Cucumber cool.

‘Think back to when we were young, when you first picked up the guitar. If someone told you that making music would be your job! That you’d go on to achieve all you have? Can you imagine? I mean – it’s incredible, Lowe.’

He goes shy.

‘Your mum would be so proud of you.’ I want to put my hand on his leg when I say that bit, but I don’t.

‘Thank you, Ella.’ He takes a breath, brushes crumbs off him that aren’t there. ‘I just don’t know what I’m gonna do with my life now; we’ve been playing since we were kids – I don’t even have a CV,’ he jokes. ‘Got any jobs going?’ he says to the empty room and I laugh. ‘We’re still so young anyway. We’ve got time.’

‘How did you feel about turning thirty?’

‘Fine,’ he says. ‘Another trip around the sun?’

I guess thirty is perfectly pleasant if you’ve achieved all your life dreams already. He must be pretty happy then.

‘Did you have a party?’ (Like the one I conjured up in my head with all the cool people and me not being invited.)

‘Well, I don’t drink, do I, so … ?’

‘You don’t drink?’ This surprises me; I thought he’d be living some hedonistic lifestyle. ‘Why? Sorry, I didn’t mean that – I mean how? I’ve tried so many times to quit and just can’t seem to do it.’

‘Yeah, it’s hard – it’s everywhere, all the time, especially on tour and it was just getting in my way. Not helping. So I stopped.’

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