Page 70 of We All Live Here
•••
“Have I donesomething to offend you?”
They’re unloading the pickup truck at the dump, having finally reached the head of a long, bad-tempered queue, the cars packed full of attic detritus and garden waste, and are moving swiftly between PLASTICS and RECYCLABLES. The contents of the boxes she has grabbed seem to be divided into multiple categories, and Lila can feel the impatience of the drivers behind her while she rummages through them, trying to work out what goes in which.
She hurls the enormous rubber giraffe into NON RECYCLABLES, feeling a brief stab of discomfort as its cheerful, innocent face disappears.Sorry, she tells it silently.
“I thought we got on well the other week. We had some nice chats but since I’ve been back you’ve been kind of…avoiding me.” He pauses while he removes the pieces of the cot from the back of his truck. “Are you really skipping this? Should we not put it by UNWANTED ITEMS? Someone might have a use for it.”
“Oh. Maybe.”
He pauses while he walks the cot pieces up to a different section, then returns. “I mean I wasn’t expecting us to have some big relationship on the back of…what happened, but it would be nice to feel we were at least friends…”
“Of course we’re friends.”
His expression is so genuine, and his sense of hurt so palpable, that she deflates. She stands there, the baby car seat in her hand. The feel of it is so oddly familiar: it brings back a thousand small journeys, the curled, shrimpy weight of her sleeping baby locked over her aching arm. “I’m sorry,” she says. “You are—It was a really great night. And I haven’tdeliberately avoided you. Things have just…got a bit complicated and I just can’t—I can’t—”
Jensen interrupts her, pointing: “That should definitely go in UNWANTED ITEMS.”
She pulls a face. “It’s really grubby. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to put a baby in there.” She can see the food stains on the padded cushioning, and all over the blue vinyl belt. At least, she hopes they’re just food stains.
“They can wash the cover, surely?” He is about to take it from her when a man in a high-vis jacket approaches. “We don’t take car seats,” he says. “They might have been in an accident.”
“But it hasn’t,” says Lila.
“So you say,” the man says, tapping his nose, and walking off. Lila stares at him for a moment, then sighs and throws it into NON RECYCLABLES. She can practically feel the drivers bristling behind them.
“Hey.” Jensen holds up a hand. “It’s fine. I had zero expectations. I know you’re coping with a lot right now. I just—I guess I just wanted to make sure we were okay.”
“We’re fine,” she says, throwing a box of broken plastic toys into the skip with a loud clatter. She’s not entirely sure which of those things she feels more guilty about.
•••
He asks againwhen they pull up outside her house twenty minutes later. “We’re definitely cool, then? I mean, I’m going to tell you—when you didn’t respond to my texts I was a little worried that I went too far that night. I felt—well, actually, I really worried about it.”
She shakes her head firmly. “You absolutely didn’t. I promise. Remember? I even did a phone recording to absolve you of any responsibility.”
“You were kind of drunk, though.”
“I was good drunk. Not paralytic-incapable-of-saying-no drunk.”
He moves his head from side to side as if weighing this up. “You absolutely sure? You don’t feel weird about it?”
She can smile at him then. She does not want him to feel anxious. “Jensen. I’m really fine. Not weird in the slightest. I just—I just have a lot going on right now. And we kind of agreed that this wasn’t a thing.”
The flicker of surprise that passes across his face makes her wonder if he had thought it was a thing.
“Okay,” he says, as if gathering himself. “No. Sure.”
They sit there for a moment. Then she reaches for the door.
“If you wanted more of a thing, I’d be happy to give it my full consideration,” he says.
“I’ll bear that in mind.”
“I can’t guarantee I would think about it immediately. I’m a very busy man. But I absolutely would put it on my very long list of things to consider. Maybe even higher than two-thirds of the way down.”
“Thank you,” she says. “I’m immensely flattered.”
