This is a Love Story (5 page)

She’s a beautiful blonde legal secretary with a cute nose, who’s so attractive it’s almost a bad thing. Men suddenly want to become her Superman so they act up when they meet her, but really, she just wants to find someone who will be there for her and stop playing games.

She has a little boy, who’s three now. No one told her that if you’re sick while you’re on the pill you can get pregnant. We were just in our late teens when it happened. When she told me about it, I remember wiping the mascara-stained tears from her cheek and thinking it would be the making of her. I was right.

People sometimes judge her the wrong way, but she’s one of the strongest, most intelligent people I know and every day I feel lucky to be her friend. I need to talk to her about this Nick situation again, tell her that it’s not going away. She will know what to do. She always does.

I was feeling even more on edge today because I had a meeting with my boss at 1 p.m., and I had no idea what it was about. Anthony had never called me in for a one-on-one meeting before, so it felt pretty exciting, although he did sound quite stressed when he phoned first thing this morning. It was the first time he’d called me before 9 a.m.

I had been trying very hard since I arrived, so I hoped it was something positive.

But then with all the silly daydreaming, my mind had been wandering, so he might be about to sack me. My probation period hadn’t yet drawn to a close so I was still on shaky ground.

Knowing that this chat was coming up meant the clock was moving particularly slowly, and each second seemed longer than the one before it. I wanted to climb up on a chair, push the hands forward and watch while the office revved into fast forward mode. I tried to make time go more quickly by turning the clock on my desk around to face the woven partition, and I even hid the one on my computer screen. If I couldn’t see it, I decided, I couldn’t clock watch.

Finishing a feature about running shoes took up a decent chunk of my time and I made enough rounds of tea to equate to at least an hour of prime faffing around time.

An hour before the meeting my mind turned to Pete, the homeless guy. Maybe I could reduce my nerves by focusing on someone else. Doing something good. That’s what my dad says, anyway: ‘If you’re worrying about yourself too much, help someone who has real worries. Turn your anxiety into something productive.’ The words were bouncing around in my brain, so I decided to act on them.

‘Lydia?’ I called quietly across the office, leaning back in my chair. ‘You know that homeless guy outside?’

‘Yes, love?’ I heard her respond from a muffled place far away.

‘Can I, erm, can I take him some tea, do you think?’ I instantly felt like a fool. What had got into me?

A wild shock of hair crept round from behind a desk partition, followed by an electric smile and crazy eyes.

‘Hmm . . .’ She looked around her, left to right, scanning for authority. Then she leaned towards me, and in a gentle whisper this time, a cloud of fruity perfume wafting up my nose, said, ‘Go for it, but I never said a word.’

And just like that she vanished again, taking her cheeky smile with her.

I got up and headed for the drinks machine, peering out of the window into the car park below. Sure enough, he was there – a thin, bent figure sitting on the bench, but this time surrounded by four cans of beer.

There was no queue this time. I got a tea with one sugar. It was a guess, of course. I imagined that if I was sleeping on the streets during a damp spring night I would probably like a sugar too. I had packed some biscuits in with my lunch so I put two of them in my pocket for him. Chocolate ones.

I hid the drink inside my jacket as I walked away and into the lift. I was nervous. What if he was abusive? What if he was rude to me? He probably wanted money. Not tea.

I stepped into the lift, hoping I was doing the right thing. I slipped unnoticed through reception, pressed the release button on the big glass doors at the back, and headed out into the cool air of the car park.

He was sitting with his back to me, his head bent forward so that from behind it looked like he didn’t have one. I looked at my watch; it was 12.05.

I walked quietly over to the bench and sat down next to him. He didn’t look at me, but his wrinkled face was now angled towards the lukewarm sun that was marking the start of our summer. He was wearing a dark navy bomber jacket, faded and full of holes, a grey jumper underneath, a pair of ragged black jeans and some brown boots with frayed laces. He stank of beer.

‘So, you’re talking to me now, are you?’ he said sharply.

Immediately I realised this had probably been a bad idea. I decided to ignore the question. ‘Hi, I’m Si—’ I started meekly but I was interrupted. It made me jump.

‘I believe in love, you know,’ said Pete, his eyes drifting off to something on the horizon. ‘I even had it once,’ he continued, shuffling nervously on the bench, his grubby fingernails playing with a thread hanging from his jumper.

‘What’s your name?’ he asked, oblivious to the fact that I had tried to tell him just a few seconds ago. He had a gruff voice with a thick London accent, like he had been posh once but turned cockney somewhere along the line.

‘Erm, Sienna. Your name’s Pete, right?’ I asked him, noticing that he was still unable to make eye contact with me.

He nodded softly to confirm his name. ‘She died, though. She isn’t here any more . . .’ he started again, a tinge of hopeless despair in his voice. This was something of an overshare for a first-time meeting, but I kept quiet, looking at the beer cans around his feet. He must be drunk. He kept pulling at the thread and a small section of his jumper started to unravel.

I didn’t really know what to say. ‘You had a girlfriend who died?’ I asked eventually, realising how stupid I sounded, because that was exactly what he’d just said. I pushed the tea and biscuits towards him across the wooden slats of the bench. He took them quickly and put them to the other side of him, away from me, as if I was going to change my mind and ask for them back.

I realised there was more to his tired eyes than cold nights on the street and a lack of nutrition. I didn’t ask too many questions.

We sat side by side and didn’t say a word for ten whole minutes. Police sirens broke the silence occasionally; a twig fell from a tree and landed at our feet. He flinched.

Eventually I felt ready to ask something.

‘Is that why you’re here, Pete?’

‘You could say that. She was my wife, actually . . . She got on the train to work one day. I thought it would be a day just like all the others. That morning everything was normal between us – two big glasses of orange juice and a kiss goodbye. It wasn’t the usual route for her, though; she was heading for some work conference and they were staying at a hotel that night. But there was a disaster, a complete disaster . . .’ He paused for a moment and bit his bottom lip.

‘She was on a train that crashed in Oakwood Park. It was an ill-fated carriage and my girl was inside and I wish I could have stopped her from going that morning. My whole life collapsed the day she died. Ruined. I did some silly things after that, and people weren’t as supportive as I hoped. So it boiled down to this, me alone in the city. It was ages ago now. Two thousand and fucking two.’

He kicked one of the cans at his feet and it rolled down the slanted concrete before nestling against the back tyre of a Vauxhall Vectra. The car park was small and seemed relatively peaceful compared to the hubbub on the main road at the front of the building, which you could just about hear.

There was room for twenty cars, the spaces surrounded by a neatly trimmed hedge with the odd crisp packet and drinks can wedged between its branches. I don’t know why the bench was here. It wasn’t exactly a great hangout spot. The only other thing in the space was a big blue rubbish bin with a black lid.

So that was it, one man’s demise in a nutshell. An edited-down, hacked-up sentence or two documenting what must have been years of agony for the lost soul sitting by my side.

The story was pulling at my heartstrings and again I wondered if this had been a mistake. I had only wanted to bring him a drink and some biscuits, but now I wanted to help him. Save him. I’m a bit like that sometimes, but it’s a mistake because I already have too much responsibility in my life.

He seemed horribly accepting of where he was, almost as if a way out seemed so impossible that he was just sitting out the rest of his life now, waiting for it to end.

Watching, waiting, scavenging. Rustling around in bins for the answers among the city’s useless solutions. No chance of hoping, wishing or even dreaming. His life had been shattered; the end was already here.

The hollow hopelessness of his situation sent a cold chill through me. I imagined the wreckage of the train, the bent shards of metal and billowing smoke. I imagined the newspaper photographers climbing over fences and using their long lenses to get another shot of tragedy. I imagined the staff crowding on the gravel by the railway line in brightly coloured overalls with reflective strips, hands behind heads, squinting with expressions of disbelief.

I don’t know why I did it, but I put my right hand on top of his left one. Sometimes you just do things because they’re instinctive. His hand was rough to the touch. He flinched.

‘Why are you doing that, Sally?’ he said, turning towards me with a toothy grin.

‘Sienna,’ I corrected him. ‘I don’t know. I just think you might have forgotten what it feels like to not be alone. I don’t want you to forget. I think everything will work out for you . . . I really do.’ Tears started to prick my eyes, and my bottom lip began to wobble as the words spilled out of my mouth like emotional soup. God, I was pathetic.

‘Oh, love,’ he said. His voice sounded tired. ‘I’m all right. I’m a soldier and I keep her with me anyway, she gets me through.’ He pulled a tatty leather wallet from his jacket pocket and dug his nails into a small inside section. The stale smell of beer crept across the space between us and into my nostrils.

‘Here she is: my beautiful Jenny,’ he declared, as he produced a tattered photo of a slim-looking woman with long blonde hair. It was stored in a bit of grubby cling film in a rather vain attempt to preserve her image. She looked clean and wholesome and happy.

I imagined what he must have looked like when he was with her, a fresh shave, a buzz cut and a suit. Maybe they’d even had a car and a newspaper subscription. I pictured them sitting together on a Sunday, Pete with the sports supplement, Jenny with the culture guide.

I looked down at my watch; it was now 12.20. I did something completely impromptu.

‘Can I take that picture away for a moment, Pete?’

‘No. I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but what if it goes missing? This is all I have and it’s in a right state. It keeps getting rained on . . . It might not last much longer,’ he replied, a hint of genuine fear in his voice.

‘Well, that’s just it, I’m going to make it better for you. Please just trust me and wait five minutes,’ I pleaded.

‘But why do you want it? Tell me,’ he said.

‘Just trust me, could you?’ I responded, my heart rate picking up.

Before he had the chance to argue any further I plucked the picture from his fingers and stood up. A look of desperation crossed his face, as if he were begging me not to take away the last beautiful thing he had. He looked as though he barely had the energy to speak.

I turned and ran through the back doors and into reception. ‘Can I use the copying room, please?’ I asked Sandra hurriedly. I didn’t want to prolong what must have been for him a period of unbearable worry. She was filing her nails and paying little attention to anything else.

‘Yes, of course, sweetheart. Whatever,’ she responded, not even glancing in my direction and flicking the file into the air flippantly.

I had to work fast; I had just five minutes to do something really special and if I fucked it up, I would spend the rest of my life trying to come to terms with the guilt.

I gently placed the photograph on the scanner, ensuring there were no greasy stains on the glass. Within seconds the image was replicated on a screen in front of me. I made it slightly larger, sharpened the colours a little and trimmed the edges. I clicked print, my right hand shaking slightly. Yes. This was going to be fine. I would just laminate this so it wouldn’t get ruined, give it back to him and go upstairs again. End of. Then he could have it forever.

The printer coughed into life and after I pressed a couple of buttons, it started to whirr. I didn’t know how to use it, but it couldn’t be that difficult.

The first copy came out, her face printed on photo paper, and it looked as good as the original, if not better. I picked it up and smiled. Cool. So far, so good.

But then another copy came out. And another. And another.

Oh God. Where was the stop button on this thing? Shit.

The copies were building up in the tray now and they were coming out faster and faster. It must have made a hundred in a matter of sixty seconds. How had this happened? Jenny’s face was taunting me. Again and again and again.

I stood there for a few minutes as the paper kept spewing out, the sheets now slipping over the edge of the tray and sliding onto the floor like a mini avalanche.

I was getting flustered. And when I get flustered I can’t think straight. I had been at least five minutes; I had already broken my promise.

I looked at all the buttons on the machine, but none of them made sense. Lights were flashing, one green, one red. There was a large pink button that looked like it might end this situation, so I pressed it but nothing happened. I leaned over the machine and my eyes scanned frantically for a wire that might lead to a plug, but it all seemed to be built into the floor. Fuck.

More copies were pouring out now. It seemed to get even faster. Clicking and whirring . . .

Suddenly I heard the sharp banging of heels across the tiled floor and the door behind me swung open. ‘What are you doing, Sienna?’ asked Sandra, who was now standing in the doorway looking suspicious.