He’s not the one. You know it and it’s coming up to two years and you haven’t told him yet. To tell him would require more resolve than you possess, and even if you hated him, which you don’t, you couldn’t do it now, not when school’s just broken up for the summer. What would you do with six lonely weeks?
You’re on the way to Skye. He doesn’t drive a car, he has a motorbike, something big and powerful, and he would have ridden up to Scotland if you’d agreed but you didn’t, so you’re doing the driving. It’s your car with your tent in the back, your camping table, chairs and cooking stove and your blow-up beds. Until Carlisle, none of that seemed to matter but now, approaching Crianlarich, resentment is building with each mile.
Everything annoys you – it’s like sitting on spikes: Tchaikovsky, the McGarrigle Sisters. Their perfect harmonies and hearts on sinking ships make you want to punch them in the mouth. He’s singing along. You want to punch him too, and all the things that you can usually tolerate individually are competing for attention in your head. Like how he turned up to your best friend’s wedding in a seersucker jacket. How his shorts are really swimming shorts and that one of these days he’s going to get arrested. How he has to boil his contact lenses in a pot.
‘We’re like the couple in Absinthe,’ he says.
‘What?’
‘The Degas painting. The couple in the bar who have nothing to say to each other.’
‘I’m driving. What do you want me to say?’
‘Alright. What are you thinking?’ he asks.
Oh, God! That I wish I had a boyfriend who could drive a bloody car.
You stab at the eject button. ‘I need a break,’ you say. ‘If I listen to any more of that, I’ll kill someone.’
‘OK,’ he says, ‘I’ll look at the map.’
His eagerness to please annoys you even more, and you’re gripped by nastiness. You hate yourself but can’t seem to shake it off. You glance across at him. He’s on the wrong fucking page!
‘Can you manage just a few more miles?’ he asks.
You release a deep resentful breath. ‘How many miles?’
‘It’s hard to tell. There’s no scale.’
‘Of course there’s a bloody scale.’
‘OK, OK.’
‘It’ll be at the front.’ And you’ll be there by the time he finds it.
‘We could go to the place I was telling you about,’ he says. ‘It’s a bit off the road but not that far.’
‘How far off the road?’
‘Five miles, maybe, but believe me, it’s awesome.’
No, it’s not awesome. The Isle of Skye is awesome. The Cuillins are awesome. And now you’re never going to get there because he wants to visit some bloody hill fort.
‘Do I have a choice?’ you ask.
‘Don’t be like that,’ he says. ‘Trust me, you’ll love it.’
You doubt that.
You’re worrying about the time. It’s already five and you’ll have to find a campsite soon. If you get the tent up without a row, it’ll be a miracle. And then you’ll have to find a pub and hope there’s something he can eat. He’s a vegetarian, but that is not the problem. The problem is that he won’t eat anything.
Last Easter with your sister and her husband was the worst. You should have finished with him then. They thought the gastropub would be the perfect choice: a lovely olde worlde place, stone-built with roses round the door, wooden floors, big oak tables and a fire burning in an open hearth.
‘This place has a really good reputation for vegetarian food,’ said your sister, picking up the menu.
‘Yeah. Quite fancy some of these myself,’ said your brother-in-law.
But by then, you had learnt never to make assumptions, and as you read down the list, mentally rejecting each one in turn on his behalf – garlic in one, mushrooms in another, Quorn – you realised there was nothing he could eat.
‘I’ll have the soup,’ he said, not looking at the waitress.
‘And for the main course?’
‘Just soup.’
They’d driven miles.
You’re still pulling up the handbrake when he’s already out the door and heading for the path.
Go, why don’t you? I’ll just stay here, shall I?
‘I’ll wait here,’ you call, ‘and watch the stuff.’
You open the door and step out. The Micra is full to the top, all of it visible through the windows, but even so, you’re not sure if you’re genuinely concerned or just being bloody-minded. He stops and turns.
‘Who do you think is going to steal it, Maggie?’ he asks, and for the first time you look properly at the place he’s brought you to.
You’re in a wooded lane, and maybe it’s because you’ve just stopped driving, but it’s all so still and peaceful. It has an other-worldly feel. There’s a movement in the undergrowth and, when you turn, a deer is standing in the road, not ten feet away. It regards you with liquid eyes, twitching its tail. You hardly breathe. Another deer steps forward from between the oaks and you realise there’s a whole line of them stretching out into the woods. The longer you stand, the more you can see, silhouetted between the lower branches of the trees, with their tiny heads and sticky-out ears. A blackbird signals a warning and the leader takes off. They all follow, disappearing one by one into the undergrowth.
You smile.
‘Wow!’ he says. ‘Come on, I really want to show it you. It’s not far.’
It’s good to be out of the car, to feel the sun on your skin. The air is soft. You pause to breathe it in. A buzzard mews. The path climbs steeply, activating muscles in your calves and thighs. Up ahead something rises from the path, a flash of green, before it’s out of sight between the trees.
‘What was that?’ he says.
‘A woodpecker,’ you say, and laugh with the unexpected joy of seeing one.
The path levels out for a while. Honeysuckle fills the air with sweetness for a moment, then is gone. You think the last uphill stretch is never going to end, but the trees thin out and you emerge onto a rocky outcrop.
The view is incredible. You are looking down onto the floodplain of a meandering river and, in the vegetation below, in a different shade of green, is the shape of where the river used to flow, where it must have migrated over centuries. You stand transfixed: it’s the picture from the textbook that you use with year eight.
‘Isn’t it amazing?’ He moves his arm to encompass the whole valley. ‘This site is where they anointed the ancient kings of Scotland. Look at this.’ He rushes over to a hollow in the rock, kneels, and scoops up imaginary water in his hands. ‘This might be the actual bowl they used. The king probably stood right here on this very spot.’
You turn back to the meanders.
‘What do you think, Maggie?’
‘I can’t believe you brought me here,’ you say.
‘Don’t you like it?’
‘I didn’t know rivers did that,’ he says, after you’ve explained. ‘Isn’t that amazing – how we can see a place so differently? I wouldn’t have noticed that in a million years. See, we make a good team.’
‘Yeah,’ you say, and for a moment you almost believe it.’ Then you see the tin. Out come the Rizlas and he starts to roll a joint, and you get a feeling like something inside you beginning to sag under its own weight.
Back in the car, you ditch the McGarrigles for Radiohead.
‘We’d better start looking for a camp site,’ you say, while he’s fastening his seat belt. ‘It’s getting late.’
‘I hate that you have to do all the driving,’ he says, ‘so I’m cooking tonight.’
‘But we haven’t got any food.’
‘Yes, we do – in the cool box. There’s veggie sauce, pasta, broccoli, carrots, a bottle of wine …’
‘Great. You do that while I put the tent up.’
‘How about some Radiohead?’ he says, rifling through the box of tapes.
You can’t help but laugh.
‘What’s funny?’ he asks.
You start the engine and press play.
Jan Howcroft lives in Essex. She started writing when she retired. Since then, she has produced a wide variety of short stories and flash fiction. Her work has been shortlisted in several national writing competitions and published both online and in print.