A Handful of Red Earth

Adam arrived on my doorstep at twelve like we had planned in our phone conversation the night before.

The call had shocked me; I had just gotten into bed and turned off my light. It was only going to be a five minute long conversation when Adam heard that, but then five minutes turned into ten, which then turned into twenty and which finished off as one hour and seventeen minutes, twenty three seconds. And I never usually stay on the phone that long; I never have enough to talk about.

He was wearing blue straightleg jeans and a white t-shirt with a blazer slung over it and I suddenly felt very ashamed.

I was wearing my ripped jeans- not the ‘fashionably ripped’ ones, but the one’s I’d had for about five years that were close to falling apart- and a check shirt over a black vest top.

“Hey,” he said, smiling, apparently not caring that I looked like a tramp.

“Hi… you look smart,” I said, looking from his outfit down to my own.

“Yeah…” he grinned ruefully. “I wanted to wear the shorts and things I had on yesterday but my mum wouldn’t let me leave the house in that,” he laughed. “But you look good.”

“Please, don’t spare my feelings. I look like a tramp.”

“No, you don’t. You actually look pretty hot- if you don’t mind me saying that…” he said, hooking a finger through one of my belt loops and tugging a little.

I didn’t quite know what to say, and I stood there for a second.

My discomfort seemed to snap him out of whatever had just overtaken him and he let go of my jeans and ran a hand through his dark hair, disheveling it completely.

“I’m sorry- I don’t even know what that was. Do you forgive me?” he asked, and he did look truly repentant.

“Yeah, it’s fine. Are you ready… uh, are you ready to go?”

“Yeah. Umm, after you…”

We walked in silence till we got to Hornsey Lane, then Adam begun apologizing again. I had to cut him off.

“I’m fine, really, I am,” I said, with what I hoped was a reassuring smile.

“But you’ve gone all quiet,” he objected. I sighed.

“If you must know, I’m actually just a little bit shocked. No one’s said anything that complimentary to me for a while- at least, not while they’re sober,” I finished with a sigh, because no one truly meant no one, a certain someone in particular who really should be nicer about me, all things considered.

I shook him out of my head as well as I could.

“I’m sorry,” Adam was saying again, “that was really disrespectful of me.”

“Honestly Adam, it’s fine. It was a little bit flattering to find someone who thinks I’m not a dog,” he opened his mouth to comment, but I hurried the conversation along. “So how’s the progress on your room?”

Adam sighed. When we’d finally said goodbye last night, his bed, his speakers and his amp, the last of which had turned out to be just fine, were the only things that had been unpacked.
Apparently he’d done very little this morning either; just unpacked some CDs, his CD player, his guitars and a record player.

“You have a record player?” I asked, astonished, and he grinned.

“Yeah. It was my mums. She was going to throw it out when it broke but I told her I’d have it instead.”

“Wow. You are… there are no words. I’ll have to see your room when its done,” I said, still unable to shake off the shock that someone like him actually existed.

“Hey, that’s not fair! I haven’t seen yours!” he said, mock indignantly.

“You can see it when I’ve seen yours,” I said, reasonably.

“Now that’s an incentive to unpack, he murmured, just as we reached Costa, our destination.

We went inside and took ages choosing what we’d have before sitting down with our drinks.

“So this is Crouch End,” Adam said, looking out onto the street.

“Yeah, this is it.”

“It’s nice. Kind of… villagey.”

“You think so? I don’t think so. Highgate Village, now that’s villagey.”

“The clue’s in the name,” he said with a small smile.

“Exactly,” I agreed, nodding vigorously and ridiculously.

We finished up our drinks rapidly, but made no more effort to leave, for that moment simply enjoying the atmosphere of the place.

“I guess we should move on,” I said reluctantly after a while.

“Yeah, we definitely should. I think that waitress is giving us dirty looks,” Adam murmured, overdramatically, making me laugh. “No, this isn’t funny! We’re a step away- maybe two- from being asked to leave!” he exclaimed, but there was a smile on his face.

We got up and left, laughing, and walked down the hill towards the clocktower.

We bumped into him there.

“Hey Ben,” I said, smiling as best as I could.

“Hi Ath…” he looked questioningly over to Adam.

“Hey, I’m Adam. I just moved next door to Artemisia.” I winced as Adam finished off his introduction. He’d decided that he preferred Artemisia to Ath, and no amount of cajoling or threats on my part would move him.

Ben flicked an evaluating look up and down Adam. “Hi,” he said shortly, hostile, “I’m Ben. So Ath, are you coming tonight or not?”

I sighed, exasperated. Tonight, Ben was having a shindig at his house, which I already said I’d be coming to, and I said as much.

Ben rolled his eyes. “Then let me rephrase that. Are you staying?”

I sucked in a breath. He was asking that because of Adam, even if Adam didn’t know it.

“I don’t know,” I stated, to irritate and get rid of him.

“Please stay, Ath,” he said gently, taking hold of my hands. “You know you want to.”

I pulled my hands away. “Later, okay? We’ll talk about this later.”

“Alright then,” he agreed. “Definitely later.” He held his arms out for a hug that I received, reluctantly at first. But the minute his arms were around my waist, I caved in.

I would stay. Of course I would, then when everyone else had left we’d sleep together, like always. And then in the morning, nothing would be said about it. Like always.

Ben’s lips brushed against my face, just at the corner of my mouth, then he pulled away.

“Seven O’ Clock. Don’t be late,” he said, and then he was gone.

“I thought you said that no one sober ever looked at you like that,” Adam said after a pause.

“He doesn’t, usually. That was just so you know that I’m taken,” I said flatly, turning away from Ben’s retreating back.

“Oh. Boyfriend,” Adam said, knowingly. I shook my head.

“No. Not anything of the sort.” I begun walking, and Adam had to jog a little to make sure I didn’t leave him behind.

“Then what?”

“Really he’s just a huge cunt. Sorry, if that word offends you but really there’s no other word that fits him so well.”

“Wow,” Adam whistled through his teeth. “That’s a fair amount of venom. What did he do to make you hate him so much?”

“I don’t hate him. He just-“ I cut myself short. “Look, let’s not talk about him, please.”

Adam gave me an odd look, but he didn’t argue.

“Where are we going now then?” he asked instead.

“We’re going to the Palace. They have a café in the Garden Center, if you’re hungry. It’s quite a walk though. You might want to take the bus…”

“Nope. I think I’m good to walk. If I feel faint though, I’ll make sure to tell you,” he teased, grinning.

“You do that. I wouldn’t want to carry you up the hill. You look kind of heavy.”

He feigned shock. “Me? Heavy? Are you trying to say that I look fat?” he asked, sounding for all the world like he’d just walked off the set for Desperate Housewives. I nodded.

“Dude, you’re practically obese,” I said, joking. There was no way Adam could be called obese.

“I’ll have you know-“ he begun, but I shook my head.

“Please don’t. Please, I don’t think I can take your Bree impression. It’s just too perfect.”

“Just too perfect? Well I’ve never head that before,” he said, thoughtfully, but he quickly got distracted. “Hey, how about we forget this palace of yours and sit in that park?” I laughed.

“That’s Priory Park. But the Palace is a park, just bigger, and higher, and with a huge house in the middle. Look, you can see the top of it there.”

Adam followed my pointing finger to the glistening roof of Alexandra Palace.

“It’s pretty spectacular,” he acquiesced, “but it also likes a wee bit far. I may take you up on that offer of a bus…”

“I could tell that you’re useless,” I said, shaking my head and earning myself a playful push that I cheerfully but ineffectually returned.

*

We caught the bus round the corner and took it to the Garden Center.

“God, it’s beautiful,” Adam said, looking at the tree’s and greenery. “If only Neasden were this spectacular.”

“Pretty much every where’s spectacular. It’s just searching for the beauty that’s hard,” I said. When I looked up, Adam was giving me the same look as he did yesterday when I’d gone off on a tangent about names. “Damn, I’ve been a nerd again, haven’t I?” I’m sorry, please forgive me.”

“You don’t need forgiveness. That was pretty profound,” he said.

“Huh, whatever. Come on, let’s eat now.”

We walked round the outside of the Garden Center to the little café.

“It’s very quaint,” Adam said, and I rolled my eyes.

“And you’re very easily impressed.”

“Hey,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “I just manage to see the beauty in everything.”

He kept a straight face until I hit him.

“You can’t use things said on an empty stomach against me,: I said over his laughter. “That’s completely unfair!”

“All’s fair in love and war,” he said, and then darted into the café before I could hit him again.

“What do you want to eat?” he asked as I got inside.

“Whatever today’s soup is with grilled haloumi salad,” I replied instantaneously, without having to look at the menu.

“And I’ll have… I’ll have tuna pasta, please,” he said to the waitress, all charm. The waitress nodded, then went back to place the order.

“You are such a flirt,” I muttered as I pulled out my purse.

“It doesn’t hurt to be nice to the people handling your food,” he replied evenly. “Now please, for the love of God, put your purse away.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m paying for you. I need to, just to placate my masculinity which has been battered by all the beauty.”

“You know you are quite something else, really you are,” I said, shaking my head at him.

“I’m going to go ahead and take that as a compliment, if you don’t mind,” he said, smiling at the returning waitress.

“Your food is on its way. Will you be sitting outside or in?” the waitress asked.

“We’ll be outside, upstairs,” I replied confidently.

“Okay. That’ll be twelve pounds thirty six.”

Adam paid, and then I had to pull him bodily out and away from the waitress- stopping to get cutlery.

“I thought you might have tried to pay,” he said as we mounted the black metalwork stairs that led to a sort of balcony of the same.

“No, no. I accept that people have fought for woman’s right to spend her much needed money on less necessary food but… that one doesn’t really do it for me,” I said, shrugging.

“Hey, hey, you can’t just pick and choose what rights to accept! It’s all or nothing!”

I seated myself and shook my head at him.

“You do realize that you are saying that I should either become a braless career bitch who cuts men out of her life completely; or that I should have left school at fourteen, chained myself to a cooker and married sometime last year.”

“It wouldn’t be like that!” Adam exclaimed but I ignored him.

“I’d have had two kids by now.”

“And your independent, self sufficient women is portrayed so wrong,”

“Third one on the way.”

“You know, I’m still right,” Adam tried to say but I knew that just meant I’d won. “I mean, a braless career bitch? When did your bra come into it?”

I chuckled, and reached across the table to ruffle his hair.

“So how are we getting home?” Adam asked once we had both finished eating.

“We’ll walk up to Muswell Hill and get a bus from there,” I replied, absently, checking my phone. It was just gone three.

“Please say that it’s a really quick walk. I’m feeling kind of full right now.”

“It’s not that far. Although personally I think a long walk would do you good. You could stand to shed a couple of pounds,” I said, rising out of my seat and clattering down the steps as fast as I could before the insult registered.

I was ahead for a fair while, but then I got out of breath and had to stop, which meant he had tackled me in seconds and began tickling me till I could no longer breathe,

We lay on the grass by the side of the road outside the Garden Center while I tried to regain my breath, watching the cars go by.

“You’re pretty fast,” Adam said, not looking at me.

“Yeah, but I’m really unfit,” I pointed out in return. “I probably won’t be able to move for a few more decades now.”

“You’d let the grass grow around you and encase you till people just think you’re part of nature,’ Adam said, dreamily.

I thought about the image, or at least, I tried to.

“You know, I don’t see it,” I said finally, giving up.

“You don’t? I see it so clearly,” he sat up and turned so he could see me clearly. “Look, the grass will grow up around you, between your arms and your legs and your sides. And then, when it’s long enough, it’ll grow across you-“ he pulled up a few blades of grass and balanced them on my arm- “like this. And then they’ll meet the pieces on the other side and tangle together till you’re hardly visible at all.”

I shook my head.

“I still don’t see it,” I said, sitting up so the grass fell off me.

Adam sighed. “You should. It’s beautiful,” was all he said.

“You’re all marshmallow inside, aren’t you?” I said, not really expecting an answer.

“I wish you could see it, Artemisia.”

Yep. He was in a world of his own.

*

I left for Ben’s at quarter to seven.

When Adam and I finally got back- we had walked all the way back from Muswell Hill- I had gone to his house under the pretext of helping him unpack. We got as far as his record collection, then I found all his Don McLean records and made him play them to me.

I didn’t even have time to go home and change before I had to leave.

I was late, by about fifteen minutes because I couldn’t bring myself to walk, and I missed my bus.

Ben was unimpressed.

“You’re late. Where were you?” he demanded as I walked in.

“I was at home,” I said, not wanting to bring up Adam with him. But it turned out I didn’t have to.

“So how was your day with- what was your friends name again?” he asked, leading me into his living room. I sighed.

“Adam. And it was fine, thank you.”

“What did you guys get up to?”

“We just walked up to the Palace and had lunch at the garden center. And then we went back.”

Ben didn’t look convinced. “And that’s all you did?”

“I went to his house to help him unpack some stuff.”

“And?”

“And what? What do you want me to say?” I cried, frustrated.

“I just wanted to make sure he didn’t try anything with my girl, that’s all,” Ben said calmly, like he wasn’t being completely unreasonable.

“When was I ever ‘your girl’?”

“You’ve always been my girl Ath. Always my favourite,” he said softly.

“Don’t say that. It’s not true.” It was a struggle for me to keep my voice flat and even.

“It is true, but it’s beside the point. What I want to know is if you two did anything.”

I was incensed. “No, we didn’t. I met him yesterday, what kind of whore do you think I am?”

There was a tense silence, then he spoke, his voice infinitely softer.

“I’ve offended you. I’m sorry.”

I didn’t reply. The bell rang and he squeezed my hand.

And then he was gone and I knew I wouldn’t see him for the rest of the evening.