Is there anything more lonely than lying next to someone you feel you’re losing? Yes, of course there is. Get a grip. Being homeless, friendless, family-less, moneyless, foodless and moisturiser-less would be way worse. But none of that was happening to me, and it was pretty shit to try and sleep knowing the person next to you was wishing they were elsewhere, their back a wall of hostility.
Pete got up at 4.30 a.m. and the front door clicked behind him ten minutes later. I’d barely slept all night. I’d tried counting sheep but it wasn’t a system that worked for me. My sheep always intended to jump over the fence the way they were supposed to but at some point they’d get bored and move into pirouetting and cartwheeling. Next thing I knew they’d be getting out Bluetooth speakers, turning up some ska music and would start parkour-ing over the fence, flipping mustangs or donning Evil Knievel helmets and shooting themselves out of cannons.
Around 6.30 a.m. I dragged open the bedroom curtains, climbed back under the covers and watched the sunrise from my bed. The horizon was the colour of an actual orange, then merged into buttercup yellow, banana yellow, lemon meringue pie yellow, before ending in the kind of pink and purple you see in the ‘girls’ aisle at a toy store.
I took a few photos on my phone but they did no justice to the intensity of the colours. It was like someone had rubbed wet crayons all over the sky. The need for coffee eventually dragged me from watching the harbour wake up. The coffee tin was empty so I threw on some clothes and plodded through the waking streets to a cool-looking café I’d spotted a few times from Trust’s van.
A smattering of diehard coffee addicts sat at tables tapping at silver laptops, appraising their neighbours and looking intensely millennial. I ordered an almond milk cappuccino with an extra shot, then sat at an outdoor table and called Pete.
‘Hi,’ he answered, his voice subdued but with a hint of warmth. ‘You’re up early.’
‘Couldn’t sleep.’ I picked at a groove in the table top. ‘Babe, I don’t want to fight.’
Pete sighed. ‘Me neither. I’m really sorry I left without saying goodbye. I thought you were asleep.’
At home, even on the days when he’d left extra early for work, he always kissed my cheek and murmured a goodbye.
‘I was faking.’ I chewed my fingernail. ‘I just . . . I don’t understand why you had to go on this trip. We’re supposed to be on holiday together. I can’t believe you just . . . went.’
‘I’m sorry, Jess,’ Pete said. ‘It’s . . . I think we’ve changed. What I want has changed.’
My heart felt like it had dropped to the pit of my stomach.
‘Since when? Since meeting Goat three days ago? So now you’re a completely different person?’
‘No.’ Pete cleared his throat and continued in a low voice. ‘I’ve been feeling like this for a while.’
A while? Pete and I had been together for six years but were friends for many years before that. We had both been in the school running team and were just as fast as each other. I would beg my teachers to let me run in the boys’ races and Pete and I would be neck and neck. Our parents became friends by the edge of the racetrack and still had dinner with each other every month or so. Pete and I remained friends through secondary school and university but then I hit twenty-three and my functional runner’s breastlettes blossomed to the double Ds I dragged around with me now, and Pete began to look at me a little differently. As did Mum. ‘Where did you get these?’ she’d asked in a clipped tone that made her German accent more pronounced. ‘Have you been in Harley Street, young lady?’ Mum had compact, efficient German boobs; Annabelle had delicate Bambi boobs (was Bambi a boy . . .?), and it wasn’t until Dad produced an old photo of his aunt with big Cornish fishwife bazangas that Mum believed I hadn’t come back from a season being a chalet girl in Chamonix having had a boob job. I’m not sure how I got on to the subject of my great aunt’s boobies but the point was, Pete and I had been ‘Pete and I’ for a very, very long time. We were happy. And now he was telling me he felt differently.
‘If you’ve been feeling like this for a while, then why did you agree to this trip?’ I said, still reeling.
‘Because I couldn’t turn down a free trip to South Africa,’ he said. ‘And Priya insisted.’
‘Priya is going to rip your balls right off when she finds out that you’ve left me here.’
Pete let out a tight little sigh. ‘And I knew if I could get you to leave Annabelle you’d have an amazing time. You never allow yourself to do what you want because you’re always helping her.’
‘What I want is to help Annabelle!’
‘But what happens when she doesn’t need your help? Then what do you want? Then who are you?’
There was a silence while I processed what Pete was saying.
‘And I’m sorry,’ he continued with a loaded sadness. ‘But I don’t think I can wait around to find out.’
I swallowed. ‘Oh my god.’
‘Jess,’ Pete said in a consolatory tone. ‘We hardly spend any time together. I thought this trip might help us reconnect but—’
‘You keep using the word “reconnect” yet I’m here and you’re not,’ I spat. ‘You want to know what I thought? I thought we’d be having an amazing holiday together. I thought we might go back to London engaged.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘But I think . . . I think being here has only highlighted our differences.’ He sounded uncomfortable. He’d never been much of one to talk about emotions. ‘I think we should—’
I heard a girl’s voice in the background.
‘Who was that?’
‘Who was what?’
‘That girl’s voice. Who was it?’
‘Oh.’ Pete lowered his voice and it sounded like he was covering the mouthpiece. ‘That’s Goat’s cousin.’
‘Goat’s cousin is a girl? You never said Goat’s cousin was a girl!’
‘I never said it was a guy.’
‘I thought this was a boys’ trip. You didn’t even invite me!’
‘You wouldn’t have come,’ he hissed. ‘You don’t even want to walk up Table Mountain!’
I wasn’t usually a jealous person. In fact I’d go so far as to say I was never a jealous person. Growing up I’d had lots of male friends. Boys were fun. And during those hideous teenage years, when girls become irrational she-devils, I’d found myself gravitating more towards their keep-it-simple, wanna-share-a-pint nature. I never thought a boy couldn’t have an innocent and platonic relationship with a girl and I was never jealous if Pete was friendly with other females. But this seemed different. It felt like he’d purposefully kept something from me. None of the photos from his hike or the seal trip had her in it. Only him, Goat, cliffs and the god damned, (admittedly breath-taking), wildlife.
‘What the fuck, Pete?! You lied to me!’
‘I did not,’ he said, exasperated. He said something else but the phone cut out.
‘What? I didn’t hear you.’
He tried again but all I heard was ‘oh oh eh oh-oh’. He sounded like he was doing the vocal on a New Kids on the Block chorus.
‘What was that?’
‘The reception’s getting bad. I’d better go,’ he said, the reception now crystal clear. ‘But I think we need to talk when we get home—’
‘Need to talk?’ I said, suddenly angry. How dare he utter the dreaded ‘we need to talk’ words over the phone when he was about to fuck off out of mobile coverage for a week?! ‘Are we breaking up?’ I said, incredulous. This couldn’t be happening. What about the ethical diamonds? What about my potential proposal at the top of Table Mountain, sweaty and breathless and hopefully free from snake damage?
‘I don’t know,’ Pete said quietly.
‘Jesus.’ I whooshed out a mouthful of air and with it went my anger, replaced by sad reality. ‘I can’t believe this.’
‘I should go.’
I didn’t know what to say.
‘Jess?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’ll call you when we’re back in range, OK?’
I hung up, dropped the phone on the table and sat with my hands curled on my lap, then snatched up my phone again and began to search. Goat’s real name was Adrian and he’d been on The Bachelor. It didn’t take long to find his full name, Adrian Du Plessis, and to find his Instagram profile. I scrolled through his pictures – he really did post abundantly – until I found ones of the seal trip. I swore audibly, which made the man wearing loafers without socks at the table next to me purse his lips. Her name was Giselle. She was a tanned, smooth-skinned, honey-haired model with pillowy lips, lovely teeth and dental-advert-worthy pink gums. Her hair was swept off her heart-shaped face in two inside-out French braids, the tail ends falling over her toned shoulders. In one photo she sat on the edge of the boat, her arm slung over Pete’s shoulder, their wetsuits peeled down to their waists and her red string bikini holding up tanned C-cups. Pete grinned beside her. I clicked on Giselle’s Instagram handle ‘@adventuregirlSA’ and scrolled till I found a picture of Pete. She’d clearly been enamoured with him because there were plenty. Pete and Giselle in wetsuits. Pete and Goat in wetsuits. Giselle and Pete in the water with seals. Goat and Pete changing out of their swimmers (Goat’s bottom was visible and by the amount of likes, the internet definitely approved).
‘Almond milk cappuccino,’ a voice said, and my coffee was placed in front of me.
I murmured a thank you and looked from a photo of Goat, Pete and Giselle (#selfie #newfriends #hotenglishboy) to my coffee. The barista had made a perfect heart in the foam.
‘Hey!’ a vaguely familiar voice said. ‘How’s it going?’
I looked up and saw Jimmy from the dog hotel/bar/gallery/restaurant grinning down at me.
‘Whoa.’ His brow furrowed. ‘Are you OK?’
Jimmy had a friend with him. They were both looking at me. I was looking at them. They had tight leggings on and I felt the need to make a joke about it. But I couldn’t find the funny words. I couldn’t find any words.
‘It’s Jess, isn’t it?’ Jimmy said. ‘This is my brother-in-law, Diego.’
I looked at brother-in-law-Diego, not really seeing him. Pete was on a seven-day trip with a model who knew how to inside-out French braid and didn’t save them merely for big nights out but casually wore them on snorkelling trips with my boyfriend. Diego and Jimmy looked at each other. Pete was sleeping under the stars with a model who liked to climb shit and get sweaty. I realised I hadn’t said anything so tried to talk, but I hadn’t decided what words I wanted to say so my mouth moved and I just sat there. Pete had been snorkelling with a model who had nice gums and the kind of armpits that looked like they’d never had a stubbly day in their life.
‘You aren’t OK,’ Jimmy said, pulling out a chair opposite and sitting down. ‘Is your boyfriend here? What’s his name? Paul?’
I glanced at the heart in the coffee.
‘Pete,’ I said, looking back at the picture on my phone. ‘He’s gone . . . up . . . very high . . . big rocks. Brutal rocks. With Giselle the French-braiding cousin.’
Jimmy turned to Diego. ‘There’s something wrong with her.’
‘I can see that,’ Diego said, glancing at his watch meaningfully.
‘I can’t just leave her.’ Jimmy turned back to me. ‘Can we take you back to your hotel? Where are you staying?’
I pointed across the road in the direction of the harbour. It looked like I was pointing to a juice bar. Jimmy and Diego looked at each other. Diego shrugged. I noticed how tremendously muscled and colourfully dressed he was, and then went back to looking at the foam heart, now sinking into the coffee.
‘Is it near?’ Jimmy said, tapping my inert arm. ‘Did you walk here?’
I felt so, so tired. I shut my eyes for a moment. Perhaps I’d just have a snooze at the table.
Diego and Pete commenced an analysis of the situation. Diego thought I was one of Jimmy’s ‘floozies’ and Jimmy let him know that the girls aren’t his floozies. Most of them are his friends. But I was neither his floozie nor his friend; just a girl who’d been a little weird about the opening times of the restaurant. I’d seemed nice, if somewhat tenacious, and I’d had a boyfriend with me who was perhaps a tad uptight but probably a decent chap. As he wasn’t here and I seemed pretty sad about something, he was potentially the cause and it was their duty to help. Diego did some sighing, said ‘another girl with a broken wing’ under his breath then mentioned he needed to get home and have breakfast before his next class.
‘I like breakfast . . .’ I said, opening my eyes. I hadn’t eaten since lunch the day before and with the lack of sleep I’d begun to feel woozy.
Jimmy looked relieved I’d spoken a full coherent sentence. ‘Do you want to have breakfast with us?’
I looked from Diego to Jimmy, contemplated saying no and going back to my empty, foodless apartment, realised I was at a café so could just eat here next to Mr-Pursey-Lips-No-Socks, looked back at smiling Jimmy and nodded.
‘Great!’ Jimmy stood.
I looked at his tight leggings. ‘Will you be wearing those?’
Jimmy cracked into a delighted grin. ‘Offensive, aren’t they?’
