Love Is Usually Where You Left It Read online

  Chapter Four: Love at First Sight. (23 Years Ago)

  Both Clive and Gayle remember the day as clear as anything. It was a Tuesday morning, in the springtime: the day that they first met.

  Was it something resembling a scene from a classic love movie; was it love at first sight? Maybe it was on a crowded train station platform on a cold, rainy morning that their eyes first met? A connection that warmed and melted their hearts as cupid struck one of his perfect bull’s-eyes? Did they both try to catch the same taxi cab? And after they’d both selflessly argued that the other should take it, they agreed to take it together, had got talking and had been together ever since? Were they two unfortunate, or fortunate, young people who got trapped in a lift? Thrown together into an inescapable, confined space; fate’s unsubtle way of ensuring that two hearts that were meant to be together were given a dramatic first push? Did they catch sight of each other over the bananas and apples of the fruit aisle in a supermarket? Instantly and subconsciously associating each other with the healthy and naturally good things that life had to offer? Did their cars accidentally collide and, as they both got out to examine the damage and discuss who was to blame, their hearts all a flutter because of the collision, their eyes linked together with the instant connection of love? Was it.....

  I should probably just tell you, right? Sorry!

  It was around 11.30 a.m., certainly some time after the high school morning break, that Gayle walked into classroom B7 for the very first time. Clive was sitting at his usual desk on the right hand side of the room, by the window, where he liked to breathe on the glass and draw little doodles on the foggy condensation. On this day he was trying to draw a big rocket but was having trouble getting the circular launch jets underneath to look just right. Gayle and her mother had just moved to the area after a messy divorce with her father which had resulted in her having to change schools. And this late start seemed to typify Gayle’s, and her mothers, attitude to the importance of school.

  She kind of swaggered into the classroom slowly but very loudly, completely interrupting Mr Jackson who was in full flow at the blackboard trying to explain the Pythagoras theorem for the umpteenth time, batting away jokes about Greek footballers and dinosaurs named Pythagoras Rex. The whole class turned to face Gayle’s noisy entrance and Clive immediately noticed her slightly snarled lip, arrogant chewing and couldn’t-give-a-shit, lethargic walk.

  The whole class stared at her and she just stared right back. Clive knew right away that she was nothing but trouble. She was all attitude and huge, pink bubble gum. The clothes she was wearing, probably as far away from school uniform as you could get, were all black and baggy, and her hair was long, curly and big; very big. It was the sort of do that Kylie Minogue had inspired a generation of teenage girls to copy – albeit about ten years earlier. On that day though, it just completed the appearance of a girl who looked like she wanted to look totally different to everyone else. If her look was giving off any kind of sign, then it was a big two fingered salute to the whole world.

  Yep, Clive knew straight away that she was someone he wouldn’t get on with. She was probably a pampered Daddy’s-girl who just had to stamp her feet to get whatever she wanted. She looked like she had no idea about how difficult real life can be sometimes; and she probably didn’t care. No, Clive had made up his mind – he would attempt to avoid her like the plague.

  Gayle remembered standing before the door of classroom B7 for a good two minutes before working up the courage to enter. She was hideously late because the old banger her mum had just bought wouldn’t start and so she had to catch two buses to get to her new school.

  The woman at reception had done nothing to calm Gayle’s first day nerves and had rather curtly just pointed her roughly in the direction of her new classroom after giving her a huge pile of paperwork that needed to be “completed a.s.a.p.” (When did people feel the need to speak in acronyms all the time? Is it any more difficult to say “as soon as possible” than it is to say “a - s - a - p”?)

  Gayle remembered clearly taking one last deep breath before placing her hand on that door to classroom B7 and stepping forward, only to trip over the long black dress that her mother had made her wear and banging loudly into the door as it opened. She was faced with a room full of strangers all staring directly at her. It wouldn’t have felt any different had it been the whole world staring at her. She began chewing her chewing gum as fast as she could, staring back so she wouldn’t appear like the little, scared new kid; whilst all along just wishing that the floor would swallow her up. Why had her mum and dad split up? Why did she have to move and leave all her friends behind? Why was she here? Why was life so unfair?

  As she continued to stare back at the room; the room of her new classmates, aware that her new teacher was standing a couple of feet away in front of a blackboard with a drawing of a huge triangle on it, there was something that caught her eye. Over on the far right side of the room, on a desk by the window, was a pleasant looking boy who, in contrast to everyone else, who were aggressively staring, was actually smiling softly at her and it made her feel a little better.

  It’s the little things in life that make all the difference in making people feel better about themselves; a simple hello, a nod of the head or, in this case, a soft smile that stood out amongst a sea of otherwise hostile faces.

  Unfortunately, for Gayle, this moment of slight relief was very short lived as her eyes were drawn to the boy sitting next to the pleasant looking soft smiler. And she knew what he was straight away: the class trouble maker. The loud mouth. The cocky nuisance. The one person to keep away from at all costs. The type of immature, brain-dead person that spends entire lessons ignoring the teacher because he is too busy drawing large penises on the window. He probably came from a privileged house where he was allowed to do whatever he wanted. A spoilt brat who Mummy and Daddy threw money at all the time. Someone who had no idea about the realities and hardships of real life; the things that she was so painfully experiencing right now. Yep, she knew straight away that he was someone who would annoy her immensely and so she would attempt to avoid him like the plague.

  Chapter Five: Road Rage.

  This is exactly why Gayle didn’t like leaving for work late. In fact, this was exactly why she hated leaving for work late. It wasn’t the inevitability that she was going to arrive at work late, because she often finished work late and so arriving late now and again maybe compensated for that slightly.

  No, the reason was because she hated feeling the way she felt right now.

  And it always happened right here, at this exact point on the by-pass where the dual carriage merged into one lane and, because of the volume of cars at this time, became a traffic bottleneck.

  All the semi-reasonable people in the world, who happened to be driving on the by-pass at this time, did the morally proper thing and joined the queue in the left hand lane, ready for the one-lane section of road. But every now and again someone decided that they didn’t want to, or maybe shouldn’t have to, queue up with everyone else; and so would speed down the, now clear, right hand lane to attempt to join the single lane right at the point where the road becomes one lane.

  Not to attach labels to anyone but Gayle found that the cars doing this often had blacked-out windows and/or spoiler and skirt kits and/or ridiculously loud exhaust pipes and/or were playing hardcore dance tunes at a volume level that suggested they maybe thought they were DJ-ing in Ibiza.

  And today’s latest member of the no-consideration-for-others club?

  Man in a suit in a navy blue BMW 5 Series who, despite the fairly dark nature of his windows, Gayle could clearly see was also chatting away on his mobile phone – that he was holding in his hand!

  Hands free?

  Not for me, I’m an inconsiderate arsehole who’s much too important to abide by the law or to queue up with all you losers!

  Gayle could feel her blood beginning to boil. BMW Arsehole was about eighty feet in front of her now
indicating to join the left lane where she had been waiting, patiently, along with everyone else, for the last seven or eight minutes.

  “Don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in, don’t let him in…” she said out loud, trying to transfer her message of frustration to the six cars in front of her.

  Gayle smiled as the first two cars, a silver Beetle and a red Peugeot, ignored BMW Arsehole and joined the single lane without letting him in. The third car though, a white Micra, didn’t advance when a gap opened up in front, instead letting BMW Arsehole in.

  “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” shouted Gayle at the top of her voice and immediately wanted to kill two people at once. BMW Arsehole, of course; but now also Micra Knob/Knob-ess for having the sheer stupidity and weakness of moral fibre of letting him in.

  And this is exactly why she hated leaving for work late; because it can’t be healthy wishing you owned a machine gun so large that only prime-era Arnold Schwarzenegger could realistically use it, can it? How can a bit of road rage turn you into wanting to commit murder in the blink of an eye? And if you kill two people you become a serial killer straight away. And for what? Because someone jumped a queue and someone else let them in? It can’t be right, can it? She wished she could just relax and not get worked up about such trivial things because getting angry and wasting so much mental energy doesn’t do anyone any good, does it? It would be so much better to just be cool, and more Zen, all of the time. (Or so she thought. She kept having these thoughts that being more Zen would be a positive thing in her life when, actually, she wasn’t even sure what Zen meant.) But then again, if you didn’t get worked up about things that are clearly wrong in life, are you even alive anymore? This was the type of debate that Gayle often had with herself, especially on a Friday morning after another long week.

  Gayle wondered whether all this road rage escalation began when such incidents first started to get published more and more in the newspapers or shown on TV. There was no way that she wanted to commit GBH on any other road users until there were nightly news reports about people scuffling over things like differences of opinions over who had right of way on a roundabout. Before then there was probably no one in the land who had even considered putting chunky DIY tools, golf clubs or baseball bats in their boot, you know, just in case.

  Do most people who take up golf do it because they actually enjoy golf, or because they want to have a handy six-iron in the car to be ready in case they are caught up in any road rage-y incidents? Damn it, thought Gayle, what good was Clive buying that axe recently if it was just going to be left idle in the shed?

  She took a deep breath and cleared from her mind the vision of herself screaming out loud as she ran down the bypass towards a white Micra and a navy blue BMW whilst wielding a large axe over her right shoulder. As she tried to calm down she also had to fight the thoughts that next time she was here, with similar, busy traffic, she would also speed down the right lane and jump the queue; because that wasn’t right either, was it? If everyone in the whole world turns into an arsehole then the word arsehole would become redundant. Well except for when you were actually referring to the hole in ones arse.

  Gayle wished Clive was sitting next to her. He could tell her one of his stupid jokes. She would probably groan rather than laugh, as usual, but she’d be laughing inside and it would certainly lighten the mood. Instead she turned the radio up and, irony of ironies, began to hear Cerys Matthews from Catatonia singing: Road Rage. What were the chances? Not of Cerys Matthews singing Road Rage, because did she ever sing any other songs?, but because she was singing it right now, in this road rage-esque situation?

  Although you think that it may have escalated Gayle’s already crazy-woman-on-the-edge sort of mood, her mind was pacified by the song immediately as, although she hadn’t heard it for a while, it was one that she really liked and remembered well. She smiled as Cerys distinctively rolled her tongue around the “R’s” of the title words in that special way that only Welsh people can as part of the unique way that they speak – especially when talking in their own language. Her smile turned into a little laugh as she remembered Clive’s amusing assessment of the way that the “people from the valleys” speak.

  “Welsh: A language invented for people who wanted to talk whilst, at the same, being able to clear catarrh and mucus their throats.”

  Gayle now felt much calmer as she again glanced around out of the window. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the cars that were passing by on the other side of the carriageway. (The side that was moving freely, without even the hint of any hold ups, which is always the way isn’t it? If you are ever held up in a traffic jam, the final insult is that the cars travelling in the opposite direction are almost always free-flowing and carrying drivers who smugly smile at your gridlocked predicament. In fact..... sorry, now that Gayle has calmed down a bit, let’s not aggravate things again.)

  Instead Gayle focussed on the large house to the left of her and and, in particular, the “for sale” sign that stood at the end of the garden. She’d obviously seen the houses at this part of the road on several occasions, as she sat here motionless on her leaving for work late days, and knew that they were pretty big. Just how big though she hadn’t been aware of until reading the “advertising shorthand” on the for sale board, that read: Extended Dining Kitchen + 4 beds, 5 baths. Would she want to live in a house like that? Probably not. Gayle hated cleaning one bathroom a week, let alone five. Although maybe a small downstairs toilet would be nice and handy. In fact, if you get to an age and condition that warrants having a stair lift fitted in your house, then a downstairs loo becomes essential. The benefits of a motorised seat that takes you to the upper floor of your house are clear to see but let’s face it: they are not exactly blessed with the speed that can be required when you are desperate for a shit. And no house has ever been enhanced by having a permanent commode situated in the front room.

  The thing was though, Gayle happened to like her (small) house on Percival Road. She and Clive had put their hearts and souls into making it a home, just the way they wanted it. Well, apart from the odd, hideous key rack and other similar, disastrous DIY-attempts.

  Gayle looked the opposite way, to her right, and watched the free flowing cars shooting past and her attention was grabbed by a black cab that had red advertising along the side. Instead of speculating on just when and why black cabs had started pimping themselves out for advertising as she may usually do on one of these plenty-of-time-for-mind-wandering mornings, she instead focussed on the actual words of the advert.

  Williamsons – Marriage Counselling Specialists.

  Her thoughts were transferred back to around thirteen years earlier when she, more or less, pleaded with Clive to come to marriage guidance sessions with her or, at least, let them use some marriage self-help books. He had refused point blank though, reasoning that they were “pointless” and that they “should be able to sort out their differences” themselves; that the whole thing was “a money making scheme” and “too American.” She knew back then that it wasn’t that Clive didn’t want to help save their marriage but rather that he was just being too proud and too embarrassed to talk about their problems to a complete stranger; he was probably being too British.

  But the fact is by not going to some kind of counselling, or getting any help at all, their problems were never really addressed in a healthy manner. The fact that both of them felt trapped, unable to pursue things they may have dreamed of as children, meant that resentment inevitably grew. And from resentment, bitterness is inescapable.

  So really, it was Clive’s fault that things had led to this – the fact that they were now on the verge of splitting.

  Or was it?

  Would counselling have been able to save their relationship? Shouldn’t they really have been able to save it themselves as Clive had said at the time? Gayle accepted that she must have
been as much to blame as Clive. What is it that people like to say? It takes two to tango? They are probably right.

  But why do they say that? First of all why have they chosen a dance analogy? It takes two to do a lot of things, so why choose a dance? Why not it takes two to play chess? Or it takes two to ride a tandem? And if you do have to use a dance analogy, then why choose the tango? All dances take two people don’t they? Well ok, actually: NO. There are some dances that are done solo, and I suppose things like the Conga, or Oops Upside Your Head look pretty pathetic if only two people are taking part.

  So maybe the tango has been chosen because of the alliteration of the “t’s” involved? I suppose it takes two to Cha, Cha, Cha doesn’t sound nearly as snappy. But then again, is this saying even appropriate for this context? Is the it takes two to tango saying really supposed to portray some kind of betrayal, in which one person cannot solely be blamed for an act of dangerous “tango”-esque passion, because it actually takes two to, well..... tango?

  What the hell was Gayle thinking about now? Talk about spending too much time thinking – if it was possible she would love to take a holiday away from her own mind.

  She cleared her thoughts and concentrated again on the music coming from the radio. As she hummed along to the, still playing, Catatonia song, thankfully almost all thoughts of the road rage, that had possessed her only moments earlier, were all but gone.

  But her mind couldn’t relax for a moment and another reflection instantly entered as Gayle remembered clearly that the song Road Rage was from way back in 1998. It was nearly as old as Jack, who had just left for university. Wow, where had all that time gone? And gone in such a rush? Everything seemed much simpler in 1998. Now, nearly twenty years later, she had no idea where her life was going. Although one thing was for sure, just like this traffic jam, even if time was speeding away from her, her life was going nowhere.