Together

‘One day we’ll do something together’, she whispered, almost inaudibly, so I had to re-run it in my head a few times to be sure she really had said it. The waves broke along the shore and washed her words in my ears. I wondered what she might have in mind, but dared not ask. I don’t know why. It just seemed so ominous, at the time. I was afraid to say anything else, in case it broke the spell. I was sure, one hundred per cent convinced, that one day we would do something together, so that was enough for me, even if I had imagined her words, I knew it was true. I wanted it to be true.

I was not sure when or where we had met. We had been bumping into each other on the bus to work, in the coffee bars in town, shopping in the local supermarket. I didn’t know, at first, what she did, where she worked. She looked so boring and ordinary: flat hair, flat shoes, flat features, no smile and eyes that seemed to look without seeing much. I was sure that although I had seen her around all over the place for months, years, she had no idea who I was.

Then, one day last month, I found that I was stood in the queue at a bus stop next to her. The bus was a long time coming. In fact, it never came, and eventually she looked towards me and asked if I knew what time the bus was due. She had a soft, feminine voice, surprisingly friendly and much more confident than I would have expected. I shrugged and said that it was due fifteen minutes ago, and that it must have been cancelled due to lack of drivers, or some such excuse. This frequently happened since they privatized the bus company and reduced the drivers’ wages. I told her that it would be 25 minutes before another bus was due and that we might as well walk, or take a taxi. She said, ‘good idea, let’s walk in together, we can keep each other company’. And off we went, like two little kids suddenly striking up a friendship out of nothing.

It turned out that she had seen me around, too, and she knew which coffee bars and bookshops I frequented the most, just because they were also her favourites. She worked in the local library, and did odd shifts, which is why I saw her at all sorts of odd times of the day while I perambulated around the place looking for items to add to my collections. She was politely interested, and increasingly fascinated, by what I told her about my collections of books and music. She had heard of many of the books I liked to buy, but read none of them. She had heard of the countries from where my favourite music had originated, but had heard of none of the artists. Her own choice in reading was modern novels, usually written by neurotic middle-aged women and her choice in music was whatever the radio stations decided she ought to listen to. Usually, I hated that in a person. This approach to music and literature was the approach I despised the most and was guaranteed to make me lose interest in a conversation instantly, but not with her. She was one of those rare people that simply disarm you with a smile and a manner of speaking that is so easy-going that you never feel pushed, contradicted or persuaded. It was such a comfortable conversation that I was unaware of how soon we covered the mile to town, across the field by the river.

‘Well, I’m late for work now’, she said as we rejoined the crowded footpath near the bridge. ‘I must dash, see you again soon’ and she disappeared into the crowds almost like magic. I wished I could do that. She was so much a part of her own world that I felt unthreatened, relaxed and happy. She could show interest and respect without any trace of obsequiousness or pretension. And she fitted so well into the world around her that she just evaporated into the crowd. I knew that I was going to have to find her again and find some way of spending more time with her. It wasn’t just the attraction of a bright young female. Actually, she appeared to be neither bright nor young. It was the attraction of a personality that was not cynical, not critical, but just happy to be interacting with someone else.

The rest of that morning I could not get her out of my mind. I went back home to try and work, but could write nothing. I popped out to the coffee shop and could not settle there, even after buying a newspaper. I left it behind and decided to go to the library. The library! Of course, there were not that many difficulties in finding her again, since I knew she worked in a library. There was only one in the centre of this town, so off I went.

I blundered around the library feeling very foolish. There was nothing I wanted there, and I felt so self-conscious looking around at the staff, bumping into people, not having any real idea where to look. The library had never seemed so large to me, and I felt very out of place, so I soon left.

As it happened, it was not long before our paths crossed again. The next day, while I was browsing a bookshop in the late morning, she came in, walked straight up to me and asked me if I fancied a coffee. ‘Good idea’ I said, ‘let’s go next door’. We settled into our chairs with our coffees, and at first there was not much to say. I kept noticing things about other people nearby, wanted to comment on them, then didn’t. The conversation was not as spontaneous as yesterday and I started to wonder how to overcome the faltering flow of chat. I decided that the best way would be to drop the small talk and ask her something serious or personal. But she beat me to it, asking me if I thought that the government had gone too far in joining in this poorly thought out war in the Middle East. It threw me a bit after the bits of chit-chat we had started with, and so she told me that she thought it was probably right to go to war, but that the government’s reasons were all wrong, and that their justification was dodgy. She felt that the regime in Iraq was tyrannical and that it needed to be changed.

I found it difficult to accept this and told her that it was precisely because of this kind of imperialistic thinking that we having such problems emanating from the Middle East in the first place. I described how I felt the Palestinians must feel, having been displaced from the homeland by the Israelis, treated like animals and backed into a corner. Anyone in that position would object violently, and I wondered aloud whether the Israelis made the situation worse by over-reacting instead of negotiating. Actually, the violence of the Israelis seemed more extreme than the violence of the Palestinians, and a simple look at the number of deaths on the two sides revealed that far more Palestinians had died than Israelis. Worse, the Americans and most of Europe seemed to back Israel, politically, militarily and financially. But I was getting too hot about this, so eased off a bit, asking her if she wanted a biscuit.

She declined the biscuit, or anything else, and came back at me, quietly at first, then getting more passionate, talking about the atrocity of the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, the callousness of the terrorists in killing so many innocent Americans, bombing innocent Israeli children. It was hard to argue with this, but important to try because she seemed to have information from only one side of the divide. But I didn’t want this to turn into an argument. I suggested that American innocence may be simply a result of a flagrant disregard, or, at best, apathy towards people in other countries. Only now, when the troubles of the Middle East had come to American soil, were the Americans finally interested in what was happening beyond their shores. But what seemed to interest them most was oil. They used the rhetoric of displacing a totalitarian regime to secure their access to rich oil reserves. I thought that this was obvious, since they did not seem to care a jot about other totalitarian regimes, and that their self-interest was the only reason that they had their eyes on the Arabic countries. While talking to her, I realized, and immediately added, that war on terrorism sounded like a great ideal, but what we really need to do is to declare war on oppression. This would be the most reliable way to eliminate terrorism.

She shifted to an angle less contentious, that this war was certainly nothing to do with religion. It was entirely wrong in her view to look at this conflagration as if Islam was fighting a just war, or Christians were on the rampage. We agreed that the political rhetoric was cynically over the top and guaranteed little more than the ingenuousness of the politicians. But the drizzle was beginning outside the coffee shop and I think her break time was over as she shifted herself around in her chair uncomfortably and started fiddling with her coat. The room got darker as people stood in the window, sheltering from the rain.

We agreed that we were not going to resolve these issues simply between the two of us, and that it was good to be able to talk and to express different views, and I asked her if she had to get back to work now. She said she had to go and then hesitated. I suddenly realized that I didn’t know her name, nor did I have any idea about what to say about meeting again. I certainly didn’t want her to think I was trying to make out with her, so was unsure what to do. Then I realized that I just needed to introduce myself and that there was no big deal, ‘I should have introduced myself earlier’, I said, and announced my name. She smiled, perhaps with relief that one of us had finally broached this, ‘Mary’, she said, ‘Mary Winford’. We grinned at each other for a moment, and then she said she really had to get going and that she hoped to bump into me again soon. I mumbled something about it being highly likely in such a small town, but then realized she was already gone, as she moved with surprising speed out of the place, with a cheerio over her shoulder.

I was now wondering whether to get another coffee, or go elsewhere. I wanted to just let the conversation swill around my mind for a little longer, getting straight in my own mind what we had said, and, more importantly, what we had meant. So I got another coffee and picked up a newspaper from the counter, to make it look like I was busy reading, while I let my thoughts settle. But as I sat down again, I noticed something on the floor under the table. It was a little silver charm in the shape of an old-fashioned sailing ship, with a bit of broken chain attached to it. The work was exquisite, incredibly detailed, obviously very expensive and very old. I wondered whether to hand it in at the counter, but then thought it was probably Mary’s. I would surprise her with it next time we met.

But the next day I did not bump in to her, nor the day after that. The week-end was upon me and I was terribly distracted by thoughts of Mary. I had really enjoyed the intense, intelligent exchange with her and was hankering for more of this rare kind of open and frank conversation. I found the silver charm frequently between my fingers, every time I put my hands in my pockets, it was there. I was already sure it was hers, and wondered if she had noticed its absence. But I busied myself with short bouts of writing, interspersed with long walks around town, popping into coffee shops on the off-chance of bumping into Mary. But she was nowhere to be found. I even visited the library a couple more times, but to no avail. This was crazy. I was even losing my appetite.

On Sunday, to take my mind of things, I went to a movie. Like many American movies, it started out very well, good story, interesting characters, but half way through it degenerated into sentimentalized schmaltz, with swirling orchestral music, and long drawn-out scenes with little happening. Of course, being an American movie, it had to have a happy ending and that destroyed any integrity that the original story might have had. I came out blinking into the sunlight wondering what it was about the American movie industry, and felt like I was on the brink of being able to articulate the reason why this always happens, when I saw Mary over the road, and all thoughts of the movie industry vapourized instantly. I crossed the road.

Mary was with someone, a man about my age. They were standing very close together, and were deep in conversation about something. But then they hugged each other, kissed briefly and parted. He headed off along the footpath, and Mary turned away from him, and walked in my direction, with a look of concentration on her face. As we approached each other, she recognised me and she smiled and said hello. We chatted about the weather, about the movie I had just seen, and how heavy the traffic was for a Sunday, then I asked her where she had been since last we met. She smiled in a sheepish way and said that, silly as it sounded, she seemed to have found a new man. She had met this fellow, and they had taken a great shine towards each other, and had this whirlwind romance for a few days, but he had had to go back to his home town, and she had just this minute said goodbye to him. I asked a few more questions about him, and ascertained that he worked in a bank, lived in Manchester and had been visiting some relative or other when he met Mary and they had hit it off so well that he had extended his stay for as long as he could. I managed to look pleased for her, but had to suppress my own feelings.

The traffic noise was quite loud by now, with several buses rattling their way through this busy street, brakes squealing and windows rattling. I decided not to suggest coffee as I was a bit confused now, but found myself instantly agreeing to it when she suggested it. We set off along the footpath towards the coffee bar, and I put my hands in my pockets, only to find the silver charm at my fingertips. I had completely forgotten about it. ‘Have you got a charm bracelet?’ I asked. ‘No’, she responded, ‘I had a toy one when I was a kid, but I find that kind of jewellery irritating and pointless.’

I was beginning to feel as though I was completely out of synchronization with everything going on around me, and wanted to re-wind the last few days and start over again. But I wondered how far I would have to re-wind it. A lot of things had been going wrong for a long time.