Chapter Thirty-Five - I've
Got a Headache
"Look, is this going to be a
regular thing?""But thursday is the
only chance I have of seeing him. Cindy's there all the rest
of the week.""What I meant was,
are you going to see him every thursday? Is this supposed to
be a permanent weekly affair?"She pouted and
frowned. "If you loved me as much as you say you do you'd
want me to be happy."And what was I
supposed to say to that? Of course I love her. Of course I
want her to be happy. But I want her to be happy with me. If
she wants to share with someone else, I suppose there isn't
much I can say about that. I could put my foot down and say
this nonsense has to stop. And anyway, if she loved me, she
would want me to be happy, but she knows darn well I'm not
happy with her going next door. But then she doesn't really
love me any more does she?So she goes next
door, and I stay home.The following week
was a holiday and Cindy didn't go up to London.Terry was off to
work as usual. Annabel was moaning that she would not be
able to see him this week. "I don't know how he puts up with
her. He ought to leave her.""And go and live
with you?" I grinned at her."I don't want to
live with anyone else.""What about living
with me?""Living with you's
bad enough.""And you reckon
you've had enough?:"I wouldn't mind a
change."I suddenly felt
sick. I had known for months things between us were no
longer good, but it was still a profound shock to hear her
say so, and in such a matter-of-fact tone. I got up and
walked over to the window and stared out at nothing at all.She obviously
realised her remark had been somewhat brutal. "You must
admit we could do with a break. Perhaps we ought to have a
holiday away from each other.""If you remember it
was some years ago I first suggested the whole idea of
marriage was a mistake. You've got brothers and sisters. You
know what it's like living under each other's feet for years
and years. You get to feel hemmed in, and you start to treat
them with contempt. You take them for granted. They bug you.
They cease to matter in any special way, maybe until
something happens that forces you to reassess your kinship
with them. It has to be like that with marriage. You cant
live with someone year in year out and still think they are
very special and exciting to be with. It's natural for you
to find everything exciting with someone else. Here we are
on top of each other all the time, even if we have our own
separate rooms.""But that isn't what
marriage is all about. You are talking about friendship.
When you love someone you want to be with them all the time.
Love is stronger than friendship. But then you don't
understand what love really means, do you?"I turned around and
looked at her. I felt a deeply rooted pain inside me making
me want to cry, and I knew that sensation was caused by a
terrible yearning for the girl who sat in front of me. She
irritated me the way she fiddled with bits of paper on the
table, and seemed to be talking in such a glib manner, and
the way she wrinkled up her nose like a rabbit.I wanted to go
across and hug her. As I stood there looking at her I could
feel her small body against me, and under my hands. I could
feel the narrow waist, her hair against my face, the
crumple of soft clothes, the silky feel of female things,
the soft living flesh of her legs and bottom, the line of
elastic in her knickers, and the strange texture of those
fabrics that exude a magical, exciting feel.I turned and stared
out of the window again. "Yes, I know nothing about love. I
don't know anything about the kind of love you talk about.
I've never read those women's magazines. I don't know how
one is supposed to feel romantic. I don't know what this
great soggy romanticism of love is all about. I dont want to
know. I only think that the people who write all that
rubbish are doing the world a dis-service. It portrays a
line of feeling which is not real. It is all fairy
tale......""I don't read
women's magazines, and certainly not love stories...""It's all escapist
stuff. The prince and the princess may have become working
class, and the prince has acne, and the princess suffers
from pre-menstrual tension, but it's still a good old
fashioned fairy tale...""What's all this got
to do with me wanting to see Terry?""It's got nothing to
do with you wanting to see Terry, but it's got a lot to do
with your attitude to what love is supposed to be. You don't
see what I see as love. You see love as a romantic emotional
liaison. You see love as being something beautiful, ideal,
and lovely. You see it as giving meaning to an otherwise
more mundane world.""But Johnny, love is
something beautiful, ideal and lovely, and it does give
meaning to life. Life without love is drab and....oh, it
doesn't have the magic. Love gives the world all that
sparkle which makes it worth while.""Bollocks! I love
you, and it certainly doesn't make life worth while at all.
It makes life a bloody hell, because you are such an
indifferent little cow, and you're a thorough-going pain in
the arse who goes off to screw the next door neighbour,
leaving me to stare out of the window feeling thoroughly
bloody miserable. That's what being in love means as far as
I'm concerned, so where is all this bullshit about beauty
and idealism making life worth while? Life was a bloody
sight more enjoyable and more worth while before I got
tangled up with all this love nonsense, and in many ways I'd
be glad to be shot of the whole business so I could get back
to normal, and not have my world tied up with this mess
called love.""Yes, but love can
be beautiful too. It is beautiful when you both love each
other.""Maybe. But how long
do two people feel in concert. How long are you going to
feel in love with me, and me feel in love with you in the
same intense way? You are talking about infatuation, about
falling in love. That maybe is a gas. It is also a falling
out of the real world into a potty kind of world. That kind
of love is very introverted, exclusive, selfish, and in a
sense like a drug trip. It's like being on acid. You are
only concerned with your view of the world through your own
particular glasses. No-one else exists.""The person you're
in love with certainly exists.""Only as an object
of general euphoria. You see the love object...""That's a horrible
word... love object!""All right, it's a
horrible word. But you do see your lover as an object. The
moment that lover stands out from the general lovey-dovey
haze and says 'look here, I want to go down to the shops',
or 'I have to go to work', then that lovey-dovey haze is
shattered, and you are forced back into the boring old world
again. The shops, shopping, food, money, the day to day
hassle of living, it all comes back into your world, and you
dont want to know; you resent the intrusion of all this
petty boring, every day twaddle. You want your lovely
secret, all embracing love. You want to be there in love,
and that is all there is to your ideal life.""I think you're
being silly. Of course people fall in love and go a bit
potty, but the pottiness wears off. That doesn't mean the
love wears off; it just settles down a bit. I'm talking
about love, and I mean all aspects of love, not just some.
You can live with someone for years and years and still love
them.""Real love never
dies, does it Annabel?"She looked up at me
sharply. "Does it Annabel? remember, you told me that years
ago.""People change," she
said moodily."Ah yes, people
change, but love doesn't. That's the guiding force of our
universe. It is the central pivot that doesn't change.""One can be
mistaken.""Now wait a minute.
How can you be mistaken? Either you have this thing or you
don't. It isn't something you get mistaken over. You feel
it, and it does you in. You know about it all right.""What sort of love
are you talking about?""All sorts.""It sounds to me as
though you're talking about falling in love.""Perhaps that is
what I'm talking about, and that is what you felt for me all
those years ago. You fell in love with a romantic notion.
And when the ideal begins to fade, and you find the prince
is just a working class semi-hero, or no hero at all, or he
has boils on his neck, the dream gets blown to hell as
reality sticks its insidious nose where it isn't wanted."She is sitting there
scowling at the table. She doesn't want to argue. She wants
peace. She wants Terry. I am irrelevant, so are my
arguments."And then people
change. But of course it's me who's changed, not you. You
can now see how I dont measure up to the dream, the ideal,
or all those princely qualities.""You're right,
you've changed. You weren't so bad tempered when I first met
you. You weren't always arguing. And in those day you talked
some sense; not a lot, but at least not all the arrogant
nonsense you talk nowadays. You didn't hit me then, and you
didn't make me lift great boards about the countryside, and
hold up plasterboards on the end of upturned brooms. And you
didn't throw plaster in my face. It's your fault. You've
changed completely. You were never like that when I first
met you. It's you who've destroyed my love for you. I've
tried to love you although you keep doing all these nasty
things to me."I don't have a
women's love-story attitude to love at all. I don't read
women's magazines, you know that. I just cant handle you as
you are any more Johnsie. You overwhelm me. Your vibrations
are everywhere, and they get into my brain, and they bug me.
I keep getting het-up because I know you are around. I can
feel you everywhere, and I cant escape from you. I don't
have any independence. You don't have to say anything or do
anything, but I can feel you dominating me. That's why I
keep wanting to get out of the house."I don't feel that
with Terry. That's why I want to go and see him. I feel
peace when I'm with him. I never feel any peace when I'm
with you. Look at you now. You're barraging me with this
nonsense. Maybe you're right, I don't know. But Johnny I
don't care either. I dont want to be argued with. I don't
want to know all about that. You are trying to bully me,
that's all I know, and I don't want to be bullied."Now, can we stop
all this. I've got a headache." * * * * *
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