Would Like to Meet. Polly James
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the energy to go for a walk. Are you still not sleeping?”
“No,” I say, “I mean, yes, I am. But that’s actually worse – because of the nightmares I’ve been having recently.”
Pearl raises an eyebrow.
“Nightmares?” she asks. “What nightmares?”
She makes me a coffee while I tell her about my recurring dream.
“It starts with me and Joel standing on the deck of the Titanic, while Joel keeps yelling at me that Dan has disappeared,” I say, finding it all too easy to visualise the scene that replays itself in my mind most nights: dark water swirling round our ankles, the captain of the ship conspicuous by his total absence, and the deck tilting more and more alarmingly.
“So what happens then?” asks Pearl.
She actually seems interested, which is unusual, given how boring most of us find listening to other people’s dreams. Esther tells me about hers every morning when we arrive at work, and I’m starting to wish she wouldn’t bother, though I’d never dream of saying so.
“Go on,” says Pearl. “We haven’t got all day, so don’t drag this out.”
“I’ve nearly finished,” I say, “and I was only pausing to take a breath. Anyway, when the ship’s about to capsize, Joel and I spot Dan sitting in a lifeboat in the sea below, so we both breathe a big sigh of relief because we know he won’t let us drown. Then we start jumping up and down, yelling, until he spots us …”
My voice tails off again at that point, as I suddenly get a bit choked up, so I try to cover that by slurping at my coffee, which is still so hot I burn my mouth.
“Ouch,” I say, getting up and heading for Pearl’s kitchen for a swig of cold water.
“Don’t change the subject by leaving the room,” says Pearl, getting up and following me. “Not when I’m still waiting to hear how this blooming dream ends – though I don’t see how you can call it a nightmare, if Dan rescues you.”
“That’s the thing,” I say. “When he finally sees us, he waves … but then he starts to row really fast. Away from us.”
“Ah,” says Pearl, who I’ve never known to be lost for words before.
She remains mute until we reach the wooden viewing seat at the top of the hill that forms the outer edge of the Abandon Hope estate, the same hill that overlooks a lake situated in a public park just outside the boundary. If Pearl thinks the sight of a large body of water is unfortunate in the circumstances, she doesn’t say so, and nor do I. I just avert my eyes.
“I want to give you some advice, Hannah,” she says, after a minute or two has passed. “From experience. When you find yourself on your own after a long time of being half of a couple, solitary hobbies like drawing and painting aren’t enough. You need to get out and meet people. You really do. I know it’s terrifying but you just have to face the fear. Take the opportunity to make new friends, whenever it presents itself, and be friendly to everyone you meet. Even people you don’t like.”
“Why have I got to be friendly to them?” I say, as I begin to sketch the view below us. (The one that doesn’t involve the lake. I’ve got my back to that.)
“Because they may have friends you like a lot,” says Pearl. “Ones they can introduce you to – oh, hello!”
She’s addressing one of the men who attended her poker night, the nice one who looks like Pope Francis, not the vile Fiddling Fred. He’s approaching us from the direction of the lake, dressed in a fisherman’s jumper and a very natty cap. The sort that a ship’s captain would wear, if he was the sort of captain who didn’t abandon women and children on the deck of a sinking ship. (I know Joel’s twenty-two, but to me he’ll always be a child.)
The man says hello to Pearl and then he smiles at me, and says, “Beautiful view, isn’t it?”
Pearl steps in before I can tell the truth about how I feel about the sight of large expanses of water at the moment.
“Hannah, you remember Albert, don’t you?” she says. “He’s one of my lovely fellow residents.”
I’d forgotten Albert’s name, but Pearl’s obviously taking her own advice by referring to him as “lovely”. She definitely told me she’d ruled him out as a potential new husband after the poker game, because he was “too quiet” for her taste.
The conversation between them isn’t exactly flowing now, which is a bit awkward, so I escape and walk to the very edge of the hill where I sit down on the grass, and start to draw the other view – the one which does contain the lake. Face the fear, and all that self-help stuff.
“I row my boat across that lake every morning,” says a voice behind me, and I turn round to see Albert looking down at my drawing. “It’s become one of my favourite places in the world.”
I don’t know what gets into me, but – all of a sudden – my mouth opens and I say,
“Albert, would you teach me to row?”
It might be purely symbolic, but imagine how much better I’d feel if I was rowing, not drowning.
It’s all very well for Pearl to tell me to take up more sociable activities, but after my first rowing lesson, Albert says I’m going to need a lot more, with the emphasis heavily on “a lot”. He claims he doesn’t mind how long it takes because I’ll get the hang of it eventually, and enjoy it once I have, but I doubt I’ll ever enjoy my other new outdoor activity: this ridiculous singles’ walking club.
There’s mud everywhere, and I’m freezing cold and soaking wet. Turns out that Joel’s super-cool “waterproof” jacket (the one I sneakily borrowed while he was still asleep this morning) is not only miles too big for me, which isn’t a surprise, but isn’t rainproof either, which certainly is. And the bloke running this stupid group is bossier than the Fembot, which I didn’t think was even possible.
The rest of the walkers are a motley crew as well, especially the men. There are quite a few young, fit ones dressed in lycra, which is a sartorial faux pas I might consider overlooking if they weren’t also so far ahead of me along the ridge that I couldn’t interact with them if I tried – and the ones staggering along behind me don’t look as if they’ll make it to the next stopping place alive. I hope they don’t, seeing as they’ve talked about nothing other than football and steam trains all the way so far. God knows why I ever thought this was a good idea.
“Too right,” says a voice from somewhere nearby, though I can’t see who it belongs to. And did I really just say what I was thinking out loud? (That’s a very worrying development, especially if I do the same thing whilst at work.)
“Over to your left,” comes the voice again. “Behind the tree. You can join me if you like – I’m going to make a run for it.”
That idea sounds so appealing that I don’t even stop to think before I make a sharp left-hand turn, and nearly send a trainspotter flying off the edge of the ridge. Then I peer around the only tree for miles that’s managed to retain its foliage in the face of the high winds that are presumably the norm up here in the wilderness. (Joel’s useless jacket isn’t windproof, either.)
“Hi,” says a blonde woman who’s standing with her back pressed flat against the tree. “Finally, someone else with common sense. I spotted a pub not far from that dip we passed a little while ago – d’you fancy joining me? I need a stiff drink after this.”
I need a hot drink, rather than a stiff one, but hopefully the pub will have a coffee machine as well as alcohol. I decide to take the risk, and follow carefully in the woman’s footsteps as she steps off the path and heads towards open