Visit Me

Come and visit me: words that are bounced around every time we speak but ultimately, words that hold no weight. Seven thousand, seven hundred and fifty-six miles stand between us, popping by for a visit is unreasonable, unrealistic… a fantasy, we both know it but, we never leave it out of a chat. Then before I know it, out of the blue, he announces he doesn’t want to hear from me anymore, being just friends is not enough for him. He misses our history together but, for now, the distance had made us, our friendship “pointless.” Until today.

The message was waiting for me this morning when I woke. I frowned when I saw his name on my screen, I was almost angry that he had messaged. It was his idea to cease talking, I had only just come to terms with his abandonment, how dare he ruin it now that I was fine. Nevertheless, I opened it, he knows I have seen it thanks to the filled-in tick icon in the bottom of the screen. He has a proposal for me it says and an apology. I am half-aware that I’m frowning as I read it, though fully aware of my heart beating too fast. My husband walks into the room.

“Are you okay Frowny Face?” He asks. I jump, I feel guilty, though for what reason I can’t admit, I am only reading a message after all.

“Oh, yes, my half-asleep brain is just trying to remember how to read,” I lie. I guess from that moment on guilt is a justifiable emotion. I place my phone upside down on the bedside table.

“Ha, okay sweetheart. I’m heading to work now, have a good day,” he replied, leaving me alone again. I stare at the phone as if it’s going to start shouting out to my husband that his wife is lying to him. When the front door slams shut, I realise I was holding my breath. I rise off the bed, making my way to the shower. Once I’ve woken up more, I’ll come back with refreshed eyes and find out I read the message wrong. Upon returning the message still revealed the same words. 

I’m glad today is my day off, for once his timing was somewhat acceptable. The whole day is free for me to decide how to respond, which is fortunate because I have been sat mulling over this message for a while, the tea in my hands is cold and barely touched. I need to make a decision soon or else I will never get anything done. Where he is, where Jake is, the weather is beautiful most of the time. He lives on an actual tropical island. It is always warm, even when it rains. Staring out of my window right now I note that it is raining, pouring actually, and it is certainly not warm despite being the middle of July. That's what I get for living in Britain I guess. I load up the message again on my phone even though I must know it by heart now. Maybe it will help if I go through it systematically; one small bit at a time.

“I have a proposal for you,” it says, “but first I should say I’m sorry for being an idiot last time we spoke. I shouldn’t have cut you out or insinuated that our relationship when we saw each other was nothing."

He is right that he was an idiot, I had assumed that he was drunk at the time, thinking I would receive a message of apology the next day but it never came. It made sense that knowing I was married, not being able to give him anything more would be difficult for him. I could understand him wanting to cut me off because it was too hard but what he added was that he shouldn’t have wasted his time, that our history was just a blip. I felt a fool for putting more value and care into how I thought about us than he did. I expected more than a sentence of apology if I’m honest.

“I am making one last-ditch effort to convince you that we could be something, you know it deep down too,” I admitted last time we spoke that we could have been something in the past but, the timing was wrong. We were good as friends I thought, then I met my husband and Jake moved across the globe (the move was not because I upset him). Could we be something now? Maybe that's what I should be answering instead of his proposal.

“Come and visit me, Jen. It’s not empty words this time or just a nice thought, I will pay for your plane ticket. There is a perfect flight next week, all you need to do is say yes. Leave him and stay with me,” there it is, that’s his proposal. Fly across the world and be with him. 

“We can sort out the finer details when you get here. Just say yes, quit your job, leave your husband and get on that plane.” 

I laugh to myself at the absurdity of it all, he makes it sound so easy. I suppose it is...for him, he’s not the one that would be uprooting his whole life. 

“Tell me if you want to make a go of it, I’ll take silence as a no”.

It’s an enticing offer, running away to an exotic faraway island with a man waiting for you. Days spent drinking Mai-tais on the beach and evenings filled with lazy love-making in the heat. It sure sounds more appealing than here. I think the answer is this; we could be something, Jake is right. However, a part of me knows that I may have been looking back with rose-coloured glasses on, we were young and often drunk. We have grown up apart but still imagine each other as we once were. The truth is, the main things he really liked about me got swallowed up. I’m not sure I can get those bits back. I’m not sure I want them back. I married my husband for a reason, I love him, I just forget sometime in the mundaneness of life. Jake and his proposal are so alluring because it is so different from what I have now and it would be a chance to fulfil an old "what if" situation.

Right now, at this moment in time, I know that Jake is not the answer. I won't reply to his proposal.