Sliding JayeLs (3)

What I did not expect was a smiling Emer leaning down to me, one hand on her knee and the other waving. “Hi, thought I’d better go talk to the only other [where I live] person here!” I never thought of that. Honestly, that was the last thing I’d have done. I would never go over and talk to a stranger simply because we’re from the same part of the world. Well, unless I was in Mongolia or something. But no, I’d never have thought of doing that and I’d never think she would. But she did. This girl, who I’d once again begun to think was snooty and stand-offish was in fact friendlier than me. I was the stubborn one, who was waiting for her to leave and stop talking about me to her friends. Oh dear, what is this night coming to?

Her friends seemed to be happy to talk amongst themselves, they were three guys and they were rather sober for the occasion. So was I; it was one of those nights when I just didn’t feel drunk no matter what I consumed. I had five pints down at this stage, and yet there I was having a fairly straightforward conversation with Emer. She was very nice, extremely nice. Her breath smelt of perfume, and this was very strange since I was very much aware of what was going on. Why was this happening? For the first time in ages, I actually had someone who could possibly turn into a girlfriend. But Deb was, is, in Galway and that’s a very big problem for me. It’s all very well saying two people can be together and yet be physically hundreds of miles apart. But I just can’t do that; to be together, you have to be together. I mean, it’s the wrong way to have a relationship; the whole thing of actually being there is huge in my priorities. The only comforting thing in the whole Deb situation is that I think she’s the same about it. But I think I’d be more sure of how I feel about Deb if she was actually here.

It may seem like I’m softening up the reader for a blow here, but no; I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Emer. Or any other type of relations that wander outside a boy and a girl being friends. I just talked with her for ages, bought her a drink (€6.50 for a vodka and orange, what the hell is wrong with this city?) and then we kinda parted for a while. I was too tired to go up dancing, so I watched Elaine and Sinead for a while. I can’t get over the fact that Sinead’s a teacher; she teaches Geography to secondary school kids on a temporary contract. I mean, she can be teachery (funny-coloured shoes, eccentric dress) but she’s……Sinead. And Sinead dances like a demon, head bopping up and down and so quick and…..ah I dunno. Elaine was good too, just doing her usual thang. I look like a twat on the dancefloor, dunno why I bother half the time. Elaine and Sinead are great friends, if I couldn’t have come over to their house on Monday evenings to watch “Friends” during the time I was in college this yeat, I’d have lost my precious grip on sanity. Human contact, to see them fussing over me and making me horrible tea (I’m very picky about my tea, very strong, a sneeze of milk and no sugar) that I’d drink anyway, it was all so nice to look forward to. And now they’re leaving for the summer. In a month, they’re returning to whence they came and I’m going to miss them so much. I’m sure I’ll visit, but it’s not the same. That’s kinda why I wanted to go out with them that night, while I still could. I found a phone on the floor and started playing with it. It rang. The place was too loud, and I was a little too drunk to care. Next thing Emer sat beside me. She took the phone from me and typed in “Where the fuck is my jacket?” She’d bought a “beigey” Gap jacket that very day and, as these things do, it went AWOL. Her night was spent talking to her friends and then going for a wander for the jacket.

So she goes to me at around 1.10am “How about we hang on here, get pissed, go to Burger King and get the half-three bus home?” And I’m like “Holy shit, that’s like……well, if I got to bed at 4am it’d be four hours sleep cos I had to be up for work at 8, in at 9. And then if I were realistic, it’d actually be 4.30 before I got to sleep. But then…….this was Emer. Emer is like……..she’s kinda like Gunther. She’s there, in every episode of my life, but she hardly ever has a speaking part. In fact Gunther’s probably a chatterbox compared to her. And to be honest, it’s always been like a fantasy for something like this to happen. Not fantasy as in my History teacher in school wanting to keep me behind after class so she can find out how much of a big boy I’ve become. No, more like a sweet fantasy in a Mariah Carey kinda way. Imagine if I met a girl I’ve seen all my life for the first time. Someone you see as much as many of your friends, but have never talked to. All you know about them are the tiny things you’ve noticed over the years. What they read on the bus, what they listen to, how they dress, what they say on the phone. And you get this impression of a person that appeals to you, but you know you can’t just go, sit beside them and start yapping away to them. That’s where drunkeness beats sobriety; you talk to folks you don’t usually talk to.