Better Than Byron

Descent into Adulthood

XIII

Joy's recollection is no longer joy,

While Sorrow's memory is a sorrow still.

-Lord Byron

I was beginning a new era, and the consideration of the future brought back the recollection of the past. It dampened some of my energy, and I felt prematurely depressed in setting out to Cambridge University. I told myself that recapitulating my former sorrows would only but hinder me from progressing happily and successfully in my newfound life, and having formed this thought I resolved to apply it to reality.

I was longing to go to Atsbury Hall so as to soothe some of my sullen suspicions regarding Deighton – I no longer regarded him as my father: I was nearly a grown man at eighteen, and I had clearer opinions and firmer resolutions; I was a stern-principled young man who was oddly susceptible to reckless habits. I had grown considerably grim in the North, for I had indulged none of my impulses, practiced no pleasurable pastimes, and did not encourage the process of friendship in anyone.

The day I arrived at Cambridge for my interview – which was to be performed by College Fellows, who examine you on original thinking and creativity – it was my good fortune to run into Oscar March – just as I had hoped – who in his haste had dropped all that he had been carrying – from loose sheets to an inkwell and pens – just as I crossed his path. I did not recognise him until we had stooped to gather his belongings, and then upon looking into each other's faces, our frowns relaxed into smiles, and the next moment we were shaking hands; laughing about a six-year old joke we had never forgotten.

"Edgar, you devil!" he patted my cheek good-humouredly, taking the papers I had gathered from my hands. Oscar had changed very much in appearance. Though the same age as I, he had the body of a man in his mid-twenties; his muscles were well developed and his face craggy yet fine. I suppose my shock was evident, for the next thing he did was to pat me amicably on the back and say with a conciliatory smile, "Aren't I a bear?"

"You always were rather big for your age," I murmured, chuckling nervously, for I was so boyish and lanky in comparison to him that he could probably shatter my bones if he set his mind to it. He looked as though he had been fighting in mills half his life, and lifting weights in his spare time. "But I see that you've kept your hair long!" I pointed playfully to his flaxen hair. "It becomes you exceedingly well, my good fellow."

"And you!" he said with a jeering laugh. "You look as ghostly and angular as you did the first day you came to Harrow. You were designed to haunt houses, I say."

"Anything else, Oscar?" I smirked, ready to forgive anything he did or said.

"Yes – you've still got that devious sparkle in your black eyes, like some woodland imp." He gave a shudder. "You startle me – you frighten me – nay: you disgust me!" This was all said in jest, and at his concluding words I gave a snort of amusement, walking away from him towards the building in which I was to be examined. He was on his way there too so we talked of times of yore, and of how much we had grown since our two years at Harrow. I introduced the subject of George Granby, for Oscar seemed rather to avoid it, and I presently found out that he had gone to Oxford, our rival university.

"You and I must now be Romeo and Juliet, Oscar," I jested, trying to raise both our evidently lowered spirits, for we had each been singularly fond and protective of that feminine fellow. After explaining to me that George was betrothed to some Minerva girl, we parted ways, Oscar turning into a museum-like corridor while I turned into another. Fortunately for us, we were both deemed creative enough for Cambridge, and as I went into the law he did into botany. We lived in separate colleges, but we ate and socialised with the same group of young men, and saw each other almost every day – once at a tavern, and another time in a park.