My hands are sweaty and my breath is short.
It gives me comfort to think about small, irrelevant, everyday sensations when I'm feeling down. When I first read The Stranger I hated it with a passion, I did not understand Camus' need to point out the fatigue our bodies feel after a long bus ride or the stickiness of one's skin when the sun is high in the sky. They're just bodily sensations that everyone has experienced, they're common things no one cares about. I wanted to read about dramatic things like heartbreak and betrayal. Now that heartbreak and betrayal have become a part of my life, I am starting to see that when everything seems pointless, the small, irrelevant things acquire more importance.
So my hands are sweaty, it's not summer and the sun isn't out. I'm in a room full of bodies, human beings, people. Some of them are strangers, most of them acquaintances, a few are friends. My breath is short because I've been jumping up and down on the spot, taking care not to step on anyone even if people don't seem to mind stepping on my feet.
When I got here and people were still on their first beer or shot, I took care to move my hips in that circular motion where you tuck your tummy in and push your butt out. I'm not sensual, my movements are not fluid, I don't feel the music vibrating within me or anything like that. But I try. Last year, my flatmate spent many hours teaching me how to move my body, how to emphasise the movements and curves of my silhouette with matching arm movements. I'm not moving my arms now, that would be too much effort. They're limp like cooked noodles' strings.
I chuckle, not that anyone hears or notices, and think back to last year when our go-to move was the tree and being awkward made our belly ache and our eyes tear up from all the laughter.
I miss them.
I don't recognise the song that's playing, my friends are singing off tune and I smile at Marlene and open my mouth as if to laugh. I never join in the off-key singing, I'm much too self-conscious. I wish I could lean against someone or something, a friend's back or a stone wall. Someone or something that will support me when my energy ends and fatigue kicks in.
There is nothing special about this party, the same people always show up or maybe they're the only ones I notice. It's early but I'm already dreading that time of the morning when people are too tired to dance, makeup is smudged and you can only find empty alcohol bottles laying around.
I signal to Marlene that I'm going out for a second, a minute, an hour and she nods. My top is too tight. I should have worn something different. One of my bra straps has fallen and my tights are itchy. I stare at myself in the back of my phone and attempt a smile. My curls have loosened. I still haven't learnt how to use the curling iron. I pull them back in a ponytail with a sigh.
I thought they would be here tonight. I wonder if I curled my hair, painted my nails and waxed my legs for their benefit. Not too shabby. That's what Mila would have said if she'd seen me before the party. Even as I think it, I know it wouldn't have happened that way. If things hadn't changed, she would have been the one doing my hair, helping with my mascara, making me feel sexy.
I open Instagram, which I know is a mistake, I'm feeling more emotional than usual. I scroll through people's stories aimlessly, or well there is an aim, I want to know what they're doing. At the beginning, I thought it would hurt less if I removed them from social media. But, it turns out, it's harder to delete someone from real life than to unfollow them. Besides, it would hurt too much to never see them, at least this way I still catch glimpses of their lives.
Not tonight. There is nothing new on their profiles, our chat has remained quiet for the past two months. They don't occupy the physical space in my life anymore. Their arms don't wrap around me when I see them at university. Our eyes only cross by mistake now, there is no sharing of jokes, no secret glances only we know the meaning of, nothing that will be picked up in a conversation later on. There is nothing purposeful now. I swallow down a hiccup without bothering to dry my tears. This is what it must feel like to be lonely.
I put my phone back in my purse and find my friends again, still dancing, still drinking. I guess tonight too, we will be the ones closing the party. The smudged make-up will be our own, the boredom will be in our eyes, the forgotten beer bottles will have touched our lips.
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Carrie can't find her purse. This has happened before so I'm just sitting on the floor, my head against the armrest of the worn-out sofa. Marlene is quizzing her about where she thinks she last saw her bag; it's not going well. I feel like laughing but that might be too insensitive, so I focus on the pictures on the wall instead. I don't think I know them, three girls striking different poses in the university courtyard, the 'everything will be okay' sign behind them. I always thought it was cute. Josie called it cheesy. We even took photos in front of it ourselves, photos I don't look at nowadays. It's a kind of mantra people at my faculty always repeat. I'm starting to wonder if it wouldn't be better to have a sign that says everything is shit and might get shittier.
Carrie and Marlene have left the room and I'm thinking that I should just get home, check when the next bus will arrive and walk away from the devastation of this house. But I haven't got many friends these days, so I decide to stay. Besides, Marlene has my phone.
"Antonia?" someone's hand is nudging me, and my back is aching. "Can you hear me?"
I open my eyes with some difficulty. I still have my contact lenses on, and I really shouldn't be taking naps in strangers' living rooms. I'm surprised to see Charlie's crouched silhouette; the lights have been dimmed and my throat feels dry. I nod and slowly move my body so that I'm sitting on the sofa.
"Sorry, I must have fallen asleep" my voice sounds weird, as if it's not coming from my body but from some far away space we can't see. I want to reach out and touch it, that way I'll believe the words have come from me. But Charlie answers, he heard me.
"That's okay" He's not near enough to smell my breath but I still worry that he can, it can't be pleasant. "We were just cleaning up"
I look around me, it doesn't look like they made much progress with the cleaning up. The floor still looks sticky, empty bottles and half-filled cups still linger. I wish someone would open a window, it smells like perfume and sweat.
I want to tell him that he can just continue to clean, he shouldn't mind me being on the floor. In fact, if he's feeling kind and wants to do me a favour, he could sweep me up with his broom or hoover me with his vacuum cleaner. Or he could use me as a sponge to wash the floor, get all the dirt off the floor with my back and my hair, I wouldn't mind.
"Of course, I'll just be on my way" I say that and yet I don't move, I don't feel like leaving, an empty room is waiting for me. This house might be dirty but at least there are people here. "I didn't know you lived here"
"Oh I don't" he smiles and he turns a little so that I notice a girl standing not far from us, "it's Sophia's place". I nod, I don't know who she is. Before I can stop myself, I'm already thinking how much we would have laughed about this, we would have teased Izzy endlessly. She would have made a show of being upset (although she has a boyfriend now) and Josie would have said something along the lines of girlfriends are replaceable and everyone would have laughed. My smile fades as I look at Charlie once more, there isn't much to laugh about now. Sophia might not even be his girlfriend.
"Have you seen Caroline and Marlene? They have my phone" Charlie's eyes go a little big, as if he has suddenly remembered something important.
"They left a few minutes ago, Carrie wasn't feeling well" his tone is apologetic but before I can get upset, he produces my phone from his jean pocket. "They asked me to give you this, and Marlene says sorry she left you here, they had to catch the last bus and she mentioned something about you having cycled here?"
I nod and type the password that will unlock my phone, she forgot I was walking. Marlene has sent me a text from Carrie's phone, it's a photo of them on the bus, the caption says sorry! gave your phone to a hottie (Charlie?), forgive us? Carrie looks asleep and Marlene's mascara is making her look like a racoon. I smile despite myself, they're not bad friends.
I pocket my phone and pull up my jeans, wishing I had a warmer jacket with me. "Thank you and sorry again for falling asleep on your floor" he doesn't correct me and I give him one last look before making my way toward the front door, which Sophia has already opened.
My contact lenses are making my eyes dry and I consider asking them for the bathroom so that I can take them off, but I think I've overstayed my welcome. I feel Charlie''s eyes on me as I leave the house, I wonder what he thinks of me. Maybe he doesn't think anything. He must still talk to Josie sometimes, she's still on the board of the party committee. He probably goes to their events sometimes.
Maastricht is quiet at night. The tourist season has not begun yet, the months between November and March are much too cold and rainy. The city looks grey and the old school bus that now serves as the sight-seeing vehicle lies dormant in the parking lot by the river. I cross the bridge, the pedestrian one that elevates when boats pass, and stop for a moment to admire the view. It's too foggy to see in the distance but the lights of the cafés are still lit, the chairs have been stacked together and tables have been covered. Tomorrow will be a busy day, Sundays attract all the Belgians and Germans.
I take my time to walk home, the room in the new apartment is smaller and more expensive but I didn't have many options. I let myself in, taking care to be quiet even if I know that the two girls I share the apartment with are long gone, one is visiting her boyfriend in Brussels and the other is back home in Cologne for the weekend.
I open the fridge and take out the bowl with frozen grapes. When Mila first offered me a frozen grape, I thought she must have gone crazy. Later, I found out she was definitely crazy, and it had just taken me a while to realise. Someone is playing music in the student apartment below and I'm reminded of the Chinese couple that used to live above us, they were quiet all day and then around midnight they'd start talking so loud it felt as if they were in our living room.
I think of my flatmates constantly.
The thing is when you've lost the thing that made your life not only worth living but special too, it's hard to let go of the memories, they're everything I have now.
I fall asleep on the sofa. There is no one that will put a blanket over me during the night if I get cold. No one to remind me to take off my contact lenses. No one to tell me that the water from the frozen grapes will melt and the floor will be wet when I will wake up in a few hours. It's just me.
✽
give it a read if you're interested, love Fran