‘Me too,’ Delia jumped in, as if they were both trying to ease their conscience for talking about me like this. ‘I’ve nevernotliked her.’
‘It’s just that she’s so . . . it’s hard to put your finger on, you know . . . But I do like her.’
Once more, ‘like her’ said as if it was some kind of consolation prize.
‘But she’s always been a bit . . . off,’ Delia offered, agreeing with her twin. ‘Even when we were young.’
‘It’s not like she can help it though. She has that type of autism, doesn’t she? What do they call it, I can never remember the name . . .’
‘Ass something or other.’
They both burst out laughing. And there it was.
The word. The label. The thing that made existing in this world so much harder for me. The thing that made making and keeping friends feel like an insurmountable task sometimes. The thing that made all romantic ‘relationships’ fall apart. I was on the autism spectrum, and that was therealreason I didn’t like being asked why I wasn’t in a relationship, because then I would need to explain to that person why it was that I was so, so bad at being in relationships and why they never lasted. My stomach flipped. I felt nauseous and then suddenly cold and clammy.
‘The whole thing feels a bit off, actually,’ Delia added. ‘She’s just not the kind of girl guys like him usually go for. Seriously, how did that happen?’
‘Maybe she’s really kinky in bed or something!’ They both hooted with such loud and manic laughter that I had to put my hands over my ears.
‘Shame, though,’ Delia said, once the laughter had faded away. ‘It won’t last. Bee was saying that she literally goes on five dates with someone and then it’s over.’
‘God, and Andrew is so fucking hot! I would totally date him if I could.’
‘Well, maybe you can. I wonder how many dates they’ve been on.’
They both burst out laughing again.
‘Seems like such a waste,’ Delia giggled, and her witchy sister joined in.
A waste. . . the word rang in my head over and over again like a loudly tolling bell. Synonyms for waste includeddilapidation, desolation, decay. I wasnotthose things. I may be on the autism spectrum, yes, but I was not those things. It had taken me a long time to accept this fact, still, having someone say it out loud like this, it was . . . hard to hear.
‘Shame, I mean I hope it works out for her, I really do, but . . .’ Delia let the ‘but’ hang in the air.
‘Sure, best of luck to them, but . . .’ And now Tertia delivered that dreaded hanging ‘but’. Two hanging buts in the air, and my brain scrambled to fill in the blanks.
But no one will ever be able to love her, because as soon as they get to know her, really know her, they leave.
‘Fuck, let’s get stoned,’ Delia said, changing the subject. I heard her rummage in her bag. ‘I need something to make me forget that I’m wearing this tragedy of a dress.’
‘Lock the door,’ Delia said. I looked around in panic. I didn’t want to sit in here while they got stoned, and the longer they were in here, the surer their chances of finding me were. I kept still as the lighter flicked, as the sound of inhaling and coughing began. When they spoke again, they voices had taken on a slow, lugubrious quality, punctuated by laughter that seemed more like wild cackling. The kind a jackal might make at night. I tried to hold my breath for extended periods of time; I did not want to get stoned on second-hand smoke. The only time I ever got stoned I had regretted it instantly and then spent the next few hours convinced I was going to die because I was choking on a piece of plastic from a gum wrapper that I’d opened.
‘Crap!’ one of them exclaimed as something large fell and hit the floor. Suddenly a box of condoms, a packet of mints and a lighter flew under the bathroom door into my stall.
‘My fucking bag. I’m so stoned!’ Tertia laughed, and then I heard her drop to her knees. I stiffened, positive she was going to catch me when she came looking for her things, only she didn’t. ‘I don’t think my eyes see anymore,’ she said, and they both burst out laughing again. How that was funny, I did not know. If my eyes stopped working properly, I would not consider that a good time. But obviously we had different definitions of what a ‘good time’ was.
‘What am I doing on the floor, again?’ Tertia asked in a vacant-sounding way.
‘I have no fucking clue,’ Delia replied as she took another big-sounding puff. She should really stop puffing! It was clear they both needed to stop puffing.
‘Me neither.’ I heard Tertia get up off the floor again. They spent the next ten minutes talking about all the guests at the wedding, as if doing a post-mortem on the event. They spoke about all the men they wouldn’t mind fucking, and Andrew’s name came up a few more times, followed by more girlish giggles. They talked a lot about what they hoped they would have for dessert, and whether it was possible to tell if a man was good in bed based on the kind of drink he ordered. They concluded that men who drank Cosmos were not good in bed.
Finally, after what felt like a torturous eternity, they left. I rushed out of the stall, my feet exploding with tingles as the blood rushed back into them. I’d been crouched on the toilet for so long I was sure I had diminished blood flow in my extremities. I locked the door behind them, pushed all the windows open and paced the room. Their words were still reverberating around my head. I knew what most people thought of me, and most days I didn’t care, but on others, like today, faced with my cousin’s wedding and my mother’s clear disappointment that the wedding had not been for me, I cared. I cared so much that a tear rolled down my face.
I touched my cheek. My fingers came away wet. The fact that salty water poured out of your eyes when you were emotionally upset was such a bizarre concept. I’d googled it once and discovered that in the 1600s people believed that emotions, especially love, heated the heart, which generated water vapour in order to cool itself down. That vapour would then rise, condense near the eyes and escape. And although it was scientifically impossible, I absolutely loved this notion. Because it often felt like my heart was hot and that it needed to cool down. Emotions, good and bad, always felt so intense, so magnified . . .Like now.
My mouth was dry, and the packet of mints on the floor caught my attention. I picked everything up, shoved a few mints into my mouth and tossed the other things into the dustbin. My aim was off, so the lighter landed in the bin but the box of condoms missed and fell onto the floor. I was about to pick it up when my phone beeped.
Andrew:Where are you? I’ve been looking for you. Literally. I’ve been kicked out of two women’s bathrooms. Are you okay?
