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“What about him? He a prick?”
I had to smile; this was such a typical thing for my mother to ask. In many ways, she was my best friend. I decided to tell her what had happened. She listened to the whole story of how I’d felt his bum at the drinks party, laughing out loud when I discovered who the guy was. Then when I told her about our lunch outing the next week, her face grew serious.
“Ok, that’s not good. What are you going to do? Look for a new job?”
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to send out a few CVs again,” I said, but I think she could hear my heart wasn’t in it.
“How often do you have to see him?”
“I don’t really deal with him at all,” I admitted. “I report to my manager and there are like, I don’t know how many people in the hierarchy after him.”
She nodded, considering the situation. The beer had gone straight to my head, producing a nice mellow vibe. I leaned back against the side of the steps and closed my eyes.
“I don’t really know much about Matthew,” my mom said. “I mean I remember you dating a guy with that name, but did you bring him home?”
“Once or twice,” I said. “Tall, good looking?”
My mom laughed, “Of course, he was! But was he the one that was a bit preppy?”
“Maybe.”
I hadn’t told my mom a lot about him, careful not to make too much of the relationship. My mother had always been a single mom and tended to be dismissive of men and boyfriends. I had grown up with the impression that men came in handy sometimes, like when you had to install a new TV or needed a plus one for a wedding. But when it came to living your life and planning your future, you had to put yourself first. My mother had bad experiences when it came to men and had been raised by my grandmother, a formidable woman I had only known for a few years before she died. She had apparently always said that men were more trouble than not, an expression my mother was fond of repeating. I never knew who my father was, only that she’d fallen pregnant during a fling and that she had wanted to keep me. I’d always felt loved and cared for and while it did bother me sometimes, I never quite had the guts to push her on the identity of my father. When it came to my own boyfriends, I tended to play down the seriousness of the situation. I knew my mom didn’t want me settling down too early, she was always saying that I needed to get out as much as possible while I was young.
“He dumped me in his senior year,” I said. “Right before he graduated.”
“What an arsehole!” my always loyal mother exclaimed.
I smiled. “He was, rather. Jealous too, didn’t like me hanging out with some of my friends. Accused me of fooling around with one of them, but I didn’t.”
“Of course not!” My mom was indignant. “I don’t like the sound of him.”
It was the part of him being jealous, I thought. It reminded her of a guy she used to date when I was younger. The relationship had been intense but when their fights became more vicious and he’d started breaking things, she’d ended it.
“And you think he’s still interested? In you?”
I thought of the way Matthew had kept looking at me, standing too close to me, touching me. He was still interested, all right.
“Are you sure you’re not?” my mom’s voice changed. She knew me well.
“Definitely not,” I said, sitting up straight. “I’m with Dax now, anyway.”
“Dax,” she smiled, drawing out the name in a drawl. She hadn’t said much about him to me but I had the feeling she liked him. I also suspected that she knew our relationship wasn’t that serious, that it was more about going out and having a good time together. Dax was a musician, he played bass for a band that was trying to make a name for itself in the city.
“Maybe just keep out of his way, then?”
“Yup.”
My mom got up and got ready to go in. “What about soup for dinner? I told Mrs.Penderis I’d bring something by. I’ll make extra. Tomato sound good?”
I nodded.
But I stayed sitting outside by myself for a little while longer.
Despite what I’d said to my mom, there was more to my and Matthew’s break up. Our relationship had been going well all year. We never fought, almost never disagreed. Both of us were busy students and I had to train a lot with the rest of the tennis team, occasionally travelling for matches. I knew he came from an important family and that he had a serious job waiting for him after graduation. He’d often said that college was the only time of his life when he could pretend that his life was his own and that he could do what he wanted. He never took me home to his family and he’d explained that he wanted to keep me separate from them, as if they were contagious or something. I didn’t question it.
Until the day we broke up, he’d never raised his voice or been mean to me. There was a certain coldness, an arrogance that I had found rather attractive initially. My friends didn’t like him, some saying he was too haughty, too superior. But towards the end of the year, as he was beginning to wrap up his studies and prepare to go back to the city, he’d occasionally be short, dismissive. I made it off as being due to stress and the tension of graduation.
But then at the party, he’d lost it, accusing me of cheating on him and making a fool of him. Apparently, nobody made a fool of Matthew Waterstone. I had been so stunned by his tone, calling me names and being so unfair that I had not even tried to defend myself. It was ridiculous, really. I was sure he’d calm down the next day and apologize. But he hadn’t. I was too proud to call him. I figured he could call me to explain himself. But he didn’t do that either. I had been living with him in his student flat, even though I had my own room in a dorm across town. When I went back to our place, he had packed my things and left them in the living room with a note telling me to have everything out of there by the weekend.
