Cecelia Ahern - The Time of My Life

‘So how do you two know each other?’

‘We work together,’ I answered.

He looked at me and I could hear him say, Remember our deal .

‘Well, we kind of do.’

‘You work at Mantic?’ Melanie asked him.

‘Nope.’ He stared at me. You lie, I tell a truth.

‘No,’ I laughed. ‘He doesn’t work there. He … he’s eh, he’s … from out of town,’ I said, looking to Life for approval. Not technically a lie. I could see him mulling it over.

He gave me a nod of approval, but a you’re skating on thin ice look.

‘Groovy,’ Melanie said, looking at him for the answer. ‘But how do you two know each other?’

‘He’s my cousin,’ I blurted out. ‘He’s sick. Terminally ill. He’s spending the day with me to write an article on modern women. It’s his dying wish.’ I couldn’t help it.

‘You’re cousins?’ she said, surprised.

Life started laughing. ‘Of all of those things, the fact that we’re cousins surprises you?’

‘Well, I thought I’d met them all.’ Then she softened her tone. ‘So that’s sad news. You’re a journalist. Are you okay?’

Life and Melanie laughed.

‘Come on, I’ve been friends with Lucy all of my life, I know her well enough to know when she’s lying.’

If only she knew.

‘You just can’t help yourself, can you?’ Life said to me. ‘Okay, now it’s my turn.’ He leaned in towards Melanie and I braced myself. She smiled and leaned in flirtatiously. ‘Lucy doesn’t like your music,’ he said and sat back.

Melanie’s smile faded, she sat back too. I buried my head in my hands.

Life looked at me. ‘I think I’ll get some drinks now. Lucy?’

‘Mojito,’ I said from behind my hands.

‘The same.’

‘Great.’

‘Tell them to put it on my tab,’ Melanie said, not looking at him.

‘It’s okay, I’ll claim it back on expenses,’ he said and wandered off.

‘Who is that horrible little man?’ she asked.

I cringed. I just simply couldn’t tell her now. ‘Melanie, I never said that I didn’t like your music. I said that I didn’t get your music, which is not the same as saying I don’t like it. It has beats, rhythmic kind of things that I just don’t recognise.’

She looked at me, blinked once and said as if I had never spoken at all, ‘Lucy, who is that man?’

I buried my face in my hands again. It was my new thing. If I couldn’t see them, they couldn’t see me. I came back up for air. Then I put my phone on the table and looked at Don’s eyes for back-up. ‘Okay fine, here’s the truth. That man is my life.’

Her eyes widened. ‘That is so romantic.’

‘No, I mean, he is my actual life. I received a letter to meet with him from the actual Life Agency a while ago and this is it. This is him.’

Melanie’s mouth hung open. ‘You are shitting me. That’s your life?’

We both turned to watch him. He was standing at the bar on tiptoe, trying to get served. I cringed again.

‘He’s … wow, well, he’s …’

‘Miserable,’ I finished for her. ‘You called my life a horrible little man.’

Her Bambi eyes were full of concern. ‘Are you miserable, Lucy?’ she asked.

‘Me? No. I’m not miserable.’ It wasn’t a lie. I didn’t feel miserable, just slightly unhappy ever since Life had made himself and my flaws known to me. ‘ He is bloody miserable.’

‘Tell me how it works.’

‘He’s like the Pinky and I’m the Brain,’ I said. ‘Or I’m the X-ray and he’s the broken foot.’ I tried to explain but got confused. ‘He’s the nose and I’m the Pinocchio. Yes,’ I smiled, ‘I got the last one right.’

‘What are you talking about?’

I sighed. ‘He just accompanies me. Like this.’

‘Why?’

‘To observe and then to try to make things better.’

‘For who? For you?’

‘And for him.’

‘What kinds of things, what’s wrong?’

I searched my brain for an answer that wasn’t a lie. There were very few thoughts in my head. Melanie never read the papers or listened to the news so she wouldn’t know about the office incident. ‘For example. There was a thing at work the other day. A man I work with was fired then came back to the office with a gun – don’t worry, it was a water pistol though we didn’t know it at the time, but he shook everybody up and a couple of things happened so now Life is here for a while.’ It was as vague as I could possibly make it.

I thought a fire alarm went off and was momentarily thankful that we’d have to evacuate and the conversation could be dropped, but then realised it was the sound of an American police car going whoop whoop . I looked around for the action and saw a waitress walking towards us with a police-car light flashing on the tray along with our drinks.

‘Well, that’s subtle,’ I said.

‘Hi, guys,’ the waitress sang. ‘The man says he’ll have his at the bar.’

‘Thanks.’ Melanie looked her up and down, gave her the biggest flirtiest smile she could. When the girl walked away Melanie leaned in. ‘She’s new. She’s cute.’

I checked her out. ‘Nice legs.’

When Melanie told me she was gay when we were teenagers I was immediately unnerved though I tried not to show it. It wasn’t because I was homophobic, it was more because we had spent all our lives being extremely close, sharing a lot of things together such as changing rooms, showers, toilets on nights out, that kind of thing. I didn’t know how to move forward with continuing those habits after she’d informed me she liked women. I didn’t do a good job of trying to hide it so one night while I’d run to barricade myself into a toilet cubicle by myself, she firmly informed me – and the rest of the queue behind her – that she was under no circumstances, nor would she ever ever be, remotely interested in me. This resulted in my feeling worse, particularly by the use of the double ‘ever’, I mean, would she ever even consider giving me a chance? It was quite possible that I could change in the future, and her closemindedness bothered me. We sipped our drinks. I was hoping we could now change the subject though I knew there wasn’t a chance of that happening.

‘So what kinds of things happened?’ She picked up where we left off.

‘Oh, nothing, I just got into a bit of trouble, that’s all.’

Her eyes widened. ‘What kind of trouble?’

‘I told a little fib on my resumé.’ I waved a hand dismissively.

Melanie threw her head back and laughed. ‘What did you say?’ She was enjoying this but I knew she wouldn’t for much longer, it was leading to somewhere I didn’t want to go. I was planning on telling a juicy big lie when Life must have sensed it and rejoined us at the table.

Melanie looked at him with new admiration. ‘Lucy was just telling me that you’re her life.’

Life looked at me, happy I’d told a truth. ‘That’s great, Lucy.’

‘This is so cool, can I give you a hug?’ She didn’t wait for an answer, and went straight for the kill, wrapping her long limbs around him and squeezing. Life seemed to melt at the attention. He closed his eyes. ‘Wait a minute.’ She pulled away. ‘I have to get a photo.’ She rooted in her bag for her phone and held it up to herself and Life. He smiled, his teeth a mustard colour next to Melanie’s white gnashers. ‘That’s one for Facebook. So, Lucy was telling me she fibbed on her CV.’ She smiled and hunkered down for the gossip, her big glossy lips permanently planted on the straw in her drink, like the man in the tank sucking on oxygen.

‘Really?’ Life looked at me, impressed again. I was getting Brownie points.