Miss Me Forever
Minna lay on the blanket pulling great, fat clumps of grass out of the earth. Her vanilla-bright hair hung down, covering her face, disguising her expression. So hard did she seem to be concentrating on ridding the park of its vegetation that I was surprised to hear her speak.
‘You know, your wisdom is more apparent to me every day.’
‘What?’
‘I said, your wisdom is more apparent to me every day.’
I laughed and nipped her elbow. ‘Very good. Very funny. Hilarious in fact. You’re wasted mowing the lawn. You should be on stage.’
She jumped to her feet in one fluid move, half ninja, half gymnast. The wine bottle fell over. A pool of red gurgled over the blanket; before I had to time to put it upright she kicked it away, and threw grass in my face.
‘Have you gone insane?’ I said, picking bits from my mouth.
She giggled, which made her boobs jiggle, which made me forgive her straight away. I must have been staring because she stopped laughing and put her hands on her hips. ‘I’m not an object for your eyes to feed on. I’m me and me deserves to be looked at in the face.’
I apologised. This was not new. In the three weeks and four days, give or take a couple of hours, since I’d met her I found myself saying sorry all the time. It wasn’t that she ever asked me to say the s-word, but somehow it always just seemed the right thing to do.
‘Today, this very second, I’ve decided to go back to Finland. You are too easy for me. Too nice and too wise.’
She picked up her bag and started to walk away. I jumped up and ran after her, grabbing her shoulder and spinning her round. A man with a black dog stopped and stared. I pulled Minna closer, showing the potential knight in shining armour that he could find some other damsel in distress.
‘What is the problem?’ she said, looking at me with sky-blue eyes so big they seemed to fill half her face. ‘This is just a fun thing, a fling-a-ling. And now it stops and we go on with our lives. You knew you’d never have me for ever, surely you knew?’
‘No, I never knew any such thing. I want to be with you. I don’t want you to go home. I want you to stay here with me. I’ll stop being wise and I’ll stop being nice and … and I’ll stop being easy.’
‘If that’s true, do something not wise for me. Do a silly thing. Run to that shop.’ She pointed to a newsagent far across the park. ‘Run there as fast as you can shouting my name, and buy me the biggest chocolate you find. If you do that I might be here when you come back. If you don’t I go now and forever.’
I shook my head.
‘Ok, bye-bye.’
‘No, no. I’ll go. I’ll do it. Please be here for me,’ I said and sprinted off as hard as I could, bellowing her name. Even when my lungs burned and my breath came in short, hot gasps I bellowed it over and over again. I made it to the newsagent and before I went inside she waved from the distance and I wanted to punch the air. I bought her two huge slabs of Fruit & Nut and rushed back outside. She was nowhere in sight.
I stopped breathing for a second, hoping she’d reappear. When she didn’t, I sprinted back to the blanket, to the spot she’d last been. Nothing. Then on the bare patch of dirt where she’d been ripping grass out, I saw a bit of paper. There were words written in red felt-tip pen. They said, ‘It is better this way. Miss me.’
And I do, now and forever.
