That Friday (6 page)

Arm in arm they started off down
the street, taking a scenic route to their destination so she could show him
the places in the city that had meaning for her. Some of them were good and
some were bad, she wanted him to see them all though, they were a part of her
past and as such she felt they were important for him to know; she hoped he
felt the same.

As they walked Tess' eyes kept
straying to Charlie; she couldn't help laughing when she saw that his hair was
being whitened by the snow, giving him the appearance of a man grown suddenly
old.

"What?" Charlie asked
,
perplexed by her laughter and the way she was looking at
him.

It was a few moments before Tess
was able to stop laughing long enough to answer him. "You look like an old
man," she said, reaching up to brush some of the snow from his hair. She
laughed again when she saw the look on his face. "It's okay though, you're
my old man."

He didn't like the thought of
being considered old, he was only in his mid-thirties after all, but hearing
her call him her old man brought a smile to his lips. The idea of being her old
man appealed to him, especially since he knew she meant it endearingly, and
that she had said it because she enjoyed taking the mickey out of him.

Impulsively he pulled her to him,
possessed of a desire to kiss her, a desire made all the stronger by the
romantic notion of kissing her while the snow was falling. He wasn't used to
snow, not as it was falling just then, and he wasn't sure if it was that or
being with the woman he loved, but he felt the moment was too wonderful for him
not to make the most of it.

The kiss lasted until they were
both breathless and had to break apart before they began to see spots. He
kissed her again, a quick kiss that time, quick but soft and filled with love;
he then took her hand so they could continue down the road.

After wandering down several roads
Tess guided them toward a bar and a bridge which held special memories for her,
both good and bad. She wanted to share those memories with him even though she
knew being back at the bridge would be painful, they were important to her,
they were a part of what had made her the person she was.

As they walked alongside a grassy
area a short distance from their destination they encountered a homeless man
and though it was cold and snowing he was still begging for money. Tess stopped
instinctively, while Charlie continued on, not realising she had stopped until
he was about a dozen yards further on, at which point he stopped and waited for
her.

Not only did he see Tess drop some
coins in his cup, she squatted to say something to the man and then put her
arms around him to give him a quick squeeze. He felt his love for grow at that,
she was so kind and considerate, he thought, far more so than him.

It wasn't that he didn't feel for
the man and his situation, he just found it uncomfortable. He found it hard
enough to deal with strangers at the best of times; the presence of those less
fortunate made him even more uncomfortable.

Tess' compassion, and the way she
dealt with a man most people, including himself, ignored, or gave little
thought to, made Charlie wonder why she was with him; she deserved better, in
his opinion, she deserved someone as loving and compassion as she was.

After a minute or so Tess stood
and turned away from the man, a sad smile on her face. "Sorry, honey. I
can't stand to see him sitting there like that in the snow, especially when
it's so cold," she told Charlie, who couldn't quite meet her gaze, when
she caught up with him. "Sorry I kept you waiting; I gave him three
pounds, it's all I had in my purse, and told him to go find shelter in a
pedestrian tunnel where he'll be out of the worst of the weather. He'll be
sheltered from the wind and the snow there.

"I told him things would get
better as well. They did for me. Look where I started and where I am now. He
didn't smell of dope or booze. He smelled of fear and sadness. I kissed him on
the forehead and told him it would all be okay."

When she reached a hand to her eye
Charlie thought she was brushing away a tear, he reached up to stop her, taking
her hand in his and bringing it to his lips so he could kiss it.

"I told him to use the money
to get a hot chocolate," Tess said with a sad smile. "I wish there was
more I could do to help him."

"I love you, honey,"
Charlie told her suddenly.

Tess was surprised by the sudden
statement. "What made you say that?"

He smiled an uncertain smile.
"Because I love you and because you're a better person than you believe
yourself to be. You're not the bitch you're always saying you are," he
said.

"I am
,
I'm a bitch; everyone says so."

"They're wrong, and they're
idiots if they think that. You're a wonderful person."

"No I'm not," Tess said
with a shake of her head. She didn't have a clue how he could possibly think
that, she considered herself far from wonderful.

He took her face in his hands and
pulled her to him so he could kiss her tenderly. "Yes you are, just look
at what you did back there," he gestured back to the shivering homeless
man. "You didn't just give him money, you spoke to him; you treated him
like a person. That's more than everyone else who passed him, including me. I
can't deal with things like that; I hate that I can't but I'm so uncomfortable
with people and situations like this.

"Not you though; you're
probably the only person to have spoken to him like that all day, perhaps even
all week. I'm sure it made him feel so much better."

Tess dismissed his words with a
shake of her head. "I've been where he is. I know he didn't believe me,
not looking the way I do now, but I had to tell him, I wanted to give him hope.
Things got better for me, they can get better for him as well; all it takes is
a bit of luck and a desire not to give up. I even gave him a kiss on the
forehead; I wanted to do something to help him feel better."

Charlie kissed her again.
"You really are wonderful. I know you don't believe it but you are."

"When we were on the bench that
night, near all those boats, I thought we'd never find a home. All I could
hear, all night long, was the clanging of metal on metal as the boats moved
with the waves. It was a bad time, but the very next night we had a place to
stay.

"For two weeks his aunt put
us up, before her husband got fed up of it and threw us out and we ended up
sleeping in the car."

Charlie hugged her tight, wanting
to reassure her and take away the memories of such a bad time. He wanted her to
remember only the good things, and to ensure that in the future she never had
to worry about anything of the sort she had in the past.

"Genie," Tess wasn't
sure if she had ever told him that they had called their car Genie,
"looked after us for three months; three terrifying, uninsured, lacking in
MOT months. We were lucky she was an estate, so we could stretch out in the
back alongside our belongings, when we put the seats down, and at least attempt
to get some proper kip.

"We were in that car for so
long that even the coppers knew who we were! I've been homeless so I know what
he's going through. I wanted to let him know that things can get better, they
did for me and they can for him."

"I'm sure he appreciated
it," Charlie said, "more than the money. Someone cared enough to stop
and speak to him like he was a real person. That's why I love you." He
kissed her once more. He never wanted to stop kissing her, to show her how much
he loved her, for her heart, for her compassion and just for being her.

With a last look back through the
snow at the man they turned and continued on their way to see the things Tess
wanted to show Charlie. "Did I tell you about the gig I went to at the
Leeds Metropolitan University? My first ever gig?" she asked as they
crossed the road, the lit up sign on the university building a couple of
streets away, visible over the roofs of the nearer buildings, reminding her of
the story.

Charlie shook his head, though he
wasn't surprised to hear Tess had gone to gigs, something he never had, for a
variety of reasons, it was not something he had known for certain. "Who
did you go and see? Anyone good?" he asked, meaning someone he might have
known. Given the level of musical knowledge he possessed it was unlikely,
unless it had been someone really famous.

"Not a clue," Tess confessed.
"I don't remember who it was, just some local band I think. All I really
remember is that my friend and I ended up at the front, right near the
speakers; I was so deaf by the time we got out of there I deafened my friend's
parents in the car on the way home shouting because I couldn't hear what I was
saying." As she told the story she couldn’t help thinking that she had
lost so much weight over the past few months that she could probably fit into
the t-shirt she'd bought at the gig. She didn't have the t-shirt anymore, so
she couldn't find out, and was grateful for that since she was sure it was not
something she would want to be seen wearing now she was older and had better
taste.

Charlie laughed, he didn't mean to
but it escaped his lips before he could stop it. To his relief Tess joined him,
laughing as well. "At least you've been to a gig," he said when he
stopped laughing. "I haven't. I've wanted to," he said in response to
the look of surprise she gave him. "But I haven't been able to bring myself
to go. Just the thought of being surrounded by all those people and all that
noise…" He shivered, and it wasn't caused by the cold or the snow. "I
couldn't deal with it. I struggle with the other people in the cinema or when I
go and see a show."

"What do you mean you
struggle with the other people?" Tess asked gently, she knew, from their
many conversations over the
years, that
Charlie had a
number of problems, especially to do with people, but he had never told her
exactly what those problems were.

"They make me claustrophobic.
I don't like being around large groups or lots of noise," he said.
"Whenever I'm in that situation my chest gets tight and I can't breathe
and I feel as though I'm going to pass out; it's horrible, I hate it.

"I went to see Oliver the
other week and had to take my sister along to help me cope with the crowds.
Several times I had to resist the urge to get up and leave. The show was good,
but being in the middle of such a lot of people was almost more than I can
handle."

Tess pulled him into her arms,
tightening them around him, desperate to make him feel better. "It sounds
horrible; you don't need to worry though, you're with me now and I won't let
anything happen to you," she whispered in his ear. "I'll take you to
a gig someday, if you'd like. I'll hold your hand the whole time and make sure
you're okay."

In her arms, Charlie felt as
though everything would be alright and he could cope with whatever he
encountered. He knew he needed to deal with his issues, someday, but just then
he was too happy with her to want to think about them.

They remained like that for almost
a minute and then they broke apart, reluctantly, so they could continue
walking. As they walked they talked, revealing more of themselves to the other.
Most of it was little things, anecdotes from their past, things they hadn't
spoken of before, for a variety of reasons, most of them stemming from the
stories being relatively unimportant.

Despite their lack of importance,
each of them enjoyed sharing their stories. They passed the time and gave them
greater insight into the other.

They were on the last street
before they reached the first of their destinations, when Tess began skipping.
Being so close
to  her
most favourite of all her
old haunts, The Dry Dock, put a spring in her step and made the smile on her
face grow until it reached from ear to ear.

Though she had told Charlie the
name of the place they were going to, and told him it was a bar, she hadn't
described the place to him, wanting it to be a surprise. "There it
is," she told him, pointing out the old barge set back a short distance
from the road. His reaction didn't disappoint, his footsteps faltered for a
second and his eyes widened in surprise.

"How did that get
there?" Charlie couldn't help asking. It was so strange to see an old
barge not just sitting next to the road, with the nearest water he had no idea
how far away, but converted into a bar with bright lights illuminating the
entrance and a sign where the boat's name would normally have been.

Tess laughed. "I have no
idea; it's been there for as long as I can remember. Since before I was born, I
think." As they got closer to the renovated barge she ran her eyes over
it; it had been some time since she was last there and she wondered if there
had been any changes. It seemed the same, outwardly at least, but she did
notice one change. "Oh wow!" she exclaimed as she reached the A-board
outside the entrance to the bar. "They do food now. They never did that
before."

"Do you want to go in for a
drink?" Charlie asked when he saw her eyes move, once again, to the
entrance and the warm glow that shone from it.

She was tempted, Tess couldn't
deny that, but there was something else she needed to do first, and if she
didn't do it then she wasn't sure she'd have the courage to do it at all.
"Not just now," she told him with a shake of her head.