Just Checking In...

I took a Christmas Day train to go see her. It wasn't a big thing. I prefer my trains empty. Even if it had been a trouble, I would've made that trip. She had flown in to spend the holidays with the family on her brother's farm. They grew peas. Not her - the brother grew peas. She worked in fashion over in England and needed to be back there by New Year's.

The night before Christmas she had come to see me at the bar I was running in South Yarra. We spoke and caught up but the drink orders kept interrupting. We never got momentum into our conversation. The small talk never had enough time to burn off. I wanted to see her properly. With time and without interruption. Going out to her brother's would be my only chance. So I got up at dawn and caught the early morning train.

I love trains. I love riding on trains. In particular, I love being short of sleep whilst riding on trains. The tiredness stings under my eyelids and combines with a hunger for salt followed by yoghurt. I'm all low energy and heavy in a haze of slowed pause. I lean back on the high backrest and watch the outside rush past. It's the movement. Movement that I can see happening in front of me. That's the best of it.

The ride was about two hours and gave me a chance to consider her and me and why I so wanted to see her. We never caught up that much when I lived over there. We'd text a little, bump into each other on the street often and have the very occasional night out. We spoke more after I moved on and away to the next city. Then it was all mobile phone and Skype talks.

These chats were always affected by the time-zone difference. I would be up a canyon above Hollywood in the afternoon whilst she was out with the girls and into their third bottle of wine at dinner. Or I'd be hailing a cab home in Melbourne after midnight whilst she was refreshed and on the way to the gym. One of us would take the lead and do the talking and the other would listen. It depended on who had what time of the day.

I had first met her at a restaurant I was running in London's Soho. She was a friend of one of the owners. He messaged me in the morning saying that some friends of his were coming in for dinner and to look after them. It was vague request and I was somewhat miffed by it all. There were five of them. Each Australian, each in fashion and each with hair a different shade of brownish-blonde. Five soft and polished faces set with hair that seem to float and hang all smooth and easy. Especially her's.

The way it seems to go, we mostly miss the same things in people. We like or need or want something and when we get it from someone - and then stop getting it - that is the thing we miss. It makes sense. But I've never wanted someone's hair. Never. What a bizarre and creepy thing to want. And yet any time I think of her, the first shot of warm nostalgia comes with an image of her auburn and golden tresses as they fall light over the front of her shoulders. And the way her hair smelled. That's the memory that follows after that.

The train broke free of the Melbourne Metro area and the pace picked up. At times, it had been a wet start to summer and green was the colour rushing past. I've flown over oceans and desserts for love before. Sometimes even just for the chance of it. I've quit good jobs here and taken bad ones there for those same chances. I don't know why I never had for her. London wasn't too far and I still had an Oyster Card somewhere.

Maybe in her mind there wasn't an 'us' on offer. We never spoke about it. We had been playing it pretty cool for years. I'd tell her about my breakups and she'd talk of her choices.
We were always the truth with each other and the all-of-her I saw left me wanting more. I had desire. But we never spoke about it. Occasionally I'd send a text message that said:

"Alright... I think we should just elope already. What you think? Marriage in Tasmania and honeymoon in Costa Rica?"

But this was at 2am and meant to diffuse not provoke.

She had to know. Know that I saw as her more than a friend. Or that I thought about her being more than a friend. Maybe she saw me the same. Wanted the same from me. Maybe she thought I was the one who just wanted a friend and nothing more. Maybe she rode The Tube asking herself these same questions.

I looked around my carriage. It was now empty. The couple up the other end had gotten off at the last stop. I turned my music up as loud as the earphones would let me and swiped over to the Rolling Thunder Revue album. I pressed 'Isis' and shuffled a little lower in my seat.

Was I waiting? Waiting for her and me to be in the same place at once? We both spoke about moving. She was getting over living in England and ready to move back to Australia. If that happened we could try something then. Until then, I could just hang on and be her friend. And then what?

She was here now. We were in the same place now - or we would be once this train arrives. Only for a few days. They'd be family and chickens and wine and all the peas one would ever need. And she had invited me. Asked me to come see her there.

This was it. This was us together. Finally spending more than just a call or a few drinks together. This would be a couple of days. What would happen to the doubt and the questions and the maybe's then?

I looked down at my phone for the time. I had only been on the train for an hour. We had only ridden half the way. There was still another hour to go.

I changed the song over to 'Girl from the North Country' and jammed the earphones in deeper.

PICTURE: A Certain Trail' by Ed Ruscha