The Forecourt

‘I don’t love you anymore.’ It escaped her lips and hovered between them. The weight of the words she had often thought but never said made the small car even smaller and made the distance between them seem even wider.

‘Is that why you brought me out here?’ He stared straight ahead, his mouth set in a hard line. She stared at his lips and remembered a time when they traced their way across her throat, as if discovering secrets, buried in her neck.

She remembered the first time he had put his lips to hers, clumsy, hurried and shy. They had been so young, so unsure, like fawns learning how to walk for the first time. She remembered a time when she would look as his lips moved and while he spoke to her she would think to herself; if he doesn’t kiss me now, I might die. It was almost unimaginable, as she sat in the beat up old fiesta, that they had gone from there to here in only nine short years.

She stared out the window at the old petrol station. The sign was crumbling so that it was almost unreadable, the paint was peeling revealing years of color changes as the station changed hands, the once pristine tarmac of the forecourt was now overgrown with weeds. Care. That’s what it was lacking, someone to care for it, to invest in it, to believe that there was a future in it. The similarities between the destitution of their meeting place and the destitution of their relationship was not lost on her.

‘Do you remember the first day we met?’ She looked at him as he stared angrily straight ahead. She continued earnestly, wanting him to remember, needing him to remember, ‘You were what? Eighteen? You were stood right over there?’ She pointed to the remnants of the second pump on the forecourt. ‘You were wearing a blue shirt and jeans, and I thought; who the hell is that?’ She laughed at the memory of it, of falling in love at first sight at seventeen.

She was lost in the memory and jumped when he spoke, ‘You jumped out of your Da’s car, all legs and elbows, this skinny girl,’ His expression softened and he almost smiled, ‘You picked up the diesel pump, it was only when I should to you that you realised the mistake.’ He looked out the window at the shadow of their relationship as it lingered briefly on the forecourt.

She saw herself as she was then, smiling at the memory of the seventeen year old girl far too concerned with impressing the boy in front of her than potentially recking her father’s car engine. ‘It’s hard to believe we were ever that young,’ she sighed.

‘Yeah,’ He snapped, the bitterness returning to his voice, ‘Time flies when you’re having fun.’

She went to place her hand on his, but thought better of it, she stuffed her hands into the pockets of her coat so they wouldn’t betray her. ‘It was fun.’ She whispered.

‘Just not anymore right?’ He looked at her, the question both accusing and pleading. He sagged slightly in his seat, defeated, ‘At least not for you.’

‘Don’t put this all on me.’ She was losing patience with his poor me act. He had a short memory, and clearly he didn’t remember his own cruelty over the past years.

‘It’s you that wants to end it though.’ His voice rising slightly with the righteous anger he now felt, ‘So I think I’m entitled to attribute blame to someone.’

‘Oh yeah, because nothing is ever your fault.’ She was losing it now. ‘You can be such a fucking child sometimes.’ She didn’t want it to be like this, she didn’t want them shouting at each other in the car, but now she couldn’t stop. ‘It’s like you don’t even remember the last six months!’

‘It’s like you don’t remember the eight years before it.’ He bit back. ‘You can’t just drag me out here, and then say your ending it because ‘you don’t love me anymore’ what the fuck is that?’ He was shouting now, banging his hand against the steering wheel, ‘What about my feelings? What about the fact that I still love you?’ She looked out the window. ‘Don’t ignore me.’ He grabbed her chin and turned her to face him, ‘I said, I still love you.’

She pushed his hand away as her eyes filled with tears. She didn’t know what she had expected, but a declaration of love was not it. ‘No you don’t. You’re just saying that because you don’t want to admit that this is over. That it’s been over now for awhile. It’s just about time one of us admits it.’

He took her hand gently, ‘It’s not over.’ He leaned gently over the gearbox, pushing his face against hers, ‘It’s not over.’ He whispered again, and then he kissed her.

It was like being thrown through a time machine. Before she knew what was happening she was kissing him back, leaning her body into his, pressing herself against him as he returned the pressure. As her sense caught up with her hormones, she pulled away.

He looked quizzically at her and then moved towards her again. She placed a hand on his chest and shook her head wordlessly. He slumped back in his seat. She traced the edges of her mouth, tingling with the pressure of him, they were swollen already and it made her remember the early days, when they would simply spend hours and hours kissing.

‘We need to end this now.’ She settled her shaking breath, ‘It’s over. I’m done. I just can’t... I can’t do this anymore.’ She looked at him, he had returned to staring out at the forecourt. ‘Are you listening to me?’ she reached out a hand to place on his shoulder, he snapped back around and she left her hand, momentarily stretched across the car. Gently, she brought her hand to his face, tracing the structure she had once loved so much, ‘I did love you. Once. For a very long time.’

He grimaced, ‘I loved you too. I still do.’

She brought her head against his. ‘I know. But it’s not enough.’

Their eyes were both filling with tears, and she knew almost immediately that if she didn’t get out soon, they would be sitting here in nine years, trying to leave each other all over again. She knew, that he could tell himself that he was still in love with her, but he wasn’t. He was in love with the ghost that hovered between them that spoke to love and future and happiness, but it was just a ghost, there was nothing true about it, it was just the lingering feelings of a relationship that died long long ago.

‘At least we’ll always have the forecourt.’ She smiled and so did he, through a haze of sadness they said goodbye, to each other and to the young lovers on the forecourt.