ϟ
open road
you've got my baby
Their first meeting is in nineteen eighty-three, September 7th.
Amanda's thirteen, Eddie's fifteen. They have a mutual friend Ryan who invites them to the park to have fun. That's where they met, on the swings, in the park downing cheap cider and smoking roll ups.
There's a group of them — fifteen, sixteen youths running riot at nine-fifteen pm, causing trouble.
It's fun and exciting and dangerous. Though they're in each other's company, they don't communicate, they don't know each other well enough to talk.
/
They meet again exactly a year later, September 7th nineteen eighty-four.
Amanda's fourteen, Eddie's sixteen. Same friend Ryan, same cider, same park, same baccy. She swings backwards and forwards, bottle of cider in between her legs, roll up cigarette in between her fingers.
This time they talk. He talks first, "alright?"
He sits on the swing beside her, not speaking, just watching how she smokes her cigarette almost perfectly. She flashes him a smile but doesn't speak, Amanda can get painfully shy at times.
"I'm Edward," he extends his hand and she smiles. She extends her own hand and shakes his, "Amanda, Mandy."
"The lads call me Eddie," she blows the smoke in his direction and laughs, "so are you from these neck of the woods then Eddie?"
"Round the corner, surprised I haven't seen you about before."
She takes a swig of the cider, realising that it cheap and nasty and sucks on her cigarette again, "you have, last year, same place."
They spend the evening sharing the bottle of cider and sharing roll ups, talking about Ryan and his gang and school and how shit the place was. At midnight Eddie walks Amanda home, promising to keep in touch with one another, if they can.
/
Same year, different place. No communication.
/
He moves out of the area when he's eighteen, heads out in the big wide world on a journey. He hears she's got a bit mixed up in things, those kind of things you can't escape from. It's not his problem, they haven't spoken in four years.
/
nineteen eighty-nine, March 19th, Eddie's twenty-first when he returns home for a pub crawl.
She's nineteen, still caught up in those problems. She spends her evenings still drinking cheap cider and smoking roll ups to get rid of the pain.
She's different. Not quiet, not reserved as she once was. Bold, bright, has the gift of the gab some would say. She struts around in her crop top, her mini skirt, throwing herself at men for a couple of quid because it's different and daring and exciting.
He finds himself left alone outside a bar because he's not allowed in and his mates have fucked off inside and left him.
He spots her first, walking in circles on her spot, smoking the roll up cigarette. He approaches her, asking if she has a lighter that he can borrow. She hands him one, her hands trembling slightly in the cold.
He smiles, "you must be freezing."
"You get used to it," she laughs and blows the smoke in his direction. He blows his smoke in her face and they both start to laugh. Her stomach begins to flip nervously and she bites her lower lip gently. He leaves not long after finishing his cigarette, thanking her for the lighter.
She walks in circles again, waiting for a client.
/
It's nineteen ninety, she's twenty, he's twenty-two.
She still walks the same spot, round and round. He's still in his home town, out in town to celebrate getting a teaching job in one of the high schools nearby. His mates tease him, tells him that Victoria Lane High is a shit school and he'd be hanging himself by lunchtime.
He spots her, that girl at the bar in the first bar they're at, supplying vodka shots to herself. She's not changed, still smokes judging by the packet of tobacco that's sat beside her shot glass. He approaches her, slowly, not wanting to startle her if she was in her own little world.
"Can I buy you a drink?"
She looks up from staring at the bottom of her empty shot glass and her eyes fall upon him, that man she met a year ago. How could she forget the gentleman she met that day, the one who borrowed her lighter and took an interest in her?
"It's you," she smiles, "I'd like that, thank you."
He buys her a glass of red wine and himself a pint. He sits beside her on the bar stool and asks, "do I get to know your name?"
"Amanda, Mandy," she smiles and bites her lower lip. He realises how attractive she is, something he never saw last time they were in each others company.
"Eddie," they don't shake hands like they did that time when they were teenagers, on the park drinking the cheap cider. They spend the evening at the bar, supplying each other with vodka shots and too much alcohol, Eddie's friends long gone to leave him alone with the girl at the bar. (the one he's pulled)
"What brings you out in these neck of the woods, Eddie?"
He blinks, a memory suddenly overcoming him of when he was sixteen, meeting a girl at the park who happened to drink cheap cider and roll up cigarettes (and looked a bit like the Mandy he met tonight) He blinks, surely they can't be one of the same?
As soon as the memory is there, it's gone again. He puts it down to the alcohol he's drank, given the chance him and Mandy could drink the bar dry between them. They wouldn't take much persuading.
"I got a job, I'm a teacher in a high school," he smiles and she smiles back. For a moment there's nothing spoken until she bites her lower lip. He realises it's turning him on and before he realises what he's doing, he's pressing his lips to hers. He runs his tongue over her bottom lip, begging to be let in.
She allows him entrance and their tongues start battling for dominance until Amanda pulls away, her eyes meeting with his. He looks around and upon realising his surroundings decides to take her back to the hotel he booked for the night. (thankful that he had booked a hotel)
Once inside the room, he begins to kiss her passionately again, her back against the wall. He's running his hands over her body, their tongues once again fighting for dominance and he wonders why he didn't do this on their first meeting.
Breaking apart from the kiss, he takes off his shirt and Amanda runs her fingers down his abs, biting her lower lip. Their eyes lock again and before they know it, their clothes are thrown all over the room leaving a trail to the bed in the middle of the room.
"You're beautiful," he whispers, kisses her neck and thrusts into her. She moans, kissing him hard as they moved their bodies in rhythm. Lying in bed together, breathing deeply, she snuggled into him and murmured before falling asleep; "I've always wanted to be a teacher."
/
He never saw her again after that night, she didn't leave anything behind that he could try and trace her with.
She isn't on her corner either, the one where she spends the entire day walking in circles and smoking roll ups or drinking cheap cider to stop it hurting inside. He asks around for an Amanda, a Mandy but nobody's heard of her so he gives up trying to find her, (it obviously wasn't meant to be)
He wonders where she is in the world and why she left. Wasn't he good enough or did she think he was just like the rest, wanting a fuck after one too many alcohol drinks at a cheap bar in town? He wonders if she's happy, if she's free from her demons and whether by chance, their paths may cross once again.
jottings / if you like it enough to favourite, please leave a review:3