Chapter 4: Reconciliation and Tragedy
One afternoon during the summer term, Sid was loitering outside Tony's house when Effy and Pandora returned from a trip to Cassie's flat to collect some drugs. When he was asked what he was doing, Sid replied that he was 'looking at the bins'. Effy invited him in. After a while, Tony went upstairs to do some revision. Sid was left alone with Effy. Rhetorically, he asked her why everything seemed to be going wrong for him. She promised to sort out his 'Soap Opera' in return for him doing her art coursework.
Cassie was living with Chris in a flat which had been provided for him by Angie. Effy set her up with a young friend of hers called Jake. She also managed to get Sid occupied for a few hours, doing her art work, with a plentiful supply of alcohol, while she photographed Cassie and Jake kissing. She plastered copies of the resulting picture all over the unconscious Sid and awaited the result.
When Sid saw the picture, he was galvanised into action. He ran all the way to Chris's flat, and confronted Cassie. He entered the flat in a furious rage, but he had reckoned without her most powerful weapon, her beautiful and expressive eyes. She used them to reduce Sid to a quivering tearful wreck in no more than fifty-six seconds. Sid had to admit to Cassie that he'd had great sex with Michelle for three days and guilty sex after that. They both apologised for their past misunderstandings, and declared their total love for each other.
For the next few weeks through the Summer Term, it seemed that everything was stabilising. Sid and Cassie were fully reconciled. Michelle and Tony were back together and once again beginning to find love. Also, Jal was in love with Chris and spending most of her spare time with him. The other two members of the 'gang' also appeared to have found partners. Anwar was spending a great deal of his time with Sketch, the little Welsh girl who had previously, unsuccessfully stalked Maxxie earlier in the year. As for Maxxie, he was becoming very friendly with a young man called James.
Although it seemed that all the relationships were settling down, a not unexpected cloud was hanging over the 'gang'. Chris had been born with a serious defect in the blood vessels in his brain, he had an aneurysm, which could burst at any time without warning with fatal results. His brother had already been killed by an identical problem. During the Summer term, he was hospitalised due to a brain haemorrhage, but had discharged himself somewhat earlier than the doctors would have liked.
One morning, after Chris had woken up, Cassie checked that he was okay. She then had a gentle intimate moment with her dear Sidney before going to the college to sit a postponed Psychology exam. She seemed okay, but in reality, she was feeling very uneasy. She just had this odd feeling that something dreadful was about to occur. She did not betray her unease until she returned from the exam. While she was away, Sid had prepared a small dinner party for the three couples. He had not told Cassie what was about to happen. When she returned, she found that Michelle had arrived at the flat and started to walk out. At the front door, she was confronted by Tony, who was carrying a bunch of flowers for Michelle. She stayed. However, her unease was coming to the surface, and she was very irritable right through the meal, even at one point taunting Tony and Michelle about the progress of their reconciliation with each other. Eventually, she got up, went to her bedroom and asked Sid to join her. Sid had sex with Cassie in the hope that it would calm her down. It did, to a limited extent. The following morning, after Sid had gone on his milk round, she joined Chris, who was contemplating his life. As on the day when she confronted Jal about secrets and honesty, all she was wearing was a pink bedsheet. She tried to reassure Chris that he was worth something and that he was worthy of Jal's love. However, she still had this premonition that something unpleasant was imminent. Later in the day, they were watching television, and Cassie remembered the t-shirt she had snaffled from a shop in Park Street the previous day. She produced it. Chris put it on. Shortly afterwards, he felt a bit vague, apparently couldn't remember his girlfriend's name, staggered across to his bed and collapsed. His aneurysm had burst. Cassie held him gently as he died and could feel the life draining away from him. His very last word was "Jal". He had remembered her name. She called the ambulance and Chris was taken away, leaving poor sweet Cassie alone and utterly traumatised. She couldn't think straight, and just wanted to escape from this dreadful place. It didn't occur to her to call Sid, who would have consoled her in an instant, and put her back on an even keel. She just packed some essentials and her passport into her backpack and walked out.
Sid was devastated when he realised that Cassie had disappeared. He did not know what had happened to her, and he was worried. He knew she did occasionally have sudden depressions and suicidal thoughts. However, he had to try to put any thoughts that she might have killed herself right out of his mind, otherwise, he would fall into a depressed state himself. Although the exams had finished, he did manage to keep his mind occupied by spending time with his friends. To make a few extra pounds, even before Chris had died, he had got himself an early morning milk round with a local dairy company. On the morning of the funeral, Graham Miles, Chris's father visited Sid and specifically excluded the 'gang' from it. That morning's post brought Sid's exam results, and a postcard from New York. It was from Cassie. All she had written on it was Sid's address, but he knew it was from her, because he recognised her handwriting. The message on the front of the card was 'NY I heart you, but you're dragging me down'.
Cassie had somehow fetched up in the Big Apple after being on 'autopilot' for a few days. She wasn't sure how to get to the centre from the airport, so se embarked on the somewhat risky strategy of walking towards Manhattan. She was still in a state of shock, having witnessed the death of her closest friend at close quarters. She was walking across Brooklyn when her luck changed for the better. She walked past a little group of Yellow Cab drivers having a rest and a brew-up in a side street. One of them asked her where she was going. All she could say was "Somewhere nice". He took pity on her, gave her a free ride into lower Manhattan and stopped outside a diner he knew on the Lower East Side. He gave her fifty dollars for food and strongly suggested she should go in to the diner, saying "You gotta eat!".
She went in, sat down, ordered a meal, then just looked at it for the next ten minutes or so. This is when she had her second stroke of good luck. One of the waiters, Adam, noticed her and talked to her. He took pity on her and invited her to spend the night with him. He made it very plain that he did not want to have sex with her. He explained that he came from Iowa. When Cassie asked him "Where's that?" he said it was "Over there – about a thousand miles". Cassie, was now at least neutral emotionally, having got over the initial shock of Chris's sudden death, but she was beginning to miss Sid's warm-hearted company. She sent the postcard, not knowing whether Sid would receive it. However, she made the best of her situation and lived with Adam for a couple of weeks.
Meanwhile, back in Bristol, Chris's funeral took place on the same day as the 'gang's' exam results were received. They had agreed amongst themselves that they wouldn't open their exam results until after the funeral, and when they did open them, they would do it round a bonfire in the evening. Although the 'gang' didn't attend the actual funeral service, they positioned themselves on some higher ground overlooking the graveyard during the interment. As the priest was just concluding his ceremony, Jal decided to give a passionate eulogy comparing Chris to a hero of his, Captain Joe Kittinger, the American airman, who in 1960 had ascended to thirty kilometres in a balloon, and jumped out, free falling for most of the way down before opening his parachute. As soon as she had finished, Tony gave the signal, and some very loud fireworks were detonated.
Afterwards, around a small bonfire, they opened their results. Thankfully all the friends who had applied for university places had obtained the results they required. However, Anwar, who had quietly melted away, had failed one subject and only attained an 'E' in the other two.
Cassie was existing reasonably happily in New York, sharing an apartment with Adam. One morning, however, she woke up alone in the apartment. She found an apple and a note by her bed. The note explained that Adam had gone away for a while 'to take a few snaps'. He was a photographer. It also said that she could stay in the apartment for as long as she wanted to. It now struck her like a thunderbolt that she was now alone, stranded in a foreign city, and that the people who loved her were thousands of miles away. She cried bitterly for a couple of hours. Once she was cried out, she realised that she would have to earn some dollars if she was to stay here. She repaired her make up and went down to the diner to inform them that Adam had gone away for a while. Much to her surprise, she was offered his job if she felt she could do it. She started work as a waitress at the Alias Restaurant in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
A couple of weeks after their joint celebration/commiseration of their results and the demise of Chris, Tony told Sid he was going to give him a surprise. He suggested that he pack some clothes into a rucksack and wait for him. Unbeknown to Sid, Tony had 'borrowed' his passport and made some travel arrangements for him. One early evening, he collected Sid from his home and drove him to Bristol Airport. Sid was quite baffled as to what was going on. Getting no information from Tony, he asked Michelle where they were going. She said she had nothing to do with this. When they arrived at the airport, Tony gave Sid a small package and gave him instructions to "Go and find Cassie". In the package was Sid's passport, an airline ticket to New York and a letter of introduction to one of Michelle's mother's American interior decorating contacts. The letter requested Grant Clifford to provide a small apartment for Sid, while he searched for his girlfriend.
Sid flew to New York, not knowing what he'd find there. His plane touched down at Newark airport, just over the Hudson River from the Big Apple. He made his way into Manhattan and, after some confusion found the address of the apartment he was to use while he was searching. He made himself comfortable and asked Grant Clifford whether there was anywhere nearby where he could get a curry. Grant directed him to a Malaysian restaurant a couple of blocks away. He had his dinner there that evening, and thoroughly enjoyed it. His next task was to try and find his sweet Cassie. He started in Mid-town Manhattan and spent nearly a week of long days there failing to find her. Each evening he would return to Nyonya, the Malaysian restaurant and console himself with a different spicy dish each evening. On the Friday of his first full week, he had a major stroke of good luck. He met Grant Clifford on the stairs. Grant asked Sid what Cassie looked like. Sid described her and showed him the photo he carried of Cassie. Grant said that there was a new waitress at a diner he often used on the Lower East Side, who looked like the girl in the picture. He also mentioned that her name badge said 'Cassie'. Sid did not go to Nyonya that evening, but went straight to the Alias Restaurant. He looked in through the window and saw Cassie walking to the counter after serving a customer. He quickly looked at his picture and went in. Cassie was startled to see him in her diner. She didn't recognise him at first, but thought he did look just like her boyfriend. When he spoke, she realised it was him. They met up after Cassie's shift finished, and spent the night together in Adam's apartment. By sheer luck, Sid had located the one person he was looking for.