Woman’s Weekly Story

by Peter Gifford

It was over so quickly Emily hardly had time to breathe. She’d had all these things she wanted to say to him today; she was going to start with a little story about the small dog she’d seen on the Tube, lying at it’s master’s feet and looking up at the commuter’s faces with so much intelligence. It had struck her that the dog looked so much more alive than anyone else on the train. She had already started planning a trip they could do together. And then there were all the events of the past week to share with him. She’d go first this time, running through the checklist in her head of struggles and triumphs she’d stored away as things to tell him when she saw him this Saturday. Then she’d listen attentively while he told her his stories of the week, and together they’d laugh about the things that had happened to them both ...

“I don’t think we should see each other anymore.”

“Why?”

She couldn’t help it. The word had popped out of her mouth.

Later, Emily knew, when she was back in her own room by herself, sitting on the window ledge in her favourite spot, looking down on the street below but not seeing anything, she’d replay this moment. The moment she should have said something hard, and cool, then walked away without a second glance. She knew she’d be rehearsing the lines for days.

“Good idea. I didn’t think it was working out.”

“Fine. Bye.”

“It’s been fun Richard. Seeya ’round.”

“Good. You were lousy in bed.”

Instead she’d opened the floodgates. Emily listened to the tired explanations, but already her mind was wandering into the future. They’d be a few days of physical agony, a few months of loneliness, a slow hardening of the shell again and eventually a long spell of day-to-day living, then eventually she’d meet someone else and the whole exhausting game would play itself out again.

Later, sitting alone at the table, Richard’s half-finished glass of beer on the table before her, she lit a cigarette (she hadn’t smoked all the time she’d been with Richard ... well, at least I can go back to slowly killing myself again, she thought) and cast a glance around the other tables. She paused to adjust the huge flashing neon sign above her head, the one that read DUMPED in big cursive letters. No one seemed to notice. Why should they, she thought, who cares about total strangers anyway, who cares about sensitive men with impossible taste in women who can be good company if they try sometimes? Not her. What I need is, thought Emily, is some life-changing, completely different, unexpected event to turn my life around and get me out of this rut.

She was on her fourth cigarette and her third coffee and she hadn’t thought of Richard since he had hugged her uncomfortably and left. She could sit her and finish the packet and drink the kitchen dry thinking about him, but instead she decided to go to the British Museum to visit a friend.

“I’ve had it George, completely had it. I’m not seeing anymore men. Maybe I should try women. Maybe I’m gay — maybe I’m some form of gay that involves not being attracted to the same sex.”

George was peering intently through a microscope. The casual observer would have taken his quiet “uh-huh” as one of disinterest. Emily knew him better.

“Look, I like this guy. I really did. I thought he liked me. He was interesting, and funny, and pretty good in bed, not amazing, sure, but that’s not everything of course ...”

“Pass me that slide, will you oh recently dumped one?”

Emily reached for the slide, pausing to look briefly at the unidentifiable blot on the glass. George took it without looking up. It suddenly struck Emily that George was an interesting, intelligent, and pretty good-looking man. Why haven’t I noticed that before? she thought. Because he treats you like a sister, she answered. It was a good thing, this brother-and-sister thing. At least you never get dropped by your brother.

“ Do you know that these tissue samples haven’t shown the slightest sign of decay in almost three thousand years?” said George, eyes still glued to the microscope.

Emily sighed. “And I’m only thirty-two ...”

George looked up from his work and fixed his eyes on Emily. He’d known her for about ten years, and this was a scene almost as familiar to him as the view through his microscope. Funnily enough, he always liked her better when she was newly single.

“Look, I’ve an idea. You’re newly discarded —” he dodged an imaginary plate thrown at his head — “and I need an assistant for this next trip. You always been on my back about how adventurous you think my job is, no matter how much I try and tell you otherwise. Why not come along and find out for yourself? Why you’re there you can make yourself useful and sketch the dig site.”

𔄢You’re serious?” said Emily, the name of Richard suddenly a half-forgotten memory. “That’s perfect! I need the work, the break, and you need an astoundingly talented artist. Where are we going?”

“Yes I do need an astoundingly talented artist. But I’m asking you instead. To Egypt.”

The next two weeks were a pleasantly purposeful blur to Emily. Working for herself as an artist, it was a simple matter to organise the time, but she had to prove to the powers that be that financed the expedition that she had the skills for the job. Then there was getting a friend to take care of her flat, buying gear, packing ... but finally she and George were taking a cab to Heathrow, boarding a flight and on their way to Cairo.

In Luxor they stayed at a friendly little place called the Oasis Hotel, so friendly they were forced to share their beds with large families of fleas. But one restless and itchy night later they were lugging their backpacks down to the Nile to board the local ferry across the brown, choppy waters. Emily practiced her ”la, shokran’s” (no, thankyou) all the way down to the shore, fending off enthusiastic taxi drivers and stallholders. She’d been pawed twice, leared at countless times and once been the possible object of an exchange of camels, but it was all part of the adventure. Well, at least that’s what she told herself when she felt like hitting someone.

On the other side of the Nile the big hotels were replaced by leaning shacks under which tethered donkeys patiently awaited another day of torture; packs of swarming children with well-practiced sales pitches, and a hundred grasping hands eager to guide you to your next destination. Emily fended off the entreaties while George negotiated with a tall thin young man with an ambitious, if patchy, black beard. Before long the three of them were — in her case — unsteadily perched on donkeys and clip-clopping along a tarmacked road towards the dirt coloured hills. Emily soaked in the little details as best she could while trying to stay atop her slow-moving mount. Children played around mud-brick houses. Women gathered around wells to gossip like wives over back fences. Before long, almost without realising it, they had passed beyond the narrow strip of agricultural land that bordered the Nile and were in completely barren desert. George turned around, supporting himself with a hand on the donkey’s rump, and gave her a beaming smile. She grimaced back, pointing to her own extremely sore rump.

They moved up onto higher ground, at times negotiating narrow trails that bordered steep cliffs where Emily held onto her donkey for dear life. But even up here, when she thought they had left all of civilisation behind, children would appear from behind boulders like desert spirits, brandishing cheap carved scarabs and figurines in return for Egyptian pounds.

“Isn’t the valley of the Kings around here somewhere?” she shouted to George.

“We’ve already passed it,” he replied, “about ten minutes back. Our site lies in a previously disregarded patch of rocky valley further into the desert. We first got clues to its existence when inscriptions on the walls of the tombs of Ramses II’s sons were uncovered, about two years back.”

“Oh.” All very interesting, but right now Emily’s world was centred on the agnonising pain in her backside. “So how many people are at this dig anyway?”

George paused to point and jabber something to their guide before replying. “It’s a small delegation from London, the University of Minnesota and the Harvard Archaeological Institute. I’ve been in contact with them for two years but none of us have actually met.” He turned to face her. “Should be interesting. Feeling sociable?”

“Right now I’m feeling like a long hot bath, my favourite jim jams and the latest episode of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ on TV.”