8

‘I’ve been feeling low.’

‘Are you OK?’

You’re lying on your bed, feet propped up against the wall, watching the ceiling like an unmoving sky. You’re on the phone, reaching across the distance, not for the first time, nor the last. Her voice spins towards you through the soft static and you try to map its direction, imagining the soundwave drifting from a place you have never seen.

‘Can I be honest?’

‘Always.’

‘I’m very tired.’

With your confession, the truth imbues your self with form and detail. You hear her low exhale and know she understands you’re not tired in the way sleep will solve, no. You’re weary. You’re not without joy, but the pain is much, often. And like Jimmy said, you begin to think you are alone in this, until she says:

‘Me too.’

‘How do you cope?’ you ask.

‘I smoke. I drink. I eat. I try to treat myself often. I try to treat myself well. And I dance.’

‘Tell me more about that. Please.’

‘The smoking or the drinking?’

You both laugh and you hear her rearrange herself, perhaps sitting up.

‘I like to move,’ she starts. ‘I always have. Used to catch me on the playground ­out-­dancing everyone. It’s my space, you know? I’m making space and I’m dancing into the space. I’m like, dancing into the space the drums leave, you know, between the kick and the snare and the hat, where that silence lies, that huge silence, those moments and spaces the drums are asking you to fill. I dance to breathe but often I dance until I’m breathless and sweaty and I can feel all of me, all those parts of me I can’t always feel, I don’t feel like I’m allowed to. It’s my space. I make a little world for myself, and I live.’

‘Wow.’

‘Sorry, that was a lot.’

‘No, don’t apologize. I’ve never heard anyone talk about dance like that, it’s cool. There’s a night on Wednesdays in Deptford, really close to you . . . it’s jazz music but there’s something different in that room. An energy that’s very . . . very freeing. A bunch of Black people just being themselves.’

‘We should go when I’m back in London. There’s nothing like that in Dublin.’

‘Let’s do it.’

You turn the phone on speaker and let your legs flop onto the bed. Resting your body on its side, both hands tucked underneath your head as if in prayer. Desiring peace. Your breathing eases. You hear hers too, both of you pushing and pulling, ebb and flow, the ocean separating you. Somewhere in the quiet rush, you hear a snore. You sign off quietly, hoping not to wake her.