Don’t want to Forget - 2. Chapter 2

The next day Arjan came in with almost a sprint in his step.

‘Oh, Arjan!’ the head nurse catches up to him, running.

‘Oh, morning!’ Arjan grins, as he takes off his coat.

‘Morning,’ the nurse pants and grins, she hands him a note. ‘We’ve put you in the west area today.’

‘West?’ Arjan stares at the notes in his hand. The west was far away from his normal workstation. ‘I mean, yeah. Sure. Not a problem.’

Nothing is said so the nurse blurts out, ‘We’ve just been told to move you, it was a last minute, sorry, Arjan.’

‘Ah, it’s no worries. As long as the hours haven’t changed?’

‘No, it’s the same number of hours. But you’ll be on the West from today and for the rest of the week. From tomorrow you’ll be moved to nights.’

Arjan sighs and folds up the notes in his hand, ‘Not a problem.’

Arjan goes to the changing rooms. The smell of damp showers being used and the cleaning products burn his nose. Taking a locker, he starts putting his backpack and puffy red coat inside, he’s aware of the chatting in the background between his two of his colleagues, Sam and Adam.

‘You get up too much this weekend? Did Anya come over?’

‘You wouldn’t believe what actually happened, Adam!’

Arjan goes into his bag, the small compartment of the bag, zipped up tight, almost never opened. He manages to tug hard and open it. There is a photo strip inside, he looks around his shoulder to make sure people were not watching him.

‘I can’t believe Anya did that!’

‘Shocking, right?’

As the men laugh, Arjan opens up the photo strip, it’s very old photos of a young Arjan, as an older teenager, about twenty years old, laughing and smiling with a guy a similar age next to him. The guy is kissing Arjan on the cheek in one photo, while Arjan is scrunching his face, giggling away. The guy has shaggy brown hair and contagious white smile. In another photo shot he is pulling a face, while younger Arjan is hiding his face, embarrassed. The guy has a slightly chipped tooth and a line down the side of his cheek. Despite it all he had a warm handsome smile and bright green eyes. A younger version of Tom.

***
Another day done. 12-hour shift.

He can feel the warmth of his home beneath his feet as he comes inside. The TV is on in the other room, too loud as usual and bright lights and steam from the kitchen. He can smell clams being cooked. Mm. That’s a new one.

Unwrapping his scarf from around his neck, he hangs it up with his coat on the coatrack. Peering down the hallway, he can hear his roommates laughing and chatting in the kitchen. As quiet as he can, he goes up the stairs to his room.

His room barely has any decorations. A bare wooden wardrobe and drawers and a small white bed. Non descriptive but tidy though. Nothing more was put into this place of rest. He was barely in.

Arjan puts his backpack down at the end of his bed.

There’s a knock on the door. He peers over his shoulder as a woman steps in. Hannah.

She leans against the doorframe and crosses her arms.

‘Did you see him again today?’ Hannah asks Arjan.

Arjan can’t help but grin but casually shakes his head, ‘I see him briefly, but I saw loads of other people today. Big day, had two people be able to go home today.’

‘Right, right,’ Hannah said. ‘Busy day, getting that rent money, right?’

‘They moved me to a different area of the ward,’ Arjan sat on his bed. ‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ he laughs a little.

‘I worry about ya, if you disappeared, I’d have two controlling women as roommates.’

Arjan snorts, ‘I wouldn’t call Willow and Lynn controlling, like, anyway I’d be around, I don’t know why you worry.’

‘Just cos of his wife.’

‘Yeah. I know. But I mean, he’s married and he is with her and he is happy and I’m happy for them.’

Hannah sits down next to Arjan, ‘So, if I went into your drawers, I wouldn’t find a picture frame of you guys in there.’

Arjan says nothing and just kicks his shoes off.

Hannah smiles and rubs her roommate’s arm in support.

‘You guys upstairs! Any of yous fancy trying the seafood selection?!’ the roommates from the kitchen below.

Arjan and Hannah turn and look at each other. They both laugh and Hannah gets up.

‘See you down there,’ she calls over her shoulder to Arjan.

Arjan waits a moment and gets up. He closes the door after Hannah. He then sits on his bed and gets his phone out. He clicks through the saved old videos and pictures despite himself. He finds the one.

He clicks onto the video.

There is a young version of Arjan and Tom. Only a few years ago.

They are lying down and Arjan has his phone out videoing them, the camera facing them straight on.

‘Ha-ha, got your camera out,’ Tom laughs, nuzzling his face into Arjan’s shoulder as he laughs.

‘I am trying to get my good side!’

‘I mention marriage and you get the recording device out.’

‘Just wanted to capture the rare moment the anti-marriage man and hater of the best film franchise of all times mentioned a ring.’

‘Me, anti-marriage?’ he laughs in the video, lifting his head and poking his cheek. ‘I don’t think we can even marry. Alright, about how capturing the moment you said you’ll never settle down either.’

‘I do say that. The only way you’ll get me is with a Lord of Rings ring.’

‘With that stupid quote, one ring to rule all?’

‘That is good; but I am sure you can find better quotes than that!’

Arjan sniffs as he watches the video.

‘So, you want a quote inside a ring? From a stupid film?’

‘Exactly.’

‘You don’t ask for much do you.’

A young Arjan and Tom laugh in the video.

Arjan stares at the video, feeling his throat tightening up.

‘Arjan come up! It’s so bad it’s good, you got to try this seafood!’ Hannah bellowed.


***
It’s been a few weeks since that night and Arjan is late on lunch.

Arjan sighs as he slides into an empty booth. It’s quiet, just the sounds of phone ringing now and then from a one-man reception area. Nighttime.

The smell of chemical and bleach is strong in the cafeteria. He takes out his food.
Arjan regrets not packing something properly for his late shift. Like a sandwich or soup. But no, he rushed out the house and grabbed the first thing he could get out of the fridge.

He unwrapped the half-eaten chocolate bar and begins snapping it into pieces.
The chocolate is cold despite being in his locker and is hard to eat. It’s almost refreshing. Clicking on his phone, he scans through his usual social media, just out of boredom rather than intrigue.

‘Hey, I mean, hi.’

Arjan looks up and can’t help the confused smile.

Tom is there with, alongside his walking stick to steady him, he smiles back and winces as he sits down opposite him.

‘You okay there, champ?’ Arjan cocks his head to the side. He nods behind him. ‘You just need a walk about? You should be asleep.’

Tom looks down and nods back at the chocolate bar, ‘Excellent choice of nutrients.’

Arjan laughs at him and pulls a face while he pops a chocolate piece in his mouth.

As he eats, he pushes the chocolate towards Tom. He knows he is on more of a variety of solid foods now so he can try have some.

‘Oh, thanks,’ he grins at him, reaching to get a piece.

‘It’s a bit of a trek for you to walk all the way from your ward,’ Arjan says as he opens up the chocolate wrapper up and spreads the chocolate pieces out for them to share.

‘What can I say,’ he shrugs. ‘The more I find out about myself, the more I feel like the biggest jerk in the world.’

Arjan laughs and shakes his head, ‘You are way too harsh on yourself.’

‘That’s the reason I came all the way here,’ he smiles at him. ‘I don’t get reminded on who I used to be. A self-entitled rich kid.’

‘Oh,’ Arjan raises his eyebrow. ‘But you did win a lot of tennis trophies and got some sweet cars.’

‘Were we ever friends before?’

Arjan pauses, surprised by the question. He eats a bit of chocolate before reaching for his bottle of water. As he opens it, he gives a little shrug, ‘Yes, we were.’

That was sort of the truth.

‘It’s nice that there’s some balance of people in my life, real people like you and fake, um, well, you know,’ he scratches his head.

Arjan nods, he knows what he means.

‘It’s like real happy positive feelings, you know?’

‘I understand,’ Arjan casts his eyes down and drinks some of his water.

‘Gut feelings and that,’ Tom looks at him. ‘I’m just intrigued. So, don’t be offended when I ask.’

Arjan almost rolls his eyes, ‘Offended by what?’

‘When I ask if we were ever more than friends?’

Screwing the lid back onto the water bottle, Arjan asks, ‘is that that gut feeling you were talking about?’

‘I don’t hear you saying no.’

He just looks at Tom and nods.

‘Did we date long?’ he asks.

‘Few years ago, we didn’t go out that long.’

It was exactly seven years ago. They knew each other from school but only got to know each other properly after meeting as volunteers at a charity-based cafe. They dated in secret for two years, then they dated publicly for a year and a half before it ended.

‘Did we end badly?’

Arjan gives him a sad smile.

He reflects back on his parents saying, ‘are you mad to date someone who isn’t our religion? What’s wrong with you?’.

He remembers Tom’s friends telling him, ‘You know we support you with anything, mate, but the fact is people are gonna be asking things like, why are you dating a terrorist and they’ll say other things too, we can’t protect you from everything, mate.’

Then Tom’s parents telling him, ‘You know you’ll have to convert to be a Sikh too, that’s what those people do, they have to date within their own circles.’

Arjan reflects on his own friends laughing at him, ‘what you trying to achieve here? It’s not going to work.’

In an ideal world Arjan and Tom would have proved them all wrong, that love conquers all. But this was the real world, and all this was too much for both of them. They cared too much to put each other through this and it broke their hearts.

‘We ended civilly,’ he tells Tom and pats his hand. ‘It was the better decision. We both moved on. You met Tanya and I found the career I wanted. It worked out well in the end.’

He pats his hand one more time before realising what he is doing and let’s go.