Could You Lay A Ghost?

When I was mere 20 I met a man 12 years older than me. He wined and dined me and all that stuff and I fell head over heels. We were together for 3 years and my god it was tumultuous He was very serious, staid and listened to Radio 2 but had a great sense of humour. I wanted to go clubbing, drink Blue Nun and wear platform green leather boots from Carnaby Street. He wanted me to listen to opera and wear a twinsuit and hated me smoking.

Didn’t matter though I was completely infatuated with him and loved so much about him. When I look back I was very impressionable at that age but will always be grateful for some of the life experiences he gave me.

My god we used to have some rows, I remember once when I lived in a flat in a crumbling Victorian house in Lewisham, I picked up one of my very best wine glasses which i treasured and threw it at him, naturally he ducked and because the walls were so old and damp half of the glass simply imbeded its self into the wall with the remnants tinkling down onto the kitchen work top.

I’ve never thrown anything at anyone since.

It was never going to work, we did toy with the idea of living together but just as well we didnt I’m sure one of us would have ended up killing the other.

After we split up I went back to the country and to mum. After a year at home I got married which lasted 18 months.

For the next 12 years I dreamed about Steve and what I would do or say if i ever saw him again, he had sent me a cheque for £100 pounds as a wedding present and wished me well and had sent me the odd postcard but then we lost touch but I never stopped thinking about him.

Then one day just as I’d got home from work my mother rang me and said “You won’t believe this but Steve turned up at my house earlier and is coming to see you in 20 minutes so for goodness sake do your hair make sure you’ve got some lipstick on”! I said but how the hell did he find me? She explained although he had my last address he had gone to the house and looked through the windows and seeing photo’s of twin boys had realised I didn’t live there anymore and had gone to the local Post Office to look through the electoral role to find my mother.

I don’t think my heart had ever pumped so fast or my mind ever been in so much turmoil. When he arrived although I was very nervous it was like I’d seen him last week and we talked as easily as we always had done. He had been travelling around England and for some unknown reason had bought me a rich fruitcake from a Cotswolds Farm Shop.
He explained that his mother was dieing of cancer but didnt know, and that he had taken her on a wonderful trip to South Africa and as he had loved it so much he was going to live out there and open a coffee shop once she had passed away. He had come to see me to ask if I would like to go with him. For a nano second I was tempted but I had at the time got a boyfriend and of course my young son so of course I said no.

After he left I felt elation, sadness and regret all rolled into one. It only took me minutes though to know that after all those years the ghost was at last laid.

I’ve never heard from him since and have hardly ever thought of him until today when I realised how sometimes laying a ghost for someone can set them free for the rest of their lives.

(You know who you are) x