When Jerry Met Ali Ch. 27

Camilla left the flat for her home a few of days after that weekend. She seemed to be elated now that she had finished her degree, and she was moving on with her life.

There was more than one farewell party for her, some of them seeming to spring up out of thin air. I did not know that she had so many friends at university, and I was also surprised that so many of these people seemed to complete their study that year. Some had already had job offers in their field of study, which was wonderful for them.

The conversations at these parties often moved on from the subject of their studies to the futures of Camilla's flatmates, including me. The other girls would end their degrees at the end of 1998, as originally planned, further education notwithstanding.

My plan for 1998 had been to defer for the year and move to Canberra with Jeremy. I still intended to do that but, when the subject arose, it quickly grated on me when some girls would answer on my behalf.

"Oh, Alison isn't going to finish next year. She's following her boyfriend to Canberra!"

"Deferring her study? That's a slippery slope. He must be some amazing guy!"

"Well, just ask Camilla how amazing he is. She's one of the 'Swinging-Sisters!'"

And that was the other thing that really irked me. The condescending and snide remarks that now appeared after the weekend. Initially, I was elated by our fun, and Camilla verged on bragging about her involvement, but quickly the whole thing left a bitter taste in my mouth.

I could see people across the room looking in my direction and laughing while Camilla lapped up all the extra attention like she was a movie star. I also had to endure total strangers making fun of me to my face.

"Alison, are you going to miss Camilla? I guess Jeremy didn't either."

"Alison, have you seen Camilla? Well, you probably saw enough of her on the weekend."

By the time I left Sydney to go back to mum's house in Bathurst for Christmas, I was in a foul mood. I didn't talk to anyone the day I left, and I almost hung up on Jeremy when he called. I say almost, but I still cut him off by pretending that I was too busy to talk.

When I got to Bathurst, I was almost in tears. I don't know how it had all come apart so quickly. Just a week earlier I had been in love, about to move cities to be with my future husband, my study deferred only for a short time. And now I felt I was on the precipice of making the biggest mistake of my life.

Mum didn't help the situation either. I knew she hadn't wanted me to defer, and she'd used the last month since we had spoken to plan her none too subtle campaign.

She backed off a little when she picked me up from the bus and saw that I was upset. I wouldn't tell her why, but she was canny enough to figure out where to press when I eliminated all the other options of family, work, army and my university results.

She subtly reminded me I had been a baby when dad had left her and found another wife. If she'd just listened to her mother, she decried.

"Men always turn into their fathers," she said. "If only I had listened."

I was feeling very confused by that point, so it didn't occur to me that if she had listened to her mother, then I would never have been conceived. It wasn't until years later that I thought about her cognitive dissonance. I knew she loved me, but she intimated that it would have been better for her if we had never been born. I know that wasn't what she meant, but that was its logical outcome.

After a few days of her chipping away at me, added to what had transpired in Sydney the weekend before, I was finally done. I had spent Christmas Eve mostly awake trying to justify the move I knew I was about to make. I don't know what time I eventually fell asleep, but when I finally woke, I felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

We had a nice Christmas day, and I was just beginning to forget my troubles when the phone rang. Mum answered and looked in my direction.

"Alison, it is for you. It's Jeremy."

------------------------------------------------------

Epilogue

Alison sat in her room, staring at the two objects in her hands. One was twenty-five years old but had never been used. The other was very new but carried much more history. Undecided still, she put them both down and walked over to the mirror to check herself once more.

She couldn't remember exactly what she looked like in 1997, but she had definitely changed. The strain of three children and her own broken marriage were bound to change anyone physically. The children had been a delight, the marriage less so. She didn't know when it had all went wrong, but after a long period of growing apart, he had finally put his cards on the table two years ago and in Alison's typical style she had moved to move on as quickly as she could.

"'Too intense' indeed," she reflected.

But the separation had not been all bad. The children weren't little anymore, and splitting custody every week gave her plenty of time to get back into shape. She'd hit the gym and the road big time, and the results were there to see. Definitely not a 21-year-old anymore, but she knew that after two years of constant training, her 46-year-old body would put most half her age to shame.

Satisfied she was looking good, Alison surveyed the room. Everything was ready, nothing out of place. She'd barely touched anything since she'd checked in two hours earlier bar her use of the bathroom and shower.

She regarded the two objects that she'd left on the bed a few moments earlier again. Grinding her teeth slightly, she determined to read the letter one last time. There was still time to back out, and she wanted to make sure she had read it properly. The one hundred and first time couldn't hurt.

The letter was brief and to the point.

Alison,

I was at the Sydney Cricket Ground on the weekend (8 July 2022) and found myself sitting in almost exactly the same seats I was with you 25 years ago to the day. I still have fond memories of our time together.

I hope life has treated you kindly.

Yours, Jeremy

The letter had arrived at her office in Bathurst eight weeks earlier. Curious about how he had found her, Alison did a quick internet search of her name. The search returned dozens of results for her. She had been a shameless self-promoter over the years, so it couldn't have been too hard for Jeremy to track her down.

She then tried the same for his name. No results. That he'd handwritten her a letter and posted it should have been a clue to his searchability. But to have no online records at all was quite the achievement.

Alison persevered online but eventually had to go deep into her glory box just to find a photo of him. The picture was of Jeremy standing next to a tree and the bicycle he rode the day they'd ridden the 95km from the SGC to Wollongong in 1997 to raise money for MS research. He had a huge smile on his face. He was young, slim and strong and had thick black hair.

"I wonder what has changed?" she thought.

Jeremy had not left a return address, so he was not wanting a reply, or he had wanted her to have to work for it. If he had not wanted her to find him, then why write at all? It was definitely option two. She'd initially tried to ignore it, but it wasn't in her nature to leave any loose ends in life.

"Dammit!" she'd cursed when she'd worked that part out. "He's in my head!"

She almost called a halt to her digging then when she'd realised that he was one-step ahead of her. But after a week of him living rent free in her head, she'd determined to find him so she could at least take back some of the power he'd somehow gotten over her with his letter.

"Double-dammit!" she cursed when she realised that he'd done it again.

Along with the photo were all Jeremy's letters. At one time, when she had gotten engaged, she'd thought to throw them away but had ended up just putting them in a box and then not touched them for over 15 years. She opened them, hoping to find an address. Bingo! The address was there clear as day, but she quickly realised that it was probably out of date by at least two decades.

Maybe there was a clue in the letters.

"Oh-la-la!" she thought. She felt herself getting giddy. Man, that man could write a good love letter. Alison reread them and then reread them all again, just to be sure.

After her trip down memory lane, Alison finally found what she had been looking for; a name: "Tom". Tom had been Jeremy's best friend from the army, that they spent a weekend with and double dated with Tom's wife. She remembered Tom had a funny surname that was something to do with the weather...

"Rain, snow, wind, spring, summer... Summer!" That was it. But not spelt that way. She did a google and got rewarded. "Sommer! Tom Sommer."

The search brought back some results, but not a contact. However, there were photos of Tom and his wife, Gloria.

"Dammit, dammit, dammit!"

Gloria was also a bit of self-promoter--respect--and was easily contactable. A brief email to Gloria produced instant results. Gloria replied within the hour and after a phone call to verify if Alison's was bona fide, she finally had a phone number.

"Alison!" Gloria said when the penny had finally dropped. "How long has it been?"

"Twenty-five years." Alison said with some embarrassment.

"I'd almost forgotten about you two!"

"What do you mean 'almost'? We only met once twenty-five years ago?"

"Oh, we never forgot that weekend, Alison. Oh, my god!"

"What do you mean?"

"Are you kidding? The noises you were making from the bedroom! What was he doing to you in there?"

"Um....?" Alison felt herself beginning to go red.

"Okay-okay," Gloria tried a different tack, "I have just one question. Was that all you, or was that all him?"

Gloria's recollection had shaken something loose from Alison's memory. She remembered that weekend. She recalled that afternoon when Jeremy had pleasured her so long and so much that she screamed a complete stranger's house down. She remembered emerging from that room hours later and the look on Tom and Gloria's faces, barely able to stop themselves from bursting out laughing, and how Gloria had kept staring at Jeremy for the rest of that weekend.

"Who does that?" Alison asked herself. Who indeed? "DAMMIT!"

Alison spent the next few days mulling over the decision to message Jeremy. What was she setting herself up for? Hadn't the last fifteen years taught her to not to rely on anyone but herself? Hadn't her mother been right when she told her that a man always turns in to his father? Hadn't she been right when she told Alison to forget about Jeremy and finish her degree?

Her mother. Alison had turned in to her mother. She texted straight away.

"Got your letter. Will be in Canberra soon. Are you free?"

Two agonizing hours later, a reply.

"Love to. Just say when."

The when was now. Alison put the letter neatly away in its envelope and picked up the second item. She looked in the mirror one last time, smiled, and walked out of the door.

Jeremy was 50 now. Still physically fit but, like his father before him, nature had taken most of his thick black hair but not much else. He had the good sense to embrace the change and keep it short. Ever the soldier, she supposed.

Alison had spotted him before he had seen her. Sitting in a corner booth of the coffee shop below the hotel she was staying in, Jeremy read a newspaper with interest. She was almost upon him before he saw her.

Business suit and tie worn comfortably like a second skin. Glasses now put away--just for reading--he greeted her with a smile and a hug. A kind smile. A warm embrace.

Alison relaxed immediately and lowered her guard. They chatted away for hours about their lives and what they--mostly she--had done in the last twenty-five years, Jeremy never once mentioning the day she had left him.

When she'd heard enough to set her mind at ease, she paused and steeled herself for what was to come next.

"Why did you write to me?"

"On the way home from the SCG that day, I had to walk past your school, that patch of long grass, your flat. It affected me in a way I didn't expect."

Alison could feel herself tearing up. That isn't what she had meant, and now she had to say it out loud.

"No. I meant, why did you write to me after what I did to you?"

Jeremy paused for a moment, took Alison by the hand, and then spoke.

"I was working in Vienna many years ago and made some acquaintances with some people from a few international organisations that were headquartered there. One day, a fellow I knew from OPEC took me aside and asked me what I was doing for a coming long weekend. As I was free, he said that I should come with him and told me to go home, pack a bag and that he'd send a car to collect me.

"The car picked me up at the appointed time and sped me to the airport, but instead of heading to the major terminal, it turned down a side road marked with a prominent red, capital A in a circle.

"As we approached the security gate, the car slowed down just enough for the guard to identify the driver and, without stopping, speed through. We drove straight onto the tarmac and stopped beside a waiting luxury private jet. The driver took my bag and led me towards the plane.

"I climbed the stairs to find my colleague waiting inside. 'My friend,' he said warmly, 'are you ready?' I nodded, and he turned to a waiting steward, spoke a few words in Arabic, and moments later the door closed. The plane taxied to the runway, and we took off. I won't bore you with the details, but as you may well imagine, it was a flight like none other."

Alison looked at Jeremy, confused. "I don't understand."

"Alison, I have been on many flights since that day, and my experience has been the same as anyone else who has flown commercially. Modern air travel is a marvel that shouldn't be taken for granted, but when you've flown once in a luxury private jet, flying commercial is just not the same."

She pondered this for a moment, then smiled.

"I never got to give you your Christmas present." She said, her nerves almost getting the better of her. "I kept it all these years next to your letters and that one photo I had of you."

Her admission intrigued, but visibly shook Jeremy. Alison placed a key on the table in front of him. It took him only a moment to recognise its significance.

"Hand cuffs?" he said, sounding confused. "What am I supposed to do with a key to a set of handcuffs?"

Detecting his cheeky feigned ignorance, Alison rose, then placed her hotel room card on the table next to the key.

"Whatever you want to lover!" She walked away, but stopped and turned to face him. "Only don't take too long deciding. That's the only key, and I don't want to catch a cold."

Thank you all for following my story though to the end. If you want to see what else I've been doing please find my links on my profile.