I do remember him. I remember that he has a famous name, the same as an actor or a singer or perhaps a playwright. I remember that he borrowed my friend's novel and that he never returned it. I remember that he lived with her for a while and they became friends, the kind of friends who see each other every day till one of them moves on and then not at all.
There is something in his grin that suggests that perhaps we knew each other in other ways. I trawl back through my memory but there is nothing tangible. It is possible of course. It is always possible. I remember that he moved up north and that someone said he was doing well.
"Are you doing well?" I ask.
"Oh yes."
He is doing well.
"So." he says with that same knowing grin. "I'll see you another time." And then he is off.
She tells me that I slept with him and I am sure she is right, but it is a gaping chasm in my memory. I don't remember where it was or how we came to it. I don't remember the size and shape of him or whether it was just the once or a series of meetings.
'The Bone People' by Keri Hulme. That is the book that he did not return to my friend and she was cross about it. He had a famous name, but although my friend reminded me and I said "of course", I have forgotten it again. He is like sand in my memory and a scant few pieces of him have caught in my filtration of our shared history, but nothing more.
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