Homesickness

‘Oh, hasn’t Bex lost weight whilst she’s been away?’

My mum’s friends think, because I’m sitting more than two feet away from them, I can’t hear their discussion. I watch them in my peripheral vision as they squint at me, scrutinising. The pair of them, along with my mum, have the appearance of a plotting coven – all they need is a cauldron and it’ll be Nab Wood’s debut production of ‘Macbeth’.

‘Yes, definitely! Bex, come over here, let us look at you!’ Sue shouts.

I remind myself that all three of them are rather hard of hearing, therefore Sue’s summoning, despite its volume, is an invitation, not an order. Reluctantly, I slouch over to them.

‘Stand up straight!’ Sheila huffs, then, without warning, starts to pat me down as if she’s airport security searching for explosives. I try my best not to look horrified and stay still until she’s satisfied. ‘Yes. You’ve certainly evened out – you’re looking more in proportion now.’

‘Thanks, Sheila,’ I mutter. I love Mum’s friends; they have a wonderful talent for complimenting and insulting you simultaneously.

Mum has been beaming throughout this examination. ‘It’s because you’ve been doing so much walking up and down that hill. Sheila’s right... definitely more in proportion.’

‘She’s left her arse in Durham.’ Another brilliant one-liner from my sister as she saunters out of the kitchen.

‘Cheers, Charlotte.’

‘Don’t mention it... By the way, Sam phoned.’

I’m immediately suspicious. ‘Which Sam?’

‘The ginger, gay, lanky one.’

Thank God! There’s been a problem ever since I came back from Durham due to the inconvenient commonness of the name ‘Sam’. In my little universe I now have four Sams; Sam, the gay best friend I’ve known since I was five; Sam, my French cousin; Sam, as in ‘Samantha’, my fellow English student at Durham, and Sam, the first term fling who has turned into a cross between a puppy and a stalker since I returned to Yorkshire. Out of those four, I’m quite happy it’s the ‘ginger, gay, lanky one’.

‘When did he phone?’

‘Erm... I dunno... a few hours ago, maybe. He seemed upset,’ Charlotte replies, annoyed that I’ve detained her for longer than ten seconds.

‘A few hours ago?’ I snap. ‘Why didn’t you tell me sooner?’

‘I forgot, alright? I’m not your flippin’ secretary!’ She then flounces out of the room. I can quite picture her being a secretary actually... Painting her nails bright pink whilst she rings her boyfriend and leaves four urgent calls on hold.

Whilst conducting pleasantries with my sister, I’ve been vaguely aware of several hands continuing to poke and prod me. I turn back to ‘the coven’.

‘I’ve read that really academic students just forget to eat because they’re so focused on work,’ Sue says, furrowing her brow at me.

Before giving any of them chance to start quizzing me about my nutritional habits, I jump in with: ‘Sorry, ladies, I’ve got a phone call to make.’

As I turn I hear a collective ‘ahhh’ and Sue says: ‘She really has left her bottom in Durham!’

* * *

‘I want to go home,’ Sam murmurs suddenly, cutting me off mid-sentence.

‘Oh...’ It takes me a while to figure out what he means, then it hits me: university. He wants to go back to university... And then my misery of the past couple of weeks starts to make a lot more sense.

You know, I’d convinced myself I was actually crazy. People tell me I am on a daily basis, of course. But this time I’d resigned myself to the fact that I would end up in a strait-jacket by my mid-twenties. Last week, the little woman who lives in my head stirred and reviewed my current situation: Happiness. Type: Non-fleeting. Non-mutable. And then, smirking, she flicked a little switch and I was catapulted into misery. I know a lot of people have a habit of standing in the way of their own happiness – I’m a repeat offender. I was so annoyed with myself - desperately trying to pin my unhappiness on one concrete thing, trying to make it a normal reaction; a lepidopterist stabbing at butterflies with a needle.

Now Sam has just skewered the butterfly for me: Durham, I want to go back to Durham... My parents have returned to work, my sister is back at school, and I’m left lounging on the sofa, watching ‘Jeremy Kyle’ and eating my body weight in chocolate. (Admittedly, this is just student life minus a gaggle of hung-over friends doing exactly the same thing.) I’m bored, frustrated with this monotony... and I’m lonely. I miss my friends who became my new family in the first term.

I’ve spent so much time recently obsessing over the concept of ‘home’, fuelled, of course, by a few midnight sessions on a ‘Mansfield Park’ essay about the importance of ‘home’. I think of Fanny Price, taken from her home in Portsmouth to the grand Northamptonshire manor of Mansfield Park. By the end of the novel, she finds herself thinking: ‘Portsmouth was Portsmouth. Mansfield was home.’

‘I know how you feel, Sam,’ I whisper finally... Nab Wood is Nab Wood. Durham is home.