Open Writing

Anne replaced the receiver on its cradle, her head going round in a whirl. Did she hear correctly - the line was so indistinct, and were her wildest dreams about to be realised?

That was Phil calling from Rome Airport, to say that he was on his way back home for good and wanted to see her tonight. Phil couldn't talk for long as he had to board his plane in fifteen minutes, and besides there was a long queue of bodies waiting for their turn at the phone. He said he would get a taxi once he arrived and drive straight to her home, and could she please be there tonight.

Anne lay back on her pillow from where she had been rudely roused by the strident ringing after midnight, and now wide awake, tried to recapitulate the past six years.

After the completion of her education she had joined the workforce at eighteen and met Phil at a friend's birthday party. He was also eighteen and an engineering student. Anne, a normally reserved person, found herself talking so easily to him and Phil responded in such a friendly manner. They had similar likes and interests and talked, laughed and danced together the whole evening and had a very enjoyable night. That was the beginning of a long friendship.

When Phil was not at College and she was back from work, they spent their leisure together taking long walks in the woods or playing tennis or going dancing. They enjoyed each other's company and the association remained that way.
After Phil's graduation he contemplated on a career. He was becoming restless - his enquiring mind wondered what was available at the other half of the world, and the desire to travel and find his niche began growing within him like a cancer. He must be positive of what he really wanted before he embarked upon his career, he thought, with that in mind he took a temporary appointment and started making travel arrangements to go to Europe.

When he finally left the country, Anne felt lost. She missed her confidante and his companionship very much. She tried going out with one or two others, but both attempts ended after the first date. She measured them up against Phil and found both wanting - less attentive, less amusing and no fun to be with.
She was twenty-four no longer an immature teenager, but a grown woman with womanly desires and realised her feelings for Phil were far stronger than mere friendship. She felt a part of her had died with Phil's departure and she was no longer a whole person.

Phil's cards arrived at regular intervals. He first went to London and wrote to her after he had settled in and found a job. He was finding his way around in that great City and enjoying everything he saw. Later he joined a group of backpackers and toured the European Cities very economically, putting up at Youth Hostels and hitch hiking wherever possible. Phil's cards from the various touristy cities he visited would mention the lovely girls he met - one a ravishing blonde, another an intriguing black eyed, black haired damsel who wore an air of mystery like a cloak around her, and the third, a friendly brunette - who enjoyed meeting students from the East.
Anne then lost contact for some time and imagined the worst - Phil must have been snared by some exotic beauty and she, Anne, had lost him forever. He had been away for two years now and perhaps his outlook on life had changed, become more sophisticated and he had grown away from his motherland and from her. She did, in her secret heart, expect that to happen though she prayed it wouldn't, and she should now try to get on with her life without him. That time would salve the pain was her only consolation.

And now this phone call in the early hours of the morning - it was a bolt from the blue. She trembled with emotion, wide-awake and unable to go back to sleep, with all the wild thoughts spinning again around her brain. Was he actually coming back to her after all his travels and having seen what other developed countries had to offer? She would know tonight.