When I downloaded One Day in my kindle, I filed it under the “serious reads” category and it was indeed; or maybe more appropriately, it was a sad read.
It’s not sad all the time, though, I did enjoy some funny scenes and witty lines, a lot of them coming from Em, but overall, it’s, well, let’s just say I wouldn’t categorize it as a romantic comedy.
And yet, despite the heavy feeling it left in my heart not to mention the streams of tears on my face, I can say that it’s a story that I enjoyed, one that affected me deeply and one that I would always remember, and not in a bad way.
I also watched the movie version last night and even though I knew exactly what was going to happen, it still didn’t prevent me from bawling.
I love the chemistry between the two leads, and I’m amazed at how they managed to age them, especially Jim. I guess facial hair and hair color does wonders.
As is usually the case, I found the book to be more comprehensive than the movie because there were certain scenes that needed to be cut out in order for the story to fit within two hours (or less) and also, the movie doesn’t show us what is running through the heads of the characters like the book does.
Still, it’s fun to watch the movie just to watch Jim and Anne play Dex and Em. They’re both such attractive and effective actors.
The story is called “one day” because each chapter gives us a glimpse of one day – July 15, St Swithin’s Day – for every year for twenty years, in the lives of two best friends, Dexter and Emma.
What I liked about the story is that it shows how life progresses, how we change as we grow older. It’s a story of love and friendship and life, and it made me realize a lot of things along the way.
Before I go on, let me warn you that there will be lots of spoilers.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
Dex and Em first officially met on the night of their college graduation, when they were supposed to end up in bed but somehow entered the friend zone instead. Though they remain attracted to each other, they just stay best friends over the years, staying in touch with long letters (from Em) and phone calls and dinners.
Em is smart and idealistic but somehow finds herself lost – a waitress in “the graveyard of dreams,” while Dex with his good looks and money ends up on TV. And while Em finds herself in a relationship with a guy she doesn’t really love, Dex sleeps around with a lot of women, fancying pretty much everyone, as he said so himself to Em during a moment when they decided to go skinny dipping in the ocean, right after admitting that he fancies her too and then tells her that if she just wanted to have a holiday fling, he was willing. Yeah, way to kill the moment, Dex. Of course she says no because she wants something more substantial, and she doesn’t want to ruin their friendship.
Then, many years later, along comes this first scene that breaks my heart:
‘I just don’t think you’re the person I used to know. You’re not my friend anymore. That’s all.’
He could think of nothing to say to this, so they stood in silence, until Emma put her hand out, took two fingers of his hand, squeezed them in her palm.
‘Maybe . . . maybe this is it, then,’ she said. ‘Maybe it’s just over.’
‘Over? What’s over?’
‘Us. You and me. Friendship. There are things I needed to talk to you about, Dex. About Ian and me. If you’re my friend I should be able to talk to you but I can’t, and if I can’t talk to you, well, what is the point of you? Of us?’
‘“What’s the point?”’
‘You said yourself, people change, no use getting sentimental about it. Move on, find someone else.’
‘Yeah, but I didn’t mean us . . .’
‘Why not?’
‘Because we’re . . . us. We’re Dex and Em. Aren’t we?’
Emma shrugged. ‘Maybe we’ve grown out of each other.’
He said nothing for a moment, then spoke. ‘So, do you think I’ve grown out of you, or you’ve grown out of me?’
She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. ‘I think you think I’m . . . dreary. I think you think I cramp your style. I think you’ve lost interest in me.’
‘Em, I do not think you’re dreary.’
‘And neither do I! Neither do I! I think I’m fucking marvellous if you only knew it, and I think you used to think so too! But if you don’t or if you’re going to just take it for granted, then that’s fine. I’m just not prepared to be treated like this anymore.’
‘Treated like what?’
She sighed, and it was a moment before she spoke.
‘Like you always want to be somewhere else, with someone else.’
He would have denied this, but the Cigarette Girl was waiting in the restaurant at that very moment, the number of his mobile phone tucked into her garter. Later he would wonder if there was something else he might have said to save the situation, a joke perhaps. But nothing occurred to him and Emma let go of his hand.
‘Well off you go,’ she said. ‘Go to your party. You’re rid of me now. You’re free.’
With failing bravado, Dexter tried to laugh. ‘You sound like you’re dumping me!’
She smiled sadly. ‘I suppose I am in a way. You’re not who you used to be, Dex. I really, really liked the old one. I’d like him back, but in the meantime, I’m sorry, but I don’t think you should phone me anymore.’ She turned and, a little unsteadily, began to walk off down the side alley in the direction of Leicester Square.
For a moment, Dexter had a fleeting but perfectly clear memory of himself at his mother’s funeral, curled up on the bathroom floor while Emma held onto him and stroked his hair. Yet somehow he had managed to treat this as nothing, to throw it all away for dross. He followed a little way behind her. ‘Come on, Em, we’re still friends, aren’t we? I know I’ve been a little weird, it’s just . . .’ She stopped for a moment, but didn’t turn round, and he knew that she was crying. ‘Emma?’
Then very quickly she turned, walked up to him and pulled his face to hers, her cheek warm and wet against his, speaking quickly and quietly in his ear, and for one bright moment he thought he was to be forgiven.
‘Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will.’ Her lips touched his cheek. ‘I just don’t like you anymore. I’m sorry.’
And then she was gone, and he found himself on the street, standing alone in this back alley trying to imagine what he would possibly do next.
They don’t communicate for a couple of years, until one day they both attend a common friend’s wedding and Dex reaches out to talk to her and they become friends again. Meanwhile, Dex gets married and has a daughter but his career takes a plunge while Emma finally gets around to writing a bestselling book. The tables have turned.
Then when Dexter’s wife cheats on him and they get divorced, he visits Emma in Paris, thinking that they would finally get together after having slept together before she left. But she tells him that he had probably only been depressed then, that he had needed a shoulder to cry on or to sleep with and that’s what she had been – a shoulder to sleep with. So she had met someone else.
In the end, though, she lets the other guy go and agrees to be with Dex, but threatening him, saying, “If you muck me about, Dexter. I mean it, if you lead me on or let me down or go behind my back, I will murder you. I swear to God, I will eat your heart.” He swears that he won’t. And he doesn’t.
And Emma helps him get his life back on track, and they get married and try for a baby.
And they’re finally where they should be when one day, on St Swithin’s day, Emma leaves a message for Dex on his phone telling him she will be late and she gets on her bike and a truck comes out of nowhere and slams into her, killing her.
The tears didn’t come then, though. They came the next chapter when it showed how Dex was coping with Emma’s death – not well at all. He drinks and gets in a fight and his dad comes to get him and as they both sit in the living room eating canned food, he asks Dex if this will be an annual thing. When Dex says he hopes not, his dad tells him, “I think the best thing you could do is try and live your life as if Emma were still here. Don’t you think that would be best?” Dex says he’s not sure if he could do that, and his dad counters with: “What do you think I’ve been doing for the last ten years?”
The nice touch in the book (which was also in the movie) is that after Emma dies, the rest of Dex and Em’s first day together, twenty years ago, is revealed, showing how they had said their goodbyes with a kiss, the sweetest one that both of them had ever known.
And when the story ends, you are left with a bittersweet feeling, that at least they finally got together, but that they had gotten around to it so late, that they had wasted so many years. Emma was the best thing for Dex, and if only he had realized it sooner, then maybe his life wouldn’t have been such a waste, you know? And maybe Em wouldn’t have wasted so much time pining for him too, being with men that she didn’t really love when she was only ever truly happy when she was with him.
So I guess what we need to realize is, there are people who are good for us, and we need to recognize them and enjoy every moment we have left with them, because one day, they may suddenly be gone from our lives and we’d be much worse off for it, and hate ourselves for having been so stupid and for having wasted so much time.
He rests his head against the mirror and exhales. In the years he was with Emma he sometimes wondered idly what life would be like if she weren’t around; not in a morbid way, just pragmatically, speculatively, because don’t all lovers do this? Wonder what he would be without her? Now the answer is in the mirror. Loss has not endowed him with any kind of tragic grandeur, it has just made him stupid and banal. Without her he is without merit or virtue or purpose, a shabby, lonely, middle-aged drunk, poisoned with regret and shame.
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