Hitching A Ride?

“I have a surprise for you,” Amy grinned, as I opened my door to her.

Not waiting for a response, she pushed past me into my room, flopped down on my bed, and waited for me to close my door on the rest of the world, just like she had done many times before.

“My dad has arranged a ride back to Liverpool in one of his lorries on Friday morning for you, but you’ll need to be at the loading bay by the time the supplies it’s taking are loaded onto it-“

“Sorry, what?” I held my hands up and shook my head as I interrupted her, showing I was mentally fighting off the idea, sure she was half way through a joke I hadn’t managed to catch onto fast enough, and desperately wanting the distress it was causing me to end, due to me still being severely traumatised by the incident with the taxi driver.

In a truly bizarre twist of fate, Amy’s dad, who was a property developer, had been building a prison in Liverpool since before me and her met.

Despite the prison not being in the same area my family lived in, she constantly referred to it as though it was. She also constantly spoke about it as though it was being built to specifically house the people who lived in that area. By this, I mean, she seemed to be under the impression that because the prison was being build in that area, that area must be a terrible place, and the people living there must all be criminals.

Regardless of her belief that prison are built exclusively in terrible areas likely being incorrect, I am an honest person, so I will happily admit that the area the prison was being built in could be considered a poor and dangerous area overall, that the area I grew up in was worse, and that the two areas are next to each other.

However, me and Amy never discussed the areas we grew up in, in detail, nor how rich or poor our families were.

To me, and everybody else, it was obvious that Amy’s family was rich, even without her hinting at it, which she did often.

To Amy, and everybody else, my opinion is that, it shouldn’t have been obvious that my family was working class. Me and my mum had both worked for many years, my sister had just started working, I also got student loads, just like every other student I knew, including Amy, and even at nineteen and twenty I was a binge eater with a shopping habit.

Yes, I likely made occasional comments about my life which made other people aware I was from a working class family, but I could easily have been lying as my life style certainly wouldn’t have backed up any comments I might have made about my life in Liverpool, or my financial situation in London.

We all discussed our financial situations from time to time, but I certainly never implied mine was worse than theirs, on the contrary it was people like May, who were from the wealthiest families, that complained about having no money.

Either way, none of that really matters in relation to this specific incident, especially if we look at it in isolation. There is no chance that I could have said anything to Amy, or anyone else for that matter, that suggest I couldn’t afford a train ticket home to Liverpool that Friday, or that I wanted or need to go there, as even if I had desperately wanted to, I couldn’t have, due to it being just after I enrolled onto fine art, meaning I had a mountain of work to catch up on, as well as a group to find and join for the group exhibition project.

“My dad has lorries taking building materials to the prison on Friday. He’s arranged for you to get a ride home in one of them,” Now I could tell by Amy’s expression and tone that not only was she not joking, but she truly believed that her and her dad were doing me a massive favour. She was actually expecting me to jump at the chance to travel across the country in a lorry with a complete stranger, not only to me, but to the two of them, all to save me a few pounds on the cost of a train ticket.

Listen, I’m certainly not trying to imply all lorry drivers are bad people, just like I wasn’t trying to imply all taxi drivers are bad people in both my stories about the taxi drivers I told, because the vast majority obviously will be good people, just like with any group of people, but would you allow your nineteen or twenty year old daughter to travel two hundred miles in a lorry with a stranger?

That is my issue with this event.

Then and now, I had/have dozens of questions, all of which I am sure you yourself are asking.

However, as far as I am concerned, the question I have just asked you, is the only question that matters.

Would Amy’s dad have allowed her to travel two hundred miles in a lorry with a stranger?

Would Amy have done it?

I believe the answer is no.

I am sure I reacted better than either of them would have if the situation had been reversed. There is no doubt in my mind both of them would have been angry and offended, and that they would have made those feeling clear.

I did not make my feelings clear. Yes, I was angry. Instead of expressing that anger though, I told myself it wasn’t Amy who thought so little of me she was actually willing to put me in danger and call it a favour, it was her father.

How wrong I was, not about her fathers opinion of me, that was correct, but that she didn’t share his opinion.

“I have a lecture I can’t miss Friday morning” was all I said. I deeply regret this.

This is one time I wish I hadn’t been the better person. Maybe if I had made it clear she was never to treat me like a peasant who needed her or her father’s charity ever again she would have respected me a little bit more, and the worst thing I would have had to deal with that year, and possibly the next two years, would have been being friends with an unpleasant person.