He pressed the receive button.
“Hello, baby...”
“Hahaha, you wish, come back here, she’s dead drunk and I can’t carry her.”
Disappointment melted somewhere in his body as he heard Daisy’s voice over loud music, she was practically screaming, else, he wouldn’t be able to hear her.
“Ok, I’m on my way.”
He turned back, taking the route Daisy had taken when she had gone back. It was easy to find the heart of the party, especially with the loud music. He was able to squeeze himself in, looking around for the two. He saw Daisy’s hand as she kept waving it somewhere around the stage, where a band was playing. He was surprised to see Emily lying on the floor, her eyes were closed. Panic seized him and he rushed to the front, pushing people out of his way.
Seconds later he had hurled Emily on his shoulders while Daisy ran after him.
They were now outside, heading towards their beach house.
“Are you sure she’s just drunk?”
“Not just Liam, dead-drunk. I wonder how much she drank after I came out and met you.”
“You could have stopped her!” he said, raising his voice.
“Look, it wasn’t my fault, she wanted to get drunk, it was part of her plan.”
“Still, you could have looked out for her and not allowed her to drink so much. And what is this she is wearing? Is it part of her plan to dress as a prostitute as well?”
Daisy snorted, but then was quiet. They were both quiet throughout the rest of the walk.
Once they were in Emily’s room, Liam lay her carefully on the bed and then pulled the blanket over her.
“She’s going to wake up with a crazy headache tomorrow for sure,” Daisy said, pulling out a chair.
“Well, at least maybe it will teach her a lesson,” Liam replied, looking at the room that they should have shared. It was large and decorated in pink and white. Marble floor, king-sized bed, a huge TV and a beautiful ocean view from the window.
“Lovely, right?” Daisy asked, reading his mind.
“Yea,” he replied.
“So, have you written your stuff?”
“Oh, I’ll do that quickly...” he said, walking to the table where he found a pen and a jotter, tore a sheet out and began to scribble some things down.
After a few seconds, he placed the note it at the front of the mirror where it would be easily spotted by Emily.
“So I guess we are done here,” Daisy said, standing up. She dipped a hand into her purse and brought out Emily’s phone, Liam watched as she scrolled through it, she pressed something and then locked the phone, placing it on the note by the mirror.
“What did you do?” Liam asked curiously.
“I removed something to make this whole drama more interesting.” She replied. “Shall we?”
“Yea,” he replied, and they walked out of the room, quietly shutting the door behind them.
The Message
As they walked down the passage, Liam came up with an idea.
“I think you’re right about giving her a break, at least, now I can see she is really taking things seriously and I wouldn’t want her to keep doing this to herself.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“I think I’ll leave tonight. I know her very well, once she wakes up tomorrow, when she finds out that I had to carry her, she will be either angry or she will start feeling bad... I don’t want her to feel either so I will leave before she wakes up tomorrow.”
“Aww… that’s really thoughtful. So where will you go? Do you mean you will leave Outer Banks or what?”
“No, that’s not it, I still believe we can make things work once she has the freedom she wants. Besides, I already took a month leave from work, if I go back home, my life will be pretty boring.”
Daisy smiled. “Well, that’s okay. So you want to rent another house?”
“I will see if I can get one by tomorrow, or even just a single room, I don’t mind. There’s just one problem.”
“What is it?”
“Emily handled everything relating to our rental and I don’t have the guy’s number.”
“Oh, that’s not a problem.” She replied, took out her phone, scrolled through it and handed it to him.
Liam copied Taylor’s number. “I’m done, thanks.”
“No problem, update me tomorrow. I’ll call you.”
“You don’t have my number.”
“I’m very smart, I sent it to myself through Emily’s phone earlier.”
“Wow! Smart, was that the only thing you did?”
“Nope, you will have to find out the rest gradually but trust me, it’s for your own good. Goodnight Liam, by the way, a message will come in soon, that’s my number.”
Liam watched her as she walked out of the house and then shut the door behind her. He got the message and saved her number.
Some minutes later, he was in his room, lying on the bed as he dialled Taylor’s number.
“Outer Banks Rentals, Taylor at your service Twenty-four seven.”
“Oh, hello Taylor, I’m Liam, we met a couple of days ago.”
“Hello sir, how may I help you?”
“Yea, just want to know if there are any beach houses left, or any vacant rooms close to the beach?”
“Oh! We just rented out the final house tonight, though there are two rooms in the house and there is just one occupant. She paid for a single room, so the other one is vacant.”
“Okay, is it close to the beach?”
“Yes sir, it is. Would you like me to send you the details?”
“Yea, no problem thanks. I would love to move in as early as tomorrow morning so please make it snappy.”
“No problem sir, I will need to confirm first from Miss Kate if she wouldn’t mind a male housemate, sorry sir, it’s one of our protocols to keep our customers comfortable... once Miss Statham says she is okay with it and...”
“Wait... Kate Statham?” Liam asked, sitting upright.
“Oh wow! Great! You know her.”
“Oh my God!” Liam ended the call immediately and dialled Daisy’s number.
“Hi Liam, you got my number...”
‘Daisy I've got a major problem.”
“What is it?”
“Don’t worry, just send me the directions to your house, I will come over.”
“Okay, call me when you’re coming, I will send you the direction.”
“Okay, thanks.”
Liam took a deep breath. This was getting even more complicated than he’d expected.
He got to Daisy’s house in the early hours. He made sure that Emily was still fast asleep and it took him a few seconds to explain to Daisy what was going on.
“Wow! You mean your ex is around, like right here?” Daisy asked, as they both stood in the doorway.
He nodded, “Yea, don’t you see fate is playing some kind of trick on me?”
“Well, I don’t know but I do know that if we both stand here, we will both freeze to death, come on in.”
Liam followed her inside. He took a seat while she disappeared somewhere into the house and came back with a hot cup of coffee for the both of them.
“So what are you going to do? Has she called you yet?”
“No, she hasn’t and I’m so afraid of checking my Facebook messages. It’s possible she doesn’t have my number anymore and she has sent a thousand messages to me on Facebook.”
“Well, calm down.” She said, handing him the coffee before taking a seat herself. “If the worst happens, I can go stay at your beach house and you can stay here. Or you might choose to leave Outer Banks.”
“No, that’s not an option, if I’m leaving Outer Banks, I’m leaving with Emily with everything set right between us, I’m not going the way I came.”
“Well, then we can settle for the first option, but how long are you going to hide from your ex? Don’t you think it’s better you check your messages now? Something there might help us make a
decision.”
Liam took a very deep breath. “Okay, let me check.” He brought out his Phone and clicked on his messenger and just as he had thought, he had plenty of messages from Kate.
“Liam, I got your message too late as I’m already in Outer Banks”
“Are you sure you are not coming?”
“Please I need you to come”
“We can fix this, where are you?”
“I booked the place we were supposed to spend our honeymoon, don’t you want to even check it out”
“If I don’t see you within two days, I will assume you have moved on and I will be on my way.”
Daisy moved closer to him and read the message, she had a look of disgust on her face.
“This lady is a total mental case. You left a man at the altar and you expect him to be interested in checking out the honeymoon beach house?” she shook her head. “She is really a mental case.”
“So now, what do I do?” Liam asked.
“Well, she said if she doesn’t see you within two days she will assume you have moved on. That means you need to hide here until you and Emily finally come together again.”
“But I’m supposed to not be hiding from Emily right? The whole plan is so that she can see me consistently and realize that I’m moving on.”
It was Daisy’s turn to take a deep breath.
“This is all so messed up. How did I ever meet you, people?” she snapped at him, “Anyways, let me see her picture.” She clicked on the profile picture and stared at it. “Well, brunette, brown eyes and nice dimples, cool, but she is still a crazy person.”
“I’m in deep shit Daisy.”
“Well, I gave you two options and we are opting for the first one, let’s just hope Emily wakes up and decides to get back with you, that way, things will be less complicated.”
By the time Emily woke up, she felt like a very big metal tank was hitting her head consistently. The pain was so bad.
“Please go away, go away,” she whined to herself, eventually had to open her eyes. She checked the wall clock, it was almost 7 in the morning.
The throbbing pain was unbearable. Gathering herself up with all of her strength, she rose and moved slowly to her bag, which was just beside the mirror. She had packed some painkillers.
She opened the bag and check the sides, found the painkiller and quickly opened them and poured three into her mouth. She shivered as the chalky-taste of the drug hit her taste buds. She snapped her eyes shut, screwing up her nose as she pushed it down her throat. Quickly, she grabbed a bottle of water that was by the mirror, opened it and gulped it down. Finally, she wiped her mouth and checked her reflection.
She was a total mess. Her make-up was all smudged and her hair was unkempt. Her eyes were bloodshot and her head ached terribly.
“I will never drink again!” she said to herself, feeling nauseous. She rushed to the toilet, opened the toilet bowl, held her hair in a place with her hand and began to vomit. She vomited four times and then sighed as she felt a bit better. She sat on the floor, breathing heavily and leaned against the door.
While her head was turned towards the mirror, she noticed some paper in front of the glass. On top of it was her phone. She wondered why Daisy would leave her a written note when she could have just called or texted her instead.
For a while, she stayed sitting, her head was throbbing slowly now, she was already feeling better and her body was coming back to normal. Slowly she stood up and walked to the mirror, she frowned immediately when she recognized the handwriting. She picked up the paper and began to read-
Hi babe, I hope you are able to read this in the morning. If you are feeling more headache, I left some pills on the table, it will help you take the bloated feeling and throbbing headache away completely. Anyways, I just want to tell you that whatever you are doing to get rid of me is probably working, I won’t disturb you or bother you again. I don’t want to be the reason why you’d be drunk to a stupor as you were last night when I had to carry you all the way home. Please be careful.
To make things easier for you, I decided to move out and rent my own place. I want you to be happy and I don’t want to burden you with my presence. I had initially thought we had a shot at another chance because I know how badly I screwed up but believe me, I never cheated on you. I would never do that. I was just going through some things and I should have shared with you but I didn’t know how you would react. Anyways, since you don’t want to know the details, I will accept that I have lost you. I want you to be happy as I care deeply for you. I will be happy knowing you are happy.
Liam.
Had he brought her home last night? Emily thought, feeling ashamed of herself. Why would Daisy ask him to bring her in and who told him she got drunk because of him? How dare he decide to just leave the house? Why would he be happy for her and why would he decide to be happy when she was happy?
The Guilt And The Drama
For a while she couldn’t say anything, she was supposed to be happy that he was finally letting her be but she was not happy, she actually felt worse.
What was wrong with her?
She took a step back and sat on the bed. He had brought her here, no, carried her here? How she wished she had been at least half awake to see how it felt being in his arms again.
To make things easy for you, I decided to move out and rent my own place
What did he mean that? Did he decide to leave Outer Banks or just this house? She thought for a while. Maybe she could go out and find out if he was still around.
She stood up and tried to open the door, but then stopped. What if he was around, was she ready to forgive him and listen to whatever explanation he had? The truth was the thought of him carrying her all the way from that party sort of stirred a warm feeling in her. Had she pushed things too hard?
She summoned courage, opened the door and stepped out of the room. She walked quietly to the lounge. If he was around the house, he would most certainly be here watching the T.V. She prayed he would be there, but he wasn’t.
He could be in his room, she thought. Maybe she could go check on him? What if she found him in the room, though, what would she tell him? Was she really ready for things to go back to the way they were?
She had no answer to that, but she really hoped he was still around. She made a move towards his room, stopped right in front of the door and firmly pressed her ear against it. Not even a single sound.
She pushed open the door and to her disappointment, he had indeed gone. There was no shirt or lost sock, or anything that could indicate he was still around.
She sighed. She had indeed taken this a little far and now she was missing him. She could have listened to him, and things could have worked out for them but now... her phone rang, startling her. She had actually forgotten she had it in her hand. It was Daisy. He picked it.
“Hey, babe”
“Hello drunkard, thank God you are awake, how’s the headache?” daisy asked.
“Yea, it was awful before but it’s better now. Hey, did you see Liam last night?”
“Yea, I asked him to come help cos I couldn’t carry you.”
“So, did he tell you he was leaving?”
“Yea, he did. He thought he was making things quite awful for you so he decided to leave.”
Emily sighed. “Do you know if he’s still around?”
“Why do you care about that?” she paused. “Wait, aren’t you supposed to be happy about it? You wanted him gone right?”
Emily took another deep breath. “Yea…yea… i do. I just thought maybe I pushed things too hard.”
“Well, you shouldn’t feel that way, you totally got what you wanted. So have fun with your freedom, I will come to see you later.” There was a beep and the call ended.
Emily shrugged and walked out of the room. She got what she wanted, and now she was feeling bad about it. Clearly, she still has feelings for him. She needed to make things work. Bringing out her phone, she scrolled th
rough her contact list but she couldn’t find his number. That was so strange. She would never have deleted his number, no matter how angry she must have felt, so who did?
She dialled Daisy’s number again.
“Hey drunk...”
“Look, stop calling me that okay? Quick question, did Liam go through my phone last night?”
“No, I’m not sure, why?”
“Because I can’t find his number.”
“Wait… you want to call him? Why? Besides, have you forgotten you deleted it last night?”
“What? Did I? When? Why? How come I don’t remember?”
“Well, let me think… oh, yea, you were so drunk last night and you started acting so weird. Don’t you remember?”
Emily shut her eyes in disappointment. “I don’t remember. I swear I will never drink again.”
“But why are you trying to call him? Wait, are you still drunk?”
“No, I’m not, I don’t know why I want to call him…you know what? Forget it.”
“Oh, No. I’m coming over right now.”
The call ended and Emily went back to her room. She was so angry with herself for having drunk excessively but she actually fulfilled one of her stupid goals for the vacation, to drink herself to a stupor and now she could barely remember anything. Hopefully, when Daisy came she would remind her of the crazy things she must have done, starting with why she deleted Liam’s number.
* * *
“Are you sure that being here is a good idea?” Liam asked Daisy as soon as she got off the phone with Emily.
“Yea, I think it is until we can get you a place. Why? Are you having second thoughts?”
“No, I’m just wondering, what if she comes here and she finds me?”
“She’s not going to kill you, isshe?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to create a wrong impression about us. Besides, what did she tell you?”
“Nothing much, just wanted to know who brought her home and just like you predicted, she is feeling pretty bad. I need to go see her.”
After All This Time: Breaking Point Page 10