Chapter 28
"You and Micky?" OK so obviously it didn't need much explanation, the answer to my question was obvious, but I guess I was just hoping that Simone would suddenly grin and say: 'Fooled you!' But she didn't and my last hope that it was all a big misunderstanding was shattered as Simone nodded solemnly and then winced apologetically as I looked at her in complete horror.
I leapt off the couch then and paced to the other side of the room, unable to be part of their seemingly cosy domestic tableau. As I crossed the room it occurred to me that, yet again, I was in a situation where my surroundings so did not match my mood. In fact, far from dark and menacing or swirly and confusing decor which would have been perfect, Simone and her parents had decorated the front room to be light, airy and accented by hints of calming pale blue. As well as the couch there were a couple of armchairs and a gorgeous antique sideboard. There was a bay window as well with a window seat which is where I headed then.
As I stared unseeingly out of the large window I thought back to all the times I had felt so guilty at not telling Simone about me and Jack, all the times my stomach had twisted and turned at lying to her. Had she been doing the same? Had we both been so wrapped up in ourselves, our dilemmas, and our guys that we'd put everything before the two of us, including our friendship?
Sobering thoughts indeed.
"I can't…" I trailed off unable to even gather my wits enough to figure out where to start or even what I wanted to say.
"Come back, sit down," Simone implored, patting the seat next to her, but I shook my head and stayed where I was. I wasn't going anywhere near her or the still smirking Micky just yet, it was all too weird.
"So," I tried again, "despite the fact that you and I have been united in considering Micky as nothing but a complete arsehole for the past 6 months, you've been seeing him? As in as a couple? Yes?" I directed my comments wholly at Simone, ignoring Micky seemed like the best idea for the moment.
"Yes, but it's more complicated than that," Simone said quietly. "Not everything is black and white, Talia."
I snorted disbelievingly, Simone wanted to teach me about complications?
"I know grey areas," I said stiffly. "I've become a bit of an expert in them over the last couple of months so don't try to fob me off with vague references to complications. I'm your best friend, or I was once, and I'd really like to know what's been going on with you." As an afterthought I added accusingly, "I thought you were dating Sam!"
"Sam?" Micky's expression suddenly uncurled itself from his smirk and twisted into a heavy scowl. "That prick wouldn't know the first bloody thing to do with-"
"Micky." Simone laid a hand gently over his and he stopped speaking just as suddenly as if she'd put that hand over his mouth instead. I was sure that if Micky's friends had been in the room there would suddenly have been a lot of cries of 'whipped!' "Why don't you go into the bedroom and call Jack and Matt and let them know that Talia's here and that she's fine," she continued, her tone the sort you would use to coax a wounded but dangerous animal out of a box.
Micky looked like he was going to protest but then he just shrugged and wandered back into the room he had only emerged from a few minutes before.
"Seriously, Talia," Simone said once he had closed the door behind himself, "come and sit down. You're right, we're best friends and we can sort this out. I've got questions to ask you too don't forget."
Good point, well made.
Now that Micky had left the room it felt like a fog had lifted and I felt no hesitation in settling myself down beside Simone once more. A second passed, and then another when we didn't say anything. The enormity of the gap that we had allowed to open up between us seemed too great to overcome suddenly and I searched desperately for something to say to kick proceedings off.
It turned out not to be up to me, however, as the second after that Simone turned to me seriously and said, "I'm sorry that things are weird between us but I just want to say it out loud, off the bat, that I think I'm falling in love Micky and I won't apologise for that."
Woah! Love?
My jaw dropped so fast that I felt the hinge give a little pop. Bloody hell, you leave your best friend alone for two seconds and she goes and falls in love with your worst enemy?
Simone smiled slightly at my completely stunned expression then said gently, "Should I start from the beginning then?"
I was so dumbfounded I could only nod in reply to this. Simone took a deep breath then began to speak, her voice clear and unhurried as if, unlike me, she had pretty much made peace with the goings on of the last couple of months.
"I suppose it all began that night we went to the uni bar to watch Micky's band play. God, that seems like ages ago doesn't it? But I guess it isn't really. Do you remember how Micky did that encore acoustic song at the end by himself?"
I nodded, noting as I did so the slightly glazed expression she wore as she thought back to that night.
“I guess you don't remember because you were kind of wrapped up in Jack," - damn, had we been that obvious? - "but Micky just stared at me the entire time he sang, it was like he was playing it only for me and I know that sounds cheesy but that's what it was like. I'd never really payed him that much attention before because he'd barely spoken a word to me all year and because I knew you hated him, but during that song, it was like he was not only seeing me but seeing into me or something."
She gave a little shiver, presumably of pleasure, at the memory and I echoed it with a matching one of distaste.
"It was so hot and I couldn't take my eyes off him. When he finished I thought I was going to cry because I was scared that would be it and he'd never approach me after that."
"But he presumably did," I interrupted.
"No," Simone disagreed, "at least not that night, no it was Sam who came up to me."
"Ah, Sam!" I pushed myself more upright and looked at her eagerly, this was more like it! "Sam who you get on with so well, what happened? Did he ask you out? This isn't going to be one of those creepy stories of twin confusion, is it?"
Simone laughed a little at this and shook her head. "Let me talk," she objected, "I can't tell you what happened if you keep interrupting!"
I made the sign of zipping my lips and she nodded, satisfied.
"No, Sam didn't ask me out he just said that he knew that I liked to jog in the mornings and asked if he could join me because he wanted to build up some extra endurance for footy. We started jogging together every morning before uni and on the weekend and we became really good friends. After a while we started telling each other stuff, private stuff, like our own little therapy session. We just felt that click that you get with some people, you know what I mean?" She was smiling but I knew what she was really saying was that Sam had filled the gap that I had increasingly left open.
I didn't have time to throw myself into another good guilt wallow at this thought, however, as Simone suddenly seemed to decide something and looked at me sternly.
"Look," she said earnestly, "I'm going to tell you something but you've got to promise that you won't tell anyone."
Maybe I'm just a particularly suspicious person but I've never found agreeing to promise something before you've heard what you've sworn to keep quiet to be a particularly attractive prospect. It's surely dodgy. In this case, though, it didn't seem as if I had much choice but to say yes.
"Not a living soul," I said earnestly, thinking as I did so that as my usual confidants in Jack and Matt weren't talking to me it was actually a pretty easy promise to make.
Simone nodded tightly at my acceptance and then began speaking very quietly almost respectfully. "It took quite a while but Sam eventually told me that the whole jogging thing had been a ruse so he could spend some time alone with me. He'd really wanted to talk to me because he wanted me to know how he felt…what I mean is that he felt that someone should know…ergh I'm going about this all wrong." She stopped talking and slumped back against the couch as I let out a little sigh
of frustration.
"What?" I asked a little crossly. "What did he want you to know? His feelings about you or something?"
"Oh, give it a rest Talia." She sounded tired now. "There's nothing going on between me and Sam and there never will be. He's gay."
Hmm well that put paid to the theory of the twins fighting over Simone.
"Are you serious?" I asked, completely flabbergasted. "Sam's gay? Our Sam? But he's-"
Simone's grey eyes suddenly flashed with anger and she cut me off fiercely, "He's what? Captain of the football team? One of the guys? Butch? You know as well as I do that it doesn't work like that."
I blinked in surprise at her sudden outburst, but as her words sunk in, I knew what she meant. Sure the stereotype might be that gay men are camp and effeminate but stereotypes were dangerous things to judge people by.
"I'm sorry," I apologised, wondering what number apology I was up to by then. "So he hadn't told anyone then, just you?"
"Yeah, just me." She sighed again. "He came to me not only because he was desperate to tell someone but also because he wanted my help. You see he'd decided that he was finally going to come out to Michael but he figured he needed an intermediary, someone just to help things along, you know?"
For a moment there I almost didn't know who she was talking about as I so rarely heard people refer to Micky as Michael. Then realisation hit of what she'd just said and I raised my eyebrows enquiringly.
"He needed an intermediary with his own twin?"
Simone looked a bit uncomfortable and then admitted, "Yeah, he was worried about how Michael would react and it turned out he was kind of right to be. Telling Micky wasn't easy, in fact saying that he didn't take it very well is kind of an understatement."
Figures I thought, out loud I said, "So on top of everything else am I to assume that Micky's a homophobe?"
Simone seemed to choose her words carefully as she replied, "Not homophobic as such. I don't think he's against the idea in principle but-"
"NIMBY right?" I interrupted, "Not in my backyard, or rather, not in my brother." I snorted with disgust. "It's virtually the same thing, Simone, prejudice and ignorance."
It was Simone's turn to get up off the couch in frustration and I watched as she tried to formulate best what she wanted to say next. "You've got to remember," she began eventually as she paced the living room, "they're twins, they've grown up together being pretty much inseparable. Michael thought he knew everything there was to know about Sam, just like Sam knew everything about him and then Sam dropped a bombshell like that and it's completely thrown him. Sam's been his only confidant through all the rubbish they went through as kids and so you've got to understand that he feels betrayed."
I had to understand no such thing! That last sentence sent a little flash of anger through me and I looked up at her and said furiously, "So that gives him the right to lash out at everybody else does it?" I demanded. "I don't know if you've forgotten but Jack didn't exactly have an idyllic childhood but you don't see him playing mind games with people or just generally being abusive and rude, do you?"
"People deal with things in different ways," Simone said through gritted teeth. "Jack clams up and, yes, Michael lashes out but it's just a front."
I got to my feet as well, too riled up to sit calmly. "Front smchont," I snapped. "That’s no excuse for treating people the way he does."
Her answer was quick and cutting. "To treat people or to treat you?"
We faced each other in the middle of the room, sporting identical patches of red on our cheeks. Negotiations had well and truly broken down.
Unusually for me I found that I didn't care if I was the first to back down. I so wanted to know the rest of her story that I held out my hands in a conciliatory manner and said, in a calmer tone, "Fine, for now let's just agree to disagree on this. So tell me about what happened when you told him."
Simone looked for a moment as if she wanted to keep fighting but then she nodded tightly and leant back against her sideboard. "OK, fine. Well, you know that telling him didn't exactly go to plan. In fact he'd barely heard what I said before he stormed off. Sam and I thought it would be better if just I followed him because-"
"Because he was probably less likely to punch you in the head," I finished for her and she nodded to show the truth of my words.
"So I went after him, managing to catch him before he drove away, and we talked. Actually," she amended, "I talked and he yelled but I think at the end of it he was a bit calmer. We agreed to meet up again the next day and we talked some more then, and then we met up the day after that, and then the day after that and so on until a couple of weeks had passed and I realised we'd seen each other every single day. Sometimes we just talked, sometimes we went to the movies or went for walks, it was almost as if we were-"
"Dating," I finished for her, my voice glum.
She smiled, seeming to ignore my distinct lack of enthusiasm for this part of the story, "Yeah, except he didn't even so much as put his arm around me and I wasn't sure whether I was glad or not. I mean I was developing some serious feelings for him, you have no idea, Talia, he's really so sweet and caring."
Sweet and caring? Micky? She was right. I really did have no idea.
"But then, on the other hand, he was refusing to even be in the same room as Sam, even though they were still technically living together, and sometimes he'd say these things that got me so angry." She smiled in a sort of bemused way. "I was pretty much torn over wishing he would make a move and refusing to ever see him again. Then it all kind of came to a head one night when he finally did make a move and kissed me." There was that dreamy expression again. "It was amazing, better than I'd even imagined." Her expression clouded over and she continued reluctantly, "But then he somewhat spoilt it by saying that kissing me could only have been more perfect if we were doing it in front of you so maybe you’d have a heart attack… "
I let out a little gasp of outrage and Simone met my horrified gaze miserably.
"That was pretty much my reaction too," she said, beginning to fiddle with one of her strawberry blonde curls. "He apologised immediately and said he was only joking but I was too angry to listen and I stormed out. That's when I started to ignore him, he called me just about every hour for a couple of weeks there, but I was so upset and confused I just hung up every time. When we had to meet up because of a group thing I felt like I was going to rip in half; it hurt so much to be near him but to blank him totally."
Once again I stared out the window and felt bits and pieces click neatly into place. Simone's sudden absences and strange behaviour for a while there followed by that awful evening when she'd suddenly seemed to snap and slapped Micky. Then Matt's words came back to me from when we were up in Bridunna 'someone rang and it was like she didn't want to talk to them in front of me and Tommo so she said she couldn't talk and hung up.' And then later that afternoon that call had come from Sam's house, but as Simone had just said, Micky and Sam lived together so it was probably Micky who'd been calling. How could I not have followed those clues up beforehand?
"So that's what that was all about," I said, feeling as if someone had just turned a light on in my brain. "And then that God awful football match happened and…oh my God," I suddenly exclaimed, "that's why Micky thinks that I've ruined everything for him, you wouldn't get with him because he was such an arsehole to me?"
Simone nodded.
"Well, bloody hell!" I exploded. "How is that my fault? I mean, sure, if I'd known about the pair of you then I certainly wouldn't have encouraged you but I didn't so how can he twist it so that I'm the one to blame? Some would say if he wasn't such a dickhead then he wouldn't have had any trouble getting with you in the first place!"
"Logic kind of gets forgotten when it comes to this kind of thing, though," Simone said quietly and I definitely heard the unspoken 'you should know that' hidden behind her calm words.
"So what changed then?" I asked, determinedly ignoring her silent dig at me.
"I mean you guys seem pretty together now and considering Micky's little outburst a few minutes ago about Sam and the fact that he has been in no way any nicer to me I'm guessing something else must have happened to make you change your mind about him."
"Which I guess," Simone said with a little smile, "leads us neatly round to the second thing you have to promise me you won't tell anyone else about."
I rolled my eyes, truth be told I was getting a little bit sick of all these stupid secrets. Long live the day when I didn't have to watch what I said or did for fear of giving something away. Still, didn't look like that time was anywhere near yet.
"Of course, to the grave and everything," I said tiredly, taking a seat on one of her armchairs.
"It's to do with Alex," Simone began and my ears perked up. Ah, the enigmatic Alex! I was looking forward to finding out what had happened there. "You remember how he was refusing to tell anyone what had happened when that kid was pushed or fell or whatever off that fire escape? You know how he wouldn't admit or deny that he had something to do with it?"
I nodded, as if I could forget!
"Well, it turns out that, actually, my little brother is something of a hero." Simone beamed at this and I saw the love that she held for her bad boy brother shining clearly through her eyes. "And if it wasn't for Micky we might never have found out what really happened that night. He could’ve gone to juvie or anything."
Yes alright! I thought impatiently, just cut to the chase already! But it turned out that finally having someone to tell her story to meant that Simone wanted to savour the moment and get it exactly right. To this end she seemed to want Micky to be there with her and so, before I could stop her, she crossed to her room and called him out.
His time-out hadn't seemed to calm him any as he was still wearing the sour expression he'd had when he'd left earlier. We glared at each other, making it clear that hostilities had not been ceased, but both of us kept our traps shut for Simone's sake.
They sat together once more on the couch, their hands firmly entwined.
"I just wanted your help in explaining the Alex situation," Simone said as Micky continued to glower.
"Are you sure you should be telling her?" He asked, jerking his head in my direction as if Simone wouldn't be able to figure out who he was talking about.
Simone's face fell briefly but then she rallied saying firmly, "Yes, I want her to know everything."
Clearly unable to see a way out of it without properly arguing with her Micky grunted and sat back, presumably indicating to Simone that she should start off the story.
"So what happened was," Simone seemed to have totally perked up since Micky had joined us once more. It was actually pretty sickening. "About a week and a half ago Micky was waiting outside here," she pointed to her front door to show where she meant, "for me to come home. He turned up like that quite a lot over the weeks but I'd managed to use the back door to avoid him or just driven away again if I turned up and saw him waiting for me."
I smirked at Micky as she said this, amusing myself with images of him sitting there lovelorn and pining for his lady love. He, predictably, scowled in return.
"But I had already planned to meet up with Sam that evening so I wasn't due home for ages yet."
My smile widened, if she said it was the day that it was pissing down with rain I knew I would enjoy this story even more. Unfortunately she didn't, choosing instead to look at Micky expectantly so that he sighed and opened his mouth to continue the story.
"It's not quite as pathetic as it sounds," he drawled, obviously annoyed by my enjoyment at his past pathetic episodes. "This place was on my way home from work and I just dropped by to see if she was in, I was here less than five minutes."
"Sure," I said sarcastically, but I dropped my attitude at a quick glare from Simone. I did, after all, want to hear the end of the story.
"Anyway, I was sitting on the step and this girl suddenly appeared from behind the bushes around the car park and ran over. She asked me if I lived in the flat which was obviously a bloody stupid question because if I lived here I would've just let myself in, wouldn't I? But before I could tell her this she asked if Alex lived here. Now I knew that he had something going on with him but nobody had said that I shouldn't say where he was living so I told her yes and the stupid girl burst into tears.
"Well meeting you for the first time can come as a bit of a shock to people," I said before I could stop myself.
"Oh, yes, well done, you're so damn witty," Micky snapped back, but he obviously just wanted to get the story over with as soon as possible so he limited himself to that comment and then continued. "So I told her either to tell me what was wrong or bugger off and she started to sob out all this stuff about how it hadn't been Alex's fault, that he'd only been protecting her and so it took me ages to figure out what she was talking about."
Simone clearly couldn't take the suspense any more as she butted in and took over the narration from that point. "But what she was trying to say was that although Alex had been involved with that kid falling down the fire escape it had been an accident. You see apparently Alex and this girl had something going on together, completely platonic of course..."
When I raised my eyebrows at this Simone met my eyes in perfect agreement. "Yeah, that's what they said, but although they both swear there's nothing going on beyond friendship, it seems like more to me. Anyway, they’ve kept it a bit of a secret because her and Alex don't exactly move in the same circles, if you know what I mean."
No, I didn't really know what she meant and so, clearly with great delight on what she was about to impart Simone clarified, "The girl is Grace Andrews!"
"No way!" Now she really had my attention. The Andrews’ were the rulers of Bridunna, Mr Andrews was the mayor and owned the largest and most successful farm for kilometres around and his wife was the biggest bitch and gossip in the Southern hemisphere. The Andrews’ have never really got along with my parents, still regarding them as outsiders despite the fact that they had lived there since before Matt was born. In Bridunna, however, if you're not at least a third generation resident you're considered an outsider. Also, as with many people in the town, the Andrews’ thought that me, my brother and his best friend were stuck up little upstarts to leave Bridunna to go to university. Needless to say they got along just fine with Jack's dad.
I didn't know much about Grace Andrews except that, even at fourteen, which was how old she’d been when I left, she was stunningly beautiful and watched like a hawk by her family. The only clear image I had of her was her walking quietly through town being completely dominated by her bully boyfriend and bitchy friends. I'd written her off as some pathetic girl, but as learning about Haley and now Sam had taught me, you can never judge a book by its cover. Unless the book has a picture of Micky on the front of it in which case you throw it away without even bothering to open it.
I whistled softly and then laughed, "Onya Alex! How did he manage to get in with Grace Andrews?"
Simone smiled slightly too. "She goes to that snooty private school Mum and Dad sent him to and, I don't know, somehow they got to talking and found something in each other that they liked."
Not unlike you and Micky then, I thought to myself. Goodness but the world truly was full of completely mismatched couples.
"So how was Alex protecting Grace?" I asked, getting back to the story in hand, "Was the guy who ended up in hospital attacking her or something?"
Simone nodded. "But he wasn't just some guy, he was her boyfriend. It turns out that he'd practically dragged her up the fire escape to…you know…"
"Have his wicked way with her?" I supplied in disgust and Simone agreed.
"Yeah, pretty much. But you see Alex was already up the fire escape, higher up and round the corner having a smoke or whatever so they didn't see him. But when he heard Grace protesting he came down and saw this guy molesting her. Alex grabbed the boyfriend and pulled him off her but this guy lost his footing on the edge of th
e stairs and even though both Alex and Grace both tried to grab him he fell and that's what happened."
Simone was grinning ear to ear by this stage and it was obvious that she was overjoyed that, for once, Alex had been doing the decent thing and wasn't really to blame.
"No wonder the guy in hospital was refusing to say anything," I breathed, wondering anew at how quickly my life had gone from drama-free to being filled with practically nothing but drama.
"Yeah, he was whisked away in an ambulance straight away so he didn't know what the state of play was. He didn't have a clue whether Alex and Grace had dobbed him in or what."
"There's a point," I said, frowning. "Why was Alex refusing to say anything? Surely he could have just explained what happened and got completely off the hook?"
Simone grimaced, but it was Micky who suddenly spoke up, giving me a bit of a fright as I'd been so enthralled in the story that I'd pretty much forgotten that he was there. "That Grace girl was so freaked out and embarrassed she asked Alex not to say anything and then ran away." The disgust in his tone made it evident what he thought about that. "And stupid Alex took her at her word and refused to say anything about what had happened to protect her."
"What a gentleman," I remarked.
"What a moron," Micky countered, "He could’ve saved everyone a lot of trouble and just said outright what had happened.
"No white knight lurking inside you then," I said, not at all surprised.
"Damn right. There's a difference between doing the right thing and not being thick."
"Interesting that you know the distinction between the two but not how to put either options into action in your own life," I said sweetly.
"Children please." Simone interjected and I reluctantly backed off. "The upshot of this whole thing is that Grace spilled the whole story to Micky who then just about throttled Alex when he got home and forced both of them to call the Bridunna police and explain what happened. It turned out the police were looking for Grace anyway because she'd been reported missing by her parents. She'd run away to look for Alex and to tell him that she was sorry and that she was going to tell the police everything. God knows how she found this place, she's actually a pretty plucky girl. And everything worked out because of Michael," Simone finished fondly, looking up at him and smiling a secret, personal smile just for him.
I thought Simone was perhaps disproportionately allocating praise here. I mean if she'd been home then she would’ve been the one to sort it out, if I'd been on the doorstep then I would have done it. It was just plum luck that he'd been there! I couldn't believe that was what had caused Simone's turn around when it came to Micky.
"And what about Micky’s behaviour towards Sam and me then?" I asked crossly. "That all just became null and void did it?"
Simone had the grace to look a bit sheepish at that. "Well, the Sam thing will take a while, but we're all taking it one day at a time and after he…um…broke Sam's nose they talked and cleared the air a bit."
Micky met my sardonic gaze head on at this, refusing to look embarrassed. I'm sorry was I the only one who thought that a sentence that was supposed to show how someone is reforming into a better person shouldn't include a bit about breaking his brother's nose? Looking at Simone it seemed that the answer was apparently so.
"And as for you," Simone continued brightly, "well you were the reason I still refused to allow us to be together properly but after that apology he gave you I..."
I choked violently on my saliva at this and gazed at her incredulously. "After that, what? Excuse me?" I looked at Micky again with raised eyebrows. "Did I miss something?"
Simone also looked at Micky in confusion. "You said you apologised, you promised…" She trailed off and I could see the accusation in her eyes.
"I said that we were going to be more civil to each other," he said stiffly. "I didn't actually get around to apologising."
"Yeah, and the only reason I said I was going to be more civil to you was because you blackmailed me, you little prick," I snapped. "What was it you said to me? That if I was a bit nicer to you, a bit more respectful you would try not to let slip to Matt about Jack and me? I guess you were hoping that if Simone saw me being polite to you she'd think that you had actually apologised." I looked at my best friend and continued, "Just for the record he didn't even get near to saying sorry, he shouted a lot, accused me of ruining his friends' lives and basically treated me like scum, but I'm afraid there was no apology."
My face reddened as the taunts he’d flung at me that day in the stairwell rose to the surface of my memory again. "And then, after all that you went and told Matt about Jack and me anyway!" I accused him. "And conclusively ruined everything not only for me but for two of your supposed friends as well."
"Hell no!" Micky said suddenly. "You're not going to pin that one on me! I got a call remember, I didn't make a call."
"So who did then?" I shouted, too far gone in anger to notice that Simone's front door had just opened. "Who else would be so cruel, so much of a bastard to do that to us?"
"Me," came a hard voice from behind me, making me jump and swing round in shock. I stared at the newcomer unable to find any words for once. Eventually, after much mouth gaping, understanding slowly began to trickle into my brain.
"Ah," I said knowingly, sinking back into my chair in fatigue. "Bloody karma."
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