by PH Morris
Sophie is what some people would call a plain Jane, but not to us. She loves sport and talking about sport. She’s the right person to have on a pub quiz, she’s charming and a little bit mumsy, but she is entirely comfortable in her own skin. It looks like she finds life easy, not because anything is easy but because she can see the world in a lovely way. She travels with her equally adorable husband, and they will go to Laos or Indonesia and help out in some orphanage. She is indeed a happy, kind soul.
And here I am surrounded by some fantastic, amazingly smart friends who are supportive and forgiving and always have your back. Even though I feel heartbroken inside, I know this is going to help me get through the next few weeks, and months…Well, god only knows how long. But I am going to be okay.
As we consume pasta, pizzas, garlic bread and several bottles of wine, the conversation flows smoothly with anecdotes and tales from our friendships going back a few years. A couple of times I feel Kat squeeze my hand and give me a warm smile, and then I realise I’ve drifted out of the conversation and found myself thinking about Mark.
I’d pull myself out of my thoughts, sit up straight, give a watery smile to Kat and, with some effort, contribute to the noisy girly chat.
A few hours later, we are back at the lodge, more drinks are being poured, but I’m bone-weary and need my bed. I give my apologies, get hugs all round and shuffle to my room. I rummage through my bag and find some less than appropriate sleepwear that was for Mark’s benefit and start to tear up. “Stop it,” I mutter, and stuff the flimsy outfit into the side pocket of the overnight bag. I strip off, throwing my clothes on the floor with only a quick sideways glance at my rebel ways. I grab a simple T-shirt and my toothbrush, keeping my knickers on, and make my way to the bathroom.
Looking at myself in the mirror, I see a pale, tired face staring back at me. Sod it, I’m done for today. I traipse back to bed and curl up under the heavy duvet. I am aware of someone stumbling into the room later; the bathroom light goes on, along with the noisy extractor fan. The bright light falls across my face, and I hear Kat curse, “Shit,” and then a quiet mumble, “Sorry, babe.”
I hear her brush her teeth, flush the toilet and a ruffle of clothing as she dispatches her clothes to form a pile on the carpet. After a few minutes I turn towards her bed, and although the room is dark, I can make out the shape of her under the covers.
“You wanna talk?” she whispers.
“No thanks, I’m good; I don’t think there’s much to say.”
“I’m sorry about what I said about Mark today, Mel.”
“I’m not… you were right.”
“I know, but I’m not sure I should have said it. What are you going to do, Mel?”
“I don’t know, move out and get on with my life.”
“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Kat mumbles, “but do you think you should talk to him and see if he got it wrong?”
“No, Kat, I don’t think I can face the rejection all over again; you should have seen his face, and how he spoke to me – he hated me,” my voice cracks on the last word.
“He does not hate you; no one could hate you, and you are one of the nicest people I know.”
“Well, whether he hates me or not, it’s over…Kat, can we not talk about him anymore?”
“Sure, of course, we don’t have to talk about him, but if you want to, I’m here for you, you know that?”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Night, Chica.”
“Night.”
Within a few minutes, I can hear her snoring quietly, and I too drift off into a fitful sleep.
I wake up the next morning and can see from the light around the curtains that the sun is shining. I have no idea of the time and reach for my phone on the bedside table but find it’s run out of charge.
My head feels full of cotton wool and my eyes literally hurt in their sockets.
In search of a cup of tea, a charger and painkillers, I walk into the living room to see Michelle staring out through the patio doors at a squirrel at the foot of a nearby tree. Michelle is your voice of reason and good fun; she has a wicked sense of humour.
She smiles up at me with warm eyes, and I rub my forehead.
“There’s tea in the pot,” she says, “and paracetamol on the worktop near the milk.”
“Cheers, Shelle, why you up anyway?”
“Oh, I never lie in. I just can’t, especially if you aren’t in your own bed, you know what I mean?” She blows over the top of her cup.
I don’t answer, make myself a brew, pop two tablets out of their foil and sit on the sofa, tucking one leg under myself.
We sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes until I break it… “Shelle?”
“Mmmm?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Mmmm.”
“When you and Steve split up, what did you do?”
“Well…I fell apart for a couple of weeks, tried to deny it, got cross, pleaded with him, accepted it, denied it, got cross, yadda yadda, you know, the whole grieving cycle. Then I put on my big girl pants, moved in with a friend and got on with my life…Well, it was a bit more complex than that but getting out of the house was the best thing, to be honest – too many memories for me. Now I don’t put myself out there anymore; tough as old boots me.” She then turned to me. “You got somewhere to go?”
I sighed deeply, “Yeah, kind of, I don’t know; the house is rented, so that’s no biggy, and he said I could stay for a few months until I get sorted, so no rush really.”
“Oh my god, he feels guilty.” She said it as a statement, not as a question. “How very magnanimous of him,” she spits out, sarcastically. “He feels bad and so he’s letting you stay; how very gallant of him,” she says with as much cynicism as can be mustered. “Arsehole,” she adds, and turns back to watching the squirrel.
After a few moments, she says, “Listen, I know what I said before about being tough as old boots, but that’s me, not you. And if you want my advice?” She doesn’t wait for a response and ploughs on, “Get out of there, find somewhere to stay, somewhere different, change of scenery – it will be amazing.”
“Wait a minute…” I can see a thought forming as if an imaginary light bulb were appearing above her head, and she sits up quickly, spilling her tea down her PJ top.
She picks her T-shirt up between her thumb and first finger and pulls it towards her, wafting it back and forth; she roughly puts the cup down, sloshing a bit on the table, and turns her full force towards me.
“David. You could move in with David.”
“What, your brother David? Don’t think his boyfriend would be too happy,” I scoff.
“Whose boyfriend?” someone mumbles from across the kitchen, and Kate appears, her hair sticking up in a classic bedhead style and black mascara smudges under her eyes.
“David’s boyfriend, Juan,” I offer.
“Who’s Juan?” Kate questions. She opens the fridge and grabs a carton of orange juice and a glass, and plonks herself down on the nearby chair, pouring herself a glassful.
“David’s boyfriend, Juan,” I repeat. “The Spanish guy,” by way of explanation, as if she’s grown an extra head.
“Wasn’t his name Neil?” She looks at Shelle.
“Yeah.” Shelle is grinning at Kat and then, a moment later, Kat is smiling too. I feel like I’m missing something.
“Who are we talking about?” Kath appears at the door.
“David’s boyfriend, Juan? Oh my god, I feel like I’m in the twilight zone.”
“Thought his name was Neil?” Kath adds, looking as confused as I feel.
Kat is shaking with laughter, and I am getting more than a little annoyed. Kath and I share a puzzled look.
Kat and Shelle are creased up with laughter.
“Is his name Juan?” I look b
etween the two of them, and they are shaking their heads and crying with laughter.
“Why do you call him Juan if his name is Neil? Is he not Spanish?”
Kat and Shelle burst out into peals of laughter.
Shelle manages to control her fit of giggles enough to say, “No, his name is Neil, but we called him Juan, not because he was Spanish but because he had a big willy.”
Kat and Shelle start in fits of hysteria again. I’m smiling but have no idea why.
Kat and Shelle look at each other and in unison scream, “Because he had PLENTY, like the advert, Juan Sheet.”
I burst out laughing and can hardly breathe with the stupidity of it. It takes a good ten minutes of slow breathing in and out before we all get things under control.
Finally, we get our breaths back, and Kath reminds us why we were talking about Neil, or Juan.
“Oh yeah,” Shelle states, still grinning, “I was just telling Mel that she should move in with David, now that Neil has left.”
We all start chuckling again.
Next, Ella shuffles into the living room, wearing her pink fluffy unicorn slippers, squinting at the light flooding in through the open curtains, grabs a clean glass and pours herself an orange juice.
“Who’s Neil?” Ella asks, obviously only hearing the tail end of the conversation.
“Oh, don’t start all that again,” Shelle smiles. Ella shrugs light-heartedly.
“Oh, I don’t know, Shelle, why would David want someone like me moving in with him?”
“Well, he’s just moved to long-haul flights, and he has his cat, and he needs a flatmate/house-sitter, but definitely not a guy – too complicated.” She does air quotes around the last word.
“You should definitely do that, Mel; show dickhead that you are a strong woman and don’t need his shit. You could move into the flat, be in the centre of town, just ten minutes to work; you would be in the thick of it.”
I am chewing my lip pensively, when I am aware that Shelle is clicking away on her phone.
“What are you doing, Shelle?” I am a bit afraid that I know what she is doing.
“I’m texting David, obviously.”
“Shelle,” I warn.
“Too late,” she says, followed by a whooshing sound as the text zooms off.
“It’s all too fast.”
“Look, Mel, if he says yeah, and you say no, then nothing lost. If he says no, then no need to worry, but he will say yeah.”
Oh no, I think, my headache is back. I lean my head back and close my eyes.
My eyes fly open as a ping alerts us to an incoming message, followed by an out of character squeal from Shelle.
“Yes, he said yes!” as she scrolls down the screen.
“I think he said more than yes,” I add.
“Well, what he said was…
‘Hi sis, hope you are having a lovely weekend with the ladies. Mel, is she the one with the beautiful cheekbones and green eyes? Well, if she is, then yes, as she will match marmalade perfectly. Perhaps we can meet up when you lovelies get back. Speak soon, mwah mwah.’
Then he’s included a dancing lady emoji and a cat face.”
As much as this was happening too fast for me, I was thinking about the possibility of this being a reality.
“Look, Mel, you met him at my New Year’s party a few years ago. He’s lovely, a total diva but lovely, and you will get on like a house on fire. Why don’t we do lunch when we get back, and you can decide, no pressure. Okay?”
“Okay,” I acquiesce.
“I’ll send you his number on text, so you have it,” she adds firmly. No point in arguing with this one. I can always delete it.
In the shower, I contemplate the possibility of this as an option and, Shelle is right, I don’t have to do anything. I will just see when I get back and take it from there.
After I’m out of the shower, dressed and a towel’s wrapped around my hair, I start to get my head around the options of what I could do, and I feel calm, sad but calm, like a weight has been lifted.
Kat was right; when I start to look back, I realise I wasn’t that happy with Mark’s behaviour towards me and how I’d done my best to see past that because I loved him. It still hurts like hell, and I rub my sternum where the pain is lodged. But I didn’t need to rely on him or be beholden to him. I could try and get my shit together without him.
Once we are all ready, we head off to the spa and spend the afternoon having fun, pushing each other into the plunge pool, seeing whose boobs float best – definitely Ella and not Kath. Well, unless you counted the chicken fillets. We compare cellulite and remind each of us of our best qualities and minimise the ones we hate the most on ourselves. Because that’s what best friends do.
After we had towel-dried our hair, scraped it back into messy buns and smeared on a bit of make-up, we went off to the pub for lunch at the lakeside.
The day passed with good humour, fun and a big dose of silliness. We returned to the lodge to get changed and then out to the American burger place for more food, wine and cocktails. Later that evening we got lost on the way back to the lodge. God, the map was confusing when you’d had been drinking, not to mention the difficulty of reading it in the dark.
Chapter 3
The next morning, I woke to look at the time and realised I’d forgotten to charge my phone from the day before. So not like me. I found a charger and plugged it in. It took a while before the white apple appeared on the screen, followed a few minutes later with the familiar picture of Mark and me smiling at the screen.
Before I could contemplate how I felt about that, my screen started lighting up and pinging with messages and missed calls and voicemails, from Mark, Louise, Mum and Dad.
First, from Mark:
‘Hope you are ok?’
‘Where are you?’
‘Mel, for fuck’s sake, where are you?’
Then from Mum:
‘Hi love, Mark rang. He doesn’t know where you are. We are anxious. Please call or text. Have you fallen out with Mark? Why doesn’t he know where you are?’
‘Mel, you are scaring us. Where are you?’
‘Melissa, so help me god, ring us. Mum’
Then from Dad:
‘Mel-please-ring-your-mum’
From Louise:
‘Hi, Mark has called me trying to find you. I thought you were away with him, so totes confused. He sounded worried, please call him or me.’
I had to smile at Dad’s rubbish texting as he didn’t put spaces in between each word, but fuckety fuck, they were going to be sick with worry. Bollocks to Mark – he should worry, but why did he have to call my parents?
I didn’t bother reading any further as I knew I had to call my mum immediately.
I dialled the number. My mum picked up on the first ring.
“Mel?” She sounded frightened to death.
“Hi, Mum,” I answered weakly.
“Where the hell have you been? What’s happened? Where are you? Why didn’t you call? We thought you were dead or kidnapped or worse.”
“Mum, I’m fine. Mum, please listen.”
Then Dad picked up the extension, “Melissa, your mum has been worried sick. Where are you? Are you in trouble?”
“Dad, Mum, please let me speak.”
I spent the next ten minutes explaining and reassuring them that I had not been abducted or sold into the sex trade. I offered to put one of the girls on the phone; finally, they believed me, and politely declined.
Once things had sunk in, my dad’s worry turned to anger about Mark and him dumping me; although I knew they were secretly pleased, they were still upset because I was upset. They, of course, offered me at least twenty opportunities to come home and stay with them, but I explained that I wasn’t going to do that, and I lied and said that I was sta
ying with one of the girls. After I said my goodbyes, I could still hear them on the phone for a couple of seconds, talking about which one of them was right about ‘him’.
Today was Monday, a bank holiday. We were leaving today, but had still planned a bit of fun, including pancakes for breakfast at the pancake house, and Kat had declared that she was definitely having a go on the pedal boats on the lake.
Once we had packed our bags and loaded them in the cars, we made our way back to the centre and had a range of sweet and savoury pancakes, woofing down bacon, maple syrup and gallons of tea. Afterwards, we decided to walk off our hearty breakfast.
We ended up near the lakeside and Kate announced she was renting a pedal boat, asking for ‘volunteers’ to help.
I politely declined, as I was feeling a little worse for wear after last night’s excesses, and I didn’t think that messing about on the water was going to help. Ella and Kath were ‘persuaded’ to assist, while Sophie, Shelle and I decided to watch from the wooden platform overlooking the lake from the far end.
The sun was warm, and we managed to secure some chairs in the sunlight. I sat facing the sun, closed my eyes and lifted my face into the sun like a flower turning to the rays. I drifted in my thoughts, not sleeping but just in a range of semi-consciousness. People passed by, feet clopping against the wooden decking, but it was sound in my periphery. The relative peace was abruptly disturbed by a loud “Coooeeee!” Oh no, I groaned inwardly, but with a smile on my face. I opened one eye and looked over the decking to see three totally crazy ladies pedalling towards the decking on the pedal boat. Well, two peddling and one additional passenger. Not only were we looking, but everyone on the decking had stopped to stare at the floating crazies.
“Coooeeee, Mel, I know you can see us.”
Standing awkwardly, I leaned on the barrier. “Hello, Kat, how are you getting on?”
“Well, I’m knackered, it’s harder than it looks, especially when only one is pedalling,” she looked sideways at Kath, who pretended not to notice, “and the other one is a lazy passenger.” She hooked a thumb at Ella, who was lounging as best as possible across the back with her sunglasses on, a slight smile tugging at her lips, clearly enjoying herself.