A Brave Start

by Andrea J Severson

  “What are you doing here?” She finally asked.

  “We need to talk hun.”

  Ellie Bean, sweetie, hun. In less than five minutes he’d been more affectionate than he’d been in a typical week while they were dating. Eleanor’s brain felt like it was melting as she tried to process what was happening.

  “Without him,” Michael finished, glaring at Patrick. “I’ve seen the tabloids, I know who you are and why you are trying to steal my Ellie Bean.”

  “I’m not leaving you alone with him Elle. I’m not,” Patrick said defiantly.

  “You’re not needed here pal,” Michael said, sounding so arrogant it made Eleanor cringe.

  “Michael, stop. Go into the living room. Patrick was invited here and you weren’t. I’ll be there in a minute and I’ll deal with you there.”

  “Eleanor!” Patrick protested.

  Michael just smirked and turned back to go into the lounge and sit on the sofa, whistling a ridiculously cheery tune as he did.

  Eleanor put her head in her hands. She could feel Patrick staring at her.

  “I’m sorry. Really Patrick. I had no idea he was coming, I don’t know what this is about. But I do know that he won’t leave until he says whatever he needs to say.”

  “I’m not leaving you Elle. I refuse to leave you alone with him.” Patrick was furious. Not at her, Eleanor could tell that much. But he was definitely angry about Michael being there.

  “Please Patrick. Michael is harmless. But if you stay it’s only going to make him dig his heels in further,” Eleanor whispered, she didn’t want Michael to hear her conversation with Patrick.

  Patrick looked at her, hard, thinking. She held his gaze. The panic she’d felt earlier had gone, in its place was a steely resistance. “Trust me Patrick. I can handle him. You can go. I’ll call you later.”

  After another few moments Patrick finally closed his eyes and sighed. “Fine,” he said reluctantly.

  He got his coat from the closet and leaned down to give Eleanor a kiss on the cheek, lingering slightly with the side of his face rested against her head. Eleanor squeezed his arm through the fabric of his coat. He turned without a word and left the flat.

  Eleanor turned to walk into the lounge, but before she did she picked up her phone on the hall table. She quickly opened up her texts and found the thread for Jonathan. She may not have wanted Patrick to witness whatever was going to happen next, but she wasn’t not going to deal with Michael alone.

  Come home now.

  Need you.

  She tapped out quickly as two separate texts. Almost immediately she got a reply.

  What’s wrong? U ok?

  She sent her response, then put the phone in her back pocket and walked into the lounge.

  Michael is here. Need reinforcements.

  * * * * *

  Michael was sprawled on the sofa, as if he owned the place. Eleanor couldn’t remember if he’d always seemed so arrogant and entitled or if this was a new thing. He’s probably always been this way, she thought. I just probably never noticed it as anything bad.

  Michael patted the space on the sofa next to him.

  Eleanor deliberately sat on the armchair in the opposite corner of the small room. Determined to put as much distance between them as possible.

  “How did you even find me? I never gave you this address.”

  “I was at Dylan and Jill’s, Jill had a Christmas card from you in the kitchen. She’d kept the envelope and your address was on it.”

  He acted like he was Sherlock. Eleanor rolled her eyes. “What do you want?” She asked pointedly.

  “Aren’t you happy to see me?” Michael asked, frowning slightly.

  “No. You had made up your mind the last time we saw each other. We’re done. You broke my heart, well…at the time. But then I moved here and I moved on.”

  “What, to that stupid actor guy?”

  “You don’t even know who he is, do you?” Eleanor said, laughing bitterly.

  “I know he’s an actor, I saw your picture in a tabloid at Safeway. I couldn’t believe it! My Ellie! In London kissing some actor.”

  “Some actor,” Eleanor scoffed. “Shows how much you ever paid attention to anything I was interested in. You used to tease me about the films I watched. You’ve seen his face a thousand times, on my TV screen, but you never cared about what I cared about.”

  “Eleanor, he doesn’t matter. Maybe I don’t know every film you loved but I care about you. I miss you!”

  “So you flew all the way to London to tell me that? What do you want?”

  “I want you back,” Michael stated. So definitely and matter-of-factly.

  Eleanor just stared back at him, blinking uncomprehendingly. Then from out of nowhere she just started laughing. Slightly hysterically. Michael’s face fell.

  “Eleanor, it’s rude to laugh,” he scolded.

  Eleanor’s laughing subsided to giggles as she tried to calm herself down. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Oh Michael, you seriously have just wasted a lot of time and money. You will never get me back. Ever. I am so done and over our relationship. You did me a huge favor when you broke up with me last spring. Huge. And I’m grateful. But we are so beyond over Michael. You didn’t want me anymore. And you don’t get to turn up, unannounced at my flat, thinking you can make some grand gesture and I’ll melt.”

  “Eleanor, you can’t give up on everything we had. We’re good together.”

  “No. We weren’t good. You might have been happy enough. But I was happy only because I didn’t know better.” Softening her tone, “I’m sorry Michael, I really am. But you made the decision for us months ago. I accepted it and moved on and I’m happier now. So much happier. And I think you’d be happier with someone else. I’m not the same person I was with you.”

  “I refuse to accept this Eleanor. I was your first, you’re really going to throw that away?”

  Eleanor felt her face burn hot. “You threw me away Michael, so don’t you dare put this on me. You gave me up twice. I was foolish enough to go back to you the first time, but that’s it. I’m not falling for it again. You did this Michael, you bear the responsibility for ending our relationship. I don’t owe you anything. You’ve gotten all you’re going to get from me.”

  “You think that fancy actor man is going to want you? When he’s used to being around supermodels and hot actresses? Like you could ever make him happy. Or satisfy him,” he sneered.

  Eleanor stood up quickly, “That’s it. You’re done. I’m not listening to anymore of this crap. You know nothing about my relationship with him. You saw me in those pictures and you got jealous. Just like you always do. You can’t stand the thought of anyone else having something you want. And that’s all I ever was to you, a thing. For you to put down or cast aside and then pick back up whenever you want. The fact is, Patrick has nothing to do with my decision. I wouldn’t take you back now even if I was single. I. Don’t. Want. You. Full stop. End of story. Now get out.”

  Michael’s face dropped as he listened to Eleanor’s furious statement. Like he finally was realizing she meant it and he’d failed.

  “This isn’t like you, Ellie, you must be feeling sick or confused.”

  “Get out Michael. Now. You weren’t welcome here in the first place and my patience is wearing painfully thin.”

  “But, where will I go? I don’t have anywhere to stay.”

  “That’s not my problem. You’re in Central London, Michael, five minutes from the West End. You’re literally surrounded by hotels. Find one and check in. But get out of my flat.”

  “Eleanor, please…,” Michael began to plead.

  “She said leave,” Jonathan’s voice cut in, as he casually leaned against the door frame to the lounge.

  Eleanor was very grateful to see him. Knowing Michael, he wouldn’t listen to Eleanor alone.

  Michael looked between Jonathan and Eleanor, as if hoping she would change her mind.

  “Who are you, another b
oyfriend? Wow, you really have been busy, Ellie.”

  “We’ve met in case you don’t remember. I’m her cousin and if you don’t leave her alone you’ll have more trouble than you know.” Jon smiled threateningly.

  Michael’s smug smile slipped a bit, but she could see he wasn’t going to give up easily. The fact that he didn’t remember Jonathan from the time he’d visited really did show he was always disengaged from really caring about her.

  “Leave Michael. There’s a hotel around every corner, no matter the direction you go out the square, you’ll be very comfortable at any of them,” Eleanor said finally, crossing her arms.

  Michael sighed and stood up. “Eleanor, you’re going to regret this. When you change your mind it will be too late.”

  “Whatever,” Eleanor said, shrugging casually.

  “Time to go mate,” Jonathan said.

  Michael walked out of the lounge and picked up his bag and walked out the front door, Jonathan went with him. Eleanor stood alone in the lounge for a few minutes. Eventually Jonathan came back in.

  “I walked him downstairs and watched him leave the building and walk around the corner.”

  “Maybe we should have given him directions.”

  “Please Elle, you know as much as I do that knowing Michael he was lying about having nowhere to go. He’s got some nice hotel room booked. If you’d said yes, he would have swept you away there as a romantic gesture, if you said no, he’d have a place to crash.”

  Eleanor paused for a moment then put her hands to her face, “Oh my god, you’re right. That’s exactly what he would have done,” Eleanor said with a bitter laugh, dropping her hands to her side.

  “Are you ok?” Jonathan asked gently, Eleanor seemed deceptively calm, still standing in the middle of the lounge.

  She opened her mouth to speak. Then closed it. Then tried again. But before she could, the tears started falling again. This time it was different. There was no racing heartbeat, no tightening in her chest or feeling like she couldn’t breathe. Just streams of tears falling steadily. Jonathan came to her side and led her to the sofa to sit as she continued crying silently. She’d reach up to wipe the tears away but they kept coming, almost from nowhere. Eleanor struggled to figure out how she was feeling and where this emotion was coming from. She hadn’t been happy to see Michael and she was thrilled to see him leave, so why was she crying? Then it hit her.

  She was finally and truly done with him. And on her terms.

  Back in the spring, the breakup was all down to Michael. He’d made that decision for the both of them and she’d been blindsided. She never got to have her say. It wasn’t that she’d wanted revenge but she’d always hated feeling like she’d just been thrown away, without any care or thought to how it would hurt her. But that had changed. She’d finally found her voice with Michael. It had felt good too. All those years she’d just gone along with whatever he wanted. Breakup? Ok. Get back together? Sure! Breakup again? Ok. But no more. He’d made decisions and now he got to live with the consequences, she was done getting sucked back in. And the best part was it hadn’t even crossed her mind to go back. Even if she didn’t have Patrick…then she remembered something she’d said to Michael just a few moments ago.

  “The fact is, Patrick has nothing to do with my decision. I wouldn’t take you back now even if I was single.”

  Even if I was single,” she thought again. Had she meant that? Did she really see herself as not single? If she was really just friends with Patrick as she’d tried to tell herself so many times, why would she say that to Michael?

  “Eleanor? Are you alright,” Jonathan asked, concern plastered across his face. “I’m going to get you some water, I’ll be right back.” He got up and went to the kitchen. Eleanor vaguely heard him getting a glass from the cabinet and water from the tap.

  She also started thinking back to Patrick’s attempts to talk about her dad before Michael showed up, and the panic attack that felt like it was going to engulf her. Having the confrontation with Michael had left Eleanor feeling like she was finally released from all the pain and bad memories. She really did feel like she was finally and completely over him, he was part of her past now. Maybe telling Patrick about her dad could have the same result? Maybe she could finally let go of those painful memories as well?

  Jonathan came back with the water, “Here Elle, just have a couple sips. You look like you’ve been put through the wringer.”

  “I have to go,” Eleanor said abruptly, standing straight up.

  “What? Now?! Elle, it’s getting late. Where on earth could you need to rush off to now?”

  “I have to find Patrick, he was here when Michael arrived and I asked him to leave. God, what an idiot! I shouldn’t have done that! He was so mad, he didn’t want to leave me with him.” Eleanor rushed to her room to get her handbag and then grabbed her coat off the hook near the door.

  “Elle, just call him, I don’t like you going out there when you’re in such a state.”

  Eleanor wiped her eyes, the tears finally gone, and smoothed her hair. She took a deep breath as she buttoned up her coat and slipped her bag over her head, cross body style. “I’m fine Jon. Better than I’ve been in ages. I have to go.” And without another word she flew out the door and downstairs, leaving Jonathan standing, open mouthed in the doorway.

  * * * * *

  Even though it was Friday it was past the holiday madness, so Eleanor thought a taxi might be the fastest way to get to Patrick’s. Even though mentally she was feeling clearer than she had in months, the physical toll of the shock of Michael and the panic attack before that left her feeling like navigating the Tube might not be the wisest thing. She ran down the steps of her building and dashed across Red Lion Square, heading towards Holborn Station. She figured she’d find a cab quick nearer the station and the main road. Sure enough she saw a few and threw her hand up to flag one down, something she’d never done very confidently before but this time it worked. She jumped in the cab and gave the driver Patrick’s address.

  There was still a little bit of traffic, but the drive gave her time to think about everything that had happened that day, particularly her conversation with Patrick. She’d known from the beginning he wanted more. He’d been flirty and sweet all the way back to that first day they bumped into each other. But under the flirtation, even then there was such a genuineness that Eleanor had rarely found in men she met. Then at her birthday, the way he’d casually but privately sent over the champagne, extending a kind gesture without making a big scene about it. He was always doing nice things for her without having to make sure that everyone around them knew he was doing it.

  The day he spent with her in Oxford. Letting her pay when she insisted at the pub, sharing jokes with her, acting as the tour guide, the way he truly listened to her and seemed genuinely interested in her life and her thoughts, and the way he shared things about his life. And since then, all the million little ways he’d shown her true friendship and caring. She knew he fancied her, that he wanted to take their relationship further, but looking back at the past several months, she could see that wherever their relationship went in the future, it was already grounded in something so solid and precious. There was a real foundation, much more so than anything she’d had with Michael, or might have had with Mark. More so than even her relationship with her father, who she felt never really loved her or cared about her happiness.

  She knew Patrick was different from any other man in her life, but was she brave enough to move forward? Did she trust herself to believe that he was different? The closer she got to Patrick’s home the more nervous she became. Everything from past experience told her to turn around and go home. But everything from her time and experience with Patrick told her to keep going.

  The cab arrived in front of Patrick’s and she paid the cabbie and got out. The cab pulled away and Eleanor just stood there at his front door for at least a solid minute. Fighting her usual impulse to run away from a scary situat
ion, she finally knocked on the door.

  No answer.

  She knocked again and waited. Still no answer.

  Eleanor stood there, not knowing what to do. She hadn’t thought about him not being home. She just assumed that he’d go home after he left her flat. He should have been here by now, so where was he? Eleanor leaned her forehead against his front door, suddenly feeling like she might pass out. The anxiety, the adrenaline, all the crying, she was beyond exhausted, she felt like she might shatter into a million pieces. And now she felt the tears starting to fall again. In that moment, all she wanted was Patrick. And he wasn’t there.

  She turned and leaned her back against the door and slowly slid down until she was sat on his doorstep, legs outstretched in front of her. Her head leaned back against the door as she closed her eyes and let the tears just fall. She was too tired to try to fight them. She felt so cold. And so pathetic. What was she even doing here? Should she text him? Ask where he is? What if he was mad at her for asking him to leave? What if he went out to some bar or club? Should she just go home? He’d never know she was here, she could just leave? Patrick would want you to text him, she thought. She knew she was right. Patrick wasn’t the type of person, or friend, to be mad at her right now or to go out drinking or something crazy to distract himself. He’d be mad at Michael and the situation, but not at Eleanor, that wasn’t his style.

  “Eleanor?!”

  She heard Patrick’s voice cut through her thoughts.

  “How long have you been here?! Oh my god, are you ok? You’re freezing.” He crouched down beside her and pulled her close into a hug, rubbing her arms and back as if trying to warm her. “Why didn’t you call me? Jonathan texted a few minutes ago asking if you’d made it to my place safely.”

  “I wanted to talk. To apologize…about earlier,” Eleanor stammered uncertainly. She looked at Patrick and then looked down to where he’d set something on the ground beside them. Grocery bags. Eleanor sighed at herself and laughed slightly as she leaned against Patrick. He went to the shop you ninny. Of course he didn’t go off to some club.