‘It happens.’
She swiped angrily at the tear that dared to creep out of the corner of her eye. ‘Not to me it doesn’t. I have a responsible job that I love, a home I adore. This isn’t like me; it just spiralled out of control. I’ve been living in denial.’ Her lips trembled with the admission.
‘Listen, you don’t have to tell me anything more unless you want to, but I’ve not got to get to work so I’ve plenty of time. It seems we could’ve both confided in each other over the years and saved ourselves a whole lot of heartache.’
For a moment, his words comforted her until she felt the cloak of misery and hopelessness settle around her shoulders again.
He waited a beat before he asked, ‘Why don’t you tell mewhat got you so upset that you went on a totally-out-of-character bender?’
‘Haven’t drunk that much since my twenties. Remember that night Louis made us do shots to commiserate with him failing an end-of-year exam?’
‘My head hurts just thinking about it.’ He laughed.
The memory was funny, the present not so much as she filled him in more. ‘I missed paying a few bills, maxed out credit cards, defaulted on loan payments, I got final demands left, right and centre, took out a ridiculously high interest loan. I’ve borrowed some money from my mother, which I hated doing, I have the threat of court looming over me for the council tax I haven’t managed to pay.’ She looked across at him. ‘See, told you I’m in a mess.’
‘I could lend you some money, although I’m not flush with cash at the moment and I need to be careful because I won’t be on full pay forever.’ She hated the frown that creased his forehead. ‘I hope I’m back to work soon but there’s no guarantee.’
‘I can’t take your money, Gio, even if you had plenty. This isn’t like borrowing twenty quid for a takeaway. I have a lot of debt.’ She gulped. ‘You must think I’m a total idiot.’
‘I think we both know I don’t think that, Bess.’
‘Renting out my spare room eases things a little, it tops up my income, but I’m still not sure where to go from here.’
The only solution Bess could see right now was to go to her mum and ask her to take money from one of the bonds or whatever she had, use that and Bess would have to pay it back plus the money her mother had forfeited for getting to the money sooner than she should. She hated that this was the only thing she could do, she’d even entertained the idea of another payday loan if that were possible, but whatever she was going to do, she only had a few days to decide.
Without using his stick, Gio took both mugs out to the kitchen, moving slowly but so much better. She didn’t mind the rear view either.
‘Thank you for being honest with me,’ he said when he came back.
So where did that leave them? Where did it leave the tenancy arrangement which they had an agreement for but a very flexible one? She couldn’t blame him for worrying, wouldn’t blame him if he got his mother to pack her things and move back in with him.
And where did it leave their friendship? Where did it leave the potential for more?
Would he want to take her for dinner as he’d suggested before or was that totally off the table now she’d revealed the truth?
‘I’m sorry again, for the pub,’ she said as they made their way towards the front door.
‘I’m sure things aren’t easy for you.’ He pulled on his coat, zipped it up, without the usual flirtatious smile or another attempt to ask her out on a date. All that flirting had irritated her at times, she’d kept her distance, but now she missed it more than anything. Because she’d disappointed him and it was a weird feeling to have when it came to Gio.
His shoulders immediately hunched up against the cold when he stepped outside. He turned back to face her as she stood in the warmth of the hallway. ‘Are you really happy for Mum to stay on as your lodger?’
‘If you’re happy for her to be here then for now I don’t see a reason to change anything.’
But he was clearly having a tough time answering that, which was probably why he gave a simple nod, said nothing else, and walked away down the path without another backwards glance.
And Bess felt unbelievably sad when she climbed the stairs to bed.
23
Once they’d settled in to the 4p.m. shift, and as the skies grew dark, Maya, Bess and Noah finally packed away the Christmas paraphernalia at the airbase for another year. The decorations had already been taken down from the walls, the ornaments and lights had been removed from the trees, but with interruptions from jobs taking precedence, returning the boxes to where they came from was still on the to-do list. They stored the boxes at the top of the cupboards in the room upstairs with a few small beds should anyone need to sleep on shift when they were quiet. It rarely happened, mostly they all stayed awake, but if you ever did a double shift, those beds were a godsend.
Back down in the office, the Christmas tree looked as sorry for itself as the one that had stood in reception until they’d moved it outside. Stripped of all its merriment, needles littered the floor of the office due to the tree drying out. Bess and Marianne had taken their tree down at home already and left it on the grass verge in front of their house with the label displaying the logo of The Skylarks. Bess hoped it would be a gentle reminder for anyone else in the street to do the same if they’d alreadymade a donation and got a label, or that it might prompt anyone who wasn’t aware of the tree collection to support their local air ambulance and get rid of their tree at the same time.
Bess thought again about Gio and how he hadn’t stopped by since he came to see her about the pub incident. Marianne was still her lodger, but Bess felt as though she was on her last chance; if she did anything else to rock the boat, she sensed Gio would have his mother out of there. It made her feel terrible about herself and yet she totally understood his reasoning.
Bess and Maya carried the airbase’s tree outside and rested it against the side of the building next to the other one, where they wouldn’t be tripped over in the dark.
‘Should’ve worn our coats.’ Maya rubbed her arms when they went back inside to the warmth of the office.
