‘Just so he can keep his dick consistently wet before, during and, optimistically, after.’ He starts typing on his phone, theclick clackfilling the empty space between us. ‘Are you responding?’ I ask.
‘Yeah?’ It’s a question.
Here’s another: what the fuck?
But he’s distracted, pressing send.
‘I have to go,’ I say, not waiting for a response. Within five minutes I’m walking out the door, looking back at his sad puppy face as he leans against the doorframe, calling out that he’ll text me.
At least I finally found his real flaw: he might not be a serial killer, but he’s totally okay being friends with assholes.
THIS BREAKUP HAPPENEDtwo hours ago. I left the house less than twenty-four hours ago. I just kind of need to remind myself of the timeline, because the house is telling me it has been eighty-four years.
How one woman has ordered this much takeaway in less than a day is unfathomable. Most of it’s still lying around the apartment, though. The lamb curry leaked out of the container and has possibly permanently stained the benchtop. And there is a smell. A damp smell that lingers. I don’t really want to find the source of that because I have a feeling it is going to give me a very large headache.
A living cliché, Bee is sitting on the couch in yesterday’s clothes and hair, eating ice cream and yelling at the television. I didn’t think people actually did that.
Never mind. It’s easier to focus on getting the house back in order. It gives me somewhere to put my gaze; it keeps me inevery room but the one Bee is in until it’s time to pick up the scattered tissue carcasses and mop up the abandoned ice cream from the floor. Truthfully, I drag out the kitchen and bathroom clean-up as long as I can. The cupboard under the sink may or may not have been rearranged.
I’ve splashed water all over Arthur’s jumper, which I’m still wearing. Probably not the wisest, wearing it while cleaning, but I can’t bring myself to take it off. Which is objectively stupid because I’m too mad at him to even respond to his texts. I did thumbs-up his asking whether I got home okay; I’m not a monster. But that’s it.
I refuse to clean Bee’s bedroom.
So, you know. That’s progress. Something something growing a backbone. Something something self-worth.
We still don’t talk about it. I force her into the shower. (She’s the source of the damp smell? Possibly? Still don’t want to know.) We settle back onto the couch watching a reality show about people who scream at each other over various dinners. It’s strangely compelling.
What we do talk about is William. ‘He’s thirty-five! Thirty-five!’ The man on the screen, who was just caught cheating on camera but is trying to gaslight the audience and the woman who walked in on him to trust what he’s saying and not what our eyes are telling us, is twenty-five. He and William would be good buds.
‘Way too old to be behaving this way,’ I agree.
‘I mean, lads on tour is cute when you’re twenty, but at his age it’s a little pathetic.’
‘It’s a lot pathetic.’
We have to turn it off when the cast trip is revealed to be Thailand. Too close to home. Now we’re just staring at a black screen. But it’s better than the alternative. I turn to face Bee head on. ‘Okay, you’re allowed to wallow for two more days, but you are going back to work on Wednesday at the ladies lunch thing. Deal?’
And I guess we’ll just work everything else out later.
By Monday afternoon, I’m already unsure that this deal will be honoured. Apparently everything that reminds Bee of William must be gone. I don’t actually think he ever left anything of his at the house, so I follow Bee and her empty box around, curious. A throw pillow from her bed that he said he liked. Her pink eye-shadow stick because he said it made her eyes look ‘ethereal’. A perfectly good dress she has worn all of once because that was on their (our) first date.
It’s a weird mix. She hands me the box at the end of the purge, throws up her hands and walks away. I place the box in my room.
That dress could get me a hundred bucks online.
Arthur has messaged a few times.
How are things over there?
Bee found a blanket in the living room William once used when they watched a movie and now she’s crying into it. Things are not good.
Do you need anything?
A new apartment. The ability to say no. You.
I don’t reply.
On Tuesday afternoon we’re back on the couch, but it’s a bit less sad because we’re sitting and not lying on it, and we’re in activewear not pyjamas, and we’re not surrounded by discarded snot, when there’s a knock at the door. Bee and I look at each other.
