Keera holds her breath as he faces Julia.
‘Do you want to sit in the garden and talk about it?’
‘No! I want to do it here with that beatch!’ shrieks Julia. ‘What do you have with India?’
‘Julia—’ begins Dan, and Keera and India watch Julia’s face fall.
‘You slept with her, didn’t you. She’s the one.’
‘That’s private,’ says Dan politely. ‘We are not together any more. You ended it, remember?’
‘But I didn’t mean you to find someone else,’ wails Julia.
‘What did you mean?’
‘I wanted to have fun, to feel like we used to when we were kids, partying and …’
Julia trails off and Keera suddenly feels sorry for her.
Facing the real world is not always easy.
‘I’ve understood something since I’ve been here, Julia,’ Dan is saying. ‘We’re no good for each other. You want something else in your life and so do I. Time has simply made us stick with each other.’
‘I don’t want something else!’ squeals Julia. ‘I want you.’
She glares at India as she says it.
‘You only want me because I told you I’d been with another woman,’ Dan says wearily. ‘You told me you didn’t want to see me again two weeks ago.’
Julia looks outraged that this information is out there in the open.
‘Is that her?’ she asks, pointing at India. ‘She’s a slut!’
India glares back. ‘A woman does not call another woman a slut!’ she says firmly.
‘Julia,’ says Keera suddenly. ‘You can have anything you want in life. You don’t really want Dan, do you?’
‘He understands me,’ protests Julia.
‘What you mean is that he’s safe,’ says Keera. ‘You split because you’re bored and you don’t want to hurt him, but you’re not in love with Dan any more, are you?’
Rose is wondering if she should intervene here but Dan surprises her.
‘Keera’s right. You don’t love me,’ he says to Julia. ‘I don’t love you. We’re stuck together by time and experiences, and because we’ve grown used to being glued together. But we’re not good for each other. You need to stop taking drugs and get some sort of normal life. I can’t believe I’ve never told you that before.’
‘That lifestyle doesn’t age well,’ Grazia adds, rejoining the group to everyone’s surprise. ‘Party girl in festival outfit is not so beautiful when you get older. Our bodies change, we can’t take it any more. I must give these up,’ she adds, holding up her cigarette packet. ‘I spend a fortune on injections to hide the lines.’
‘You look wonderful,’ says Julia.
India beams. ‘She does, doesn’t she? Yes, it was me: I slept with Dan. It was glorious fun but I’m not tying him down.’
Julia eyeballs India.
‘He loves me. He’ll be back,’ she says carelessly. ‘I’ve had other men and Dan comes back to me.’
Dan waits for the ache in his heart but it doesn’t come.
‘True,’ he says thoughtfully. ‘I have done in the past but not any more, Julia. You can sleep with whoever you want.’
