“What did you say to Sophie about me? Not just when you told her that I’d hurt her, what else?”
“Nothing! I told her nothing else. She was a bitch. She said I was only looking after my career…”
“Which has always been the truth.”
“Fuck you, Liam. It wasn’t. You know that. There was more between us. We were two old souls together…”
“Don’t for one minute think your life was anything like mine. You grew up in a big house with rich parents; you knew where you’d sleep each night and you had no idea what a social worker did until I told you, so any pretence you have of not being some spoiled little rich girl is wasted on me. Now what did you tell Sophie?”
“Nothing.”
“What. Did. You. Tell. Her?”
“That you’ll hurt her.”
“What else?”
“Why? Why do you want to know this?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Amber, tell me, or I will publish my own story about you and you won’t work again.”
She paused. She knew I had enough on her to make sure she didn’t get another interview with an artist again. No one would trust her.
“I told her I was worried she’d hurt you. And I am – that’s what she’s done, isn’t it?”
“What did you say?” I knew what the answer was. I didn’t need any more. “Did you tell her about Marissa?” Amber was the only person I told. It was after a gig, about seven years ago, and I thought I’d seen Marissa in the audience. It probably wasn’t, I knew that at the time, but it was the anniversary of her leaving her job, one of the few dates that meant anything to me, and she’d been on my mind.
“Kind of.”
“Thanks.”
“The woman you’re marrying should know this shit about you.”
I hung up. That would be the last thing I said to her.
* * *
I grabbed a shower, pulled on clean clothes and a huge sweater that I’d packed knowing it would be freezing and headed outside, ignoring any feelings of hunger. It was snowing and I could hear laughter coming from the lagoon. Later I’d get in the water, soak away whatever tension I could, but there was one more phone call I needed to make.
I sat down away from the noise and rang Seph Callaghan. Out of all Sophie’s friends, Seph was the one I’d kind of clicked with most. He was also close to her in a platonic kind of way and he had sense.
“Morning! How’s Iceland? I’m guessing it’s better than an office where you’re older brother is about to have a haemorrhage over the photocopier breaking again.”
“Sophie flew home by herself this morning.”
“Fuck. What did you or she do?”
I sighed. Gave him the cliff notes version of her message.
“You know what she put is the truth. She doesn’t bullshit. She’s not calling anything off or telling you anything’s over, man.” Seph sounded torn. “You had a long relationship before?”
“No. Only with my right hand and my guitar.”
“They’re hard work. I was with my girlfriend on and off through college and we only broke up properly a couple of years ago. We were on and off all the way through and we cheated on each other. It was good at times but hard work and we should never have stayed together for so long. It’s never simple.”
“This wasn’t meant to be a relationship. We never said it was. It just kind of happened.”
