It’s hard for anyone to hear that they’re a mistake, and certainly the phrase is not leaving me alone, but it’s the injustice that really bites. I really don’t think I have been crowding her. At no point do I think that I have been pathetic and lovelorn like some heartbroken adolescent, and to suggest that I would behave so in my place of work is beyond insulting.
Running on the treadmill in the gym, the speed set high to see if I could run off some of my emotion, rather as Lily clearly did after battering that poor bride, meant that I was able to get the phraseLily Galbraith can just fuck offsatisfyingly coursing through my head as my feet and my heart did the hard work.
But in the wee hours of the night, that sentiment was not the one filling my mind. Instead, I felt bereft, as if I had lost my best friend, Christmas had been cancelled and the whole world had seen me walking the streets naked and had laughed and pointed.
Part of me had spent the night lying there, making excuses for Lily. I had known her vulnerabilities and had gone too hard and too fast. I should never have used the word ‘love’. I should have gone gently, gone back to shared friendship and worked from there.
But that seems manipulative – am I not allowed to feel the way I do? Why should my feelings be forced to take the backseat? Should I not be able to hope that if I want to spend my life with a partner they would not want me to be hiding things, being dishonest or playing games, albeit a long one?
Part of me last night told myself I was allowed not to be understanding, not to be such a pushover. She had been rude, bloody rude and hurtful. She bears responsibility here too and I can’t see how we can come back from this. It’s obvious that there is no way back, that Lily is not going to apologise or try and make me see why she has acted as she has. And that’s because she doesn’t care. That is the one thing that yesterday had made abundantly clear.
And that was the main thing that had me lying awake as anger spiralled around in my mind. I knew despite my internal ranting that it was only there as a superficial forcefield covering up my hurt. And the hurt is a wound that does not need further prodding right now.
But the joy of work means I do not have the time or space to dwell on my wounds, that these girls have far bigger problems than mere romantic rejection.
‘Jay, Jay!’ Ellie comes bowling through the door as I am playing a quick game of table football with Shireen, one of the younger girls. ‘Man, I can’t believe it, like literally cannot believe it. Your mate messaged and has offered me studio time. He can fit me in a week on Wednesday at four. So pumped, man, so pumped. I’m gonna be a star!’ and she twirls and then bumps hips with me, making me miss the goal.
‘Oi, I would have won that!’
‘Not a chance,’ Shireen snips back before high-fiving Ellie. ‘Winner stays on.’ She nudges me out of the way and beckons her mate over to play.
‘That studio time comes with conditions, Ellie.’
‘Yeah, yeah, I know. I gotta get myself to school. Your boy says any absence and the slot is cancelled.’
‘Right. And he will cancel it too. You think I’m tough on you, believe when I say Henri is going to be more so. The man don’t take no shit. He’s doing this as a favour to me and I’m doing it to blackmail your arse into going to school. You maintain, I’ll maintain. And I’m gonna be checking in with your school on the Tuesday, believe it. So, no more absences from tomorrow on, you got me?’
‘Yeah, yeah. For sure.’ Ellie says with ennui that even the most jaded celebrity would admire.
‘So, Jay, you going to that Drag thing next week, the one Lily’s friend is in?’ My back stiffens. That is the one name I do not need to hear today, the words ‘lovelorn’ and ‘clingy’ in my head again, cutting deep.
‘How do you know about that?’ I ask and Chloe lifts her eyebrows and fixes me with a look that is nothing short of terrifying.
‘We keep in touch,’ she says enigmatically. ‘That first meeting, we asked what sort of thing she does when she’s not working and she told us about this bar she goes to.’
‘Yeah and we looked it up and saw there was all this stuff on and when we spoke again she told us her best mate was in like this competition. And my brother can get tickets for anything, anything...’ Ellie adds.
‘Yep, I remember.’ She has told me about her brother’s ticket-securing skills before. ‘But even with tickets, you guys are underage.’
‘I’m not,’ Chloe states. It’s true. ‘Anyway, tickets say you have to be over sixteen. We’re gonna behave. It’s Lily’s patch.’ She shrugs her shoulders and if it had been anyone but Chloe I wouldn’t have believed her.
Mind you, how Lily is going to react when she sees the girls there is anyone’s call. I figure she’ll stay professional and be pleased to see them but the one thing I have learned about Lily is that I cannot predict her reactions.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Lily
Iam so ashamed of myself I am not sure what to do other than bury myself in work. One minute we were back to our old selves with Kevin and his ridiculous lovestruck antics and within half an hour I was a bouquet-hurling banshee who should be charged with ABH.
The embarrassment and shame have been haunting me now for three whole days.
It hadn’t started like that. It started with Jay and me in the sunshine, sharing moments; you know, those sideways glances where you’re both thinking the same thing, that secret mutual smile and a quick bashful look away because you don’t want everyone around you to know you’re having these intimate shared moments with no verbal communication necessary.
I had been guilty of perving over him a bit as well, taking me back to that night, the way he made mefeel. And as we lay on that bank of grass scanning The Downs for Dan, I resolved to try and concentrate on that, the wayhemade me feel rather than the way my head makes me feel.
And for that moment it was pretty bloody lovely.
And then it was just the two of us getting closer and closer to the fact that we were going to have a conversation where I was planning to apologise but make it clear that I was in no place to move on with Jay. When he went and threw the L word at me.
