“Starbucks is all that’s wrong in the world.”
Why would he think that? Because it’s readily available? Made for the masses?
Asshole,I think as I stir my second coffee of the day, this one in the ’Bucks in the Westfield shopping mall. A coffee I can’t seem to stomach.
Maybe Starbucks is beneath him. Maybe a wealthy man like him refuses to drink out of anything but a gold-plated Hermès espresso cup. Maybe there’s nothing but Black Ivory beans in his office—the stuff that’s fermented in an elephant’s stomach beforeit’s shit out at a thousand dollars a pound.Or something like that.It strikes me that it’s a pretty apt analogy for how I feel right now. Shit out, though without the gold dust price tag.
I hope I never set eyes on him again. I don’t need to hear his bullshit excuses. It’s wildly apparent why he didn’t tell me the truth. Because he never thought he’d see me again.
He was probably laughing at me the whole time.
He’s no better than the rest of them—no better than Brandon.Than Pete.Well, fuck him. Once you’ve broken my trust, that’s it.
I pull the sides of my jacket closer, my shoulders rolling agitatedly. It’s not that the jacket is ill fitting. More that my skin feels too tight right now.I’ve had enough therapy to know why. The past.Isn’t it always?A childhood like mine doesn’t come without scars. And right now, I feel like my skin is transparent, like my whole sordid history is on show.
And boy, does that make me feel inadequate.
Poverty and neglect can do that to a soul. Poor little white trash girl.
The jacket I’m wearing is new. I just picked it up from a store called Whistles, thanks to mine still being in the office and the weather being god awful.The office. Shit.I hope they bought Martine’s excuses. Her earlier text said that the meeting looked to carry on without me. And, apparently, without Matt. Not that I asked. Not that I care.
I’ve also emailed HR, apologized, and said that I’m sick.
It’s not a lie. I’m sick of being lied to. Sick of feeling like I’m not enough. It’s the reason I ended up at Whistles. Then the next clothes shop ... and the next. I glance at the multiple bags at my feet.It’s just a temporary tumble into old habits,I tell myself. It’s what I have done, since I could afford to, to make myself feel better. Can’t say it’s cheered me up any today.
Fuck it.The chair legs protest as I stand abruptly, the squeak drawing attention in the busy coffee shop. Whatever. I’m not goingto sit here marinating in self-pity a moment longer. Liar or not, it was only one night. It’s not about to change the course of my life.
I am young, free, single, solvent, and successful,I remind myself as I loop the numerous bags over my wrists and fingers. I don’t need a man to fix me or make me feel good. I pay my own bills, and I take care of myself. Me. Nobody else. And I am not going to sit here and wallow one moment longer.
Straightening, I throw back my hair and pick up my cup and take it to the counter, because I’m not a sociopath.
I’m going home. To the serviced apartment, at least. Tomorrow, I’ll go back to work, force everything to return to normal, and by the end of the week, I’ll move into my own place. London is big enough for us both. He’s bound to want to continue the conversation. I expect he wants to deliver his apology to ease his conscience and make himself feel better. I also expect I’ll hear him out, for no other reason than to make my own feelings clear.
Then I’ll never need to set eyes on him ever again.
I take an Uber home and, at the last minute, call into the nearby Little Waitrose, which is like a bodega and Trader Joe’s had a cute store baby together. I mindlessly grab something for dinner, along with a bottle of organic sauvignon blanc, which I almost put immediately back. But the bags hanging from my wrists remind me my vice is my own, and not my mother’s.
“Looks like a good night,” the cashier says as I heft the wire basket to the checkout counter.
“Er, yeah. I guess,” I agree as he begins to pull out the items to scan.
It seems dinner consists of a sharing-sized bag of tortilla chips, a small tub oflabneh, and another of spicymuhammara. Plus a jar of dill pickles, a packet ofHariboTangfastics, and a pint of vanilla Häagen-Dazs, the latter three of which I seem to have planned on eating together.
That’s as weird as hell.
I guess tonight’s food choices are thanks to whatever made me ill earlier. Or maybe my body is just craving the familiar, thanks to food in London not tasting quite right to my foreign taste buds.I’m sure it’ll just take time.
The cashier scans the final item—the wine.“You know what they say. A little of what you fancy does you good.”
“Turn that frown upside down before people begin to think you don’t fancy me.”
I find myself grabbing the countertop at the phantom of Matt’s voice. The things he said that night in October and the way he looked at me.
Immediately, my mind begins to whir, snapshots of my day flittering through my brain. My bad-tasting coffee. The awful fruit. Vomiting. The bra that I thought must’ve shrunk in the dryer. There was the bar of chocolate I couldn’t eat last night and the weird metallic taste I’ve had in my mouth for days.
When was the last time I had my ...
But I’ve been busy. Stressed! Moving to the other side of the planet can do that to a girl. My argument is silent, my denials adamant. But it’s all there, even if my brain is trying to convince me otherwise.
