Page 111 of Unapologetic Love Story

‘We’re not doing this,’ Ottie said, yanking some toilet paper free so she could clean her face. ‘This bullshit sisterhood crap. We’re not friends. I know you have some kind of disease that means you can’t read social cues or whatever, so this is me saying fuck off.’

Raina got to her feet and made to leave the bathroom. ‘I’m sorry, Ottie.’

‘You know you’re not one of us, right? Not just because of your . . . whatever. There’s other things. You don’t belong here. Tom would choose us over you.’

Her words were garbled and not entirely coherent. Raina spoke softly, the way she did when invited to speak about neurodiversity at a junior school. ‘I would never ask Tom to choose between me and his friends, Ottie. You know that, right? That’s not a healthy thing to do. He won’t ever have to choose. Unless he wants to.’

Those words caused something to harden in Ottie’s face. Something that made Raina wonder, for a moment, if she’d underestimated the other woman. Ottie stared up at her, with calculating eyes and a cold, appraising smile.

‘I just don’t get it. I’m prettier than you. I’m lots of things more than you.’

Raina smiled sadly. ‘You’re probably right.’

But Ottie was expecting to win a prize for a cruel, ancient game that had always been a lie. There was no reward for being prettier or meaner than other women. No prize worth winning, at least. There was an old joke about two people who had to outrun a lion. The first saw the second stretching and readying his shoes. The first said, ‘You can’t outrun a lion.’ To which the second responded, ‘I only need to outrun you.’

If Ottie thought she just needed to outrun other women to find whatever was at the finish line, she was going to be disappointed. Raina knew women like her only extended solidarity or friendship to others like them. Other rich women. Other white women. Other allistic women. But it always hurt. Each time, it stung.

‘Hope you feel better and work things out,’ she said gently. ‘You deserve to be happy.’

Then she left, wincing as she heard muffled sobs behind her.

As Raina made her way back down to the party, she spotted Tom standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking concerned.

‘There you are,’ he said upon her arrival. ‘When Pepper came back without you, I was worried.’

‘All good,’ Raina said. She looked behind Tom at Dexter and his date. ‘That’s Dexter. Pepper’s lost love.’

‘Yikes,’ Tom said softly, looking surreptitiously over at the couple. ‘She okay?’

‘She will be. She just needed a moment.’

Tom’s eyes narrowed and Raina turned to see what he saw. It was Ottie, returning to the buzz of the party with a feverish look in her eye and a slightly chaotic gait. She glared at both Raina and Tom before returning to the bar. Raina glanced around for Seb, locating him by a pillar, with an entirely different woman to the one from before. They were leaning in close to hear each other speak.

There was an electricity in the air that made Raina nervous.

‘Dance with me.’

The words jolted Raina back into the moment. ‘I don’t like dancing, remember?’

‘Let me hold you and sway then.’

She laughed and relented, following him to the middle of the room. They found a square on the vast marble floor and stood as they had at the Hathaway Dinner. Only this time, they had their own private history. One they’d forged.

‘Is this the dress you’re wearing to the Mondays?’ asked Tom as they danced.

‘Oh, no, that one is quite something. You’ll see.’

‘I can’t wait to take it off you, whatever it looks like.’

Raina laughed against his mouth as he bent down to kiss her. She was excited for the awards show, now only a few days away. She was allowing herself the luxury of anticipation.

As Tom whispered sweet promises in her ear and kissed her neck, she spotted Ottie. She stood by the end of the bar, staring at them with cold detachment. It sent a chill through Raina and instinctively made her want to pull free of Tom’s arms and run.

‘Everything all right?’ Tom asked. He must have felt her body tense.

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ she said, hearing the restlessness in her own voice.

She wondered if she should tell him about his friends. He would surely hear some version of it eventually. But her past kept her quiet. Whenever one of Matt’s friends had done something awful to her, he’d told her she was being too sensitive. She knew Tom wouldn’t be that way, but she was still resolutely committed to staying out of their business. As she’d said to Ottie, she would never make him choose.