Chapter Twenty Nine
T he couch cushion was soaked with tears and Bea’s head hurt, her nose was swollen, and she could barely see. No more tears would come. She was dried up and dehydrated and didn’t know what to do.
She’d only been doing her job. And, honestly, she’d had no idea that Alli would fail the program just from one silly attendance report. Bea had been careful to include that Alli had participated in the latter half of the program, and she’d assumed that would be enough to get her through. Never for a second had she dreamed otherwise.
And now this. Now Alli’s temper so hot and frightening had come into her flat and Bea knew that things couldn’t be the same. She knew that things had changed. But she was just getting used to the last set of changes. How could she handle this now?
She miserably pulled out her phone and texted Liz an SOS message. She couldn’t deal with this alone. But just as the text sent, the front door of the flat opened.
For a second, quite stupidly, Bea thought Alli might have returned. She leaped up, desperate to explain herself. But it was Marilyn that walked through the door.
“Gosh, you look a bit rough,” Marilyn said cheerfully. “Are you alright?”
“No,” Bea said more sharply than she’d intended.
“Alright, alright, no need to snap,” said Marilyn. “I just bought home some shopping for mine and Robbie’s dinner. I’ll just put it away and then I’m back off to work.”
“Fine.” Bea said dismally.
Marilyn stopped by the kitchen door. “Are you sure you’re alright?”
“I’m fine,” Bea said again.
“You don’t look fine.”
“I’m fine,” said Bea through gritted teeth. When was Liz going to text her back? She had a broken leg, for God’s sake. It wasn’t like she could be out doing anything. She started pacing again.
“Only,” started Marilyn.
She was interrupted by Bea tripping over one of the Ikea boxes that were stacked against the couch. “Jesus Christ,” Bea said.
“Whoops,” said Marilyn.
And something snapped inside Bea. “Whoops? Whoops? That’s all I get? These boxes have been stacked here for weeks now, and there’s been no attempt to move them.”
“God, I’m sorry,” Marilyn said, moving over to re-stack the boxes.
“No, enough is enough. Sorry means nothing. Do something about them,” Bea said. She was standing with her hands on her hips, knowing that she was mimicking Alli and unable to stop herself. “Either find somewhere to put them or throw them away, one or the other.”
“I know,” Marilyn said. “I’m sorry. I’ll put them in our room.”
And another thread snapped. “No,” Bea said firmly.
Marilyn paused, boxes in hand. “No?”
“No. It’s not your room.”
Marilyn frowned. “Right. Okay. But, you know, you sort of said…”
“I know what I said,” said Bea. “And I don’t care. That’s my room. The two of you move into my flat after you’ve cheated with my boyfriend, and then you steal my bedroom. And it’s not on. I’ve been too nice, that’s the problem. I’ve been too nice and you know what? You’re going to give me my room back.”
Marilyn swallowed and nodded. “Sure, yes, of course.”
“And more than that, you’re going to be moving out,” said Bea.
“We’re looking,” Marilyn said. “We really are, I swear.”
“Well, look harder,” Bea said. “Because I’m moving out, I’ve already given notice to the landlord and I’ve already found a new flat. So the two of you will have to be out by the end of the month because the lease is in my name.”
“The end of the month?” wailed Marilyn. “But…”
“But nothing,” said Bea. “You’ve had long enough. Find somewhere. Or find some other idiot that will let you take over their entire flat with your things, who’ll let you cook dinners in their kitchen, who’ll let you have sex in their bed, who’ll let you move into their lives and just hijack them.”
Marilyn dropped the boxes and picked up her bags. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, obviously. Right. I’ll get on that.” She hurried into the kitchen, shoved her shopping bag straight into the fridge without even unpacking it first, and then practically ran out of the flat.
Bea was left open-mouthed both at her own audacity and the fact that it had worked. She had her flat back. That was all it had taken, just a little truth-telling, a little standing up for herself, a little confidence.
A little of Alli’s influence.
It was only then that her phone rang. Liz. Bea picked it up, her hand still shaking.
THERE WAS TEA on the table and screwed up tissues next to it. A bottle of wine had been opened, and Bea’s eyes stung even more. She hadn’t thought that there’d been any more tears. Turned out, she’d been wrong.
“She sounds like a real piece of work,” Liz said.
“She’s…” But Bea couldn’t do it. She couldn’t speak badly about Alli, even though she was torn up inside with what had ha ppened. “She’s upset.”
“Don’t make excuses for her,” said Liz. “She’s an adult, and she lost her temper. She had no right to speak to you like that.”
Silently, Bea nodded.
Liz reached out and patted her leg. “I’m sorry, Bea. I really am.”
“I just thought I’d found something. Someone,” said Bea, her voice sounding a million miles away. “It was… different and fast and a whole bunch of things that I’d never imagined having in my life. Yet it felt right somehow. Comfortable. For the first time in my life, I felt like I was with someone who was my equal. Someone as flawed as me, someone who I could give to and take from.”
Liz picked up her teacup, shuffling around the couch until her plastered leg was comfortable. “That’s what it’s supposed to be like,” she said. “That’s what I’ve been trying to explain. A relationship has to be a balance, a meeting of equals. If it’s not, there’s always going to be someone suffering.”
“I babied him, didn’t I?” asked Bea sadly.
“Robbie?” Liz snorted. “You ironed his football shorts and made him hot milk before bed.”
“There’s nothing wrong with looking after someone.”
“No,” said Liz. “Except remember that time that you got the flu? He pissed off to his mum’s because he didn’t want to catch it.”
“You caught it instead,” Bea said. They’d spent a week cuddled up on her couch in a duvet, feeling like they were dying and sharing all the things they wished they could have done.
“Yeah, do you see what I mean there?”
Bea couldn’t imagine Alli curling up with her sick on the couch. But equally, she couldn’t imagine her leaving her like Robbie had done. Then again, she probably had no right to imagine Alli doing anything, did she?
Her heart sank into her stomach. She just couldn’t get her head around this.
“Listen, Bea, did you do the right thing?”
Bea nodded .
“Then maybe Alli will realize that,” Liz said. “Maybe she was just angry and she’ll come to her senses and come crawling back. Because you were just doing your job. The way I see it, it doesn’t look like you had much choice. If she doesn’t come back, well, then it wasn’t meant to be.”
It made sense. Sort of. But there was something growing inside Bea, some certainty, some sense of something that she couldn’t quite put into words.
“You can’t let her walk all over you, though,” Liz said now.
Bea laughed bitterly. “She’s the one person who hasn’t. And besides, that’s over now. I’m going to stand up for myself more, get more of what I want out of life.” She looked over at Liz, who looked disbelieving. “I got my bedroom back from Marilyn and Robbie,” she said, as proof. “And told Marilyn that they need to move out.”
Liz looked suitably impressed. “What brought all that on?”
Bea thought back. “Alli,” she admitted. “She’s taught me a little something about making my voice heard, about taking care of myself because no one else will and no one else should have to.”
“Seems like a sensible way of looking at life.”
“I can’t go on the way I am. The way I was,” said Bea. “I’m over thirty. I’m living with my ex and the woman he cheated on me with. I don’t have a real job. I need to start living for me, not for someone else, not just to make other people happy.”
“I agree,” Liz said. “It seems like a healthy change. And sometimes people come into our lives just to teach us lessons like that.”
“And then they leave,” Bea said, her heart crumpling again, tears threatening again. She was thinking about the way Alli held her, the softness of her. She was thinking that she missed her, even now.
“She might come back,” said Liz, reaching out to hold her leg again. “She might.”
Bea shook her head. “I lost her her job. It was the only thing in the world that was important to her. Even though it was killing her. Even though she was stressed by it. She’ll never forgive me for that. She won’t come back, Liz.”
Liz sighed. “She taught you something. Maybe you taught her something in return.”
“Like what?” muttered Bea, rubbing her eyes with her sleeve to stop the tears leaking out.
“Something about forgiveness, about intentions, something about being caring and loving.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Bea sank down in her seat. “It doesn’t matter even if she did.”
“Why on earth not?” asked Liz.
“Because you’re right. I can’t have someone talk to me like that. I can’t be with someone who could lose her temper any second. I can’t put myself in that position. If I’m going to look after myself, then I have to do just that. I have to put myself first.”
“Even if that means being without her?”
Bea closed her eyes. “She doesn’t think she has a problem. I think she does. I don’t see how this can work out, Liz. I really don’t. And…” She hiccuped a sob. “And it hurts. It hurts so much.”
“Why?” Liz asked quietly. “Why does it hurt so much?”
“Because I think I was starting to love her,” Bea said. “It was fast and soon and I’d never say the words to her so early. But there was something there, something in the way we improved each other, something about how she made me feel. Not like she’d look after me, but like I could look after myself. I think I was falling for her.”
“Oh, Bea,” Liz said softly. “Oh, love.”
There were no words that could make this better. And Bea was sobbing again.