Chapter Fourteen Say Hello, Wave Goodbye #3
“That’s your problem, Jules. You make everyone around you feel like shit.
Because you’re vain and selfish and no one could love you as much as you love yourself.
But they try. God help them, they try. Everyone falls in love with you because you’re shiny and bright and you’re the only Goddamned shiny, bright thing in this fucking city.
But you only like other shiny, bright things.
As soon as your newest toy gets the sheen worn off it, you’re off to the next shiny thing.
But your toys don’t forget you. They still love you.
They can’t help it. Only now you treat ‘em like shit because you know you can. You know they won’t leave you.
You love how they love you. You feed off it.
You’re a fucking vampire, is what you are.
And you leave everyone around you drained and feeling like shit.
The bloody shit vampire, you are.” She laughed bitterly through tears.
“Even people you threw other people over for, for Christ’s sake! You threw Rahul over for me, you threw me over for Rahul, now you’ve gone and thrown Rahul over for this new shiny pillock. You bloody love Rahul and he’s up there right now feeling like shit because of you!”
She wiped angrily at her wet cheeks before realising they were wet from more than just her tears.
It had started drizzling a freezing rain and she hadn’t even noticed.
Julian still wouldn’t look at her. There was something painful about that.
His inaction was a violent thrust straight into her heart.
It was as though he couldn’t be bothered to look at her.
As if he didn’t think she was worth the effort.
She was overcome with a blinding desire to make Julian feel even one tenth what he was making her feel.
“One day the sheen’s gonna be off you, you know,” she said.
“No one’s going to be falling in love with you anymore.
The shiny objects you’re chasing after aren’t going to want you, and you’re gonna wind up alone.
You’ll die alone, Jules. ‘Cause there won’t be anyone left you haven’t buggered into hating you. ”
The sharp hillocks of Julian’s shoulders rose like defensive battlements.
She’d been nasty. She could admit that much.
She’d just wanted to wound him like he’d wounded her.
An eye for an eye. She couldn’t be sure if her words had had the desired effect.
Julian’s face was a void of shadow, only the droplets of rain collecting in his hair were visible, reflecting the light of the club’s marquee like thousands of diamonds.
Regardless of how he’d received her barbs, his silence spoke volumes.
A sort of icy calm came over her. It was well and truly over.
The worst had passed. She’d ripped the plaster off and now could busy herself with the healing scab.
She had the sort of bright-eyed clarity that comes after retching up the night’s too many drinks.
It was out of her system now. She was free.
Just like leaving the key behind. Unshackled.
She sniffled loudly and rose to her full height, unbothered for once how it might eclipse Julian. “Goodbye, Julian. I hope you prove me wrong.”
Then Aisling walked away.
* * *
Michael was startled awake out of a cosy dream by the ear-piercing shriek of the telephone on his bedside cabinet. He lifted the receiver groggily to his ear without fully waking. “‘Allo?” he mumbled, voice gravelly.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t wake you, did I?” came the distant, static-laced voice on the other end of the line.
“Julian?” The sleep fell away from him like a lifted veil. He sat up and flicked on the lamp, casting the stark colours of his bedroom into a dreamy gold.
“Sorry, yeah, you were probably asleep. I’m an idiot. I’ll just call you back, shall I?”
“No, no, I wasn’t asleep,” Michael lied. Julian’s voice sounded particularly small and a little wet around the edges. He almost sounded as if he were… crying? But that couldn’t be. Could it? “Is everything all right?”
“I --” Julian’s voice caught like a jumper sleeve on a branch. He breathed raggedly into the phone for several seconds before speaking again. “Am I selfish? Am I a bad person?”
From what Michael knew of Julian, in the short period in which he’d gotten to know him on a more, shall we say, “normal” basis, Julian was a little selfish.
But that didn’t make him a bad person. Still, he wouldn’t admit that to Julian’s face -- or ear, as it were.
Especially not when he was this obviously upset. “No, of course not.”
“Am I going to die alone?”
There was a clear sniffle at the end that gave him away and Michael’s heart constricted. He cooed into the phone, as soft and sweet as he could manage given he wasn’t a man prone to softness or sweetness. “Of course not, love. What’s brought all this on?”
Another child-like little sniffle. “Nothing. Only my ex has been round to see me and… she said some things. Got me thinking. Maybe I really am awful. I think every now and again I might be a bit awful, but then I forget about it and go about my business. But things she said… Am I really awful, Michael?”
His voice was so small and unsure that Michael longed to scoop him up into his arms and press kisses to his face until he melted against him, soft and pliant and happy like he was meant to be.
In the background, Michael could hear rain pelting and wind howling.
He lifted his head and saw that rain was coming down hard against the double-paned windows. “Where are you?”
“I’m outside the club. Phone box.” Another sniffle, a shift of fabric. What might have been the blowing of a nose.
“Can you come over?”
“No, I… I’m all right. Really. You were sleeping.”
“It’s really no bother. I’d rather have you here than out there in the cold.”
A soft huff of a laugh. “No, really. I’m all right. I’m just being silly. But, um… I wouldn’t mind seeing you again. Soon. Maybe even going out. You know, properly. Like, uh, like a date and everything.”
Michael smiled despite himself. Julian asking him out.
Fancy that. Life really did have a way of surprising you.
And the touch of nerves, as if even now, after having snogged like a pair of teens, he was still unsure as to the nature of their relationship.
It was all just too endearing. “I’d like that very much.
In fact, I know the perfect place. Leave it all to me. I’ll arrange everything.”
“You sure? Sounds like a lot of work for just me --”
“It’s not. But even if it were, you’d be worth it. Now go home and get some sleep. Forget everything that woman told you and have sweet and pleasant dreams.”
There was another little breathy chuckle. “All right. I’ll try. Thanks. You get back to sleep, too. Sorry again for waking you.”
“I don’t mind being woken by you. And, Julian?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re not awful.”
Michael could see in his mind as clearly as if he were there. Julian ducking his head and biting his lip against a pleased little smile, all huddled up in the phone box with his puffy parka. His voice, when it came, was as soft as that ridiculous coat of his. “Thanks.”
The line cut off with a gentle click and Michael was met with staticky silence.