Chapter Two
Ezra
“Promise me you have some plans for tonight,” Shane said, my best friend’s voice laced with earnestness as I tucked my phone under my ear and rifled through my pockets for my keys. I’d had them less than two minutes ago and somehow I’d already lost them.
I’d probably left them in the fucking car. It wouldn’t surprise me considering how much of a daze I’d spent the whole day in. I’d have left my head in the car too if it hadn’t already been screwed on.
Although maybe if my head had been screwed on properly to start with, I’d have saved myself a lot of heartache and ten years of my life.
I shifted the shopping bag in my other hand and heard something jingle as it slid past the bottle of vodka.
Problem solved.
“I do,” I said as I fished the keys out and forced my front door open, giving the bottom of it a kick to make it move inwards. God, this place was such a piece of shit.
“Plans that don’t just involve lying on your sofa with a bottle of vodka.”
“Hey, there’ll be food too. I got some olives. Call it a deconstructed martini.”
Shane sighed but there was a fondness to it. “I’m going to order you a pizza.”
“You don’t have to do that. I’m fine.”
“Tough shit, I’m doing it anyway. What do you want?”
“I don’t care.”
“Spicy and meaty it is,” Shane said as I shoved the door shut behind me and swore under my breath. I didn’t know why I ever bothered locking it. If anyone tried to break in, I was going to hear them. And it wasn’t like I had much for them to steal anyway.
It was times like this I missed my beautiful house in Manchester more than ever.
I should never have let Reed keep it.
“Should be about forty minutes, so at least try and stay vaguely clothed and sober until it arrives. Please,” Shane continued, oblivious to my struggles with the door. He knew about my feelings towards the flat, though, because he’d listened to me moan about it endlessly for the past four months.
He deserved a fucking medal at this point for not throttling me.
I knew he was my best friend—and therefore almost obligated to deal with my shit—but there were limits.
Unless he was going for sainthood. Which, judging by Shane’s previous behaviour, he definitely was not.
I was grateful, though, because nobody else was willing to put up with me and on today of all days, I appreciated him calling.
It was a nice reminder that despite everything, there was still someone in my life who cared. If I hadn’t felt so numb, I would have cried. I probably would later when the vodka kicked in.
“Deal,” I said as I bent down to slide my shoes off, leaving them in a heap by the door to sort later. Or tomorrow.
“How was work?”
“Fine. Preseason training starts again soon, so we’re working on strategy, announcing fixtures, shit like that.”
“Sounds fun.”
I shrugged. “It’s fine. Nothing exciting.”
“A good distraction at least?”
“No, not really.” I took the shopping bag through to the kitchen, with its cracked beige cupboards that had seen better days, its chipboard counter covered with an ugly-as-sin wood-patterned vinyl, and an oven with all the numbers missing off the dials.
I took the jar of olives out of the bag and opened them, shoving two in my mouth before opening a cupboard to grab a short glass.
“What about when the players come back?” Shane asked and I could hear the smirk in his tone.
“Not all of us are as obsessed with men in shorts as you,” I said as I opened the vodka and poured two fingers into the glass. Then added an extra two for good measure. I’d promised Shane I’d be vaguely sober when the pizza arrived, and I would be. Because unlike him, I could hold my liquor.
“You don’t have to be obsessed to look at them.”
“What if I don’t want to look at them?”
“Then you don’t have to,” Shane said softly. “You don’t have to do anything, E.”
I chuckled as I picked up my drink and took a sip, his words nudging at the vulnerable spot where my heart had been. “I love how I have the shortest fucking name, and you still found a way to say less of it.”
“Yeah, well, it’s because I love you.”
“Thanks.” I paused, struggling to get my words out. “And thanks for this.”
“No problem.” There was another pause, longer this time, as I took another sip of my vodka. It burned as it went down and wasn’t particularly good, but it had been cheap and strong, and tonight that was the aim of the game.
And yeah, maybe I shouldn’t have been drinking with the sole purpose of hoping I’d pass out and not have to relive the memories of my wedding to the man I thought I’d spend the rest of my life with…
until six months ago, when I’d realised he’d been cheating on me for the past year with every pretty young man in a two-mile radius, forcing me to leave the life, career, and house I’d adored in an attempt to get away from him.
Reed had said I was being a coward and running away, but he’d also thrown plates at my head while I’d packed my suitcase, so I didn’t really give a shit about his opinion.
I thought he’d wanted me to scream and shout and argue with him, but I’d felt numb.
Hollow.
Empty.
Like someone had reached into my chest and scooped out my heart with a rusted spoon. One of the small ones, like the kind my granny had used for boiled eggs.
I vaguely remembered telling Reed we were done and driving to a hotel, but the rest of that night was a bit of a blur.
But I must have messaged Shane because he’d banged on the door at two in the morning with a bottle of vodka, a packet of doughnuts, two kebabs, and some cheesy chips, like we were nineteen all over again.
The kebabs had almost made me feel worse than my marriage ending. At least, for a day or two while they tormented my digestive system and reminded me I couldn’t handle that sort of shit anymore. Especially since I was closer to forty than I wanted to admit.
“How… how are you holding up?” Shane asked. “Or is that a pointless question?”
“I don’t know,” I said, the same empty feeling sinking into my bones as I drank. “I know I should feel something but… it’s like there’s nothing there. I’m angrier at my front door than Reed.”
“You’re not still blaming yourself, are you?”
“Why? Am I not allowed to do that?”
“No! He cheated on you, E! In your fucking bed! In that house which you loved and poured so much fucking time and money into, the place you made into a home for the two of you. You were together for ten bloody years, and he threw all of that away,” Shane said hotly, and I almost smiled because I could picture him pacing up and down his kitchen while his husband, Eric, watched from the sofa.
“So no, you’re not allowed to blame yourself.
What would you even be responsible for? You didn’t install Grindr on his phone or summon an army of demon twinks to seduce him. ”
“No, but… I worked a lot. I didn’t make time for us. I didn’t put him first. Or us.”
Shane scoffed. “I’m sorry, but when that happens, you talk to your partner.
You don’t get your neighbour to suck your dick, and…
no, I am calm, Eric. I am. Well, okay, but I’m allowed to be upset.
Reed was a cunt!” I poured more vodka into my glass, amusement pulling at my lips as I listened to Shane argue playfully with his husband. The two of them were so good together.
In hindsight, they were everything Reed and I had never managed to achieve.
“Sorry,” Shane said as his focus switched back to me. “My husband is telling me to calm down.”
“I didn’t say that!” I heard Eric say in the background and I almost laughed.
“That’s very rude,” I said as I took another long sip. I was getting used to the taste now, and the burn had all but faded.
“I know! Anyway, you’re not allowed to blame yourself, even if the two of you were having problems. He should have talked to you, told you how he was feeling, suggested fucking couples’ counselling, not blown up your entire life.
And if he did want a divorce, he could have had the decency to tell you, not let you walk in on him. ”
I swirled the vodka around in the glass as I leant against the counter, my eyes unfocused as I stared at the brown pattern on the cream floor tiles.
I’d thought it was deliberate, but now I was wondering if it was just dirt.
“I’m not sure he did want a divorce,” I said quietly.
It was a thought that had been percolating in my brain for months now, but this was the first time I’d ever voiced it.
“I think he wanted to have his cake and eat it too. Have me and our life—the house, the holidays, the wardrobe—and then his men on the side. I don’t think he expected me to walk out.
It’s why he threw the plates at me. He wanted me to fight for us, even though he’d given up. ”
“Like I said, he’s a cunt. And he doesn’t deserve you,” Shane said.
“He doesn’t want me anyway. He’s already scrubbed me out of his life. I checked.”
“Seriously?”
“I know, I shouldn’t be looking.”
“Yeah, but I was more talking about the fact he’s scrubbed everything. I’m so sorry. You deserved so much better.”
“Thanks.”
“Apparently, your pizza is already on the way,” Shane said. “Want me to stay on the phone until it arrives?”
“It’s okay. I’m sure you and Eric have plans.”
“No, this is my plan.”
A tiny smile crossed my lips, the empty crevice in my chest somehow filling with warmth. “Thanks,” I said, ignoring the way my voice cracked slightly. “I just want to get through today and then… I don’t know. I wish I could forget him as easily as he’s forgotten me.”
“I know. It’ll get easier, I promise, but it might not be for a while.”
“That’s bollocks.”
“Yeah, it is.”
I sighed and added more vodka to my glass before walking over to the sofa, collapsing onto the end, and looking around the empty shithole I now called home.
None of this had been in my plan; it hadn’t even entered my mind.
Reed and I were supposed to have our happily ever after in the fairy-tale life we’d built for each other, only now I’d realised that dream had been made of straw and the big bad wolf had come knocking at the door.
“I’m not doing this again,” I said, half to myself and half to Shane.
“Doing what? Drinking? Because I can guarantee that’s a lie.”
“God no. I mean dating, love, getting married, all that bullshit. I’m not doing it again. I can’t.”
“You don’t have to,” Shane said. “Just… look, fuck, this might be the worst thing to say and you don’t have to do anything you don’t want, ever, but maybe don’t completely close yourself off to idea that you might find someone else.
And you don’t have to. You can be single forever if that’s what makes you happy.
But promise me you won’t let someone like Reed take away your chance at being happy.
Don’t do it just to spite him. The best revenge you can have is living the best fucking life you can, so when he stalks your socials—which he inevitably will—he’ll be reminded of what he lost. And then he’ll be miserable, which is what he deserves. ”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Thank you,” Shane said. “Hey, do you want to watch a film? We can video chat while we buddy watch something on Netflix. Your choice.”
I thought about telling him no, but then I realised how much I didn’t want to be alone tonight, despite all my earlier plans. And if I could finally get Shane to watch Rush, then I’d take it.
“Yeah, let’s do that,” I said, putting down my glass and searching around for the remote so we could pick something while I waited for the pizza.
Today was still a shit day, but it wasn’t quite as shit as I’d imagined it being.
Maybe Shane was right. Maybe the answer to my misery was living the fuck out of my new life.
That could start tomorrow, though.
I was allowed one more night to wallow.