Chapter 36 - Bess
Chapter thirty-six
Bess
Jeanette takes me to a café down the street. One I don't own and therefore don't have to deal with looking at, or speaking to, her co-conspirators while I try and process the fuck out of what has been happening these past few weeks.
It is an unsurprisingly thoughtful gesture, because Jeanette is pure sweetness and light.
We take a window table and she positions herself so she sits next to me looking out at the people passing on the street, not saying anything, just being present. It's exactly what I need. Someone near while I am buffeted by the emotional squalls swirling and scattering and regrouping inside me.
I don't know what to think or how to feel.
I put my finger on one emotion – grief over the double loss of the soldier – and then it shifts to humiliation, and then anger, and then admiration, and acceptance I brought this on myself, and then anger again.
We sit there until the tea in the pot goes cold and I am no closer to pinning down a single feeling.
I reach for something within the maelstrom and what settles on my tongue is, "All my followers. I lied to all my followers." I've bared my deepest desires, shown my vulnerability through reading those letters and done it without apology. I've built my brand on that.
Jeanette places a hand on my arm. "You believed everything you said because you couldn't have known any different. Your integrity can't be questioned."
"But you all put it at risk."
"Yes, my love. And we did it with your permission."
Whatever it takes. I did say it. Emphatically. And there's no denying I absolutely meant it.
"I think, so far, it's been worth it. Don't you think?"
I say, "I don't know yet," except I do. I don't have to dig deep to know this community means more to me than several million strangers online. It even means more to me than my integrity. The only possible answer is yes. "It's going to have to be."
It sits very uncomfortably, however. Everything I do from here on in on my TikTok channel will be hollow and brittle. A veneer over a big, fat deceit. "It might have ruined it all."
"It might. It was a good means to an ends, and depending on what you decide to do next, that end could be tomorrow evening. Right?"
I scoff. "I can't sell fraudulent art."
Jeanette showers me with her tinkly laugh. "You can sell fraudulent art. It's a matter of will you."
Sucking in a shaky breath, I exhale slowly.
I don't know. I honestly don't.
I think of my Whatever It Takes painting and while I meant it at the time, now my back's to the wall, I'm not sure anymore.
Jeanette pats my arm, then removes her hand. "All the people who know will never let on. Not when it means securing their future, preserving a way of life in a place they love. Don't you think?"
She's right. I know she's right. But they are not the only liability.
As if reading my thoughts, Jeanette says, "You haven't been worried about the letter discarder to this point."
"The stakes are higher."
Jeanette wags her head from side to side as if weighing something up. "Yes. The game's changed. But I know you, Bess. You have the metal to pivot. If that's what you choose."
It's too big a decision to make under the weight of today's revelation.
Ed's anxious and shame-filled face fills my head. Principled, honourable Ed. My heart tilts towards the whirling mess of emotions under my ribcage. Perhaps I don't know my best friend as well as I think.
"Ed," I say quietly. "I never knew he had it in him. To be that kind of devious."
"Oh, yes. Poor Ed. He's really struggled with it all. It's been more difficult for him than anybody else."
"So it bloody should be. How much of it was his idea?"
"None of it. It was all Mistral's doing. Everyone else has been a lackey." Through a laugh, she says, "Elly showed a little less resistance to the idea than the rest of us."
"Mistral?" I didn't see that one coming.
"Bess." Jeanette turns to me, her brows knitted in earnestness. "We really were going to tell you. As soon as you announced the auction, we had to. And then the high bidding...complicated things."
I bet. The promise of a million pounds – over a million pounds – is a lot of money to walk away from, especially when it means all of us continuing to live here and do what we love. I'm having the exact same struggle right now.
The tension inside me gives a momentary reprieve and I laugh. A full-throated, head-tipped-back laugh. The whole letter scheme was audacious. Audacious and utterly brilliant. Until I decided to make money off the letters directly.
I would never in a million years have imagined they were capable of not only conceiving and executing a plan aimed at deceiving me, but also achieving it.
I won't make the mistake of underestimating them again. I think I'm proud of them.
"You didn't want to tell me from the beginning? Have me in on the deception?"
"Do you think you could have reacted to the letters in the same way?"
I don't say anything. Of course I couldn't. And it was my reaction to them as much as the letters themselves that got the videos the phenomenal views they did.
I turn away from Jeanette and look at the street outside without really seeing it. My thoughts are still scattered and I can't catch any of them to pin them down.
"So, my love. What are you going to do?"
I take a sip of my cold tea and really wish I hadn't. I place it back on its saucer with an aggressive chink and say, "I'm going to have to sleep on it. I'll know how I feel in the morning."
Who am I kidding?
It won't matter how I feel in the morning. Time has run out and we both know there's no other option but to run A Lettered Man at auction.