‘But you areyou, Rowan, she would have felt like she had to do it. You must know that. You know you have influence. So, she would have automatically assumed that something was going on between us. And…’ Lila swallowed. ‘And, she’d seen the blood on my jeans, all over my thighs from where you lifted me up and so of course, that, along with you insisting she give me the job…’
‘You’re saying you think she thought we had a fumble, while my hand was bleeding?’ He frowned because that wasn’t where his mind would have logically gone to.
‘Why else would your hand have been all around my upper thigh? That’s a more understandable assumption than the truth, which was you picked me up to post me through a fucking window.’
‘Okay maybe I can see that.’ He scratched his head.
Lila pulled away and pushed her hands through her hair. ‘All this time…all this time she never wanted me here and she never felt like she could get rid of me, because of you. And God knows who she’s told. And now they’llallknow anyway. And they’ve been thinking how useless I am, that I’m only here because I’m your…your…’ She clapped a hand over her mouth.
He put his hands out, palms down, trying to get her to slow down. ‘Why do you think everyone knows?’
‘Because it wasRuthwho showed me the damn article.’ She covered her face with her hands. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
Rowan looked up at the ceiling. ‘I guess because it didn’t really seem like a big deal? It was a non-event. I didn’t want you to lose your job over a stupid mistake I made. And you didn’t. All I did was tell them a slightly edited version of the truth. Ididhurt my hand. Youdidhelp me with it and get delayed by me. That’s all there was to it.’
‘From your perspective.’
‘Yeah. Okay. Granted. From my perspective. But Lila, people will talk no matter what the truth of it is and you can’t do anything to stop that. Nothing’s actually any different than it was this morning or yesterday.’
‘Everything’sdifferent. I know you don’t care about what people think about you, Rowan. I know it’s all water off a duck’s back to you! But it isn’t for me! And you’re the only person here who truly, truly understands that about me. I trusted you with my…my brokenness and you let this thing hit me like a tonne of bricks.’
‘You’re not broken,’ he said firmly.
‘You know what I mean. My anxiety. I thought you understood.’
‘I’m sorry. I thought you were getting better at coping.’
‘I have been. Or I thought I had been. Maybe if you’d talked to me about it, I would have had the time to get my head around it. Maybe…’ She shook her head and tears spilled down her cheeks. ‘But now…everything feels…too much. I can’t…I can’t face them. I don’t want to walk out there and see all their eyes on me. Judging me.Everyoneis judging me. I was a fool. I was an idiot to ever think this wouldn’t blow up in my face. How could this ever work between us?’
Ice shot through his chest. ‘Don’t say that. Of course we can make it work. Ithasbeen working—’
She shook her head. ‘It’s all been a lie.’
‘What lie?’ His voice rose, and he took a quick breath, forcing himself to lower it again. ‘There aren’t any lies between us.’
‘You kept a fundamental truth from me. You let me think I was worthy of this job—’
‘Because youare—’
‘I’m only here because of you. And everyone knows it. You may be able to cope with people having a low opinion of you, Rowan, but it breaks me. It just proves all the things that I think about myself. I have to go.’
‘Please don’t—’
‘I need to take the camera back.’ She shook her head again. ‘Don’t follow me please. I need some space.’
Lila
Lila’s heart thundered in her ears as she tried to process it all and walked back to the makeup trailer. Every step dragged as she thought of the team assembled there.
It was true. Sibyl hadn’t wanted to bring her out to Sicily. Rowan had made her. All the parts of her that ached when she felt rejection, when she told herself that she was weird and not wanted by people, had just been proven right. It crashed over her like a wave. She was drowning in it.
When she got back to the trailer, the team weren’t even there. They hadn’t waited for her. The minibus was gone too. They’d probably assumed she would be with Rowan. It was partly relief and partly a kick in the gut.
All her delusions, thinking she’d been gaining confidence over these months, finally thinking she could get a handle on this anxiety… She’d been such a fool. Everyone was thinking she was useless, and a liar and she didn’t know how she was going to bear it.
How many of the crew hadalreadyknown before the story even got out?
And, now she thought about it, he’d said he’d told “them” about her helping him with his hand. He’d overheard Sibyl talking to someone. Who had theotherperson been?
