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‘Gin and tonic, ladies?’
‘Please,’ we say in unison and he disappears into the dining room where the antique drinks cabinet from our old family home lives.
‘Shall I open a window?’ I say.
‘That would be great, thanks.’ I squeeze past Fee in the galley kitchen and reach over the counter to the latch on the window at the end.
‘So, when were you going to tell me about Valentine Boretti?’
I almost slide down the window and faceplant on the countertop.
‘What? How? What?’ I turn to face her, my brows knitted together, and I know there’s no colour left in my face. It’s all sunk to the pit of my stomach, which is now twisted up into a tight ball.
‘Gossip Centralhad a lovely little shot of you leaving a football match together a few weeks ago. I would have grilled you sooner, but you’ve been impossible to get hold of.’ She’s navigating the pots and pans but her focus is entirely on me and I’m struck still, my body awash with the pain of it, of what I’ve done and what a mistake I’ve made.
She turns away from the cooking, her eyes narrowing on me. ‘Jesus, what’s wrong, Liv? You look about to...’
Too late. The tears I’ve been fighting fall freely down my face and she’s across the room in seconds, her arms around me.
‘Here we go, ladies, two—what?What happened?’
Fee turns to Pete, my head tucked into her bosom. ‘Shoo, no, leave those, then shoo.’
I hear the glasses hit the surface and the soft click of the door closing. I rise my head on a sob-cum-snort and she pulls me back into her chest.
‘It’s all right, honey. Whatever it is, just tell me.’
I shake my head, hiccupping as I struggle to speak, to control my voice long enough to get anything out.
‘Bugger.’ She quickly releases me. ‘One second.’
She rushes around the kitchen, turning off the heat, pulling things out of the oven, a quick swoosh and then she’s back and I’m wiping my face on my sleeve, trying to dry it even as the tears keep falling.
‘I messed up, Fee.’ I suck in a shaky breath. ‘He told me he loved me and I... I basically told him he was ridiculous, that the idea of anuswas ridiculous.’
‘Wait. You need to back up a bit. Start from the top. Who is he to you?’
I tell her everything—how we met, minus the club detail, the boardroom visit, the fantastic strides we’ve made with the charity thanks to him, the people he introduced me to, the football, the week that followed and...the track day...the argument.
‘So, let me get this straight...’ she squints at me ‘...you told him that he shouldn’t live his life constrained by what happened to his wife, and by what-ifs over the future, but you did the exact same thing to him.’
‘I didn’t.’ I shake my head at her and she walks away to take up the drinks that Pete left.
‘I didn’t.’ I repeat into her silence, only it’s much weaker.
She comes back to me and passes me my drink, takes a sip of her own as she eyes me with compassion and a look that says,You bloody did, you bloody idiot.
‘Don’t look at me like that.’
‘Like what?’ she says over the rim of her glass.
‘Like I’m an idiot.’
‘You have to admit, you are a bit of an idiot. Don’t you think it makes you a hypocrite?’
‘A what?’
‘You pushed him away because of your past, because of what you went through.You’reletting your past dictate your future. Just as you accused him of doing.’
