Happy Endings (10 page)

‘What do you think Kate is doing right now?’

Up until that moment, I hadn’t really been thinking too much about what Kate had been doing for the past few weeks. We spoke on the phone and she’d mentioned she’d met a guy called Jed or something, but I hadn’t or didn’t want to think about her living without me. Just the thought of Kate in Thailand and what she was doing made me nauseous. Not that I didn’t trust her, because I did, or I thought I did. But the fact was she’d chosen to leave me and if she could do that, what else was she capable of?

‘I should probably get another round in,’ I mumbled, before getting up and walking off towards the bar.

As it turned out, Georgie only lived a five-minute walk away from the pub. It was gone eleven and we were stumbling through the streets together. I was going to walk her home before getting a taxi back to Wandsworth, like a proper gentleman.

‘I’m sad,’ she said as we reached her front door step.

‘Why?’

‘Because we can’t do this anymore. I like you, Ed.’

‘I like you too.’

‘How much?’

‘A lot. Very much. This much,’ I said, stretching out my arms as wide as they would go.

‘Too much?’

I was going to say something, but before I had the chance she leaned in and we were kissing. I should have pulled away. I should have said no and left, but I didn’t. Georgie was young, beautiful and for some reason only known to her, she found me attractive. She wanted me and I couldn’t say no. The alcohol didn’t help, but it wasn’t an excuse. I knew what I was doing and I wanted it. Her lips were so soft and she kissed me like she wanted me more than anything in the world. But the elation didn’t last. It couldn’t. The longer we kissed the more I thought about Kate – the love of my life. The girl I planned to marry and spend the rest of my days with. What if she didn’t cheat? Then would I always be the one who had wrecked our relationship. I wasn’t that man. I quickly pulled away.

‘I’m sorry. I can’t do this.’

‘What’s the matter, Ed. Don’t you want me?’

‘Of course I do. You know I do. This isn’t about you, it’s Kate, I can’t cheat on Kate.’

‘Even though she’s probably cheating on you right now?’

‘Even so.’

She gave me a look I couldn’t decipher. I felt terrible. I wanted to say, ‘Fuck it, let’s go upstairs and get naked,’ but I didn’t. I couldn’t. The guilt would have torn me apart. I wasn’t equipped for the life of a philanderer. I was too weak or maybe too strong, I wasn’t quite sure which.

‘Your loss,’ said Georgie, who turned around without another word and slammed the door in my face.

I found a taxi and spent thirty minutes in the back racked with guilt. Should I tell Kate what I’d done? Was it worth it? Eventually, as we pulled up outside my house, I decided it was best not to. I hadn’t done much and it wasn’t worth the arguments it would no doubt create. I wouldn’t go out with Georgie again and so that was it. I would focus on work and I definitely wouldn’t kiss her again. I took a deep breath and realised I’d just dodged a big bloody bullet. I’d been a fool, but somehow I had escaped by the skin of my teeth.

Jack

Writing has always been my coping mechanism. I can lose myself in words and ideas so easily and when I do, everything else in the world seems irrelevant. It helped a lot when Dad died. I spent ages writing after the funeral. Most of it was nonsense, lots of wistful poetry and mawkish stories about death and loss, but some of it was useful.

I was at my desk trying to work through a few minor kinks in the synopsis before I sent my novel off to agents: my last chance to have the life I’d dreamed about since I was a teenager. It was terrifying to think it was my last throw of the dice, but I didn’t have a choice. Having a dream was one thing, but at the expense of everything else was too much of a sacrifice.

I was happy to have writing to do because I was keeping out of Emma’s way. It had been a tumultuous week; it started badly, with an argument about her late-night drinking session with Rhys. It wasn’t that I minded her going out with him, not that I was thrilled about it, but she didn’t think to even call me. I was at home with dinner ready, waiting to apologise about our earlier argument, while she was boozing it up with Rhys and his media mates in Soho. I waited until ten before I threw her dinner in the bin and went to bed in a strop. She came home past midnight and sneaked into bed reeking of alcohol.

I had to be at work early the following day and so I didn’t see her until the next night. We spoke, but it was tense and we both said things we probably shouldn’t have. Then on Tuesday on page thirteen of the
Sun
there was a picture of Rhys and Emma leaving a café together hand-in-hand. She was referred to as a ‘mystery blonde’ and perhaps Rhys’s new flame. She explained it was nothing, just typical paparazzi looking for a story where there wasn’t one. Since then it’s been a week of avoiding each other, monosyllabic conversation and mainly not speaking at all. Neither of us, it seemed, knew where to begin.

‘I need to tell you something,’ said Emma suddenly.

I stopped what I was doing and spun around in my chair. She looked serious. Had she cheated on me with Rhys after all? It was the first thought that popped into my head. I tried to remain calm and not jump to any conclusions because I had no reason for not trusting her. Mum’s words echoed in my ears, ‘It’s ironic, but the fear of failure is often its catalyst’. I didn’t want to be the man who ruined a perfectly great relationship out of fear of losing it.

‘OK,’ I said calmly.

‘I have to go away for a week with the cast. It’s not until the middle of February, but I really need to go. Do you mind?’

Did I mind? I spent a moment thinking about it and the truth was I didn’t. I don’t know what she thought of me or what had happened to us over the past week, but I didn’t want her to think I was annoyed or jealous of her success. I didn’t know how to tell her it wasn’t her success I feared, but losing her because of it. Just looking at her sitting opposite me, so meek, it made me feel awful. I’d done that. I’d made her that way. Change was hard and the realisation I hadn’t handled it well made me feel like a prize idiot. My father’s words quickly followed Mum’s in my head, ‘We should love blindly without question, without regret and selflessly’. I’d been a selfish prick and I knew it. I looked at her and smiled.

‘Of course I don’t bloody mind,’ I said and we fell into a mad embrace. We kissed deeply before she pulled away and looked at me, tears washing around her eyes.

‘I’m sorry if I hurt you, I . . .’

‘It’s me who should be apologising. I’m sorry. I should have been more supportive and I wasn’t. I was stupid and a real prick about things.’

‘You were a bit,’ said Emma, with a ridiculously cute smile.

‘But not anymore. I’m going to support you and give you whatever you need. I’m so proud of you, Em and I love you so much.’

‘I love you too,’ she said and before I knew it, my writing was all but forgotten as we stumbled, kissing and pulling each other’s clothes off, towards the bedroom.

‘So that’s what it’s like to shag a film star?’ I said as we lay in bed afterwards.

‘Oh, stop it.’

The sex had been incredible because when we finally orgasmed together, it wasn’t just a regular orgasm, but one filled with relief and awash with love. There had been moments, albeit fleeting, but moments nonetheless when I thought we might never have sex like that again. However, lying there wrapped up together under the duvet, our naked bodies curled around each other, I felt nothing but calmness. Her head was on my chest, bobbing up and down slowly to my breathing, her body fitting perfectly against mine, and everything felt right again.

Our cocoon of happiness didn’t last quite as long as I’d hoped though as my phone suddenly stirred into life. I reached across to the nightstand and had a look at the caller. It was Ed.

‘You’d better get it,’ said Emma. ‘I’ll jump in the shower.’

I watched as Emma hopped out of bed and walked off towards the shower; her perfect little bum wiggling away brought a smile to my face. I was a lucky man.

‘Ed, mate, how are you?’

‘Good thanks, you?’

‘No complaints. How’s life without the missus?’

There was a brief pause and even on the phone I could sense a tension in his voice.

‘Oh, you know, dull. I was calling to see if you wanted to get a drink.’

‘Yes, of course, when and where and I’ll be there with bells on?’

‘Tomorrow night?’

‘Sounds perfect, mate,’ I said. ‘About seven-thirty?’

Ed and I agreed to meet at a pub on the Southbank and go from there. I was looking forward to it and maybe a night out with Ed was just what I needed.

I liked and admired Ed so much because in many ways he was my mirror opposite. At twenty-nine, I was still chasing a dream and working in a crap service job while I waited for my big break, whereas he was doggedly settled into a life of hard work – not necessarily doing a job he loved, but one he knew would pay the bills. He definitely wasn’t a dreamer, but a realist who didn’t want to rock the boat and make any mistakes. That’s why I wasn’t surprised he didn’t go with Kate. I would have been more surprised if he had. I used to think he was a bit boring, but now I saw that above everything else, he was just afraid of failure. Afraid that with one wrong move the whole bloody house of cards would come falling down.

Emma

There was something I didn’t want to tell Jack. It was nothing really, just a silly misunderstanding. It was one of those things that happened with people like Rhys. I’d had enough experience with other actors to know what it’s like and Rhys apologised profusely and promised it wouldn’t ever happen again. We even laughed about it afterwards because it was so ridiculous. I felt awful though because I shouldn’t have let it happen at all and now I was keeping it from Jack.

After we left the café in Swiss Cottage and headed to Soho, I was so excited and wrapped up in a glow of exhilaration. Having my photo taken with Rhys and then being whisked away in a cab to an exclusive club, I felt like a proper celebrity. I know it’s all a bit superficial and silly, but as the flashes of the cameras were on me, blinding me with their hunt for a story, I felt like the little girl who had put on a play for her mummy.

Once at the club, I soon realised it wasn’t like anywhere I’d been before. For a start, it was impossible to get in unless you came on the arm of Rhys Connelly and inside it was wall to wall celebrities, and I was one of them; part of the inner circle.

After we were settled in and got drinks, Rhys introduced his friends. There was Paul, an old friend from Wales, who lived with him to help ‘keep his feet on the ground’ and there was Eloise, Rhys’s fabulous agent. I asked her where she was from and she just smiled and said, ‘Everywhere, Emma, and nowhere.’ It was probably why she seemed to have an accent that sounded like South African crossed with French, topped with a dollop of American and finished off with shavings of high-society English. She was lovely though and kept telling me how beautiful I was.

The night changed at just gone ten. Paul and Eloise had to leave. Paul was heading back to Wales early in the morning and Eloise had to catch a flight to LA. Eloise gave me a long hug goodbye, followed by a kiss on the lips and told me to stay in touch. They both disappeared, leaving Rhys and me alone. By that point we’d both had quite a few. I was still on cloud nine and alcohol was running through my body like liquid excitement and so when Rhys asked me to dance, I didn’t think anything of it.

I’m sure in most clubs the sight of Rhys dancing would have drawn looks and hushed comments, but in there, in a room packed with celebrities, he was just another body and I was just another body dancing closely next to him. We danced for what felt like an hour, but was probably more like fifteen minutes, gradually getting closer, moving together, until suddenly we kissed.

Maybe it was the alcohol, the adrenalin, or that it was Rhys Connelly, I don’t know, but when he leaned in and kissed me, I didn’t stop him. Not right away. It didn’t last longer than a few seconds and then he pulled away once he realised I wasn’t really kissing him back.

‘Shit, sorry,’ he said. ‘Got a bit carried away.’

‘It’s fine.’ I smiled. ‘I understand. You’re Rhys Connelly, big movie star. You’re probably used to getting whatever girls you want.’

‘But not you, eh.’

‘That’s right,’ I said and we carried on dancing.

Rhys apologised again at the end of the night as he put me in a cab and paid the driver. I said it was fine because it was. It was nothing. Just a silly, drunken kiss.

I felt awful when Jack was apologising to me, but I couldn’t tell him and, honestly, it was never going to happen again, so what was the point? It meant nothing.

‘Sure you don’t mind?’ said Jack, standing in the doorway, looking gorgeous in his going-out clothes. He had on a pair of faded blue jeans, a pale green gingham shirt and he smelt wonderful.

‘It’s fine, you have fun with Ed.’

‘But what about the wedding stuff?’

‘Right, the wedding stuff, and you’re going to do what exactly? The flower arrangements? The invitations?’