Paper Dolls (16 page)

* * *

It was a few days later when I opened the door to my apartment that I saw her sitting on the couch. My body flooded with relief. And yet my muscles were all tense, ready for the next round of our fight. We had never fought like this before. Only because I always used to give in to her.

I knew instinctively this would be a long battle, both of us tearing pieces off each other before one of us gave in. I would not give in this time.

I forced myself to step inside the apartment even though a large part of me wanted to run.

She sat up straighter when she saw me. “Hey.”

“Hey,” I replied, cautiously.

“You look like shit.”

“I’ve barely slept.”

“How was work?”

I stared at Salem from my doorway for a second. I kicked the door closed behind me and dropped my bag and keys on the kitchen counter. My arms cross over my chest like a shield. “Really?”

“What?” she asked, her eyes going wide with feigned innocence.

“You’re going to just pretend that nothing happened? You’re going to act like you didn’t just blow out of here days ago leaving me to worry sick about where the hell you went.”

She stood up and her arms crossed over her chest as she mirrored me. “Thought you wouldn’t care where I went. You were perfectly happy to give me up for some
guy
.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed my eyes. Every night I had slept alone in that cold bed, staying up, willing to hear her key in the lock, signalling that she was home. Now that she was here…

A vein throbbed in my temple. I needed an aspirin.

I heard her walk towards me. When I opened my eyes she stopped, metres from me.

“Shit,” she muttered. For once in her life, Salem actually looked…uncertain. “I didn’t come back to start another fight.”

“Well done. You managed it anyway.”

“I came back to say sorry. You were right. I…I shouldn’t have run out without telling you where I’ve been.”

Well, I’ll be damned. I think this might be the first time Salem actually admitted that she was wrong. “Don’t do it again.”

“I won’t.”

“FYI, you suck at apologies.”

“I know. I’m not used to giving them. Just like…just like I’m just not used to sharing you. That’s something I guess I’m going to have to learn now that loverb−, I mean, Clay is here to stay.”

My stomach panged with sympathy. This wouldn’t be easy on Salem. I don’t know how I would have reacted if I had found her and she had someone else as important to her in her life. I stepped across the divide between us and pulled her into a hug, squeezing her to me. “I’m glad you’re home,” I whispered in her ear.

She squeezed me back.

When we pulled apart she shot me a hopeful smile. “Have you got plans this afternoon?”

“No. Clay has a deadline so he’s busy working.”

Salem nodded her head, slowly. “So we can do something, you and I?”

Maybe things would start to get better for Salem and Clay and me? Maybe the three of us could finally learn to coexist? “Sure. What do you want to do?”

A slow smile began to creep across Salem’s face. “Let’s go for a drive.”

“Where are we going?” I asked Salem as she directed me off the highway and into the nearby town of Noosa Heads.

She lounged in the passenger seat, her black Doc Martens on the dashboard. “You’ll see.”

She gave me more directions. We drove farther into the town until we ended up driving through a leafy residential suburb, built up of modern-looking townhouses and low-level apartments, all with large balconies and decks to take advantage of the great weather and sea air.

“Pull up over here.”

I did so, put the car into park and turned off the engine. Salem pulled her legs off the dashboard and sat up. But she didn’t get out.

Her fingers drummed on the console as she stared out my window and across the street. I turned my head but couldn’t tell what she was looking for. “What are we doing here?”

“It’s a nice area,” she replied, still looking out beyond my shoulder. “Don’t you like this area?”

I frowned. “Sure. It’s a nice area. Do you want to go for a walk here?”

“No.”

“Then what−”

“Just wait.”

Salem was being weird.

Before I could respond again she straightened up and pointed over my shoulder. “There.”

I turned in my seat. I had to blink several times to be sure my vision wasn’t betraying me. Across the street Clay had stepped out from inside one of the townhouses. What was he doing here? I thought he had a deadline.

He moved aside and I could see that a slim blonde woman was holding back the red front door he had just come out of. She beamed at him as he turned back to speak to her.

“I thought you should know,” Salem’s voice came from behind me, a smugness to her tone, “Clay comes here when he tells you he’s working on a deadline. That gorgeous blonde always answers the door and he always stays in there with her for several hours.”

I watched, my vision shaking, my hand to my throat, as Clay leaned in to embrace her.

Her voice was so close it sounded like it was coming from inside my head. “He’s cheating on you.”

9

I kicked the car door open and climbed out. Salem didn’t try to stop me.

I was angry. I was numb. I just couldn’t believe that Clay could cheat on me. I knew the way he looked at me, the way he touched me. But there he was across the street pulling away from the arms of another woman, a woman who now disappeared behind a blood-red door. Seeing is believing.

I slammed the door behind me, barely looking both ways before darting across the street.

Clay was halfway down the stairs when he saw me, the surprise evident in his widening eyes. “Aria? What are you doing here?” We met on the sidewalk. He didn’t try to touch me, in fact he just stared at me. More evidence of his guilt.

“You bastard.” I gripped my hands into fists so tightly that my fingernails dug into my palms. “You said you were working.”

The only sign that he was uncomfortable was a throat swallow. “I was. What are you doing here?”

“Salem brought me here.”

His mouth twisted into a snarl. “Salem,” he said her name with venom. “I should have known.”

My eyes darted to the townhouse door, the number 29 on the front in brass numbers.

“It’s not what you think.”

“Really? That blonde woman at the door isn’t your other girlfriend?”

“No.”

“Then who is she?”

“She’s an employee.”

I laughed. Was he really trying to pull that on me? “You really expect me to believe that?”

“It’s true.”

“What does she do for you then? As an employee?”

“Quite frankly, that’s none of your business. All you need to know is that I’m not, nor have I ever, or will I ever sleep with her.”

My mouth dropped open. I had never heard such a frosty tone coming from Clay. He had never ever spoken to me that way. If I even believed that he wasn’t sleeping with her, I knew he was still hiding something.
Can you live with any more secrets?

“If you won’t tell me the truth,” I swallowed, “we have nothing more to say to each other.” I turned to leave, tears already pooling in my eyes.

Clay grabbed my arm and spun me back. His tone was softer now. “Stop, Aria. My relationship with Tenielle is strictly professional. I swear, it has nothing to do with you and me.”

Tenielle. The stupid bitch. I’ll kill her.
“That’s where you’re wrong, Clay. If it has something to do with you then it has everything to do with me. This won’t work if we won’t share all of who we are, good and bad.”

I felt a stab in my gut. You hypocrite. If you demand his secrets, then you have to give him all of yours.

They’re not just
my
secrets. They’re Salem’s too.

Clay stared at me for a long moment, his brows furrowed with resigned anger. “You want to know all of it? Fine.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me up the stairs behind him.

“What are you doing?”

He didn’t answer. When we reached the door he stabbed the doorbell with his finger, the buzzing echoing through the inside of the townhouse.

Salem. I almost forgot about Salem. I turned my head towards the car still parked across the road. But Salem was nowhere to be seen.

I turned back when I heard the sound of heels clacking on the ground from behind the door.

“Aria,” Clay spoke in a low menacing tone, “I was going to bring you here when I was ready. But once again you seem keen to push me into doing things I’m not ready to do.”

My stomach tightened. What had I done?

The door flew open. There stood the most beautiful blonde woman I had ever seen, sapphire blue eyes and hair of golden threads, pulled back in a chignon, her long elegant neck on display. Her pouty lips flew into a smile when she saw Clay and my heart stabbed. “Clay, did you forget something?” She spotted me behind Clay, one step down. Her thick, dark lashes fluttered as she took me in. “Who’s this?”

“This is Aria.”

Her mouth widened to an O. Her large blue eyes opened to saucers as they went from me to Clay then back to me. “Oh, wow. Aria. This is Aria. I didn’t know she was coming.”

“Neither did I,” Clay said coldly. “Can we come in?”

The woman nodded and stepped aside. As she pulled open the door I saw a flash of something on her hand. A ring. An engagement ring.

Were they engaged? Did that make
me
the other woman?

My head spun. But I refused to entertain any more thoughts about that damn ring. No assumptions, Aria. Assumptions are what got you into this mess. Just keep your head about you until you know everything.

Clay walked in first without looking back at me. Before I could follow, the woman stopped me with a hand on my arm. “I’m Tenielle, by the way.”

“Aria. But then
you
already knew that.”

She winced, before sending me what I guessed to be an apologetic look. “You guys should talk. Go on.” She pointed to where Clay was walking down the hallway.

Yes, it was certainly time to speak to Clay.

Tenielle disappeared and I was left to face Clay alone. He stood at a doorway, his hand on the handle. He glanced at me as I approached through this thin corridor. So far the other doors were shut and the bright ceiling light bounced off the white hallway walls, making this place feel so sterile and empty. There were no pictures on the walls, no paintings, nothing to show any character of the people who lived here. Did Tenielle live here? Who was she?

I stopped in front of Clay. He looked so torn. So sad and conflicted. I wanted to touch him but I wasn’t sure I should.

“I lied to you.” He swallowed, pausing long enough for my heart to jam up into my throat. “A harmless lie in my opinion. I just…wasn’t ready to talk about her yet.”

Her.

Her
.

The woman. The woman he lost? The woman he loved?

Why would Clay be hiding her? Why would he still be visiting her? My heart began a steady increase in pace.

“Before I take you inside to meet her,” he said quietly but firmly, “you need to know a few things about her.”

He wanted me to
meet
her?

“She suffers from schizophrenia. Do you know what that means?”

Flashes of
Jane Eyre
came into my mind. The crazy woman in the attic. Clay was hiding a wife. He was already married and there’s something wrong with her.

This was why he was so hesitant to sleep with me. This was why it always felt like he was holding something back. He had already made a vow to another woman.

I shook my head even as images of wild-haired and spitting patients in white jackets came to mind. I stared at the closed door beyond him. I didn’t want to meet her. I wanted to turn and run. Why did Salem have to bring me here?

“Schizophrenia is a brain disease,” Clay explained. “It can cause delusions, hallucinations and paranoia as well as a host of other symptoms, but those are the most well known. Medication and therapy can help but there’s no cure.”

“Do you still love her?” I needed to know.

I didn’t want to.

But I had to.

He glared at me, like he was angry that I would even think to ask him that. “Of course I love her. I’ll never stop, not even because of what she has. You can’t put conditions on love. That’s not real love.”

I suddenly felt like the floor was swaying under my feet, so I grabbed the wall to hang on to the earth. He loved another woman who was mad. So what was I? Just someone to pass the time? Someone to fill the hole in his life?

“Every person who suffers from schizophrenia is different,” Clay continued, oblivious to my struggle to breathe. “She hears voices, mostly. She would hear them and talk back to them. She was depressed most of the time. Sometimes she became paranoid that everyone was laughing at her behind her back. At her worst, she attacked me once because she was convinced that I wasn’t her son.” He fingered his chest where I knew his scar was.

“Her son?”

He frowned. “Yes. My mother thought I wasn’t her son.”

She was his mother. She was the woman? Not a wife? My heart felt like it pulled back into my chest.

I’m an idiot. Stupid stupid stupid. “I’m so sorry.” I moved closer and placed a hand on his arm. “When did you realise…?”

“In women, symptoms usually develop in their twenties and thirties. She began to show signs of it when I was thirteen, when she was thirty-two. She attacked me when I was eighteen. That’s when I knew I had to get her help, professional help. Up until then I had thought that maybe if I loved her enough…she’d get better.”

My heart clenched as his face filled with pain.
“You can’t make someone better by loving them. I know…”

“Schizophrenic sufferers get a bad rep in movies and books. Most sufferers can get better with medication, living relatively normal lives. Unfortunately she was one of the unlucky ones who couldn’t. She needs twenty-four-hour care to make sure she doesn’t harm herself.”