Chapter 25
I stood nervously outside the door leading to Haley's flat and told myself sternly that I had been brought up to behave better than I had been. Quickly running a little montage of all my stroppy, pathetic moments that I'd had recently involving Haley, and cringing majorly at my conduct, I managed to gird my loins enough to reach up and knock decisively on the door.
"Who is it?" The cracked, hoarse voice of someone who had clearly been smoking for a very long time sounded so loudly near me that I jumped and actually looked behind me thinking that someone was behind me. Seeing no-one I faced the door, so like my own, once more.
"Um, it's Natalia from upstairs," I answered, surprising myself with the use of my full name, but feeling that that creepy voice demanded the formality. "I'm a friend of Haley's." OK, so technically a lie but if it was in aid of apologising to her it couldn't be that wrong, right?
There was the sound of someone undoing deadlocks and, looking at the door closely, I saw that there were three as opposed to the one that our door had. The door opened a crack revealing a security chain and a pair of pale, rheumy eyes peering out at me.
It was all a bit creepy actually. They had a security chain? Who on earth did they think was going to break in?
I smiled reassuringly at the old lady looking through the gap at me. So I was finally meeting Haley's aunt, by the looks of her she must have been a great aunt, she appeared positively ancient.
"Hi, is it alright if I pop in and see Haley for a moment?" I asked in my most polite and friendly voice. You know the one, the tone you reserve for elderly people, and it's really hard to keep the patronising note out, isn't it?
The door was closed slightly as she removed the chain and then she opened it totally and appraised me frankly. It must be said that I did the same. She was tiny and frail looking, but I was willing to bet that she was a bit of a battleaxe. Her hands seemed like claws and were stained brown with nicotine and her mouth was surrounded by the purse lines long time smokers get. Of course it could just be that she pursed her lips with disapproval a lot as she was doing at that moment.
Fitting in with the theme of the day, she did not look at all impressed with me.
"She's crying in her room. That's your fault I suppose?"
I gulped, this woman could combat my mum in terms of disconcerting bluntness. "Yes, probably," I admitted. "I'm here to apologise."
"Just as well," she grumbled, moving aside and allowing me in. "Haley's room is over there," she added, pointing towards a closed door with a gnarled finger.
"Thanks," I said, squaring my shoulders and picking my way around the various pieces of antique looking furniture in the main room which was so similar to my flat upstairs and yet so different. You know how doilies seem to have disappeared from mainstream use? Well, I think I found out where they've gone. It was like Haley's aunt was running a rescue shelter for all things old and musty.
I knocked lightly on Haley's door, conscious of her aunt's gaze on me and hoping Haley would open up quickly so I could escape her disapproving glare.
"I'm fine thank you, " Haley's weak voice filtered through the door and I felt a flash of sympathy for her having to continually use that 'old person' voice when at home.
"It's Talia," I called out. "Can I come in?"
Haley made strange noise somewhere between a squeak of surprise and a sob and then said hesitantly, "Sure."
I opened the door and then closed it quickly behind myself, wanting to put something solid between me and Haley's scary aunt.
It took me a minute for my eyes to adjust to the brightness of the room after the frankly dank main room. Haley's room was about as far removed from the heavy darkness of what was obviously the aunt's domain as it was possible to be. There was a lot of white, a white chest of drawers, a white cupboard, a white wicker chair, and a white bed with a white doona on top of it. The walls were painted a light green with little swirls of lighter colour through it making it seem as if it was rolling ocean, the whole effect was actually very pretty.
I focused back on task quickly as Haley let out a little sniffle. She was sitting cross legged on the bed, there was a box of tissues next to her and a dishevelled looking bit of tissue clutched in her hand. She looked so miserable I felt like the biggest type of rat there could possibly be.
"Is it alright if I sit down?" I asked, gesturing towards the bed and she nodded and shuffled back a bit so there was room for me to join her.
Once I was settled she threw her tissue into the bin and looked at me with a tiny little spark of defiance I'd never seen in her wide blue eyes before.
"I suppose Jack sent you," she sniffed, pushing a soft wave of her light brown hair behind one of her ears.
"No, he didn't," I said softly. "I mean, he wanted me to apologise of course, but I think he wanted to come down and make sure you were alright first."
She smiled slightly then sighed. "He's sweet. You're really lucky, you know?" She said, envy virtually dripping out of her tone.
I nodded, I truly was despite all the nonsense I was wrapped up in at that moment.
"I am," I agreed. "And I know I don't appreciate it sometimes. Look Haley I've really got to apologise. I've been having a rotten time recently, but that’s absolutely no excuse for going feral at you."
Haley nodded and then gave a little smile. "You know I'm actually kind of glad you yelled at me finally, I was getting kind of sick of the snide remarks."
Damn, she'd noticed those? Then again I suppose she would have had to be pretty obtuse to miss them. There was silence in the room as I struggled to stop myself falling into such a great pit of guilt that I would be useless at apologising. Haley broke it by saying suddenly, "I just don't understand why you hate me so much! I've always gone out of my way to be really nice to you."
Gah, this was excruciating. As mean as I might seem, I really hated the idea of sitting down and discussing with someone why exactly it was that I didn't like them but that was kind of what I had to do to explain myself.
"You have always been really nice to me," I agreed apologetically, "and therein may lie the problem."
"I was too nice to you?"
Well may she look totally incredulous, it does seem pretty weird…even to me.
"Maybe not that exactly, but you treated me differently," I clarified. "When the guys are around you're really perky and giggly but when it's just us girls you clam up and refuse to speak to Simone and I, like you're too good for us or something."
"But that not it!" She protested. "I just don’t know what to say to you. You and Simone are so cool and confident and I thought you'd rather I pretended I wasn't there when we were together."
Cool and confident? Boy was this girl bad at reading people!
"Well, maybe we've managed to get stuck at cross purposes then," I said slowly.
"Maybe," Haley said quietly, biting her bottom lip nervously and then saying quickly, "I never meant to make you think I was insincere or only after the guys, I really thought we could be friends, but you acted like I was the enemy from the get go and I didn't know how to change your mind."
I hated to admit it, but she was actually totally right. I'd decided pretty much the second I met her that she was the enemy. People seem to forget that guys aren't the only ones who get stupidly protective over their friends and family. I'm ludicrously close to both Matt and Jack and I must have somehow thought that she were trying to tear us apart…or maybe it wasn't even that, I miserably admitted to myself, maybe it was just that I didn't like another girl encroaching on my territory.
"Oh my God!" I suddenly exclaimed as I hit a massive realisation. "I'm like Micky. I've been your Micky."
She smiled slightly at that, but I wasn't trying to be funny. I really just had had the most awful epiphany.
"You weren't as bad as Micky," she tried to reassure me, but I was having none of it.
"I pre-judged you and gave you a whole lot of grief you didn't deserve, didn't I?" I asked. "So
then in principle I am, I'm a bloody Micky and I'm really, truly sorry."
"That's OK." Haley looked a little uncomfortable at my obvious distress. "You were right with some things. I do pretend to like football although I have no idea what's going on and sometimes my clothes are inappropriate for the weather."
"Oh, so you do feel the cold then?" I asked before I could stop myself.
She didn't seem offended, however, she just gave a little laugh and nodded. "Yeah sometimes I'm freezing!"
"So why do you wear what you do?"
"Because," she suddenly covered her face with her hands and mumbled through them, "I'm going to sound really pathetic, but it's because that's what everyone else wears." She peeped at me over the top of her fingers. "Awful, right?"
I shrugged, trying to be diplomatic, "Wear whatever you like. Nobody, especially a jeans addict like myself should pass judgement on what you want to wear. Please don't waste time thinking that any of my nasty opinions actually have any merit to them. You are so pretty I'm sure you'd look just fine in a sack."
I couldn't stop my voice from sounding a little bit grudging, but when she blushed, I did manage to hold back a sigh at the way it made her seem sweet and innocent rather than like she was suffering from a bad case of sunburn like it did with me. After all, that really wasn't her fault.
Wow, looked like I was improving already!
"I'm not as pretty as you," Haley said after a moment and I snorted loudly at this obvious lie. "No, I'm serious," she protested. "You don't see the looks guys give you, you're so confident, you don't let anyone mess you about and they think it's hot." She flushed even deeper at this and I rolled my eyes.
"There's a difference between staring at someone because they've just marched in and made a total fool of themselves and staring at someone because they think they're attractive," I said forcefully. "You could have any guy you want, but you’ll only flirt with the group of guys you hang out with. As soon as anybody else comes near you clam up. I've always thought that was because you only wanted Matt or one of the others, but that's not it, is it?"
She hugged a pillow to her chest and shook her head sadly. "I'm shy," she murmured. "And maybe it seemed like I was too clingy, always coming round and everything, but Matt and the others seemed to like me. I didn't even care that it was probably only because they felt sorry for me because other guys don't want anything to do with me."
Ergh! I wanted to grab her shoulders and shake her! How could she be so blind? I quickly felt my frustration subsiding, however, to be replaced with sympathy and a little bit of embarrassment that I could have read her so wrong.
"Oh, Haley," I sighed, "we're both of us useless at this guy thing, aren't we?"
"Not you, you've got Jack," she said encouragingly.
Something in my chest contracted cruelly at her words and I shook my head. "No I don't," I told her truthfully, "I never did, not really. It wasn't real, any of it, I kind of talked him into teaching me about being with a guy because I was so rubbish at it."
Her eyes widened and I could see she was trying to understand what I meant, after all it sounded pretty weird. I wasn't in the mood to properly explain my full pathetic exploits then, however, especially not to someone I had only just stopped hating.
I looked down at her bedspread in shame at what I'd done and so was surprised when she said softly, "I don't know the full details of how you and Jack came about, but you only have to look at him to see how much he cares about you."
"As his best friend's sister," I agreed, "but not anything more."
Wait a minute? More? Did I want Jack as more than a friend? The answer came back to me very quickly and it went something along the lines of: 'Of course you do you bloody idiot!' Cue the lightning bolt cracking the sky and waking me up!
I know it seems utterly preposterous, but honestly, it was only at that moment that I let my common sense collide with my emotions and I jumped as if electrocuted. It was so much more complicated than I had ever imagined!
I liked Jack, as in like liked! Maybe I even…no! I wasn't going to go that far, that really was dangerous territory to start treading in.
All the time we'd been together I'd tried to explain away the tingles as nothing more than a chemical reaction, excitement whatever, I'd made sure I never really connected it to Jack. I was such a total moron, all the signs had been there, I got jealous over Haley, I wanted to be with him all the time and I was prepared to risk my mental health and my relationship with my brother to be with him.
What if he knew? Oh my God that would be too embarrassing for words, he would think I was totally pathetic!
Haley was watching me with some concern, I suppose I must have looked pretty odd as those thoughts ran through my head. "Are you alright?" She asked, "You look like you've just been slapped or something."
"Jack," I murmured faintly.
"Ah." She smiled knowingly. "You love him, right?"
"No!" I snapped quickly. "Nothing like that. That would be totally stupid."
"Why?"
"Because!" I struggled for a moment with the overwhelming swell of feelings I was experiencing. "He's like family, he's my brother's best mate, he's going away…ergh this really is horrible." I stood up off the bed and actually found myself wringing my hands. "Look, I'm really sorry, Haley, but I've got to go, I hope you'll forgive me for how I've behaved towards you in the past. I really think we could be friends."
"Yeah, I'd like that," she agreed, although I could tell she was a bit confused by my sudden desire to leave.
I was about to go but, on a sudden impulse, I asked, "Hey why do you always call me Natalia?"
"Oh when you first arrived here Micky told me…" she began to trail off and our eyes met in a mutual understanding of what a tool that boy was, "…he told me you prefer it with people you don't know very well," she finished, shaking her head. "He was having me on, right?"
"Oh yeah," I agreed before smiling at her once more and exiting her bedroom.
We weren't friends yet, far from it, but I did think that with a bit of time and an open mind on my part we could be at some stage. Preferably a stage when there wasn't so much drama going on.
I skirted through the main room of her flat, glad that I didn't run into her scary aunt again, and pelted up the stairs to my flat again. Once inside I ran into my room and rummaged through my bag until I found my mobile.
There was no way in hell I was going to stay in the flat that night and with Simone refusing to see me that really only left one person who wasn't first a friend of my brother's.
Flicking through the address book I selected Adam's number and then moved around the room packing a small overnight bag as it rang. I was worried for a moment that he wasn't going to answer but eventually there was a click and Adam's warm voice said, "Hey Talia."
I was so relieved I sank down upon my bed and smiled widely.
"Hi Adam, how's things?"
"They'd be better if you hadn't left me all alone today, you cow," he said jokingly. It took me a second to figure out what he was talking about and then it clicked. It was a uni day! I'd had a lecture that morning but taken it off to be with Jack when he found out about the scholarship. Thinking about Jack and the scholarship made my heart sink a little but I rallied enough to say lightly, "Oh I'm sure you managed just fine without me." I took a deep breath and ploughed on, "Hey I know this is totally out of the blue and everything, but would it be alright if I crashed at yours tonight?"
"Oh." Adam sounded surprised and so he should, we were great mates but we weren't really at the stage where we had impromptu sleepovers. Still, he obviously heard some of the desperation in my voice as a second later he said jovially, "Yeah of course you can. Is something wrong?"
"No," I lied, "I'm just getting a bit of cabin fever being stuck in this flat all the time and thought it would be nice to hang out somewhere else for a change."
Rubbish excuse I know, but I really didn't have time to think of anything better. I
t was clear he wasn't convinced but the sweetheart just agreed that he got that way sometimes too and said he was on his way to pick me up.
I approved of this plan as I really wasn't in the mood to drive, I'd probably drive on the wrong side of the road or something. I took the time it took for him to come over writing a quick note to the boys to let them know where I was and that I would be back the next morning, and taking deep breaths to try and calm myself. I could handle this. Tonight I would hide at Adam's and tomorrow I would tell Matt about Jack and me, leaving out, of course, the realisation I'd had down at Haley's. I didn't bother trying to make plans for what would happen after that, there was no point, if Matt acted the way I thought he would Jack or I or both of us would be dead which rather neatly solved the problem.
Yes, I was being a bit melodramatic, but it was better than actually thinking about what would happen when I told Matt.
When Adam turned up I was so glad to see someone not entangled in my mess that I flew into his arms and gave him a big hug, unashamedly hiding my face against his jacket.
"Hey." I could hear the smile in his voice. "Bad day?"
"You have no idea," I mumbled against him before pulling away and forcing myself to smile reassuringly. "But nothing major," I lied. "Let's go."
And so Adam took my cue and did not pry about my sudden need to escape. Instead he took me to his place where we ordered pizza and made drinks (my vodka lemon consisting of considerably more vodka than lemon) and snuggled together on the couch. The TV was on in the background, but we weren't paying attention, rather we talked non-stop covering many topics and laughing a lot, although it must be said my good humour was a little forced.
The sun hid itself behind the mountains, the moon and stars came out as we chatted and after that it wasn't long before the day's extreme highs and lows began to catch up with me. I began yawning more and more often and my eyes drooped. During a lull in the conversation I must have drifted off completely, I was so warm and comfortable.
It seemed only seconds after my eyes had closed, however, that a noise woke me and I jerked awake, confused for a moment as to where I was. There was a pillow beneath my head and a doona over me which hadn't been there the night before, and bright, greyish light was streaming in through the curtain-less windows of Adam's somewhat dingy apartment. I struggled into a sitting position and saw Adam looking at me from over in the kitchen area wearing a crumpled T-shirt and a pair of satiny boxers.
"Sorry," he said with that cute grin of his. "I was trying not to wake you, but I dropped the coffee canister." He held it up for me to see and added, "Want some?"
I shook my head, still a little disorientated. Then it hit me. Tomorrow was today.
It was the day that I finally told Matt what I'd done to his best mate, although I knew it was what he thought of as his best mate doing to me that was going to cause the most issues. I groaned and threw the doona back over my head wanting to hide for just a few minutes longer. I heard Adam chuckling and then his voice saying, "Got a bit of a hangover have you?"
And yes, now he mentioned it, I realised I had. Still, the thumping inside my head was nothing compared to the odd thumping inside my chest; in fact it was quite nice to blame some of the misery I was feeling on an excess of alcohol the night before. Kicking back the duvet I saw that I was wearing the clothes I'd worn all yesterday, well of course! I'd fallen asleep on the couch and Adam was hardly going to get me into my pyjamas.
Man I must look as scungy as I felt!
Standing up and finding that I was swaying slightly and my bladder was full to bursting, I asked Adam whether I could have a shower and he nodded towards a closed door.
"Sorry about the mess," he apologised in advance and I laughed lightly as I picked up my bag which contained a fresh set of clothes.
"I live with two boys, Adam, it won't be anything I haven't seen before."
And it wasn't, stuff was scattered all across the small counter and the shower mat was a sodden mess, but for a guy who lived on his own, I thought it was relatively clean. I went to the loo and then stripped off my crumpled clothes and climbed into the shower.
The pressure was rubbish and the temperature didn't seem to get above luke-warm which made it seem to me that the shower was personifying how I was feeling. Sleeping on the couch had given me a sore neck to go with my pounding head and heart, I really must have looked a complete mess.
I scrubbed myself with the sliver of cracked soap I found in the shower caddy and used the shampoo and conditioner I'd remembered to bring with me to try and rub a bit of normalcy back into my body. It wasn't a totally successful plan, but I did feel quite a bit more human as I stepped out of the shower and grabbed an already slightly wet towel from the towel rail to dry myself off. I dressed quickly in a pair of beige cords and a black low scooped three quarter sleeved top and stepped out into the main room towelling dry my hair as I did so.
"Your shower sucks," I informed Adam and he nodded the truth of it as he sat in an arm chair drinking his coffee in jeans and a T-shirt, he'd obviously got changed whilst I'd been in the shower.
I brushed my hair and began twisting it back into two plaits on either side of my head asking casually as I did so, "What time is it?"
Adam looked at his massive over sized watch (why is it that men always have such massive watches? Are they not able to see the numbers on smaller watches or something?) and his eyes widened in surprise.
"Christ, it's just after 11."
"Seriously?" I fastened the second plait with a thin hair tie and gaped at him in astonishment. Despite everything, I’d slept for a very long time. Maybe my body had offered sleep to me as some form of escape. I wished momentarily that I could pull a Sleeping Beauty and conk out for a 100 years, that would solve things pretty conclusively.
Unfortunately, reality was knocking insistently on my already sore head so I said, "I'd better get back, Matt and Jack will be wondering where I am."
"Can you grab some breakfast at the uni-caf with me first?" Adam asked, getting to his feet immediately, putting his coffee cup into the sink and grabbing a jacket and his car keys off his table.
I thought about it for a moment as I pulled on my black boots. I really should have hurried back to the flat as quickly as possible, but my inner coward pushed to the front of my warring emotions and I found myself nodding. "But just quickly," I qualified as we headed out the door.
As it was about half 11 by the time we made it to the café, we ordered toasted cheese sandwiches as a kind of brunch and he had another coffee while I opted for orange juice, I was jittery enough as it was. I was barely able to keep the small bites of my sandwich down as my stomach was churning so hard, and I gazed unseeingly out of the large windows we sat in front of rehearsing various ways to tell Matt about Jack and me.
I was so wrapped up in my thoughts I almost forgot Adam was there and so jumped dramatically when he gave a little cough and began to speak.
"Talia, I was wondering something."
I looked at him a little dazed and then nodded, trying to look interested in what he was saying.
"When I first met you you'd just broken up with that Brad guy, right?" I nodded again, barely able to muster up the interest into where he was going with that line of inquiry. "And I got that you weren't interested in the whole dating thing then, but I was wondering whether that had changed at all, you know since we started being such good mates."
I froze, my orange juice half way to my lips. No, no, no, no, no! Not now! Not something else that I had to worry about!
I put my glass back down on the table with a thump and tried to ignore the fact that I'd just gone bright red.
"You mean me and you…?" I let the sentence trail off, but it was obvious where I had been heading.
Adam nodded, his orangey hair flopping slightly as he did so. "If you feel like you're cool with it then, yeah, I'd really like to go out sometime."
"Oh." Well he couldn't really have put it much plainer then
that. Crap! I'd already let him down gently once before, I wasn't sure I could do it a second time and keep him a friend, but I sure as hell didn't want to lose him. My brain whirred looking for something just right to say but it was too exhausted at having been squeezed for what to tell Matt. I was screwed.
I looked at Adam and all that sprang to mind was the truth, I could give him that at least, I was sick of lying anyway. "The thing is-" I began, but at that moment someone appeared next to the table, casting a shadow over our food.
Adam and I both looked up and I had to bit back a groan as I saw it was Micky.
"Hey, this happened before," said Adam, not seeming the least bit fazed by his band mate's sudden appearance. "I'm not late for a band meeting this time am I?"
"No." Micky actually seemed to send a genuine smile over at Adam and I thought fleetingly that he actually looked quite nice looking when he wasn't scowling or smirking. All even vaguely pleasant thoughts about him fled however as he turned his eyes on me and I remembered what I had promised to in order to be able to tell Matt myself. He had probably sought me out specifically so he could torture me with this 'respect him' business.
"Hi, Micky," I said, trying my utmost to sound polite. "That's…um…a really good shirt you're wearing." Out of the corner of my eye I saw Adam raise his eyebrows in surprise and had to fight back a sort of hysterical laugh as I added, "It really makes your eyes pop. And I mean that respectfully."
At this Adam burst out laughing but Micky and I were totally solemn as we eyed each other. Micky opened his mouth, presumably to tell me that I obviously had trouble distinguishing between respect and taking the piss, but then his mobile rang. He snatched it out of his pocket and turned away from the table as he spoke to whomever was on the other end.
Adam, his eyes still twinkling with mirth, leant forward and asked, "What was that all about?"
I shook my head, indicating with my hands that Micky was still close by and that I didn't want to talk about it just yet. Adam looked surprised but nodded that he understood. I picked up my now cold sandwich and took a massive bite hoping to forestall Adam from pursuing the conversation Micky had interrupted.
This turned out to be a bad idea as a second later, when I was still chewing on the mixture of bread and melted cheese, Micky swore loudly, slammed shut his mobile, returned to the table and grabbed me by the arm.
"Hey, what-" I choked as he dragged me to my feet.
"Micky what are you doing?" Adam half yelled also getting up and trying to push him away from me.
"Go home," Micky said intensely reaching down, grabbing my bag and shoving it at me. I clutched it automatically and found myself being propelled out of the café by Micky, Adam protesting and following in our wake. "Where's your car?" Micky demanded looking round the car park and obviously not seeing my little car there.
"I don't have it with me," I said, finally managing to swallow my mouthful and turning to glare at Micky. "Let go of me."
"Fine, you'll have to take her," Micky said, ignoring me and turning instead to Adam who was looking entirely bemused.
"OK, but why-" He wasn't allowed to finish either as Micky looked at me again and said in a low, serious voice,
"You need to go home. Now." He released me roughly towards Adam who put his hands protectively on my shoulders and began to yell something at Micky about him being an arse. I didn't really notice the commotion as tiny icicles of fear were forming on my spine and I suddenly was finding it hard to breath.
"Let's go," I gasped, grabbing Adam by the arm and pulling him towards his car. I ran round to the passenger side and got in, hoping that Adam wouldn't waste time demanding answers. He thankfully seemed to have caught some of my panic and got into the car and put it in gear without any arguments. A second later we shot out of parking lot so fast that there was a squeal of rubber and we probably left a black mark on the asphalt.
"What's going on?" Adam asked as we drove quickly through the light traffic towards my building.
"We'll find out soon enough," I told him curtly, not really in the mood to hash over the details. "Just please get there as quickly as possible."
We didn't talk after that and, a few minutes later when we pulled up alongside my car, he didn't object when I shot out before he'd even brought the vehicle to a complete stop, he just followed me as I flew up the stairs to my floor.
I fumbled with my keys, so nervous that I was unable to find the right one and then when I finally did find it I couldn't get my hands to stop shaking enough to get it into the keyhole.
"Here." Adam took the key off me and put it cleanly into the lock before pushing the door open and standing back as I darted around him and ran into the main room.
The scene was as bad as I had feared. The place was an absolute tip, the dining room table had been overturned and the chairs were scattered around it as some dervish had whirled through our designated dining area. The other thing I noticed was a massive dent in the plaster near my door and the phone receiver lying in bits on the floor beneath the hole. It didn't take a CSI specialist to figure out that someone had thrown the phone at the wall and I was willing to bet that person had been Matt.
It wasn't the surroundings that disturbed me so much that I felt like I had suddenly fallen into a patch of quicksand and was sinking fast, however. It was the sight of Matt and Jack, the erstwhile brothers and comrades, their faces scant inches apart, my brother with a handful of Jack's shirt while it looked like Jack was trying to push him away, that broke me and I screamed, "No, Matt, leave him alone!" Before I could think through the repercussions that might have.
Matt and Jack both turned their heads to see me and Adam framed in the doorway and I felt my eyes smart with tears at the hollow look on both their faces. Matt's expression changed as he saw me, the mottled ruddiness already visible on his skin going even redder and a furious scowl twisting the mouth that was usually so ready to smile.
That grotesque look chilled me deeply and confirmed all the fears I’d had about how Matt would react when he found out about Jack and me. I opened my mouth to warn Jack but I was too late. Turning away from me Matt suddenly yelled, “Bastard!"
He slammed his fist hard into Jack's stomach, throwing him back against the wall and not seeming to care that his best friend's head was smacked hard into the plaster.
"Matt-" Jack's voice was so agonised I wondered how Matt's heart wasn't wrenched in two like it felt mine had been.
"Don't talk to me!" Matt growled loudly and his fist flew out again, this time catching Jack with a powerful blow across his jaw.
"Bloody hell," I heard Adam mutter before he brushed past me and forced his way between the two boys. "Matt come on, mate," he said calmingly, pulling at my brother and managing to get him to release Jack who slid down the wall to slump on the carpet.
As Adam propelled Matt towards the door and, therefore, me, I saw that his eyes, so like mine, were gazing at me with the most hurt expression I had ever seen. Knowing that it really wasn't the time to break down, but having a hard time stopping myself regardless, I numbly told Adam to take Matt down to the car-park and moved further into the flat to gather up Matt's car keys and wallet. There was no way Matt could stay here, he would have to go somewhere to cool off.
Before I followed Adam outside I knelt down beside Jack and gently cupped his face on the side he had not been hit.
"Jack?" I asked quietly. "Are you alright?"
He looked up at me, his expression incredulous, his eyes holding limitless, intense pain but I knew it wasn't from where he'd been hit. "It's going to be OK," I whispered, my voice cracking over the fact that I didn't know that for certain. "I'm going to make sure Matt's alright and then I'm going to come back and we're going to sort this out. He didn't mean to hurt you, he's just angry but he'll get over it."
"Yeah," Jack agreed hoarsely, but we both knew that we were just trying to reassure the other. I bent my head and kissed him gently on the lips, conscious that he was hurt and being
very careful not to make any of his injuries worse.
I wanted desperately to stay there with Jack and let him comfort me with empty words, but I forced myself to pull back and get to my feet. "I'll be back soon," I promised him, hurrying from the flat and down the stairs to the car park where I saw that Adam had released Matt and was simply standing next to him, looking grave. When he saw me exit the building he walked over and I smiled feebly at him.
"I'm so sorry about all this," I said fervently. "And thanks for diving in there, I probably wouldn't have been able to separate them."
"No problem," he said in his usual easy way although it was obvious he was a bit uncomfortable at getting caught in the middle of our little domestic. "I can see now why you were in such a hurry to get here. What did Jack do?"
I looked at him in confusion for a moment and then realised that, of course, he didn't know what had gotten into Matt up in the flat.
"I'll tell you later," I said awkwardly. "Right now I should probably…" I trailed off and gestured towards Matt who was now slumped against his car watching us.
"Right, of course. Be in touch, yeah?" Adam gave me a quick hug then went over to his car.
As he drove off I took a deep breath and started to walk slowly towards Matt. This was not going to be pretty.
So Much to Learn Page 45
