Among a Thousand Stars

by Jo Bartlett

  ‘So you’d rather let the world think that Chloe’s love songs are aimed at you?’ Ashleigh furrowed her brow, what difference did it make who the press thought Chloe was writing about? If it ended with Hugo, it ended. It was hardly as though Chloe and Tom would skip up the aisle one day either, not unless someone performed a lobotomy on him and he had a complete change of personality.

  ‘We can control that story, play it out to Chloe’s advantage. If the world finds out about her and Hugo, she risks the same exposés made by her previous boyfriend when it finishes. Her new image is not about playing the victim.’ He was like a frustrated parent having to explain something to a child for the tenth time over.

  ‘So it’s about control?’ Ashleigh was every bit the child whose opinion didn’t seem to matter to anyone. She wanted to shout that he didn’t understand what she was trying to say and to slam a few doors for effect. ‘What if Chloe and Hugo really have found love, how are you going to control that?’

  ‘What, after a week of knowing each other?’ Sarcasm dripped from Tom’s voice, his every reaction, as she’d known it would be. ‘Get real Ashleigh. I don’t know why we’re having this conversation, what is it that you expect me to say?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know, maybe that it’s nice to see Chloe so happy, that you hope she’s found someone as great as Hugo seems to be.’ Holding back the threatened tears she forced herself to look him in the eyes. ‘You know those normal kind of responses.’

  ‘I think I should go.’ There was a hint of emotion in Tom’s voice, but she couldn’t be sure if it was anger or something else.

  ‘I think you’re right. I know we agreed there were no strings, but this isn’t working for me anymore and we always said we’d get out at that point, didn’t we?’ Her voice was calm, unlike the rest of her.

  ‘I think those were the terms.’ Tom picked up his keys. ‘In that case, I’ll see myself out.’

  Ashleigh, whose stomach was in knots and whose throat was aching with the effort of bottling up her feelings, trotted out a well-practised last line, perhaps the business-like delivery would impress Tom. ‘I hope this won’t affect our professional relationship.’

  There was a suggestion of something in Tom’s eyes, as though he wanted to respond differently to the question than he did. ‘Of course not. I’ll have Angus get in touch about some assignments in the New Year.’

  Ashleigh didn’t respond. The lemony scent of his aftershave lingered in the air as she sank down on the sofa, finally allowing the tears to flow, as bitter as the now cold coffee on the table beside her.

  ****

  ‘No Ashleigh today then, darling?’ Isobel greeted Tom at the front door of her sister’s house with a warm hug, but disappointment that he was on his own was evident on her face.

  ‘Not today. It’s just a flying visit I’m afraid.’ Tom wasn’t about to stand on the doorstep and tell her that Ashleigh had called things off. His aunt’s neighbours weren’t adverse to a bit of eavesdropping. The middle-aged couple, who lived next door, had come out as soon as he’d arrived and were making a great show of examining a rosebush that wouldn’t sprout a leaf for months, probably on the off chance of hearing a bit of juicy gossip. Curtains were no doubt twitching all around them.

  He was already in a bad mood and a well-meaning enquiry from a nosey neighbour might well have tipped him over the edge. For days he’d thought of little else but spending the afternoon in bed with Ashleigh, and he’d cursed himself on the drive to his aunt’s. It was always going to be difficult for someone like her not to get more involved than he wanted.

  ‘That’s okay darling, I’m just thrilled you weren’t coming to tell me that the two of you had split up.’ She fixed him with the kind of steely glare that she’d once reserved for getting him to do his homework. ‘You know that sort of news could literally kill me don’t you?’

  ‘Where’s Auntie Maureen anyway?’ Tom changed the subject; he wasn’t keen to lie to his mum, so the less said the better.

  ‘They’ve gone for a look around the sales.’ Isobel grimaced. ‘So Bertie and I have taken the opportunity to have a cuddle on the sofa. We’re not normally allowed!’

  ‘Why don’t you just go home then?’ How his mum and her sister had emerged from the same gene pool was a mystery to Tom. ‘Do you think I’m allowed in?’

  ‘Yes of course darling, but probably best to take your shoes off, just in case she gets home before you go.’

  ‘Got to love Auntie Maureen, she’ll have us all shuffling around like psychotic inmates who can’t be trusted with their own shoelaces.’ Tom followed his mother into the house, which ironically had quite a few similarities with a padded cell. There were thick, white shag pile carpets, which he’d assumed had gone out in the Seventies, and white walls. Only the glass chandeliers and coffee tables, with ornate marble columns supporting their weight, offered any contrast in the room. Homely it wasn’t.

  ‘So, how was the rest of your Christmas? Romantic I hope!’ Isobel’s eyes lit up. It wasn’t going to be easy for him to get out of talking about Ashleigh.

  ‘It was great, the best one for years.’ It was true. Of course it didn’t mean anything, but they’d had a good time; even he couldn’t deny that.

  ‘I’m so glad, darling, you’d be an absolute fool to let Ashleigh go.’ Patting the dog’s head she smiled. ‘Bertie sensed it straight away and dogs are an excellent judge of character. Call it a mother’s intuition, but I really think she could be the one.’

  ‘We’ll see.’ He couldn’t bring himself to shatter her illusions, it could wait until the New Year and maybe there’d be another candidate for his mother’s romantic fantasies by then. After all, just because a dog and an elderly woman thought so, it didn’t mean he’d really lost something important, did it?

  ****

  Twenty minutes after Tom left there was a knock at the door. Maybe he was back, coming to tell her he’d got it all wrong. Ashleigh’s heart thudded; let it be him. But it wasn’t. Instead Carol was framed in the doorway, swathed in crushed purple velvet and looking very much like she’d rummaged through Dumbledore’s closet.

  ‘Mum.’ She couldn’t inject any enthusiasm into the word. ‘What are you doing here?’ She’d have to let her mother in, otherwise she’d draw even more attention to herself. Carol began waving the object she was holding in the air, the feathers, shells and weird tassely bits jerking about as she did so.

  ‘I’ve brought you a dream catcher!’ Her mother continued to make it dance in the air and Ashleigh automatically folded her arms across her chest. A dream catcher? Right. Useful.

  ‘Are you stopping?’ She did her best not to make it sound like an invitation.

  ‘I can’t really, darling, I’m going to my path to tranquillity classes.’ Carol breezed past, despite saying she couldn’t stop. It was almost certainly best not to ask what the ‘path to tranquillity’ classes were.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Ashleigh asked the question even though it quickly became obvious, as her mother began throwing open every window in the flat. A more appropriate question might have been to ask why.

  ‘There’s a lot of negative energy.’ Carol gave her a look, which suggested that Ashleigh had brought it on herself. ‘And it smells worse than my five bean pot roast in here.’ When Ashleigh started to protest, her mother cut her off. ‘Oh, I know you all think I’m daft and that I don’t know what you say about my cooking. Yes I know the five bean roast stinks when I’m cooking it and that it gives you gas like a warthog, but it’s very good for the soul… and the bowel come to that.’

  ‘Mum, please, do you have to make everything about bodily functions?’ Ashleigh was exhausted and, despite her protestations, too weak to really fight her mother on anything. She could only hope to God that Carol didn’t pick up on that, or she’d be dragged along the path to tranquillity too. There was no way she was going to
confide in her mother about finishing with Tom either. The last thing she wanted was to find herself press-ganged into a date with Nigel, the sweaty bell-ringer who she’d caught staring at her several times during her mother’s party, before you could say campanologist.

  ‘Oh relax, will you darling, you need to get out more – physically and mentally – you spend far too much time in your own head. You really should mediate with me, such a shame I don’t have time before I go.’ Carol wavered for a moment.

  ‘Yes it’s a shame, but you really have got to go.’ Ashleigh stopped short of actually shoving her mum through the door, but it came pretty close.

  ‘Okay, darling, well another time, definitely.’ The promise was akin to a threat. ‘And don’t forget this.’ Thrusting the dream catcher into Ashleigh’s hand, Carol swept out of the flat, almost running down the path to tranquillity by now.

  ‘What the hell am I supposed to do with this?’ Ashleigh spoke out loud in the empty flat, setting down the unwanted gift on the coffee table. One by one she shut the windows that her mother had just opened. Dreams only set you up for disappointment and, right now, the only thing she was in danger of catching was a cold.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Given that she’d only sent muted responses to his texts inviting her over to see him, and sidestepped his questions about how things were going with Tom, Ashleigh wasn’t completely shocked when Stevie turned up on her doorstep, late in the afternoon of the thirty-first. Although she wished he hadn’t; it wasn’t fair on Zac to lose out just because she was a walking disaster when it came to love.

  Resolving not to be pathetic and cry, Ashleigh recounted the events of Boxing Day, her decision to finish with Tom and the resulting conversation the day before. Predictably, after some tea and sympathy from Stevie, her resolve was soon broken. It was a mixture of the break up and it being New Year’s Eve again, the anniversary of her dad’s tragic accident, that did it, tears blurring the lines between the two things.

  ‘Right, there’s only one thing for it.’ Stevie stood up and pulled Ashleigh to her feet. ‘It’s New Year’s Eve tonight and we’re going out to get very, very drunk.’

  ‘Oh no, Stevie, please, I really don’t want to.’ She did her best to sit down again, but there was no way he was letting go. ‘You should be with Zac anyway, not keeping a miserable idiot like me company.’

  ‘Honey, no arguments, not tonight. Forget about Tom and let’s have a drink to your dad’s memory instead. Zac’s on his way over anyway and we’re taking you out.’ He propelled her towards the bedroom. ‘Get changed and I’ll pour us both a huge drink.’

  ****

  By the time Zac arrived, they were well on the way to getting plastered. Ashleigh had squeezed into a midnight blue body-contour dress that Stevie had bought her the Christmas before. Having miraculously lost half a stone since Boxing Day, the dress finally clung to her in all the right places.

  ‘Heartbreak obviously suits you, babe.’ Zac hadn’t quite relinquished the Casanova act and he pinched her bum enthusiastically. ‘Come on then, let’s get this party started.’

  Aubrey’s wine bar was heaving with people, it was certainly too closely packed to catch someone’s eye across a crowded room and, as a result, not many people realised that Zac Starr was among their number. Ashleigh wasn’t in the mood for getting caught up with fans wanting an autograph. She just wanted to get drunk and wipe the past few months out of her mind so that she could forget all about Tom, at least until she sobered up.

  At some point, someone, it must have been either Zac or Stevie she supposed, decided it would be a good idea to move on to tequila. The boys hit the dance floor not long afterwards, but couldn’t persuade Ashleigh to join them – the tequila holding far more appeal by that stage. After the fourth shot, she was becoming more numb than emotional, when he suddenly appeared, a face from the past.

  ‘Wow, Ash, baby. You are looking hot!’ Liam hadn’t changed a bit. He was still as slimy as ever and the way he was looking at her made her flesh crawl. Had she really been in a relationship with him for all that time and not noticed what a vile human being he was? ‘And you’ve lost weight.’

  ‘Thanks.’ She wished she could be one of those people who could casually tell someone else to ‘piss off’, but she wasn’t. Even though she gave Liam no encouragement whatsoever, he wedged himself tightly into the seat beside her. She was too drunk to care that almost the entire side of his body was pressed against hers, so she didn’t bother moving – mistake number one. ‘No Millie tonight then?’ His librarian lover was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘We split up at the beginning of the month.’ Liam leered at her, as if expecting her to be overjoyed.

  ‘What was up? Didn’t you want to fork out for a Christmas present!’ Ashleigh swayed forward, laughing a bit over enthusiastically at her own joke, which gave Liam an excuse to put his arm around her, drawing her back into her seat.

  ‘Don’t be like that babe, you know how generous I can be.’ He winked at her and she shuddered slightly at a memory she’d rather not have had. He’d always gone on about how hard he worked to make sure she had two orgasms. His workmanlike approach to the task was somewhat off putting, however. More often than not she’d faked at least one of them, just to make sure the determined poking and prodding had stopped. Yet with Tom it had been so different. But she wouldn’t think about it, couldn’t let herself weaken. It was far better to end it now.

  ‘So, what was the problem then?’ Ashleigh wasn’t even interested, but somewhere in the foggy, cotton wool wasteland of her brain, it seemed a good idea to keep him talking; at least that way he wouldn’t be able to stick his tongue down her throat.

  ‘She kept on about rings constantly. It was all she wanted for Christmas, some big engagement scene in front of all of her family.’ It was Liam’s turn to shudder. ‘You know me babe, commitment, mortgages and all that stuff, it’s just not for a free spirit like me.’ He flicked his hair, probably thinking it made him look cool. But, having grown it to shoulder length and added heavy blond streaks since his split with Ashleigh, he was uncannily like Miss Piggy.

  ‘Hi Ya!’ She mimed the Muppet’s famous karate move and got a blank look in return. She was definitely drunk. ‘Sorry, not sure what came over me there. Was Millie, very upset?’ Maybe he’d left another poor girl to struggle with a mortgage alone.

  ‘Yeah, judging by the twenty texts a day I received for the first couple of weeks, I’d say so.’ Liam gave her a self-satisfied smile. ‘You know what it’s like to be on the end of that kind of heartbreak yourself though, don’t you babe?’ There wasn’t a hint of irony in his words and Ashleigh struggled not to laugh, to tell him he’d been a minor bump in the road. It wasn’t until Tom that she hit the big pothole and understood what her break up with Liam should have felt like, if she’d ever really loved him.

  ‘So back with your mum are you?’ Ashleigh smiled. Martha, Liam’s mum, had been one of the nicest things about him. She was a warm homely kind of woman, who fussed around after Liam, taking great care of the girls who passed through his life too, and still referred to him as her little prince.

  ‘Yeah, for now at least.’ There was a suggestion that, if she played her cards right, she might get a new roommate.

  ‘Right, so really living that free spirit life then…’ Laughing again, she nearly choked as she took another huge slug of tequila. Zac had persuaded the barman to sell him a couple of bottles, so that he didn’t have to queue with the masses for drinks. He and Stevie were still dancing, and looked vaguely like they were practising their synchronised swimming moves on dry land, so it was down to Ashleigh to keep necking tequila for the team.

  ‘What about you babe, how’s your love life?’ Liam ignored her snide comment, either too thick or too drunk himself to notice. ‘Any action, or are you still missing these hips?’ He swivelled his pelvis in what he probably assumed w
as an alluring manner and a wave of pure disgust swept over her.

  ‘Oh my God, don’t please!’ She took another swig of tequila to push the nausea back down her throat. How could she have slept with someone like Liam? She’d wanted to live with this man, really? Maybe one day she’d bump into Tom at work and have the same reaction, but she very much doubted it. ‘I’ve just finished with someone actually, but I don’t want to talk about it.’ Liam was absolutely the last person on earth she would choose as a confidante.

  ‘Oh shame, dumped again.’ He seemed to think it was fate, a golden opportunity to get Ashleigh into bed and he gave her thigh a painful squeeze. ‘You know your problem, don’t you babe?’

  ‘No, I don‘t actually.’ Ashleigh wasn’t about to correct his assumption that she, as he so eloquently put it, had been dumped. ‘But I’m sure you’re about to tell me.’

  ‘You’re damaged goods.’ The bluntness of his response shouldn’t have shocked her, but it did.

  ‘What you mean because I’m still so heartbroken over you?’ She gave a brittle little laugh. If only he knew.

  ‘No, well, at least not at first, I don’t suppose it helped though.’ Liam patted her leg almost as though he might be sorry for what he’d put her through. ‘You’ve always been like it, at least as long as I’ve known you. I reckon it’s to do with your mum and dad and everything, you’re just so needy.’

  ‘Needy?’ She struggled not to shout the words and tears began prickling at the mention of her dad tonight of all nights, Liam had clearly forgotten the significance of New Year’s Eve.

  ‘Yeah, you’ve got no self-esteem babe. You need constant reassurance that you’re doing your job well, that you look okay, that the person you’re with really loves you, blah, blah, blah.’ He blew out his cheeks with a long breath, like a marathon runner at the end of a race. ‘Frankly babe, it’s exhausting.’