Breaking Leila (27 page)

“We broke up
over the weekend,” she blurted out. “Joseph and I.”

“I’m sorry.”
Now I had to pick my words carefully. Had to use a needle when I
normally skewered them on a knife. “Has he said something to you
this morning?”

She sniffed.
“Nothing I didn’t encourage. It was just a bit of a shock.”

“It always is,
I think.” Shimmering taupe swept over her eyelids as I painted her
pretty again. “You’ll be all right though, Isobel. You know that,
don’t you?”

“He’s a Nazi. He needs…” She shrugged helplessly. “Therapy.
Or something. He was using prostitutes. You should know, Leila.
After–well.
 
That
 
night.”

I lowered my
eyes. “Was he really?”

“But you
mustn’t tell anyone I told you. He’s pissed as it is.”

“Of course. Try
not to blink.” I stroked mascara over her long lashes. “How did you
find out?”

“He told me. He
 
told
 
me. It was a very bad night.
Do you know what they call him, his friends?”

Did I want to?
“No.”

Air hissed through her nostrils. “The
 
Chairman of the
Whored
. All this time, all these months,
they’ve all been laughing at me–”

Jesus. “Of
course they haven’t. Why would anyone find that funny?”

“I don’t know, Leila.” She swallowed. “I thought I was
indulging him, that night with you. I never realized it was one of
his fucking
 
hobbies
.”

“I’ll bet.” I
dusted bronzer over her cheekbones and held up a little mirror.
“There. You look beautiful.”

Another sad
little sob. “Thank you. Really. You’ve done a great job.”

“Technically,
it was Lancome.” I smiled, and reached over and tucked a strand of
hair behind her ear. “Not that you need it.”

A flush lit her
cheeks as she glanced away. “If–if you knew something…you’d tell
me, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course.”
Needles, needles. Prick prick prick.

“I mean…oh,
God.” She put her face in her hands. “You were never involved with
him other than that night, were you? It was just a one-off?”

At least she
spared me the eye contact. “I have a boyfriend,” I said quietly.
“It was just a one-off.”

She snorted.
“He told me you were a lesbian.”

“Oh. Well.
That’d be a lie.”

“I should’ve
known. You’ve no idea how relieved I am, seeing you here. I thought
you might have been…” She gulped. “Hired.”

My look of
horror was genuine, although not for any reason she could
guess.

“I’m sorry,”
she went on. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“I…I’d have
thought the same.”

“Yes. Well.”
She got to her feet, brushing the creases from her skirt. “Please
don’t tell anyone about this, Leila.”

“Of course
not.” I followed her out of the stall. “I’m sorry this has happened
to you.”

In the mirror,
her reflection stuck in a forlorn scowl. “I don’t need him. I’ll be
fine.”

She didn’t
believe it. I didn’t, either.

* * * *

I couldn’t look
at Joseph in the meeting. Matt sat right next to me, his leg
pressed firmly against mine, and the blatancy of his display mixed
with Isobel’s rough sobs–still ringing in my ears–was too much to
tolerate. Basic tasks were dished up and I nodded absently.

“No point
starting much now,” Joseph said. He wore that knowing smile which
made my nerves coil and spring.

“What do you
mean?” Poppy’s pen poised over a fresh sheet of paper as if she
might skewer it at any moment.

“Nothing I can
confirm yet, children. Just don’t make any plans for next week.” He
arched his fingers in his lap. “You’ve all got passports, haven’t
you?”

Poppy
practically vibrated with excitement all day. “We’re going on a
trip. Has to be. He always takes the last load of interns, everyone
says so.”

“Best not be
before Saturday,” Matt grumbled. “I’ve got a big match.”

“I wonder where
it’ll be.” She sighed wistfully. “Last year, it was Salzburg…”

I tried to join
in with her, but all I could think about was the next job. It would
be on that trip–of course it would. Similarly subdued, Matt thought
the same. I could tell by the state of his hair.

Poppy
disappeared at lunchtime and Matt went out for bagels. The office
empty, he dragged his chair next to mine and we picked at each
other’s food.

“Little holiday
next week then,” he said.

“Sounds like
it.” I speared a slice of tomato. “Exciting.”

“Yeah.” His
palm rested on my knee and he rubbed absent-mindedly. “Are you busy
tonight?”

I bit my lip.
“I’ve got a friend coming over.”

“Oh. Thought we
could have dinner, that’s all.”

I pressed my
hand over his.

“Could do
tomorrow?”

“I’ve got
practice.”

“Come and see
me after. All sweaty and muddy.” I grinned.

“Are you sure?
I’ll smell like a gorilla’s ballsack.”

“Sounds
delightful,” Joseph said behind us as he strode through, his
eyebrow cocked in amusement. “He’ll probably taste like one too,
Leila.”

The door
swallowed him and I winced.

“I am going to
punch him before I leave,” Matt hissed. “Seriously. I’m going to
wait outside and just deck him one day.”

“I’m sure he
was joking.”

Matt glared at
me. “Don’t make excuses for him.”

“Sorry.” I
broke off a bit of chocolate brownie and held it out in
reconciliation.

He leaned
forward and took it in his mouth.

“I’m not
interrupting anything, am I?” Poppy dropped bags by her desk. She
sounded distinctly unimpressed.

“No. I mean,
sorry,” I said, edging away from Matt a little. “Just having
lunch.”

“You’re supposed to eat the
 
food
,” she said dryly.

Matt shot her a
wicked grin and I poked him under the desk.

Poppy twisted
the ringpull off a can of iced tea and it frothed quietly over her
fingers, dripping onto the carpet as she stared. “Get a room.”

* * * *

I stopped off
at the supermarket for flapjack ingredients on the way home.
Butter, syrup, peanut butter, oats. The hoard made me feel fat and
indulgent, which, dare I say it, was nice. At home, I melted it all
to a mess on the hob and then shoved it into the fridge to set.

The story turned a thousand times in my head. Charlotte’s
knife sailed through,
 
chop chop
. She presented the options on neat little plates and I
shrugged them away. I hated lying to Clemmie, but how could I
justify selling my body? I could say that I was okay with it until
I turned blue in the face, but confessing to prostitution would be
like admitting schizophrenia: suddenly, a side of me emerged that
people didn’t know existed, something dirty and uncomfortable they
didn’t understand. Nobody would care that it was just the other
side of the looking glass. Nobody else would look hard enough at
themselves. Clemmie had only ever been vaguely supportive of my
relationship with Charlie, and though I could understand why–I
cheated on every nice boyfriend I had and Charlie was old enough to
be my father–it didn’t make me feel any better about it. I suppose
that was kind of the point, but still.

I would have
confided in Aidan, but I had a sneaking suspicion that he now
played for Matt’s team, so to speak.

“Where shall I
put the wine?” Clemmie called through a heap of carrier bags.

“In the fridge.
Somewhere. Make room.”

The fridge was
stuffed with oaty goodness.

“Okay, but I’m
opening one now. I’m parched and I’ve been racially abused again by
Diederick.”

I pulled a
rather phallic chunk of fresh ginger from her shopping and gazed at
it mournfully. “What’s he done now?”

“He keeps asking me ‘What’s Chinese for this? What do they do
about that in China?’ I need to get a big tattoo on my forehead
that says
 
I’m Thai!
 
Thailand, you incompetent cock!”

I sloshed wine
into two thin-stemmed glasses.

“He’s a
bastard. Ooh, it’s bubbly.” The crisp chill seared my throat as I
swallowed. “What have I done to deserve bubbly, Dim Slut?”

“That was the poorest pun I’ve ever heard.” She giggled. “But
you have screwed up in
 
epic
 
proportions your only
relationship in the past two years–”

“Hey, I’ve
had–”

“One nighters
do not count!” She waved a hand dismissively. “You’re about to
screw it even more, I imagine, so you may as well get drunk.”

Thanks for the vote of confidence
. I
pouted at her and she rolled her eyes.

“Make yourself
useful and chop something, would you?”

Shiny red bell
peppers were smooth in my hands. Phallic too–what was she trying to
do to me?

I adored
watching Clemmie cook. Her mum had taught her all these traditional
recipes and she could just throw things together and make them
taste like something from a swish restaurant. Everything she made
was vibrant, colourful, pretty…a lot like her, actually. My mother,
as indicated by the lunch she’d prepared, had passed on no such
skill. Ikea may have been vibrant and colourful, but culture it was
not. How I learned to cook at all, I’ll never know.

We arranged
ourselves in front of the television with steaming plates of
noodles and king prawns, the wine bubbling quietly at our feet.

“Start from the
beginning,” Clemmie demanded. “It was only last week you were
having your–” She put down her fork to do quotation marks,
“Date-type-thing.”

Was it really
only last week? Jesus.

“We had it. And
we had a bit of an argument–we have a lot of those, actually–but we
ended up deciding we should try and make a go of it.”

“Of a
relationship, you mean?”

“Yeah. He’s a
bit of an all-or-nothing sort.” I speared a huge prawn and chewed
slowly. “He hasn’t even come back here yet, but he’s already
changed his relationship status on Facebook.”

“Oh gosh.”
Noodles twisted around her fork. “Why do you keep arguing?”

“Things we’ve gone over a hundred times, things he knew
before we started dating. Not that we’ve actually done
much
 
dating
.”

“Are these
things deal-breakers?”

“I don’t know.
I’m guessing not if he’s still around, and he’s very full-on. But
this Charlie thing…ugh. He hates the guy. He has huge issues about
his parents splitting up.”

“You haven’t
seen Charlie for years, though,” she said pointedly. “Who’s to say
Matt ever needs to find out? What’s the point in telling him if
that’s the case?”

“I don’t
know…he’s very funny about me having secrets. It’s hanging around
and just waiting to fuck things up, you know?”

“Then you need
to ask Charlie what his wife knows.”

“You
think?”

“This might all
come to nothing. If Charlie’s never said anything, he wouldn’t want
to give Matt further reason to dislike him, right?”

“That’s a good
point.” I reached down for my wine glass. “I hate the idea of
keeping something from him, though.”

She stared at me hard. “Do you really want him,
Leila?
 
Really
?”

“Of course I
do.” I shifted about awkwardly.

“You’re making
excuses for something incredibly simple to sort,” she said
suspiciously. “I know you, and I know you don’t like being
smothered. You’ve already said that’s what he’s like.”

“Yeah,
but–”

“But you’re
willing to settle?” She arched an eyebrow at me.

“It’s not like
that. I want what he wants…”

“And what’s
that?”

“You know…being
a proper couple. Like you and James,” I added wryly.

“Ugh, don’t say
that. He’s being a prick right now.”

I touched her
arm. “You can come and crash here again if you need to.”

“No, it’s not
that bad. Just family stuff. Commitment comes with its own
complications, unfortunately. Anyway.” Cushions splayed as she
jumped up. “Bathroom. Back in five.”

I flicked
through music channels while she was gone, and when I’d finishing
eating, deposited both of our plates in the kitchen and broke lumps
of flapjack off into a bowl. Clemmie sat cross-legged on the sofa
when I returned, eyeing me with something between incredulity and
amusement.

“What?” I said,
sitting down again. “What have I done?”

“You said Matt
hadn’t seen your flat,” she said.

I nodded
slowly. “That’s right.”

“So…those boxer
shorts in the bathroom. Who do they belong to?”

Blood rushed to
my cheeks. I remembered folding them after Joseph had left, draping
them over the radiator. Just hadn’t seemed right to move them…it
wasn’t like he’d asked for them back.

“Um.”

“Don’t
 
um
 
me!”

I lowered my
eyes. “My boss.”

She paused; I
didn’t dare look at her.

“O
kay
,” she
said eventually. “You were going to tell me about
him…when?”

“It happened
last weekend,” I mumbled. “Before me and Matt got together.”

“I knew it.”
She snapped her fingers. “I knew there was something else. Or
somebody. Whatever. How did your boss end up back here?”

“He came to
visit.”