Page 77 of Mad About You

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‘Hats off to the prick, I genuinely find it hard to choose a favourite line. I can’t decide between “selfies on her phone which I had a God-given right to scour, to prove she was unfaithful” or “my parents being alive mean I am a more balanced person than her”. Can you imagine not picking up on any of the red flags in that? More red flags than a communist parade. His creepster cocksureness is coming off it like steam. “I was being played!” You used to drive a fuckin’ Nissan Micra, you’re not Drake.’

Harriet opened her mouth, but Lorna continued: ‘WAIT, no, I do have a favourite. “Her identity isn’t the point – but here’s her first initial, a detailed physical description, an event she recently attended and where she’s from.” I would honestly like to feed him feet first into an airline propeller.’

Lorna paused to breathe. She was in a dress with fuchsia chiffon balloon sleeves, which set off her expressive arm waving beautifully. The day of Scott’s post was, coincidentally, also their after-hours date at The Dive, and Harriet had never been so brokenly grateful for it. Candles flickered and Lorde’sMelodramaplayed from somewhere behind a toweringSwiss cheese plant. She’d WhatsApped the sorry mess to the Fleaslags to disbelief, and a cyclone of messages all afternoon. It helped her weather the storm of the kind of alternate raging and impotent weeping that had left her feeling hollowed out.

Lorna had plenty more to say. Roxy had a Tinder date, and had asked if this was a real definite total crisis, or if Harriet minded if she still went …? Lorna, she knew, would’ve sacked anyone or anything off to provide this moral support, and a therapeutic Scott Dyer deconstruction.

‘I don’t think anyone analyses these things, you know,’ Harriet said morosely, examining her glass of red. Her throat was still sore and her voice sounded scratchy and dry. ‘They go by the feelings they get from it. It’s an outlet for their own aggro. They can smack the Harriet piñata in a frenzy and hug each other and have a cathartic wail. At first, I thought:if only they knew it isn’t true, and then I worked out that they don’t care if it’s not true. It’s just a vessel. Scott himself used to say social media is only another type of computer game, and for once I think he was right.’

She paused, looked at the ceiling, blinking. ‘Remember I said Cal, my landlord, couldn’t have a decent reason for walking out of his wedding? He did, and I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t have the full context. I said there couldn’t be a reason, because I couldn’t think what it would be. This isn’t that different, the arrogance of assumption. All these people would say,Well, Scott’s got no reason to lie. But he has, it’s just unknown to them. We’ve all lost respect for the factthere’s things we don’t know, and I fully include myself in that.’ Sheswiped again at her wet cheeks. God, she was sickened by how Scott had so thoroughly turned her inside out, again.

‘I dunno how you’re being so fair-minded and philosophical, to be honest,’ Lorna said.

‘Hah. Kind of you to see it that way, I was thinking this was more fatalistic acceptance. I’ve not got anything else to be, have I?’

‘… So, what was Cal’s reason for absconding?’

Harriet was relieved to briefly break off to outline someone else’s piece of private life theatre, to ‘oohs’ and ‘oh my Christ, no way!’

‘He came in, I meant to say!’ Lorna said, ‘With a girl, a very sleek girl. He left a generous tip, so probably was impressing a date, hah.’

Harriet made an ‘oh really’ face, and stuffed her feelings down. Of course the fabulous life of Cal Clarke continued, outside her remit, why would she expect it not to? He hadn’t brought anyone home but then again, she wasn’t always sure when he was home. She wasn’t his keeper. Perhaps social media Gatsbys with lodgers sprung for a suite at the Malmaison.

Courtship could be costly: she’d had to duck behind a letterbox in town the other day when Jon had strode past her bearing a turquoise Tiffany’s bag; mercifully, he’d not seen her. Harriet thought:lavish gift for early-doors dating?Then realised: it’d likely be a Make It Up To Mummy present. Once she’d finished reviling Harriet for their face-off, Jacqueline was probably quite irascible towards her son. All that spite had to go somewhere; Jon’s chequebook as sticking plaster.

‘Surely there’s something you can do legally?’ Lorna said, as they returned to the main subject. ‘That piece of shit has as good as accused you in a public forum. There are Twitter libel trials nowadays.’

‘No, there isn’t. Apart from the fact I don’t have the money to take him to court, couldn’t afford losing and couldn’t stand the thought of them picking over the evidence of whether I did the things he’s saying I did, which would be a He Said, She Said … Apart from all of that, even if I won, “Harriet Hatley – wedding photographer who was embroiled in the emotional abuse case” doesn’t have a very Would Hire ring to it, does it? People don’t even need to buy Scott’s version. They just won’t want to buy into it at all.’

Lorna made an air-escaping noise.

‘And, if I did my own post, refuting Scott, it’d have the Streisand Effect, wouldn’t it? You know, where an attempt to shut something down only means tons more people hear about it.’

‘This can’t be the end.’ Lorna smacked her hand on the table in emphasis. ‘You can’t behave like him and come out on top. Much more of this and I’ll start thinking karma is merely spiritual woo for Pollyannas.’

‘Ha. By the way, I don’t want you to think I resent you at all for being completely right in your advice to me. I should’ve known to listen, your advice is never wrong,’ Harriet said. ‘I was a woman possessed about sending that letter. I was in denial that I was rattling the cage bars of a … maniac, I guess.’

She swigged her wine. Once again, it was a failure ofimagination as intellectual protection: she couldn’t predict how Scott could harm her, therefore he didn’t have a way to harm her.Wrong.

‘Funny you should say that, because I have FULLY come ON FUCKING BOARD with your letter. The fact he could do this shows you have to DESTROY THE APPALLING SHIT. We need to work out how.’

‘Hahahaha. I love you,’ Harriet said, and leant over to hug her. Scott could take Harriet’s reputation, and very possibly her livelihood, but he couldn’t ever take her best friend again, and that was something.

‘The way he’s used all the elements of the letter and twisted each thing I’ve described to sound like it was my crime, is so mad …’ Harriet said. ‘I’ve asked myself,does Scott really believe himself?I think he does, you know. He tells himself his version so many times, he thinks it’s the truth. His self-righteousness is like a mind-altering drug.’

Harriet took a deep breath. She’d been limbered up by wine so she hoped she’d not regret saying this next thing, in the morning. Admitting to it was counter-intuitive – she didn’t want to, but if she didn’t voice it, she’d feel like she was carrying the horrifying shame of it alone. She inadvertently recalled Cal telling her about Lily, and his dad. She’d vaguely wondered at the time why he had, given he was obviously stricken at it being gross. Could it be, as it was for Harriet here: because some people were important enough that they needed to know the whole of you …?

Harriet needed to be swift, because if Lorna cast it up as another example of Scott’s ridiculous falsehoods, she’d loseher nerve. The most sadistic ploy in the whole thing was to casually toss in Harriet’s most private humiliation, and for it to be genuine.

‘Lorna. One thing though. The sex thing, the begging,’ Harriet said, nervously. ‘That part’s true. It wasn’t true I threatened to cheat on him, but the rest of it … That’s where he got me to: it was squalid. I honestly didn’t think even he’d be so savage as to tell the world.’ She closed her eyes, shook her head. ‘It was like roleplay, it’s what hewantedme to do, you know? So it could be clear he held all the cards. What I hate most about Scott is what he turned me into. But it’s not like I emerged from four years with him with nothing but credit.’

‘Oh, God, don’t sweat that,’ Lorna said, seeing how mortified Harriet was. Harriet forced a grateful smile back.

‘That reminds me, how was the Gethin date?!’

‘I am experiencing a profound disquiet regards Gethin.’

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