Page 68 of Glitterland
17
Tomorrows
Slipped away sweetly in a haze of sex, one after another.
18
A Morning
My phone was bleeping insistently and I was just as insistently ignoring it.
Eventually, Darian untangled himself and went to retrieve it.
“I’m starting to fink you gotta secret lover, babes.”
He tossed my phone to me. I had accrued an extensive collection of emails and text messages. “Oh fuck. Oh, wanking fuck. I’m meant to be in Cambridge. There’s a wedding tomorrow and a rehearsal dinner tonight.” I rolled myself into sheets that smelled of both of us, pulled a pillow over my head, and whinged—in a rather muffled manner—about not wanting to go.
Unlike most of my social engagements, I hadn’t made my usual internal commitment to avoid Max and Amy’s wedding. There were some acts too low even for me. But somehow the reality of it had slipped away from me, along with everything but Darian, and I was left without resources.
Darian sat down on the edge of the bed and patted lightly at my shoulder. “Better get moving, babes.”
“I don’t want to. I feel panicky just thinking about it. It’ll be awful. What if something goes wrong?”
He tugged at my cocoon. “It’s just you being anxious or whateva. It’s gonna be fine.”
“Just anxious?” I repeated, as furiously as I could from beneath a pillow. “Just anxious. Fuck you. That’s like saying, it’s just a broken leg, start climbing that mountain.”
“Sorry,” he said with a distinct lack of repentance. “I just don’t fink you should miss summin what’s important to your mates.”
“I’ve spent the last however many years letting my friends down. Believe me, they’ll cope.”
“Aww, that’s sad.”
I snarled at him.
“Sorry.” A pause, and then, “You ’aven’t let me down, babes.”
“Give me time.”
He slowly began to peel away my sheets, and I slowly stopped fighting him.
“But you did modlin and everyfing.” He pulled off the pillow and put it back in its usual place. “What do you normally do when you ’ave to do somefing what you feel all anxious abaht?”
“I don’t do it.”
“That ain’t true.”
I sat up, sighing. “It’s mostly true. I suppose I could take some diazepam, but I hate it. It makes me feel sub-human. I think Hamlet must have been on it.”
“Don’t fink they had that back in ’istory, babes.”
“‘O, that this too too solid flesh would melt.’ It’s exactly like that. And it’s addictive, so if I’m not careful, I’ll end up a clinically anxious, bipolar depressive with a drug problem.” I waved a finger at him. “Oh, oh, and let’s not forget its many many side effects. One of which is…depression.”
He made a snuffling sound and hastily clapped a hand over his mouth.
“It’s fine, laugh it up. It’s funny, it’s fucking ridiculous.”
“But there ain’t nuffin else?”
