Page 51 of Wish You Knew
“What do you mean?”
“You and Rosie Tatton. Thought you two were serious after that pic last week of you at the country pile.”
All the good work done by the punk song dissipated after Mat mentioned Rosie’s name.
“Fuck off,” I growled, throwing a cushion at his face.
He laughed and chucked it back at me. “Hit a nerve, did I?”
They knew me better than I knew myself.
I flopped down onto the floor, lying on my back and staring at the ceiling. “What have we got for the album then?” Focus. If I could get some focus back, I might be able to get all thoughts of Rosie out of my head.
Declan dropped a whole ream of paper onto my chest. “Enough for a double-triple-special-edition if this is anything to go by. You really did manage to get some work done while you were away shagging Rosie.”
“Don’t talk about her like that!” I sat up abruptly, the pages scattering around my body. “In fact, don’t ever talk about her again. Any of you!” Hauling myself to my feet, I slammed out of the studio in the direction of the kitchen.
There was no-one else there, none of the studio staff or any of the visiting mixers and producers. I relished the solitude to straighten out my head and clear my thoughts.
Working on new stuff with the band always had potential tipping points. We were close, more than close, always had been. Wouldn’t have been able to spend so much time together without driving each other totally crazy. But sometimes, just sometimes, someone would overstep a mark. And that mark had to do with Rosie right now.
I pulled out my phone and opened up the messaging app.
It should be so easy to apologise.
To tell her how you really feel, the voice in my head whispered.
Ugh. Fuck. I hated this.
I wished I could go back to the pub, not get so fucked up on gin and pretend in front of Vivian and Bas that Rosie meant nothing to me.
Any kind of inspiration for an apology deserted me and I stared at the blank screen, willing some words of wisdom to come.
The door creaked behind me. I shoved my phone back in my pocket, turning to see Mat entering the room.
“You okay?”
“You have to ask?” I itched to light a cigarette, but the warning posters on the walls plus the smoke detector in plain sight advised against it.
“Ignore Dec. He’s a dickhead sometimes.”
I sniggered. “Most of the time, to be fair.”
Mat busied himself making a coffee. “Want one?”
“Sure. Considering you won’t let me have beer.”
“Touché.” He heaped the coffee into a mug. “And you’ll be on a caffeine high now instead. As if it isn’t bad enough with your nervous energy anyway.”
“Who knows? We might get everything down this afternoon.” I did a stupid dance, ending up with jazz hands.
“Unlikely if you stay in this mood.” Mat passed me the drink. “What is going on with you and Rosie then?” He held up his hands. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
My mood dipped. Mat was a good friend. I knew he wasn’t digging for the sake of it. He wanted to know what was going on for the overall good of the band. But if I told him how I felt about Rosie, it would be out there, and then I couldn’t take it back.
“Nothing,” I said, letting out a hard breath. “There’s nothing going on. You know the history we’ve got. It hasn’t changed.”
“Not a bad history to have though. She is smoking.” He winked.
