Page 2 of Knots About You
An apoplectic fury made my insides tremor.
I ripped open the bagel bag and tore it apart, smearing cream cheese over his pristine counters while he stood with his mouth hanging to his knees.
‘What are you doing? he yelled while grabbing an ungodly amount of paper towels and arming himself with multipurpose spray.
‘I’m sick of this. It’s not normal to live in a flat that is cleaner than a surgical theatre. You can take your coasters and shove them up your overbearing ass.’ The glass coasters stood in their rack like little soldiers in his army of precision. One by one, I snatched them up and launched them at his stupid head.
I’d kept everything so tightly restrained for so long, fighting my natural chaotic self to be the perfect girlfriend and the perfect employee, that it felt like my firing had unleashed a monster.
By the time I’d obliterated the coasters, I was craving maximum destruction, and Marty looked like he might cry.
Well, good. He deserved to cry.
‘You say I should be happy with helping you out for free despite you dropping me in the shit so badly that no one is going to hire me in PR ever again. Twelve years of my career down thepan. And for what? Orgasms? Don’t make me laugh. The only orgasms I have are when I use my hand while you take what you want. I have a better relationship with my shower head than you.’
‘That’s a cheap shot,’ Marty said. His brow knitted as he moved closer to the cream cheese smears, hardly able to focus on me while there was a mess in the vicinity.
‘I’ve wasted my twenties on your company and you. God, I’ve been such an idiot.’ I gathered up my coat and bag as I spoke.
‘I can still give you a good reference.’
It wasn’t a laugh that escaped me, but something between that and a scoff. A sound I wasn’t convinced I’d ever made before. ‘And what will you write? Gullible twat. Great for pinning your disasters on. Pop her in the cupboard until you need a mess cleaned up.’
‘That’s unfair. I didn’t have a choice. It was you or the whole agency. Your name was the one that signed off on the campaign.’ Marty swept a paper towel over the counter.
‘You had a choice and I wasn’t the one who signed it, was I?’
Marty sighed.
And our relationship, fourlong,secretive years, died in that exhale of breath.
By the time I stumbled back to the flat that I actually paid rent on, despite rarely staying there, I looked like the before shot in one of those glossy magazine makeovers where they circle your bad bits in red. Mascara stains running to my chin, hair stuck to my cheeks and sodden, snotty tissues erupting from my bag like a volcano of self-pity.
You know you’re looking especially tragic when people give you a wide berth on the tube.
The universe evidently decided rock bottom needed a trapdoor for me to trip ass over tit into.
Because when I pushed the front door open, intending to launch myself into the depths of my duvet, I was greeted with the sound of skin slapping skin. Moans that would make the most seasoned sex worker blush.
‘Oh God.’
The living room rug crumpled beneath my flatmate, Shelly, and a man I had never laid eyes on. And I’d seen a fair few men, often involuntarily, thanks to Shelly’s open-door policy on trousers.
They were going at each other with a level of gusto that was pretty impressive. Marty and I were far more perfunctory than the flesh-coloured tornado in the sitting room. Limbs tangled, mouths full. If hating men wasn’t so high on my to-do list, I might have admired the absolute hammering of his rather peachy backside.
‘Hey, hun,’ Shelly called breathlessly, as if I’d just walked in on her eating supper rather than screwing on the floor. ‘Don’t mind us!’
‘Shelly, you can’t be doing it in the sitting room,’ I squeaked. An attempt to reverse into the hallway ended with me pinned between the wobbly coat rack and a pair of antlers she’d bought from a flea market. My hood caught, and no matter how hard I jerked, I was stuck there like a fish on the end of a line.
I lost it. Deep sobs tumbled out while I stood there, unable to leave.
There was laughter and a grunt before Shelly’s head popped around the corner, hair wild, and the patchwork throw from the back of the sofa wrapped around her. ‘Oh, baby, what’s wrong?Sorry about Dominic, he sort of moved in while you were staying with Marty.’
‘Sort ofwhat?’ I mumbled through another snotty sob. ‘I leave for a couple of weeks and you sublet the rug to apenis?’
‘You’realwaysat Marty’s.’ She half-held the throw while unhooking me with her other hand. ‘And you never even notice when I eat your food anymore. I assumed you’d moved in with Marty.’
‘All my stuff is here. And I still pay rent. I still live here.’ I yanked off my coat and threw it at the rack.
