‘So, you decided that a visual example on the kitchen table was the best way to break it to me?!’
Ned sighed and sat down in front of me.
‘Nell, when a man loves a woman …’
‘Don’t!’ I said, holding up a warning finger. ‘Don’t you even dare use sweet, beautiful Michael Bolton to get yourself out of this one.’
‘Fine. Fine. Sorry. But, Nell, can I just ask you one question?’ I looked up in to his eyes, waiting for him to ask me some deeply scarring question like: ‘Can you start calling me Dad?’ or ‘How would you feel about a baby sibling with my nose?’ but instead, he just raised his hand, brandishing the snow globe and asked, ‘What the fuck is this?’
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I don’t know if the snow globe was displayed, pride of place on the kitchen shelf to make me feel better about the fact that I had been both mentally and emotionally scarred by seeing my mother splayed out on the kitchen table like a spatchcock chicken, or if Ned actually found some kind of enjoyment in a tack-tastic, diamante-eyed, Virgin Mary swilling around in a jar of glitter water. Whatever the reason was, the snow globe was there, her eyes boring into me as I attempted to eat the takeaway sushi that Mum had bought in to make me feel a little better.
I knew that I was an adult, an adult who had sex. And because of this, I understood that my mother was also an adult, an extremely attractive adult, who had the same physical needs, but there are some things in life that you can know but never dwell on and there are some sights that you simply cannot come back from. I skewered a salmon nigiri from my plate of untouched food on a chopstick and gave it a healthy soak in the sodium bath of soy sauce, before raising it to my mouth. I had tried to forget about what I had seen, but even the action of skewering the sushi had made me break out in a cold sweat and I fantasised about stabbing chopsticks into my eyes so they could never be harmed again by such heinous sights.
Mum and Charlie were filling the void of silence between Ned and me by talking about her work. I think that Charlie was genuinely interested, but I could see the strained looks behind their eyes. The look in his that said, ‘I’ve seen your nipple, Mrs Coleman,’ and the look in hers that replied: ‘Please tell no one.’
I stared at Ned over the expanse of the table, my lids lowered, my jaw clenched, as he pretended that he didn’t see me, making patterns in his wasabi paste with the end of his chopstick.
How? How exactly could my closest friend possibly go behind my back like this? They had been so discreet and lied to me so seamlessly that I hadn’t suspected for a moment. But why would I suspect such treachery from the person who filled the void of best friend and father in one fell swoop. I guess that he was taking that paternal role he’d always filled in my life before to new levels now.
For now, the image of Ned’s betrayal was still there inside my brain in glistening 4K ultra HD, but I held out hope that my brain would soon adorn the offending memory with a neat little fig leaf. I chewed the nigiri three times before spitting it back out onto the plate and washing my mouth out with lukewarm water.
It took me a moment before I realised that everyone was watching me.
‘Sorry,’ I said, looking down at the half-chewed sushi on my plate and only now realising how gross that would have looked. ‘I’m just nursing some PTSD.’
‘Joel came by again while you were gone,’ Ned said, deftly changing the subject. ‘Brought another box.’
‘Oh yeah?’ I answered, passive-aggressively stabbing a tuna maki roll and dousing it in wasabi. Maybe the burn would take away the memories. ‘What was in it this time, a dust bunny he thought I’d grown emotionally attached to or a broken spatula from six years back?’
‘Nope. It was just the one thing this time.’ He stretched out a leg to the side where an empty Walkers Crisps box sat on the floor by the wall. He kicked it under the table and I looked down between my knees at whatever treasure he’d sent back to me this time. The box was big enough to fit fifteen or so books, but sitting down in the bottom right-hand corner was one tiny thing that made my stomach lurch.
I reached down and picked up the ring – silver with a large black stone set into it and little delicate flowers made of the same silver that kept the stone in place.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and took a deep breath as pressure began to build behind my eyes.
‘What is it?’ Charlie asked, his comforting hand landing on my knee. The warmth of it snapped me out of my thoughts and I placed the ring onto my finger.
‘Just an old trinket,’ I said, unconvincingly.
I stood in the bathroom, my chin dripping water into the sink as I stared down at the ring on my hand. Rings were so small, so losable, that I’d just put it there out of fear of mislaying it. But having it there, sitting on my prematurely bony finger, was bringing back all sorts of memories. Not all of them good, but memories nonetheless.
I sighed and stared hard at my reflection. Why was I even thinking about Joel right now when Charlie was in my bedroom, getting ready to jump into the same
