Action

“It’s not just me, is it, Marianne?” she said as she put her feet up on the old stool beside the living room couch. “This has been the strangest day, hasn’t it?”

“No kidding,” Marianne said from her perch in one of the armchairs. “I didn’t know you were so popular.”

“Neither did I. They seemed genuine, didn’t they?” she said.

“Yes, they all seemed genuinely eager to risk a jail sentence to work with you again.”

Davina lobbed a pillow at her head.

“Still,” she said. “It was nice of them to tell me. Even if it was out of pity. I did make a catastrophic cock-up of this whole thing, didn’t I?”

Marianne sipped her tea.

“Let’s just say you made the phrase ‘one-track-mind’ resemble a runaway train.”

Davina stared through the old bay window into the garden and her heart clenched. It felt like the only person in the whole of Brighton that she hadn’t seen was Jack. And she didn’t want to see him anyway. She bit her lip. She was almost one hundred percent sure that she never wanted to see him again. Well, maybe ninety percent.

“There’s a lesson in this,” Marianne said. Her head was resting on the back of the chair and her eyes were closed.

“Don’t use things without permission?”

Marianne opened one eye.

“How about: don’t become too obsessed?”

“And don’t hire amateurs?”

“Don’t be afraid to change your life plan, maybe?”

“Don’t eat too many brownies?”

Marianne grinned at her. “I don’t think you’re taking this seriously.”

Davina sighed, but she definitely didn’t feel as worn down as she had done earlier.

“I think I went about this the wrong way,” she said. “Next time, it needs a bit more planning.”

“Next time?!”

Marianne let out a long cat-like wail and they both collapsed into giggles.

“Now all we need is for Jack to apologise and things can get back to normal around here. Or at least what passes for normal in your life.”

Davina sat up straight.

“What did you do?”

Marianne blushed.

“Well, you were so upset. Suicidal, practically.”

Davina folded her arms.

“I’ve never been suicidal.”

“Fine.” Marianne threw her hands in the air. “I was feeling murderous. Same difference. You still end up dead. I was fed up with you moping around, going all ‘woe is me, I’ll never be an actress’.”

“My life fell apart on Friday,” Davina said. “It’s only been two days.”