Joe ran his hands through his hair and stared up at the sky as if he was looking for some divine intervention.
“It was a pity proposal, I’ve known him since I was four years old. He felt sorry for me, protective. I would never have married him for God sake!”
“Marry who?” Max said as he walked over to where we were standing. I could see Robyn close behind him a look of fear on her face. She knew shit was hitting the fan.
“Did you know Ella was pregnant?” Joe asked Max accusingly.
“No. Fuck no, you think I’m such a shit friend I’d keep something like that from you?” Max replied looking over at me in shock.
“Well Ella did. She told her friends but couldn’t tell me. Now I find out she had a miscarriag
e that she thought I didn’t need to know about and some guy proposed to her all in the space of two months. Welcome to my shitty life.”
Joe held his hands out then turned his back on us all.
“I didn’t do any of it to piss you off Joe. I was going to tell you I just needed a few weeks to get my head straight. I didn’t know things would go so… wrong.”
My patience was wearing thin now and I needed to get away. I had had enough of our little trip down memory lane. Too much booze and heightened emotions would only lead to tragedy if I didn’t walk away and take a time out.
“I want to go home. Robyn can we go home?” I pleaded.
“Yeah sure, come on Chris you ready?” She went to grab Chris and I stalked off ahead muttering.
“You can leave him festering there for all I care he isn’t my favourite person right now.”
Joe called out to me, “Ella you can’t avoid me forever, we need to sort this out.”
“Whatever. I’m not doing this anymore tonight.” I called over my shoulder and headed to the front entrance where a line of cabs were waiting to ferry the happy guests away, oh and me.
I jumped in the front as Robyn shoved Chris into the back seat then joined him. As we pulled away I saw Joe standing next to the cab but I couldn’t bring myself to look at him. A mixture of anger, embarrassment and shame swept over me. God what had I turned into? It was his baby too and he’d need to mourn just like I had. I’d been a bitch and taken that away from him. He’d never forgive me. Why did that bother me so much?
I closed my eyes and let the cab drift down the driveway and take me away from the car crash that was my life. I had royally fucked it all up, but I couldn’t run anymore I needed to face up to this. I needed to do the right thing.
10
I woke up on Saturday morning with the head from hell. All the God awful moments from the night before coming back to me in flashes of excruciating embarrassment, horror and remorse. How did things end up like this? Why was everything such a mess? I knew I’d have to face Joe eventually but I dreaded it. I realised how selfish I’d been lately and I’d been too ashamed to admit it before now. It had taken a drunken truthful Chris to out me and make me face up to my reality. I should have been honest with Joe from the start. I had a lot of growing up to do I knew that. Was I being too hard on myself? Probably, probably not but my head wasn’t in the right place at the moment to make any sound judgement.
I dragged my sorry ass out of the bed and went to the bathroom to brush my teeth and freshen up. I was already missing the anonymity that being with Nan had afforded me, city life in comparison was way more intense and there was no escape from the misery of my hopeless decisions.
“Jeez how much did we drink last night?” Chris groaned from the sofa as I made my way downstairs.
“We both had way too much to drink, but I wasn’t too keen on the truth serum you took with all the alcohol Chris.”
I went to walk straight past him, not wanting to start my day off with a fight with my best friend.
“I’m so so sorry Ella, I don’t know what got into me. If I could take it all back I would.”
“Too late now Chris, my life has gone from car wreck to train wreck in a matter of hours. I don’t think there’s any amount of damage control that can help me.”
Robyn came out of the kitchen and rolled her eyes at me.
“Chris, you threw Ella under the bus and the lorry last night. Did you really need to tell Joe about Simon?”
“Oh shit I told him about Simon too? Man I must have been wasted. Ella, you have my permission to carry out whatever revenge you see fit. Please don’t defriend me though babes I couldn’t handle that.”
I sighed, “I could never defriend you Chris, no matter how much of an ass you make of yourself and me. He’d have found out sooner or later. Let’s face it my secrets never stay secret for very long. At least you were all there to whisk me away in the cab. I knew last night would end with some kind of drama I just didn’t envision it being quite so brutal.”
I sat down on the sofa next to Chris and he leaned over to give me a friendly hug.