Poison

Hey, it’s Anna. Long time no speak. Was just wondering how you’re doing.

Damn fucking fuck, I regretted it as soon as the sent tick flashed up.

I consoled myself with the hope that maybe he had indeed got a different number this past decade. I mean that would make sense. A decade was a long time.

I consoled myself with the hope that he was probably busy with a whole new world, with no time or thought to even read my message, let alone fire back a response, as cringeworthy as that may be.

But I’d heard… just the faintest scrap of a whisper at the very edges of our extended social circle… I’d heard he might be single…

I consoled myself with the chatter of my brain telling me I really had been insane and really would come to my senses and return to boredomville and Seb with a smile on my face, resigned to my fate forever.

But then it came.

The ping.

The ping from him. The poison in my veins, even after all these years.

The ping that changed my whole fucking world.Chapter TwoLucasThe buzz of my phone was enough to drag me out of my slumber.

I blinked at the sun streaming through my gaping window like a piece of shit to burn my retinas. My mouth was parched, bedsheets crumpled underneath my sprawled nakedness. Anything but a lovely way to greet the morning. Still, a regular one.

I coughed and stretched, and my arm landed on two empty wine bottles, cast away like fallen soldiers. The usual deal. The usual shit.

I scrabbled around for my phone, expecting it to be the alarm bleeping at me, but it wasn’t. My gut did a thump as I saw the text icon, no doubt a spiteful whinge from Maya and a cancellation of me having Millie. Another usual deal.

Only it wasn’t Maya’s flashing name that greeted me, it was number unknown. One that had my attention on full alert as I propped myself up and opened the message.

Hey, it’s Anna. Long time no speak. Was just wondering how you’re doing.

My eyes scanned that message over and over before my brain would accept I was really conscious. I considered it must be a joke. Or a balls up. Some kind of crazy cockup in the communication ether.

It had to be. There was no way that Anna Blackwell would ever be asking how I was doing on a random Sunday morning, or any morning for that matter – I’d swear she’d rather eat her own shit. But still, that message was staring back at me in cold hard text.

My fingers took on a life of their own, typing out a response before my brain had even caught up with the flow.

Very long time no speak. Doing so so. Can’t complain. How about you?

I wondered what the hell she would say, or if she’d say anything at all. I wondered what the fuck could have led her to message me out of the blue, like we were just old friends needing a catch up. I wondered if she’d been on some crazy binge and had her phone stolen by some idiot friends playing some prank.

But no.

I was out of bed and brushing the stale alcohol from my teeth when the next ping sounded.

Life has been quite a whirlwind these past few months. How is yours?

Our old social circle was still attached on the outskirts, but I rarely heard anything about her in passing from distant connections. I rarely heard anything whatsoever these days about Anna, and she certainly hadn’t been keen to forge a friendship from our explosion of a break up. Not at any point this past decade, and I can’t say I blamed her.

I wondered if she’d heard about my split from Maya. About how much of a train wreck people were judging my life to be these days. About how much of a train wreck people were judging me to be these days.

They had a point.

Maybe this was a gloat fest on her part, but it didn’t feel like one.

I swilled out the toothpaste and let my fingers fire off a reply.

Good thanks. You still in Cheltenham?

I hadn’t heard of her leaving the city, and a weird little twinge in me hoped she was still local. I’d vacated well and truly to the outskirts with Maya and Millie in tow, and had no intention of venturing back onto city turf, but it was still my locale.

I hoped she was still my locale too.

Yeah, I’m still here. In the city centre. You?

I pinged right back.

Close enough.

And then she said it. She actually said it and sent the string of texts to a whole new level.

Fancy a game of tennis?

I caught my smile in the bathroom mirror. One I hadn’t seen on my face in an age. Just a shame it was there under hollow eyes.