“I read about that. It’s in April, right?” If I’m not mistaken, it’s the night of my birthday.
She nods excitedly. “It’s awesome. You’ve got to come with us. We usually have pre-ball drinks at someone’s place before heading to the campus later that night for the music event. It goes on until the early hours of the morning, and it’s completely wild.” She tugs on my arm. “Please say you’ll come.”
“Please say you’ll move in.” My eyes plead with her to say yes.
“Are you really sure?”
“I am.” I don’t hesitate to confirm it.
“Then I would love to move in.” She flings her arms around me. “This is going to be so fun!”
31
“Remind me again why I agreed to this?” I ask, dumping bags of chips into a large white ceramic bowl.
Ash nudges my hip, grinning. “Because you love your new roomie and it’s about time you threw a housewarming party. Plus, it’s Saturday night. And it’s Valentine’s Day.”
God, please don’t remind me.
“That’s four good reasons,” she adds, handing me a vodka cranberry. Her features soften. “I also have a feeling if we hadn’t organized this party tonight you’d spend the night crying in your room.” Her eyes flit to the large bouquet of lavender roses presently sitting in a vase on the dining table. I need to move them before anyone arrives, because they’ll only invite questions I’m not prepared to answer.
They arrived earlier today from Reeve, and I broke down in front of my new roomie for the first time. Tears prick my eyes, and my lower lip wobbles. “Shit.” Ash puts her drink down, taking mine and placing it on the counter, before enfolding me in a hug. We’re both still in our slippers and pajamas. No one is due to arrive for a couple of hours yet, so we planned to get everything set up and then make ourselves beautiful. Ash is so tiny and she barely reaches my chest, but her hug is solid and comforting, and I need it.
“Sorry,” I sniffle, rubbing at my eyes when we break apart. “I hate how fragile I am. It’s been eleven weeks, and I’m still a basket case.”
“I get it.” She hoists herself up onto the marble island unit, dangling her legs off the edge. “It’s been almost three years since my relationship with Cillian ended, and it still hurts.”
“Ugh. Don’t tell me that.” I crick my neck from side to side, hoping to loosen my stiff muscles. “If I still feel like this in three years’ time, I’ll have to be committed.”
“It does get easier, but the pain of Cillian’s betrayal will always sting.”
Leaning back against the counter, I grab my drink and take a sip, wondering if I should have this conversation.
Ash makes that decision for me, continuing without me having to ask. “Our story sounds a little like yours. Cillian was my boy next door. He lived directly across the road from our farm, and we went to the same school. He was Dillon’s best friend, so he was always hanging around with us. He was my first kiss at eleven, and we spent a few years messing about before it became serious.” She grabs the edge of the island unit, staring off into space as she takes a wander down memory lane. “I lost my virginity to him at fifteen. We were inseparable after that. Fucking like rabbits any chance we could get. He drove me insane half the time, but I loved him,” she adds, fixing her eyes on my face. “We argued nonstop, but we shared this real fiery passion, ya know?”
Do I? I know her question is rhetorical, but it sets my mind thinking. I wouldn’t call what Reeve and I shared a fiery passion, but it was passion none the less. “What happened?”
Tears pool in her eyes, and she grabs her beer, knocking back a few mouthfuls. I wait patiently for her to continue, understanding how hard it is to relive the past. “He cheated on me with my arch-nemesis.” In this moment, I feel her pain as acutely as my own, and I can’t believe we have had similar experiences. “This bitch had been chasing after him for years. Cillian and I had fought earlier that night. It was a particularly vicious fight, and he went out partying without me.” A lone tear rolls down her face. “He had sex with her, but I didn’t find out for six weeks because he was a fucking lying bastard as well as a cheat. Rumors were doing the rounds at school, but he denied them until he couldn’t.” Anger flashes in her eyes, and I can relate to the lightning-fast emotional switch. “He got her pregnant.”
She visibly gulps, and my heart aches for her. I think I would lose my shit if Reeve turned around and told me Saffron was pregnant. My stomach lurches, and I knock back half my vodka in one go, wishing I could scrub that thought from my brain with bleach.
“The chickenshit didn’t even have the guts to tell me before that bitch thrust the news in my face.”
“I’m so sorry, Ash. I can’t even begin to imagine that level of pain.”
“I’ve never been one of those girls who dreams of a big white wedding, but I always imagined my future with Cillian in it. His betrayal destroyed me. Even if I hadn’t kicked his cheating ass to the curb, he would’ve left me. His family are very conservative and extremely religious, and I knew they would force him into marriage.”
I almost spit my vodka all over the floor. “He married her?!” She nods. “What the fuck? We’re not living in the dark ages. He could’ve supported the child without marrying the mother.”
“Of course, he could, but he let his parents force him into it. They had a quickie wedding two months after I found out she was pregnant.” Her chest heaves as more tears shine in her eyes. “Three weeks after that, I tried to kill myself,” she quietly adds.
Setting my drink down, I rush over and hug her with tears clouding my vision. “Oh no, Ash.”
“I was in a real bad place. In so much pain,” she sobs, easing back from my embrace. “She was parading her bump, her wedding ring, and him all over school, and I just couldn’t take it.” She swipes the sleeve of her pajama top across her damp eyes. “The night before I took an overdose of my mum’s sleeping pills, he had come to me, telling me he was sorry but it didn’t mean we had to be over. He said he didn’t love her and he’d only married her because he had to do right by the baby.” She snorts out a laugh. “The dickhead proposed we continue sleeping together and that we could sneak around behind his wife’s back. It was the final straw for me. I lost it that night. Threw shit at him. Screamed and roared. Woke my whole family up.”
“I can’t believe the nerve of him,” I fume, angry on her behalf. “Men are assholes.”
“Dillon beat him to a pulp the next day while I dumped a load of pills down my throat.”
I rub her arm. “I’m glad you didn’t succeed. I would never have met you otherwise.”
“Dillon found me. Called an ambulance and got me to the hospital in the nick of time. My recovery was rough. I ended up having to defer my Leaving Cert while I took time to heal. I put my parents and my brothers through hell, but I eventually crawled my way out of the black hole, and you will too,” she says, draining her beer and jumping down off the island.
I’m understanding Dillon’s need to protect his sister from all threats more clearly now. I can imagine finding Ash like that must have been traumatic.
“Can you keep a secret?” I ask, as she grabs another beer from the refrigerator. Ash has trusted me with her story, and my gut is telling me I can trust her with mine.
“I can.” She looks me straight in the eye. “But you don’t owe me anything. Just because I shared my story doesn’t mean you have to tell me yours.”
“I want to, but you have to promise you won’t tell another soul. Not Catriona or any of your friends and certainly not your brothers.”
“I promise you can trust me to be confidential. If you don’t want anyone to know, I won’t breathe a word.”
“I need another drink for this,” I say, snatching a second can of vodka cranberry from the refrigerator and dumping it into my glass. At this rate, we’ll both be drunk before any of our friends even get here.