“Enough,” I say, cutting him off. Hadley laughs harder.
“You a piece of shit, you have lot of making up to do. Roses don’t mean she give you fucky fuck.”
“Ghost, you’ve made your point,” I mutter.
He reaches into my open wallet and takes some cash out. “Arsehole,” he utters, folding at least fifty in notes and stuffing them in his pocket.
“You’re an arsehole. Next time, I’ll let Scar do it. He’s less of a talker,” I say, snatching the roses and handing them to Hadley. He swoops down and kisses Hadley on the cheek before making his exit. “Sorry, he got a little over-excited in his role,” I say.
“Don’t be. He was much funnier than the original rose seller. I still have it, by the way, the rose.” I grin at her confession. “It’s dry and shrivelled, much like our relationship,” she says, winking, “but I kept it anyway.”
After a couple more drinks, we head back to the club for bathtime with Oakley. Once she’s asleep, I take Hadley by the hand and lead her outside. It’s weird touching her after not being allowed for so long. I feel like small electric pulses are passing from our hands.
We go outside to the oak tree. Our oak tree.
HADLEY
This feels like our special place. I always felt close to him here, and after he left, I’d cry in this spot. I rub my chest, remembering how much it hurt back then. I thought I’d never get over it, but here we are again, acting like he didn’t rip out my heart and stamp all over it. Listening to him talking with Meli last night, I realised just how much I’ve missed them both being in my life. I came to the conclusion that they miss me just as much, so what is keeping us apart, except for me being stubborn? They can’t change the past, but I can change our future. Oakley needs them both in her life and so do I.
Grim tugs me to sit beside him, then he throws a blanket over us both and opens the book. This time, he continues to read more than one chapter. Snuggled under the blanket, listening to his rumbling voice has me rooted to the spot, and after some time, I lay my head against his shoulder and close my eyes. I feel like I’m home.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
GRIM
The following day, I feel stressed. “It’s not working,” I say, pacing Mav’s office. Rylee gives me a sympathetic look. “She would have said something to you, and she hasn't, which means she isn’t impressed or swayed,” I continue.
“I could go ask her how she’s getting on,” Rylee suggests.
“I don’t want you to dig. If she was thinking about taking me back, she’d have told you. I know she would have.”
“Hadley’s kind of distanced herself from me. Not in a bad way, just she’s busy with work and Oakley. We don’t talk like we used to.”
“I need something bigger, better.”
“You revisited past dates, you’ve done shit she loves . . . how about you make new memories,” Mav suggests.
“Like?”
“I don’t know, use your imagination. Surely, you can think of a date.”
It took a lot of organising and begging, mainly because the woman in charge was stricter than fucking Hitler. But I cracked her, and now, I’m waiting by a candlelit table—fake candles because of Hitler. I feel nervous. This feels like the make-or-break date. Thursday already and I’m here wondering what kind of fucking pussy organises a dinner date in a library that apparently survived the second World War.
Mav leads Hadley in, her arm hooked in his. She looks around in awe and it’s the effect I was hoping to have as her eyes land on me. “Does Betty Battle-axe know about this?” she asks, smiling wide.
“If you mean Hitler, yes, she knows. I’m lucky to have survived with my balls still attached.”
She giggles and the sound almost takes my breath away. Mav kisses her on the cheek before stepping out and leaving us alone. “It looks beautiful.”
“As do you,” I say, pulling out the chair for her to sit.
I lift the lid on our dinner, and she laughs at the discovery of burgers underneath. “In my defence, I only had a short window and Hitler was very specific about the use of heat and flame, so having a chef cook right in front of us was a definite rule-breaker.”
She smiles even wider. “This is perfect, Grim. Really perfect.”
I take my seat. “The library is full of secrets. Books that hold a world of them.” I pour us each a glass of water. “So, here goes. The first girl I ever kissed was when I was six years old. Janey Peaches. She smelt funny and I’m pretty sure she’d been eating sand right before I planted my lips on hers as a dare. Your brother’s dare, might I add. Anyway, she punched me right in the face and told me she was gonna tell her dad. I wasn’t scared cos I knew I could take her dad, even at six years old. My first time was with Erica Bradshaw. I was ten, and she was thirteen. She was a crazy motherfucker and into some weird shit for a kid. I was scared after that for months.”
I laugh to myself, lost in the memories of my childhood. “Jenifer Wood. She was second. I remember her because right before I met up with her, I’d killed my mum’s latest boyfriend. I remember turning up at her house with the confidence of a lion, like I was some big motherfucker afraid of no one. I asked her out because rumour had it she was easy, and I needed easy in my life seeing as everything else was so fucking hard. She didn’t want to have sex, but I was pumped from what I’d done earlier, and I talked her into it. I felt like a prick after. After that, women became faceless. I can’t tell you names, ages . . . I can’t even picture them. I can tell you places, maybe . . . an alleyway, a club parking lot, the cinema, a bar. So many places. And then I noticed Meli.”
Hadley shifts uncomfortably, but it needs to be said so she can understand everything.
HADLEY
I hold my breath, preparing for his confession of undying love for my twin. I’m not sure I can handle the truth, but something tells me I need to hear it, so I sit quietly, waiting for him to continue. “She reminded me of Janey Peaches,” he smirks, “and that reminded me of times when I felt innocent. When I wasn’t soiled with blood and guilt and women’s cheap perfume. When it was all about funny smells and sand grains on lips.
“Meli didn’t give a crap about offending people or sticking to rules. I never told her how I felt, just watched from a distance and wondered what it would be like to be so guilt-free and happy. I didn’t know the truth then, that she felt just as soiled and used as me. The night Rosey returned and everything came out, I was floored. Like we all were. And when everyone had gone to bed, and I was alone with my bottle of Jack, I sat behind the bar and cried.
“I didn’t see it, even though I watched her, so I blamed myself. And on top of that, I felt guilty for being jealous over her carefree life when in actual fact she was suffering worse than I ever did. She found me behind the bar, and we drank. We drank so much, I don’t even know how we ended up doing what we did. And I can’t sit here and lie, I can’t tell you I woke up and regretted it, because I didn’t. But I didn’t remember it either. It was just like all the other times, yet she wasn’t faceless. She was Meli, the woman I’d been pining after for years.