towel in time to do my hair and make-up. Rebecca obliged, layering on lashings and lashings of mascara and eye-shadow while I blow-dried my hair in a frenzy. I was just about done when Cara rang the buzzer, merely taking a final moment to adjust my waves before getting dressed.
Bex buzzed Cara on up and stood back to admire her handiwork.
“Hot to trot, baby, you’ll knock him senseless,” she purred, then laughed as she flicked up my towel. “Look at the state of you, Kitty Cat, you still have fucking tigger-stripes, our James Clarke will be chomping at the bit when he sees those beauties.”
I laughed along with her, turning myself in the mirror to check them out for myself. “He hit me bloody hard,” I said. “It hurt like an absolute bastard.”
“Lydia?! Oh my God! Lyddie?!”
My eyes flicked to the doorway, instinctive horror flooding right through me. Cara stood with her hand over her mouth, eyes screwed shut in mortification, but she was the least of my concerns. At her side was Steph, wide-eyed and wide-mouthed, her jaw flapping as she struggled for words.
“Steph? Shit! What are you doing here?”
I struggled to back away from her but she was at my side, her eyes all over my fucking bruises. “What happened to you?!” she screeched. “Who did this to you?”
Rebecca yanked Cara by the elbow, dragging her through to the balcony. Cara mouthed ‘sorry’ and Bex mouthed ‘stupid cow’, I appreciated both sentiments.
“Calm down,” I said. “It’s nothing.”
“It doesn’t look like bloody nothing!” she thundered. “Someone’s beaten the shit out of you! It’s that suit man, isn’t it?!”
I wrenched out of her grip, retreating to my bedroom for my dress. I felt so much safer with it on, but still she wouldn’t let it go. “It’s sick, Lyddie, sick! What kind of man would do this to you? What kind of man, Lyds?!”
“He didn’t do anything to me, Steph, I wanted it.”
“This is all fucked up, Lydia Marsh, it’s so fucked up. I knew you being here was a bad thing.” She pointed at the roof terrace with flailing arms, and I saw Rebecca poke her tongue out at Steph’s back. I fought the urge to laugh. “These people are WEIRDOS! They are CRAZY!”
“They aren’t crazy.” I rolled my eyes. “I like it here. I’m happy here.”
“You’re coming home with me right now!” she yelled. “Where these people can’t hurt you again!” She tried to pull me along by my wrist, but I had none of it, twisting away.
“I’m not going anywhere, Steph. This is my home. These are my friends.”
“And what about me?” she snapped. “What am I? What is Stuart?”
Stuart’s name thumped me in the gut. “Stuart is my ex-boyfriend. A nobody. He got someone else pregnant behind my back, I couldn’t give a fuck about him anymore.”
“That’s why I’m here!” she wailed. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, if you weren’t too busy with these weirdos to listen to your fucking messages!”
I folded my arms. “What are you here to tell me?”
“It’s Stu,” she said. “He’s not the father! Carly admitted it the other night, admitted it clean out. The baby isn’t his, Lyds, it was all lies. I doubt he even fucked her in that alleyway, not really. She may have sucked him off, sure, but I don’t think he took it all the way, he was too drunk to remember, and she took advantage. He’s not going to be a dad, Lyddie, he’s not, and he’s so bloody sorry, all he wants is to make it right with you. It’s his second chance, Lyds, he knows how bad he’s messed up.”
“I don’t want Stuart,” I seethed. “Baby or no, it makes no odds. I don’t love him anymore.”
She turned purple, her bottom lip jutting out in rage. “You’d rather a man that beats the crap out of you, would you? You’ve lost the fucking plot, lady, these people have fucked with your mind.”
I looked at the clock, horrified to find just ten minutes to spare. I lost my temper, needing her out and away before my twisted-as-sin chaperone crashed her little monologue.
“I’m happy, Steph. Just leave me the fuck alone, will you? I don’t want Stuart, I’m not coming back to yours, I don’t want your cutesy little life of peaches and cream and evening quiz shows. I want to be here.”