Something akin to rage flashed in Kim’s suddenly piercing gaze. “What mixed messages? I was honest about Lena, and I haven’t been with her since I met you. What more do you want from me?”
“Been with her? As in—”
“As in shagged her, Jas. ’Cause that’s all you’re bothered about, right? Who screws who? Not that she’s my best friend in the world? Not that it’s really fucking hard to let go of the one person who’s always had my back? Who’s forgiven me for every fuckup I’ve had?”
The fury in his rant caught me off guard. “I’ve never asked you to give her up.”
“Why not?”
He had me there. Even if he had slept with Red in the time since we’d met, he hadn’t cheated on me, because I’d given him nothing to be unfaithful to. “Because I don’t want you to give her up.”
“Because you don’t want me?”
“No, because I don’t . . . Ican’t. . . feel threatened by something that means so much. Kim—”
“Fuck this.” Kim dodged me as I reached for him. “Look, just forget it, okay? It is what it is between us—some shit-hot sex and mates, yeah? Shame we can’t have a pint together. We’d be laughing then.”
“Kim.”
“Jas, please. I gotta go, okay? I’ve got loads to do tonight, and I reckon you’ve seen enough of me for one day.”
That would never happen, but instead of saying so, my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth, and Kim was halfway to Red’s ridiculous pink car before I took a step forward.
And by then it was too late. Kim was out of earshot and, it seemed, out of the flawed brand of friendship I’d kidded myself that I could handle.
Kim didn’t call. And I didn’t call him, which meant we were back in the silent phase of our never-ending cycle of bullshit and miscommunication.
I blamed myself. How could I not? Everything Kim had said to me was true. I’d asked to be friends, and then screwed him on the floor of my old flat, then I’d asked him to be a friend I could fuck, only to drive him home with no more than a snog on the doorstep, all the while letting on no indication that I gave a shit what became of us.
The Red thing wasn’t quite as he saw it, though, but it would take a hell of a conversation for him to believe that. Despite what Rich had put me through, I truly had no problem with the bond Kim and Red had forged long before I knew them. How could I, when he’d been so honest about it? Because it wasn’t Rich’s wife who had hurt me so much, it had been the lies, the deception . . . the hidden side of a man I’d believed I would spend the rest of my life with. I didn’t know Kim as well as I wanted to, and I didn’t know Red at all, but somehow I believedinthem, a notion that made little sense as I threw myself into my work in an effort to give Kim some space.
Space. Ha. Would I never fucking learn? When a week of silence turned into ten long days, it appeared not. Tail between my legs, I got in my car one Saturday afternoon and drove to the commune, but there was no one there, and no sign of Red’s pink car.
Deflated and slightly desperate, I wound up at the farm, seeking shelter in Laura’s kitchen while the others were all out painting the barn to match the new doors Kim had apparently delivered the day before.
“We honestly didn’t expect him to have them finished so soon.” Laura set her gigantic teapot on the table. “He surprised us when he turned up last night.”
“Was he okay?”
Laura arched an eyebrow. “Okay? Yes, he seemed to be, not that he said much. We couldn’t even tempt him in with a glass of your dad’s blackberry wine.”
“He doesn’t drink, Ma. He’s an alcoholic.”
“Oh.” For once, my wonderful stepmother appeared lost for words. “Well, he doesn’t look like one.”
I rolled my eyes. “Who does?”
“Is he a functioning alcoholic? I’ve read about those.”
“Ma, I have no idea what you read about in those daft magazines of yours.”
“Cheeky.” Laura cuffed my ear as she claimed the seat beside me, softening the blow with a plate of jam-filled shortbread. “But I’m sorry if I’ve put my foot in my mouth. Us old fogies have to work hard to keep up.”
“You’re not that old.”
“Old enough to know better than to talk when I should be listening.”
Knowing that resistance was futile, I took my cue. Besides, I couldn’t stand any more silence. “I think I’ve fucked up.”