59

‘What happened? Is Rob okay? Is Abby?’

‘Calm down. Now hush my dear.’ She took hold of Rose’s now shaking hands and pulled her towards the kitchen. Making kissing noises for Muffin to follow them. The smell of baking bread failing to wash over her with any kind of calming effect

‘Both are fine. It was that stupid wretched woman and her love of smashing the blooming vases.’ She sat Rose in a chair and moved away to fill the kettle. ‘Cut her arm open quite badly and left blood all over the lounge rug that I’m going to have to clean up.’

‘Oh my god!’ She laid her face on the table, suddenly feeling faint. Muffin sensing her distress pawed at her ankle before laying across her feet protectively. Small whimpers as he continued to glance up at her.

‘It’s okay dear. Rob was quick off the mark. Bound it up and held it tight. Abby had been out here when she heard the smash and the screams, in the kitchen with me. She helped get her in his car and they rushed off. Abby told me to man the phone for her call.’

She placed some cups out neatly, getting them ready for the boiling water. Rose could hear every movement and noise, still holding her head on the table while nausea and dizziness passed. Her breathing shallow and her thoughts frantic.

What the hell had that stupid woman done? Oh, my god...Rob.

She felt sick to her stomach with the realisation that this is what he had been afraid of all along.

‘Quite a bit of drama. Abby said she would call with an update as soon as she could.’

Rose lifted her head unsure how to feel. She took the mug of tea gratefully and sipped down its hot liquid. Thankful for the excuse not to talk, thankful for a task that focused her frantic brain.

Alice was clearing plates and washing dishes in the sink, chatting away about the state of the lounge and speculating on this morning’s row. Rose watched her in disbelief, almost deaf to her words and lost in her own scrambled brain.

How could she be so calm?

‘It’s odd, but I assumed things were long dead with those two... But he had obviously had her stay the night in his bed, judging by the mess of it, the extra towels on the bathroom floor and the two plates of breakfast left sitting on his bed.’

Rose felt her face colour and tried not to react. Willing the old woman to stop talking.

‘Not that it’s my business, even if it’s just sex. He should never confuse things that way with her, it explains all the recent outbursts if he’s been sleeping with her again and leading her astray.’ Alice carried on, oblivious to Rose’s pale pallor and wide eyes, or the way she was staring at her hands in a bid to stay quiet.

‘She thinks he’s seeing another woman behind her back.’ Alice looked her way with a raised eyebrow. Rose almost choked on her tea. The flush of guilt creeping up her neck.

‘I think she might be right you know?’ Alice winked merrily. ‘Should have seen the mess of his mother’s bedroom. Someone had certainly been having a good time in there last night. And it was not red hair on the pillows. Nooo, it was a brunette. I know it was Rob who had used the room as only him and Abby have keys, besides me. It stays locked and Abby has jet black hair.’

Rose inwardly cringed. Plastering a smile on her deeply blushing face and wriggling uncomfortably in her seat. Making sure not to draw attention to her hair by touching it.

‘Not that I blame him mind. He’s told her a million times that there’s nothing between them that’s serious. He’s dated women in the past on and off, but I don’t think she had the inkling like she does now, following him around moping and crying. He needs to get on with his own life and just be done with her. A nice girl and a family. Not all this drama.’

‘Hmm.’ Was the only reply Rose could formulate for fear her voice would betray her. Her head racing and face burning with shame and guilt.

The phone shrieked like a welcome alarm on the kitchen wall and Rose resisted the urge to jump up and answer. Instead, having to sit and pretend she was not dying to grab at it. Alice was so slow to answer, drying her hands first that she was almost in hysterics with anticipation.

Greeting Abby on the line she hummed and ahhed as she listened and asked some brief questions on Morag’s state. Rose was tapping both foot and hand against the table, trying not to chew her nails or wrestle the phone from her.

‘Oh, and Rose has come by to see you.’ She added as an afterthought, stopping to listen to the response, smiling she turned holding out the cordless handset towards her. Rose wanted to snatch it manically but instead, she smiled and deliberately took it gently and calmly. Her hands still trembling.

‘Rose?’

‘Hey Ab’s. Yeah, it’s me. Alice told me what happened.’ Rose gushed down the phone, finally relieved to have made contact with one of them.

‘Oh my god, Rose, it was awful. So much blood. I nearly puked!’ Her voice was weak and shaky, and she was in obvious distress.

‘How is she now? How’s Rob?’ Rose couldn’t conceal her concern, tears prickling her eyes and her hands shaking violently.

‘They have her in with them. We were not allowed past the waiting room, so we don’t know. Rob has been trying to find out for the last hour but no word, she’s in surgery apparently. I had to come find a payphone as my mobile is totally dead and he doesn’t even have his here. He’s quiet... Worried I guess, and not saying much.’

‘I have been so worried, when I didn’t hear from either of you, I didn’t know what to think.’

She saw Alice raise her eyebrows in interest from the corner of her eye.

‘I’ll tell Rob you’re at the house. He will want to call. He’s been major stressed at not being able to contact you. Neither of us had either your home phone number or your mobile with us and your cottage isn’t listed.’ Abby sounded tired and so far, away, the hospital was a good thirty to forty-minute drive away.

‘Okay. Please keep us updated Ab’s. I’ll stay here until your back, so you can call me, so he can call me.’ Rose tried to lower her voice, but she could see Alice had the hearing of a hawk.

‘Okay. I better go. I’m running out of money, I’ll call soon, when I get more change.’

They said their goodbyes and Rose returned the phone to its cradle quietly. Relieved that the people she loved were okay but frustrated at not being able to talk freely or to him. She just wanted to hear his voice so badly right now, know that he was okay.

Alice smiled and offered some words of comfort about no news sometimes being no big deal. Busy hospitals and short staffed. Waiting times being hours long. Rose listened, only half taking it in and drinking the new mug of tea placed before her on the scrubbed pine table, unaware that she had already emptied her last one. The older lady began making some homemade soup in silence as Rose sat gazing blankly, obviously lost in thought.

She jumped when the phone rang again and without thinking jumped up to answer it saying his name before he spoke. Not caring that Alice expression was that of someone putting two and two together and getting a satisfied conclusion of four. A knowing smile spreading across her face.

‘Baby, I am so glad to hear your voice.’ He sounded tired and stressed. ‘I’m so sorry about standing you up, I had no idea how the hell to get hold of you to let you know.’ He sounded tired, exhausted if she was being honest and yet relieved to hear her finally.

‘It’s okay, my parents bailed on me with hangovers, I’m seeing them tonight. I am just so relieved to know what’s going on.’ Her voice was strained, hushing to avoid Alice’s ears and desperately wanting to be able to talk freely.

‘I just want to be there with you right now, wrapped in your arms and lost in the feel of you baby.’ His husky tone and betrayal of emotion sent tingles along her spine. Rose face and neck warmed, and she tried to hide by turning towards the kitchen door, aware Alice had become extremely interested in this phone call.

‘Umm so any news on Morag?’ Rose was trying to make it clear she wasn’t able to talk.

‘I guess you’re not alone?’ Rob was quick on the uptake.

‘Sure, Alice is taking great care of me, plying me with tea.’ Brightly casting a smile towards the lady, making it clear that she could not openly say what she wanted too. After a pause, he told her to take the phone to his room, to tell her she was to go find something for him.

‘Okay sure...Uhuh I’ll go now.’

She covered the phone telling Alice she had to go retrieve something for Rob and headed off down the small hall, motioning for Muffin to stay under the table. She fumbled with his bedroom door handle. Once inside, concealed in the familiar closed room and free from prying ears she sat on the bed and sighed with relief. It felt better being surrounded by his smell, his things, Away from eyes and ears.

‘I’m alone now. God Rob, I was so worried when I didn’t hear from you. I felt so frantic. What happened?’ Her voice was shaking, matching her hands and at least in here she felt able to be herself.

‘I’m sorry baby...It was all my fault, Rose. I told her I was seeing someone, that I was in love with someone.’ He sounded odd, tired and deflated. ‘I told her I couldn’t go on like this anymore and that she had to stop, that she had to let me go.’ He sighed down the line, obviously torn up from events.

‘She smashed something? Flipped out?’ Rose questioned quietly, trying to picture it, sensing he needed to get this off his chest.

‘I was hungover and pissed that here I was dealing with this shit again, making you hide out like some dirty bit on the side in my room and I was tactless. I spat it out in anger. I handled it really badly.’ His voice had an edge to it, stressed anger, maybe annoyance at how it had panned out.

‘Rob, you can’t blame yourself. You are stuck in an awful situation and you have the patience of a saint dealing with her this way all the time.’ Rose soothed, her voice strained with the effort of not crying for him.

He sighed. Murmuring that he had no patience left anymore. His unfamiliar tone bringing a lump to her throat at his obvious lackluster. He was spent. He sounded so fed up with everything and she ached to hold him and wipe it all away.

‘Tell me what happened. Talk to me Rob. I just want to hear your voice. I miss you.’

‘I miss you more.’ That cheeky hint of a smile invaded his tone for a second and was followed by another heavy sigh.

‘You know she burst in manically going off on one this morning? Well she pretty much carried on after, ranting and raving and smashing another vase in the hall. She was pissed about my distance at the dance, pissed that my phone was off all night.’ He sighed again ‘Same shit, just another day.’

‘She was drunk, she drove over here in that state?’ Rose questioned in disbelief.

‘Yeah, another thing she spat at me, accusing me of not caring about, that she had to drive over drunk because I wouldn’t answer her calls. She wanted to know who my whore was, wanted to know how long I had been cheating on her and I just couldn’t be assed with the shit anymore. I lost my temper and told her to fuck off.’ There was a silent pause and then a sardonic laugh. ‘I just realised how done with all of it I was, how she just made me see in that moment how differently I felt for you. I told her to get back on her meds and to go sleep it off.’ ‘I’m guessing she didn’t take that well at all?’ Rose sighed, knowing his gentle handling he normally displayed had obviously been lacking.