Page 17 of Insta-Love

“This is only one bad day with many better ones to come,” Ava assures her. “It hurts, I know, but it’ll be over before you know it and you’ll have an awesome new cast to decorate by the sounds of things.” She smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes.

She feels responsible, I know it, and I contributed to that. I can’t stay in here.

“I’m going to duck out and find a vending machine.” First excuse that comes to my head other than I’m not coping with the repressed memories this brings up. “You need anything?”

“If they have something dry, like chips or a cookie, that’d be great.” Ava reaches for her bag, but I grunt and shake my head when she looks up again.

“My shout. You worry about what’s going on here.” I circle my hand around the cubicle.

“Okay.” Her gaze flits to Lily who’s closed her eyes and rests while she can. “I better phone my parents and let them know where we are.”

She pulls her phone from her bag as I duck out the space in the curtain. The beats of my heart finally gain a little space between them as I walk out of the examination room and into the hallway. Searching left and right, I wonder which way is less likely to get me lost.

A young, and reasonably pretty, nurse walks up from my left. Like all women around my age do, she takes a long look at me before she smiles and offers, “Can I help?”

“Where can I grab a bite to eat?”

She gestures to my right. “Second left, follow the hall to the red doors and swing a right straight after. You’ll see a row of vending machines; the canteen doesn’t open again until morning.”

“Thank you.” I give her a little extra in my smile for being so helpful and she blushes. Predictable.

Her uniform rustles as she walks away briskly toward a sign that points at the nurse’s station. I drag in a laden breath and drop my head back, eyes closed briefly. You can do this, Bowen. It’s not that hard. The thought of leaving has crossed my mind a thousand times over but then how would Ava and Lily get home? What kind of an arse would that make me ditching them here and forcing them to pay for a taxi they can’t afford? What do you care? Why is it one half of me wants to shove her away because she’s everything the right woman for me isn’t, and yet the other half wants to head back into that cubicle and wrap my arms around her shoulders, kiss her head, and tell her she’s an amazing woman and that everything will be fine?

The move to Henderson Street was supposed to be a fresh start. A new place on my own, living by my own rules, with nobody to blame for my successes and failures than myself.

It’s a fresh start all right, just not in the part of my life I expected.

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