Page 93 of The Reality of Us
“That’s not what we mean.” Mrs Mandrill leant forward, her hair now a faded pink, not the bright hue she’d had the last time he saw her. “How are you going to get her back?”
“Get her back …” Owen raised his eyebrows.
“Yes.”
“Uhhh …” He gulped down a swallow of his water, looking over the rim of the glass at Lulu.
“Rumour is that video is rubbish,” was all she said. “She’d had surgery, and her stitches tore. She wasn’t high on drugs. Well, not illegal ones, at least.”
He coughed. “How do you know that?”
Lulu threw her hands in the air, bracelets jangling with the exaggerated movement. “Because we’re the Old Girls Gossip Brigade, Owen. Darling, catch up! We know everything, remember? Now, how are we going to make this right?”
Why hadn’t Alice said that then? Or released a statement afterwards? Done something other than act like she’d done the wrong thing?
“Teddy said she hasn’t been home since the race. Her brother and his fiancé dropped Owen’s car off. They packed a bag for her and took all Murphy’s things. I thought the two of you were so lovely together,” Mrs Mandrill said wistfully, and Owen frowned at his mother. So much for keeping their secret.
“Don’t you look at me like that, Owen David James.” Lulu waggled her finger at him. “I didn’t say a thing. You young people think you’re so difficult to understand. We figured you’d tell everyone when you were ready. You know, with all the nonsense with her ex and everything. Everyone gives us a hard time about gossiping, but we can be discreet when we need to be. It was obvious to everyone that the two of you were falling in love.”
He swallowed a bitter-tasting laugh. After all their sneaking around, everyone had known anyway.
“She said it was all a mistake.” Vocalising the words hurt almost as much as hearing them had. He bit the inside of his cheeks and waited for the inevitable sighs of sympathy.
But they didn’t come.
“So?” Mrs Mandrill lobbed across the table. “She was put on the spot! Ambushed. Of course, she panicked. Poor girl’s probably got PTSD after the stunts her ex has been pulling.”
“Imagine if you’d worked so hard to rebuild your life and it was all going to be taken away again,” his mother said gently.
“Then why didn’t she let me …” He picked up his drink.
“Take over?” Mrs Mandrill shook her head.
“I was helping!”
“By taking over …”
He put his glass down so quickly that water sloshed over the side. “Alice didn’t want anyone to know we were … that we’d been—”
“Falling in love?” Mrs Mandrill piped up.
“No!” Owen’s face was on fire. No way was he going to admit that to anyone when he’d never even had the chance to tell Alice.
His old teacher stroked her chin. Said hopefully, “Having sex? Netflix and chilling?”
God, just kill me. Talking about his sex life with his mother, year three teacher and all the other Old Girls was not something he wanted to do.
“That’s not … that’s not important. She didn’t want people to know we’d been involved so I couldn’t go over there and be her boyfriend. And as her lawyer—”
“—ha! But you were her boyfriend! You admit it.” Mrs Mandrill grinned triumphantly.
“Joan,” Owen barked, surprising himself. “Not the point right now.”
“Of course it is.” Lulu crossed her arms and sent him such a withering look of disappointment; it was like he was five years old all over again.
“If being her lawyer and doing my job was the wrong thing to do and I couldn’t let on I was her boyfriend”—he sent a warning look at Joan because fuck it, now he’d snapped at her, he could allow himself to use her first name—“what was I supposed to do?”
They gaped back at him like he was an idiot. Finally, his mother spoke. “If you can’t figure it out, then we’re not going to tell you.”
