Page 10 of The Missus
That was a good point. She couldn’t afford this place on her own. Benjamin, however, worked in IT and made more than her. He could swing it by himself, whereas she’d have to get a flatmate. And that was if she could convince Benjamin to leave.
Shit, shewasgoing to have to leave.
Benjamin watched her, realising all this. He gave a bitter chuckle. ‘You didn’t think of that, did you? Gonna go home to your mum?’
What a thought. Her mother was… well, actually, a lot like Benjamin. A control freak. She couldn’t believe this was the first time she’d noticed the parallel. She supposed it was because the things they tried to control were quite different. Benjamin was a neat freak. Her mother was more obsessed with how the world viewed her. This manifested itself through her tendency to keep trading up on husbands with increased status. She’d started with a plumber, Alanna’s dad, a poor start. After he died, which Alanna had always suspected had come as a relief to her mother, she married an accountant. She left him for a guy who owned a restaurant chain. She lefthimfor a surgeon who she was probably going to see it out with, being as she was knocking seventy now. The whole thing was quite revolting to Alanna. Particularly as her mother tried to apply her worldview to her daughter. Was she successful enough, married, pumping out crotch goblins? It was a no on all counts, and her mother harped on her about these things constantly.
So no, Alanna couldn’t go there and live with her mother. But she didn’t like the way Benjamin was laughing at her. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ve got plenty of places I could go.’ She grabbed a bag and chucked a few things in it. She went into the bathroom to grab her makeup bag before she realised that was pointless. ‘Right, well, that’s me done,’ she said, going back into the bedroom and picking up her stuff. ‘I’ll text you to finish up details.’
Benjamin nodded. ‘Best of luck,’ he said evenly. Alanna wanted to see more suffering than that, being as he was the villain of the piece. But he couldn’t even give her a bit of pleading or crying, could he, the bastard? Nope, he didn’t care. His life was untouched.
She slammed out of the flat. Out in the hall, she didn’t know what to do or where to go. She thought of her best friend, Jenny, a fellow counsellor, but she was on holiday, and she’d left yesterday for a full fortnight at an all-inclusive resort where she intended to, as she put it, ‘Rinse out the male population.’
There was her next closest friend, Lizzy, who she’d known since school. She was married with two kids, three dogs, one cat, and a budgie. There couldn’t possibly be any room at that inn.
Next down the list? Her old uni buddy, Calvin. He was currently living in a van parked illegally on a trading estate in an attempt to get off the grid, which he tweeted about daily.
Those were the only people she could ask and all of them were non-starters.
She walked down the hall toward the elevator, wondering where the hell she was heading to. The doors of the elevator opened, and Keira was revealed. She took one look at Alanna and cried, ‘Jesus, are you OK?’
‘Yeah, I’m OK,’ she lied, puzzled.
‘Your face looks kind of…’
Alanna realised she had smeared her makeup in the heat of the fight. She must look like a panda having a breakdown. ‘Oh, no, I just… This is nothing. Don’t worry about it.’
‘Oh, alright. I didn’t mean to intrude,’ Keira said, stepping out of the elevator. Alanna stepped in.
‘You’re not. I’m just…’ The doors began to close. ‘I just have to find somewhere else to live,’ she found herself saying as the doors shut. She pushed the ground floor button. The elevator moved off. Alanna reached into her bag and pulled out a wet wipe. She cleaned her face as the elevator took her to god knew where.
It juddered to the ground floor, and the doors opened. Alanna was about to step out into the foyer when Keira jumped out in front of her. Alanna let out a shriek of shock.
‘Sorry,’ Keira said, panting, doubled over, pink in the face. ‘Took… the… stairs. I… was trying… to catch… you… before you… left,’ she wheezed.
‘Were you?’ Alanna asked, surprised.
Keira took a few deep breaths, trying to gather herself. ‘Sorry… I’m… asthmatic.’
‘Take your time,’ Alanna said, still baffled.
‘Did I hear… you say… you’re… leaving?’ Keira gasped, standing upright and then immediately bending double again. She pulled an inhaler out of her pocket and sucked a dose into her lungs.
‘Are you alright?’ Alanna asked.
Keira pulled a better breath in. ‘Almost… functional,’ she muttered.
Alanna kept waiting until Keira’s colour corrected and she seemed ready to talk again. But what came out of her mouth was surprising, to say the least. ‘Right, OK. What I was going to ask was… Do you need somewhere to live?’
Six
Keira liked living alone. She had no desire to change that. But when those elevator doors closed on Alanna’s revelation that she was leaving her flat (and presumably, her boyfriend), Keira was struck by a belter of an idea. An idea that she needed to transport down to the ground floor despite her crap lungs or lose the opportunity forever.
‘Do you need somewhere to live?’ she asked Alanna when she could breathe.
‘Huh?’ Alanna asked, baffled.
‘I’ve got a spare room. You could live in it.’
