Page 137 of The Moon Also Rises
“Yes, he said he’s coming but still plenty of time for him to not show,” I say feeling the need to pre-empt that out loud, just in case.
“Oh, no, I’m sure he’ll be here.” Lionel taps my arm in reassurance.
There’s something about the depths of Lionel’s kind eyes, or maybe it’s the progress I’ve been making with my debt, and in therapy recently, that has me pulling in a deep breath and launching into a conversation that months ago I never would have dared to start with Lionel and Luigi.
“Actually, there’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you both about. If you have a minute.”
“We are here in our finest attire just for you, old boy,” Luigi says with one of his guffaws.
“Well, you know at your wedding. How Rami was my date… my boyfriend.”
Lionel and Luigi share a quick look that I can’t decipher so I just push on.
“The thing is, we weren’t exactly together, then. Or really maybe ever. I don’t really know what we were.” I pause and need another deep breath before I can continue. “But we weren’t together at your wedding. Rami was my fake date, my fake boyfriend. He came with me so I wouldn’t be alone at your wedding.”
“He was yourfakedate?” Lionel’s face creases in confusion.
“You weren’t really together?” Luigi asks, also with a heavy frown. “But that’s impossible. What about the dancing…”
Lionel takes over. “At our wedding. When he did that dance in front of everyone and he… he kissed you.”
“That was all part of the pretence,” I say glumly.
“What about that other night?” Luigi’s eyebrow lifts into a very impressive arch. Of course, he has overachieving facial features as well as everything else. “You know, when we made drunken fools of ourselves at your place, I believe there was a lot more than kissing happening then…”
“Oh, God.” I groan and cover my face with my hand. “Did you hear us?”
Luigi gets as close to blushing as is maybe possible. “I was in no fit state to make sense of anything that night, but hindsight did make me question if I heard… something.”
“Well, yes, there was something going on then, and after that. For a while…” My voice and my mind drifts away from Lionel and Luigi. It goes back in time to a place where Rami laid me out on his sheepskin rug and covered my body in kisses
“But not anymore?” Lionel asks and he sounds like he’s genuinely intrigued.
I swallow the lump in my throat. “When I texted you we broke up, that was when whatever we were ended. That was when he went back to LA and I’ve not heard from him since.”
“Nothing at all?” Luigi has the same curiosity.
“Nope,” I say and I do try to smile even though I’m almost certain it doesn’t convert. “I’m sorry I lied to you about him being my boyfriend.”
Lionel chuckles then and the sound helps ease some of my own discomfort. “Well, tickle me under the arms with a feather duster, I can’t believe you weren’t really dating! You seemed so good together.”
We were, I want to call out for him and anyone else to hear but I feel I have no right.
“You know, it could all still work out,” Luigi says but doesn’t continue after Lionel gives him a pointed look.
“I really do think that ship has sailed,” I say to Luigi before turning to Lionel. “Not everybody gets the happy ending you both did. And I’m okay with that.”
That’s the thing. I really am. In the last few weeks I’ve seen glimmers of something that could be called peace. In the way my debt is reducing. In the way therapy actually feels like it’s making a concrete difference rather than giving me soundbites to cling to when I need to ride out the latest chaos in my life. Chaos that invariably used to involve me doing online shopping in the middle of the night or treating myself to a big night out my bank balance or my liver could ill afford, all things that I have now stopped doing.
“Oh, biscuits. I want to hug you again,” Lionel says and this time when he leans in, it’s just me and him. As his arms envelop me, I think about how much our relationship has changed. Four months ago, I was actively avoiding Lionel’s calls and dreading his wedding and now I am closing my eyes and relaxing in his embrace like it’s a little extra oxygen.
Part of me wants to thank Rami for this evolution, for being by my side as I cleared the air with Lionel, but a bigger, stronger part of me just feels proud becauseIdid that. I may have done it with Rami somewhere in the background, and certainly Lionel’s big, kind heart helped us both get to where we are today, but still, I was part of it too. Albeit long overdue, I was humble enough to own up to my mistakes and apologise for them. I was strong enough to keep Lionel in my life when pushing him away felt like the easiest thing. I am still brave enough to keep these hopelessly in love idiots close to me when a former version of myself would have banished them forever.
I’ve been feeling brave a lot recently, which is just as well because when I open my eyes and lift my head off Lionel’s shoulder, I see my father and Carol entering the courtyard.
I quickly excuse myself and make my way to them.
“Dad, Carol, you’re here,” I say as I come to stand in front of them.
