Free Unbind by Sarah Michelle Lynch Page B

was fatigue and annoyance. I’d kissed a really great guy and she didn’t seem to give a fuck about my day.
    We settled the bill, though I ended up shouldering most of it. Then I helped her up from our table (with some guy’s help) and got her arms around my shoulders, walking us both back to the flat. So, not on our hands and knees, which might actually have been better. That would have been funny. Holding my friend up because a guy had drained all the sass out of her was not pretty, not in the least.
    Inside the flat, we collapsed in her bed and I held her while she cried herself to sleep. The douche was a bad influence and she knew it—ruining her aspirations, her self-esteem and even threatening a friendship that’d survived worse tests than a cheating scumbag.

Chapter 7
     
     
     
    THE NEXT MORNING I had to peel myself from her arms, her grip on me in that bed of hers iron-tight. If that didn’t reveal her state of mind, I didn’t know what else might. Maybe my arrival was more fateful than I realised. Clearly, I was needed. Sure there’d been plenty of trips to London to visit her but I’d never gotten a full picture of her relationship woes.
    I showered and dressed in our tiny little living space and she groaned as she watched me. Never could take her drink all that well. No time for fancy stuff that day, I yanked on skinnies, ankle boots and a cream jersey.
    “Should I dump him?” Her voice was frail, and small.
    I celebrated inside. “I think so.”
    “Knew you’d not try to convince me to stay with him, but I could do with a voice of reason.”
    A voice of reason would demand you shag any guy but him! Let’s go round and round in circles until I tell you what you want to hear …
    I couldn’t help but bite out, “He came onto me loads of times, Kayla. Even tried to get his hand up my skirt once. He’s a loser and he’s rubbing off on you. Look… you worked so hard and you’ve got a really good job but you’re risking it all for a knob-jockey. You’re living in a bedsit because you’re always buying material shit to try make you feel better. Tell you what, get rid of that prick and you’ll be so much better off!”
    As soon as I saw her facial expression in response, I wished I could take it back. I couldn’t.
    “You’re just raw cos you ain’t got a fella,” was her painfully emotional retort.
    I carried on getting ready, brushing my hair, sliding all my gadgets in my bag. I applied make-up in the mirror above the filled-in fireplace.
    All the while, she just stared like I was eventually going to take it back.
    “Why didn’t I tell you?” I started in a clear, rhetorical voice. “Well, I knew you’d react like this. I knew you’d get defensive. I hate this more than you, trust me, because all I see when I look at you is a great girl, sucked dry of all hope by a shit bloke intent on taking what he can get from whomever—”
    “Shut up!”
    I turned to her, trying to think of something inspiring to say, but just blurted, “You know the real reason you’re like this, Kay. It’s not him. He’s the cover for what’s really going on here.”
    “Fuck you. You don’t get to judge me, woman.”
    I carried on getting ready and realised the sooner I was out of there, the better. Didn’t she realise he was wrecking everything people loved about her—her spark, vitality, spirit?
    I felt my body trembling and tears threatened to rocket out of my eyes. I didn’t like to get like this and she knew it. “Just so you know, I do know what it’s like to want someone Kay. Just because I haven’t gone the distance doesn’t mean I don’t know what it feels like to put myself out there.”
    “Chloe—”
    Before we could get further into our spat, I left the building and began my long walk to work. We both needed air to breathe and it’d all blow over, I knew it. Just… deep breaths.
    The further I walked, though, the harder it got to tell myself it was just a tiff. I knew what