After You... (1st Draft)

Chapter 8 - "That's The Thing About Dating; It's Not Exclusive."

Before I could leave though, he'd grabbed me. I'd turned around to ask him not to do this to me, in fact wondering why I was doing this to myself. I could have walked away but damn me for not doing it. He'd looked down at me, his intense glare making me catch a pathetic breath,

"You'll always belong to me, you know. I'll always be yours. You know why? Because you practically haunt me. Because every time I look at you it's like a kick to my gut that I don't have you anymore. I can't beat myself up hard enough."

Those were the words he'd left me with. I'd pulled myself free when he said that. I didn't want to belong to him. I belonged to no one but myself. I didn't want to think that maybe he was ri—

"I can't even be arsed to make breakfast." Kibbie said, jumping me out of my thoughts, one hand stuck stubbornly in her hair, and her mobile glued to the other as she plonked down on one of our sofa chairs in the living room.

I sucked in a breath, it was unsteady from the memory of last night, and studied her as I stood in the kitchen, our place was open-plan. "I'm having tea for breakfast 'cause I can't be arsed to make anything either." Tea? I sound old...

"Gimme some if there's that blackberry and apple left. That one's actually alright." She pulled her oversized tee down over her knees as she tucked her legs in. "And strangely good for hangovers." she yawned.

She'd never been big on the idea of fruit teas before I started infesting the cupboards with them. After the blackberry and apple though, she was soon sold. I opened the cupboard, pulled the packet down and checked, "Whoa, you've been drinking a lot of these, Kibb. Two left."

"That's because it tastes like ribena." she laughed. "Didn't think I drank that many though. I bet if I go pick up more I won't find it. Or it's 'new and improved.' " she groaned.

I smiled. If there were two things that irked Kibbie with food, it was crisp packets with only 20 per cent content dwelling in 80 per cent air, and things she loved to eat or drink that now all of a sudden had the dreaded 'new and improved recipe' stamped on it. According to her, 99.9 per cent of the time it was never 'improved' and always, always tasted better before. She had a thing about that. It proper pissed her off.

Kibbie could have the last two, I was fine with that, that was her favourite, so I went for my favourite one; strawberry with added honey. Trust me, it's gorge. I passed Kibbie hers and sank down into the other sofa chair and sipped at mine. Lovely, it melted me.

Kibbie was only just slightly hung-over but said it was okay because she didn't work until late. I wondered if Malachy would be there. In fact, I wondered why in the two times I'd actually been to Reds before, I hadn't seen him there. I could never have missed a guy like him. Nobody could. But it soon became apparent that they changed shifts and often times never worked the same ones.

I was contemplating. I'd already called in sick at my work. I worked as a receptionist for a company in East London, a developmental business area, I hated the place, I was constantly on monotonous-task territory and was thinking of studying again like Kibbie had, but for now it paid the bills.

"I'm not surprised you pulled a sickie."

"I know, I know, but it's the first sickie I've pulled in almost a year, I'm long overdue. Plus I got that Jackie chick to cover me. I've covered her way too many times to count, and the weekend's round the corner so I should be alright for Monday."

Kibbie's phone went off and she looked at it, a smile quickly followed as it curved her lips. I noticed she was completely devoid of makeup because sometimes when she was too tired she slept in it, but her deep-toned skin was practically flawless. Courtesy of her ethnic mix. Lucky girl.