- MILES -
I’ve had a fuck of a day.
One of my clients ended up breaking his arm by not listening to me when I said to drop the weight back down and not push himself too hard, and I had one of my best personal trainers resign as they’re moving to New Zealand.
I also received a long, scathing text from Tate, who, informing me she had a counselling session with a therapist earlier today, proceeded to tell me in a great many words exactly how much my rejection of her had hurt and the various ways in which her self-esteem and self-worth had been shattered by it all. She’s been pretty icy with me since New Years when she caught me lusting after Eden and denied her offer to bang, but this was an especially hard pill for me to swallow. I’m not sure that it’s entirely deserved given we entered into the arrangement on equal terms, as mates who occasionally fuck, instigated by her, without promises of anything more from either of us, nor had I been hooking up with anyone else at the time for her to have misconstrued any kind of ‘cheating’ scenario.
I’ll own that I could have spoken up earlier and made it more clear like in our conversations both before and after we first slept together that we were just friends and I didn’t want anything more, and have taken full responsibility for the many times since whenever I’ve tried to talk to her, which she has consistently brushed off or otherwise not heard a word of because she’s been yelling or crying at me. I will---and I did repeatedly---apologise for how my actions may have made her feel, but I’m not about to assume blame and guilt for something I didn’t do, which is lead her on like she is trying to claim I did.
We agreed it was going to be a casual arrangement, and that if feelings did start to develop, that they’d be brought up and discussed, and the situation called to an end and we’d go back to just being friends with no more benefits. I recognised her feelings---as well as my own developing for Eden---and called things off with no ill-intent or malice.
She doesn’t agree.
But I’m not about to censor her feelings. If she feels hurt and upset and thinks I’m to blame for those feelings, it’s not my place to say otherwise. But I’m also not responsible for things not working out the way she hoped, just as she and her hurt feelings aren’t to blame for our friendship being on the rocks now as a result. It just is what it is, and I hope one day she’s not so disappointed in me and that we can work through this because I love her and don’t want things to be like this between us.
And, to rub a bunch of salt in those wounds of disappointment at work and frustration in my social relationships, I had a massage booked in with Luna today, which would usually be nothing but a complete joy, only for the content of the discussion that came along with it.
Luna was laying on the massage table while I was working on her sacrum area and glutes which are tight as hell, so much so that she had to ask me to ease off on the pressure because she was so tender, even though I was barely touching her. This baby is doing a number on her coccyx, and pulling her pelvis out of alignment on a pretty regular basis which I can’t imagine has made standing around on your feet all day cutting hair too comfortable. I’ve told her she needs to take it easy and rest, but she’s never been one to really put her feet up, even more so now she’s coming to the end of her pregnancy and is needing to get her ducks all in a row before going on maternity leave.
I finished up with her massage and left her to get dressed, and she met me in my office, seating herself on a large exercise ball which I’ve noticed since she's been coming in for weekly massages seems to help in taking some of the pressure off her back.
“Thanks, Miles,” she said, bouncing up and down slowly on the ball at different angles, testing out the new range of movement she must now have after the loosening of her muscles. “You’ve made the last couple months so much more bearable.”
"My pleasure,” I said with a smile, glad that I could have been of help to her.
“You okay if I hang here for a bit with you? My next appointment isn’t for another hour and I can’t be bothered going home beforehand just to then need to leave again.”
I laughed at how unenergetic she seems to be. Her body is definitely winding down into late pregnancy mode these days. “What is it today? Breastfeeding classes?”
She looked at me flatly, as if she wanted to flick me in the forehead. "If you tease me for what I'm about to say, I'll make sure Heath fucks up your hair during your next cut," Luna threatened, which had me both terrified and intrigued as hell and I nodded my promise not to laugh at her. "I've joined a prenatal yoga mother's group," she said, though it looked like saying the words aloud was somewhat torturous for her. "None of my close friends have kids and I wanted to make sure I was still practising regularly and ensuring I wasn't about to make this hideous back pain any worse by not flowing properly during the later stages of my pregnancy."
Despite my promise, I laughed at her embarrassment; but as a personal trainer and remembering the units I had to study on pregnancy and exercise, she's done the right thing by connecting with others and actually having a proper instructor to guide her.
"Genuinely no teasing. Only laughing at how uncomfortable you find the idea of being in a mother's group who come together to practise yoga. You're about as Byron cliché as they come, my friend."
"I know, and I loathe it. I haven't even told Wolfe yet for fear of him never relenting in his teasing, and you are sworn to secrecy."
"Well, no real teasing from me on the matter of your health and wellness. It's the smart and safe move to be making connections with people going through the same thing as you and having proper guidance in your practice at this stage."
She cocked her eyebrow at me like she didn't believe I actually agreed with her. "Thanks, Miles," she said apprehensively, as if waiting for the punchline. She's practically setting me up to tease her.
"So, what does a person do following Yogi Mother's Group? Shopping for reusable natural hemp nappies? Knitting organic, alpaca wool baby booties?" I joked, unable to help myself. Teasing Luna is just so much fun because she's so reactive.
She just stared at me with disdain.
"No? Was it crochet, not knit? Macrame? A bamboo and coconut fibre blend, not alpaca wool?"
She couldn't help but laugh. "Bamboo and coconut blend? How do you even know what macrame is? Dude, you're more Byron cliché than I am. I'll have you know I’m fine with just natural cotton nappies and acrylic wool," Luna joked, or at least I think she's joking. I can't quite tell. "Blanket though, not booties. That's a bit outside of my level of expertise."
While she can easily take a person out with her contemptuous glares, she's also as soft as butter and will make some kid an excellent mother.
"Good for you, Luna," I said sincerely. "And after your class? What else is on?"
Her expression shifted slightly with her reply. "I need to make a dessert of some kind to bring to Eden's house. We're finally meeting her new boyfriend for the first time tonight."
Well, fuck. She must be pretty sweet on this guy to be introducing him to her friends, though I do find it interesting that they’ve been dating for at least a couple months now and she’s only just introducing him to her most important people.
‘“Oh, that should be fun?” I finally said, pushing through my own disappointment to refocus back on my present conversation with Luna.
“It’ll be something,” Luna said quietly, not seeming as excited as I’d have thought she would be given she’s meeting someone her best friend seems to genuinely care about.
“Not feeling it?” I asked, not necessarily because I wanted to know the answer but because I could tell my friend was perturbed by it.
Luna sighed defeatedly. “I don’t know that I have the energy to be the mediator between Eden and Wolfe tonight. He hates him. Like, seriously intense loathing, and I don’t understand it any more than Eden does, especially seeing as he hasn’t even met him yet.”
“Yeah, I’ve been getting the impression that he’s not keen. Poor Eden,” I said, which made Luna laugh.
“Poor me, Miles! I’m the one that has to cop it on a daily basis,” she said jokingly. Or at least I think she was joking.
And because this day really couldn’t get any worse, I decided to drop in to Tate’s on my way home and see whether we could hash this shit out, because I really don’t want this hanging over my head if it doesn't have to be.
"I'm sorry," I said, standing on her front porch after she had opened the door and not really giving her a chance to talk before I jumped straight into it.
"I thought you knew where I stood, but I guess I could have made it clearer, especially when I started to notice things had changed for you. But I have no regrets, because it was a fun time, every time, and maybe we were just both a little naive about it not impacting our friendship. A good friendship I don't want to lose, and I'm sorry for everything I did that put it at risk."
She stared at me a while, her eyebrows drawn together in deep thinking about everything I'd said, and perhaps wondering how to respond. Eventually, she sighed and her body finally relaxed in acceptance of my apology.
"I'm sorry, too," Tate said, resigned. "I was wrong before when I blamed how shit I've been feeling on you and saying that you led me to believe we could be something more. You didn’t. I know that. I think I was just looking for something---or someone---to blame after my session today, which was a rough one and brought up a whole lot of childhood shit, and you were the safest target."
"Safest target?" I asked, not really sure I understand her trail of thought and how I ended up being the scapegoat in this scenario.
"You and me, we've always been solid. You’re probably the only man throughout my whole life that I can say that about and genuinely mean it, I wasn't prepared for that changing,” Tate said, leaning against the doorframe defeatedly. “I trust you, Miles. Always have. I knew you weren't going to fly off the rails and give me the argument I was idiotically thinking I needed in that moment of vulnerability."
"Girl, that makes no sense," I said, laughing and shaking my head at her weird, incoherent reasoning, but grateful that she's at least speaking to me again.
"Miles, I'm a headcase. You've known this for well over a decade and a half now. Don't try to make sense of it. Just know I'm sorry too, and I should have known I wasn't able to make it work, and it wasn't fair of me to blame you when it didn't."
"So, mates?" I said with a less-than-energetic shrug, not because I wasn't enthusiastic about finally making things right either Tate, but because of all the other shit swimming round in my brain right now.
"Mates," Tate agreed, looking at me curiously. "So long as you tell me what else is wrong."
This is why I love her. She knows me, and usually doesn't beat around the bush with anything, unrequited-crush-emerging-from-misguided-friends-with-benefits-arrangement notwithstanding.
"Why do you think there's something wrong?" I asked.
"We've known each other half our lives. I know when you're stressed. Talk to me," she implored, seeming sincere in her wish to hear what was bothering me.
"You're not going to like it," I warned, knowing this probably won't be a conversation she wants to hear.
She chuckled darkly in knowing. "If we want to be mates, then let's be mates. Something's clearly bothering you. Mates talk about what's bothering them and I've been forewarned. Hell, I dropped enough money on therapy over the last few months to emotionally brace myself for you telling me you're in love with someone else. There isn't much that you get truly worked up over, so I’m putting my money on that being what this is about."
I raised an eyebrow at her, wondering firstly whether she’s a psychic, and secondly if she was being serious, and she just laughed sadistically, accepting and adapting to this friends-only reality of us moving forward and not convincing me she doesn’t have supernatural powers of telepathy.
"So,” Tate said, growing impatient. “Come on, who is she?"