Billy slowly ran the back of her hand over her lips trying to hold on a little longer to the kiss, and avoided looking at Alex’s shocked expression because of the self-deprecating thoughts and feelings she would start to experience at hurting her best friend all over again.
There was a part of her that wanted to run after Jesse, but she had run out like a stray bullet and even if Billy managed to catch up to her, she was sure Jesse would not want anything to do with her. Quite frankly, she was afraid Jesse was completely done with her this time.
Now, to have to explain this whole thing to her best friend was a challenge she was not looking forward to. She exhaled and turned to face Alex. The astonishment was still creasing her features and Billy had no idea where to begin.
“What the hell has been going on?” Alex asked.
Billy bit her lower lip when words failed to form and then she covered her face with both her hands, massaging her temple as she thought of something to say. The fact that her kiss with Jesse was still all she could think about made her feel like a terrible friend.
“Jesse is doing the remodeling project for Global Designs. What you just saw…” she trailed of, unsure of herself. “It wasn’t meant to happen. We’re just working together,” she finished.
“Do you remember what happened the last time you lied to me?” Alex asked.
Billy nodded. How could she forget? She had slept with Alex’s girl.
“Then how could you let this happen again?”
Billy was a little confused. “Alex, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you but everything has happened so sudden. This whole thing started yesterday. I did not plan to meet her and I certainly did not mean to-“
“Kiss her, barely a week after she’s back in town?” Alex interrupted her. “I asked you to go after her when she left and you stayed behind. You asked me to do the same thing and I stayed behind. Now, we’ve never explored our reasons for why we never went after her, but mine is this. I stayed because I knew if I went after her, it would permanently damage our friendship. We were both in love with her.”
“Were, Alex; past tense. You’re with Alyssa now. Why is this whole thing getting you so upset?” Billy asked, starting to get frustrated.
Alex paced around her office and when she stopped and faced Billy, it all became too unsettlingly clear. Alex was still in love with Jesse. “I’ve never lied to you, Billy. Maybe its time you stopped lying to me,” she said and headed out of the office.
“Alex,” Billy tried to stop her, but it was all in vain.
She cursed herself for losing control with Jesse and hurting her friend in the process. She knew Jesse would not come anywhere near her now, which was probably a good idea. But she didn’t know what to do about Alex.
“Hey, did I just see Alex walk out of here?” Lana asked, startling Billy out of her thoughts.
“She walked in on me kissing Jesse,” she said.
“What?”
“I was trying to talk Jesse into easing up on me, you know, so that it can be easy for us to work together. Then somewhere along the way, I just found myself hypnotized by her. I just wanted to…” she recalled the moment and replayed it in her head. “Touch her again. She was looking at me the way she used to when we got too close. I couldn’t…” She breathed out loud, pushing the image away. “I couldn’t control myself.”
“You’re still in love with her,” Lana said.
Billy scoffed and shook her head, feeling stupid for denying it. “I think so,” she said.
“You poor soul.” Lana walked up to her and wrapped her arms around her.
“I think Alex is still in love with her as well.”
“How did she react to seeing you two kiss?” Lana asked, slightly pulling away.
“She was pissed. And she had every right to be. I should have told her about Jesse from the very beginning instead of her walking in on us like that. She thinks I kept it from her on purpose.”
“And Jesse?”
“She ran out of here like the room was on fire. I have to talk to her. I think she might pull out of the project and I wouldn’t blame her.”
“Oh Billy, what have you gotten yourself into? Is there anything I can do to help?”
Billy thought about Alex and decided to give her a few hours to cool off. The situation with Jesse could not be salvaged, well, at least not on a personal level. But if she stuck by her professional ethics, Billy hoped Jesse would not pull out of the project, but she needed to be sure.
“Can you talk to her?” she asked.
“Alex? I don’t think she would listen to me.”
“No, not Alex. Jesse.”
“I don’t know, maybe.”
“Just find out if she is still willing to do the project.”
“Okay, I can do that.”
“Thank you, Lana.” She wrapped her arms around Lana, inwardly feeling like shit.
**
Alex angrily stomped into her house and unintentionally slammed the door. She couldn’t believe she had just walked in on Billy and Jesse kissing.
As much as their affair had hurt her, she’d never quite imagined them together. That picture, whenever she had tried to visualize it, had never materialized into something tangible because the very thought of it had driven her mad and she had not wanted to dwell on anger that would only poison her friendship with Billy.
After all, Jesse had walked out of the picture and the two had needed to repair their friendship. It had taken a while to trust Billy again and she’d forced herself to forget the whole thing had ever happened, but walking smack into it so unexpectedly just plainly pissed her off.
“Alex?”
Max’s voice startled her. “What the hell are you doing here?” she asked, eyeing the baseball bat in her hand.
“I came to borrow some tools,” Max said.
“What’s with the bat?”
“I thought you were a burglar. The door made a loud thud. What’s going on? I thought you were going to see Billy.”
“I did. I found her kissing Jesse,” she said.
She sat down and ran her fingers through her short hair in frustration.
“Jesse?”
“Yeah, one and the same.”
“Thought you were both done with her.”
“So did I, but someone conveniently left out the fact that they were working together and having intimate rendezvous’ in her office. Goddamn it! How can she do this again?” She stood up and groaned, almost in pain.
“Wait, let me get this straight. Billy and Jesse are working together and hooking up again?” Max asked.
Alex wasn’t even sure she was clear with the details, but she nodded.
“Okay, I get that you’re pissed at Billy for doing whatever it is that she has been doing, but is there a possibility that you might be pissed because you might be jealous?”
“Jealous of what? They can hook up and go get married for all I care. I just can’t stand that Billy has been lying to me knowing full well that when it comes to Jesse, we don’t fuck around.”
“Because you still carry a torch for her,” Max said.
Alex stared at her with dagger eyes and Max backed off.
“Okay, I think you need to cool off and then talk to Billy. Get to know what is really going on.”
“She can go fuck herself. By doing this, it goes to show how remorseless she is about cheating with Jesse in the first place. It shows how little she cares about our friendship and I for one am tired of giving a fuck so screw it.” She got up and headed to the door.
“Where are you going?”
“To revisit the past,” she said and left.
She got in her car and drove aimlessly for a while, then she headed to Jesse’s office. She had kept her distance because of her respect and loyalty to Billy and now that she knew how selfish Billy had been, she had flushed both respect and loyalty down the toilet.
Billy was not her friend because friends did not stab each other in the back. And that was exactly what she had done to Alex. She could not be trusted. Jesse had barely been in town for a week and Billy was… what exactly was she doing?
Alex groaned again. She parked her car and looked at herself in the mirror. The anger was visible in her eyes. She could not storm into Jesse’s office looking like that. She needed to relax. She didn’t even know what she was doing there. What was she going to say to Jesse?
She stopped herself before her thoughts scared her into facing Jesse and headed for the building. Last time she had gone to see Jesse in her office, it had been to confront her about the affair with Billy. Seemed that not much had changed since then.
Her memory of the place did not fail her and she was glad she did not find Jesse’s personal assistant at her desk because that gave her the element of surprise. She walked in and found Jesse busy working on her desk.
Jesse must have thought it was her personal assistant who had walked in because she did not immediately look up and instead started talking. “Oh, good you’re back. I want you to-.”
Alex was observing her when she looked up and stopped mid-sentence. She stopped and slowly rose from her seat and Alex stepped forward.
“Alex,” Jesse was the first to speak.
“I don’t know why I’m here,” she said, suddenly feeling foolish. She wasn’t there to confront Jesse. What Jesse had done was within her right. She did not awe Alex anything. “I should go, I’m sorry.” She turned to leave.
“No, Alex, wait.”
She thought about what to say and decided to let Jesse speak first.
“I’m sorry about what you walked in on earlier.”
Alex looked at her face and she could see the remorse behind her words.
“The last thing I want to do is hurt you again.”
Alex approached her desk and looked at Jesse’s beautiful face. She was sad and Alex could understand why. “Were you two planning on telling me?” she asked, trying to mask her hurt.
“I thought Billy had told you that we would be working together.”
“Then what was that, earlier on today?”
“A mistake, Alex. It was a mistake and I am so sorry you had to walk in on it.”
Jesse’s sincerity made Alex feel like an ass, walking into her office demanding an explanation like she was owed one. Jesse was being so humble and graceful. It reminded Alex of their time together. It had been so easy to be around her.
“Can I ask you something?” This was a question that had eaten her from the moment she’d found out about the affair. The answer, regardless of what it was, was going to hurt but she wanted to know so that she could quit wondering.
“What?” Jesse said.
“When did it start?”
Jesse raised her eyebrow at the question and Alex asked again, “Your affair with Billy. When you and I were seeing each other, at what point did the affair start?”
Jesse seemed to recoil at the question. Alex had asked her this when she’d confronted her but Jesse had never answered the question. Now, she wanted to know because she needed to reexamine everything.
“Alex,”
“Please tell me. I need to know.”
Jesse fumbled with a pen in her hands then placed it down and came around her desk. When she stopped in front of Alex, she leaned back against her desk and averted her gaze almost as though she was ashamed of what she was about to admit.
“The night we met,” she said.
Alex’s mind went back in time at her words.
“When she took me home after the fight,” Jesse said.
It was a hard hit but Alex slowly absorbed it. She remembered going to apologize to Jesse the following day and asking her out. “Why did you say yes when I asked you out the following day? Why didn’t you tell me you were interested in Billy instead?”
Jesse looked at her as though she was afraid to reveal the information. Was she afraid of hurting Alex? Did she still care about her?
“I wasn’t. It was supposed to be a one night stand. She left before I woke up and I thought that was the end of that. I didn’t expect you to come over the following morning. I didn’t expect you to ask me out. I had just met both of you the previous night. I honestly thought I would never see either one of you again.”
“Why did you go out with me? Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“Because I liked you, Alex. I wanted to get to know you. When we started getting serious, I told Billy to tell you about us, about what had happened. But she didn’t and I didn’t think it was my place. I felt really bad about it, but whenever we were together you would be so good and kind and warm and I just fell in love with you.”
Her honesty was endearing but what she was saying was ripping Alex apart. She had put the whole thing behind her after Jesse had walked out of her life. Now that she was back, Alex wanted to know everything that had happened. Maybe it would give her some sort of closure.
“You said it happened twice when I confronted you,” she said, trying hard to hold herself together. “I can guess the timing of the second time, thanks to Kim, but we were in love. We were happy, right?”
“Yes, we were happy. It was my fault Alex. I screwed things up. That’s why I never really had a choice to begin with, because I didn’t deserve either one of you.”
“If that’s how you truly feel, then why are you letting this happen all over again? Is it because if you had been forced to make a choice, you would have chosen Billy?” Her heart was crumpling up inside her like a piece of paper, making it harder for her to breathe.
“I’m not letting anything happen. Billy’s personal assistant collaborated with my business partner, then he handed the project over to me. I had no idea I was going to be working with her. I swear to you, nothing has been happening between us,” Jesse said.
“Would you have chosen Billy?” Alex asked.
Jesse exhaled and closed her eyes. “I told you, it wasn’t a choice I had to make,” she said.
Alex commended Jesse’s honesty. Everything she was saying should have come from Billy. From how the affair had started to when they had gotten caught. No matter how uncomfortable it would have made them, Billy should have been the one telling Alex all of this.
She had forced herself to understand their affair. Jesse was still that lovable fun girl Alex had known and fallen in love with so Billy falling in love with her too, ironically, hadn’t come as much of a shock to Alex. And Billy, for as long as Alex had known her, she had always been an amazing person. Since Alex had trusted that she knew Billy well enough, she had not blamed Jesse for falling in love with her.
She had forgiven them both because of that and she had kept her hurt aside to mend a childhood friendship. Now she wondered if it had been worth it because all that hurt and pain had been waiting for her to acknowledge it, and when she accepted that, she felt like her veins were going to pop.
“I put my hurt aside to repair my friendship with Billy. I focused my time and attention on recreating our friendship and somewhere along the way, I forgot I still needed to repair my broken heart. I was okay. I told myself Billy deserved you because she had never been in love and if she felt something close to what I felt for you, then she deserved a chance to explore it.”
God, she had not come to see Jesse to release her pain. No, she needed to get a grip. She needed to regain her self-control. When she tried to speak, her voice gave out and she looked away, holding back tears she had not known she had.
“Alex,” Jesse said, reaching out to touch her hand but Alex stepped back.
If Jesse touched her, she would break down. And she could not do that. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Jesse. “I’m sorry,” she shrieked, almost inaudibly.
Jesse surprised her by closing the space between them and wrapping her arms around Alex’s neck, which unfortunately, was all she needed to let out a pool of tears. She sobbed silently in Jesse’s arms and fought to control herself but once she unleashed the pain, there was no forcing it back in.
“I’m sorry, Alex. I’m so sorry,” Jesse said.
A while later when she was calmer, she pulled out of Jesse’s embrace and wiped away her tears in embarrassment. When she looked at Jesse, she realized she had been crying too and her heart broke all over again. She wanted to comfort her, tell her not to cry, that everything was going to be okay, but she was in too much pain herself.
“I have to go,” she said instead and headed out.
“Alex, wait,” Jesse said.
Alex stopped, but did not turn around. She could not bear to face Jesse again.
“Had it been up to me, I would have chosen you,” Jesse said.
Against her better judgment, Alex turned around in surprise.
“You are selfless, you put others before yourself, you are kind, loving and compassionate. You made me feel safe and you made me happy. I would have chosen you because you were the perfect girlfriend,” Jesse said.
She should have been happy to hear that, to know what Jesse would have truly done, but it only made her feel worse. “Yet I wasn’t enough,” she said, meeting Jesse’s gaze. “You risked it all for someone who is still too much of a coward to acknowledge you, even now when you’re just working together.” She left before seeing the expression on Jesse’s face at her words.
When she got back to her car, she took a few calming breaths and realized she had made a decision regarding her relationship with Billy. She was startled when her phone started ringing and she had to look around the car to figure out where it was. She found it in the dashboard and answered it when she saw Max’s name.
“I’ve been trying to call you. Where are you?” she asked.
“Heading to Bob’s to get drunk,” Alex said.
“I’ll meet you there,” Max said.
Alex quickly drove out of parking and as she drove to the local bar where she used to hang out with her friends on weekends, she replayed her whole conversation with Jesse. She felt terrible, like her heart had just been broken again.
She focused on the road and sped up. In a short while, she was walking into the bar and ordering herself a dry shot of whisky. She was on her fifth shot when Max arrived and she was just starting to get a buzz.
Max ordered herself a beer and asked, “What happened?”
Alex shook her head and said, “Nothing. Nothing happened.” She got three more shots and downed them one after another.
“Whoa! Slow down, Alex.”
“I came here to get drunk, that’s what I plan to do.”
“Did you see Jesse?”
“Yes, I saw Jesse. She’s beautiful. She’s an angel.” Was she drunk already?
“How did it go?” Max asked.
“It went well. She told me that Billy fucked her the first night we met her.” She laughed, even though there was nothing funny about what she’d said. “The night Billy claimed to have spent on her couch after she dropped her home, she spent it in her bed fucking her and the following morning, she looked me in the eye and lied in my face.”
“Shit, that’s harsh,” Max said and got her a bottle of water. “Hydrate if you don’t want to black out right now.”
“Talking to Jesse about it all was an indirect confrontation upon my feelings. I realized that I was so busy trying to mend my friendship with Billy, that I forgot I had a broken heart.” She scoffed and opened the bottle of water. “I’m such an idiot. Who forgets they have a broken heart?”
She took a couple of sips of water and Alyssa’s face came to mind. She was coming back in a couple of days. “Shit, what am I going to tell Alyssa? How do I tell her that I was fine when we met, started dating and got into a relationship, and a few days after my ex is back in town I realize just how severely broken my heart is?”
“Don’t think about that right now.”
Shit, now that the thought had planted itself in her brain, it was all she would stress about.
“Fuck!” Max cursed.
“What is it?”
“Jade called me when I was on my way and I told her we would be here drinking,” Max said.
“Yeah, so?”
“She’s here with Billy,” Max said.
Alex followed Max’s gaze and saw them at the entrance, headed to the counter where they were sitting. She didn’t think she was in the right frame of mind to see or talk to Billy just yet, but she was drunk and she wanted to give Billy a piece of her mind.
“I’m going to tell Billy this is not a good time,” Max said and Alex grabbed her arm in a deathly grip.
She looked at Max and darkly stared at her. It took a lot to get her angry and the events that had unfolded that day, coupled up with the alcohol she had taken acted as a catalyst. “Let her come,” she said firmly.
“Shit, Alex, you know how you get when you’re angry. Even I get scared of you,” Max said.
Alex let go of her hand and tried to calm herself, just as Jade and Billy joined them. She could see the warning look on Max’s face directed toward Billy, whose gaze was focused on Alex.
“Hey guys, how are you two doing?” Jade asked, completely unaware of what was going on.
“Good, good. How are you?” Max said.
“Alex, can we talk for a second in private?” Billy asked.
“We can talk here. Everyone knows what is going on,” she said.
Billy appeared uncomfortable at having to speak in front of Max and Jade, but at that point, Alex didn’t really care much for her comfort.
“Okay. I want to explain what happened today,” she said.
“I know what happened. Jesse told me everything.”
“Shit, what’s going on?” Jade asked and Alex saw Max warning her not to interrupt.
“Oh, okay. Can I tell you my side of the story?” Billy asked.
“Oh, now you want to tell me? How long would it have taken you to tell me if I hadn’t walked in on you? Would we even be having this conversation?”
Billy did not answer.
“See, what I think is, you are here because you are plagued with guilt and you need to free yourself from it. Well here, I forgive you. It’s okay.”
Billy looked at her in confusion.
“Why are you surprised? Isn’t that what you expected? To tell me how sorry you are, make yourself into a victim and expect me to sympathize with you then forgive you and forget it ever happened?”
“Alex, no, it’s not like that.”
“That’s not good enough for you? Okay, here, let me try this. You have severally mistaken my kindness for weakness and I don’t blame you. I’ve always had a soft spot for you because you were my best friend but you know what, not anymore. You and I are through. I am done cleaning up your messes and I am done with you. You can take back the knife you used to stab me in the back.”
She was more controlled than she had thought she would be, but maybe it was because she had broken down in Jesse’s office, completely showing her vulnerability and embarrassing herself in the process.
“Alex, I never meant to hurt you,” Billy said, almost in panic.
“You never mean to hurt me, Billy but somehow, you always end up doing so. I’m doing myself a favor and eliminating the problem.”
“Alex, please let me explain. Don’t say those things. You don’t mean what you’re saying,” Billy said.
“I mean every single word. You are a poor excuse of a friend. Now do me a favor and get the fuck out of my life because I never want to see you again.” Throughout the whole thing, her voice remained firm and her posture unyielding.
She assumed that was why Max was afraid of her when she was angry. She did not lower her dignity by resulting to bouts of explosive fits; she kept calm and controlled and expelled all her negative energy through hurtful words intended to wound.
But she rarely got that angry, which was why when those occasions presented themselves, she kept to herself and waited for time to take its course, slowly but surely cooling her off. Otherwise when she was confronted by a situation that time or patience could not deal with, she turned into a cold heartless creature, which was what she was now.
She thought she was even being a bit kinder in this case because she was talking to Billy; her childhood best friend who had ended up breaking her heart. “Get out of my sight,” she said in a low seething voice.
Billy’s expression was so broken, she looked as if she was about to cry but Alex mercilessly looked away. She couldn’t allow herself to start being remorseful so quickly after having delivered such an amazing performance.
“Wow, that was brutal,” Jade said when Billy walked away.
Alex turned to face her and asked sweetly, “What’s going on with you? Any news about you and Lana?”
Both Max and Jade looked at her in surprise at her quick change of subject and she smiled at them, downing the bottle of water before ordering more shots of whisky.
“I think she’s cheating on me,” Jade said.
“How can she be cheating on you when you two are broken up?” Alex asked.
“I meant to say that I think she’s seeing someone else,” Jade said, her cheeks turning red.
“What makes you think that?” Max asked.
“She’s been unusually aloof,” Jade said.
“Maybe that’s because she’s tired of fighting with you,” Alex said.
“No, she can’t be tired of fighting with me. She loves making me miserable.”
“Have you considered that you maybe projecting what you’re saying to her?” Max asked.
“Jade, in your relationship with Lana, there is no bad guy. Maybe you need to remember that and work on your problems before she really does start seeing someone else,” Alex said.
“Ugh! Let’s get drunk,” Jade said.
Alex raised her glass and downed it.