‘Poor Lesley,’ she whispers as she looks at me with such concern. ‘How was she? I can only imagine.’
I take a moment as the reality of today hits me once more. How did it all come to this? So much has happened. I know it is all of my own making, but it’s still hard to take it all in.
‘We sat together in the hotel room that should have been our honeymoon suite,’ I begin, feeling my voice tremble as I relive the moment I broke the news to Lesley. ‘It was so hard to find the right words, but she knew when she saw me at the hotel that there was something terribly wrong. She cried and I cried and then she got angry. Very angry. It was awful for her, Kate. So awful.’
Kate looks on, crestfallen.
‘She asked was there someone else.’
‘Oh no.’
A heavy silence hangs in the air between us. I feel my eyes sting and a wave of nausea settles in my stomach.
‘And what … what did you tell her?’ Kate asks me.
I shake my head and stare at the floor as she waits on my answer.
‘She asked if it was you,’ I reply, then I rub my throbbing forehead, ‘but I couldn’t hurt her any more so I said no. I told her there was no one else, but I don’t even know, do I, Kate? I don’t know what’s going on. It’s such a mess.’
Kate reaches across and lightly rests her hand on my arm.
‘I feel heart-sore for you both,’ she whispers. ‘But David, this will work itself out. You’re not the only person ever to change your mind about getting married, even if you did leave it till the very last minute. As much as Lesley is hurting right now, which I’m sure is excruciating, she will know in time you were right to be honest. Why the hell didn’t you talk to me sooner?’
I look up at her.
‘I suppose I thought that by talking to you, I’d confuse myself even more,’ I try to explain to Kate. ‘But I actually did try to call you this morning, not to mention at least ten times before I left my parents’ house earlier today and twice when I stopped on the motorway to get a bottle of water. Lesley is in pieces, she really is, and I feel rotten with guilt right now. But I’m not a bad person, am I, Kate?’ I try to grasp for some comfort.
Kate tilts her head to the side, pushes her dark hair out of her eyes and bites her lip.
‘You’re not a bad person, David,’ she says, reaching out and resting her hand on my lower arm. ‘You are compassionate, caring, sympathetic, and also incredibly honest in everything you do. This too will pass. You’ve done the right thing, even if it doesn’t feel like that right now.’
Her smile lights me up inside and she reassures me just like I’d hoped she would.
‘I can’t get it out of my mind – the look on her face,’ I say to Kate, as the image of Lesley, heartbroken and tearful, flares in my mind. ‘I just can’t understand why it’s taken me so long, why I left it so late to tell her … I’ve no doubt she is devastated. She said she wants me to move out of our house immediately of course, which I expected. She said after today she never wants to see me again, not that I’d blame her for one second. My dad said the same.’
I take another sip of the brandy, glad of its neutralizing effects on the swirl of emotions that engulf me right now. The relief of seeing Kate and her healing, unconditional welcome, the guilt of running away to her when deep down I know it’s my feelings for her that made me push through with my decision, and the horror of causing someone like Lesley so much heartache when today was meant to ease the pain of losing the baby just as she was getting her head around the fact that she was unexpectedly pregnant. Not to mention how I’m going to face up to all my friends andrelatives who had no doubt spent a fortune in preparation. I don’t know how I’m ever going to forgive myself.
‘Lesley is well within her rights to be mightily pissed off right now, but your dad should be supporting you through this, not throwing you out on the street when you need him,’ Kate says. ‘And your friends and relatives will forgive you, don’t worry about that.’
‘You’ve met my father,’ I whisper. ‘So you’ll know that his reaction was as if I’d murdered someone. The shame I’ve brought on him. How is he going to explain this to his congregation? How is he going to face Lesley’s parents? It’s all about him and his reputation and his big fat ego. He doesn’t seem to care about Lesley’s pain, only his own embarrassment.’
Kate looks as if she might burst with frustration.
‘Well, none of us has a clean slate to work from, and I very much doubt that he does either,’ she says, wringing her hands as she speaks. ‘It’s called being human! You know, some people say that life is hard, but it’s not life that’s hard, it’s being a human that’s hard. We all have our ups and downs in life. There’s not one of us walking this earth who can say we have never messed up, or stepped out of line, or hurt someone by our actions no matter what our best intentions were. None of today makes you a bad person, David, and it’s unfair of your father to turn his back on you, but at the end of the day it says more about him than it does about you.’
I manage to smile a little at Kate’s rant. She looks so passionate as her eyes dart around the room when she talks and I can just imagine her as a campaigner of sorts one day, fighting from her very core for what she believes in.
‘What’s so funny?’ she asks me, looking totally surprised and even a little bit offended by my expression.
‘You are funny,’ I try to explain to her. ‘You’re so loyal and fierce and I love …’
I stop at that.
I almost said something else, but today isn’t the time to go that far. If I feel bad now about Lesley, I’d feel a million times worse tomorrow if I declared my love for Kate while Lesley is wiping away tears and packing up her wedding day to make an early return back home.
‘I can’t help it. I’m just very passionate when it comes to you, David,’ Kate tells me, which takes me by surprise. It’s not the response I was expecting at all from her. ‘This probably sounds weird, but I feel pain when you feel it. If you’re hurting, I’m hurting too, and I hate that your father is treating you this way. When you’re upset I get upset. I feel what you feel.’
Wow. No one has ever said anything like that to me before.
