Rewind, page 4
Bridget lifted her head, the late morning sun glared at her. Its warm embrace stabbed into her retinas.
Cemeteries were always far too quiet, always so full of palpable sadness.
She wanted to scream. She wanted to run for the gates, climb into the car and never come back. She felt suffocated by everything. The golden leaves fluttering from the trees, the cool snap of the air, the oppressive silence - it all made her want to scream.
She closed her eyes. She had to dig deep but she managed to bury the yearning.
She fantasised that her sister was alive, that she had just reinvented herself. She’d ran away and started a new life. A cowardly exit for sure, but she would now be happy somewhere.
Perhaps she was even stood here in the cemetery watching her old family mourn her. Peeking on it like one of those uninvited guests.
She opened her eyes and scanned around her. There was no shadowy figure watching them. There was an old pair of ladies hugging each other near a gravestone. They were the sum total of visitors.
Would it make Christine happy to know she was being mourned? That she’d managed to hurt the family she hated so much? Was that the point? Was that why she ran away? Too cowardly to kill herself and put everyone out of their misery, so instead runs away and causes a long suffering instead. She stopped herself. This was not the time for such negative and toxic thoughts. The vitriol was surprisingly easy to conjure, it ebbed around her consciousness at all times.
She resented Christine.
Resented her for the damage she’d caused. That fact made her feel ashamed of herself.
She had tried hard to rid herself off this vitriol, yet no matter how many times she purged the toxic puss came back. The wound never healed.
She glanced around again.
What would Christine do if she knew that nobody cared that she’d disappeared?
Would she be pissed off that they were all glad she’d vanished?
That they actually hoped she was dead so they could accept it and move on… Would it piss her off that they wanted to move on? How would she feel if she knew that they were sick of her?
She stopped herself.
Jesus Christ, she was sounding just like her sister…
If anything, Christine sure would be glad that she’d corrupted the prodigal daughter.
CHAPTER FOUR:
21:34 pm 27th October 2015
“So he hasn’t stopped talking about you y’know…” Amy continued. She’d been talking in one long stream since she’d plopped alongside Bridget. Amy was a dumpy, long haired, bookish type of girl. Typically wore glasses, blazers and converse. She usually looked like the library kid taking her first steps into fashion. Her long brown hair was past her naval and obviously her most cherished feature. Tonight she was covered in luminous green body paint and a witch’s outfit. Her broomstick was somewhere in the house, lost to her. The party was in full swing; music was blaring and thumping around her. Bridget felt like she was submerged in an ocean of sound, the bass-line to the pop hit vibrated in her temples. Amy was having to talk loudly in her left ear, just to compete with the music. Bridget had positioned herself on a sofa and claimed it as her own. It afforded her the best view of the party, it also afforded her the view of the front door. From her vantage point she knew exactly who was coming and going.
There was easily a hundred teenagers crammed into this four bedroom semi. There was limbs and drinks being splashed in every corner of the house. The girls had predictably rolled out in sexy Halloween costumes; the mix of half assed witches, cliché psycho girls, boring zombies and the actually imaginative mummy brides. The boys hadn’t fared much better; their imagination seemingly limited to zombified incarnations of themselves - zombie jocks, zombie geeks, zombie Goths and so on, the few who bucked that trend stuck closely to tired tropes like Dracula. It was your atypical Halloween fancy dress party.
“You’d think they’d be wise to her, she really is going for the full set,” Amy remarked scathingly. Bridget didn’t follow so Amy pointed.
Rachel Adams had come as a cheerleader; a “slutty cheerleader”. So basically she had come as herself. She was gyrating off a member of the college football team, the only one she hadn’t slept with. She literally had worked her way through the entire team.
The football player, whatever he was called, was quite into Rachel. His hand was slipping around under her miniskirt, his oafish hands caressing her tanned buttocks. The party was treated to the occasional glimpse of this grope as they continued to swallow each others tongues.
“I’m surprised she doesn’t glow in the dark with that much fake tan,” Bridget shouted in Amy’s ear. Amy laughed. Rachel Adams had a penchant for fake tan, she spent majority of her time looking like a wotsit.
“Bitchy!” Amy giggled. She knocked her bottle of lager against Bridget’s bottle of WKD. Bridget smirked, more out of her own accomplishment.
Bridget’s attention drifted from the pair towards the mass congregating in the kitchen. The group of social awkward teens were all huddled around the punch bowl, trying to look like they were enjoying themselves. Bridget smiled when she watched “Harry Potter” do an awkward shuffle to the beat, she suspected Mr “Potter” had been dying for a reason to dress up as his literary hero - it was hardly Halloween material.
Bridget drained her WKD. They tasted like shit; like it was a drink composed entirely of sugar and sugar alone. She made a mental note to avoid the blue flavour next time. She wasn’t that well versed in the ranges of alcohol so she was still working her way through flavours and tastes. She’d concluded lager was gassy and peculiar tasting, whiskey was nasty, rum made her feel sick and the smell of vodka had prevented her from even trying it.
So far she wasn’t that impressed by WKDs either, she concluded she’d try the lemon one next.
“Hello darlings!” Danchel appeared. He was dressed in a white satin robe, channelling the ancient Greeks. He had gold leaves melded into a headband and several gold bangles. He was thin, painfully thin. He was also excruciatingly attractive, he always looked like he’d just fallen out of a fashion magazine. That coiffed hair, the amazingly sculpted eyebrows, the resting pout-face and those beautiful eyes he often exaggerated with mascara.
Right now he was clapping enthusiastically and greeting Bridget and Amy.
You didn’t need a gaydar to see that Daniel was gay.
His sister, the other half to the infamous Danchel, was his spitting image. She had dressed herself in a white wedding gown, one that she had imaginatively desecrated with red paint along the bottom and artistic “bloodstains”. She had covered her milky frame in a thick layer of white paint, but sculpted her face as beautifully as ever. Both twins were the master of contouring. Bridget had never known what contouring was capable of doing until she met the twins.
Rachel had swept her blonde hair up into a neat bun, her veil cascading down from it. She looked flawless, as ever.
“So pleased you could come, Bridget you look amaze!” Daniel leant forward. Bridget recoiled in confusion. It took her a few moments, and several second-glances, before she realised that the twins had gender swapped. Who she thought was Daniel was actually Rachel and vice versa. Her jaw dropped.
“Totally Bridge, rocking it…” The real Daniel winked. He leant down and with a set of perfect nails he gently touched her dress. He seemed genuinely impressed.
“This old thing…” she joked.
“Bridge, you’re totally fucking awesome!” Rachel cackled. She leant down and air kissed both Bridget and Amy. “Enjoy yourselves!”
“They liked your dress…” Amy commented when the pair disappeared into the kitchen to continue greeting their guests.
Bridget had deliberately gone outside the box. She was wearing a curtain. An actual curtain. It had taken her a few weeks, and numerous YouTube videos, but eventually she’d crafted herself a dress out of the ugliest curtain she could find. It was all sorts of horrible; musty green, bland beige and popping yellow gaudy floral motifs. She’d completed the look with a giant flower, which she’d suspended on her left shoulder. It was a sickeningly gaudy pink and she’s scrawled the word “wallflower” on the petals.
It was a statement to say the least. She’d finished the look with little black high heel shoes, veneer tights and a little red headband. Her blonde hair hung around her face, her eye make up was simply eyeliner. She’d applied a little lip gloss but it had long wiped off. When she’d stood in the mirror before leaving, removing a set of earrings because she’d once heard you should always remove one item of clothing before you leave the house, she’d been impressed with her look.
She would make all those drag queens on RuPaul’s Drag Race proud. She’d taken a selfie, posted it on social media and within minutes received twenty likes.
It was always nice when strangers could appreciate hard work.
“I still can’t believe you made that!” Amy lovingly felt the stitching of the dress.
Was she envious? Had Bridget made the fashion student green with envy? Bridget guffawed to herself, Amy had come as the wicked witch of the west. How apt!
“Never again though,” Bridget shook her head.
“Really? You’re really good at it!” Amy continued to gush.
Bridget shook her head. “Nope, never again…”
It had been a headache. She’d lost count of how many times she’d lost patience over it, just like she couldn’t recall how many times it had been tossed to the floor in a sulk. Dress-making was certainly not an easy task. She was proud of her accomplishment but she was in no hurry to repeat it.
“Want another drink?” Amy offered.
“Get me a lemon,” Bridget pointed to the WKD bottle. Hopefully the lemon one would be nicer.
Amy disappeared and Bridget returned to people watching. She spied Max appear, talking to a few of her friends. She’d come as Miss Piggy. She’d invested in a sparkling ankle length pink dress, a feather boa and an exquisite blonde wig. Wigs actually, Bridget had spent the evening helping Max layer her hair and building up the numerous layers of artificial hair. More drag-queen advice had come into play as Bridget played hairdresser. God she loved YouTube. If Max wasn’t wearing a pig nose she’d be the most glamorous being at the party. They’d spent two hours “beating her face”. She was contoured better than Danchel. Without the mask she looked like a million dollars.
Somehow knowing that Bridget was watching her, her best friend turned her attention and gave a little wave. Bridget waved back. Max returned to her conversation.
“The last one,” Amy reappeared. She handed over the last bottle of lemon WKD. Amy had got herself a glass of the punch. She tentatively sipped it, smacked her lips a few times and went in for a swig.
“Nice?” Bridget tested. She didn’t trust a single person in the room not to have spat in the punchbowl, so she’d decided to steer clear.
“Fruity…” was the only word Amy could think of. She coughed a little, the alcohol was burning its way down her oesophagus.
“Arthur’s coming tonight…” Amy returned to the subject.
Bridget’s expression dropped a fraction.
Arthur was a subject she wasn’t that keen on discussing, yet she knew Amy would inevitably bring it up. She thought she had sidestepped it the first time. It seemed she was going to have discuss it, much to her disappointment.
“It’s a good party, he’ll enjoy himself,” she answered vaguely.
Amy was Arthur’s friend, they’d only met each other through him. Bridget had been unsure what would come of her relationship with Amy when she and Arthur broke up, Bridget had anticipated Amy to not bother anymore. She’d thought that perhaps Amy was only interested because she was Arthur’s best friend. It seemed it would carry on as normal. Friends still, but still not quite.
“That’s not what I meant…”
Bridget shrugged. What was there to say? She knew Amy knew all the ins and outs anyway. Bridget wasn’t the scorned girlfriend, nor was she completely “100% okay” with it either.
“He still talks about you,” Amy squeezed her knee in a friendly manner.
Bridget gave her a strange look. What was the point of saying that? What use was it to know that he still thought of her? He’d broke up with her for Christ’s sake, citing he needed space to work out some issues. You can’t dump somebody then spend every minute “thinking” about them. They’d been together a year and out of the blue Arthur wanted to end it. There hadn’t been an ugly fallout, no screaming matches had been shared between them both. That didn’t mean Bridget hadn’t used a few choice words about him and spent several evenings ranting to Max about the “dickhead”. She’d grieved the breakdown, of course she had, she’d loved him. She just did it all with a sense of dignity. No drama, no fuss - but plenty of angry black poems and paintings locked away in her bedroom drawers instead.
“You miss him?” Amy enquired.
Bridget’s face contorted sharply and her expression darkened. She assumed it was the alcohol making Amy say these stupid things. Why else would she be trying to put fingers in wounds? Bridget had sometimes considered the fact Amy was a jealous sort, that she secretly coveted Arthur but was trapped in the friend-zone.
“Sorry, I don’t know why I said that… I guess I’m just sad you two broke up,” Amy grimaced.
Every time Bridget was sure she understood Amy, Amy went and did something to change her mind.
“You’re sad?”
“Yeah… you was good for him…” Amy sighed.
Bridget didn’t have a response. She just wanted the conversation to end. She’d spent enough time over the last three weeks stewing over him, she didn’t want to spend another evening mulling it over. Between Arthur and Christine, Bridget was pretty sick of feeling the sting of loss. She took a deep breath.
“Oh god…” Amy groaned.
Bridget had already clocked him.
Jason had arrived. He was attired in a leather jacket, a grey beaten baseball cap and what seemed to be leather trousers. Bridget wasn’t sure, but was he wearing white trainers too? Max greeted him warmly, throwing her arms around his neck. She leant up, kissing him square on the lips. For a second it looked like his bushy beard had swallowed her face.
Then she re-emerged and beamed at him. He seemed to be returning the gesture but it was hard to tell. There was only a narrow window of his face visible between the cap and his beard. Where was the fancy dress?
Bridget and Amy watched him whisper something into Max’s ear. She recoiled and jabbed him in the ribs with a finger. Then she took hold of his hand.
Bridget couldn’t deny the fact that Max was pretty smitten with him.
Max gave Bridget a little wave, Jason even extending a little hesitant shake of a hand too, and the pair of them headed up the stairs.
“What do you think to him?” Amy tested.
Bridget took a moment to respond, she needed to word it diplomatically. She didn’t want Amy running off and telling something bitchy to Max. She didn’t have the strength to deal with that sort of drama.
“…Not a fan,” she answered coolly.
“Oh no, no me neither…” Amy agreed tripping on her words a little. Bridget gave her a curious look. The lie was blatant but she didn’t understand why. What difference did it make if Amy liked Jason? Did she think Max would be jealous? Max wasn’t that type of girl. Bridget considered calling her out on the lie but decided ultimately that perhaps it was just polite female decorum. Why cause a fuss?
The music lowered and the buzz of the party came into focus.
Bridget was beginning to feel a little hot, the party was starting to turn muggy.
The first piano note hit and she instantly recognised the song. Oh god, just what she needed as she began to feel her mood slide south.
‘You shocked me to the core, undid, superseded all that before,’
Bridget took a deep breath. God she loved this song but it stung like a bitch.
‘Took away my foundation blocks, and broke across the rocks,’
As if it was a divine cue Arthur stepped into the party. She instantly recognised him. He was average height, well built from a healthy interest in the gym. He’d not tried to be anything but fit, he’d never subscribed to the “bigger is better” philosophy that was sweeping through the guys of her generation. He was black, of Jamaican descent. His Jamaican mother and father were the loveliest people she’d ever met, even if his father’s accent was so thick she barely understood two words he said. She was guilty of having humoured conversations with him, nodding and agreeing on cue while desperately hoping she wasn’t being noticed. Arthur had never developed the accent, he spoke just like every other Wintervale thoroughbred. Bridget had developed an intense love for Arthur’s mother and father, it broke her heart that she couldn’t reach out to them anymore because of their break up. The parents were sometimes the worst casualty in the demise of a relationship.
Arthur had come as Michael Jackson; the thriller era with a little afro wig just for good measure. His handsome face, with those sultry eyes and soft cheeks, was not blemished by his haphazard make up. His rich chocolate eyes were masked beneath yellow contact lenses but she intimately knew the shade of brown beneath them.
He’d shaved his goatee off, something he’d begun doing since the break up.
Arthur was a math student, so obviously Bridget’s father had been smitten with him. She remembered sitting at the dinner table watching her boyfriend and father have private in-jokes about maths. Her family had loved him as much as his had loved her. It was the match made in heaven, but something inexplicably just went wrong.
She didn’t know what it even was… One day it just suddenly changed.
‘But everything in life has to come to an end, and the truth hurt more than I could pretend,’
He looked a little disorientated by the throng of people clustered around him. He turned into the room, saw Bridget and Amy.
‘And I knew holding onto you meant deserting me, and after breaking apart over you I still had to fix me,’
