I block out her words, pay, grab the carrier bag and head straight to the train, sitting myself in a corner, away from the other passengers.
I stare out of the window, in a daze, wondering where it all went wrong. Did I play the whole thing badly by making myself too readily available by moving in with him and quitting my job so soon after getting together? We’d eliminated the thrill aspect of dating because we were worried the relationship wouldn’t survive if we weren’t in close proximity. And I’d given myself over to Billy completely, even though I knew he’d never be able to do the same for me, causing my life to seem uninteresting and losing myself somehow.
Eventually, when the train starts moving, I pull the newspaper out of the plastic bag and study the front page. The picture is exactly how Billy described; Heidi has one hand around the back of his head pulling him closer, the other on his crotch, her lips are locked on his, her face intense and passionate. What’s more interesting in the image is Billy; his hands are by his side with his fingers flexed, not touching her, although they could be about to push her off, his head is pulled back into his neck, trying to get away and his face is grimacing. He’s clearly uncomfortable and distressed, in shock at what’s happening. I can see that, but anyone else looking at it would think Heidi and Billy were caught in the throes of passion, especially with the headline that’s attached, and the story beneath it.
BILLY’S BUSK-SINFUL FOR BLACK
Billy Buskin and Heidi Black look set to rebuild their romance after years apart, thanks to sexual tension building between them on the set of their new film The Walking Beat.
Just months ago, Billy Buskin was gushing about his love for girlfriend Sophie May when accepting an award for best male actor at the BAFTAs. However, it seems the pair have now split following hefty rows, causing him to run back into the arms of his ex, Heidi Black.
Billy and Sophie were still together earlier this week, with insiders claiming that the increased sexual tension on set between Billy and his ex led to the couple arguing constantly.
An insider has said: ‘Billy and Heidi have been trying to keep apart when at work, but the sexual tension has been apparent from the start, so it was only a matter of time before something happened.
‘[Billy] had been bringing his girlfriend Sophie into work with him, in a bid to put a barrier between him and Heidi. However, the intense sex scenes caused them to have a massive bust-up on set earlier in the week, bringing filming to a halt as the couple argued loudly in his trailer.
‘It didn’t surprise us when Sophie finally snapped, in fact, we’re surprised it didn’t happen sooner. She’d have to be blind to miss the chemistry surrounding Billy and Heidi.’
The source continued: ‘Heidi was clearly embarrassed by the drama and felt awful that her actions could have such a negative effect on their relationship. She was seen comforting Billy when he returned to the set a little while later, even managing to raise a smile from him. They continued to whisper to each other for the duration of the day.’
It seems in this exclusive photo that Billy has put the arguments with Sophie behind him, happily turning to Heidi for support. The old lovers were caught in a passionate clinch after a romantic meal in Mayfair’s dark and overtly sexy restaurant, Hakasan, where they headed straight after filming their raunchy scenes together.
A friend of Heidi’s spoke to us, saying: ‘It’s early days, and obviously Heidi is keen for Billy to deal with his split first, before taking things further with her, but she really thinks it could last this time, now that they’re more mature and able to understand the pressures of the job.
‘At the start of filming, Heidi was going through heartache of her own, after breaking off her engagement with film producer Roger Szams. Billy noticed she was quiet and became her rock, reigniting their friendship.
‘I personally can’t believe they’ve managed to keep apart for this long, the bond between them was always so strong.’
The pair last worked together on teen film Halo, which led to them being a couple for several years. They split amicably, saying distance and hectic work schedules were to blame.
Even though I know it’s a pile of rubbish and that the ‘friend’ is probably Heidi feeding the paper lies, it pains me to know that everyone else reading this will see it as the truth without questioning it. It also angers me that more of my personal sadness has been shared with the world, turning my life into a spectacle once again. Seeing as I spent the whole of my teens shying away from people, preferring they knew nothing about me, it’s crushing to know my life is being laid out for everyone to judge. I feel ridiculed.
I ring the doorbell when I arrive home, not having the energy to root through my bags and find my keys.
When Mum comes to the door, I watch as her expression turns from delight to worry as she sees my face.
‘Love, what’s the matter?’ she asks, stepping out of the house towards me.
‘Oh, Mum!’ I whine, as I fall into her arms and sob.
22
Wanting to be alone, I go up to my old room and shut the door as soon as I’m inside. Standing there, I can’t help but feel disappointed as I look around at the pink walls and little-girl décor, exactly as it has been for the past fifteen years. Everything that was once familiar is now strange to me, uncomfortably so. After finally allowing myself to leave Rosefont Hill behind to experience what else life had to offer, my room feels tiny and dingy. I feel as though I’ve worked my way backwards – it’s humiliating.
But I’m safe here, I remind myself.
Dumping my bags on the floor, I shut the curtains – irritated by the sunlight that filters through, making the world seem bright when it obviously isn’t. On the bed, I throw myself under the duvet and find Mr Blobby waiting for me. I bury my face in his belly.
I want to do nothing but hibernate here for the rest of my life. Lying in the darkness, not wanting to face the world.
My earlier tears have finally stopped flowing, seeming to have dried up for now. Instead numbness surrounds me as I continue to reflect on where it all went wrong.
Looking back, I never felt enough. At first that feeling didn’t stem from Billy, not at all; for a long time I did feel like his world, but it came from the people in Billy’s life who couldn’t comprehend him falling for a ‘normal’ girl when he could have so much more, people like Paul and Heidi.
On that first Press Night, when I stood alone, looking at the clique around me, I felt like such an outsider; I felt like I didn’t match up to the greatness that surrounded me. Even after that, when I was included more, no one genuinely wanted to talk to me, they wanted to talk to Billy. I was just someone they were lumbered with if he happened to be talking to someone else. Many people feigned an interest, if they were polite enough, and the odd few blocked me out, preferring to stand in silence next to me, just looking in Billy’s direction, waiting for an in. On those occasions, I would question myself as to why these people would choose to talk to me anyway, and no doubt that came across as I stood awkwardly at Billy’s side, looking a little out of my depth in my surroundings. You could say I’d made myself ‘not enough’ from the start. It was always in my thoughts, eating away at me.
I’d pushed my own dreams and ambitions aside, and happily so, to try and make our relationship work – Billy is a superstar, who has succeeded in doing great things and gaining critical acclaim; his job and dreams were always going to be more important than mine, because his success was on a much bigger scale. Whatever I manage to achieve in life would always pale in comparison to his successes – it’s thoughts like that which made our life together very one-sided. The emphasis was always on what Billy was doing, and how I could fit in around his plans to make his life as easy as possible. My purpose was to make Billy happy, to lovingly welcome him back into a warm, clean home of an evening. It all sounds very quaint and sweet, but I ended up living my life for him and having nothing of my own; nothing to take pride in. I’d lost myself.
&nb
sp; Occasionally, I think certain thoughts and I wonder if they’re real, or if my brain finds it easier to look back and see all the faults in a bid to get over the heartache I feel. After all, I didn’t always feel bad, I wasn’t always made to feel like nothing; that occurred in only a handful of tiny moments; however, the feeling they caused lingered, because I always saw the truth in them. They helped to feed my own insecurities.
I miss Billy.
If Billy was plucked out of his life and able to exist as the man I first met and fell in love with, I know we’d be happy together, if the relationship was more balanced. However, I know that equality could never be struck with him staying in his profession. Quite frankly, he has too many people blowing hot air up his arse, telling him how wonderful he is and what he should be doing with his life. He’s never able to live just for himself.
Billy hasn’t turned up at Mum’s, he has been respectful of the fact that I asked him not to, although he has left me a barrage of texts and missed calls. Every time I look at my phone there is some sort of message on there from him, along with a missed call or two from Molly, although even she seems to have stopped trying for a couple of days. I know she’ll have read the papers and that she’ll be worried about me, but I haven’t had the energy or enthusiasm to talk to anyone. I’m surprised she’s not turned up at the door, bringing cake to mend my broken heart. Perhaps Mum has told her I’m not up for visitors just yet.
I stare at the photos on my pink bedroom wall, having hung them up as soon as I got back, and think of Dad, trying to block out all the other thoughts that niggle at my brain, concentrating on his beaming smile, his kind brown eyes and the love which encompasses every image.
For five days I have stayed under my duvet in bed, the time passing in a blurred mixture of tears, snot and never-ending cups of tea and toast. So far, my desire to block out the outside world has been honoured and I’ve been left to stew in my own sorrow, but I know Mum won’t let me continue in this way forever. Over the past two days, each time she’s come in she’s lingered by my bed, eager to say something, but always deciding against it at the last second and shuffling away. We’ve never been in this situation before – one where she’s the giver, trying to find the right words to say to pull me out of my stupor. I can’t help but feel sorry for her and her efforts.
As Mum knocks on my bedroom door, for the fourth time this morning, I hear her muttering to herself and I know this time she won’t leave without trying to get her words out.
After letting herself in, Mum places another cup of tea on my bedside table, next to the mountain of snotty tissues I’ve created, and sits down next to me on the bed. She turns to me, pulling a sad face – one that is full of sympathy and possibly mirroring my own expression.
‘Love, you can’t just stay in bed and mope about here for the rest of your life,’ she says softly, as she concentrates on sweeping stray bits of hair away from my face.
‘Why not?’ I sulk.
‘Because … you can’t.’
Unsatisfied with the answer I stay quiet and just stare back at her.
‘Soph, I know how it feels to want to shut yourself off from the world, but it won’t do you any good.’ She sighs and looks away from me, taking in the room – my dolls, teddies and books. Her eyes rest on the photo frames in front of us. ‘I did a really bad job, didn’t I? After your dad died.’
‘No!’
‘Yes, I did. It’s OK,’ she says calmly, ‘I can easily admit that myself. I know I was rubbish. I just couldn’t function, you know?’ she says, glancing at me before turning her attention back to the photos. ‘I didn’t see the point in getting up in the morning. I just couldn’t get past the fact that he’d gone.’
‘It was hard for you, Mum,’ I say, as I pull myself up into a sitting position.
This isn’t the conversation I thought we were going to have – I thought she’d fluster her way through talking about boys and heartbreak. I didn’t expect her to talk about Dad, especially not his death.
‘It was, but I should’ve remembered that I had an eleven-year-old at home who needed her mother,’ she continues calmly. ‘I didn’t even think about how the whole thing was affecting you. I forgot that you’d be hurting too. That’s awful.’
‘Mum, you don’t have to –’
‘But I do, Sophie. I was so absorbed in my hurt that I didn’t console you in yours. You should’ve been my top priority but I was selfish. ‘
‘But you had so much to deal with and –’
‘Sophie, I’m not looking for you to make excuses for me. I’m trying to explain,’ she says softly, cutting me off. ‘I felt like I didn’t know who I was any more. I’d lost my present and my future – the only thing I wanted to cling on to was the past – but the past was too painful to think about. We were so happy, and then suddenly it was gone,’ she pauses and looks down at her hands as she rubs them together. ‘He was so young – it was so unfair. I couldn’t understand it. All I could think about was the life we’d lost. I couldn’t bear the thought that I had so much of my own life to live without him. That he had missed out on so much.’
I don’t say anything, choosing to let Mum voice these feelings she’s never been able to share with me before. I lean forward and hold her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. Letting her know I’m here. Listening.
‘And then I think of your little brother or sister that we never had. I failed him. I failed your dad because I wasn’t able to do that right.’
‘Mum, that’s rubbish!’ I protest, suddenly feeling a tightening around my throat at the mention of that other life.
‘And then there’s you … my biggest regret is that I let life stop for you.’
‘But it was my fault,’ I blurt.
‘What was?’
‘Dad’s death … everything.’
‘Why do you think that?’
‘Because of our argument. Because of me being a spoilt brat and demanding marshmallows. Because if I hadn’t done that, then Dad would still be here.’
‘If you want to go down the blame route I could say that it was my fault for not realizing we were out of marshmallows when I did the shopping.’
‘That’s just stupid.’
‘And so is you thinking it’s your fault,’ she says sternly, before turning away and shaking her head. ‘I should’ve insisted we both got help straight away – therapy or whatever. I can’t believe I let us plod along like zombies for so long – that I let you stay at home and look after me instead of living your life.’
‘But I didn’t want to go anywhere else, Mum.’
‘And why not? Tell me honestly why you stayed at home,’ she says, squeezing my hand.
I pause before responding. To share the thoughts in my head could be upsetting for Mum, but is it better for us to have those unsaid words out there at last, so long after the events that have unquestionably shaped our lives?
‘I was scared,’ I say matter-of-factly, not letting emotion take over – ensuring that my words can be heard. That we can communicate at last. ‘Scared of what you might do to yourself if you didn’t have me around to look after you.’
Mum looks at me with a sad nod.
‘I never begrudged it, Mum.’
‘But you stopped your life to look after me.’
‘What life?’ I say with a laugh. ‘I had no real friends at that point anyway. It’s not like I was itching to leave your side to be with them. By the time your breakdown came, Mum, I was so relieved to have a glimpse of the old you back that I’d have given anything to stay with you. Yes, it was hard. Yes, it was painful to see you in such a state. But there was no way I was going to go and leave you.’
I look down at our entwined hands as memories of my childhood and the little girl I once was flicker through my brain.
‘I sometimes wonder what my life would’ve been like if Dad hadn’t died – and not just because he’d have been here with us, but I look at who I am now and I wonder who I would’ve been if I h
adn’t had to go through all that loss.’
‘Before that you were such a bright young thing – a bubble of energy.’
‘See, I see myself as two separate people – before and after, you know?’
Mum nods.
‘Not only did Dad get snatched from us, but I felt as though my childhood got taken from me, too. I was so different to everyone else. I knew things that I shouldn’t about how cruel life can be and how quickly it can be crushed.’
‘You were forced to experience so much so young.’
‘I was … and I think that is partly why I cut myself off from everyone.’
‘Do you think it’s had a knock-on effect? With your relationships as an adult?’ Mum asks. I’m surprised at the frankness of the question, of the whole discussion we’ve been having, but it feels good to share. Good to get the niggling thoughts out of my head.
‘Definitely. I’m better now than I was, but it’s still there sometimes. The fear of getting close to someone in case they leave me.’
‘You let your guard down with Billy, though.’
‘Yes, and look where that got me.’
‘Soph, don’t you think you’re being a bit quick to act on this whole thing?’
‘What do you mean?’ I snap suddenly, pulling my hands away from hers and instantly shattering the ease of our conversation by getting defensive. Inwardly I cringe at my tone – I know Mum is trying to help. ‘I’m sorry,’ I grumble quietly.
‘That’s OK, love,’ she says as she stands up and picks a few stray bits of cotton from my duvet cover off her skirt. ‘Locking yourself away in your room isn’t going to do you any favours, though …’
‘I know, Mum. But I’m just not ready to face anyone yet. I need time.’
She leans over and plants a kiss on my cheek. ‘Just remember that we’re all waiting for you to come back to us.’
She leaves and I lie back and bury myself under the duvet once again.