Unplugged (14 page)

She sits back.
“But you didn’t screw her, so I won’t.”

Cerys is in Cardiff. I
’m on my way back to the States. So is this over before we started? Would we have allowed the resonance to change our lives? The painful awareness that Honey is the person who suits my lifestyle edges in.

“
Did they take the presents from under Mum and Dad’s Christmas tree?” I ask.

“
What? Why?”

“
Some of the gifts under there were for Ella, weren’t they?”

Louise shakes her fringe from her face.
“You’re weird, worrying about a little girl’s Christmas.”

I don
’t tell her I’m worrying about Cerys’s Christmas if she opens my gift to her in front of the dickhead who’s Ella’s dad.

****

CERYS

3 a.m.
Thanks, Ella
. Craig’s pissed off with her coming into the bedroom and nagging every hour since midnight; I wanted to put her back to bed and scold her but Craig insists we get up. His plan is to let her open the gifts so he can crash back to bed again.

At least her dad is here.

Of course, Craig’s splurged stupid amounts of money on the huge pile of brightly wrapped presents that she rips through, opening them in ten minutes flat. Her spoils are piled beneath the wrapping; books, Lego, DVDs, and boxes of toys requiring batteries I doubt I have. Ella grabs the last gift.

“
I saved this one because the paper is pretty,” she says.

The silver and gold wrapping stands out from the gaudy
Santas and reindeers, and Ella’s right; the paper does look pretty. Not the kind of wrapping paper selected for kids, which arouses my suspicion about who this is from. Unable to read the label, she thrusts the present at her Dad who kneels on the floor next to her.

“
Who bought my present?” she asks.

His brow furrows as he reads the label.
“Liam.” He glances sharply at me. “Who’s Liam?”

“
You know who, Louise’s brother.” I fight the pink but fail.
Shit, Liam
. “He probably didn’t want Ella to feel left out when he bought everyone else a present. He’s home for Christmas.”

The suspicion on his face grows at my rambled explanation.
“You mean Liam Oliver? Since when does he come back to Wales? Thought LA was more his scene these days.” He pauses and I attempt to keep my face unreadable. “Must’ve been fun living with a rock star.”

“
Yeah, right, I had a great time living there,” I snap. Thankfully, Craig doesn’t want to go back to the topic of his behaviour so he drops it. The bastard hasn’t once apologised.

“
Uncle Liam bought me an Olaf!” shouts Ella and hugs the soft toy version of her favourite movie character to her chest. “I love it!”

At the words
‘Uncle Liam’, a muscle in Craig’s cheek twitches.

“
Open your presents now!” Ella instructs us.

We divided the presents from under the tree
, and me and Craig have a small pile too. My eyes are drawn to the small gift in paper matching the gold and silver of Ella’s. I push it to one side, beneath the shaggy black rug. Why do I feel guilty? One kiss. Well, lots of kisses but nothing more.

I
’ve avoided sex with Craig since we got back here a couple of days ago, letting him think he has to re-earn my respect first. I doubt he’ll wait long so there’ll be another source of arguments.

Craig has
bought me lingerie.

I inhale as I pull out the expensive
black silk bra and panties and Craig’s eyes shine. “You can wear them for me later.”

My desire to let this man touch me is zero.
Without a word, I fold them back into the paper. I give permission for Ella to open the rest. Linda and Jim have bought me a basket of bath gels and soap; Ella’s face lights up at the chocolates and perfume from Louise.

“
Okay, let’s tidy all this up! Daddy wants to get back to bed. We can watch your new movie together!” I say.

Ella dutifully scrunches all the discarded paper into a corner.

“You forgot one,” says Craig in a cold voice. “It got pushed under the rug.”

He
’s looking at the present I know is from Liam. “Oh?” I have no choice and retrieve the package. Carefully, I undo the tape and push back the stiff paper. The black box inside is unmistakably a jewellery box and my palms sweat. I know what this is without opening.

Inside rests
a gold chain holding a heart-shaped pendant with a diamond set in one side of the heart. A replica of the one I lost. I fix my gaze on the pendant, scared to look at Craig.

“
What is it Mummy? Is it from Uncle Liam?”

I don
’t answer but Craig’s observant enough to see the paper is the same. He snatches the box from my hands and lifts the chain out of the box, dangling the heart. “Why did he buy you this?”

“
Because I lost the other one.”

“
‘The ‘other one’. You mean the one I bought you?”

The day Ella was born Craig bought me the necklace I lost. It was the closest we ever got to a piece of jewellery showing any commitment. Marriage was discussed and every time we see his family the topic resurfaces, but Craig was never keen. Maybe in the early days I
’d have agreed, but recently I’m glad I didn’t.

“
Yes,” I say quietly. 

“
Why would he do that?”

“
I don’t know. I was upset when I lost the necklace. He’s a nice guy; he probably thought I’d like a replacement.”

“
Oh, yeah, and how nice to you was he? Did he replace anything else?”

Ella looks between us and I pray with all I have that she won
’t say something incriminating. “He was nice to Ella.”

“
Guys don’t buy girls this stuff unless they mean something,” he snaps.

“
It’s nothing to him. He has money to burn.”

“
Not the cost, it’s a bloody necklace, Cerys. With a heart on it.”

“
Do you honestly think I had time to start a new relationship living in someone else’s house? And with a member of Blue Phoenix? Don’t be ridiculous! He’s a friend from years back.”

“
Yeah. I remember. You used to follow him around.” Craig stands. “I’m going back to bed.” He drops the necklace so it lands in my lap. “Send it back to him; I’ll get you a new one.”

The lights on the tree twinkle in the room, the smell of Christmas paper reminding me of childhood. I have to focus on Ella. She scrabbl
es through her pile, looking for her DVD. When we put it on, she snuggles up to me, hugging her Olaf toy. Disney movies about princesses, and the prince arriving with his ‘true loves kiss’ are bad for little girls because they grow up and think one day a prince of their own will arrive with the long-awaited kiss. I hope one day that she’ll question that because reality is harsh.

I pick up the necklace and hold the heart in the palm of my hand, wishing with all of mine that I was in St
Davids with Louise. And with Liam.

PART TWO

CHAPTER 14

APRIL 2014

LIAM

The problem with stepping back from Blue Phoenix for a few months is everything else in life sharpens into focus. Avoiding wedding plans is no longer an option
. And
Jesus
, does Honey have plans.

Relaxing after the crap of the last few months
— deaths, overdoses and tours cut short — is hard. The last time I had peace and downtime away from the band was… no idea. Years ago, and I’m lost.

Honey currently appears as a regular extra on a new TV comedy show. I watched it once
; it was bloody awful, but when she raves about her big break, I smile encouragingly. The part she has does little to counteract the bimbo image.

If Honey isn
’t working, her day is filled with wedding organisation. Three weeks to go and my feet aren’t cold, they’re fucking ice blocks.

When I came back to the States after Christmas, we
patched things up. In a way, I’d behaved the same as her: Honey swears she only kissed Mason, and I kissed Cerys. I didn’t tell Honey. I know why Honey behaved as she did; and although I understand the depth of her insecurity and need for attention, running to another guy every time we fight isn’t the answer. What if next time it’s more than a kiss? Will being married be enough for Honey to believe my commitment to her? These niggling whispers over the last couple of months are now voices drowning my thoughts.

At the centre of my doubt is Cerys. Although we haven
’t spoken since the day we kissed, the night is as indelibly inked as any of my tattoos are. Honey kissed a guy and had no emotional desire to get close to him; I wanted Cerys and I would’ve traded Honey for her. That makes what I did worse and why each day the doubt grows. The problem isn’t the possibility Honey could be unfaithful again, but the attachment to Cerys I can’t shake. Every time I think about Cerys, and every time I crave to go back to the moment in time that fused me to her, I’m unfaithful to Honey. I can’t give Honey my whole heart when I left a part with Cerys at Christmas.

But I can
’t have Cerys; she’s with another man. If she no longer is, our time meant less to Cerys than me; otherwise, I’d have heard from her. I toyed with the idea of contacting Cerys a few times, but if she is still with Ella’s dickhead father, my interference won’t be welcome. I asked Louise about Cerys a couple of times, on the rare occasions I speak to her, but only got a ‘she’s okay’ response.

The deeper we get into wedding plans, the more I get caught in the tide. I switch off, let Honey get on with the military manoeuvres,
and reassure myself everything will work out and this is all pre-wedding nerves.

****

Blue Phoenix gets a shitload of fan mail and someone in our PR department opens it and sends out crap to people — postcards, stickers, whatever, I don’t know. Dylan is insistent that every piece gets answered which means there’s a backlog of months. Each piece is opened, date stamped and added to a pile. I bet some of these people aren’t fans anymore by the time they hear back.

Today
, I got a letter from Cerys and my grip onto the world I returned to slipped.

Not strictly from Cerys, but Ella. I
’m handed a pile of fan mail and inside is a picture of three people and a dog in the snow: a man, a woman, and a girl holding a doll. The dog and the man have the same orange colour hair. My name is represented by an L and half-formed letters to make the ‘iam’. ‘Ella’ is scrawled in a corner. The letter is date-stamped two weeks after Christmas. On the back is a note from Cerys:

Ella drew a picture to thank you for her Christmas gift. She loves Olaf and takes him to bed every night. Your gift for me was very thoughtful, thank you. I hope you are well. Cerys x

This sucker punch to the head prevents me thinking about anything else all day. Four months ago, she contacted me and I never responded because I never got the fucking letter. Why didn’t Cerys ask Louise for my real address instead of sending c/o Blue Phoenix? Did Cerys make any decisions based on me not contacting her? I shake away the ‘what ifs’. What if everything fizzled, that the spark of our kiss was nothing more than the lonely need Cerys spoke about.

Fate made the decision for us with a little help from our own stupidity.

I stick the crayon picture on the fridge with a magnet. Isn’t that what you do with kids drawings? After kicking round the house obsessing about Cerys, I head out to my meeting with Tate Stephens. Music has been part of my life for eight years and despite Blue Phoenix being on a break, I have the need to keep working. So, I have session work lined up with Tate’s band, Landlocked, and I need to discuss the details. Honey’s pissed off because it means delaying the honeymoon; but our whole life is a luxurious holiday, so I fail to see the need for another. I guess the romantic in me is hidden too.

I
’m on a high when I get back to the house in the evening. The meeting was awesome. Getting involved with Landlocked is a breath of fresh air, a meeting of musical minds. Their music isn’t as heavy as Phoenix’s, but my signature bass flows perfectly into their sound. I fucking love my job.

“
Hey, babe!” I call as I walk across the granite floor into the tiled kitchen. Honey doesn’t reply; she’s not exactly the domestic type so I don’t expect her in the kitchen. Her red sports car is on the drive so she’s around somewhere. Maybe she’s in the pool. I head to the fridge to grab a beer before looking for Honey. I’m psyched about the session work and want to chat about my plans.