BooksBarbecue
Back Because She Loves Me
Chapters (50)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Contents
  5. One
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. Thirteen
  18. Fourteen
  19. Fifteen
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Ninteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-one
  26. Twenty-two
  27. Twenty-three
  28. Twenty-four
  29. Twenty-five
  30. Twenty-six
  31. Twenty-seven
  32. Twenty-eight
  33. Twenty-nine
  34. Thirty
  35. Thirty-one
  36. Thirty-two
  37. Thirty-three
  38. Thirty-four
  39. Thirty-five
  40. Thirty-six
  41. Thirty-seven
  42. Thirty-eight
  43. Thirty-nine
  44. Forty
  45. Forty-one
  46. Forty-two
  47. Epilogue
  48. Letter From the Author
  49. Acknowledgements
  50. About the Author

‘He’d go quiet at first, which was when I knew what was brewing. Then he’d start asking snide questions, making sarcastic comments. Eventually, he’d get angry, start shouting, throwing things. He never hit me but he’d scream at me and threaten me and whoever it was he was convinced I was screwing. After that was over he’d be contrite, crying, telling me he was sorry, that he would get help. But he never did get help. It happened over and over again and every time I forgave him.’

‘Why?’ I asked.

She shrugged. ‘I loved him. Because the rest of the time he was lovely. But it was always there, like a little . . . gremlin that lived in our flat, hiding, waiting to come out.’

I had shaken my head. ‘If that ever happened to me, I’d be out of there like a shot. There’s no way I’d put up with it.’

I looked towards the bedroom. It’s easy to feel certain of how you would act when you don’t have a real situation, real emotions, to deal with. I was shocked and upset by what Charlie had done, what she’d accused me of. I had a sickening vision of a future in which I could never relax, would repeatedly find myself in dramatic, disturbing scenes, a life where I could never accept the innocent offer of a lunchtime drink from a girl at work, never click ‘like’ on the picture of a woman I was friends with, eventually give in to the pressure to break contact with my female friends.

But when I pictured another future, one without Charlie in it, where I was alone again, the pain was even sharper. I was in love with her. Besotted. When we were together, the rest of my life felt sepia, dull, a black-and-white movie. The thought of losing her made me panic.

I hated to think of her suffering too. I wanted to make everything all right, make her happy. Perhaps, a little voice murmured, I had been in the wrong. I shouldn’t have spent the night at my friend’s flat, leaving Charlie here on her own, especially when we had been planning to talk about her moving in, when we were both expecting a fun evening together.

No, I told myself firmly. You are not in the wrong. You were being a friend to Sasha, that’s all. Charlie should understand that. And even if she was upset, she shouldn’t have reacted like that.

I knew that I was going to have to do something about this. Nip it in the bud.