The Boyfriend Sessions (21 page)

Thank God it was wine o’clock.

I gulped, rather than sipped my glass of wine, then fell back in the armchair.

“Busy week?” Cate was looking at me from the kitchen, while she put out chips and crackers for our usual Thursday night crucify Christa and her ex-boyfriends session.

Busy was an understatement.

Monday night I’d worked late. I think I’d finally made it home and managed to crawl into bed sometime before 1am, the revised concepts for Oz Guardians completed. They were nowhere near as inspiring as our first concepts, but I was happy with them.

I’d missed boot camp on Tuesday morning due to lack of sleep and the need to be at the office first thing for an internal review of the new concepts. Then Max had been tied up at work late on Tuesday night, so I’d worked late from home and started on the sketches for his gaming avatars.

Wednesday night was when we’d agreed to catch up, but those plans hit the fan when Oz Guardians came back with yet more changes. Another late night of work ensued.

I’d managed to drag myself to boot camp this morning—probably more due to the desire to see Max again than for my dedication to my exercise regime—and he’d spent the majority of the class laughing at my complete lack of coordination.

I became clumsy when I was tired. I’d actually managed to miss his padded hands during the boxing reps, had clipped his upper arm rather hard, which had unbalanced me enough to land me squarely on my butt. Even Brett, the instructor, hadn’t quite known what to say when that happened. He merely raised an eyebrow at Max as if to say,
she’s your problem, mate.

Now it was Thursday night and there we were for another of my gruelling counseling sessions. I honestly didn’t know if I had the strength. Everyone was coming. Even Max. I was hoping it had more to do with his desire to see me again rather than learning more about my failed love life.

I picked up my near empty glass of wine and held it out to Cate as she came into the lounge room. A worried look on her face, she generously poured me another.

“Has Maddy been working you too hard?”

I shook my head, while I swallowed another sip. “No more than any other job. I’ve been trying to do the work for Max as well.”

“Those Spencers,” Cate sympathised, a small grin on her face.

“What about the Spencers?”

Maddy came out of the bathroom adjusting her already perfect hair and sat down next to Cate.

“Working me to the bone,” I joked.

Maddy cocked her head to one side, registered I was poking fun and turned to Cate. “She’s been awesome. That big client we were telling you about has been intense this week and she’s kept the whole thing going.”

“Did they like the new concepts?” Cate asked.

“They do now, thank God,” Maddy replied.

It had taken a few versions, but it looked as if they’d sign them off at next week’s board meeting.

And wasn’t that a relief. I needed a break and some time to focus on Max’s job. In fact, I’d negotiated the day off tomorrow from Grounded Marketing. I was looking forward to the freedom of working on the concepts at home, alone, without any interruptions.

There was a knock at the front door and Cate went to answer it.

“Look who I found in the foyer.” Max stood in the doorway holding a brown paper bag. He gave us a broad smile and nodded at Scarlett standing beside him. He’d made a trip to the bottle shop for some beer.

“Sorry I’m late. Management meeting.” Scarlett threw her bag on the ground and approached the lounge room or, more specifically, the bottle of wine and spare glasses on the coffee table. “And wasn’t that a crock.”

We snickered quietly and wisely chose to keep our thoughts to ourselves at the image of Scarlett involved in an agency management meeting.

After a long sip of wine and a mouthful of crackers, Scarlett seemed to relax. “And who do we have tonight?”

“Perfect Pete,” Cate replied helpfully.

Scarlett frowned then nodded. “Not my idea of perfect, I’ll admit, but he wasn’t bad for Christa.”

“Here we go … ” I muttered.

“He was lovely!” Cate cried, rushing to Pete’s defence.

“If you loved him so much, then why didn’t you go out with him?” I asked. Pete had always been a sore point between the two of us. Cate was convinced that Pete was ‘the one’, marriage material and the rest, and then I’d gone and broken up with him.

“Alright, back up,” Max interrupted. “What exactly was it about Pete that made him so perfect?”

Cate let out an overly dramatic sigh and reclined in her seat. “Pete was awesome. He was just the right amount of gorgeous and sincere. He was one of those guys who doesn’t really know what a good catch he is.”

“Kind of like you,” Scarlett commented to Max through a mouthful of crackers.

Max coughed quietly and I could see the faint hint of color creeping up his neck. Very endearing.

“Exactly!” Cate agreed. “Just like Max. Except he was tall and blond with blue eyes instead of dark and handsome.” Cate’s eyes widened at her unintentional compliment, while Max continued to cough into his drink.

“Stop hitting on my brother. He’s off limits,” Maddy advised.

I cleared my throat and put my wine carefully on the coffee table. We were heading into dangerous territory and it was time to redirect the conversation. “Pete was a great guy. We met through a work function originally. He was in media sales and we kept bumping into each other—”

“Not another sales guy,” Max muttered.

“Not like that,” I said, shaking my head at him. “He was really down to earth and genuine. I think he’d been interested in me for a while but knew I was with Michael, so nothing had happened. Then the news must have traveled that we’d broken up and we got talking one night at a sponsor event. He asked me to dinner and I said yes. It was all very boring.”

“It was not boring!” Cate protested. “He’d waited for ages to ask her out and as soon as Christa was ready, he was there.”

Scarlett rolled her eyes at Cate. “So he was a stalker. But not as pathetic as Handy Hamish,” she thought necessary to add.

“He was not!” Poor Cate, no one seemed to share her rosy, romantic view of the world.

“He wasn’t a stalker,” I told them. “Just an average guy, a very sweet guy.” And it was the truth. He’d been exceptionally sweet. After my horrible spate of failed romances in my early twenties, I’d decided that normal—if not slightly dull—men like Michael and Pete were safer territory for me.

“He was so sweet,” echoed Cate, “and he took such good care of Christa.”

Max smirked at me from across the room. “He took ‘good care’ of Christa?”

I did my best to suppress a smile. Trust Max to get it in one. I was about to open my mouth to say as much, but Scarlett beat me to it.

“Christa may look all innocent and sweet, but she sure as hell doesn’t need looking after,” Scarlett commented.

The way Max’s eyes twinkled told me he understood better than they appreciated, and I had to look away. As I studied my glass of wine, I heard Max say, “I’d have to agree with you there, she’s one tough lady.”

“Seen her in action at boot camp, hey?” Cate asked curiously.

“Something like that. She’s got one hell of a mean punch.”

“Really?”

“Yep. We call her Magda.”

“What?” all three women said at once.

I used all my willpower not to burst out laughing. I met Max’s eyes again and shook my head. His face remained amazingly well composed, but his eyes laughed at me. I couldn’t help myself. “Watch it, Spencer.”

He took a sip of wine and looked at the other women. “See? I’ve been warned.”

“Anyway.” I tried to steer the conversation back on course. “We were talking about Pete and not my fantastic right hook. So yes, Pete liked to look after me. He was that sort.”

“The caring sort,” Cate reaffirmed.

“Uh uh,” Scarlett said, shaking her head. “He was the needy sort.”

She was right. “He needed to be needed. It was like his success as a male depended on his ability to care for others. It became … stifling is probably the best way to put it.”

“Especially when you got in one of your creative moods,” Maddy added, looking over at Max. “I remember her coming over to my place to escape regularly so she could work on her sketches. It was the only way she’d get any peace.”

“So he most definitely wasn’t perfect,” I concluded despite Cate’s pout of disagreement next to me.

“How long were you together?” Max asked casually, but I could tell he was trying to hide his interest.

“About a year.” At his surprised expression, I gave a wry grin. “He was actually a great guy, but just not the guy for me.”

“She got out of there before he could put a ring on her finger,” Scarlett added, a little brutally in my opinion.

Max set down his glass. “Not another proposal?”

I didn’t say anything, just gave him a guilty look.

“Seriously?”

Cate leaned in to steal my thunder. “She found a ring!”

Max looked at Cate and then back at me, the corner of his mouth curling deliciously. “So you got out of there?”

I bit down on my grin. “I got out of there.”

The room erupted in laughter and I joined in. It was so ridiculous, I supposed it was kind of funny—I was a magnet for unwanted proposals.

“Oh, Christa, what are we going to do with you?” Max murmured.

Scarlett picked up another cracker and gestured in my direction. “Swearing her off men seems to be working.”

I dropped my head instantly in an attempt to hide my burning face.

“It seems you have a unique effect on men, Bubbles. Regardless of your feelings, they seem intent on proposing to you,” Max said.

My head shot up in alarm. “What do you mean?”

“Mmm,” Maddy agreed. “He’s got a point.”

A point? What point? “But why?” I practically exploded, “what have I ever done to encourage them?”

Scarlett resumed snickering next to me and I shoved her gently. “Shut up, you. You’re not exactly putting yourself out there as marriage material either.”

She turned to me, clearly unimpressed. “Yes, that’s true, but at least I’m honest about my intentions from the start.”

“How am I not honest? All three proposals, I’d never hinted at, let alone discussed—”

“No, but you’re never very open with your feelings, Christa,” Maddy interrupted quietly but firmly.

“What? My emotions are so obvious. I’m hopeless at hiding anything,” I whined. I knew I was getting worked up but I didn’t care. Point in case—I was crap at hiding my emotions.

“But you’re not honest with yourself,” Scarlett replied, practically echoing Max’s words from our earlier conversation.

“But—”

Cate held up a firm hand, very un-Cate-like of her. “No, Christa, she’s right. You’re not honest with yourself and in doing that, you lead these guys on.”

I stared at her open-mouthed. I could accept that she was still secretly in love with Pete, but more worrying was she was actually agreeing with Scarlett. It was a grim day when the forces of good and evil teamed up to conspire against me.

I finally found my voice. “How am I not honest with myself?”

I’d been avoiding his eyes, but when Max leaned forward in his chair we all turned to look at him. “If I can offer my opinion, I’d say Christa has everything so tightly wound up in there, she doesn’t even allow herself to feel. She just acts.”

I sat back, a little stunned. I know I was thinking the same thing myself only days ago, but it stung to have it said out loud.

“I’d say you’re wrong.” As usual, I was nothing if not perverse.

Max cocked his head to one side, narrowing his eyes. “I’m wrong, am I?”

“Yes, you’re wrong,” I said again primly. “I knew exactly how I felt about those guys, they just misinterpreted things, that’s all.”

“Because you kept it to yourself.”

“Hang on a—”

Max ignored me and barreled on. “They thought they’d finally met the girl of their dreams and you couldn’t be honest with them. You let them think there was a future and those poor guys didn’t stand a chance.”

Was he talking about us too? I was shocked at the bitter tone of his voice, shocked that it felt like I needed to defend myself against his recriminations. He was mad at me for keeping our relationship a secret. Was that what this was?

Then I caught the look Maddy aimed in his direction. It was full of sympathy.

“Max,” she said softly.

This wasn’t about us, I realized. Well, not entirely. It was about
her.

Sarah.

Max held up a hand to silence his sister and she sat back, wary.

“So, what’s it going to be, Christa?” Max turned to me. “Are you going to be honest from now on?”

“I thought I was being honest,” I replied stubbornly. I’d told him as much the other week. I’d never meant to lead any of those guys on. I might not have loved them as they’d thought, but I’d never given them the impression that I was after the white picket fence, the ring on my finger, and the brood of kids.

“That’s not true,” Max said, his voice gruff. “You can’t even be honest with yourself, let alone everyone in this room.”

My breath caught. That wasn’t fair. He knew I didn’t want to tell my friends yet, knew I wasn’t ready to reveal our relationship. And who was he to talk? He was obviously carrying around a serious amount of baggage from his break up with Sarah. “Max—”

Max pushed up from his chair roughly and glared at me. “I didn’t think so. You’d rather lie to yourself, than face the truth. I should have seen that before.”

“Max—”

He ignored me. “The truth is you haven’t been honest about your feelings since you discovered your mum cheating on your father.”

I opened my mouth, but no sound came out. He wasn’t playing fair.

“And then you discovered Matt cheating on you, when you were seventeen—”

“Max!” Maddy’s protest was vehement, loyal friend that she was. But I had a feeling she wouldn’t be coming to my defence quite so quickly if she knew the truth.

Max turned to look at his sister. “She can take it,” he told her, his voice almost a hiss.

Maddy blinked while I flinched. He turned back to me, his eyes cold. “It cemented everything you ever believed about relationships, didn’t it?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know what you’re getting at—”

“That they’re doomed to fail. You’ve been setting yourself up for failure ever since.”

Somehow I managed to find my voice again. “I think we established that previously, thank you very much,” I retorted acidly. “You might recall it was at that point I stated I was done?”

Max observed me quietly. “You’re scared of turning out just like your dad.”

The room went perfectly silent, which was when I discovered I couldn’t breathe. Actually, literally, couldn’t breathe. I felt myself beginning to panic as I tried to draw breath into my lungs but it wouldn’t come.

Apparently finished making his point, I watched, frozen as Max stormed from the room, with Maddy hot on his heels. I was able to note that she looked equally as pissed as he did, but it was only a distant observation because I still couldn’t breathe. Oh God, I couldn’t breathe.

“Christa!”

Cate, beautiful Cate, had noticed my distressed state and was at my side in an instant, rubbing a firm palm in circles on my back. “Breathe, Christa, breathe.”

I shook my head at her wildly, my eyes opened wide as if maybe they could take in the breath for me. “Can’t,” I choked. The memories were a vice-like death grip on my throat.

I never spoke about my dad, never allowed anyone else around me to speak about him either. And Max had just flung it in my face so carelessly, so brutally.

“Oh, shit.” Scarlett was at my other side then, not so subtly pushing my head down between my legs. “Got to let the breath out first, Bubbles, before you can pull it back in again.”

It sounded easy to do in theory, but for the life of me, I just didn’t seem to be able to do it.

I tried to draw the breath in like Scarlett told me to, but I couldn’t do it, not with the thoughts currently whirling around in my head.

My father was dead.

Long dead, but in that moment I was nineteen years old again. I could still see with perfect clarity my mother’s pale face when she’d taken the phone call, and my stepfather’s sympathetic expression when he’d stood beside her when she’d told me. Then her look of pure and utter devastation when I’d spat the only words I could find, the words of an inconsolable teenage girl who’d lost her father.

It’s all your fault.

He’d lost everything. His wife, his family, his career. His life.

As much as I’d wanted someone to blame—and it hadn’t seemed fair to blame him then—the horrible truth was that he’d drunk himself to death over a broken heart. Unable to cope with the loss of his wife and his place in his family, he’d slowly but surely self-destructed until he’d no longer been able to work, no longer been able to see past the next drink. In that cycle, he’d lost himself and left behind all those who mattered to him.

If only he’d realized he wasn’t the only one with a broken heart.

Scarlett lifted her palm and brought it firmly down on my back, bringing me back to reality. “Let it out, Christa, let it out.”

I had no idea if it was something she’d learned at a first aid course, or just hyperventilation treatment Scarlett style, but the sudden contact was enough to shock my body into action. I choked out a ridiculous sob and then I was pulling the air back into my lungs, blissful, fresh air. It evaporated quickly into a series of tortured sobs, but I didn’t care, I was able to breathe.

The girls stayed with me, rubbing my back and murmuring reassuring words, while I stared blankly at the carpet beneath my feet. The numbness spreading through my body was almost comforting and I’d never noticed the carpet was getting quite so dirty before. The off-white was more of a dirty cream. Maybe we should hire one of those steam cleaner things you got from the supermarket …

“Don’t you walk out on me, Max Spencer!”

My head shot up at the sound of Maddy’s infuriated voice and I felt a cold rush of air as Max, then Maddy, stalked past us.

“Leave it alone,” Max ordered his sister, not looking at any of us as he stormed down the hallway.

“No, I will not leave it alone! You have no right to talk to Christa that way! Look what you’ve done to her—”

For a second, Max stopped and met my eyes. A flicker of pain passed through them, those beautiful dark eyes, that only days earlier were making love to me. If he was thinking the same thing, he appeared to shut the thought down because his eyes transformed themselves into cold, black stones I barely recognised.

“It’s nothing she hasn’t brought on herself,” he said quietly, then turned to resume his march down the hallway.

Cate gripped my arm tightly and even Maddy looked momentarily stunned at her brother’s words.

And I knew then. I knew in that moment, he was running too. There was no way he’d deliberately hurt me— well, not unless we were in the midst of a blood lust session of Mortal Kombat. He could see I’d been running for years now and he’d called me on it until he was blue in the face. He was trying to save me.

And I’d hurt him. Oh God, I’d hurt him. By refusing to be honest about our relationship, I’d proven to him he wasn’t any different to any of my ex-boyfriends. I’d practically resigned him to that pile before we’d even begun and that was such a monumental mistake … because he was different.

I still had to work on being honest with myself before I could contemplate my feelings for him. But I did know I couldn’t let him walk out the door without trying to return the favor.

He’d tried to save me. Now it was my turn.

I heard the familiar click of our front door being opened and stood up abruptly, almost sending Cate and Scarlett sprawling on the floor.

“Do you think you’re any different, Max? You’re running too.”

My girlfriends remained silent as we all waited to see what he would do. Eventually, still with his back to us, he spoke softly, “I’m not running.”

“Well, what do you call it then?” I demanded, my voice growing stronger. “You hold onto your past like it’s a precious secret, something no one else could possibly understand. Yet here I am, week after week, discussing the intimate details of my relationships for you to critique and throw back in my face, and you don’t even have the decency to share?”

“I’m not talking about this now.”

“Then when are you going to talk about it?” I persisted.

“Christa,” Maddy said carefully. “I don’t think it’s any of your business.”

“What do you think, Max? Is it any of my business? Or don’t you ever plan to ever share that part of yourself again?”

“Christa!” Maddy advanced on me. “I’m telling you to leave it alone!”

“Shut up, Maddy,” I snapped, genuinely annoyed at her need to keep everything and everyone under control. “I’m sleeping with your brother and I think I have a right to know more about the woman who broke his heart.”

I closed my eyes and listened as everyone around me sucked in their breath simultaneously. It sounded quite melodic.

Way to go, Christa.

It only took Maddy a second. “You
what
?”

I cringed as she spouted off a series of expletives that only very rarely left her beautiful mouth.

When I opened my eyes, I noticed with a sense of relief that Max had turned around to face us. His eyes regarded me warily and they’d lost some of their harshness.

“Give it a rest, Maddy,” he told her, with an audible sigh.

“No, I will
not
give it a rest! I can’t believe you! The both of you!”

“Give. It. A. Rest!” Max bit out the words through clenched teeth.

Maddy stepped back and after a moment, shut her mouth when it became apparent there wasn’t any more sound coming out.

Confident Maddy had exhausted herself, Max’s eyes found mine again. “Thank you.”

Two words. Only two words. But they said everything.

“I’m sorry,” I replied genuinely. I hadn’t meant to hurt him. I didn’t realize that by keeping it a secret, it would burn a hole inside of him and make him doubt ever getting involved with me.

“I’m sorry, too,” he said quietly.

“You’re not the only who’s been hurt, Max.” He looked away and I wondered why I couldn’t have just left it alone. But I couldn’t. If he expected complete honesty from me, then I needed the same in return.

“I know that.”

“Then why can’t you talk about? It can’t be that bad.”

A flicker of pain crossed his face. “I don’t need to talk about it.”

“Then you’re lying to yourself.”

He didn’t answer, just turned to open the door again.

“You’re just going to leave?”

Judging by the way the door was now half way open, yes, he was going to leave.

“Wow, Max. You’re such a hypocrite.” I’d descended to name calling, never a good sign, but I couldn’t believe it.

“I can’t talk about it now.”

“Can’t or won’t?” I demanded, unmoved. “I’m pretty sure it falls more into the category of won’t.”

“Whatever you say.”

Where was the fire, the fight, I’d seen just moments ago? In its place was an eerie resignation, that instead of frustrating me, just downright scared me.

“Well, I say you’re a coward, Max.”

“Christa—”

I reeled on Maddy and pointed a finger at her. “Don’t! Your brother isn’t special, Maddy, he’s not different to any of us, not in the slightest. We’ve all been hurt. We’ve all got our sad stories. The only difference is that Max feels it necessary to carry his around like a silent badge of honour.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying.” She looked unusually pale beneath her olive complexion.

“I know exactly what I’m saying,” I shot back then looked back at Max who’d turned to face us to watch my little tirade with Maddy. “What was it then? Hey? Did she cheat on you?”

His face remained impassive and it infuriated me that he wouldn’t acknowledge my words.

“Alright, then. You cheated on her and regretted it?” It was a long shot, but I had to start somewhere. “Or your computer games? She freakin’ hated your computer games. She didn’t get it, resented it, and had no idea how to beat the crap out of you in Mortal Kombat?”

Nothing. Not even a twitch of the lip at my Mortal Kombat reference. He just continued to stare impassively at me, his eyes strangely devoid of emotion.

“She earned more money than you and you just couldn’t handle it? Kick-ass career girl had your balls in her purse?” My suggestions were growing increasingly more absurd.

Obviously thinking the same thing, but still exasperatingly mute, he turned toward the door again.

I threw my hands up in despair, infuriated. “For fuck’s sake, Max! What is your fucking problem? You weren’t married, you didn’t have children—”

And in that second I knew. At exactly the same time as Maddy inhaled a breath with a rapid hiss, I saw Max stiffen and falter, if only for a moment. Then he put one foot in front of the other and walked out the door.

“Oh God. Max. I’m so sorry,” I called out. Children. It had to be. Why didn’t he just say? For the first time I realized it wasn’t hurt, so much as loss, that involuntarily reared its head whenever the subject of his ex-fiancée came up.

But now I was talking to a closed door and Maddy advanced on me, seething. “Are you happy now? I
cannot
believe you. I can’t believe you would sleep with him. I trusted you—”

“Fuck off, Maddy.”

She stopped as if struck. I don’t think in our entire friendship I had ever spoken those words to her and I wasn’t particularly proud to be saying them now. But I just wanted her to stop. I couldn’t think straight with her in my face and I was trying desperately to absorb what had just happened.

“Max,” I muttered, then bent down to scoop up my handbag and keys, and ran down the hall, leaving Maddy staring icily behind me.

Distantly, I was aware of Cate and Scarlett. Cate stood looking heartbroken, sweet romantic Cate, while Scarlett remained seated on the lounge, not looking surprised at all. Curious, but not surprised. Figured.

I vaguely wondered if I had just destroyed something very precious between the four of us, but now wasn’t the time to find out.

I had to get to Max before it was too late.