The Story of Me (24 page)

“How the fuck d’ya know he’s got nine inches?” Marley asks. I bury my face in my hands. Please just let me be dreaming all of this. Please let me be hallucinating due to my jet lag.

“Oh, come on, Marls, girls talk about these things.” I take my hands from my face and look up at the ceiling, what must my dad be thinking? I don’t have to wait long to find out.

“Georgia, you said nothing happened in that hotel room Saturday night. Were you lying?”

“
No,
” Cam and I both say at the same time. I sit forward on the sofa.

“Dad, look, Cam and I had a relationship when Sean and I split up. I was still seeing Cam right up until I got back together with Sean. We haven’t seen each other for years, except for the odd occasion. I bumped into him Saturday night and everything happened exactly like I told you.”

“Nothing happened between us Saturday night. I swear, Frank. Georgia was a little drunk and tearful. It was a tough day for her. I didn’t know that when we first started talking, but once I realised, I got her out of the club and back to her hotel and made sure she ate, and drank some water.” He turns and looks at me. “We talked through a lot of stuff that was never resolved between us and that was it.” Not all entirely true but I’ll go with that.

My mum walks back in the room, her hands on her hips. She looks furious and I’m not sure if it’s aimed at me or Cam as she seems to be looking between us.

“Have you got a pregnant girlfriend?” Oh, fuck!

“No, I, let me explain… I, she’s not my girlfriend.” Cam looks from me to my dad.

“Spit it out, son. I’m listening.”

I stand up. “I can’t take much more of this. Why is my life up for discussion by everyone? Why is it okay, for all of you, to talk about me and my relationships like this?” I look around at everyone. “I’ve never sat at the dinner table and discussed the brothels, the prostitutes or the drugs you two have been involved with.” My dad’s mouth falls open. I look at Marley and then at Ash. “I’ve never discussed in front of everyone else that you like to watch your wife with other women.” I turn and look at my mum. “I’ve never sat with Dad and talked to him about the fact that you know he’s fucked other women. So why, please tell me, do all of you openly discuss everything about my life?”

I drain my wine glass and feel my pulse throb in my throat. I take a breath and continue, “You’ve always done it, even when Sean was alive it was the same. I’m not public property. I’m a person, a human fucking being and I have feelings.” I can feel tears welling up and I fight really hard to say what I’ve got to say without crying. I’m so sick of crying. “All I ever do is try and please everyone. Everything that I do, every breath I take, I worry. I worry about what you lot will think. I worry about how the press will report my actions.” I look around the room at all of them, but I leave my gaze on Marley a little longer than everyone else. “When I was younger, it was always my brothers I worried about pleasing or just the family name. I was a Layton. I was expected to behave a certain way. Nobody ever saw me as Georgia. I was Frank and Berni’s daughter or I was Bailey, Lennon and Marley’s little sister, then, then I was Sean’s girlfriend.”
Don’t cry. Don’t you dare fucking cry
. “I’m not famous. I’ve never wanted to be famous. I just fell in love with a boy who ended up being one of the biggest rock stars in the world. I just happen to be the sister of a boy in one of the world’s biggest bands, and because of that, the press haven’t left me alone. I’ve been dealing with the press and their bullshit stories about me since I was sixteen and was titled ‘The underage harlot who broke a rock star's heart’.” Now I start to really struggle. The lump in my throat, the knot in my stomach are alternating between making me choke and making me want to vomit.

“I did nothing wrong, nothing. I stayed home. I went to school and when my boyfriend and my brother were photographed in a hotel room, snorting coke off a whore’s tits and later accused of raping that whore, guess what… Guess what, everyone?” I look around the room at everyone again, my mum’s crying, Marley’s not far behind her, Ash has her hand over her mouth. My dad and Bailey are wide-eyed and silent. I can’t even bring myself to look at Cam. “It was me the press went for. It was
my
reputation that they ripped to shreds. It was me that got death threats and dog shit sent through the post. It was me who lost my boyfriend, access to two of my brothers and my best friend. It was me who paid for their stupidity and then… then when Sean and I eventually sorted our shit out, they still didn’t leave us alone. He’s gay. He’s having affairs. He’s fucking her. She’s fucking him. All they ever do is judge.” I wipe my now snotty nose on the back of my hand and look at my mum, just daring her to comment. “And even now, despite everything, despite all the shit that I’ve been through, they still won’t leave me alone. My husband’s been dead a year. How long do I have to wait, how old have I got to be before I can just be Georgia? How long till I’m not just Frank’s daughter, Sean’s wife or that ‘poor girl’? When can I just be me and not give a fuck about having you lot, the press and the rest of the world think that it’s all right to judge and discuss my life?”

I don’t know where the words are coming from. I never even realised I felt like this, but the words just keep coming.

“When Sean and I split up, I had a mental breakdown, and you lot did nothing. You pandered to me. I know you thought you were doing the right thing, Mum, but all that aside, one of you, someone, should have stepped up and told me to liven the fuck up. If it wasn’t for Ash forcing me to go out, I don’t know how things would’ve gone, but even then, I spent a good six months on a different road of self-destruction.” I pause and look at my parents. “Sorry, but you need to hear this. You need to understand what I went through. I slept around. I did a lot of drugs and not one of you knew or you did and just chose not to say a thing.” My mum moves and stands behind my dad’s chair and puts her hand on his shoulder, and I smile at their unity.

“I’m not telling you all of this to hurt you. I’m telling you so you understand me,
me
, Georgia, not Frank’s daughter, not Sean’s wife, the story of me, so you can just try for a minute to understand what my life’s been like.” I look at all of them.

“I was angry. I was angry at life. I was angry with Sean. I thought he’d found it easy to move on and I couldn’t.” I shake my head, almost drowning in the emotions I feel as I remember just how hopeless life seemed to me back then. “And then one night, one night, this man, this man right here stepped in.” I finally look at Cam, his big hand is covering his mouth and his brown eyes glisten as he looks at me. “He didn’t care when I told him I loved Sean, that I would always love Sean. He didn’t take my bullshit. He let me cry. He let me talk, and piece by broken piece, he put me back together. He fixed me, and just when I was mended, I fell straight back into Sean’s arms and never looked back.” I sit back down next to Cam. I feel totally drained, but there’s more I need to say. “Please don’t ever tell me that he won’t look after me, because you’re wrong. I know without a shadow of a doubt, he would lay his life on the line for me. I’m not saying any of you wouldn’t and I know that Sean would, Sean did; he put himself between me and that car as best he could and he died because of it, but I just don’t want any of you calling into question what Cam would do for me.”

I take in a shaky breath and watch as Ashley goes and sits down next to Marley.

“I love you all. I love the bones of each and every one of ya, but I’m not made of glass. I’m tougher than you all think and I seriously wonder why some of you don’t seem to get that. When I went to pieces after the Whorely incident, somebody should’ve kicked my arse and told me to pull myself together. I know you all thought you were doing the right thing, but you just left me to wallow. Jimmie tried, but even she was too soft on me, I know it’s because she loved me, I know I was stubborn and wouldn’t see sense but seriously, someone should’ve just slapped me, shouted at me, told me a few home truths, but anyway, it was Ash and Cam who eventually got through to me.”

Ash has a hold of Marley’s hand and has tears streaming down her face. Cam rests his right ankle on his left knee and sits back, but angles himself towards me. I continue, “When I lost Beau and Sean and then tried to kill myself, you left it to Jimmie and Ash again to make me see sense, to make me realise what a selfish bitch I was being. But it should’ve come from one of you.” I look between my brothers and my parents. “I’m a grown woman. I’ve lost two babies and one husband, and yes, all of that has nearly killed me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t need to know when I’m being a complete bitch. It doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t be told that my behaviour is unacceptable; that I’m being selfish. I need to be told these things. I know anyway. Most of the time I know when I’m being an arsehole, but it’s only you lot letting me know that makes me want to do anything about it.” I know I’m rambling a bit now and gone a bit off subject, but these thoughts must’ve all been hidden somewhere in my head and I just need to get them all out. Even if some of them don’t make sense and some of them probably contradict each other, and if they do, well, then I need to be told that.

“So you don’t wanna be judged for your actions but you wanna be told when they’re wrong?” And that’s Marley picking up on exactly what I was thinking.

“Yes, Marls, I do, because when you all stay quiet and just let me get away with shit, I worry. I lay in bed and worry about what you all think of me, the conversations that must go on behind my back. I wonder if all my sisters-in-law get together and have a bitch fest about Princess Georgia and her latest antics.”

“We do, all the time,” Ash says, straight faced. “We can’t wait for the next Georgia fuck up, because, quite frankly, it makes us three look so perfect.” I tilt my head to the side and smile at her as she winks at me.

“I’m sick of worrying. I’m sick of caring. I’m sick of giving a fuck. I don’t want to do what I think everyone would want me to do. I want to just do what feels right, and if it’s wrong, then I need to learn from that. I need to learn the same way everyone else does, from my mistakes. I just want to be me, just me.”

Cam reaches for my hand. “I love the fuck out of you, Kitten.” He kisses the back of it and despite the fact that we’re sitting in a room filled with my family, my first thought is that I so want him to fuck me. I don’t want to be made love to. I want him to take me to bed and take complete charge. I don’t want to have to think for a second. I want to be told, no, I want to be ordered what to do and I want him to do to me exactly what he wants.

“I fucking love the fuck out of you, too, Tiger.”

“Don’t swear, Georgia, not in front of your mum.
”

I let out a long sigh. “I fucking love, the fucking fuck out of you, Tiger.” He gives that little shake of his head and turns to my dad, who, like everyone else in the room, is staring at us with their mouths slightly open.

“D’ya see what I’m up against here, Frank?” My dad’s nodding in answer to Cam. I shrug and roll my eyes. Cameron stands and approaches my dad’s chair. “Look, Frank, I know you don’t want her with me, but we really do need to talk. Would you mind me taking her back to my place with me tonight? We just have so much we need to clear up.”

My dad’s eyes turn to me. I nod at him. We do need to talk. He might love me and I most definitely love him, but we still have the pregnant girlfriend and the press to discuss, but instead of my dad giving his permission, he surprises me by saying, “Georgia’s a grown woman. She can decide for herself whether she wants to go with you or not,” and his response makes me smile.

I nod. “I’ll come to yours, but I’m not sure how long I’ll be awake for. I’m exhausted.” Cam reaches out and shakes my dad’s hand and then Bailey’s. He moves along to Marley and my heart falters as I wonder what his response will be, but he puts his hand out and shakes Cam’s then looks across at me and I actually have no idea what he’s thinking.

Cam moves to a spot in the room where he can see everyone and says, “I know what you all probably must think of me and I know that I’m the last person you would want Georgia to be with, given the choice.” He looks at me and he actually looks nervous and I love it. My big, bad, cocky Tiger is shitting himself as he talks to my family, and it just does things to my heart to think that he’s up there, feeling so uncomfortable just for me. “I know in the past, I’ve had a bit of a reputation, but I promise you, that’s my old life. I earn enough money from my clubs nowadays, and it’s all totally legit. I occasionally come across the odd arsehole who needs to be dealt with, but that’s life. I can’t help situations like that happening, but all of my business dealings are legal and above board. I swear.” He swallows and clears his throat before continuing, “I’ll be honest and say, I have a lot of shit going on in my life at the moment and I have no idea which way Georgia and I are going, but I need you all to know, I love her and I’ll always do right by her.” I watch my
mum wipe a tear from under her eye. I seriously can’t be doing with any more tears, or emotions of any kind for that matter. I just wanna get out of here and hear what Cam’s got to say about this pregnant girlfriend.

I stand next to Cam and say to my family, “I’m sorry if you think I’ve been a bit harsh today. You know how much I love you
all, but I just needed to get all of that off my chest.” I can’t think of anything else to add to that without things getting more emotional. I go and give my nieces and nephews kisses and cuddles, and promise that we’ll spend some time together soon. Cam’s waiting at my mum’s front door as I call out, “Laters taters,” to my family. I get a “See ya, spud,” reply from all of them and it makes my heart swell. Most people would probably have no idea what we’re talking about, but we do; it’s our thing, a Layton thing and I just hope I’ve not upset any of them too much this evening with what I’ve said.