Ruby and Mia giggled and I half-wished the ground would swallow me.
“I always liked it,” he said, and the way he said always made me feel so weird, so exposed. “You look great, Jodie. Really great. You look amazing.”
He ran his fingers across his stubble, his mouth closed tight, as though he’d said too much. He shifted from foot to foot and cleared his throat.
“Thanks,” I said, and my eyes found his again. “I feel really great. Thanks for helping to make it happen.”
He nodded. “Right you are.”
“Don’t you want to see Jo’s sexy new outfits?” Tonya prompted, and it was too far, much too far. I cringed at the embarrassment in his eyes, the absolute discomfort, hovering in the half-light of our old life together, staring at the reincarnation of the girl he fell in love with when we were just kids.
I felt it, too.
He gestured a thumb towards the front door. “Better be off. Shit to do.”
Ruby groaned. “But Dad! You could stay! See Mum’s new stuff! She’ll look like a queen!”
“Your dad’s probably very busy,” I said.
“Work stuff,” he said. “Another time, Rubes.”
It broke my heart to see the deflation in her eyes.
“Go see your dad out,” I said, and he didn’t hang around a second longer. He raised a hand in goodbye to Tonya and gave me a nod, and then he was off, with the girls close behind him.
I listened to him call goodbye to Nanna, listened to the girl’s goodbyes afterwards, Ruby’s loud chatter and Mia’s quieter please don’t go just yet, Dad, and it hurt.
I don’t know why it hurt so fucking bad, but it felt like I’d been stabbed right in the pit of me.
I exhaled a loud breath when I heard the door click shut, and Tonya breathed one of her own.
She picked up the bottle of wine, poured us both another big one.
“I think you need this,” she said.
She wasn’t bloody wrong.
I could have been anywhere. It wouldn’t have mattered shit to me. Balls deep in some slutty bitch’s pussy in a posh hotel on the outskirts of Cheltenham, rutting away on her with other guy’s dicks all around me. It took me a second to remember her name.
Melissa.
Melissa with the hairy pussy.
I ran my thumb over it and she jerked, offered an appreciative grunt as she choked on Buck’s dick.
That’s when it first fucking hit me.
I didn’t want to be here. Didn’t give a shit about the cash waiting at the end of this shitty fucking romp.
Jimmy O shot me a glare and I realised I’d stopped thrusting, standing like a fucking moron with my dick still half inside her.
“Get up here,” I grunted, stepping aside to give him a turn. He shrugged and grinned, took up the spot with gusto, and Melissa didn’t give a shit, not really. She squirmed under him and groaned for more. Like they always do.
I took a step back and watched, strangely vacant, like I was watching a shitty porn film after too many beers.
This fucking craziness was all Tonya’s fault, dragging Jodie into her girly makeover crap and dragging me along with it. I felt a smile as I recalled Jodie’s happiness, the easy grin on her face before she realised I was watching her. I’d stepped into a time warp and right there on the other side was the girl I’d loved so fucking hard I thought it would kill me.
Only she wasn’t mine to love anymore.
Hadn’t been mine to love for a fucking long time.
I’d loved Jodie Symmonds when she was a slip of a girl with a dirty smile and a slick, sharp bob of dark-red hair. I’d loved Jodie Symmonds when she was so swollen with pregnancy that she could hardly walk, when her hair was greasy as fuck and she was moaning about under-boob sweat, pushing her fingers between her tits and smearing it under my nose as a demonstration. I’d loved her when she’d sat and eaten a whole bumper bucket of KFC and then farted like a stinky bitch all night long. I’d loved her when she was angry, when she was sad, when she stared at me as though she was unsure whether to fuck me or kill me. Maybe both at the same time.
I’d loved Jodie Symmonds when she’d forgotten how to love herself.
I thought I’d loved her enough for both of us. But no.
Life fucking sucks like that.
I pulled on my jeans, resigned to sitting this one out. Hopefully Melissa wouldn’t notice with four other dicks to keep her attention.
My phone was in my back pocket, I pulled it out to check the time, only it was flashing with messages. I pressed Unlock.
The icon flashed with photo messages from Tonya, and my heart pumped as though I’d shot my load into Melissa’s hairy pussy after all.