Living In The Shallows (UK Crush #1)

Chapter Twenty-Two

When I woke up, Matty, Gethin and Ro were seated on the sofa watching me sleep, reminding me of the day we'd met. I smiled, and they smiled back.

"Where's Teddy?" I asked sleepily. At my words their smiles evaporated.

"He's with Paul, having his eye seen to," Gethin answered briefly.

"Good," I answered firmly. "Hopefully the cut won't leave a scar, and hopefully make-up will cover the worst of the bruising for the appearances and the show."

"How can you just be normal about him?" Matty burst out. "Aren't you furious? At how he talked about you? You haven't forgiven him?" His tone was unbelieving. Gethin put a restraining hand on Matty's arm.

I sighed. "Matty. It's not about forgiveness." I tried to figure out how to phrase my words. "Just try to see it from his point of view." I could see from the way he rolled his eyes that Matty was in no mood to see anything from Teddy's point of view, but I kept going. "You guys are his brothers, his family. For the past seven years, you've always had his back, you've always been on his side.

"Then, suddenly, someone new gets added to the mix, and in the space of a week, this new person, this interloper, seems to have the inside hand. He does something that maybe in retrospect he's not particularly proud of, and he finds out you guys know about it before he's had a chance to tell you, and he thinks maybe you've judged him for it before you've heard his side of things. How hurt do you think he was? And he was drunk, his judgment was impaired."

"You're not making excuses for him because he was pissed?" The normally even-tempered Ronan was surprised by this.

I shook my head. "No, not excuses, just an explanation. He's surprised, he's never been turned down before. It's embarrassing. He comes back, drunk, finds out maybe everyone's been talking about him. We've been together for hours, it looks as if I've been crying, like I said, he's been drinking, his judgment's shot, it's not an unreasonable thing for a drunk person to think. So he says some hurtful things. Just imagine yourself in his position. And don't say you'd never say those things. I'm saying imagine that you've already said those things. How terrible would you feel?

"Now think about how you want to treat him when he comes back, okay?

"I'll take care of what's between him and me when it's just him and me, so don't worry about that, I can take care of my own shit." I lay back, tired from my long speech.

"Geth, can you pretty please get me some more pills? And Matty, bring me the hotel phone so I can call down for some soft rice?"

Gethin wordlessly brought me some more pain pills and some antibiotics. As I swallowed them he sat down facing me, with one hand on either side of my legs. He looked at me, a small smile playing on his lips. Freshly showered and shaved, he was almost unnaturally good looking, like a magazine photograph.

"Glad you're feeling better, poppet," he said, leaning in to kiss my forehead. He turned and smiled at me over his shoulder as he left.

Teddy entered from the interconnecting door. He once again wouldn't look at me, but went straight to the sofa and sat down, looking at the ground. He had tape similar to mine holding his cut closed, and the bruise around his eye had begun to turn interesting shades of purple. Ronan poked his head into the room, looking curiously from me to Teddy. I motioned him back, making motions for him to close the door behind him, and did the same to Gethin, who was watching from the doorway to my room.

"Teddy." No response. "Teddy, please. I need to talk to you, and I'm still not good on my feet. Please come over here, don't make me get out of bed and go over there?" After a few seconds, he got up, came to the bed and sat down, though he still wouldn't look at me.