A little story seeing as Monday nights episodes may have still broken my heart, but as per usual I don't feel that enough attention was given to Carla and Michelle's conversation.
"Talk to me Chelle.." her voice was unusually soft for her, a slight crack to it as she occasionally took her gaze off the road to have a quick glance over at her best friend, she could see the sadness behind her usually bright and beautiful eyes, she wasn't crying but she could see the tears that were desperate to fall but were being forced to stay inside. With no answer still given, Carla removed her hand for where it was resting on top of the gear stick and searched out the younger woman's hand, gently taking hold, linking their fingers and giving it a reassuring squeeze, desperately trying to coax her to snap out of her trance and look at her, and it finally seemed to work, sad hazel eyes finally looked up from where they had been set on the road straight ahead.
"Can we go somewhere else first? I don't want to go home yet" her voice was quiet and weak, as though she could go to pieces at any given moment. With just a nod in response Carla drove to the only place she could think that they would be left in peace to talk.. that place was the same place they used to go to when they were just kids, the same place that a terrified Michelle confided in Carla that she might be pregnant, the same place that an ashamed Carla had managed to tell Michelle the abuse she was suffering at home from her mother and George. It was a place that they could be honest and that was what they needed right now.
They both noticed that not much had changed since they had last been here. The small play ground area was still there, but the chains for the swings were thick with amber rust, the noise as the wind gently blew them backwards and forwards was ear piercing, but oddly calming and familiar, the seats had long been stolen and Michelle casts her mind back to the memory of her and Dean pushing Ryan on one of their many days out. Spotting the bench they had sat on many times previously, Carla linked her arm through Michelle's and gently guided her towards it, only letting go of the younger woman to remove some of the rubbish off it to make way for them both to sit down. It was a cold afternoon, the sun was slowly starting its descent and both the women wrapped their coats further around their bodies as they finally looked at each other, their expressions pretty much identical.
"It's just so hard.. I think about him every single day, what he would look like, what he'd be learning to do today, I picture him taking his first steps, his first words, starting nursery... every dream I have, every single night is about him. I wake up every day and just for a split second I wonder if losing him was all part of a sick horrible nightmare, and then I feel a little bit more of my heart break when the realisation hits me that it's all my reality, I can't sleep when I first lie down in bed, all I can think is what did I do wrong? What could I have done differently? What if I hadn't tried to move the crate of mixers in the early stages.. it has to be my fault some how because this doesn't happen to everyone"
The tears finally escaped from their confines and cascaded downwards leaving the faintest of grey tracks down the younger woman's beautiful face, her eyes however look so very haunted that it causes Carla's vision to blur as she thinks about how much her best friend has been torturing herself and keeping it all to herself too.
"I pretended for Roberts sake to try for a baby.. that it's what I want" she knew the question Carla wanted to ask her, over her motives for trying again.
"He was so desperate to be a dad, he would be brilliant, he's so caring and he, well he saved my life so I felt like I owed him this at least. Now I can't even do one thing for him in return, I thought I could, that the worrying every day and being terrified would be worth it if it all went right, but after that scare today I know I just can't do it.. now I have to go back to that flat and shatter all of his dreams"
Watching her best friend torture herself like this was almost too much for Carla to bear. She was one of the good ones and deserved the world, she felt so much resentment for the cards Michelle had been dealt in her life but losing Ruairi was most definitely the worst part of the pain she had endured, and one that Carla could relate to in some way.
"He will understand Chelle, and you know what? I understand too, only too well" watery green eyes fell to focus on the broken leaves that coated the ground as her hand searched for Michelle's once more.
"I feel that grief and guilt every day too. If I hadn't had the disaster of a life style I had at the time maybe things would have been different, the stress of an alcoholic boyfriend, I cared more about wondering where he was whilst he was off with a girl half my age than I did about... about my own little girl. She should have come first, from the moment I knew, but what did I do? I wouldn't even find out for sure, look at how I came to you and wouldn't take a test, then I wanted rid anyway, and then I change my mind, slowly come around to the idea, but I still didn't put her first and then look what happened. You looked after Rauari as best you could so you should never feel guilty Chelle, you are the best mum.. you know that don't you"
There was a bitter sweet laugh at Carla's words, and Michelle's eyes dropped to the floor.
"The best mum? Really how can I be? I made so many mistakes with Ryan, we had so many arguments, I'm pretty sure he would have swapped me with Dean if he'd had the opportunity, and then I ended up messing it all up with Ali back when he was barely even a teenager, made him feel like he wasn't wanted as part of our family. I always manage to get it wrong, maybe Ruarai had a lucky escape.. I didn't get a chance to screw up wit-"
"Chelle enough, I can't and I won't let you torture yourself like this. You are so caring, you have the best heart and you have never intentionally tried to hurt anyone. This is what makes you so special. You aren't like anybody else I know. Look at me, all the mistakes I've made, all the horrible things I've done and the pain I've managed to course, yet you have always stayed, told me I'm worth something and that I'm too hard on myself and that I deserve love so why are you doing this to yourself? Your boys love you, they both live with you for gods sake.."
Her voice lowered as she shuffled slightly closer to a visibly shaking Michelle
"And look at the lengths Ali went to, to make sure you were no longer in any danger from Ronan"
Michelle nodded in response, struggling but beginning to process the words Carla had told her, gently twirling her engagement ring around on her finger, admiring its beauty and her heart broke at the thought of removing it.
"I bet her and Ruarai would have been good friends you know, they'd have grown up like cousins and I reckon they'd have been so close" Michelle smiled as she tried to visualise the two children, happy and care free.
"They'd have been thick as thieves.. a bit like you and Aidan back in the day" Carla laughed as they reminisced. Michelle knew what she was referring to, her and Aidan would cause so much trouble, but it would always be Aidan's fault, with Michelle feigning innocence and everyone falling for it every time.
Smiling at each other Michelle slowly reached an arm and wrapped it around Carla's shoulders, beginning to pull her closer, she rested their heads gently against each other, their eyes falling back to the broken swings, both imagining what could have been.