Wounds
White.
It makes her laugh to think of it now.
She remembers standing in front of the full length mirror in the backroom of the pub, watching with baited breath as Michelle's reflection put a veil over her face. To hide her modesty. To amplify her beauty. Carla remembers her own smile. She couldn't see it all through the netting; it was partial and she remembers, at the time, finding some irony in that. Because she hardly recognised herself, yet she expected Nick to want her. To want her lies and her deception and her total lack of respect for him, for their relationship.
But what is done cannot be undone and that thought is what got her down the aisle, got her to take his hand in hers, let him tell her you're so beautiful and it is what allowed her not to flinch when her dirty laundry was aired in public. One by one, guilty faces flashed and increased Nick's hurt, Nick's anger.
Nick's bloody face haunted her dreams for weeks after, though she can't say she slept much. She can't say she did much at all.
Carla ran like Carla always does and Carla did always mean to come back.
But she didn't.
This time, she hid. The shame was too much; her selfishness no better. She could not face up to what she'd done, the hurt she'd caused and all that she had ruined.
She didn't come back and this is the reason why she is in Nick's girlfriend's place of work, feeling sorry for herself. Wallowing in it. Nick's girlfriend, she learns quickly by listening to the people around her, is called Melissa. And she can just hear her chirpy voice singing call me Mel; it's Mel for short and Carla can't imagine ever asking a person to call her Car. The shortening of her name has always been a natural process, though it is not one Nick went through when they were together and that stings a little now that she is reflecting upon it.
Now, she is reflecting upon everything and nothing quite feels the same as it once did.
"Do you want another drink, love?"
She looks up into green eyes. Melissa smiles at her, wine bottle in hand. The white liquid is tempting to Carla, but not nearly as tempting as her need to say, "Nice place you've got going here."
The bar isn't busy, not as busy as it perhaps should or could be. It's in a central location and the interior design of it reminded her so much of the bistro as she left it when she entered that Carla had to stop for breath. Her chest had felt so tight. The bar is trendy, contemporary. It suits its owner, the owner who blushes at the compliment she has just received and places the wine bottle down onto the bar.
"Thanks," she says. "I like to think so."
She looks around the place a bit, pride evident in her expression.
"How long have you had it?" Carla asks.
"A couple of years." Her fingers run along the rim of the bar. "But this site is new. My boyfriend helped secure it for me. He's got contacts, you see."
She winks playfully and she isn't to know why the lost looking woman in front of her has to lower her eyes, why her hands raise to her head and she is silent for a good thirty seconds. Her not knowing does not, however, stop her from making a note of it. She waits for Carla to continue.
"Oh, right," she says and her voice noticeably shakes.
How serious must a relationship be for him to help her buy a bar? She knows the answer and she can only think of one thing.
Leanne.
The Joinery.
"He's been brilliant with the whole thing. He's invested so much into it time wise and I want to make it work, you know? For him, if nothing else." Melissa knows she is rambling, but that's just in her nature. Endearing to those who know her; an annoyance to those who don't. "Anyway, that's enough about me." And Carla decides it really is. She isn't sure her heart can take much more, isn't sure she can stop her hands with their trembling. "Tell me about yourself..." She is fishing for a name.
"Suzy," Carla replies and it's one of the easiest lies to have left her lips in a long time.
"Suzy," Melissa repeats. "Tell me about yourself."