Unplugged (13 page)

“
I don’t know. Things were shit at work. We were arguing. I wasn’t happy. All you did was nag me when I got home, and Ella did my head in. I couldn’t cope anymore; I wanted my own space.”

“
You have responsibilities, you dickhead!” I say, and then lower my raised voice. “You’re not the teenage boy you pretend to be by going drinking with your mates every night. Just because they don’t have kids yet, doesn’t mean you can pretend you don’t!”

“
I’ve never been unfaithful to you,” he says quietly. “I had loads of chances.”

“
What? Are you telling me I should be grateful you only kicked me out and haven’t been screwing around?”

“
No, I mean I must love you if I said no to other girls. We can work this out.”

“
Are you suggesting I move back in and forget what you did? How do I know this won’t happen again? How do you know I even want to come back?”

Craig reaches across the table and wraps his fingers around my clenched hand.
“Because you always do what’s best for Ella.”

As I look back into the brown eyes I once loved, the band across my lungs tightens. His secret weapon against me.
“You don’t care about Ella.”

“
What?” He pulls his brows together as he drops my hand. “She’s my daughter. I love her. I’ll love her until the day I die because she’s mine!”

“
Well, you have a bloody funny way of showing it!”

“
I fucked up. I lost my shit. But I’m here now to fix this.”

“
Lost your shit? It took this long for you to recover from your childish tantrum and come and look for us?”

“
You could’ve come back!”

“
What? You took my keys, Craig! You told me to fuck off, that you were done.” I stand. “No, I won’t come back.”

He leans back in his seat, legs outstretched.
“Well, you can’t stay here forever, where are you going to go?”

“
I don’t know. I’ll find somewhere.”

“
I’m not having my daughter living in some dodgy area with single mothers and drug dealers!”

“
You created this!”

“
No, you did the day you got pregnant and asked me to help! I gave up everything for you and Ella!”

“
And I didn’t? You are so fucking selfish!” I yell.

The kitchen door opens and Louise hovers in the doorway.
“Sorry guys, Ella’s listening and she’s getting upset. Can you keep it down?”

I clench my teeth and close my eyes.
“Sorry. I’ll come now. Craig’s leaving.”

“
I’m not leaving without Ella. You stay here if you want but she’s coming with me.”

“
She is not!” I shout. “We’re staying here!”

Louise
holds a palm out to me. “Cerys. Shush.”

Then I see her
, Ella in the doorway next to Louise clutching her rag of blanket. Her eyes break my heart, the expression I’ve seen every day since we got here. Almost every day, on the days Liam paid her attention the pale, lost look was replaced with a smiling child. The tears aren’t far, for me and her.

She steps into the room and says in a small voice.
“I want to go with Daddy.”

I am a hairs breadth away from smacking Craig
’s smug look across his face. Louise’s furious expression meets mine and she tips her head, indicating I should talk to her. “Wait there,” I say to Craig.

“
I’m not going anywhere,” he replies and lifts Ella onto his lap.

How? How can Ella forgive and forget
so easily and snuggle up to him? Fighting frustrated tears, I walk into the hallway to Lou.

“
Why did you let him in?” I hiss.

“
You’re not seriously going to go with him?” she hisses back.

The weight of the last two weeks falls on me, dragging me down
. Craig is right. What choice do I have? Stay here and impose on the kindness of Linda and Jim, and stop Ella spending her Christmas with her Dad? Or go with him, give Ella her Christmas and take things from there?

“
For Christmas, Lou. Then I’ll decide what to do.”

“
Cerys! You’re a fucking idiot! Don’t do this! You can’t go back to a man who treated you like shit.”

“
You don’t understand; he’s done me a favour.”

In the midst of all the crap, there
’s been a glimmer of something else. I could cope if I needed to. Inadvertently, Craig’s put me in a position to see other possibilities. Another man showed me I was strong, told me I was amazing, and kissed me in a way that proved he truly believed his words. Liam showed me I’m worth more than a life with Craig. I’m not stupid, I know I could never have a relationship with Liam Oliver; but I do know I can find myself, and then find someone worth me.

The problem is I want this man to be Liam
because over the last few days he’s imprinted himself on my heart and soul.

CHAPTER 13

LIAM

The house is eerily quiet when I let myself in; I expected the TV
, or Ella, on high volume. I take a quick scout around the place and nobody’s here. It’s Christmas Eve, where is everyone?

Louise is likely to be taking part in the Christmas Eve tradition of drinking from lunchtime until falling-over-time
; and if previous Christmases are anything to go by, Dad will have been dragged out last minute shopping by Mum.

Will I ever get a warm welcome walking through this door from anyone apart from the dog charging round the house in excitement? I head upstairs with my rucksack, back to the tiny room with the single bed. A world apart from Dylan
’s. Yeah, I could’ve spent the few days back at my place in London, or come back earlier but the band sticking together until the press attention lessened made more sense.

I spoke to Honey once a couple of days ago, when I answered my phone without checking who was calling. The call ended with tears and her apparent undying love for me. After several days around Dylan and Sky, seeing what a genuine connection between two people looks like, I had nothing for her. Yeah, I can
’t run forever, me and Honey need to talk; but the fact Cerys has been on my mind and in my dreams since I left tells me until she’s out of there, there’s no room for Honey.

I missed Cerys. Bloody weird, but I did. I asked Louise for her number the other day but got a lecture about how I should leave her alone. That pissed me off
; but I figured I’d see Cerys again when I got back to Wales, and next time I leave I’ll take her number with me.

My real bedroom door is open, and I pause on the top step. Last time I was in there, the floor was covered in toys, books
, and clothes. The brown carpet is clear. I push open the door. The open curtains allow the winter sun to shine into the clean and tidy room. Even my guitars have been rearranged where they were when I left years ago. This is my bedroom again.

I drop the rucksack on the floor and my heart drops with the bag. Looks like I should
’ve tried harder to get Cerys’s number because I don’t think I’m going to see her again anytime soon.

****

With a well-earned Christmas beer or two, I lounge in front of the TV waiting to see who comes home. My hassled Dad arrives with his hands full of shopping bags.

“
Back are you? Beer. I need one,” he says. “Help your Mum with the bags.”

Getting
Dad a beer and shaking my head at his gruff greeting, I do as he asks and go outside to Mum.

“
Liam! Why do you always sneak back?” she asks.

I kiss her head.
“I didn’t decide until this morning.”

“
How’s Jeremy?” I can’t believe she still calls him this. Jem hasn’t been Jeremy since he was in primary school, apart from if we want to annoy him. If Bryn really wants to piss Jem off, he sings him the Pearl Jam track of the same name. “Terrible business about him and that poor girl.”

“
Mmm.”

She catches my look
. Mum’s used to my refusal to discuss Blue Phoenix business with her. A few years ago, the press began to understand my family is told nothing, if I keep things that way; my parents and sister are left alone.

How soon can I ask Mum the question about
Cerys’s whereabouts without arousing her suspicion? Inside the house, we unpack the bags together and I remember Cerys’s words about my non-rock star behaviour. As if I’d behave like Liam the rock star at home, Mum won’t stand for bad language and manners so, like all kids returning to the home of their childhood, I’m back to my childhood self again.

“
I see I’ve got my bedroom back,” I say, shoving vegetables in the fridge.

“
Oh, yes. Cerys and Ella went home.”

“
Home?” I suspected but didn’t want to believe she’d go back to the guy who treated her like shit. “To her parents or Cardiff?”

“
Craig came for her yesterday,” says Mum matter-of-factly, as if she’s gone home after a holiday.

“
Oh.” I pick up the mince pies from the table and open the box, taking one out to eat. “They sorted things out then?”

“
Well, I think they’re going to. I hope so, for the sake of that little girl.” She slaps my hand as I pick up a second mince pie. “Liam! Don’t eat them all.”

I chew on the sweet pastry that really doesn
’t go with the beer I was drinking. Is that right? Should Cerys go back to someone who hurts her, for the sake of Ella? Cerys said Ella doesn’t get attention from her Dad. Maybe Louise has the full story.

****

Louise and company sit in the same spot as the other night: the night I kissed Cerys. I pass the Christmas tree and wonder if Ella is having her Christmas Eve in front of a different one. Shaking the thought away, I head for the pub.

Cerys is right
; I’m the sweet guy who fails at the badass rock star act. I don’t do much better at the dark and brooding like Dylan either, and I knocked drugs on the head the first time Jem ended up in rehab. I’d say I don’t fit the clichés until I think of Honey. Yeah, well, our relationship isn’t what the world wants to think it is. Honey hasn’t told the press and neither have I. Are we both unsure?

Louise doesn
’t spot me until I appear next to her with a vodka, which I slide toward her.

“
Liam!” She hurls herself at me and I steady the stool she’s about to fall off. Her swimming eyes meet mine. “Glad you came back for Christmas. Thought you were going to disappear back to Barbie in La-La Land again.”

“
I’m going back after the New Year,” I say. “Blue Phoenix isn’t exactly flavour of the month currently.”

“
Yeah. How’s Jem?”

“
Same. How are you?”

She raises and eyebrow at my subject switch.
“Cerys left.”

“
Yeah.” I fight the need to go twenty questions on her, if she’s drunk, she’ll tell me anyway.

“
Can’t believe she went back to him,” she continues. “I wouldn’t.”

“
Why did she?”

“
Ella wanted to go home. Me and Cerys had…words, I told her she was a fucking idiot; but Cerys insisted Ella should have Christmas with her Dad, and then she’d decide what to do after Christmas.” Louise takes a long drink from her vodka and tonic. “I said I’d help out if she changes her mind.”

So not a definite reconciliation? As
if, it matters to me.

But it does. I don
’t know why, but I got sucked into Ella and Cerys’s life. This is me, soft-hearted Liam who doesn’t like people hurting, that’s why. Okay, I know that’s a lie too. What happened in the time we spent together? We knew each other before and we were drawn together again by a shared past and a shared hurt but this is more. Connecting with Cerys was like plugging into a new energy, a resonance that opened my heart and called it home.

“
I can help her too.”

“
You can help by staying away, Liam. She’s confused enough without you hassling her.”

“
I meant financially!” I snap.

“
Sure you do!” She drains her glass. “I know you kissed her. Nice one, messing with her head like that.”

“
I didn’t exactly force myself on her!”

“
Yeah, if you’d screwed her I’d punch your face!”

“
Sure, Lou...” Shit, this girl is drunk. I’d better hang around to help her home because nobody else at the table looks capable. One girl with long brown hair is asleep against a man’s shoulder already and several people have their elbows on the table heads in hands. Two other girls with tinsel wrapped around their hair and shoulders sway from side to side and sing along with the cliché Christmas songs blaring from the pub.