A. L. Michael - My So-Called (Love) Life

‘Tigerlily!’ Ruby half ran over to her as she entered, pulling her in for a bear hug, all patchouli and cigarettes. Ruby was the owner of Entangled, but Tig had privately taken her on as a role model and personal saviour. Ruby had her shit together. Today her greying hair was tied back with a rockabilly red scarf, dangling ruby earrings getting caught on Tig’s hair as she pulled back. ‘Early for the Young and Bitter Club today, darling?’

‘It’s a Misery Dinner, not a club,’ Tig corrected, walking over to her usual table.

She knew there was no point arguing; the Misery Dinner was nothing if not a meeting of the Young and Bitter brigade. It was her fault. She’d decided after Darren left that if her love life sucked, her career had gone down the toilet and she was back to living with her uni housemate, well, there should at least be an excuse for monthly margaritas. The idea was to compartmentalise. Once a month they got together to talk about how shit their lives were, to wallow and enjoy moaning about it all. And then they got on with their lives. It made sense at the time, Clint had cheated on Ame, and she was going through divorce proceedings, fighting for the house and thanking whatever deity was responsible for her very modern decision to sign a pre-nup. Tig had yet to remind her that it was she, not God, who’d advised her to be careful about it all.

Which meant, a year down the line, that Ame had a beautiful house in Hampstead, but was still working for her ex-husband. And Dana had thrown herself into work ever since Elodie, refusing to move forward and look for love again, instead settling for working her way up and owning the PR company she worked for by thirty. She was twenty-eight, and almost killing herself to get to the top. It seemed better than the alternative, which involved the realisation that there might not just be one perfect person for everyone, that loves could be multiple and varied. Dana didn’t buy that.

‘You know, you girls will be old before your time if you don’t stop focusing on the negative,’ Ruby said, raising her eyebrows in what was probably meant to be a severe sort of expression. Which was pretty impossible, as Ruby radiated goodness. She was like Audrey Hepburn would have been if she’d run off with a biker and opened a cafe/bar in London at sixty. Ruby was pretty much what Tig wanted to be when she grew up.

‘We’re having dinner, Ruby. We’re not sticking pins into voodoo dolls, or cackling over cauldrons.’

‘You’re wallowing. Two months is pushing it. Seven is taking the piss. You could have almost grown a person in this time!’ Ruby raised an eyebrow.

‘Well, the whole “not growing a person” thing is definitely something to be thankful for. Can I have a margarita now?’

Ruby shook her head, clearly disappointed. ‘Madam, if you were my daughter I’d give you a boot up the bum. But as it is, I’ll settle for sending you death glares across the room until you give in and get over that idiot.’

‘I am over him,’ Tig challenged. ‘I’m just still … in shock.’

‘Shock’s immediate,’ Ruby said severely, looking over the rim of her glasses. ‘Comas can last a lifetime.’

‘You know what this coma patient could use to wake her up? A tequila-based cocktail, ’ Tig said pointedly.

‘Lucky for you, the new guy needs the practice,’ Ruby shrugged. ‘I’ll bring it over.’

‘New guy?’

Tig hated when the staff at Entangled changed. She liked it to be her haven, knowing that she could walk in and it would always be the same, only the art on the walls and the cakes on display changing.

‘Short term, four months. Really enthusiastic about bar work,’ Ruby winced as a crash sounded from behind the bar, ‘despite not having worked in a bar for about two years, and being excellent at breaking things.’

‘First days are tough …’ Tig shrugged, trying for hopeful. Ruby looked past her to the door, seeing Ame and Dana come rushing in.

‘I’ll make that three margaritas for the moody madam brigade!’ Ruby chortled. ‘Oh, sweetheart, you left some bits and bobs here last week – a notebook, some letters …’

‘Oh, crap.’ So that’s where her planner was, not under a pile of clothes at home.

‘Artistic people are often awful at life stuff,’ Ruby patted her shoulder.

‘ Well, thanks , I feel much better!’

‘I just meant you’re clearly a creative genius!’ Ruby laughed. ‘Hi girls, drinks are on their way!’

Ame threw down her bag, and started unwinding her Hermes scarf, honeyed brown hair falling perfectly at her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry I’m late, I had the worst day, and you’ll never believe what Clint did today –’

‘Hi Tig, how are you? Well, I’m fine, Ame, thanks for asking before you launch into a diatribe about your ex-husband. I really appreciate that I’m more than just an aural punching bag,’ Tig sing-songed, honestly quite tired of hearing all the ways in which Clint was an arsehole. Especially considering she’d spent the year they were engaged and the six months they were married hearing about all the ways in which Clint was the most fantastic of human beings. She kind of just hated him for existing at this point.

‘Jeez, Tig, harsh.’ Ame frowned briefly, and then Tig saw her physically smooth down her brow to avoid getting wrinkles. Sometimes she wondered how they were friends at all. If she’d never started working at the student bar, she and Ame would never have been friends. At least then her friend was fun, silly and joyous. Now she seemed to walk around with a perpetual pinched look, eyes raised to the sky like she was waiting for a piano to fall on her head. Which would have been fine if it was just the Misery Dinners, but Ame’s misery was bleeding into every other part of her life, which, as her housemate, or lodger, was pretty damn difficult.

‘Well, Ame, you maybe should greet people before hitting them over the head with your emotional issues,’ Dana shrugged, then sighed as her phone flashed up. ‘Sorry, it’s a client, I have to take this.’ She shuffled over to an empty corner, coat still half on, long dark hair tied back in a bun. Dana was an Amazon of a woman, tall and powerful, her pinstriped suit perfectly pressed even after a long day. But she looked weary.

‘Well, Dana, maybe if you weren’t so emotionally repressed you’d hear where I was coming from!’ Ame hissed at her back.

‘This is getting off to a great start,’ Tig sighed.

‘Even when she leaves work she can’t leave work.’ Ame tried for a half smile and a shrug, looking at Tig hopefully. ‘I’m sorry, hun. I’m working on not being such a bitch all the time. How are you?’

Like an ant stuck in amber, Tig thought to herself, trying to smile back because Ame was making an effort.

‘I’m okay,’ she replied.

‘Do any work today?’ Ame prodded.

‘I worked with Petunia and Theo,’ she said in a huff, knowing that wasn’t what Ame meant at all.

‘Are you planning on getting back to photography any time soon? I know that teaching art to privileged four-year-olds in Hampstead mansions is good money, but it’s not really a career choice, is it?’

Ame had this way of throwing out hurtful comments like they were facts. Sadly, most of the time they were facts, so you didn’t feel justified in getting upset. It was just one of the many irritating traits Tig had noticed about her friend, living with her post-university. Back then they’d never had a problem. But Ame had been more fun then. They both had. Maybe it wasn’t just Tig, maybe they were all getting more bitter by the moment.

‘Ame. Shut up. She’s doing fine.’ Dana strode back over, phone tucked away, pulling her hair out of the tight bun and massaging her scalp delicately, wincing slightly. ‘You are, aren’t you?’