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

Tig nodded.

‘Then leave her the hell alone,’ Dana demanded, picking up her menu to signify the conversation was over. Dana was learning to become more demanding. She’d been reading a lot of personal development books, doing anything she could to get to the top. Tig suspected it was more a way of filling her time and avoiding getting on with her life than it was a result of particularly loving her job, but Dana was just quietly getting on, so you couldn’t really call her on it.

‘I’m just trying to be supportive!’ Ame was good at the outrage these days, too. ‘She’s a brilliant photographer and there are other gigs out there. You don’t have to be a wedding photographer anymore …’

‘Ames,’ Tig held up her hand, ‘I really appreciate what you’re saying. And I’ll get there. I’m making enough money for rent and a gym membership and monthly margaritas, so unless you’re about to kick me out, I should be fine. Tell us about your day.’

Ame rarely needed an excuse to launch into the tales of woe in her office, centred around her arsehole ex-husband.

‘He keeps shagging these interns in his office, and then sending them to deliver files to me, still smelling of sex,’ she raged, ‘and they look so embarrassed, because they know who I am and what he’s doing. Though, I mean, they should know better than to sleep with their boss –’

‘Ah!’ Dana pointed.

‘I heard myself say it!’ Ame said. ‘Okay, so we all make mistakes! Women are victims, men are evil! I’m not blaming the sisterhood! Okay!’

‘Um,’ a male voice said into the stilted silence, ‘three much-needed margaritas?’

Tig looked up to see the new barman, standing awkwardly with a tray in his hand. Dirty blond hair, stubbled jaw, blue eyes. He was wearing a smart white shirt, rolled up at the sleeves to reveal old-school sailor tattoos on his forearms. Exactly the type to bartend at Entangled. Friendly enough, but always with enough edge to remind you they’re out of your league. Not that she was in anyone’s league, or looking to play a ball game of any sort. Tig realised no one had answered him.

‘Hi, yes, thanks! Desperately needed!’ She unnecessarily tried to clear some space on the table for him to put the drinks down. He twitched a smile at her, which she twitched back. Ame and Dana seemed to be having a huffing match about feminist standpoints under their breath, so she turned back to the new guy. She might as well be friendly, seeing as she was at Entangled more than her own home these days. You always wanted the staff on your side.

‘How’s the first day going?’

‘I’ve only broken three glasses and spilled ice all over the floor so that Ruby tripped head over arse,’ he shrugged. ‘Not at all mortifying.’

‘First time bartending?’ she asked. Am I prying? Why am I forcing this conversation when he’s clearly hovering about like he needs to go? Shut up, Tig.

‘Nope, just out of practice. And I’m going to blame jetlag, and first day nerves, and anything else I can think of! Just yell when you want the next round of drinks. I can almost guarantee I won’t screw them up,’ he winked and strode off.

Tig smiled, remembering how awful her first day had been in the SU bar, where she’d dropped a pint of snakebite down her front and the rugby team had made her swear so effusively she was sure she’d get fired. Instead the manager had patted her on the shoulder, given her a towel and said, as long as she kept that mouth on her, she’d make it through alive.

Tig turned back to see if her friends had stopped arguing. They had. In fact, they were both looking at her like she’d morphed into some sort of terrible sea creature.

‘What?’

‘You … him …’ Ame pointed at the bar, and Tig felt a violent irritation stir in her chest.

‘I had a conversation with Ruby’s new barman, Ame. It’s called being polite. It doesn’t mean I’ve suddenly solved all my problems, will get into a relationship, go back to work, get married and have babies,’ she spat. ‘It means I was tired of you two bitching at each other once again, and made conversation elsewhere.’

They looked at her, this time like the terrible sea creature had revealed talons and a bad dye job.

‘Okay, Tig, calm down.’ Dana made soothing noises. ‘I think Ame was trying to point out, in a very positive way, that it was nice to see you making an effort to welcome a new person to Entangled. Especially a person who happens to have a penis, because you’ve spent the last seven months wanting to chop off all the ones in the immediate vicinity, regardless of who they’re attached to.’

Tig blinked. ‘And that’s why you work in PR.’

She took a deep breath and tried not to blush as she thought about her overreaction. ‘I swear I never used to be so mean. Or angry. I mean, I’ve always had the ability to be a bitch …’

‘No, you haven’t,’ Dana smiled. ‘In fact, for the most part, you’ve always been a big hippie softie. Think you might have lost that somewhere along the way.’

‘Maybe Ruby’s right, maybe the Misery Dinners are making things worse,’ Tig shrugged, sipping her drink and sighing in relief.

‘They’re helping, Tig, honestly,’ Ame said forcefully.

‘So you’re done moaning about Clint? You’ve worked through that?’

‘He hurt me, Tig. That takes time …’ Ame shook her head. ‘You just don’t get it.’

Tig closed her eyes and took a deep breath, tucking her red hair behind her ears. Living with Ame had been a bad idea. When Darren had dumped her on Valentine’s Day, and Ame found out Clint was cheating, it made sense for them to move in together. And whine (with wine) together. Tig had given up the wedding photography business and Ame let her stay in the Hampstead flat for minimal rent, which she’d really appreciated. But Ame had started to become … difficult. She lived in a permanent state of outrage, and was getting more and more bitter. Which wasn’t helping Tig to become the glass-half-full type girl she’d been before, either.

You get hurt, you wallow, you move on. Those were the rules. Tig had spent the first few weeks after the break-up almost catatonic, permanently drunk and stoned, slowly eating her way through two hundred wedding cupcakes embossed with ‘Mr and Mrs’. The next couple of months she graduated to quietly drinking neat vodka, curled up on the sofa in front of romantic comedies, waiting until the final scene to shout, ‘Sure, it’s all great now, but wait until he leaves you because your tits got too small!’

But she was past that now. She was. She got dressed, she went to the gym. She could be trusted not to warp the world views of young children, and as of today she had interacted with a male without wincing. She was improving.

‘I know what it’s like to be hurt,’ Tig said calmly, ‘and I know what it feels like to get so bitter and twisted that you don’t really like yourself anymore. I want to be happy.’

Dana nodded, with that quiet, approving presence that she had. ‘That’s great. So are you going to start up the photography business again? Back to weddings?’

Tig’s stomach plummeted. Okay, so … maybe she wasn’t so ready. She could grow, and be happy, but being around weddings again? She still couldn’t look at her portfolio without crying. Her wedding dress was hanging in the back of her wardrobe almost a year later, with the ‘five days to go!’ tag still tied around the hanger.

The problem was, she was good at wedding photography. She’d been planning her and Darren’s big day for almost three years, and during that time, meeting other brides, retailers, she’d accidentally started a business. Become an institution. The other brides liked her because she was in the same situation as them; she knew what they wanted, because she wanted it too. She’d paid for the wedding with their weddings. She was so happy those three years, meeting all these people, making plans. Finally being able to pack in the insurance job to take photos for a living, the dream she’d had since uni. It was hard not to blame Darren for taking all that away. It was harder to stop blaming herself for letting it stay that way.