Too Many Words to Say

Chapter 32

As soon as Howard tried to open his eyes, the light hurt him and pain shot across his forehead. He groaned and lay back against the pillow. He became aware of someone else by his side, as a hand travelled up his chest and his name was mumbled.

"Allie?" he whispered and moved his head to look at his bed companion. "Oh shit no. Not her," he groaned again as he realised that it was Clare who was curled up at the side of him.

Disentangling himself from her, he got out of bed and quickly dressed, trying not to wake her as he did so.

Going straight to his own room and undressing again, he turned on the shower and took two painkillers. Stepping into the cubicle he let the hot water run down his body as he leaned against the tiles, trying to remember the events of the night before.

Bit by bit things started to come back to him. The end of the show, then being in the bar steadily getting drunk. Then things got hazy as the night progressed. He remembered the flashing lights of the paparazzi as he'd left the end of tour party. They'd got back to the hotel and gone to Clare's room, she leading him inside, kissing him and undoing the buttons on his shirt as they went in. He remembered pushing her back onto the bed and then it went hazy again. He couldn't remember any more about what had happened after that. Shaking his head he turned off the water and stepped out of the cubicle, wrapping a towel around his waist as he returned to the bedroom.

His telephone bleeped, telling him he had a text. Quickly he went to pick it up, sadly disappointed when he read Clare's name there.

'That wasn't nice of you. Going without saying goodbye. Never mind, I'll see you later. C. xx'

Deleting it, he tossed it back onto the night cabinet and sat on the bed, his head in his hands. He could do without this. What had possessed him to go to her room last night? And what had happened there? As they'd both been naked in bed when he'd woken, he'd assumed that they'd had sex. Just like Allie had said, there were lots of others waiting to take her place. She'd been right, he had done exactly as she'd said. Maybe she knew him better than he knew himself.

It was still early and his headache had begun to ease. Still feeling tired, he got back into bed. He'd have to sort out the problem with Clare later on. His eyes felt heavy and soon he fell asleep again.

He woke a few hours feeling much better, his headache practically gone. His phone was buzzing on the night cabinet beside the bed. Picking it up he saw that the caller was Gary.

"At last!" he cried as Howard said hello to him. "We were beginning to get worried about you. Where are you? Did you get back to the hotel last night? You just disappeared and no one knew where you had got to."

"Yeah I got back ok. Just had had enough and came back here," he told him, being selective with the truth. He didn't want to tell him that he'd come back with Clare after all the problems they'd had with her.

"Jay said the last time he'd seen you, he thought he saw you talking to Clare," Gary said, "Don't tell me that you went back with her Dougie."

"Er, I talked to a lot of people last night from what I can remember," Howard began hesitantly. "I could have...."

"You idiot!" Gary groaned at him. "I thought you were going to try to persuade Allie to stay longer and leave for Germany today? What the hell went wrong? How did you finish up with Clare?"

"I don't know Gaz. One minute we were fine, the next she was walking out on me. She's ignored my texts to her ever since."

"You must have done something to make her act like that," Gary insisted. "What are you going to do about it? You can't want to be back with Clare surely?"