London

9 - "Did you drink?"

Harry

The party is in full swing when someone places a Christmas hat on my head. The little, white ball of fluff hanging on the end of it falls in front of my eyes and is quickly pushed away by the hands of Susie.

"Merry Christmas," she says, leaning in to kiss me on my cheeks. One on each side. Feeling too stunned to see her, I don't react at first and forget to return the words. "Alex not here?"

"No," I tell her, shaking my head for a moment. "Pascal doesn't want her here after what happened last time."

She frowns for a second, but recovers quickly. "I guess that might be for the best, right?"

"Yeah," I mumble. 

Before she'd placed the stupid hat on my hair, I'd been thinking of her. How cool it would be to have her next to me. Instead I'm guarding her present for her family so that no one will drink it, and sulk in the corner. Not feeling the Christmassy atmosphere tonight. Mostly because of my already present nerves of returning home in a few days and seeing my mother again for the first time since I'm back with Alex. 

"Is everything okay with her?" Susie asks as she must have seen me worry. I forget that she knows me well enough by now to read it of my face and knows of Alex too. 

"Yes, she's just adjusting," I tell her. 

At least that's what I hope is up with all her cleaning and hiding bottles of wine here at my work. One of the frustrating things with Alex is that I can't read her as well as I was able to. I have my suspicions but I'm not as certain about them as I was. Because so much happened when I wasn't with her that I can't be sure and the harder I try to get to know her again, the more she seems to push me away. Just like yesterday when I realized that she does want children, even with me, but took her escape the moment she could and went to bed.

"Do you miss Palas?" Susie asks as she stands next to me instead of in front. The both of us leaning against the wall where my booth is. 

"No."

"Is it that bad?" She laughs at my quick answer.

"Oh, no, that's not it. It's actually a cool place, but I'm done there. My life is here now."

"I was thinking of going there this summer."

"You will like it. For a holiday I'd like to go back from time to time," I tell her, thinking of the cliff where Alex's father's ashes are scattered. 

I miss the man and for a second I push on the little X that Alex tattooed on my arm all those years ago. It also reminds me that if I still miss Bob after all this time then it must still be hard for Alex as well. We don't speak about him often, but I know he's on her mind more now that Christmas is coming. A holiday they both loved and celebrated by simply spending time together, something I intend to do as well.

"Shame we can't go together," Susie says in an attempt to lighten the mood or maybe flirt with me. 

"Yeah," I mutter, not feeling it at all tonight. All I want now is to go home and be with Alex, but she's with Liam. Sleeping there and it pissed me off enough to grab a beer here although I promised to not drink at work again. She won't know though.

"Look, I'm sorry for texting so much the last days. I just wondered why you suddenly stopped. I thought you wanted to talk," Susie says and I turn to look at her for a brief second. 

After Liam called to say that Alex wasn't waking up and drank an entire bottle of wine, I didn't doubt for a second and deleted my message that I was going to send to Susie. Feeling ashamed that I'd been close to inviting her to our home when she was the exact reason Alex felt the need to drink that bottle, prevented me from texting her back. Even now I feel slightly guilty because maybe something really was up that she wanted to discuss with me, but I ignored her later messages.