Begin Again novel Chapter 168

The sound of a key rattling on her front door snapped Eden out of her daze, and a moment later, her friends shuffled in, looking all cosy and comfy in their jammies.

"Edie, what the fuck happened?" Lydia screeched as she dumped her pillow and duvet on the sofa. Since it was bound to be a long night, she came prepared.

"Yeah, you haven't invoked 'code blue' since Simon," Cassandra added as she uncorked the bottle of red wine and waited for Sienna to hand her the glasses.

Eden couldn't wait that long, though. She snatched the bottle as soon as it was opened, not caring at all she'd wake up with a banger of a headache or, worse, an upset tummy.

She took a huge mouthful, stunning everyone with her level of commitment. They knew she'd gone on a bender recently, but it was the first time in two years she was drinking in their presence.

They exchanged worried looks as she set the bottle down on the counter.

"He knows," she announced in a deadly calm voice, belying the turmoil in her heart. "Liam knows about Aiden."

"Oh fuck!" Lydia cried as she picked up the bottle and gulped it down before passing it on.

Cassandra took the longest sip before handing it over to Sienna without uttering a word. She didn't need to. The horrified look in her eyes said it all.

"What did he say?" Sienna asked as she cradled the bottle in her hand.

Eden filled them in, starting with their fight at Fashion Week and her walking in on Liam with Laura.

"Edie!" Lydia screeched. "And you tell us all of this now? OMG! That sonofabitch!"

"I don't think Liam getting head from his ex is the main attraction right now," Sienna pointed out. "Did you miss the part where he knows about his son, and he threatened Eden with the lawyers?"

And things went to shit from there as they all blamed each other for the mess Eden was in.

"I said it from the start. I told her to tell him," Sienna reminded them. "And I warned her this shit wouldn't end well!"

Surprisingly Lydia jumped to Eden's defence. "She thought he was married, remember? What else was she supposed to do? Ruin his life?"

"He wasn't married, though!" Sienna retorted as she threw up her hands. "And we told her this!"

"Enough!" Cassandra stepped in and laid down the law. "This isn't helping anyone."

"You both may be okay with all this fuckery, but I'm not," Sienna refused to back the hell off. "She fucked up, and she needs to own it."

The blame-shifting carried on for a while till Eden thought she'd lose her mind.

"Guys, I get it!" She snapped, at last, as she drained the bottle, convinced their bickering would turn her into an alcoholic. "This is my fault and no one else's. And as heartbroken I am at how Liam found out, in a way, I'm also relieved. Holding on to this secret was eating away at me like cancer. I'm glad he knows. And I'm okay."

But even as she said the words, her eyes were already bright with tears, and her bottom lip was trembling violently, a clear sign she's not too far off from a total breakdown.

So she bit the inside of her cheek to stop herself from falling to pieces.

"I'm okay," she repeated, just to convince herself. But her friends knew her too well.

They huddled around her and held her, but she still couldn't bring herself to cry. She was so afraid if she did, she wouldn't stop. And she couldn't have that, not when she had a 7:00 AM meeting tomorrow morning with the very same man whose world she had just upended.

No matter what hell she was going through privately, publicly, she had to be the perfect image of calm and poise. It was the one lesson Erica had taught her but had never seen the need to practice till now.

Even when Simon left, Eden never cared about keeping her shit together. In the days following the breakup, she'd looked like the hell she was going through.

Not this time.

This time she had to keep it together and confront her mistakes with poise and grace.

"Simon hurt me," Eden said and rested her head on her knees, her hair cascading around her face.

"So?" Sienna frowned as she held up the bottle under the light, making sure it was truly empty.

"So I had every right to cry then," Eden explained. "This time, I don't. Everything Liam's said and done is well within his rights. I've hurt him. And I have no right to cry when I wounded him."

"I still don't get—" Sienna shook her head and glared at Lydia, "—whose idea it was to only bring one bottle of wine."

Lydia rolled her eyes and whacked her with a pillow on the head. "Well, next time you're in charge of the drinks!"

"Edie," Cassandra pulled her close in a hug while Lydia and Sienna carried on with their bickering. "It's okay. I think you need to get some sleep. Things will look so much better in the morning."

Eden highly doubted it, but she nodded anyway and excused herself to go freshen up.

When she returned to the living room some forty-five minutes later, her friends were already fast asleep. Lydia had called dibs on the sofa while the other two took up most of the space on their makeshift queen-size bed on the floor, leaving her with very little room.

She tossed and turned for a while, unable to close her eyes because the moment she did, she'd see Liam in front of Aiden's cot, and the despair and rage she'd felt from him earlier would jolt her awake.

Convinced the image permanently burnt in her mind now would drive her mad the longer she tried to force herself to sleep, she kicked off the covers and headed to her bedroom.

She came back with her easel and paints and brushes and lined them up in front of the window overlooking her weedy backyard.

Her breath shaky, her heart torn to pieces, she sat in front of the easel.

For the first time in two years, Eden picked up her paintbrush and poured all her heartache on the canvass.

By the time the sun crept up in the sky, she was still lost in her little world, oblivious to her friends and her son watching her in awe as her hands worked feverishly to eternalise the moment her choices culminated in Liam's grief.