The Other Side of Jealousy

Today I stayed home from work leaving Mother to fuss around trying to work out what was wrong but there was no point speaking to someone who couldn’t understand life outside her little bubble. Mother’s reality is structured around her routines and each day has its special little rituals, from attending day spas to lunch with the old boods, to shopping in town, to gin at night in her room. It would be impossible to explain to her the stress of having to outwit a Dubois so you can save a friend’s boyfriend who is too stupid to save himself.

To watch the guy you are in love with run off with a soap actress tart, to be stalked by the creepiest person in existence and to watch your boss slink off to sleep with every married client he meets, this is not a world I think she can understand much less offer me advice about. I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling wondering how on earth did I wind up in this hell and it was a world I could not face. If I went to work I risked meeting Gervais and if I saw his smarmy git face grinning at me I would have to kill him as today I was so stressed there would be no alternative.

Then there is Jojo for if I saw him driving about town or in Djini’s I think I would explode with grief. My phone rang several times but I didn’t even bother to see who it was as I was not up to any questions or interrogations from anyone. I had no idea what I could do to get Gervais away from me, to keep Elyce from Royce, to not want to hurt Jojo as much as he hurt me and not to smack Tiah in the face for mentioning how to break up Jazz and Braith. Why did I say Tiah-- because it was her that was ringing me over and over again, I found this out because in the end she rang the house phone which had Mother answer and then tell me who it was. I reluctantly picked up the receiver to hear Tiah sprackling all over the place.

It seems Taryn was going crazy trying to discover where Elyce Dubois had disappeared to, at least Gervais had kept his side of the deal, and was about to cancel the dinner party when Braith stepped in and said it could be an engagement party for Jazz and him. Taryn was cornered by invitations into having some sort of party and to Tiah’s total surprise agreed so now Tiah has given us all of a week to come up with a plan to break them up as she would rather eat glass than have Braith marry Jazz.

Taryn doesn’t appear to have come to terms with the reality of this relationship and the fact that Chantal would be in the family. She sprackled to Tiah that she could not find Caspar and the fact I was not there probably meant no one was taking any messages. I told Tiah if she wanted I could take a message from Taryn for Caspar but Tiah told me to forget it as she didn’t want this party to happen! I told her to face it, they were going to marry and there was nothing she could do about it. Tiah suddenly changed the subject and asked me what I was doing having lunch with Gervais Dubois. I told her I was not having lunch with him he just invited himself to my table the way he invites himself everywhere, what was I supposed to do-- scream the place down? She said from what it looked like he and I were all cosy and I got all defensive and angry and said it looked like that to whom? Just who saw me being all cosy? She got all vague and couldn’t tell me but I knew it was just the usual gossip of people with no jobs and nothing better to do with their time. I tell you that work certainly gives you a perspective on what is important in life.

Angrily I told Tiah that maybe I was busy saving Royce from Elyce and instead of nagging me over Gervais be happy that the evil bitch is gone. Tiah was really surprised and asked me how I did that and I told her I didn’t do anything except not scream when Gervais sat at my table. She didn’t believe me but I was not about to reveal the truth to her as she would spread any gossip with glee and my life was hard enough right now without being the source of Tiah’s entertainment.

Right after I hung up my own phone rang and thinking it was Tiah remembering some useless thing I answered it and found Jazz Sedero on the other end. She sounded a bit nervous and I didn’t blame her, this was the second time she had called me in a week and neither had been for happy reasons. She said she had been ringing me all day and I told her I had not been near my phone then she mumbled around for a bit before asking if I knew about the engagement party at the Vanderhaven’s. I told her yes I knew and was her mother doing the catering, this made her choke as she said that her mother would see hell freeze over first which means Chantal was not taking the engagement well at all. She abruptly changed the subject and asked me why I was lunching with Gervais the other day which made me fed up with everyone in this town minding my business, a coffee with a creep and they all start sprackling. I told her sarcastically it was because I was madly in love with Gervais and he was the man of my dreams.

She squealed before she caught on that I was being sarcastic and told me that Gervais was a person I should be careful of. I asked her why she cared what I did with my time and she replied that Jojo had seen me there and was concerned since I had problems with Gervais in the past. Jojo’s meddling in my life brought out all my bitterness towards him and I told her that Jojo did not have to be concerned about me as I was just fine and could deal with Gervais. I then suggested that instead Jojo should do some thing positive in his own life like learn how not to be seduced by whores. Jazz then got a bit fizzy and told me that we should both stop being such babies and admit our feelings for each other but I was still so angry and hurt about what Jojo did I told her that I would sooner have feelings for Gervais than care one bit about her stupid monkey boy brother. With these words I hung up the phone and cried into my pillow for the rest of the day for there is no solace in jealousy.

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