Summer Soap (Episode 6): Haunted by guilt, Char’ confides in her friend

Welcome to The Echo’s annual feature - Summer Soap. Now in its eighth year, Summer Soap is a daily fictional serial run over 12 parts, which started on Monday and runs till Saturday week. Called Charlotte’s Choice, this story is about a Cork woman and her tangled love life, and was written by Gabrielle Dufrene, from the MA in Creative Writing Programme at UCC. Catch up with previous episodes at echolive.ie. In the sixth episode, Charlotte wakes up in her lover’s bed, and the guilt swiftly kicks in...

CHARLOTTE awoke suddenly, shivering violently. The night came flooding back to her. Even though the room was warm, she couldn’t stop shaking.

Seán lay sleeping next to her, his chest gently rising and falling, his arm draped over her torso. She picked it up and replaced it by his side, and he sighed softly before shifting and returning to sleep.

She collected her clothes from around the floor, her mind racing - she’d ruined everything. She didn’t want Seán to wake up - she could barely stomach facing herself, much less him. And Gregory. Oh God, she thought. Gregory.

Hastily pulling on her jeans and sweater and stepping into her loafers, she shoved her dress and heels from the day prior into her bag, grabbed her phone, and left the room. She would call a taxi or walk to the station if she needed to. She didn’t care how dishevelled she looked - she had to get out of there.

She took off down the road where, just hours prior, she’d confessed something unforgivable. 

And if Gregory found out - when he found out... he won’t find out. He can’t. There’s no way he’ll find out, she thought, her mind racing in circles of paranoia.

It was a 30-minute walk to the train station, and fortunately, the next train to Cork was arriving in 45. The walk would give her a little time to clear her head. The sun seemed to mock her as it beamed down, glinting off her engagement ring - now the source of all her shame.

Where could she go from here?

******

As soon as she got back into the city, she showered, had a good cry, and then texted her best friend, Laura. She needed her advice, and she didn’t care if she knew - she couldn’t keep a secret of this magnitude to herself. She’d put Seán’s contact on ‘Do Not Disturb’ on the train, unable to bear the thought of facing him until she had time to think about what she wanted to do.

Charlotte and Laura had planned to meet atop St Patrick’s Hill, where they could talk in a neutral space without being heard. Laura was already there when she arrived, reading a novel and sitting on top of a yoga mat. She could tell something was extremely wrong; the second she saw Charlotte, she stood up and held out her arms.

Charlotte crashed into them, immediately bursting into tears, breathing in her best friend’s signature vanilla scent, deriving temporary comfort from it. No matter what, she still had Laura.

“I don’t know what happened,” Charlotte gasped, in between sobs.

“Hey, sit down,” Laura said, easing onto the ground and patting the space next to her. “We’ll figure it out.”

After a few minutes, Charlotte fished a tissue out of her purse and blew her nose, then smoothed her hair and looked out at the city that spread out beyond the hill, the cars gliding past, small dots on the horizon. She wished she could trade lives with anyone out there. Anyone. She was a horrible, evil person.

She explained everything to Laura, who sat, eyes wide, nodding slowly in reply, taking it all in.

“Well,” Laura said eventually, after Charlotte had fallen silent. “Do you love him?”

I don’t know. Of course I love him. I’ll always love him. But I think I just got swept up in the emotions of the day. It was just a mistake - a terrible mistake. My life is with Gregory. He’s my future.

Laura continued to stare at Charlotte.

“What?” asked Charlotte.

“I don’t know. I think if it was anyone else in the world, you wouldn’t have done this. I know you never would have. You don’t make decisions unless your heart is behind them. I think you need to listen to it.”

Charlotte shook her head.

“You don’t understand. I can’t. I have to be...“

“I’m not telling you what to do. You know I’m Team Charlotte always. Whatever you decide, I’ll support you. But I think you need to sit down and think and be very honest with yourself.”