30. Matilda

I despised myself all day. That dinner was the final straw. Even my mother, by the end, was holding my hand and checking I was okay. “I have never known you talk so much in your life! What has happened to my quiet girl,” she said with confusion in her soft blue eyes.

My natural shyness comes from being one five. Some personalities rise to the top, like Naomi and Leona, and others are happy to be spectators like me. Yet tonight, it felt that if I didn’t keep talking that somehow the world beneath my feet would crumble.

I am holding onto my sanity with the ragged edges of my fingertips. Sat next to me at the table was my mate. The silver haired lion of a man whose touch sends fireworks shivering down my spine. The person who Nina wailed for. Yet across from me was Cillian. The man I have loved for so long.

As soon as everyone else retired, leaving us alone in the grey, miserable room, Tange took my hand and whispered, “now kitten, come and join me.”

“Where?”

“In our bed. I have been pat