Day 108: Tales Of Acting Like Children And Friendship Interventions
Day 108 Of How To Move On From A Man — 1LD
If you’re new here to 1 Lovelock Drive, welcome! Let me fill you in on what you’ve missed.
I’m Andie and my ex, Douglas, dumped me. This is my break-up, so to speak. Douglas is a power player in Melbourne, worth more than I could ever comprehend.
I have no idea why we broke up.
I work and live at 1 Lovelock Drive. There, my best friend James and I are building Highway, our unisex clothing line. Our two other best friends, GG and Sophia, are investors.
GG is dating Douglas’ brother, Taylor. Awkward.
I’ve recently discovered my ex has bought a controlling stake in our business. But I had to find that out the hard way!
“How could you say that to him?”
Of all the things that happened in the city that day, James scolding me for telling off my ex in the middle of a busy Melbourne street was the last thing I expected to happen.
We had got home, ten minutes apart, almost in comical timing. As James laid eyes on me, he exploded with fury.
I didn’t know what to say but it felt like having an argument with a sibling.
“How could you embarrass me?” he asked, again.
I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t hold my tongue, and I certainly didn’t want to enter into this juvenile conversation with him.
Walking away to my bedroom, I wanted to slam the door and never reappear. A prisoner in my own home. Uncomfortable in my own sanctuary.
How had my relationship with James made it impossible to love 1 Lovelock Drive?
The next morning I retreated to the gym before James was awake. By the time I returned home, I noticed familiar cars in the drive.
Sophia’s.
GG’s.
They were all here, and I felt a foreboding as I put my key in the door. Waiting for me at the dining room table, it felt like I was walking into an intervention.
Not for the first time since my break up, too. Of all the things I wanted to repeat in my life, this was not it.
“What the actual is this?”
Containing my disdain was impossible.
“Sit down, Andie,” James said, sternly.
There was a spare chair with a glass of water in front of it. Like a conference, like in a meeting room. Like something that happened in the towers owned by a Gallo brother.
“I don’t think so.”
James stared at me. “Andie, sit down.”
I didn’t unlock my gaze.
“Perhaps I’m not making myself clear. No.”
I went to move away from the dining room, get on with my day, but James stood, his temper flaring.
“Andie, stop acting like a goddamn child.”
Walking away was no longer an option. Turning, I felt my voice wanting to match the intensity and heat of James’s. Yet, I wasn’t getting into a yelling contest with a man I didn’t agree with.
This wasn’t how we did business, how we agreed to do business when we started Highway. And it wasn’t how we built our friendship. We were a team.
There was never a dictator or even space for someone in charge, but now there was someone seizing power.
As calmly as possible, I addressed his assessment of me.
“Children talk behind backs. They bitch and moan and whisper when their friends leave the room. They plot immature scams to cut people out. You, the three of you, are the ones acting like children.”
I paused. No one said anything.
“And when you start acting like adults, I’ll talk to you.”
You’re reading The Andie Chronicles
The 2023 romance-fiction series from the 1 Lovelock Drive (1LD) universe.
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