Love Is for Losers by Wibke Brueggemann (ebook pc reader .txt) 📗

Apparently, and rather disappointingly if I’m honest, not sharing details of my father’s demise with his child (!) was a joint decision between my crap mother and my crap godmother.

But, of course, they were going to tell me one day …

They just figured that finding out I’ve been lied to since always would be so much less disappointing than having known the truth from day one.

My life is literally one of those talk shows where people find out family members/loved ones have been keeping secrets from them, and at first everyone’s shouting, but in the end everyone’s crying. Or leaving.

So this morning Kate and I had to go to the thrift shop early, because someone was coming to service the fire alarms.

We stopped at Starbucks to get coffee.

Kate (yawning): Remind me why I’ve chosen to run a thrift shop?

Me: Because you didn’t want to be a trauma nurse anymore?

Kate (rubbing her eyes): Oh yes. Of course.

Me: Why did you give it up?

Kate (shrugs): Many reasons.

Me: Name one.

Kate: I couldn’t do it anymore.

Me: Why?

Kate: I couldn’t do it anymore.

Me: What, you woke up one day and were like: Okay, that’s it?

Kate: Yes. I woke up and was like: Okay, that’s it.

Me: You’re lying.

Kate: And what if I am? It’s seven in the bloody morning.

Me: So something happened.

Kate: Phoebe. Things always happen when you’re a trauma nurse. And they’re never good. Especially in a war.

Me: So tell me.

Kate (looking at me like it’s on the tip of her tongue, then breathing out and in again): I’ll tell you one day, Phoebe.

Starbucks person (shouting, even though we were the only customers, and standing right there): One black Americano, and a soy chai latte for Kate.

Kate: Thanks.

Me (holding the door open for her): Have you noticed that you don’t treat me in a consistent manner?

Kate: What’y’a’onaboutnow?

Me: One minute you talk to me about ticking boxes and cat sex, and the next minute you’re like: Oh, no, Phoebe, I can’t possibly share this information with you.

Kate (stopping in the middle of the sidewalk, then pulling me into the alleyway that always smells of piss just between the pet shop and the pound shop): Okay, Phoebe, so first of all, not everything is about you. Maybe, on this occasion, I’m not ready to share information with you, because even though I am an adult, I am a person with feelings. And second of all—fine, I’ll bloody well tell ya.

Me:…

Kate: I watched your father die.

Me:…

Kate: I’ve watched many people die, but this was different, because he was my friend. And your mum loved him, and I couldn’t save him.

Me (piss alley literally spinning):…

Kate: I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything …

Me (piss alley still spinning):…

Kate: I’m so sorry, Phoebe, I …

Me (Kate also spinning):…

Kate (reaching for my free hand): I suck, I’m sorry.

Me (pulling away my free hand): Don’t touch me.

Kate: Phoebe—

Me: And don’t talk to me.

I left her standing in Piss Alley, and walked on ahead to the shop where I waited for her to come and open up. I think I was too confused to throw a tantrum. Or run away. It was totally pathetic.

Kate eventually caught up with me and unlocked the door, and I went straight to the back and started sorting clothes. When the fire alarm guy came and was like: “Hiya, you all right?” I was just like: “Not really.”

Later on, Pat was like: “Have you fallen out with Kate?” And I was like: “Yep.” And I swear she looked pleased.

I can’t believe nobody has ever said anything.

The one good thing about it is that there’s genuinely no one left who could disappoint me now.

10:36 P.M.

Kate just told me the whole story.

She was outside my locked door like: “I’m sorry we never told you, and I’m sorry I blurted it out like that. It was a very difficult time, and we don’t like to talk about it. Please don’t tell your mother I behaved like a five-year-old. I’ll do that myself. I’ll email her in a minute. Phoebe?”

I was like: “Fine,” and I opened the door.

I knew Dad died when he worked at a hospital in Iraq and it got bombed, but I never knew Kate and Mum were there, too.

Kate said she was still in the building the doctors and nurses lived in, and my dad had just left to go across to the hospital where Mum was already working.

Kate said the thing with bombs is that you don’t hear them because of the speed they are dropping with. So suddenly there was this insane explosion, buildings were shaking and collapsing, and everyone was thrown to the ground.

Kate said that she ran out into the courtyard, and that most of the hospital building opposite had been flattened, and that people were screaming and running, and apparently all she could think was: “Shit, Amelia’s in the hospital.”

She ran across, and then she saw my dad lying on the ground.

She said a big piece of roof had blown straight into his stomach and that he was bleeding out so fast that he was already lying in a puddle of his own blood by the time she got to him.

She said that she thinks that he knew he was going to die.

And she said that he probably knew that she knew, and so she just knelt down beside him and held his hand.

Kate said it was the most horrendous moment of her life, and that the whole thing was over in less than thirty seconds, but that she remembers it like it was hours and hours.

Me: Why did they bomb a hospital?

Kate (shaking her head): Wars, Phoebe. You can’t imagine what it’s like, you just can’t. People become evil.

Me: Did Dad say anything before he died?

Kate (shaking her head again): No, pet, he didn’t.

Me: What did you say to him?

Kate (shrugging): I … Gosh. I think I told him not to worry about anything.

Me: I’m sorry.

Kate (hugging me): No, I’m sorry, Phoebe. He was your dad. And he was a wonderful human. Just like you. And