Never Let You Go

[jack+martha=trooluvv]

Chapter 9

Warning: Content unsuitable for younger readers

Martha lay on her bed, feeling alone and lonely in the flat, staring at the wall without seeing it. It was late at night – or maybe early in the morning. Very early in the morning. She rolled over to check her bedside clock and saw that it said 2:00. Martha punched her pillow and snuggled under the covers, trying to relax and empty her mind for sleep, but she couldn’t. Her mind was taken up with what to do. She had seen Roman – she knew it was Roman!! But who was that girl he was having an affair with? Her outline seemed vaguely familiar – curly hair cascading to the shoulders, small and slight with hardly any curves. Her voice seemed familiar too. Slightly throaty.

I wonder if he’s having affairs with any other girls, she mused. Martha ran her fingers through her hair and realised with a little thrill of disgust how dirty and greasy it was. She slowly got up and went to the bathroom, turned on the light and looked at herself in the mirror under the unforgiving fluorescent lights. Martha knew that fluorescent lights brought out every wrinkle and spot, but she looked terrible. She had huge shadows under her eyes and her skin seemed bumpy and rough. She lifted her dress up and looked at her chest and stomach – her ribs were protruding painfully and her stomach was flatter than ever before. Martha had always been skinny but now she was seriously underweight. Martha stared at herself, and with a sudden fiery burst pulled off all her clothes and marched into the shower.

“This can’t go on!” she murmured as hot, hot water, far hotter than her normal shower, cascading over her shoulders, soaking her hair. She felt as though she was cleansing away all the impurities – the hot water burned but it also healed. “This can’t go on!” she repeated, rubbing shampoo and conditioner into her hair and putting moisturiser on her skin. She could have sworn her hair sighed with relief as it swished around, all the shampoo and conditioner rinsed out. She stepped out and dried herself totally, swishing her hair around with a hair-dryer and loving the feeling of taking care of herself, taking care of her body. Instead of getting back into the still damp spaghetti-strap dress, she walked naked into her room and put on a swishy white cotton nightgown. She suddenly realised she was hungry. It was a wonderful feeling – one she hadn’t really felt since Michael had left her. Padding into the kitchen she found a chocolate mud cake that she had bought a few days ago but not been able to bring herself to eat. She cut herself a slice and ate it, enjoying it. With a sudden pain she remembered Jack. He wouldn’t have let me get this bad, she thought to herself. Like a dog clearing its ears of water Martha shook her head a little and willed Jack to leave her mind.

She then went to bed, and relaxed into the warmth. “I’ve got to tell Rachel,” she said aloud, making her decision. “She has a right to know.” And with that decision off her mind she rolled over and went to sleep.

***

Tony rolled over slowly and found himself entangled with a woman. He blinked again and refocused. His head felt like there was a woodpecker living in it that was determined to bash its way through the other side. Realising that he wasn’t fully dressed he murmured, “Oh, my god!” to himself. Then he properly saw the woman. She had blonde hair, long eyelashes, her lipstick smudged. Tony put his hand to his mouth and took it away again. There was a reddish-pink mark on it. It was Kristee, still asleep, her lacy singlet and underwear fitting nicely on her slim form. Tony tried to remember last night.

Outside a bar, Kristee and Tony stood close to each other, both tipsy.

“You haven’t changed as much as I have, Kristee,” he murmured.

“You hardly look your age!” she declared with a shrill giggle.

“Well, what do you say we head to my place?” Tony asked, arching an eyebrow.

She leant up and kissed him – that passionate, fiery kiss…

Tony laughed a little despite the nausea and rolled on his side to watch Kristee slowly breathing in and out. He remembered that kiss outside the bar, that kiss that had been repeated who knew how many times in Tony’s flat. Allowing the mental picture to dwell in his mind somehow the woman in the picture changed to Rachel, Rachel in that nice halterneck black dress, one of her legs kicked up behind her, her curly hair falling on both of their faces. He shook his head and the picture disappeared as though it had been doused in cold water. Kristee stirred and turned.

“Hey,” she murmured.

“Good morning,” Tony said back. He swung his legs over the end of the bed and realised that he was only in boxers. Quickly he got up and pulled on some jeans (back to front) and buttoned up a shirt wrongly. Kristee giggled from the bed. He turned and looked at her. “Um…Kristee…about last night?”

“Yeah?” Kristee asked chirpily. She didn’t look nearly as hung-over as Tony, even though Tony was sure she had had as much to drink.

“Well…I’ve just had a really rough time and I don’t know if I’m ready for a full-on relationship.”

“Sure,” Kristee replied with a sunny smile. “It was just a drunken fling, don’t worry. Though you are just as wonderful as I always remembered,” she sighed.

Tony cleared his throat. “I…um…have you found a place to stay yet?”

“Yeah, I’m staying in this totally crappy hotel near that bar,” she sighed with a cute pout on her face. Tony smiled as he remembered how she used to do that. “This place is way nicer.”

“Well…it’s pretty cheap, it’s a good option,” said Tony.

“Hey, do you want to have a picnic today?” Kristee asked completely out of the blue.

“I…huh?” Tony did a double-take. “I thought we agreed…”

Kristee smiled again, showing her straight white teeth. God, she hardly looked her age. Tony was in his forties, so Kristee must be too but she looked like a twenty-five-year old. “Oh, just as friends,” she said sunnily. “I’m going to stay here so we might as well get to know each other.”

Tony gave a little smile. “Yeah,” he said, surprising himself. “I’d like that, Kristee.”

“Good!” she cried. “But you look a little hungover…”

“Oh, I’ll manage,” said Tony, inwardly resolving to manage even if he started vomiting and couldn’t stop, which luckily didn’t happen.

***

Three hours later Tony had somewhat recovered, luckily he never had hangovers for long. They were sitting in the park, having a picnic. Kristee had told him all about her recent marriage break-up. Tony had confessed to her about Rachel and they listened to each other, sharing each other’s problems. Tony bent over to get another sandwich from the basket when he overbalanced and landed on top of Kristee on the rug. He looked into her eyes, and tried not to rest his hands on her.

“I…sorry,” he murmured.

Kristee didn’t acknowledge his apology but looked up at him with her head tilted and said lightly, “Are you ready now?”

“I think so,” Tony said quietly, without thinking what he was saying. And then they were kissing again, and that image of Rachel came back into his mind, and he cleared it from his mind again as he let the old flame take over.

***

Martha knocked hesitantly on the door of Rachel’s place. Rachel answered, in a pink button-up T-shirt and bell-bottom jeans. Martha smiled at her nervously. “Hey Rach, can I come in?”

“Sure,” replied Rachel, and opened the door for her. Martha walked in and sat down, twisting her fingers nervously. Rachel smiled at her. “You look a lot happier.”

“And healthier,” laughed Martha. “I can actually eat now.”

“Well that’s good,” said Rachel. “I know the break-up with Michael must be hard.”

“It’s getting easier,” Martha said, running her hands through her long, dark brown hair and loving the silkiness of it, “Life goes on, you know? You can’t keep agonizing about the past, you need to move on.”

Rachel smiled. “I know. Me and Roman – I haven’t been able to handle a proper relationship since Kim, Lewis was a disaster, but Roman is just so – well, we click really well.”

Martha giggled nervously. She considered just heading straight out of the door right then, but decided to plow straight ahead. “Um…Rachel…I need to tell you something,” she said quietly.

Rachel looked concernedly at her. “What’s up, Martha?”

“Well,” Martha said in a rush, “I went out for a walk a few nights ago, at night, and I went past the place where Cam’s club used to be. There’s a new club there now and I saw Roman out the side of it. He was talking to this girl, and she was saying thanks so much for giving her the pole-dancing job – ” Martha could see Rachel’s eyes widen in disbelief – “And then…then he kissed her.”

Rachel shook her head. “Martha…that’s not true. Don’t be stupid.”

“It is!” cried Martha.

“Roman wouldn’t do that,” said Rachel indifferently. “It was someone else.”

“It wasn’t!” Martha said. “It was Roman!” She realised how much this must be hurting Rachel, she could see the tears starting to form in the blue eyes.

“No!” Rachel yelled back, and the tears spilled out, tracking down her face. “You’re lying!”

“Rachel, I’m not!” said Martha desperately, grabbing Rachel’s hands. “I thought you had a right to know…”

Rachel roughly pulled her hands away from Martha’s. She took a deep, shaky breath. “Take it back now, Martha. I refuse to hear you saying things like that about Roman.” Her voice was cold and hard.

“I can’t take it back,” said Martha softly, “because it’s true.”

“It’s NOT!” yelled Rachel, finally cracking. “Just because you stuffed up your love life doesn’t mean you can sabotage mine! It’s NOT TRUE! Your lying!” Rachel’s face was contorted with fury.

Martha felt like Rachel had just punched her in the stomach. How dare she speak to Martha like that, just because she didn’t want to accept the truth! “You just can’t accept the truth!” Martha screamed. “You can’t and it’s not my fault!”

Rachel slapped Martha hard across the face. She gasped as she felt the searing pain on her cheek. Without thinking Martha hit hard back in Rachel’s stomach, and felt a savage pleasure in Rachel’s scream of pain, until she saw Rachel drop to the ground, a red blotch quickly spreading from the spot where Martha had hit her. Martha dropped to her side. “Rachel!” she yelled.

Next Chapter: Is Rachel okay????? Finally, Sally knows the truth – but there’s something more that Miles isn’t telling her, and it’s to do with Belle…

[Inactive User]

Wow awesome chapter! Uh oh! Is Rachael pregnant?? If she is, Martha killed a little innocent soul! That's terrible. *cries* Update soon

[matticus01]

OH MY GOD. . . . . . . .

MARTHA . . . . .

Well that was certainly different . . I'd have never picked Martha to punch someone like that . . .

BUT I LIKED IT

Update soon . . .

oh and btw Meggie, you have 2 chapter 8's lol . . .just thought I'd point that out

[jack+martha=trooluvv]

Oh whoops...

I'll edit it now lol

[KaitieL]

^ You got me all excited. I thought there was an update.

[defying_gravity]

keep updating! its awesome!

[jack+martha=trooluvv]

Hey everyone...

I've just had a FANTASTIC idea for a new fic!!!!

It's called: Just A Commoner and it is about...

Martha who is the Queen of England (don't laugh - it gets better) and Jack who is a poor peasant, whose disgusting farmer dad beat him so that he ran away from the nice rich farm they had...

And Martha, Ms. Snobby McSnob Queenie, falls in love with Jack, the poor commoner who wears rags for clothes. When they realize their love...what drastic measures will they take to avoid the gossip??

I won't write this for about three and a half months. I know that sounds like a really long time, but I am just concentrating on this fic and He's Mine!!!, and I'm trying to get them finished before I go away for a two month holiday in one and a half month's time. So when I get back I will write it.

Okays, back to this fic, I will update soon, promise. Here's a sneak peek of what I've already written:

“What happened between you and Rachel Armstrong last night?” Lara asked, looking straight into Martha’s eyes.

“I…stuff,” she said weakly.

“Martha, that answer isn’t good enough. Rachel is seriously injured, and you wouldn’t confirm that it was an accident last night in the hospital. Tell us what happened.”

Okays seeya

[Jack+Martha4Eva!]

Hey Meg

Its Nat from homeandawayrulesxx!!Lol

I LOVE THIS FAN FIC

I hope J+M get together!!

Lol i think you should do the Love in a Chat Room fan fic thats sounds really good:)

And so does the Just a Commenor

Cant wait for the nxt chapter!!

[jack+martha=trooluvv]

OMG Hey Nat!!!!!!!!!!

BE WARNED: Bttb is ADDICTIVE.

But it's great to see you here!!

[Jack+Martha4Eva!]

Lol i no im on it all the time ever since i made an account!lol:)