I can't hide from you like I hide from myself - gooreb (2024)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

Suki was dying.

That could be the only explanation, surely, for the way her heart was racing in her chest and the way the faces in the corridor seemed to blur in front of her as she desperately tried - and failed - to catch her breath.

“You’re upset,” her husband’s lawyer said blankly, without looking up from his phone. “It’ll be fine.”

If she could speak, she would tell this imbecile that she knew what upset was. She had one son who was too worried to eat and another who had taken to announcing he hated her at the slightest rebuke, a daughter who regularly cried herself to sleep and a five-year old who clung to her when she brought him to school or put him to bed, terrified that she would be taken away from him too.

For six months, upset had been a leak she didn’t have enough hands to patch - every time she thought she’d stopped the flow of one child’s grief, another burst through with even more urgency. Every day was a scramble to keep her house from flooding.

But what she was feeling right now, Suki was quite certain was not upset. She was sweating and her fingers were tingling and her chest hurt and why was everything spinning, ever so slightly, if she wasn’t absolutely dying right now, right here, in this stupidly long courthouse corridor with the awful stained carpet?

She could feel the lawyer’s eyes on her. Surely he could tell! Why wasn’t he was using his phone to call for an ambulance, right now?

She was just able to register the sound of him tutting over the sound of her own heartbeat. “Go get some air before we reconvene,” he said, voice dripping with irritation, rather than concern.

Something else Suki was quite familiar with was the urge to run away. It had first started when she was thirteen and her father broke her favourite record and it crept back in sometimes, when she was feeling especially bored with her life.

But this wasn’t a daydream during a slow evening in the shop or a response to not getting her own way. This was every nerve in her body firing a warning to her. Run. Run. Run.

So she did.

“Are you joking? This is the second time it’s been pushed this week! And it’s Tuesday!”

The clerk’s chair squeaked as he leaned back in it. “I dunno what to tell you darlin.’ Murder trials take priority over the sh*te the magistrates don’t wanna deal with, dun’ they? That’s how the Crown works.”

Eve hated having to tell a victim that the biggest moment of their life was not sexy enough to secure a place on a court docket, almost as much as she hated having the rules of the game explained to her. Most of all, she hated being called darlin.’

Unfortunately, in her line of work, all three of these things happened too often.

“Yeah well, thanks for nothing.” She pushed herself off the counter and slung her bag over her shoulder.

She made it six steps before she felt a pang of guilt.. Murder trials were a nightmare for everyone - they had the place crawling with press, they bumped up the line to the bathroom and they meant Judges and courtrooms were shuffled around at the very last minute. It wasn’t the clerk’s fault.

Sighing, she turned back toward him, but he was already engaged in a heated debate with a uniformed police officer. She made a mental note to bring a pastry as a peace offering tomorrow. An eclair, maybe. She was sure she’d seen him eat one before.

She slipped her phone out of her pocket and typed up a text to the victim’s advocate. Usually, she’d have the decency to break the news herself, but this one was different. On this occasion, she let herself be a coward.

No court this afternoon. I’ll let you know when I have more info. Pass on my apologies.

Her thumb was hovering over the send icon when a woman in a blue coat and a mass of dark curls slammed into her with such an almighty force that her phone went flying.

“Oi!” she yelped, but the woman didn’t wait to assess the damage or apologise. She didn’t acknowledge Eve at all, just charged on, quickly vanishing from sight.

Eve scrambled to find her phone and examined it, swearing under her breath. There was a crack on the screen and a chip out of the bottom that was sure to cause a headache when she plugged in the charging cable.

Lately, Eve had been picking fights everywhere. On the bus, when people refused to give up their seats for a pensioner. In the office, when David left his dirty mug in the kitchen sink for someone else to clean. With women she dated, who wanted her to party less and text them more.

She almost always felt bad after. It just wasn’t enough to stop her, in the moment.

So Eve sprinted after the stranger through the metal detectors and out the main entrance. Outside, the other woman came to a sudden halt, meaning that this time, Eve almost crashed into her.

“Oi! You’re not even gonna apologise for banging into me like that?” Eve demanded, stepping around her.

The woman gasped, clutching her hand to her chest. For a moment, Eve blinked at her. And then she realised.

“Are you…alright? Actually, no, that’s a stupid question sorry. Of course you’re not.” Eve looked around for help, but the people who were milling around were too busy to catch her eyes. No one seemed all that bothered by the woman gasping for air in front of her. “Come on, sit down a minute.”

She reached out to still the frantic undoing of her coat, but the other woman pushed her away with surprising and impressive force. Eve stumbled back.

“Ok, ok, you need to calm down.” Eve didn’t try to touch her again, but she did step closer, catching a pleasant whiff of her perfume as she did. “You’re having a panic attack. You need to focus on your breathing. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Like this.”

Eve demonstrated a few times before the woman stopped clawing at her clothes and actually copied her. The next big gasp was punctuated with a little whine.

“Good, that’s it.” Eve held her eyes – they were brown and beautiful and terrified – as she sat down on the edge of a step. After a few more breaths, the woman joined her there.

Her breathing was evening out, but now that they were sitting close, it was harder to ignore she was shaking.

“It’s alright. You’re safe, yeah?” Eve helped her to shrug her coat off, then folded it and set it between them. “You’re just sitting here, getting some air. Nothing bad is happening.”

She tensed, folding into herself as she clutched her chest again. “It’s getting worse.”

“No it isn’t. You couldn’t talk before, could you?” The woman’s dark brows knitted together, sceptically. It was cute. Not that that mattered. “Look, it’s getting better, I promise,” Eve said. “It just doesn’t feel like it.”

“That makes no…sense.” She gasped again and squeezed her eyes shut. “What do you know anyway? I doubt you’re even a…doctor.”

“Can you stop trying to fight with me for a minute and just focus on your breathing?”

The silence lasted 45 seconds and then, “Is your phone…broken?”

“Nah. It’s fine. Has a case on it.”

“So you were coming out to have a go at me for nothing?” Her eyelids fluttered open and then her eyes narrowed on Eve. “That’s a bit much, innit?”

“Yeah, sorry.” Eve bounced her knee. “It’s been a rough morning.”

The woman made a little noise of indignance. “Tell me about it.”

Eve looked at her – breathing normally now, but still shaking a little, maybe from the cold, maybe not. She had a little gold hoop in her nose.

Eve stood up. “Alright then. Coffee?”

She was looking at Eve like she had lost the plot. “I can’t. I have to go back in there.”

“And you will. But coffee first, ey?” Eve stuck her hands in her pockets and gestured her head to the left. “Come on. The place next door is decent.”

The woman obviously planned to protest further, but Eve turned and started walking before she could. She was delighted when she looked back and saw her following, two steps behind, her coat slung over her arm.

“I’ll get these,” Eve offered, grateful for the lack of a queue in the café when they stepped inside. “What do you want?”

“I don’t want anything.”

Eve watched her cross the room to sink into a chair in the corner. She rested her elbows on the table and rubbed her temples.

Eve had seen court freak out lots of people. This wasn’t the first coffee she’d bought for someone who felt swallowed up by the legal process. So she understood how this stranger – this rude stranger – was feeling and that she clearly shouldn’t be alone right now.

And if Eve felt compelled to be the company she hadn’t asked for, well, that was just because she knew how it felt to be overwhelmed. It had nothing at all to do with the fact she was also very beautiful and that Eve found her hostility kind of fascinating.

“I guessed your order,” she announced a few minutes later, putting the tray down on the table.

She was tapping her fingernails against the table – not impatiently, but in a nervy, repetitive motion. She barely glanced up at Eve.

“I said I didn’t want anything.”

Eve put a coffee cup down, then the glass of iced water. “You should alternate sips. Hot and cold. It’ll help calm down your nervous system quicker.”

An eyebrow quirked up at this. “That’ll help me feel better, will it?”

Eve shrugged and took the seat across from her. “Well. That depends on what got you in that state in the first place.”

She looked over her shoulder, to the door. “I should really – ”

“- I’m Eve, by the way.”

“I didn’t ask.”

A smirk tugged at Eve’s mouth. She should be offended by her bluntness. Instead, she found it amusing. “What’s your name?”

“Look, I appreciate you…calming me down out there. And I – I’m sorry if I bumped into you. I mean, you were standing in the middle of a busy foyer with no concept of people around you but – ”

“Yeah, I was a bit out of it,” Eve conceded. She looked down at her coffee. “My case got pushed back this morning, for the second time.”

“Hm.” She sat back a little in her chair. Clearly, she could emphasise. “I have noticed urgency isn’t really a thing here.”

“It’s some crazy murder trial,” Eve explained, feeling herself get wound up again. “Completely takes over. Suddenly nothing else matters just cause some bloke gave another a battering.”

As she’d said this, the woman in front of her flinched, and realisation dawned on Eve. Oh.

“sh*t. Oh God. I’m sorry.” There had to be at least three other cases being tried in that courthouse today. What were the odds?

She reached for her coat. “I really need to go.”

“No. Don’t, please. That was a really inconsiderate thing to say. I’m so sorry.”

Instinctively, Eve reached out - forgetting that the last time she’d done that, it had earned her a shove. Maybe it was the desperation in Eve’s voice this time that prevented a similar reaction, or maybe it was the way their eyes locked when Eve’s fingers landed on her wrist.

She dropped her hand, sensing…something. The other woman pulled her seat back in.

“It was supposed to be over by now,” she said, quietly. “They keep dragging it on. It’s - ”

“- a nightmare?” Eve offered.

“Inconvenient,” she said, coolly. Eve didn’t have much time to digest that, before she was taking a sip of coffee, face twisting in response. “I don’t take sugar.”

Of course you don’t, Eve thought wearily. “Yeah, alright, I did only meet you fifteen minutes ago. I’m not psychic.”

“You knew what was going on with me out there.”

“That you were having a panic attack? Is this the first time that’s happened?”

A nod. She fiddled with the hem of her blouse. “I’m usually better than that at keeping it together.”

“Well, maybe that’s part of it. I mean, you can only stuff things down for so long, can’t you?” Before the other woman could take offence, Eve added, “I speak from experience. You’re not the first person to have a panic attack in a courthouse. Been there, done that, got the talk therapy referral.”

An incredulous look flickered across her face. “Really?”

“Yeah. And look at me now. It’s me home away from home.”

“You’re a barrister?”

“When I’m not being a good samaritan.”

The woman didn’t react to her joke. She sat forward, twiddling her thumbs together. “Can I ask you something?”

At that, Eve felt uneasy. “If it’s what I like to do for fun, yeah. If it’s legal advice: I’m not qualified to comment on random cases. Especially something as serious as murder. You really would be better off taking your questions to the appointed counsel.”

“I can’t.”

Eve should push back. That was the right thing to do. But then she looked up and caught those eyes staring hard at her, like there was trust there, so far from the skittishness she’d seen just a few minutes ago, and her professional standards promptly slipped.

“Tell me your name first.”

“Fine. It’s Suki.”

“Suki.” Eve turned it over in her mouth. “Suki?”

“Yeah.”

Eve nodded. She had to keep her end of the bargain, didn’t she? “Go on then. What do you wanna know?”

“If you lie on the witness stand and they find out…can you go to prison?”

Eve blew out the breath she’d been holding. “Perjury can carry a prison sentence of up to five years, yeah. It depends on the kind of lie and what its implications are on the case. Most people slip away with a fine.”

Suki’s expression gave nothing away. “How much of a fine are we talking?”

“I’m not sure exactly and look, I wouldn’t recommend you try and find out.” Eve frowned. “Perjuring yourself is serious. I know it can be tempting - especially if you want justice. But part of the reason I became a lawyer in the first place is because I believe the system, for all its faults and flaws, can generally be trusted to do what it’s supposed to do..”

“Do you honestly believe that?”

“Yeah,” Eve said. “I do.”

She wondered, sometimes, but Suki did not need to know that.

“I didn’t think I would have to testify. They told me I wouldn’t be called.”

Eve had told the same fib to a witness more than once. “Yeah,” she said, feeling a little twist of guilt. “That happens. But look, it’s nerve-wracking enough being up there without having to lie as well. If you just take your time and - ”

“I’ve been lying for months.” The admission fell out of her, onto the table between them. “I’m not a bad person. I did it to protect my family. I think the truth would destroy them.”

As much as Eve desperately wanted to ask, she did not want to risk spooking Suki. She took another sip of coffee. “It kinda seems like the lying is destroyin’ you.”

“The lies aren’t the problem. It’s what could happen if the jury actually believe them.” Suki shook her head. “I don’t think I can live with that.”

Eve had no way of knowing what she was getting at, but she reckoned it didn’t matter. If Suki wanted someone to understand, she wouldn’t be confessing all this to a stranger in a coffee shop. Sometimes, it was enough to just listen.

“You’ll do the right thing, when you’re up there. I trust you.”

Suki laughed shortly. “You don’t even know me.”

Suki no longer felt like she was dying, which was an obvious improvement. The urge to run away was coming and going, still.

“Help me out then,” the Northerner in front of her, Eve, said, breezing right by her allusions to perverting the course of justice. “What do you do when you’re not - ?”

“What, when I’m not havin’ panic attacks in courthouses, you mean?”

Saying ‘panic attack’ out loud, acknowledging that what Eve said had happened was accurate, felt overdramatic. Surely it hadn’t been as bad as that. If her parents could hear her, they would chide her for being so British, they would tell her that women with bad nerves just had too much time on their hands.

Her nerves were just fine. She was just having a bad day.

A bad day that felt a little less awful when Eve smiled at her. “I was gonna say when you’re not getting vague legal advice from strangers.”

“We - ” She stopped herself. Cleared her throat. Crossed her legs. “I have a shop.”

“Ah, a business woman. I reckoned it would be something posh like that.”

If she felt a little shy under the appraisal of Eve, it was because it had been months since anyone had wanted to talk to her about anything besides this trial.

“Says the barrister. And anyway. It’s nothin’ much. Just a corner shop. Well, for now.”

“For now?” Suki felt warmth pooling in her cheeks. “Ambitious. I can hardly pay my utilities on time. Can’t imagine all the admin that goes into that.”

“I don’t mind that part actually.” She was good at paperwork, book-keeping. Better than Nishandeep had been, anyway. And it kept her mind busy, gave her something to do when she couldn’t sleep.

“What parts do you mind then?”

Suki did not hesitate. “Customers.”

Eve laughed. “A necessary evil, I suppose.”

Suki looked down at her fingers. She’d painted her nails last night, for something to do other than think. This morning, she’d caught sight of them in the mirror and immediately taken the polish off. It didn’t fit with the role she was playing as the devastated wife.

“And it’s hard at the minute. Staffing and that. I have to keep closing up to be here. Which is - ”

“Inconvenient,” Eve said, knowingly. “Hopefully you’re not needed in court much longer then. Although.” She paused and raked her hand back through her short dark hair. “I’d like to bump into you again. In less dramatic circ*mstances, obviously.”

“If you make a habit of standing around in the way, you’re bound to, ain’t you?” While Eve laughed again, Suki caught herself. She stood up. “I gotta get back. Thank you. For calming me down. And…the advice.”

Eve looked up at her, a cheekiness in her eyes. “But not for the coffee or the dazzling company?”

“Those were less impressive.” It shouldn’t have been so difficult to tear her eyes off this oddly forward stranger with poor coordination and an ill-fitting blazer. She was clearly still under the spell of her funny turn earlier. “I really do have to go.”

“Well, good luck. With testifying. I’m sure you’ll smash it.”

She gave a grateful nod, then hurried out of the coffee shop. Outside, she put her coat back on and glanced over her shoulder, through the window, as she tied it at the waist. Eve was already engrossed in her phone. She would probably never think of their interaction again. Which was the normal thing to do, of course.

There was no space or time to feel any which way about that. She had to get to court. She had to testify.

She had to ruin her husband's defence.

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

Eve left the meeting with a chip on her shoulder. The stall in her case had given way to the defence lawyer calling in some favours. Her boss, who two weeks ago had told her, “Evie, I trust you to put this bastard away,” had now decided they were going to offer a second plea bargain.

Four years. A suspended licence and a year’s probation. In the meantime, the hit and run victim would probably undergo another two surgeries and years of painful physio. If they were lucky, they might have regained some movement in their legs by the time the defendant got out.

She tried to stay away from alcohol during the week, but this was a good reason. What she needed right now was to drink too much, go home with a stranger or call up an ex, distract herself from her personal feelings on the case. Professional distance always came more naturally when it was accompanied by a hangover and the desire to just finish this damn thing so I can go back to bed.

As she turned the corner, she stopped in her tracks. Suki was sitting on a bench outside the main courtroom. Her hair was tied back into a low bun today. She looked small sitting there alone, hunched shoulders under her big coat, staring into space.

Eve knew it wasn’t smart to get involved. It was just that this was the quickest way out of the building, and anyway, it had only been two days since they’d had coffee together - it would be rude to ignore her, wouldn’t it?

Suki didn’t react as Eve approached. She was clutching the bench beneath her with a fierce grip.

“Fancy seeing you here,” Eve said. Either Suki hadn’t heard her, or she’d chosen to ignore her. “How’s it going?”

“What kind of question is that? Is there anyone in this entire building that would say ‘yeah, thanks, things are great’?”

Eve thought of the meeting she’d just left, the smugness of the defence counsel's face. “You’d be surprised, actually.” When she sat down next to her, Suki edged away. “How did it go then? Your testimony?”

“Don’t pretend you haven’t googled.”

She had, in fact, googled extensively. All she’d managed to find was confirmation of what she already knew - last Summer, a man beat another man to death in an alleyway in East London.

“There’s not much about it online, actually.”

“Suppose brown men killing each other ain’t news most people care about, is it?”

Eve had her opinions about how the media treated people of colour in this country, but she was fairly sure Suki wasn’t actually looking to engage with her about the racist gaze of crime reporters. She changed the subject. “Did you tell the truth?”

Suki glanced at her. “Well, I didn’t lie.” Eve didn’t miss the distinction, but before she could press further, Suki was looking over her shoulder and then back to her, her voice lower, “What if it’s not enough? What if he just gets a few years and then he’s out?”

“There are laws in place to protect witnesses and the victim’s family when a convict gets released.”

“What about the killer’s family?”

“Don’t worry about them. You can’t - ” Eve stopped, abruptly, realisation dawning as Suki’s eyes slipped away from hers. “Oh.”

“Thanks for checking in,” Suki said, with sudden and forced politeness. “I’m sure you have a case to get back to.”

She was giving her an out. Eve knew the sensible thing to do was take it.

Eve stood up, slinging her bag over her shoulder. “You think you can get out the coffee you owe me that easily?”

Ten minutes later, they were at the same table in the corner, away from the window. Suki complained that the coffee was even more bitter than she remembered.

Incredulously, Eve eyed her. “You sure you don’t want sugar?”

“I know how I take my coffee, thanks.”

“Suit yourself.” Eve tore open a sachet, stirred it into her own coffee and took a pointed sip. “Hm. Tastes alright to me.”

“We must have different definitions of ‘alright’.”

Eve genuinely enjoyed their back and forth, but enough of her usual good humour has been bled dry by her imploding case that she wanted to get straight to the point. “So. The alleged killer.”

Suki frowned. “It’s not alleged. There’s CCTV to prove it.”

“Oh. Well, then. Sounds straightforward.” Or as straightforward as these things could be. “They wanted you as a character witness, then?”

“They wanted me to say that Usama was threatening our family. That it was a row about culture. Religious differences.” Suki clarified, “We’re Sikh. Usama is - was - Muslim.”

It was an interesting defence angle: depending on the ethnic and religious make-up of the jury, it might even be a smart one. It could alienate the white people in the courtroom enough to want to leave it well alone.

“So there wasn’t religious differences?”

“I don’t know. I never talked to him about religion. I barely spoke to him at all. They just lived across the road.”

Eve hoped Suki’s defensiveness hadn’t been this obvious when she was testifying.

“He doesn’t actually think he’s gonna get off with this, does he?” Eve hesitated. “Sorry. Your brother, is it?”

Suki went very still. “My husband.”

Eve choked on her coffee. God, she really needed to stop assuming things. “But you don’t wear a ring,” she said, feeling as stupid as she sounded.

“I do sometimes.”

“But not to court?”

Suki shrugged. “Well, what kind of relationship can you have if one of you is in prison?”

That was…fair. And also, cold, but then, her fella was a murderer. It was probably wise to detach herself. “So why did he kill him?”

“Well I don’t know, do I?”

“What, he hasn’t said?”

Suki snorted. “He says a lotta things. Doesn’t mean they’re true.”

“Sounds like you want them to throw away the key.”

Suki took a sip of coffee, pulled another face, and then sat back in her chair. “What about your case? The one that was pushed? Is it on today?”

Eve didn’t trust herself to repeat the latest update without losing it, so she brushed off the question. “Nah. I’m here to file some things. It’ll be next week before they get to it at this rate.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“Is it an important case?”

“They’re all important.”

Suki’s eyebrows shot up. It was just as cute as it had been the last time, but now Eve felt too testy to appreciate it. “That’s a very noble answer.”

“That’s me.”

Eve had been to enough therapy in her life to know exactly why she was being off with Suki. She was disappointed that she was straight. Which was childish and unfair and - what had she been expecting to happen, anyway? It had been a long time since she’d let herself get this carried away.

Stacey would have a field day if she knew. She’d accuse her of being a sucker for a damsel in distress. Maybe she was. Or maybe she was just an idiot.

An idiot who caved quickly when faced with an awkward beat of silence.

“It was a hit and run. I’ve never prosecuted one before. I want to get it right.”

“Passionate about road safety, are you?”

“I’m passionate about people not getting to create a mess, ruin lives and then walk away with their hands clean, yeah.”

Suki blinked at her. She obviously hadn’t been expecting the edge to her voice and truly, neither had Eve.

This case was wearing on her. She needed to just let it go to a plea and move on with her life. But if she did, if she brushed this victim aside and forgot all about them, what did that say about her loyalty to Erica?

“We should probably head back,” Eve suggested, getting to her feet.

They hadn’t finished their coffees, but Suki didn’t object. It wasn’t like she wanted to be here, anyway. She’d made that clear. “Yeah.” She nodded. “Yeah, of course.”

Eve was too distracted by the anger that was making her stomach clench and the desire to get to the nearest bar as soon as humanly possible to feel guilty about being abrupt with her. When the shadow of hurt on Suki’s face as they parted flashed in her mind three drinks and a kiss with a stranger later, Eve convinced herself she’d imagined it.

Looking across the gallery everyday and seeing Nadia was something Suki had come to expect. They hadn’t spoken one word to each other since the morning before Usama died, but when Suki was testifying, she felt Nadia’s eyes on her, hanging on her words almost as desperately as Nishandeep was.

As the prosecution worked through their closing argument, waving their photocopied pictures of Usama’s injures, Nadia had begun to weep.

Once, in the early days of their friendship, she had told Suki she’d never cried in front of Usama. “Men don’t know what to do with their wives weakness,” she had said.

Suki supposed it didn’t matter now. Nadia wasn’t a wife anymore.

The Judge asked Nadia to compose herself or leave the court. In the end, she had to be escorted out by a clerk and no less than three family members.

During the next recess, Suki took as long as she could to wash her hands and freshen up in the ladies bathroom. She didn’t want to loiter too much in the corridors, in case she ran into Eve again. Their last interaction had turned tense quickly and although she had replayed it in her mind several times since, she still couldn’t work out why.

Not that she particularly cared to. Whatever was going on with Eve wasn’t her problem. They’d settled the coffee score - they didn’t owe each other any more than that. In all likelihood, she would never see Eve again.

With her hands under the dryer, she squinted at herself in the mirror. Between blows of hot air, she heard the door to the ladies toilets shut firmly. She could feel eyes on her.

Suki’s stomach twisted in a nice way that she didn’t wish to interrogate too closely. Eve.

She turned, anticipating the taller woman with her beat up leather satchel and her ear length-hair, ready to lure her away for another terrible coffee. Instead, the someone watching her was small, with a face she had spent months memorising, framed by a hijab.

“Suki,” Nadia gasped, and then a sob followed.

Suki grabbed her handbag. Suddenly, the four cubicle bathroom felt too small. “I have to go.”

“I just - I only wanted to say thank you. For telling the truth.” Nadia wiped her eyes with a tissue tucked into her sleeve. “I know Usama was not a violent man. I know he had nothing against Sikh’s.”

“We shouldn’t be talking.”

They should never have talked in the first place. If Suki hadn’t let her loneliness spur her on, if she hadn’t been so stupid as to to lean into the way Nadia’s friendship made her feel -

“I can’t believe Nishandeep could do this. He was so kind,” Nadia said, shaking her head. “Oh, Suki. Why would he do this?”

Suki knew why. It was jealousy. It was control. It was the venom in his voice when he’d called her ‘mine’ and how he would quiz her at the end of every single day about where she’d gone, who she’d been with and it was the dress he’d told her to buy and then called her a slu*t for wearing and all of the other things that Nadia and his mother and her own parents explained away as his ways.

It is how he shows his love! You are lucky really, to have a husband who is so obsessed with you.

It made her want to scream. Even now, she was the only one who could see Nish for what he was, and that meant she was stuck shouldering the burden of an innocent man’s death, while everyone else got to sit back with their clean hands and wonder.

She stepped past Nadia before she could say something she would regret and pulled the door open.

Eve was on the other side. “Suki?”

Behind her, Nadia was calling her name too. The desire to scream intensified. “I can’t do this,” she announced, pushing past Eve and taking off down the hall to nowhere in particular.

Eve caught up to her easily. “Are you alright? Suki, where are you going? The Judges Chambers is this way, you can’t- ”

Suki came to a halt and let out a hiss of frustration. “I just want this to be over!”

Eve nodded. Her eyes were soft. “I know you do.” Eve’s hand rested on her back. Suki didn’t let herself lean in, but she didn’t move away, either. “What time do you need to be back? Let’s get some air, yeah?”

She had fifteen minutes. Not enough time for the café, so they agreed on a walk to the car park and back instead. When Eve held one of the doors for her on their way out, she noticed her knuckles were bruised.

“What happened to your hand?”

“Hm? Oh. I punched a wall.” A blush rose in Eve’s cheeks. “I’m not - like that, normally. It’s just cause I was drunk.” She winced. “That sounds terrible, doesn’t it?”

“It does, yeah.” Suki thought about leaving it there, but something stirred her to say more. It felt safe to say more. She took in a breath of fresh air. “I slapped my son last night. He’s fourteen and he’s angry about his dad and of course it’s everyone else’s fault. I really am trying to be patient with him, but this time I had a migraine and I just needed him to shut up, for just a minute.”

Suki’s shame hung between them for a moment and then Eve looked at her and said, “I didn’t know you had kids.”

“What about you?”

Eve scoffed a bit. “Nah. Don’t get me wrong. I like kids. I just don’t think I’d want me own.”

Suki nodded. She’d grown up thinking having a family wasn’t optional. She loved her kids, but that didn’t mean she didn’t sometimes resent that becoming a mother was something that happened to her, rather than a choice she made.

“What about a drinking problem?” she asked. “Do you have one of those?”

“I had an anger problem when I was younger. I worked through it.” Eve gestured to her hand. “I know I’m not exactly a glowing review at the moment, but if your lad needs help - well, I know some good counsellors.”

Suki felt guilty then. In truth, Jagvir was probably the most gentle of her children. He didn’t have his father’s temper - he was just oversensitive, overreactive, overemotional. He was just too much.

It made her feel helpless, to see one of her children in the kind of states he got himself into, and that made her lash out, which inevitably made Javgir more upset. For her own sanity, she needed to believe this vicious cycle they were trapped in wouldn’t go on forever, that it was situational, that he was unsettled because of the move and his father’s trial.

“He’ll be fine when this is over.”

“And you? That woman back there really freaked you out.” Eve paused. “You know, Suki, if the victim’s family are harassing you - ”

Suki sighed. “They’re not. Nadia’s just - we haven’t seen each other since it all happened.”

“Were you close? Before?”

By now, they’d followed the footpath all the way to the smoking shelter. There was no one else around.

She could tell Eve. She was easy to talk to. She asked the right questions. She moved passed the things Suki wanted to move past. She didn’t push her for explanations.

What would it feel like, to say any of it out loud?

When she looked up at Eve, she was staring at her, with a curiosity in her eyes that made Suki’s stomach flip.

Maybe Eve already suspected. And if this stranger, this person she’d only met three times, was halfway to figuring it out, figuring her out, what would that mean for the people who actually mattered?

“Not really,” she said, adjusting the waist tie of her coat and turning back toward the building. “It’s just awkward, you know?”

“Sure.”

She let Eve do the talking on the walk back. Her office was undergoing renovations, so next week, she would be working from the crappy cafe next door to the courthouse.

Suki knew it was an invitation. How hard could it be to just not take it?

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

Nishandeep hadn’t wanted to speak to her in the days after her testimony - but he’d had the weekend to cool, so by the time Monday rolled round, he was ready to berate her.

She sat with her hands folded in her lap while he raged in the small conference room. She was afraid - because he was now finally starting to accept he was going to prison, and that meant he felt like he had nothing left to lose - but she worked hard not to show it.

Even when the bailiff came to take him down to the holding cells, he was insisting that nobody would ever want her. An adultress with four kids and a husband banged up? She was tainted, ruined. She would always, always, be his.

Eve’s face lit up when she sat down across from her in the café.

“Don’t look so pleased with yourself, alright? I was gonna kill time in the smoking shelter, but then the rain came on.”

“God Bless the British weather, ey?”

Suki didn’t bring up Nish and she didn’t ask Eve about the case she was so touchy about. They talked about the tube line closure and the burly man with the tiny chihuahua two tables over who brought a bowl with him and asked the waitress to fill it with water. Suki learned Eve’s feelings towards dogs were similar to her feelings towards children. She told Eve about Kiah, the dwarf hamster she bought the kids to make them smile again in those early weeks after Nish’s arrest, who had been quietly replaced twice since then.

Eve’s laugh was something else. Until now, Suki would only have described her as attractive. Striking, at a push. But when she laughed - like proper, breathless, belly-laughed - she was something else. Something closer to beautiful.

“You’re gonna be up in court next,” Eve said, still laughing. “For your contribution to the mass extinction of dwarf hamsters.”

Suki grinned along with her. “Is it bad that I wish one of them would just figure it out already so I can stop? Pets At Home must be having a right laugh at me. What was I thinking? A goldfish would have been cheaper to replace.”

This led Eve on to tell her about the two fish she’d had as a child and one's eventual cannibalising of the other. By the end of the conversation, Suki was adamant this iteration of Kiah was the last one and a strict no pets policy would be enforced thereafter.

She was also convinced she had not felt so at ease with another person in a long time. Maybe ever.

Tuesday was the defence’s closing arguments, which Suki had no desire to sit through. So she was there, already at the table with their bad coffee orders waiting, when Eve arrived at 10am.

“I’m not gonna distract you,” she insisted, as Eve sat down. “I have work to do, too.”

It was numbers she needed to run over before a meeting with the accountant. She had meant to do it the night before, after her youngest two were asleep, but she got sucked into some nature documentary the boys were watching. When the baby elephant was reunited with the herd, Jagvir teared up a bit and Suki and Kheerat teased him thoroughly - but before he went up to bed, he gave her a kiss on the cheek for the first time in months.

Eve had seen the documentary too, apparently. Well, some of it. She’d dozed off in the middle because the presenter's voice was so soothing. Suki found that a little bit cute, but of course she would rather die than admit that to Eve.

They only distracted each other to begin with. As the day went on, Eve typed away on her laptop and Suki did her workings out for her forecasted spends and at some point, Eve asked what she was listening to on the old iPod Kheerat had taught her how to load songs onto.

Eve was shocked that she liked metal.

“Suki, you are full of surprises,” she marvelled, like that was a good thing.

When Eve excused herself to go to the bathroom and their third round of coffees arrived, Suki caved and put a single sachet of sugar in hers.

Eve was right - it wasn’t so bitter anymore.

By Wednesday, Eve was going wild.

Suki had gone to court in the morning. It sounded like her husband’s lawyers were less than thrilled with her absence the day before. She’d left a note on the cafe table for Eve to explain. She’d ended the note with Lunch, maybe?

When Suki rushed in just after one, Eve had already ordered for them.

“The bacon and cream cheese bagels are the only thing I’m confident about. But it’s not too late to change, if you want.”

“So you admit this place is terrible.” Suki put her handbag on her chair and looked around. “I will have to change it though. I’m a vegetarian.”

Eve watched Suki flag down the waitress to explain. She was wearing a royal blue jumper today. She looked especially pretty in blue, and it was kind of distracting.

So distracting, in fact, that she managed to knock her glass of water over. Suki returned to the table, frowning. “Can’t leave you alone for a minute, can I?” and then sauntered off in search of blue roll.

Eve was finding it near impossible to believe Suki did not know that their back and forths were becoming increasingly flirtatious. Surely Suki knew that strangers did not have a regular table at a random café, or spend several hours together at a time talking about everything and nothing, or share headphones while they worked, or get somewhere early to leave the other a note?

“Sorry about that,” Eve said, as they mopped up the water together.

“It’s fine. Won’t have to worry about me throwing you off for much longer anyway.”

Eve stopped, soggy blue tissue in her hands. “What?”

“The jury were sent for deliberation. They reckon they’ll have a verdict by the middle of next week. And then I never have to come back here.”

Of course Eve had known that the trial was wrapping up. And she knew how keen Suki was for it to end, so she could go back to her job and get stuck into building a new life for her kids. This was always gonna be the natural progression of things.

Eve just thought they’d have a little more time.

“That’s great, Suki,” she made herself say. She held out her hand as Suki finished the last of the mopping up. “Gimme those. I’ll chuck em in the bin.”

As they ate, they picked up on topics they’d dropped the day before. Suki listened to some of the album she’d recommended on the tube home and they debated the best song; Eve had, in fact, called the defence attorney who was trying to amend the plea bargain for a second time at the eleventh hour an arsehole and hung up on him.

It did not feel like a final conversation. It couldn’t be, could it?

When the toe of Suki’s boot brushed against her knee, Eve flinched in surprise. She watched Suki carefully, how she didn’t miss a beat as she shared the gossip she’d heard around the courthouse about the upcoming high-profile trial of a current MP who’d been embezzling money from public funds to support his interest in Thai women.

Eve adjusted her legs under the table. “Yeah,” she said, struggling to keep up with how fast Suki was talking. “He’s the worst. They’ll throw the book at him. Bound to. There’s the public interest angle if noth - ”

And then it happened again. Suki’s foot on her leg.

Suki maintained eye contact and waited for her to finish her sentence.

She was doing this on purpose. Eve’s mouth broke into a smile.

“Uh, sorry, what was I saying?”

“Public interest,” Suki reminded her, helpfully, but her eyes were bright with mischief.

She was f*cking with Eve and it was bloody brilliant.

“At least our next lunch will be somewhere nicer,” Eve said, when they’d finished picking at their respective bagels. “I won’t even order you the wrong thing or flood the place. Promise. I’m not usually this bad at wooing women.”

Later, Eve would agonise over whether it was the prospect of taking this outside of their current bubble, or the comment about wooing women that made Suki bolt.

“I need to go.”

Eve shook her head. “Don’t, Suki. Did I say something wrong?”

“I need to go,” she repeated, springing into action. “I’ll - um.” She paused, like she wanted to say something else, but then the waitress approached and started clearing the table and the moment was gone. “Bye, Eve.”

She didn’t even hang around for Eve’s response before disappearing out the door, she was that keen to get away.

Being rejected by someone who wasn’t ready to come out – or had no intention of doing so - didn’t feel any better at twenty-seven than it had at eighteen, or twenty-two, or twenty-five. Maybe Stacey was right and her taste in women was a form of self-sabotage.

She spent the next few days trying to forget that thing Suki did when her tongue when she was concentrating or the way she held onto the lapel of her coat when she was walking. She didn’t want to wonder how she was doing, if her kids were giving her a hard time, if the supplier she’d been badgering had finally called her back.

They weren’t going to see each other again. Whatever had been going on between them, it had only taken the smallest acknowledgement of it to send Suki literally running in the other direction.

Eve knew her heart couldn’t take the chase right now.

So when she arrived at court on Friday, she kept her head down in the corridors. She didn’t go to the café – it was ruined for her now, probably – and she used the toilets on the other side of the building. She didn’t know when the jury would return a verdict in Suki’s husband’s case, but she wasn’t taking any chances.

She made it through the plea hearing, done what her boss expected of her and pushed Erica so far to the back of her mind that she knew the only way she’d get past the guilt was with a weekend full of drinking.

As she made her way down the courthouse steps at the end of the day, Eve could hear women yelling in a language that wasn’t English. She glanced in the direction of the noise and saw Suki standing there, a few feet away, with three women wailing at her in various pitches.

“Suki?” she called. The oldest of the women, a small, slight lady, was crying and motioning wildly with her hands. The younger two cast Eve a glare that could cut glass and then went back to berating Suki.

She jogged over. “Hey, everything alright?”

Suki blinked up at her, watery eyed. The women spoke more furiously now they had been interrupted. Around them, people had begun to stare.

“Come on,” Eve said, decidedly. She tugged Suki’s arm, surprised at the lack of resistance she was met with. Suki was letting her pull her away. Their voices followed until they were at the bottom of the steps. “What was all that about?”

“Nish was found guilty on all counts. A life sentence.”

“Good,” Eve said, too quickly. “I mean, not good, but –”

Suki sniffed. “No. It is good.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Suki’s tears spilled over then and Eve could have cursed the fact they were in public. She had never wanted to hug anyone more.

“Let’s get you away from all this.” Eve glanced up at the women who were still causing a scene. Other relatives had started to circle them, offering comfort and agreement. “My place isn’t far.”

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“You wanna walk to the tube with that lot?”

Suki slipped her phone out of her pocket to check the time. “An hour. That’s it.”

“What language was that?” Eve asked as they crossed the car park.

“Hm? Oh. Punjabi.”

Eve nodded. “Sounded nice.”

Suki scoffed. “You wouldn’t think that if you knew what they were saying.”

“How bad was it?”

“Well, they never liked me to begin with. It’s just that now, they have an excuse.”

“Your testimony?”

Suki nodded. “They said it’s my fault. That it’s shameful, that I didn’t protect my husband. They think the community will turn against me and that my kids will hate me.”

Eve whistled. “What’s the Punjabi word for misogyny?”

Suki gave a small smile and shuffled a little closer as they walked. “I didn’t know if I’d see you again.”

Eve squinted ahead. “Didn’t think you really wanted to.”

“Used to people throwing themselves at your feet, are ya?”

“Just women.” Suki drifted a little to the left then, putting distance between them. Eve’s laugh sounded bitter even to her own ears. “It’s alright. It’s not catchin.’”

Suki didn’t take her bait. They didn’t speak again until they arrived at her flat.

“Want a drink?”

“No, thank you.” Suki was wandering around the living room, admiring the art on the walls, running her fingers along things, probably judging Eve’s lack of commitment to dusting.

It was destabilising, to see Suki in her space. Eve went to the fridge and grabbed a beer. When she returned with it, Suki was sitting on the couch. She gestured to the room. “This is nice.”

“Eh, it’s alright.” Eve took a swig of beer and perched on the arm of the armchair. “My first few dozen places were right sh*tholes.”

“You’ve moved around a lot, then?”

Eve nodded. “Don’t like staying in the same place, me.”

“You get bored?”

Her restlessness was a running joke among her friends and colleagues. Most of the time, Eve laughed right along and took pride in being hard to tie down. Every now and then, it stung to be reminded that she didn’t belong anywhere.

“Something like that.” Eve shrugged. “I graduated with a degree in corporate law. Worked for a few big companies for a couple of years.”

Suki hummed. “Good money, I bet.”

“Yeah, it was. Only… I didn’t feel like I was doing enough with my life. And it started to get to me. I thought – maybe if I was making a difference, doing good –”

Maybe then she wouldn’t feel so horribly guilty for being here, when Erica wasn’t.

“What?” Suki pressed, quietly. “Eve?”

“I just thought it would make me happy.” Eve hesitated. “You know, to put bad guys away.”

“And it doesn’t?”

“No, it does. It’s just – not how I thought it would be, I s’pose. I dunno.” She suddenly felt very self-conscious under Suki’s stare. “Sorry. Your husband’s just been sent down and I’m here going on about my stuff.”

“Well, I asked. I wanna hear about your stuff.”

Something in Eve’s chest stirred at that. She knew she was a good listener, a good shoulder to cry on. She just wasn’t used to being on the other side of it.

“And I get it. I was eighteen when I married Nish. Don’t look at me like that – now I have teenagers, I know how it sounds, but it wasn’t like that,” Suki protested, frowning. “No one forced me into it. It made sense at the time. It didn’t even feel that wrong, in the beginning. It was what I wanted, once.”

“What changed?”

Suki opened her mouth to speak, then shut it quickly and looked up at Eve. “Suppose it just wasn’t what I thought it would be. Confusing, innit?”

“Yeah, it is.” Eve picked at the label on her bottle of beer. “You know what else confuses me? Us.”

“Us?” Suki echoed.

“This thing between us.” Eve stood up, so she was in front of Suki. “There’s this…energy when we’re together.” She touched her fingertip to Suki’s chin, tilting it up to her. “I mean, am I wrong?”

Before she could talk herself out of it, she ducked down and pressed her lips to Suki’s. It only lasted for a few seconds, which was as long as she needed to realise oh sh*t, Suki wasn’t kissing back, and then she drew back, a knot in her stomach and an apology on her tongue.

Suki’s hand moved so quickly she literally didn’t see it coming until her cheek was already stinging. Suki pushed past her, grabbing her handbag and hurrying out of the room. She slammed the door as she left.

And just like that, Eve was alone again.

Chapter 4

Chapter Text

Eve could handle being wrong.

It wasn’t a pride thing. She had fancied women before who didn’t feel the same. She could take the loss, move on. She wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. No hard feelings.

It felt different this time – mostly because she was so sure she hadn’t been wrong.

At least, that was how she felt at first. As the days turned to weeks, doubt started to creep in. Had the hit and run case and all the emotions it dug up made her needier than usual? Had she been so distracted by her own attraction that she’d seen signs where there weren’t any?

“Right. You gonna tell me what’s going on with you or what?” Stacey demanded, closing the door as she came into the kitchen.

Eve had agreed to help out with her Godson’s second birthday party in an attempt to keep busy. She loved Stacey and Lily and little Arthur and actually, all the screaming kids had been a good distraction. It wasn’t until Arthur had been put to bed and the other kids were playing upstairs and it was just the adults left in the living room – Stacey and her fiancé Martin, her mum Jean and her partner Harvey, her cousin Kat and her husband Alfie – that Eve had felt very aware she was the only one in the room who was single.

She’d been to a dozen family events at Stacey’s. She couldn’t recall ever being upset by that kind of thing before.

She couldn’t tell Stacey this. Eve knew her best friend - Stacey had a hard time believing she deserved to be happy and Martin made her really, really happy. She wasn’t about to put a damper on that. Or risk Stacey forcing her back onto the dating apps.

“Nothin’s wrong, Stace. I’m fine.”

“Tell your face that.” Stacey pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. “Is it work?”

Eve had known being a criminal prosecutor would be more emotionally taxing than being a company solicitor. She hadn’t been prepared for how anti-climatic the majority of her cases would be. She had yet to actually prosecute anyone in the eighteen months since she’d qualified.

The hit and run had been resolved in a matter of hours once the terms of the plea were agreed. All she could do now was hope the victim had more luck in civil court Job done, justice not served. She had no choice but to move on.

“I’m alright, mate, honest.”

“Well I don’t believe ya.” Stacey’s eyes narrowed on her. Eve went back to the washing up. “Is this about a woman?”

Eve scoffed. “As if.”

Stacey’s sigh was long-suffering. “Go on then. What’s her name?”

“I told you – ”

“ – Oh Eve, come off it, yeah? I know you better than anyone. You’ve been AWOL for weeks, then you show up here with a face like a slapped backside and I’m supposed to just take your word for it when you say everythin’s alright?” Lower, Stacey added, “We both know you’ve always been there for me. Would it kill ya to let me return the favour once in a while?”

They’d met five years ago as begrudged members of a bereavement support group. Eve was being forced to attend by the HR department of the company she worked for at the time, who had invested too much time and resources into training her up for her to be allowed to fly off the handle at the Christmas party and go on unchecked; Stacey, a single teenage mum at the time, had been under duress of Social Services, who needed to see that she was being proactive about her mental health after her bipolar diagnosis.

They hit it off instantly, taking the mickey out of the people who actually wanted to be there, who took turns sharing their stories of loss with the group, who clearly didn’t have enough grief of their own if they were so hungry for each others. Stacey’s obligation to attend ended right around the time the facilitator had decided to kick them out of the group for snigg*ring. Eve moved to a different job, they kept in touch. They started going for a drink together and exchanging drunken ramblings, their own support group.

When Stacey had let slip one night that she didn’t think she’d ever get over Bradley until she confessed to the murder he’d been accused of and cleared his name, Eve made it her mission to find her the best defence lawyer she could afford. In the end, Stacey got diminished responsibility and a clear conscience that allowed her to find love again, and Eve got a surrogate family in the form of the Slaters.’

Now, Eve dried her hands with a tea towel. “It was just someone I met at work. But it’s complicated.”

“What, like another lawyer?”

“God, no.” The last thing she needed was someone with the same baggage as her.

Stacey screwed up her face. “Not a client, Eve?”

She forced a laugh. “No. Not a client. It doesn’t really matter who it was now. Nothing came of it.”

Stacey frowned. “But you wanted it to?”

Eve wished one of the many children in the house would burst through the door begging for more orange juice and spare her the embarrassment of having to answer, but that didn’t happen. She shifted her weight, leaning against the kitchen sink.

“I guess I did, yeah.” Stacey’s eyes softened in sympathy, and Eve hated it. “But – I dunno. I reckon I got ahead of myself. Like, now I don’t even think she was interested.”

“Then she’s an idiot,” Stacey said, simply. She got up and wrapped Eve up in a hug. “Have you thought about getting back on the apps again? There’s a new one out now, ya know – ”

Stacey didn’t push her when Eve shot down this idea, but she knew she wanted to. She hung out at the Slaters’ a little bit longer and then said her goodbyes. She always felt a little sad to leave.

On her way to the Walford tube station, she spotted a corner shop, just next to the pub. She fancied something packed full of sugar for the journey home, but as soon as she ducked inside, she stopped still and her mind went blank.

“Eve?” Suki’s deer-in-headlights expression would have been something if Eve wasn’t sure she looked exactly the same.

Her brain wasn’t computing. Suki was here. In this Walford corner shop.

No, wait. Suki was behind the counter in this Walford corner shop.

“This is your shop?” Eve managed to ask, finally getting it. She was grateful the only other person witnessing this bizarre exchange was an older woman at the back, sweeping up and doing a poor job of pretending not to listen.

It was a small shop. Smaller than Eve had imagined. Granted, Suki hadn’t really gone into any amount of detail – it was more that Suki seemed so sharp and capable. She seemed better than this.

Suki caught her taking it all in and her expression hardened. “Why are you here?”

“Oh. Um. I wanted – ” She could feel herself blushing. She glanced up at the woman in the back, distracted by some mark on the floor, and stepped closer to the counter.

Suki folded her arms across her chest. “I already have a husband in prison, I don’t need a stalker as well.”

“Oh! No! I’m not – ” Eve winced a little, realising how this looked. “It’s my Godson’s birthday. Maybe you know his mum, Stacey? Stacey Slater? She lives over the square.”

An eyebrow shot up. “Yeah, I know the Slaters. Stacey’s mum stole my cardigan from the laundrette last month. I only just got it back.”

The accusation in Suki’s voice amused her. God, she was such a menace. “I would very much like to hear that story in full.” Eve gestured to the street outside. “There’s a café just across there, isn’t there?”

“I’m working.”

Eve made a point of looking around at the lack of customers. “Yeah, seems hectic.”

Suki’s glare was intimidating, but Eve stuck her hands in her pockets and stared her out and eventually, Suki sighed. “Debbie,” she called to the other woman, “Can you take over? I won’t be long.”

She let Suki take the lead. They didn’t speak until they were at the counter, ordering, and the blonde at the till told them to take a seat and she’d bring it over.

As they sat down, Eve admired the gingham print tablecloth, the neon sign on the window that read Kathy’s. “Alright, so I’ll give it to you that this place is nicer than our usual haunt.”

“That’s not difficult.”

Was it mental that she’d missed Suki’s complaining? Probably. “I’ll have you know they recently had their hygiene rating upgraded to a three.”

Suki snorted. “You wanna watch you don’t get food poisoning.”

“Wow, didn’t know you cared. So, how are you?”

“Fine,” Suki said, automatically, like she’d been waiting for the question.

To be fair, she did look fine - and older, in a beige blazer with a colourful broach and jeans, the top of her hair pinned back. The messy bun and panicked expressions she’d worn to court had made her seem smaller and more vulnerable. It occurred to Eve she had no idea what age Suki actually was.

“Here you go, ladies,” the waitress said, putting their coffees down on the table. “Oh, Suki love, I saw your Jags this morning when I was opening up. Doin’ better now, is he? I tell ya, kids don’t half know how to scare you.”

Suki tensed. “He’s fine, Kathy.”

The other woman did not take the hint. She drew Eve into the conversation. “It’s hard on kids, havin’ a parent whose banged up, I mean, they’re bound to act out.” She tutted. “Boys and their fathers, eh?”

“Yeah well, Kathy, you’d know.” The casual edge to Suki’s voice made Eve wince. “Phil still drinking, is he? Ben still biting other kids?”

“Oh, you know what, m’sorry I asked,” Kathy snapped, turning away.

They sat in silence until Kathy had angrily cleared plates and mugs from a nearby table. When she’d gone back to the counter, Eve sat forward. “Suki, I reckon she was trying to be nice there.”

“I don’t need people to be nice. I need them to mind their own business.”

“Well, is Jax alright? What happened with him?”

“It’s Jagvir and he’s fine. He’s fine. Or he would be fine, if everyone would stop fussing. If people who hardly know him would stop trying to get him to talk about how he feels and dragging the whole thing up again.”

Eve hesitated. “Eh, I dunno if that’s how it works.” She wasn’t in any position to preach but even she could recognise that was a pretty damaging way to approach mental health. “Did you two have another row?”

“Some boy at school told him his father wasn’t a hero after all. He asked me if it was true.” Suki looked away. She bit her lip. “I should have just lied.”

“No, you did the right thing.”

“I don’t feel like I did,” Suki said, sounding distant. “He ran off. I didn’t even realise until he didn’t come home for dinner. It had been hours by the time I called the police. I thought of all those shows, about time being so important when kids go missing, but none of them would take me seriously. The things that were going through my head, Eve.” Suki shook her head. “I was going mad.”

Eve had run away once as a teenager. She’d hastily packed a bag and then spent a few hours at the bus stop for a bus that never came. She couldn’t remember much about her parents' reaction when she got cold and came home. Had they even cared?

Erica had cared. Erica had been more angry with her than she’d ever been before. We’re twins! You can’t just go off without me.

“Turns out, he slept in one of his friend’s sheds,” Suki continued. “Their parents brought him home the next morning when they realised.” Her shoulders sank, like the tension was leaving her body all over again. “I could kill him now I think about it but at the time… I was just so relieved.”

“And how is he now?”

“Better. I think it scared him too - seeing me worked up and the police being there. We had a talk.” Suki rolled her eyes. “He says I need to be more honest.”

Eve scoffed. “Outrageous.”

Suki smiled then, and Eve felt a flutter in her stomach that reminded her what they were really here to talk about.

“Look, Suki. I’m sorry about - ”

Suki’s eyes widened and she glanced over her shoulder, as if the builder engrossed in his crossword two tables away gave a damn about the way their lives had become tangled up together. “Don’t,” she warned.

“Right.” Eve lowered her voice. “Well. I’m sorry. I don’t want you to think I was trying to take advantage. I wanted to be someone you could talk to. I still want that, I think, but I get it if me misreading the signals has messed that up.”

Suki ducked her head. “I shouldn’t have slapped you.”

“Well, you were in shock and you were upset - ”

Suki’s brows knitted together. “I wasn’t shocked, actually.”

Eve blinked at her. “Oh. You…weren’t?”

What did that mean?

“Look.” Suki folded her hands together on the table, next to Eve’s wrist - not touching, but close. “My life is complicated,” she said, quietly. “You don’t wanna get involved.”

“What if I do, though?” Eve asked, lifting her fingers to brush against Suki’s. A shadow of surprise ghosted across Suki’s face.

“Mum?” A voice said, from behind Eve, and Suki sprang back, putting far more distance between them than was necessary.

“Kheerat? What are you doing here? Why are you not in school?”

When Eve turned, she saw a tall teenager in a school uniform. He wore a black turban. He had Suki’s eyes.

“Teacher training today. I told you this morning, remember? You said you could do with a hand sorting the back store out. I didn’t know where you wanted me to start and Debbie said you were over here.” The boy’s eyes fell on Eve then. “Ah, sorry. Am I interrupting?”

“No. It’s fine, putt,” Suki said, meeting Eve’s eyes across the table. “Eve’s a lawyer. She’s going to look over some of the new contracts for me.”

She was a quick and believable liar. Eve didn’t know whether to be impressed or concerned.

“Oh. It’s nice to meet you, Eve.”

“Alright?” Eve said, nodding at the teenager.

“We’re finished now anyway,” Suki announced, getting to her feet. Her eyes slipped away from Eve’s. “Thanks for your time.”

Eve couldn’t let it end like this, couldn’t let Suki walk away from her again - not now she suspected Suki had actually wanted her to kiss her before. “Hang on a minute,” she said, turning towards Suki as she passed her.

Suki stopped still in her tracks. Next to her, Kheerat adjusted the strap of his backpack. They were both staring at Eve.

“Gimme your phone,” Eve said, holding out her hand. “You’ll need to give me a call when those new contracts come in, won’t you?”

Suki looked at Kheerat and then back to her. Sighing, she slipped her phone out of her back pocket and reluctantly handed it over.

She thought about saving her number under ‘Sexy Contract Lawyer’, but she was already testing a boundary and she needed Suki to feel comfortable to call her. So she went with ‘Eve Unwin’ and passed the phone back to her.

“Talk to ya soon, yeah?”

“Yeah, sure.” Suki didn’t bother to put the phone away before gesturing to Kheerat to go.

All Eve could do now was wait.

Nish’s lawyer was clicking his pen incessantly. “He says his calls haven’t been going through.”

She’d gotten rid of the landline and changed her mobile number.

“I haven't received any calls.”

“His mother said the children might be ready for a visit soon?”

Over her dead body.

“Hm, yes, they’re getting there.” Suki lifted her head up from the paperwork she’d be summoned here to sign. “Is this it? You could have scanned these across.”

“He asked that I meet with you in person.” The pen clicking stopped. “Your husband is very upset, Mrs Panesar.”

“Well, he is serving a life sentence for murder, I suppose that’s to be expected.” Suki slid the documents across the table and grabbed her handbag. “I better go.”

“It’s the isolation that he’s struggling with. He wants to see you.”

“I’m very busy. Nishandeep knows that. He’d want me to prioritise our family and the business over visiting him all the time.” That might have been the biggest lie so far. Nish would never be so selfless. Suki smiled. “But give him my best.”

She’d turned on her heel, feeling smug, and then the lawyer spoke again and ruined it. “He’s been talking about an appeal.”

“He can’t.”

“He can, legally. Look, I don’t recommend it unless we have some new evidence that would point to Usama doing something to start the fight.” The lawyer stood up. “Anything you want to get off your chest?”

Suki’s face suddenly felt very hot. “What are you talking about?”

“Nish said there was an affair. That he said it was a fight about religion was because he wanted to protect your reputation.”

“You’re joking.” Suki could feel her hands starting to shake. “Well, he’s gonna say anything, isn’t he, to make it look like a crime of passion, to get a few years knocked off his sentence? A judge will see right through him.”

“Be that as it may, he is determined. I don’t need to tell you how difficult it is to talk your husband out of something once his mind is made up.” The lawyer closed over the folder and put it in his briefcase. “I don’t need to tell you how messy this can get for you, for your family, if you aren’t on the same page. I strongly recommend you talk to him.”

The night before, she’d text Eve for the first time.

I have a meeting in town tomorrow at noon. Are you around? S

I’m wfh tomorrow. Come over when you’re finished, Eve had replied, within a few seconds. She followed up with the address of her apartment and Suki was grateful for this, because the last time she’d been there, the last thing she’d been paying attention to was the location.

Now, she stood on the doorstep, turning her phone over in her hand and trying to work up the courage to ring the buzzer.

This was stupid. It was insanity. Last time she was here, Eve kissed her. What if she did that again?

If she left now, deleted Eve’s number, she wouldn’t have to take the risk. Eve would never kiss her again. It would be over.

She rang the buzzer and Eve let her in. The living room was tidier than it was last time. It smelt like lemon. Eve had cleaned in anticipation for her coming.

“Tea? Coffee? Water?”

She was nervous enough to accept tap water.

“How was your meeting?” Eve asked, settling on the other end of the couch with her legs tucked underneath her.

“Fine, yeah, just work stuff.” The last thing Suki wanted to do was think about what the lawyer had said. She looked at her watch. “I can’t stay long. My youngest two get out at 3.”

“They’re primary school then?”

Suki nodded. She’d been vague about the kids until now, and Eve hadn’t directly asked. “Vinny’s six. Ashneet will be ten next month.”

“And the one I met the other day. Kheerat? He’s the oldest, is he?”

“He’s sixteen. Jagvir is fourteen.”

Suki had already thought about how this would go. “Oh, sh*t, you really do have your hands full,” Eve would say. “I wouldn’t wanna waste your time.”

Like Nish had said - who would want her?

But the Eve in front of her didn’t seem put off. “And do they all get on?” she asked, sounding genuinely interested.

“They have their moments.” Just this morning, she’d broken up a fight over which station the radio should be set to, during the course of which Ashneet had told Jags to go run away again, Suki had shouted at her and then Vinny had cried. In the end, Kheerat, ever the diplomat, shut it off and they ate breakfast in silence. “They do put up an excellent united front against me when they want to, though.”

Eve smiled. “I wouldn’t take it personally. Me and my sister were the same. Like cats and dogs one minute, then conspiring against our mum and dad the next.”

On the bookshelf was a white framed picture of two smiling Eve’s. Suki got up to examine it. “Hm. And you’re gonna to tell me that it’s different now you’re older? That you’re all close?”

“Uh, no, actually.” Eve nodded to the picture in Suki’s hands. “Erica. My sister. My twin sister. She died.”

“Oh, Eve. That’s - I’m so sorry.” Now that she examined at the photo properly, she could see that it was clearly dated. Eve and Erica looked young and wild and brimming with joy. “What happened to her?”

Eve leaned forward, her elbows on her knees as she rubbed her jaw. “She was hit by a car when we were seventeen.”

Suki put the photograph back down. “That’s awful. I can’t imagine.” She didn’t have any siblings herself, but she did have a daughter who had a terrifying tendency to dart across the road without looking both ways. “Your poor parents. I don’t know how you’d ever get over something like that.”

“Yeah. We - fell out, shortly after. We don’t talk now.”

Of course. Other than one of her and Stacey Slater, dressed up for a wedding or something, there were no other photographs in the room. Suki felt a twist in her chest. She’d thought Eve’s baggage had been from some past relationship or an identity crisis. She hadn’t realised it was grief.

“You don’t talk because it’s too painful?”

Eve tensed. “That and they couldn’t accept that I’m gay.”

Suki didn’t know what to say to that. She looked down at her hands. A second ago, she’d wanted to comfort Eve. Touch her arm, where her sleeve ended, squeeze her bicep and tell her she was strong for carrying on with her life after losing so much.

Now, that word hung between them. Gay. It made the space too thick to cross.

Eve seemed to want to move on, anyway. She excused herself to go get a drink and returned after a minute that stretched into two with a beer and eyes that were just a little bloodshot.

“So,” she said, with a fake smile. Seeing Eve put her pain away so quickly made Suki feel worse for letting the moment pass without comforting her. “What about your folks? Are they around?”

“They moved back to Mumbai when my father retired. Ever since Nishandeep got sentenced they’ve been begging me to move there.”

Every Sunday when they called now, it was the same. Sukhwinder, your mother is sick with worry. Sukhwinder, the boys need your father to guide them or they’ll grow up to be soft and spoiled. The children will do just fine in Indian schools, it is silly to coddle them like you do. It’s only a silly shop and you are too prideful.

“I’m sure they just want to help you out.”

“More like they don’t think it’s right I live in my home without a man. That I run my business without a man.” Suki sighed. “They talk about what’s expected and what’s proper but I think it’s just their way of saying they don’t think I can do this on my own.”

It hurt so much only because it hadn’t always been that way. When she was younger, her parents used to praise her for being so smart, so strong-willed. But Nish had been her choice, not theirs, and now it was clear they no longer trusted her judgement.

Eve nudged her shoulder against Suki’s. “Well, you’re showing them, aren’t you? I mean, you’re doing it.”

Suki couldn’t help but smile a little. It was nice to have someone encourage her. It was nicer still to have Eve sitting so close, feeling the warmth from her body, smelling the light notes of her shampoo.

“Sometimes I think it would be nice to have their help. But then I think about what I’d have to give up.”

“The business you mean?”

“I know it’s selfish. But Nish didn’t want my input before. I had to learn how to play him, make him think my ideas were his, you know?”

“I’m glad you don’t have to do that anymore,” Eve said, quietly. “And it’s not selfish, to want to be financially independent, or to be ambitious. To enjoy your freedom. You shouldn’t feel guilty for those things.” Eve put her beer down on the coffee table. “You shouldn’t feel guilty for being here with me, either. But you do, don’t you? That’s why you didn’t kiss me back?”

“You don’t understand.”

“Make me.” Eve’s hand slipped over Suki’s. It was warm and soft but it didn’t hold her tight, like she couldn’t get away. She felt dizzy. “Suki, I want to understand.”

“The man my husband killed…it was because he thought we were having an affair. But we weren’t.” Eve’s frown deepened. Before she could rush to reassure her - and she would, wouldn’t she, because Eve was kind and seemed determined to explain away all of her faults in a way no one else ever had - Suki finally told the truth. “It was his wife.”

“Oh.” Eve didn’t drop her hand and flinch away. She stared for a moment, thinking. “The woman in the hijab? The one you were arguing with in the bathroom that day in court?”

“It wasn’t anything. I didn’t do anything. It was just feelings. Thoughts. That’s it.” She could hear the panic in her voice, but she didn’t know how to reel it in now she’d let it out. Eve’s thumb stroked across her knuckles, and a new kind of panic set in. “I’ve never felt that way before. Or I hadn’t. Until - ”

Until you.

She couldn’t say it out loud, but Eve didn’t need her to. There was a little smile tugging at the corner of Eve’s lips.

“I’ve thought about you,” Suki said, confessions rushing out of her now she’d started. “About how you make me feel so still. About how I wish - I wish I’d been brave enough to kiss you back.”

Eve’s other hand brushed against Suki’s cheek. It was such a gentle touch. She wanted to get lost in the feeling. “I reckon you’re braver than you think.”

She knew Eve wasn’t going to make the first move twice. That was fine. She didn’t need Eve to. She just needed Eve to kiss her back.

And she did.

Chapter 5

Chapter Text

Eve had never dated anyone with kids.

She had certainly never dated anyone who had four kids, a business, a social calendar packed with community obligations and a phobia of stepping out of the closet for even one night.

“This is how it has to be with me,” Suki had told her, when they were breathless from kissing on her couch. “It has to be a secret. You know that, don’t you?”

Eve hadn’t wanted to hash it out then. She wanted to kiss Suki again. So she’d pressed their foreheads together, bumped their noses, and told her to stop worrying.

“You’re getting ahead of yourself. You’re allowed to have fun.”

And it was fun. Finding out Suki liked to put her hand on her throat while they kissed was fun. Talking on the phone about their respective days, bitching about Judges and customers, was fun. Taking the tube down to Walford late one night a week to hold Suki in her kitchen and learn all the different ways to make her smile was fun.

But there were also parts that were not fun - like having to leave hastily when a tired little voice called out “Māmī!” from the landing, or spending her weekends alone but not wanting to go out on the town with her mates in case Suki called and she missed it, or the need that was starting to build now when they kissed and touched, the desire to make love to Suki, cut off by the frustration of knowing even the smallest discussion of the logistics of that would send the other woman into a blind panic, and then it would be over.

Eve had never felt ashamed of being a lesbian, but she was very aware of other people’s shame about it. It was why she hadn’t let herself wait around for her parents to struggle towards begrudging acceptance. Maybe they would have got there eventually, but by then, the damage had already been done. She was too proud to stay somewhere she wasn’t properly wanted, even if that meant she was on her own.

Or that had been her philosophy, before she realised how much she liked being with Suki.

In trying not to think about it, Eve was filling her free time as best she could. She got last minute tickets to a Frozen matinee for her and Stacey and Lily and tried not to wonder if Suki’s younger kids - who she’d yet to actually meet - would like the show. After, they went for pizza and when Lily was engrossed in her iPad, Stacey turned to Eve and said, “So, are you gonna tell me what all this is about?”

“What, I can’t just wanna spend time with my best mate and Goddaughter?”

Lily wasn’t actually her Goddaughter, but that didn’t matter. She’d been in her life since she was a toddler.

“Course you can, but come on, Eve. Can barely get you to come over for dinner most weeks.”

“Aw, Stace -”

“I’m not starting. I know you’re busy with work an all. But this,” Stacey waved her hand, “is out of character.”

Eve wiped her hands on a napkin and thought for a moment. “When you and Martin were dating, was it hard? I mean, cause you had Lil.”

“I dunno. I suppose, yeah. You hear about weirdos who target single mums to get at their kids, don’t you?”

“Hm.”

“Why, what’s that - oh God, you're dating a woman with a kid, aren’t you?”

“You wanna do the lottery, you.” Eve sighed. “She has a couple of kids. And her life is complicated. She was married. Well, she still is, actually, but it’s not - oh Stace, don’t look at me like that!”

“This is bonkers, Eve! A married woman. With kids! Have you lost your mind? Does her wife know?”

“Eh, husband and no, but it’s not -”

“- husband!” This time, Stacey couldn’t keep her voice low. Lily looked up from her iPad. “Eve, tell me you’re not chasing after some closet case.”

“It’s not like that.”

It was exactly like that and it was depressing.

“So what, she says she’s gonna leave her husband and kids to be with you?”

Eve rolled her eyes. “Well it’s not the 1800s, so she doesn’t have to leave her kids. And her husband’s not around, so it’s not an issue.”

“Oh, even better then. You gonna step up and do the school run? Pack the lunches? You had to set an alarm on your phone to remember to water a plant and you still killed it.” Stacey frowned, then, like she’d realised how harsh she sounded. “I’m not trynna be mean. But you need to think this through. Eve, this woman - if she’s any kind of mother, she’s gonna put her kids first. And that means you’re always gonna come second.”

“I know that, mate, I’m not stupid.”

Stacey nodded at Lily. “And it means that if she’s taking time away from her kids to be with you, then she must think this thing you have is worth it. She must be serious about you. Are you ready for that?”

In reality, Suki really wasn’t really taking time away from her kids at all. She had no reason to: Eve was embarrassingly willing to squeeze into whatever free space she had in her day.

And maybe, as far as Suki was concerned, Eve really wasn’t worth it.

Lily asked to sit on her shoulders on the way to the tube station. When they hugged goodbye, Stacey pulled back to look at her.

“Look, if you’re serious about this mystery woman of yours, then don’t let what I said put you off, yeah? You’re great with kids and they’d be lucky to have you. Just - be careful. You don’t need to be with somebody who hides you away.”

That night, when Suki called, Eve didn’t answer right away. She let it ring a whole two times. Baby steps.

“Can we have lunch together this week?” she asked, after their usual chit-chat had subsided.

“Lunch?”

“Yeah, you know, the meal in the middle of the day.” Suki didn’t lean into her teasing. There was silence on the other end of the phone, save for the sound of Suki’s washing machine in the background. Eve desperately wanted to back track, but Stacey was right - she didn’t want to hide. “I was thinking maybe the caf across from the shop?”

“Kathy’s?”

Suki’s increasingly appalled one-word reactions were starting to grate on Eve. She clicked her tongue. “Yeah. I just thought, well, it’s handy for you. You don’t have to worry about being away from the shop for too long. Tuesday or Wednesday would suit me. What do you think?” More silence. “Suki?” she pressed.

Suki cleared her throat. “It’s very…public.”

“Hardly. It’s small. And it was quiet that day we were in.”

“Quiet to you, maybe, but the regulars are my neighbours.”

Eve couldn’t believe she was having this conversation. She was too old to be badgering someone for scraps like this. It made her head ache.

“Yeah, God forbid they see you having a sandwich with another woman, they’d be running you off with pitchforks.”

“Eve, I told you this had to be - ”

“- a secret, yeah, I know.” She let out the breath she was holding. “I just didn’t realise that meant we couldn’t ever be seen together in public.”

“You said you liked how things are.” Suki had the audacity to sound annoyed. At her.

“I did. It was sexy, sneaking around.” Eve paused. “A month ago.”

“Oh, bored already, are you?” Suki didn’t sound annoyed anymore. She sounded hurt.

“That’s not what I said - ” she was cut off by the jingle of her phone exiting a call. Suki had hung up.

She immediately called her back, but Suki didn’t answer, so she put her phone face down on her bedside table and forced herself to shower, eat, water the stupid plant she always forgot about, anything that meant she wasn’t staring at it waiting for Suki to call. By the time she was jimming with the charger, she had no way of stopping herself sending a text.

She typed out, Sorry about earlier, but she wasn’t, so she deleted it. Then she agonised for another minute about what she did want to say, before settling on I don’t want you to be upset.

In the same exact second as it sent, a message came in from Suki. Are you mad at me?

Eve sent a laughing emoji. Suki was typing. Then she wasn’t. Then she was again.

Eve could picture her hunched over her phone in her kitchen (mostly because she had yet to see the rest of her house), her brows knitted together, her tongue wetting her lips as she thought about what she wanted to say.

I’m trying.

It made Eve feel like sh*t. She knew Suki had been through a lot - the more they’d talked, the more she’d realised how much. It was clear Suki’s husband had been emotionally abusive and that she was still working through that in ways Eve would probably never understand.

I know, Eve shot back. I’m not mad. I miss you a bit, though.

She didn’t let herself overthink the last bit- just clicked send and then covered her eyes. It had only been three days since they’d last seen each other. Was it unhinged to say she missed her? Was this going to prompt Suki to lose it completely?

Suki responded with, Just a bit?

Eve smirked. f*ck. She was so screwed.

Goodnight Eve, the next message read. And then, Miss you too. A bit.

“It’s in South London, so you won’t need to worry about bumping into anyone from round here. And it’ll be in the dark, so even if our knees brush no one has to know.”

Suki had quite enjoyed Eve’s careful pitch. “It sounds lovely.” It really did - a little indie cinema was showing her favourite bollywood movie as part of some film festival. She wanted to go. She wanted to go with Eve. But. “I can’t get a babysitter for tomorrow night. It’s too short notice.”

“Can’t Nish’s mum have them?”

“So I can go on a date?”

Eve pulled a face. “Yeah, ok, fair. I could ask Stacey.”

She shuddered at the thought of leaving her kids with the Slaters, much less how she would explain to them why they were being left with the Slaters. “Absolutely not.”

“Well. They could always come with us.”

“On a school night? It doesn’t even start till eight.” Suki sighed. “I’m sorry, Eve. I really would have - ”

“ - Alright, mum?” Naturally, her eldest children chose that moment to come saddling into the shop. There was something to be said about their timing.

“Hey, Eve.” This was Kheerat and Eve’s third meeting. He’d caught them sharing a bottle of wine in the kitchen one evening when she thought he was already upstairs. They’d told him they were celebrating closing a contract. “Jags, this is mum’s lawyer friend I was telling you about.”

Eve glanced at Suki. She had no idea what Kheerat had been telling Jagvir, but whatever it was, it didn’t seem to have stuck. He shrugged vaguely and nodded at her. “Alright? Ooh, what’s that?” he pointed at the brochure for the film festival Eve had brought with her.

“It’s nothing, putt.”

Eve passed the flyer over, open on the page about the Umrao Jaan showing. “Just me trying to get your mum out of the house for an evening.”

Immediately, Jagvir’s eyes widened in recognition. “That’s your favourite.”

Kheerat looked over the top of his brother’s head. “You should go, mum.”

Eve turned to her, smirking.

“I can’t. It’s tomorrow. And it’s fine, I’ve seen it a hundred times anyway - ”

“ - yeah but not in the cinema.” Jagvir handed the brochure back to Eve. “Have you seen it?”

“Nope.” Eve put her hand over her heart and hung her head dramatically. “And I never will if your mum has anything to do with it.”

Suki scoffed, but Jagvir laughed. “Aw see! You have to go.”

“They’re right, mum,” Kheerat interjected, wrestling with his school tie and side-stepping his brother to head toward the storeroom and dump his school bag. “You never get to do anything. We can manage Vinny and Ash for one night, can’t we?”

Jagvir nodded. “Course.”

Eve looked delighted with this development. Suki folded her arms across her chest, unconvinced. “And who’s going to manage you two?”

“Mum, I’m sixteen.”

Jagvir smirked. “Yeah, you were basically married at that age.”

Suki held up her finger to Jagvir in warning. “Ey, I was eighteen, actually.”

“Bet you weren’t as wise as me,” Kheerat teased. Suki looked up at her oldest, towering over her, his pagri making him even taller.

“Not even close,” she admitted with a sigh, giving his cheek a quick pinch. She turned back to Eve. “Fine. Go on then.”

Eve broke into a grin that was far too wide for that of a lawyer friend, but the boys had gone on through to the back, already too busy chatting about something some teacher at school said to notice.

“I think I might love your kids.”

Suki smiled. “I take full credit for how brilliant they are, obviously.”

“Obviously. Right, gotta get off. Jean’s making sausage surprise and I said I’d call in. I’ll order the tickets. Call you later and we can work out a plan.” As she left, Eve winked at her, and Suki felt the flutter in her stomach that sometimes happened when they were kissing, or when Eve was touching her face, or when they bumped noses.

Eve made her feel a lot more than butterflies. She wanted her. Sometimes, when they were together, it took every ounce of restraint not to grab Eve’s hand and put it under her blouse, or press into her hip firmly enough that she’d take the hint and unbutton her trousers. In the shower one morning, she touched herself and imagined she was touching Eve.

She was losing her f*cking mind.

So maybe they would go see the film and Eve would love it and they would discuss it at length because they were both wired like that. Or, maybe, she would flirt with Eve on the tube, lean into her a little more than she absolutely had to, and they would decide that actually, they should go to Eve’s apartment instead. Umrao Jaan was probably on YouTube anyway.

Either way, Suki was prepared to have a great night. She put on a nice blouse, some earrings, more eyeshadow than she would usually. And just as she was debating whether dark lipstick was too obvious, Vinny burst into her bedroom.

“My tummy hurts.”

She stared at his little sad face in the vanity mirror. “Did you have sweets at school?”

“No.” He pouted. Sceptical, Suki pressed her palm flat against his forehead. Sure enough, it was hot to the touch.

sh*t.

She quickly ushered him downstairs to the kitchen and then popped him up on the counter while she dug around for the digital thermometer. She held the laser at various distances from his forehead all to the same result. He had a fever.

“Well, he’ll be alright with Kheerat, won’t he?”

She’d already had this debate with her oldest before getting through to Eve. “No. That wouldn’t be fair.” It was one thing to leave Kheerat in charge while she went across the square to close up the shop, or when the kids were already in bed. It was another to expect him to play nurse to his little brother while she went on a date. “I’d be glued to my phone all night, anyway, worrying about them.”

“Alright, so maybe we can go somewhere closer to home. Dinner? Or a drink in the Vic?”

“I can’t, Eve. He’s only six. He’s ill and he needs his mum.” Even as they spoke, Vinny was upstairs in her bed, miserably clutching a teddy bear and being fussed over by Ashneet. “I’m sorry, OK? I was really looking forward to tonight, too.”

“Were you? Cause it’s the third time I’ve tried to organise something and something always comes up.”

“I have - ”

“- Four kids. A business. Your faith. Yeah, Suki, I know where I am on the list.”

Sometimes, the eight years between them felt like nothing. Sometimes, it felt like too much. “Eve,” she started.

“Forget about it. I should let you go.”

She meant from the call, but for one split second, Suki panicked anyway. “I’ll call you later?”

“Don’t bother. I’m going out.” She heard Eve sigh. “Look, I hope Vinny feels better. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

Vinny’s fever broke around 3am, after he’d vomited twice and fallen asleep in her lap. Suki looked at her phone and wondered if Eve was home yet. She pictured her stumbling into her apartment with some young woman wrapped around her, her hands in Eve’s hair as Eve tugged greedily at her clothes. A woman with less baggage. A woman who could just have sex with Eve tonight and go out to breakfast with her tomorrow like it was nothing.

It didn’t help that Eve didn’t text until the following afternoon. She asked how Vinny was, but was dry otherwise, responding with yeah, it was alright when Suki asked how her night had been.

After two days of torturing herself with images of Eve and mystery women - who looked nothing like her - Suki sprang to action.

Are you free Sunday? Eve saw it but didn’t reply. Suki followed up with, I’ll have the house to myself. And then, as one last desperate measure, I’ll cook.

What time?

Suki grinned. 2 please.

At 1:30pm, she was fussing about the food - was there too much? what if Eve couldn’t handle the spices? should she have cooked a meat dish? - when there was a knock on her back door. She opened it, expecting a neighbour asking to borrow something and instead finding Eve, looking impossibly attractive in a dark sheer shirt, holding a bottle of wine. “Hi.”

A sudden rush of nerves made her stomach flip. “You’re early,” she said, a little flustered. Eve was always late.

Eve blinked at her. “Uh, sorry. Are the kids still here? Do you want me to come back in a bit?”

The kids were visiting Nish’s side of the family for the day, but that wasn’t the point. The food wasn’t ready. She was still in her slippers, for God’s sake, and she hadn’t fully committed to the red blouse she was wearing. Now, taking in Eve, she wished she’d gone for something lower cut, something more fitted.

In any case, Eve was here now. If she sent her away, they'd just end up having another row and that wouldn’t help. Suki stepped aside to let her in. “No. I just - wasn’t expecting you yet.”

“Yeah, they’re doing work on the line and I didn’t wanna risk being massively delayed.” Eve looked around the kitchen. “Wow, it smells amazing. Can I help?”

“No,” she said, bluntly, and Eve laughed.

“Alright, well at least let me pour some wine.”

“No, I’ll do it.” Suki took two wine glasses out of the cupboard. “Give it here.”

“Is everything alright? You didn’t have to go to any trouble, you know.”

But she did - because if she was going to compete with young and uncomplicated and public then it had to be perfect.

Eve was standing so close to her then, destabilising her even more. “Suki?” she said, gently. “What’s wrong?”

She shouldn’t ask. She shouldn’t ask.

She had to know.

“Did you sleep with someone else when you went out the other night?”

Eve took a step back. “What?”

“I’m not tryna fight with you. This thing is hardly exclusive, is it? You’re allowed to.” Suki picked up the wine bottle, just for something to do with her hands that would make her seem more nonchalant than she felt. “I can’t be mad, can I?”

Eve looked baffled. “Course I didn’t.”

“Why not?” Now that she had started spiralling, Suki was struggling to regain her composure. Her voice was too light, too shaky. She wrestled a bit with the lid of the wine. “I can’t imagine you have any trouble picking up women. So was there just no one there who was your type? What is your type, anyway?”

Eve took the bottle off her and put it back on the table. “Suki, what are you going on about?”

She folded her arms and ducked her head. She felt small and silly then, in her slippers in her kitchen in the middle of the day, trying and failing in her great plan to seduce Eve. “We haven’t had sex.”

Eve nodded, slowly. “And?”

Suki wanted to scream. Tears pricked in her eyes. “Don’t you want to?”

“Are you joking? Course I do!” Suki looked up at Eve then, comforted by how sincere she looked. Comforted even more when Eve took her hand and leaned in. “I’ve been waiting for you to be ready. I didn’t want you to feel like I’m pressuring you.”

“Why would I feel pressured?”

Eve drew back, her eyes on Suki in a different, more cautious way. “I dunno. Sometimes the way you talk about Nish - I get the impression that it wasn’t always consensual.”

Suki turned the implication over her mind. She’d never let herself think about it too much. She was his wife. She had a duty. In the grand scheme of things, it was worth it to have her children.

“I’m sorry.” Eve squeezed her hand. “I didn’t mean to make you go there. I just want you to understand why I’ve been waiting for you to make the next move. I know I’ve been pushy about going on a date, but the intimacy stuff is different - I can be patient, Suki. I can wait.”

How had Eve known that sex with Nish had been difficult for her? How had Eve known she was having a panic attack, that first day in court? How had she found and named her pain so quickly when for years, everyone else in her life looked right through it?

Was it because Eve saw her, not as a daughter or a wife or a mother, but as a woman?

“I can’t be patient,” Suki admitted. She ran her hand up Eve’s neck, combed through the back of her hair with her fingers. “I want you, Eve. I want you.”

Eve’s smile was perfect, but not too perfect to hold Suki back from kissing her. Hard.

It didn’t take long for the intensity to kick in. As Eve kissed her neck, Suki twisted her arm, turning off dials on the oven. Somehow, Eve managed to catch what she was doing. She pulled back to chuckle.

“What about dinner?”

“I don’t care,” Suki said, working the buttons of Eve’s shirt. Her fingers were brushing against the pink skin of Eve’s chest. She could see the outline of her bra under her tank top. God.

Why had Eve stopped kissing her?

“You put all this effort in,” Eve started, gesturing and Suki quickly yanked Eve’s hands back to her waist, where they were supposed to be.

“I don’t care,” she said again, more of a growl this time, and it would have been embarrassing if Eve weren’t eyeing her with so much admiration.

“I should have known you’d be this demanding.”

Suki didn’t even care to think of a clever response. She was already leading Eve out of the kitchen, up the stairs, to her bedroom.

Touching Suki was her new favourite thing.

Not even her new favourite thing about them. Just generally. In life.

“When I said you’re allowed to sleep with other women?” Suki breathed, arching against Eve, needy and beautiful. “I didn’t mean it.”

Eve laughed. “I know.”

She hadn’t considered it before and there was no chance of it now. How was anything else gonna compare to this? Granted, Suki was not the first woman to come in her arms, moaning against her shoulder, but she was the first woman Eve just had to kiss on the cheek after. And then her forehead. And then her other cheek.

When Suki’s giggles morphed into a cry, she drew back and touched her chin. “Hey, hey. What’s this?”

“I’m happy.”

Eve stroked her hand over Suki’s and smiled. She understood. She hadn’t realised how much she’d been coasting through life, feeling numb or angry or just alright, until they found each other nine weeks ago. She felt so awake now. She felt grounded.

“Me too,” she said.

If they hadn’t been kissing, maybe they would have registered the knock on the bedroom door sooner. Maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference - after all, there was barely ten seconds between the knock and Kheerat slinging it open with a casual, “Hey, Mum,” that promptly trailed off when his eyes fell on them.

Suki gasped and shot up in bed covering herself with the duvet. Eve rolled away. She watched as Suki struggled to choke out her son’s name, then watched the teenager shake his head and walk out of the room.

Eve reached for Suki’s hand. Suki recoiled from her touch.

“Ok. Ok. So I know this feels like a disaster right now, but - ” Suki pulled on a dressing gown, tying it with shaky hands. She went after Kheerat while Eve was still speaking.

Eve had never gotten dressed so quickly in her life. As she came down the stairs, she could hear hushed voices. She assumed they were speaking Punjabi.

Suki met her in the hall with a faraway look in her eyes. “You need to go.”

Kheerat was staring at her from the kitchen. He looked no less horrified now he was downstairs. Eve wanted to say something to him, but she had no idea what.

“Now,” Suki said, walking past her to the front door. “Please.”

She followed her lead, but as she crossed the threshold, she shook her head. “Look, don’t panic. Just breathe, yeah? It’s fine. It’s gonna be fine.”

Suki looked at her numbly. “Goodbye, Eve.”

No one had ever literally shut a door in her face before - and even if they had, Eve doubted it would feel this gutting.

She rubbed her jaw with her hand as she turned away, feeling like she’d been slapped all over again.

What was gonna happen now? Was Suki gonna block her number, pretend she didn’t exist, right when things had finally been so perfect for a minute there?

“Eve?” Stacey crossed the square quickly to get to her. “I didn’t know you were coming down today. What’s happened?”

“I think I love her, Stace.”

Stacey looked around. “Who? Your mystery woman? The one with the husband and kids? Did you come all the way down here - ” Only then did Stacey realise which house Eve had just stumbled out of. Her mouth fell open. “Oh you’re having a laugh. Not Suki Panesar!”

Tears welled in Eve’s eyes. “Mate, I think I love her and she’s push me away. She’s gonna end things, I know it.”

It wasn’t fun at all anymore. Suki was going to reject her, like everyone else.

Chapter 6

Chapter Text

“Water?” Suki said, as she poured herself a glass. She leaned against the sink, her back to her son.

Kheerat was sat at the kitchen table, still and silent. It was so unlike him that she had to glance over her shoulder to make sure he hadn’t snuck out just as quickly as he’d snuck in.

“Why are you back so early from your Dadi-Ji’s anyway?”

“They were slagging you off. Dadi-ji and the aunties. I couldn’t sit there and listen to it anymore.”

She felt a flicker of pride at his loyalty. Surely that meant she had done something right? Surely their bond was too strong to be undone by this?

She took a sip of water and then smoothed down her hair. It was frizzy from laying down. She should tie it up. “I’ll get dressed, then make us some tea.”

“It doesn’t matter what you’re wearing or what we have to drink.” Kheerat looked up at her, confusion splayed across his face. “Mum, what did I just see?”

“It was a mistake. People make mistakes, Kheerat.”

“You were in bed with…a woman.” Kheerat grimaced. “You’re my mum. You’re married to my dad. What about what you believe? What we all believe?”

Suki sat down at the table across from him and shook her head. “I’m sorry.”

Kheerat’s eyes narrowed on her. “Are you gay?”

“No!”

“Bisexual, then?”

“No. No, I’m not. I’m your mother. And I made an awful mistake but it didn’t mean anything. It was nothing.” Even as she protested this, she felt an ache forming inside her. She lied all the time. Why did this one hurt so much? “You have to believe me, putt. It won’t happen again.”

“It didn’t look like nothing.” Kheerat sat forward, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Look, whatever this is between you and Eve. Whatever's going on with you. You need to talk to the Gyani.”

Suki’s breath hitched. “I can’t do that.”

“That’s what he’s there for, mum. Guidance. Counsel.”

When Nish was first arrested, the gurdwara seemed to be the only place Kheerat found peace. He persuaded her to go back when she was worried everyone would stare. It was ironic, really, that she had raised such a faithful son and yet had managed to stray so far from religion herself.

“And if, after that, this is really how you feel - if you and Eve aren’t a one time thing? We need to know.”

“We?” Suki echoed.

“You promised Jags you wouldn’t hide things from us anymore.” Before Suki could protest, Kheerat’s hand covered her own. “We’ve already lost dad. If you keep lying - this family will fall apart again. I won’t let that happen.”

After that, she got dressed and left Kheerat to finish off dinner while she went to get the kids. She put them in the car, then doubled back to channel her pain into a row with Nish’s sisters on the doorstep. In a phone call from prison, Nish had told them all about his plans for appeal and his unfaithful wife who made the perfect scapegoat. If Jagvir, Ashneet or Parvinder heard their aunties call their mother a whor*, they didn’t let on. No one spoke on the drive home.

The next day, she was re-arranging the entire shop when Stacey Slater came in.

“The cereals are at the back now. Top shelf,” she said, only glancing up briefly from where she was hunched down, stacking the washing up liquid.

“I’m not ‘ere for cereal. You need to stop mucking my best mate about.”

“Keep your voice down,” Suki warned, horrified. Eve had told Stacey about them? What was she thinking?

“No, I won’t. Eve’s a good person an she’s been through a lot, and she deserves someone who’s gonna make a real go of things with her.”

Suki turned back to the washing up liquid. She stared at the wall. “Stay out of it, Stacey.”

“No, because she’s too head over heels to tell you this but you need to hear it.” Suki should be concerned about how loud Stacey was still being. And she was. It was just hard to get past the idea of Eve being head over heels for her. “I bet you’re not even a lesbian, are ya? Whatever game you’re playing with her, I’m tellin’ you, you better pack it in.”

She’d already stopped. Stopped answering Eve’s calls, stopped thinking about her in the shower, stopped wondering about her with other women. Kheerat was right. She couldn’t risk her family falling apart again.

Half-term came at the perfect time. She left Debbie the keys to the shop and took up the invitation extended by her friend Polka to finally go visit her in Edinburgh. She could focus on her kids, not think about Eve or Nish’s appeal. She could run away, just for a bit.

Kheerat and Jagvir acted as though she was ruining their lives for dragging them away from their friends and playstation for three whole days, but Polka had a pretty neighbor about their age that managed to soften the blow.

Ashneet, on the other hand, was thrilled by new sights, checking things off the list she’d made before coming, taking endless photos on her digital camera, soaking in every museum and show.

“It’s like I’ve gone back in time twenty-five years,” Polka joked.

Suki and Polka were old friends. They’d gone to school together, but then Polka had gone on to Uni and Suki hadn’t and then life happened and they fell out of touch. When she heard that Nish had been arrested, Polka had called Suki in the middle of the night and asked if she needed somewhere to go. Suki had declined, but since then, they called each other regularly, mostly to complain about their mothers or their children.

Polka’s daughter was Vinny’s age and they played together nicely enough, but Suki couldn’t help but notice the differences between them. Farah was chattier, more confident, not as needy.

“Girls develop faster than boys, don’t they?” Polka reasoned, when she pointed it out, but Suki knew it wasn’t that. She’d been watching the kind of mother her friend was - how she gave affection so easily, answered Farah’s questions so openly, was firm without having to raise her voice.

As much as Suki wished it weren’t true, the mistakes she’d made had shaped the people her children were turning into. If she’d waited until she was older to start a family, or if she’d had them with someone she actually loved, their lives could have been so different.

On their last night in Scotland, she sat on Polka’s doorstep and watched Ashneet, Farah and Vinny on the trampoline.

“Not a care in the world, eh?” Polka said, passing her a mug of chai and sitting down next to her.

“Hm. It’s been good for them, getting away for a bit.” It was true. Ashneet hadn’t mentioned her father the entire time they’d been here, which was a new record. The previous night, Vinny had fallen asleep with his brothers instead of crawling into bed with her. “Thank you, again, for having us.”

Polka waved her off. “I wish you’d visit more. I worry about you, you know. You were always too good at keeping everything bottled up.”

Suki looked down at her mug. “Was I?”

She had trouble remembering the person she was before Nish. She supposed that’s what she got for getting married so young.

“Yeah. You were. I know I keep saying it, but God, Ash reminds me so much of you. I mean look at her, bossing the other two around.”

She squinted at the sun as she looked up at Vinny and Farah standing back against the netting obediently to observe Ashneet’s stunts. She couldn’t recall ever having her daughter’s nerve. “You’d think I wouldn’t find her so difficult, then. If she’s so like me, how come I never know what she’s thinking?”

“You were like that, too,” Polka mused. “Especially as we got to be teenagers.”

She felt safe here, with Polka, and because of this, the question had slipped out of her before she could stop it. “Did you ever think there might be something…different about me?”

Polka stilled. “What, like, mentally? Not until you married Nishandeep.”

Suki gave a soft laugh to hide the disappointment. What had she expected Polka to say? She took a sip of chai. “I’ve missed your brutal honesty.”

She could feel Polka staring at her.

“Can I be brutally honest now then? And you won’t go off on one?“

Suki frowned. “Go on.”

“I always thought you were a lesbian. Or - I suppose when you got married, I assumed you were bisexual.” Polka waved her hand, like she hadn’t just upended Suki’s entire sense of self with one statement. “Or something like that, anyway. There’s different labels for it now than there was when we were growing up.”

Suki put down her mug and ran her hands up and down her thighs. The chill in the air was more obvious to her now.

How did you know?

She cleared her throat, but still sounded strangled when she asked, “Why did you think that?”

“It was probably silly things that started it. The music you liked, the way you held yourself. And then it was bigger things. You weren’t interested in boys - which was fine, some girls our age weren’t - but you pretended to be. And you really went for it too - it was like you were repeating lines you’d read from a magazine or seen in a film.”

It should have spurred her to defensiveness. She should be pushing back, telling Polka she didn’t know what she was talking about. She should be denying it.

But all Suki could think was her exchange with Stacey, when she’d accused her of mucking Eve about. I bet you’re not even a lesbian, are ya?

It had stuck with her. She’d started to wonder if Nadia was just an escape from her miserable marriage, if she was just so drawn to Eve because she was paying her attention. What if it wasn’t that she wanted to be with a woman and just that she didn’t want to be her husband’s wife anymore?

To hear Polka say out loud that she’d always suspected Suki was attracted to women was scary. But on some level, it was validating too. Maybe she wasn’t a horrible person. Maybe the thing with Eve was as real as it had seemed.

Polka put her hand on Suki’s knee. “You were a great friend, Suki, but you were really intense sometimes - like you were pouring yourself into us. I thought maybe it was because you didn’t have anywhere to put your…I dunno, your passion, I guess.”

The women she was closest to nowadays were Haspira, the wife of Nish’s oldest friend, and Barminder, who gave good business advice when Suki had been desperate enough to ask for it. The three of them spent time together at the gurdwara and asked about each other’s kids and sometimes had a laugh together at the expense of the men, but Nish had always been quick to remind her they weren’t her friends. The more time passed, the clearer it was to Suki just how hard he had worked to make her distrust the people around her.

“What about now?” she asked, turning to Polka. “Do you still think that I might be…?”

She couldn’t say the word, but Polka knew what she meant.

“Well, when I called you after Nish got arrested, you didn’t sound like someone who’d just lost the love of their life. You were more upset about what the poor man’s wife would think.”

Suki felt her cheeks burn.

“I’m not judging,” Polka said, kindly. “I wish I’d said something, when we were younger, but it wasn’t something you could go around asking. Everyone says it’s such a personal thing.”

Suki swallowed back the lump in her throat. “Yeah. It is.”

Polka tutted and put her arm around Suki’s shoulder. Suki let herself lean against her friend. For the first time in a long time, she felt relief.

Eve shouldn’t let her in.

She knew this, when the buzzer to her apartment went and she heard Suki’s voice through the intercom. “It’s me, Eve.”

They hadn’t talked in two weeks. She’d called Suki more times than she wanted to admit. She’d even sent her one embarrassing text message when she was really drunk, where she’d spelt ‘special’ wrong. Suki had left her on read.

“Stacey said you went off somewhere.” She put the kettle on and tried not to look at the other woman. “Mumbai?”

“God, no. How mad do you think I am?” Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Suki untying her coat and taking it off. “We went to Edinburgh for a few days; stayed with a friend.”

Eve braced herself against the counter as the kettle boiled. “You didn’t have to go to Scotland to get away from me, you know. I’m not gonna hound you.”

“Aren’t ya?” The teasing in Suki’s tone wasn’t doing much to soothe Eve’s hurt. “You had my phone blowing up there for a bit.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll block the number if you want.”

Suki leaned against the counter, to face her. “You know that’s not what I want.”

Eve scoffed. “How could I possibly know that? You don’t even know yourself.”

“I’m sorry I freaked out like I did. I’m sorry I didn’t take your calls. I had to make sure we didn’t traumatize Kheerat. And I’ve been figuring some things out, about…myself.” Suki reached up to tuck a strand of Eve’s hair behind her hair, then her hand lingered there, at the side of her face. It wasn’t fair how much her body wanted to lean into the touch. “I told you, didn’t I, that my life is complicated?”

“So just talk to me. Why do you have to make it worse by shutting down?”

“I don’t know. But I don’t want to do it anymore. Not with you.” Suki’s hands moved to hold Eve’s face. “Next time, I’ll talk to you. I promise.”

Eve had lost enough sleep over the last two weeks to be offended Suki took for granted that there would be a next time. She felt like a sap.

“I want you, Eve,” Suki said then, her lips against Eve’s ear, and with those stupid three words and that slight touch, Eve’s irritation vanished and her desire returned. “I want to be with you. I just need time.”

Three days later, she was being ushered out the back door of Suki’s at the crack of dawn after spending the night.

The next time, the following week, Eve found herself wanting to stay longer, wanting to have breakfast with Suki, wanting to call in sick to work and spend the day making love to her.

“You’re obsessed,” Suki sighed, contently, as Eve kissed her neck and tightened her hold on her waist.

She’d hid upstairs until the kids left for school. Now, she had Suki all to herself again.

“Mm. Want me to stop?”

Suki snorted and slipped her hand between the gap of Eve’s unbuttoned shirt. “Absolutely not.”

The click of the back door opening pulled them apart, although not nearly as quickly as the last time they were caught. Kheerat gave them both a weary look.

“I wondered why you wanted us out of the house so early this morning.” He stepped into the kitchen and grabbed a bag from under the kitchen table. “Vinny forgot his PE kit.” He was halfway out the door before he turned back. “What if one of the others had come back and seen you two?”

“Kheerat,” Suki started.

Kheerat shook his head. “I told you, mum. You have to tell them. Or I will.”

When he was gone, Eve put her hand on Suki’s back. “Do you think he would?”

Suki didn’t seem convinced either way. She said Kheerat was a good boy and it wouldn’t be like him to force her hand, but he was still a teenager at the end of the day. They were known to be quite unpredictable.

Eve thought for sure he’d kick off the afternoon they returned to the shop after having lunch together.

“Where were you?”

Suki put her handbag down on the counter. “I was having lunch. Need your permission for that, do I?”

Eve winced. One thing about Suki, she didn’t back down from an argument - even if it was with a teenager holding her biggest secret over her.

“Debbie had a dentist appointment. I had to cover. I’m supposed to be studying.”

“Well you wouldn’t have had that problem if you’d stayed home like I told you to.” Suki nodded to the back of the shop. “Go on then.”

“What do you thiiink!” Jags’ cheery voice broke the tension as he bounced into the shop, wearing dark green traditional clothes - a long shirt and bottoms, with a red print down the chest and on the sleeves. “Oh, hey, Eve. You’re back.”

“Yeah. More contacts to go over,” Kheerat said. Suki shot him a look and he rolled his eyes before sulking off into the back room.

“You look good, mate,” Eve said, admiring Jags’ outfit. “Maybe a teeny bit long in the legs.”

“She’s being generous,” Suki said, bluntly. “Stay there. I’ll get some pins.”

Leave it to Suki to keep a full blown sewing kit at work. Eve leaned against the counter and watched her bark orders at Jags to stay still, stand up straight, stop holding his breath.

“It’s Dad’s,” Jags said, softly, stroking the fabric of the sleeve as Suki hemmed the shirt. “He won’t mind if I wear it, mum, will he?”

Eve met Suki’s eyes, saw the flicker of dread at just the mention of Nish. “Course not, putt.”

“What’s this in aid of anyway? Heading somewhere nice?”

“A family friend bought Walford East,” Suki explained, a pin between her teeth. “Jagvir! If you move again, so help me - ”

“You should come, Eve!”

Eve barely had time to be touched at the offer before Suki had jumped in to rescind it. “I’m sure Eve’s got better things to do.”

“Better than dancing? And all that food?” Jags rolled his eyes back in an expression of mock-pleasure. “Uncle Ranveer said the more the merrier.”

“As much as I like both of those things very much, I’ll have to give it a miss. Thanks for the invite, though, mate.” Eve slipped a packet of chewing gum into her pocket. “I better get off. See ya.”

She was halfway down the market when Suki came out of the shop after her. “Eve, wait.” Wrapping her cardigan around herself, Suki looked sheepish. “He’s right. You should come.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. I won’t know anyone.”

“You’ll know me.” Suki gestured toward the square. “And the Slaters will be there, I’m sure. Not like them to pass up a free buffet.”

“Oi,” Eve warned.

Suki ducked her head, failing to hide a smirk. “Sorry. But I really would like you to come. Please?”

Eve really needed to figure out how to say no to Suki.

Chapter 7

Chapter Text

Only Eve and Nish’s lawyer knew about the visit. The children would get too worked up and her parents would have questions and Polka would insist she go see a doctor.

Eve wasn’t mad at her for not telling her about the appeal sooner. She reassured her that the CPS were incredibly unlikely to review the case, but she didn’t make Suki feel stupid for worrying about it. Best of all, she listened to the plan she’d come up with, made a joke about how Suki scared her sometimes, and then helped her work out what to say.

In a prison jogging suit, Nish seemed smaller. To look at him now, Suki wondered how she had ever lived in such fear, how he had ever had that much control over her.

“I’ve missed you, Sukhwinder.”

“I’ve missed you too.” Suki focused her eyes on a crack in the plastic table. “It’s been so difficult without you.”

“How are the children?”

She had a non-committal answer prepared. Eve had warned her he would use the kids to manipulate her. And yet sitting with him, the man who had given her them, she wanted to let her guard down, just for a minute.

Didn’t he have a right to know how well Kheerat was doing in school? Wouldn’t it comfort him to know that Jagvir’s darkness had lifted and he was back to making everyone laugh again? He had always said Ashneet was his princess, but she was shaping up to be the most stubborn girl who ever lived and it thrilled and terrified Suki in equal measure. She wanted to laugh with him about the Sunday night board games Vinny begged them all to play and how he was completely undeterred by the fact he had yet to win even once.

“They only have one father,” Nish said, before she could say any of that. “How will they feel when they find out what you did to me?”

“What I did to you?”

“Your testimony.”

Of course. Suki caught herself quickly. “I was so upset with you. How you could do something that would take you away from us, leave me alone. How you could doubt my commitment to you.”

A muscle ticked in Nish’s jaw. “You were punishing me, Sukhwinder?”

“I didn’t think you would get life. I thought - ” Suki shook her head. “I feel like I’m the one being punished. The children’s hearts are broken. My heart is broken, Nish.”

“You destroyed our family.”

“I know. That’s why I’m here. I can’t bear it anymore.” She forced herself to look up at her husband. “Your appeal.”

Nish scowled and waved his hand. “My lawyer says there’s no point.”

Suki sat back in her seat. “He works for you, Nish. He has to do what you tell him.”

“He says a judge won’t reduce a sentence without new evidence.”

“So we give them some.” Suki frowned. “I wasn’t unfaithful to you. But if we can make them believe I was and that when I broke it off, Usama harassed me, threatened me, hurt me - if they can see that you were just trying to protect me…”

“They’ll never believe that. It’s too convenient.”

“No. You’re right.” He always liked hearing that. Suki held his eyes. “We’ll have to convince them. I spoke to a different lawyer, got some advice. It’s why I haven’t been visiting. They said if we have contact, if it looks like we’ve had time to come up with this. If this is gonna work, we need to make them believe I’m not just lying to get you a lighter sentence.”

“But you have every reason to lie. You are my wife.”

Suki’s heart was racing. “But what if I wasn’t?”

“What are you talking about?”

Suki sat forward. “If we were separated, what reason would I have to want to protect you? Why would I admit to perjuring myself? To having an affair?”

“What is this, Suki?” Nish looked disgusted when he said her name. “You want me to agree to a sham divorce?”

Suki took his hand in her own. “I want you to let me help you.”

He softened at her touch. He always did. This was a good thing, Suki reminded herself. It meant her plan was working. She silently coached herself to ignore the way her skin was crawling.

“Nah, this doesn’t make any sense. An affair, a divorce, lying to a court…you could not survive the shame.”

“I am your wife, Nish. I will be your wife forever. That’s what I believe. You know that. But if it means the court will believe me, if it means your sentence is lowered, if it brings you home to me sooner. I can handle the shame.” She forced out a few pathetic tears. “I can’t handle life without you. The business and the children - it’s too much. I need you.”

“You must have had the affair. Where is this guilt coming from?”

How good would it feel to tell him the truth? To watch his face contort in horror as he realised he had killed the wrong person, that it was Nadia she wanted, not Usama? It would destroy him to know how little he knew her.

Maybe in another life, she could have been brave enough for revenge like that; in this one, she would settle for a divorce.

“I wasn’t a good wife those months,” Suki said. “We were fighting all the time, do you remember?”

“It’s that wildness in you. I’ve always known it. It’s dangerous, Suki. I had to tame it, I was protecting us, our family, you.” Nish frowned. “You understand that, don’t you?”

Tame it. Tame her. Like she was an animal.

Eve didn’t want to tame her. Eve wanted to set her free.

He touched her chin and she barely managed to keep from flinching.

“Do you remember when I hurt my wrist that summer?” She had not hurt her wrist. He had grabbed it, in a fury about money they didn’t have, and twisted it enough to leave bruises. She was sure even now it had been fractured. “I went to the doctor. They did an x-ray. I can say Usama hurt me when I ended things.”

“I didn’t know you went to the doctor.”

She had not. She hadn’t dared. She had told Nadia she’d fallen and Nadia had said that she was clumsy too and Suki had took that to mean they understood each other, that she wasn’t the only one with an angry husband. Then Usama had come home and Nadia kissed him like she wanted to and leaned into him like she felt safe and Suki had felt more alone than ever.

She knew it was a risk - creating a lesser betrayal to cop to. But Nish wanted to be angry at her, wanted to blame her and it was better that she control where he put those feelings.

“I went to the gurdwara a lot then too.” This part was true. She’d prayed every day that her feelings for Nadia would go away. “I spoke to the Gyani, told him I was having a difficult time - that I was worried.”

The Gyani had asked her, kindly, if she felt unsafe, and she had thought that such an odd question. She was too preoccupied with the things she didn’t want to admit about herself that she hadn't even realised he was perhaps the only person who had noticed Nish’s growing obsession with controlling her.

“This is your evidence, when they challenge you?” Suki nodded. “Why didn’t you speak to me? Why go to these men when you should have come to your husband?”

“I was ashamed. You’re right. This thing in me - the wildness - I don’t know how to control it and I knew it was pushing you away from me. You don’t know how it feels to think you have failed your husband.” She placed a kiss to his hand and pulled it to her heart. “I am trying to make up for it now. Let me, Nishandeep. Please.”

His fingers touched her hair. She envisioned him yanking a strand, pulling her into the table. But he didn’t. His eyes softened. “For you, soniye.”

They talked for a few more minutes, agreed that she would get divorce papers drawn up and passed onto his lawyer for him to sign. She told Nish she would wait a little while before she wrote a letter to the Judge. He didn’t seem to suspect at all that there would be no letter; that as soon as she was granted legal separation from him, as soon as she was free, he wouldn’t get as much as a thought from her again, much less an appeal.

She hadn’t expected that they would kiss goodbye - she didn’t think it would be allowed until others around them started to part, doing exactly that.

“It could be months before I see you again,” he said. “I want to kiss my wife.”

This would be the last time, wouldn’t it? She closed her eyes and went along with it. What was one more lie?

As she went to step back, his hold on her tightened. “You are mine, Suki. Always.”

A few nights before, during sex, Eve had growled “mine” in her ear and Suki had thought she might die she was so turned on. When Nish said it, even softly like this, it felt like a threat.

When she got back to the car, she fixed her mascara and sent Eve a text. It’s over. It worked.

She was in court today so Suki hadn’t expected a reply. As she was driving, a message popped up - !!! - and then, a second later, I’m proud of you. See you 2nite x

The ‘x’ nearly had her missing her turn. Things with Eve felt like they were moving too fast and not fast enough. It was terrifying. It was the most untethered she had ever felt in her entire life.

That evening, ahead of the Gulati’s party, Eve slipped in through the back door.

“I thought you were going with the Slaters?”

“I am. I just wanted to sneak a look at you first so I’m not too obviously blown away when I see ya.” Eve admired her, sweetly, her head tilted and a smile on her face. “You look gorgeous.” Gingerly, she touched the fabric over Suki’s shoulder. “I like your dupatta.”

This amused her. “Oh! Been researchin’ have ya?”

“I wanna know what I’m complimenting.”

Suki laughed. “Well,” she said, tugging on Eve’s collar. “You don’t look too bad yourself. The eyeliner is a nice touch.”

Eve caught her hand, then frowned. “What’s this?” She gestured to the ring on her finger. “I thought you said he agreed to a divorce.”

“He did, but there’s no point telling anyone until it’s all signed.”

Suki could tell Eve didn’t like this answer. “So what, you just wanna go on pretending?”

“It’ll just upset the kids if I tell them now. And tonight is about Ranveer and Haspira. If I show up with no ring, talking about divorce, it’s gonna cause a scene.”

“Right, yeah.” Eve stepped back, obviously annoyed. “I better get back to Stacey’s. I’ll see you at the party.”

Suki put her arms around Eve’s neck, before she could leave. “Come back here with me tonight? Stay over?”

It only took a beat longer than she expected for Eve to grin and say yes and kiss her.

Stacey was in rare form.

“I can’t believe you made us come here just so you can catch a glimpse of Suki flamin’ Panesar.”

If they weren’t sat in one of the restaurant’s booths, Eve would have been concerned about the level of her friend’s voice. “Your mum and Harvey were coming anyway,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, well, they love a free buffet.” Only a few days ago, Eve had scolded Suki for saying the same thing. It made her laugh. She didn’t dare say it to either of them, yet, but she thought that Suki and Stacey would actually get on if they could get past each other’s mouthiness. “Who even is this bloke anyway?”

Eve shrugged and sucked up the last drop of her vodka co*ke through her straw. “Some mate of Suki’s.”

“Suki doesn’t have mates.”

“Watch it,” Eve warned.

Stacey sighed and went off to get them another round of drinks. After a minute, Suki came in with the kids. At the sight of Eve, Kheerat rolled his eyes, but Jags gave her a little wave. The other two trailed behind their brothers, chattering away. It struck Eve how odd it was that Ashneet and Vinny had no idea who she was, yet she was in their house at least once a week.

Suki leaned against the booth and smiled at her. “Hello.”

Eve grinned. “Hi, you.”

“Sukhwinder!” A woman’s voice called from the other side of the room. “Oh, you came!”

“Haspira,” Suki greeted warmly. Eve watched as Suki embraced this other woman, pecks on the cheek and all, and felt a pang of jealousy. Suki barely felt comfortable talking to her in public.

“Got your glimpse, did ya?” Stacey asked, slipping back into the booth across from Eve.

As much as Eve hated to admit it, Stacey was right. She was four drinks in when Suki seemed to remember she existed and came to stand beside her at the bar.

“You alright?”

Suki’s voice was low because she was afraid of being overheard speaking to the only (out) lesbian in the room. She was wearing her wedding ring. She’d spent the last hour acting like they didn’t know each other, talking to people Eve didn’t know, in a language she couldn’t understand.

No, Eve was not f*cking alright.

“You invited me here, you know.”

Suki sighed. “Eve.”

“Aw Suki, just go back to pretending you don’t know me, will you? I’m not in the mood for this.”

Suki looked around, quickly getting the attention of the restaurant owner. “Ranveer. I’d like you to meet Eve.”

“Eve,” Ranveer said, nodding. “Thank you for coming. Do you live close by?”

Eve looked numbly at Suki, who had already started to answer. “Eve has family on the square that she visits sometimes. She’s a friend of mine.”

She’s a friend of mine.

Suki looked very pleased with herself, which only made Eve more irritated. Suki didn’t get it. She didn’t get it at all. In what world was this fake introduction supposed to be an olive branch?

“Oh, well, any friend of Suki’s is a friend of ours.” Eve looked down at her drink. “And what is it you do, Eve?”

“She’s a solicitor,” Suki said.

“Actually, I’m a barrister,” Eve said, chucking back what was left in her glass. “And we don’t know each other very well really. I wouldn’t call us friends.”

She left Suki to provide an explanation for her rudeness. She had no doubt that whatever bullsh*t she came up with, Ranveer would be wholly convinced. Suki was good at making people believe things that weren’t true.

All Eve wanted to do was find Stacey and tell her they could finally get the hell out of here, but her friend was laughing with Martin and another neighbour. She didn’t wanna be a killjoy.

When she turned toward the exit she saw Jags, coming in from outside. She couldn’t leave without passing by him, and there was no way he wouldn’t ask why she was leaving so soon, and then she’d have to join in with Suki’s lies.

She found a back door through the kitchen and ducked outside. The fresh air was nice, at least. She sat down on the step and dug her phone out of her jeans pocket to text Stacey.

Her screen was still cracked. She really should get it replaced. As if she needed another reminder of how hard Suki had crashed into her life or the damage she’d done.

Heading home. Im ok. Talk 2moro. x

The door creaked open. She expected Stacey, having spotted her looking sad, but it was Suki. She was holding a glass of sparkling water. She bent down to brush the step with her hand, as if to clean it, then hitched up the dress part of her outfit to sit down.

Kameez. That’s what the website had called it. Eve hadn’t a clue how to pronounce it. At the rate things were going, she’d probably never need to.

Suki passed her glass to Eve.

Eve didn’t like sparkling water, but she took a sip anyway. Her face twisted and she passed it back. “I dunno how you drink that stuff.”

“Says you. You drink beer.”

Eve hung her wrists over her knees. “Guess I just dunno what’s good for me, eh?”

Suki squinted into the darkness. “What would I call you? If I could introduce you?” She sounded like she was fishing. “My girlfriend? My partner?”

“Mistress would do.”

Suki scoffed. “That’s not how I think of you, Eve.”

“It’s how it feels.” Eve looked at Suki then. “I know coming out is a big deal and I know that for you, it’s especially hard. I don’t want to pressure you if you aren’t ready. But sometimes I feel like we’re taking one step forward and three steps back.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want you to be sorry. I don’t - I don’t think it’s your fault, even, at least not completely. But it’s still sh*t, Suki.”

“I know, but look, I - ”

The roar of a male voice cut her off. Suki turned her head toward the sound. They heard it again, and then Suki jumped to her feet.

“Kheerat?!”

Eve followed her down the alleyway, around to the front of the restaurant, where two lads were wrestling each other on the ground.

She didn’t immediately recognise Kheerat with his hair loose.

Suki ran to them, yelling in Punjabi. At her reprimand, they immediately released each other and sprang apart.

Now she was closer, Eve could see that despite their difference in sizes - the other boy short, but muscley, Kheerat tall and lean - they were as equally as dishevelled as each other. They’d both got a few digs in. As they stood up, Kheerat squared up to the shorter boy again. Suki screeched his name and Eve quickly got between them.

“Alright, alright,” she said, giving Kheerat a little push back. “Enough, yeah?” The other lad scarpered back inside.

“What on earth has gotten into you?” Suki demanded. “I thought you’d grown out of this childishness with Ravi. And at his father’s party, Kheerat? Where is your respect?”

She said some other stuff, in heated Punjabi. Eve looked around for Kheerat’s turban and passed it to him when she found it. “Here you go, mate.”

Kheerat took it from her, wordlessly, fuming at his mum. “He started it!”

“Oh, don’t! I can’t believe you would behave like this, embarrass your family - I suppose it’s over some white girl, hm?”

“Pot, kettle there, mum, isn’t it?”

Up until now, Eve had assumed Kheerat had inherited his scrappiness from his father, but then she had to quickly knock Suki back from lunging forward.

“Oi,” Eve said. “You two are gonna hurt my feelings if you keep this up.”

“I’m telling you it’s him you should be shouting at,” Kheerat insisted, pointing in the direction of the party. “Since Dad…I take your side every time, in every fight. Even when you’re wrong.” Eve did not miss how his eyes flicked to her briefly as he made his point. “Why is it so hard for you to do the same for me?”

Suki’s expression shifted from rage to exasperation. “Oh, Kheerat, that’s not -”

He stormed off into the night before she could finish. She made a move to follow. Eve caught her wrist.

“Give him a minute, yeah? Let him cool off.”

“I wasn’t blaming him!” Suki protested, waving her arms. “Ravi’s always been a troublemaker - I’m not surprised he’s growing into a thug. Kheerat’s different. He’s kind and clever and - ”

“ - and yours,” Eve said, stepping closer to Suki and putting her hands on her shoulders. “I get it. He’ll get it too, when you’re both calm enough to talk about it.”

Suki hesitated. “We’re not very good at talking about things.”

Eve gasp. “That is truly shocking to me, honestly.”

Suki’s smile was her cue. She brushed her hand to her cheek and Suki’s eyes flickered closed. They stood there, breathing together for a minute, and then Suki opened her eyes. “I should go tell Haspira and Ranveer what happened. Will you come with me?”

Eve swallowed hard. “Suki, it probably is better if I go.”

“No.” Suki was practically pouting. “Stay. I want you to meet Ashneet and Parvinder.” She took Eve’s hand and squeezed it. “Please, Eve?”

Twenty minutes later, Eve was introducing herself as ‘a friend of your mum’s.’ Madder still, she was buzzing about it.

Ranveer asked her to stay behind to clean up.

Usually, she wouldn’t mind - she might even have offered. Tonight, though, she was keen to get home. She wanted to make sure Kheerat was alright, that he’d eaten.

Still, she couldn’t say no. Suki knew there was an appetite for more gossip about her family among their shared friends and acquaintances and Ranveer and Haspira were charitable enough to keep quiet about the fight between Kheerat and Ravi. She sent the kids home and grabbed a bin bag.

“I’ll stay too,” Eve offered.

They’d sat together for the last two hours, tucked in a booth, joined by the kids and Martin and Stacey and even Barminder and her husband for a little while before they had to leave to pick up their boys from the babysitter.

It had been idle chatter, the kind of thing Suki found dull and tedious, but every now and then Eve would make a stupid joke and a rush of fondness would hit her. Several times, Suki had thought about how nice it would be to be the woman who laughed in corners with Eve at every party, all the time.

“Oh no, we really couldn’t ask you to,” Ranveer said. “I’m sure you are a busy woman, Eve.”

And I’m not? Suki wondered, but she forced a smile and turned to Eve while Ranveer and Haspira were gathering the cleaning supplies. “You don’t have to.”

“Last tube’s not for ages yet. And I’d like to walk you home.”

Suki raised an eyebrow. “I live across the square. Reckon I can manage it without a bodyguard.”

Eve leaned over her to grab a bin bag. “I know, but can’t kiss you goodnight here, can I?”

As the four of them cleaned, Ranveer and Haspira talked about their plans for the front of the restaurant. They wanted to install an outside party bar, with patio tables and heaters and lights. They would offer shots and co*cktails. They’d heard this kind of thing was popular now.

“We don’t know much about all that of course, seeing as we don’t drink.” Ranveer said, wiping down a table. “I wonder, Haspira, if it might be worth getting our friend Eve to take a look at the co*cktail menu?”

“Oh, I’m more of a beer drinker myself.”

Haspira passed the mop to Suki. “Nonsense. You are young. You will have better insight than any of us! Come with me.”

Eve shot Suki a look of resignation and she understood completely. Haspira was an impossible woman to say no to.

When it was just her and Ravneer and an awkward silence, Suki couldn’t help but apologise for her son’s behaviour, once more.

“Oh, Sukhwinder, don’t trouble yourself. Boys will be boys. And it must be hard for young Kheerat - not having a father figure in his life at the moment.”

“Hm.”

Sometimes, Suki did worry about that. She really did believe children needed a mother and a father - if she didn’t, maybe she would have considered leaving Nish years ago.

But it was also true that Nish had had expectations of a marriage, of her as his wife, that she would have never forgiven herself if he’d been allowed to pass onto their sons. Or worse, their daughter.

Suki finished mopping the floor and stood back to admire their work. She’d missed a few spots. Before she could pick it up again, Ranveer stopped her.

“Sukhwinder, there are whispers at the gurdwara that you will separate from Nish and take another husband.”

Suki wasn’t naive: she knew there were rumours about all sorts of things to do with her marriage. This one only flustered her because it was partly true. “That’s ridiculous.”

“I know. I’ve told them as much.” Ranveer stepped closer to her. “I told them you are a loyal woman. It is so hard to find loyal women.” He tilted his head, his eyes looking over her in a new way. “Nishandeep is very lucky.”

“I appreciate that, Ranveer, but you don’t need to defend me.” She looked up. “I’d like to see Haspira’s drinks menu. Shall we go?” Ranveer took another step closer. Suki backed into a table and felt blood rush to her face. “I really should go get Eve. I would hate for her to miss her train.”

“Forget about her.” Ranveer’s hand cupped her cheek. Suki flinched in surprise. “I saw you both, earlier. Outside.”

Outside? After Kheerat and Ravi…

Suki’s mind spun. They hadn’t kissed, had they? No. No, they hadn’t. But they had been standing together, touching.

Just like Ranveer was touching her now.

“Ranveer, I don’t know what you - ”

“Poor Sukhwinder. Seduced by someone like that. What would the community say? What would Nishandeep think?”

From the second he’d stepped into her space, Suki’s heart had been racing. Now, it lurched. “No. Please, you can’t -”

Ranveer’s touch on her back made her gasp. “I could keep your secret,” he said, sounding kind, even as his hands travelled lower, “If you only let me have what I’m owed.”

“Stop, Ranveer, please.” She attempted to move past him, but suddenly he was everywhere - his body blocking the front of her, his hands holding her from behind, his face in her hair, his breath on her neck.

He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “Shh, Sukhwinder,” he said, but she heard Nish’s voice, smelt Nish’s prison sweat instead of Ranveer’s cologne. She was frozen.

There was a noise behind her, but she couldn’t place it. And then Ranveer went still, stepped back enough that Suki could breathe again, and Eve was thundering toward them. “Get away from her!” She gripped Ranveer by the shirt and pulled him off her. “You are scum, that’s what you are!”

Suki put her hand on the table to steady herself. Eve was by her side in an instant, asking her if she was hurt, if she was ok. Suki opened her mouth to speak and the sob that had been lodged in her throat escaped. She crumpled into Eve’s arms.

“Who are you to speak to me like this?” Ranveer demanded. “You dirty lesbian.”

“Suki?” Haspira’s voice was quiet, but it broke through the chaos. When Suki turned toward her, she looked stricken. She hadn’t come into the room with Eve. All she had caught was Ranveer calling Eve a lesbian - and now Suki was clinging to her, crying.

“Haspira,” Suki choked.

“Nishandeep was right,” Ranveer said, voice full of scorn. “There is something very wrong with her. He thought she was mad but she is perverted.”

It’s the wildness in you. It’s dangerous. I had to tame it.

Eve’s hands were balled into fists. “Don’t you dare - ”

Haspira covered her mouth with her hand. “You…and this woman?”

“Haspira,” she repeated, trying to steady herself. “Haspira, I can explain.”

She had known Haspira her entire adult life. Haspira, with her boy two years older than Kheerat, had been the person she’d turned to with the questions about motherhood she’d been too ashamed to ask her own mother, like are you really supposed to breastfeed for the entire eighteen months and why do I cry so much more now and is it normal to love your child more than your husband?

Yes, when Jagvir came along they had drifted apart, but only because it was too painful for Haspira, given her and Ranveer’s inability to have a second child. They had always stayed friendly, always gravitated toward each other at the gurdwara or at parties.

If she could just speak to her alone, if she could just have a minute to wipe away her tears and fix her clothes, cover herself with her dupatta, she could fix this. She would be able to fix this.

But they weren’t alone.

“Hold on, you’re outraged at us, but not that your husband just tried to force himself on her?” Eve demanded.

Us. That was as good of an admittance, wasn’t it? Suki covered her mouth, stifling another sob.

“Those are filthy lies!” Ranveer seethed, banging the counter of the bar.

Haspira had not taken her eyes off Suki even once. “Is it true? Suki?”

Suki stared at her friend. She wanted all of this to go away, quickly. She needed it to. She needed to undo all of it. “It was a misunderstanding.”

“Suki,” Eve said, standing in front of her, as if to block her view of the Gulati’s. “No. You need to tell the truth.”

She ignored this and looked between Ranveer and Haspira with distress. “Please don’t tell anyone. Please.”

A tear rolled down Haspira’s cheek. Suki stepped forward, wanting to comfort her friend, but Haspira raised her hand and pointed at her. “What a good choice in a wife,” she said. “That is what everyone said, back then. You were so young, when Nishandeep - when you married. So young and so beautiful. And all those children.”

“What a shame you have ruined it all,” Ranveer snapped. “Who will want to go into business with you now? Who will want to have their children marry yours, when the time comes? No one will risk the disgrace, Sukwinder.”

Eve moved toward him again, bringing a fist up. Suki pulled at her, feeling desperate and embarrassed and small. “Stop! Stop, Eve, please.”

Eve was vibrating with rage, but she backed down all the same. She guided Suki out of the restaurant.

“I never should have left you alone with him,” she said, sticken, when they were outside. “Suki, I’m so sorry. We need to call the police.”

Suki blinked at her. “What?”

“Do you realise what he was about to do to you? If I hadn’t walked in -”

She shuddered at the thought. “I don’t - I can’t. If I go to the police, he’ll tell everyone about us.”

Eve’s face fell. “Suki, I think that ship has sailed.”

“No! Haspira is my friend. She’ll talk to him, calm him down. She won’t - ”

“ - Listen, I dunno what’s up with that woman. Maybe we’ll ever know. But I don’t think she’s going to protect you.” Eve’s hands on her shoulder startled her and then Eve’s eyes filled with tears. “Oh, love. Come on. We need to report this.”

Suki was stuck on the idea that Haspira would allow Ranveer to out her. She started to shake. “If they tell everyone…”

“Suki, I need you to focus on what’s actually important here.”

“This is important! We’re talking about my life being destroyed.” Suki clutched her chest. She could feel pressure starting to build there. “I need to go home. I want to go home. I can’t be here.”

They walked back to the house in silence. When they got to the back door, Eve asked if she wanted her to come inside, make her some tea.

“We can talk about what happens next,” Eve said, like it was some mystery, like they didn’t already know that tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that, Suki was going to lose everything.

Chapter 8

Chapter Text

“Shouldn’t you be opening up the shop?” Kheerat asked from the kitchen doorway, where he was staring her down.

After she washed her face and stripped out of her clothes, Suki had tried to sleep, but she couldn’t stop crying for long enough. She didn’t want to risk waking any of the kids up, so she put on a dressing gown and spent the rest of the night at the kitchen table, trying and failing to think of a way out of her current situation.

Usually she was good at that. Within two hours of Nish’s arrest, she had come up with the idea that he had been protecting them - not for his benefit, but because she needed something less shameful to be able to tell the children and the neighbours.

This time, though, it was like her brain was stuck. She couldn’t think ahead. She could only replay the events of the previous night, on a loop in her mind.

“We’re closed today,” she said, tapping her nails against the table. She kept them short these days. It made being with Eve easier. If they were longer, would she have thought to scratch at Ranveer?

“Since when do we close?”

“Since I-said-so,” she said, enunciating the words slowly in the hopes he would take the hint and leave her the hell alone.

“Running away to Scotland again are you?” Kheerat went to the cupboard and took out a loaf of bread. “Well, I’m not going.”

Suki rubbed her forehead. “I’m not going anywhere. I just want to stay in.”

She didn’t understand the look of horror on her son’s face. Wasn’t she such a bad mother for dragging them out of bed on the weekends to come with her to the shop? Weren’t they so hard done by because they didn’t get to laze around playing video games and stuffing their faces like their mates? She couldn’t win.

“Late night with Eve, was it?”

She had never wanted to slap someone more than she wanted to slap Kheerat in that moment. He shamed her so easily. Maybe he wasn’t so unlike his father. Maybe fifteen years was long enough for Nish to have left his horrible fingerprints all over her child.

And if Kheerat hadn’t fought with Ravi, she wouldn't have felt guilty enough to stay behind and help Ranveer - and Haspira wouldn’t know about her and Eve, and her life wouldn’t be falling apart.

“Mum?”

She didn’t trust herself to look at him. She got up from the table and went back upstairs.

Eve woke up on Stacey’s couch at noon to her goddaughter standing over her.

“You were yelling in your sleep,” Lily announced.

Eve winced as she sat up. Her head was thumping. Her back was stiff. She felt sick when she realised the night before hadn’t been a bad dream.

She didn’t tell Stacey everything, just that Ranveer knew about them and that Suki was shaken up about it. It didn't feel like her place to mention the assault, even though she knew Stacey had had her own trauma in the past and that maybe, she’d be able to tell Eve how the hell she was supposed to handle any of this.

Maybe she shouldn’t have pushed Suki so much about reporting it. Maybe she should have pushed harder. She hadn’t kissed Suki when they’d parted the night before - there had been too much going on and she’d worried Suki would flinch away again, but now she wondered if it sent the wrong message, if Suki would interpret it in the light of day as a rejection.

Stacey made her eat lunch and shower before she went over to Suki’s. She knocked on the back door once. She could make out an outline through the frosted glass, so she tried the handle and it opened.

She needed to talk to Suki about locking the bloody door - Stacey was just as bad.

Suki wasn’t the shadow in the kitchen. It was Kheerat. He had a recipe book open on the counter. Something on the stove was boiling over. He swore as he turned a dial down.

“Is your mum here?”

His glare was almost as intimidating as Suki’s. “Barely. What do you want, anyway?”

“I need to see her.” Eve headed toward the hallway. Kheerat blocked her.

“What are you playing at?” he hissed. “My brothers and sister are here.”

It occurred to Eve that not only did Kheerat not know about his Uncle attacking his mother, he didn’t know that they’d been caught by Ranveer and Haspira either. She didn’t have the heart to tell him that it probably wouldn’t be long before his siblings found out, one way or another.

“Did you two have a row?” Kheerat demanded. “Is that what this is? Eve. What happened after I left?”

Kheerat was mature for his age and despite his attitude, it was clear he loved his mum. It would be a relief for Eve, to have him to keep an eye on her when she wasn’t around. And Suki seemed to listen to him, in a way she didn’t listen to most people. Maybe he would have better luck convincing her to go to the police.

The stove started bubbling over again. Kheerat rushed to take off the lid, sighing, shaking his head, looking much more like a sixteen-year old playing the man of the house than Eve really wanted to see.

“Just tell her that I called, yeah?”

“You know, she was happy before you came along.”

Less than 24 hours ago, Eve had watched in horror at how quickly Suki had legitimised Ranveer’s actions, how keen she’d been to keep the peace at cost to herself, how she’d practically begged to stay hidden and hating herself. Until then, it hadn’t clicked with Eve just how terrified Suki was.

She knew Kheerat was only clinging so tightly to this facade because he’d spent his whole life watching his mum do the same.

“Mate, I know you wanna believe that,” Eve said gently, “but we both know that’s not true.”

Kheerat turned his back on her. “Go away, Eve.”

Eve did as he asked. She knew exactly where she was heading next.

Suki woke up on Sunday morning to Vinny tucked into her side. She had no idea at what point in the night he’d climbed in beside her - the sleeping tablets she’d found in the back of the cupboard had done the trick. He was especially clingy when he woke up.

Just shy of 8am, Ashneet came in and perched herself on the edge of the bed to conduct an interrogation. Suki sent them both off with a stern warning to give her some peace.

From her bed, she could hear Jagvir challenging Kheerat in the hallway.

“If mum gets a pass, why are you makin’ me go?”

“What do you mean she’s sick? Like a flu? Or a mental breakdown?”

“f*ck it, K, I’ll wear what I wanna alright? How many times? You’re not my dad.”

It was a relief when they left for the gurdwara and the house was silent again. She had one new message from Eve.

Still at Stacey’s. Can I see you today? x

If Eve were here, holding her, maybe she’d be able to sleep properly. To get there, though, first Eve would want to talk, and then she would realise Ranveer was only half of the reason Suki couldn’t function, and Eve would say, well, everyone was bound to find out about us someday, and then Suki would have to tell her that no, actually, they wouldn’t have, because she never really planned on coming out.

She was halfway down the stairs when she heard the back door. Sighing, she wrapped her dressing gown tighter around herself. She should have known Eve wouldn’t give her the space she’d asked for.

She went on through to the kitchen, an objection dying on her lips when her eyes fell on the person in her kitchen.

It wasn’t Eve. It was Ravjot Gulati.

“What are you doing here?” She suddenly felt very aware of herself - her messy hair, her unbrushed teeth, the thinness of her dressing gown.

The boy quickly averted his eyes. “I’m sorry, Aunty. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

She wasn’t scared until he told her not to be. Was he here to threaten her? Finish what his father started?

“What do you want?” Her voice was scratchy from fake sleep and it made her sound weak. She hated it. She folded her arms across her chest, desperate to assert herself. “Why would you let yourself into my home?”

Ravi rubbed his jaw. “I need to know if it’s true. If my dad - if he put his hands on you.”

He must have heard his parents talking about it. Or maybe he’d been sent here to test her. “It was a misunderstanding,” she said, carefully.

Ravi’s body tensed. “He’s had misunderstandings with women before. You’re not the first.”

This new piece of information struck her. Granted, she’d always known Ranveer didn’t see women as equals, but lots of men didn’t. She would have never thought that meant he felt entitled to their bodies.

If this was something Ranveer did, some twisted habit or pattern, what difference did it make that she’d been friendly enough to stay behind after the party or that she hadn’t fought back against him?

Men like that got what they wanted, didn’t they, no matter what you did or didn’t do? And he hadn’t gotten what he wanted, in the end, because Eve had burst in and saved her.

“I can’t stop the lies my mum is spreading, but I’ll make sure Ranveer stays away from you,” Ravi said.

“How?” He owned the restaurant in the middle of the square. He’d talked, the night before, about taking on Jags for a few shifts over the summer. They would see each other at the gurdwara and at parties and -

- or maybe they wouldn’t. She was on the cusp of being ostracised by the whole community, wasn’t she? It was entirely possible she would never have to be in a room with Ranveer again.

“Mum doesn’t believe the women,” Ravi said, quietly. “But she would believe me, and he knows that.”

All women love their children more than their husbands, Sukhwinder, Haspira had said, sixteen years ago, when she’d asked her to validate her fears. Our husbands know this too and it scares them.

Ravi wasn’t a little boy balanced on his mother’s knee anymore. He was eighteen now, an adult, and he was offering to go against his father, threaten to tear apart his family, to protect her. It didn’t make sense.

“Why would you help me?”

She didn’t think it was a difficult question, but Ravi blinked wildly and looked away, obviously struggling to answer. “Because what he did was wrong,” he said, eventually. “I don’t wanna be that kind of man. And without Nishandeep Uncle around, you need someone to look out for the family.”

Ravi didn’t hang around to be questioned further. He left her standing in the kitchen, confused and strangely relieved.

She showered. Brushed her teeth. Fixed her hair. Put on proper clothes. The next time she came downstairs, she could hear the hushed whispers of her children in the living room.

Kheerat was in the kitchen, breaking down a pizza box for the recycling.

“I was going to cook,” she said. He ignored her. She leaned against the door frame. “How bad was it?”

His head snapped up. “Today’s sermon was on sexual deviance. Everyone stared at us. Vinny asked me if you’d killed someone too.”

Suki crossed the kitchen to start on the dishes. “They’d probably have had less to say if I had.”

“Why didn’t you tell me Ranveer knew about you and Eve? I would have sorted it.”

Suki barked out a laugh as she ran her hand under the tap. “How were you gonna do that, Kheerat? Fight him too?”

“Someone beat me to it, by the looks of it.” She didn’t have time to ask what he was talking about before he sharply said, “Ravi’s a drug dealer, mum. That’s why we were fighting. I caught him trying to sell ket to Jags.”

“What?” She whirled round to face Kheerat. Jags? Drugs? “Why are you only telling me this now?”

“When was I supposed to tell you? You’ve been pining over your girlfriend for the last two days.”

“You will watch the way you speak to me,” Suki ordered fiercely. “I am your mother.”

“Oh yeah?” Kheerat scowled. “And when are you gonna start acting like it?”

He made sure to slam the back door as he left. She stared after him. The basin in the sink behind her was filling up.

“Mum?” Ashneet and Jagvir were standing in the hall, watching her. She couldn’t see Vinny, but she was sure he was hovering behind them, listening.

She shut off the water tap and dried her hands with a tea towel. She passed by them in the hallway on the way to the living room. “Come on then,” she said, when they gaped after her. “Let’s talk.”

When they had settled in the living room - Suki and Vinny on the couch, Jagvir and Ashneet in separate armchairs - Jagvir looked around. “Family meeting, is it?”

“Without Kheerat?” Vinny asked, frowning. He looked at the door like he was willing his brother to come back.

Were they afraid of her? Or did they just not trust her? Suki wondered which was the greater failing as a mother.

“It’s ok, mum,” Ashneet said gently. “No one believes the things they’re saying.”

Jagvir winced. “Eh, I wouldn’t say ‘no one.’”

“Jags! Shut up.”

Suki looked up at her children. “It’s true.”

Three sets of brown eyes drew to her instantly, like magnets.

“What, that you’re a lesbian?” Jags said.

Vinny tilted his head. “What’s that?”

“It means…” Suki stopped, took a deep breath, then started again. “It means I like women. You know Eve? Who you met the other night? I… like her.”

“Eve is your friend.”

“She’s…more than that, Vinny.”

Vinny blinked at her, slowly. “Like, your best friend?”

“Like her girlfriend,” Ashneet corrected, hotly.

Vinny’s little face scrunched up. “Mum’s don’t have girlfriends!”

“I know this is a lot to take in - ”

“- I thought you didn’t talk about dad because you missed him so much.” Ashneet’s eyes, narrow and fierce, glared at her. “I thought your heart was broken!”

“It was.” Suki shook her head. “Marriage is complicated, Ashneet. You’re too young to understand.”

“He’s your husband. He’s our dad. How can you just stop loving him?”

Suki didn’t think she had ever loved Nish - not really, not how you were supposed to love your partner.

“Are you gonna stop loving us?” Vinny’s voice was barely more than a whisper. When she looked at him, he started to cry.

“Oh, Vinny, don’t be silly.” How could he think that? How could any of them think that? Everything she had ever done was for them. She patted her lap. “Come here, putt.”

“Don’t listen to her, Vinny,” Ashneet said, sourly. “She lies about everything.”

Suki glared at her daughter and grabbed her son’s arm. He shook her off. She sat back, stunned. “I want Kheerat!” he howled, running out of the room, thundering up the stairs.

“Are you happy now?” she demanded of Ashneet.

Ashneet folded her arms. “I’m never gonna be happy again,” she announced. “My dad is gone and I’m stuck with you.”

“Your dad - ” Suki caught herself a second before her frustration got the better of her.

If she told them the truth about their father, maybe it would shift their anger away, but for how long? And would she really feel better, knowing she had given them even more pain to carry?

“Go to your room,” she ordered Ashneet, burying her head in her hands. “Now.”

When she was gone, Suki forced herself to look up. Jags was still sitting in the armchair, biting his thumb. He’d been too quiet while Ash was having a go.

“Oh just say what you’re gonna say Jagvir, will you?”

He was the one who had given her the hardest time when Nish went away and if she was being honest, long before that. Her middle son, who seemed to need so much more for her than she had to give and made sure she knew it.

She expected him to say he hated her. It wouldn’t be the first time. He would probably stay out all night again and worry her sick to her stomach. Maybe he would go buy drugs from Ravi and become a dealer himself or join a gang and eventually go get himself killed when he ran out of other ways to spite her.

The couch dipped as he sat down.

She turned to look at him. He didn’t look angry or disgusted or disappointed. He put his arm around her shoulder.

“I think you’re brave, mum,” he said, softly.

At that, she sank against him, surprised by how strong he seemed, all of a sudden.

“Really?” she whispered.

Jagvir nodded. “Yeah. And Eve’s ace.”

She remembered then that Jagvir wasn’t just her difficult child - he was her funny one too.

Still at Stacey’s? Xx

Eve nudged her best friend and showed her the phone screen.

Stacey sighed. “Alright Lil, time for bed. Mum, I reckon you should go join Harvey for that drink after all.”

When the Slaters’ had cleared out of the front room, Eve turned off the TV and text Suki back. A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door.

“Hi.”

Even with her hair scraped back and no make-up on, Suki looked beautiful. Eve wanted to tell her that, but she didn’t want to make her self conscious.

“Hi.” She stepped aside to let her in, gesturing to the kitchen. “Do you want tea or something?”

Suki immediately engulfed her in a hug. “Just you,” she mumbled and Eve’s heart leapt in her chest.

It felt so right, to hold Suki tightly like this, to breathe her in and feel her relax in her arms. How had she ever thought that might change?

“Are you ok?” She drew back to look at Suki. “I’ve been so worried.”

Suki walked on into the front room. Eve followed, closing the door behind them for privacy.

“Sorry I didn’t call. I had a lot to think about.” It took Suki all of two seconds to notice her knuckles. “Tell me you’ve been punching walls again.”

“He hurt you, Suki,” Eve said. “I couldn’t just let him away with that.”

Suki’s mouth fell open. “So you hit him? Eve!” Suddenly, her eyes were darting all over Eve’s body. “Did he hurt you?”

“What? No. His kid was there. Ravi. He stepped in.” An odd look crossed Suki’s face then. Eve frowned. “I know he and Kheerat don’t get on, but he seems like an alright lad. Better than his parents, anyway.”

With a sigh, Suki sat down. “He was selling drugs to Jagvir. That’s why they were fighting.”

“sh*t.”

“Hm.” Suki pinched the bridge of her nose. “Jagvir said it was for a friend.”

“And you believe him?”

“Of course not,” Suki scoffed. “But he’s the only one of my children still speaking to me at the moment, so I can only push so hard.” Suki turned to her. “I think Ravi feels guilty about it. He came round to mine this morning. He said he’d make sure Ranveer doesn’t bother me again. Does that seem weird to you?”

Eve considered this. She too had been surprised by Ravi’s loyalty when he’d gotten between her and his dad. But with the drugs thing, his rationale was starting to make a bit more sense. “Maybe he’s afraid of you telling his mum or the police about the dealing.”

Suki’s brow furrowed. “Maybe.”

Eve put her hand on Suki’s back. “What’s up with the kids? They didn’t take it well?”

“That’s an understatement.”

Eve felt a pang of sympathy. “I’m sorry, Suki.”

“It’s not your fault,” Suki said, quietly. She looked at Eve. “How long do you reckon they’ll hate me for this?”

“Don’t be daft, Suki. They don’t hate you. They’re just in shock; they’ll come round.”

“And what about everyone else?” Suki bounced her knee. “All the people round here. Talking about me. Judging.”

“Let ‘em.” Eve took Suki’s hand. “Suki, you are the most belligerent, hard-headed, antagonistic person I've ever met. And you're the strongest. Do you really care what people think?”

Suki’s expression softened. “How do you feel? About people knowing? I can’t imagine Jean Slater is thrilled about you seeing me.”

Jean had been struck dumb with horror at first. When she did regain the ability to speak, she lectured Eve for a good twenty minutes about the minute mart prices and cross words in the Vic. The cardigan debacle seemed to be a mutual sticking point.

“She’s just protective,” Eve said. She nudged Suki with her elbow. “Give her a few months an’ she’ll be buying a hat.”

“I just - don’t know what my life looks like now, Eve.” Suki looked down at her hands, running her finger across her thumbnail. “Without my faith, my community. It all feels so hard.”

Eve took her hand in hers. She knew what it was like to lose your identity in a minute. When she’d lost Erica, she had been completely convinced she couldn’t go on.

But she had.

“Right. Well, tomorrow morning, you open up the shop just like you have a million times. Then, you go home and have dinner with the kids. And then in the evening, you call me and we talk about the book I’m reading and the rudest customer you had all day. And you do the same thing again on Tuesday and every day after that until eventually, it doesn’t feel so hard anymore.”

“And what happens then?”

Eve smiled and bumped her forehead against the side of Suki’s face. “I dunno. We go on a proper date?”

Suki let out a shaky little laugh. It broke Eve’s heart. “Ok,” she said. “I can do that.”

Chapter 9

Chapter Text

Wednesday was too soon for their proper date, and Eve knew this, but she had a meeting near Walford right before lunch and it seemed silly to waste the journey. She’d settle for sitting in the back of the shop and eating sandwiches from the fridge if it meant she got to spend an hour with Suki.

It wasn’t Suki who greeted her when she came into the shop. It was a scowly ten-year old in a Walford Primary School uniform, stacking shelves at a snail's pace.

“Oh, hi, Ash. Half day today is it?”

“She was sent home for fighting.” Eve turned toward Suki’s voice. She was leaning against the door to the back room, with her arms folded. She looked very unimpressed. “I’m getting really sick of everyone round here thinking with their fists.”

Ash rolled her eyes. “Here we go again.”

“Excuse me, Ashneet?!”

“Anyway!” Eve gestured her head to the side, so they stepped out of earshot of Ash. “I was in the neighbourhood. Thought we could have lunch. The invitation obviously extends to Rocky over there, too.”

Suki frowned. “I can’t today. I’m waiting for a delivery.”

Ash knocked over several cans of beans. “Oops,” she deadpanned, and Suki’s eyes narrowed.

“I might kill her.”

Eve laughed. “How about I take her off your hands for an hour?”

Suki shook her head. “It’s fine.”

“Oh, come on. I reckon some time apart would do you two good.” Eve winked. “Besides, gotta make sure you’re complying with those child labour laws.”

Suki frowned. “Eve, are you sure? I don’t expect - ”

Eve stepped back from the counter and turned to Ash. “Fancy some chips, you?”

Ash looked to her mother. “I thought I wasn’t allowed to see the light of day ever again?”

Eve chuckled, but Suki glared at the little girl. “Yeah, so you’d better go and get your coat before I change my mind.” When she disappeared into the back room, Suki turned to Eve. “If she doesn’t drop the attitude, bring her straight back.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Behave,” Suki warned, as they were leaving.

“I’ll try,” Eve joked, and she thought she saw a flicker of a smile from Ash, but she couldn’t be sure.

They walked to McKlunky’s in silence. It occurred to Eve that she had absolutely no idea what to talk to Ash about. Her only proper experience with kids was Lily, who was a good three years younger, and could be relied upon to be obsessed with whatever the latest Disney movie was. She didn’t think that approach would get her very far with Ash.

“So. You got into a fight?”

“I punched Cassie. She was giving me dirty looks.”

“Ah.” Eve couldn’t judge her for that. She’d been there herself. Several times. “Do you like school?”

“It’s alright.”

“What’s your favourite subject?”

Ash shrugged. “I dunno. All of them.”

“Oh, yeah, your mum said you're dead clever.”

This seemed to surprise Ash. “Did she?”

“Oh, aye. You had some prize-giving thing a while back, didn’t you? She said you wiped the floor with the other kids.”

She wasn’t exaggerating. It was an exact quote.

“I won an award for creative writing.” Ash stuck her hands in her pockets. “We had to write about our hero. I wrote about my dad. Mum said she would read it, but once she realised it was about him, she stopped.”

Eve felt a pang of sympathy for Suki. She sometimes cringed at the way she interacted with the kids, but she couldn’t imagine loving someone as fiercely as did them, making sacrifice after sacrifice, and then having to sit back and watch them glorify the man who’d made her life hell for seventeen years.

“I’m sure it was very good.” Eve was relieved to see the McKlunky’s sign. She held the door open for Ash, then told her to grab a seat while she ordered.

“Mum doesn’t let us have fizzy drinks,” Ash said, when Eve set a co*ke and a Fanta orange on the table.

sh*t. She knew that, didn’t she?

“Well, I won’t tell if you don’t.” It occurred to her, as she went up to retrieve the chips, that she probably shouldn't be encouraging Ash to keep things from her mum. So she ordered a strawberry milkshake as well, because, well, it was fruit and milk, surely, and wasn’t that better?

Ash looked amused by her growing collection of beverages. “You know I’m not mad at you, right? It’s my mum that lied to us.”

“Ash, mate, it’s not really lying.” Eve hesitated. She didn’t want to speak for Suki, but she also knew Suki was a long way off being able to have this conversation herself. “I think for some people, like your mum, they hide being gay from themselves for almost as long as they hide it from their family and friends.”

“And their husbands.”

Eve winced. She walked right into that one. “Yeah.”

Ash chewed her chip thoughtfully. “When did you know you liked girls?”

“Me? Oh, I dunno. I think I’ve always sort of known.”

“Even when you were ten?”

Eve frowned. “Uh, no. I was older than that.”

“Like, Jags’ age? When you were fourteen?”

Eve had a niggling feeling they weren’t talking about Suki anymore. “Probably somewhere in the middle.”

Ash nodded and continued to devour her chips without missing a beat. “Was your mum mad at you, when you told her?”

“My parents weren’t great about it, no. But things have changed a lot since then. People are more accepting.”

“Mum was crying when she got off the phone to Nani Ji and Nana Ji. I heard her telling Kheerat that they’ve disowned her.”

Eve didn’t know that. It made her heart sink. “Oh.”

She was still reeling from that when Ash asked, around a sip of her milkshake, “What does dyke mean?”

“Um. Well. It’s an offensive - ”

“ - Yeah but why? What does it actually mean?”

Eve struggled to find the right words for a minute before she took out her phone, googled, and then immediately regretted it. Ash skimmed the wikipedia article over her shoulder, scoffing. “But my mum isn’t butch. She’s really pretty.”

“Yeah.” It didn’t seem like the time to point out the two weren’t always mutually exclusive. Eve locked her cracked phone screen and frowned. “Why? Did someone call your mum that?” Suddenly, Ash went quiet. “Hold on, is that why you were fighting at school?”

“Don’t tell her,” Ash pleaded. “She’ll go mad. She said we’re not supposed to defend her.”

“Ash…she thinks you’re ashamed of her.”

Ash’s brow furrowed in a very Suki-like fashion. “That’s stupid. She’s my mum.”

When they got back to the shop, Suki was unpacking the delivery.

“Do you want help, mum?”

Suki’s eyes flicked from her daughter to Eve, sceptically. “You’re alright. Go do some of that work your teacher sent home. I’m not having you fall behind because of some troublemaker.”

Ash did as she was told, going off to the back room. Suki turned to her, a sharpness in her eyes. “You didn’t have a go at her, did you?”

“No.” Eve laughed. “We just talked. I reckon you should go easier on her.”

“Oh, don’t you start. It’s bad enough Kheerat thinks butter wouldn’t melt.”

“That girl she hit?” Eve half-whispered, half-mouthed. “She was sticking up for you.”

“I specifically told them - !”

“- I know, I know, but look, she loves you. She’s gonna be protective, ain’t she?” Eve stroked Suki’s cheek with her knuckle. She liked how the stress on Suki’s face disappeared at the gesture. “She said your parents called. That you were upset?”

“It’s fine, Eve.”

They had talked on the phone every night this week. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

Suki sighed and turned her head away. “I didn’t want you to judge them. They’re good people - kind people. What they say, it hurts, course it does…but I know it’s because they love me.”

“Suki, it’s ok to be mad at them.”

“I’m not, though. I get it.” Suki sighed. “This isn’t the life I would want for my daughter, either.”

Eve stepped back, stung. This wasn’t denial. It was internalised hom*ophobia. She didn’t have the same tolerance for that.

Was your mum mad at you when you told her? Ash had asked. Your mum. Not your parents. Not your family. Suki was the lens her kids looked through when they saw the world. Would she turn on one of them if they were gay?

“What’s that, someone who loves her?”

Suki blinked at her. “Love?”

“Well, yeah, Suki.” Eve rolled her eyes. “What do you think I’m playing at here?”

“I thought you were just after the free chewing gum.”

“Yeah, that’s it.” Eve stepped back. “I gotta go.”

“Eve, wait.” Suki grabbed her hand, pulling her back to her. “I - I’m sorry, ok?” She hesitated. “I’m still trying to like myself, yeah? I’m still trying to accept this part of me. But I’ll get there.” Suki ran her other hand through Eve’s hair. “And I love you too.”

The wave of affection - love - Eve felt then washed away the annoyance. She pulled Suki closer to her and kissed her. It wasn’t everything she needed to hear, but it was a start.

On Friday, Ravi came into the shop as Suki set out the morning papers.

He ignored her, lifted a can from the fridge and a handful of chocolate bars to stuffed the pocket of his hoodie. Her mouth fell open.

“Oi! You better be planning to pay for that.”

“What, like you don’t owe me?”

“Owe you?” Suki couldn’t help but scoff. “Your idea of looking out for my family is selling drugs to my child.”

Ravi’s mouth twisted into a scowl. “You think your boys are so perfect. Jags came to me.”

“He’s fourteen, Ravjot!”

“And that’s my problem, is it?”

Suki was not naive enough to think she was going to change Ravi. She had enough to worry about with her own kids. She stepped around him and went to the till, punching in the things she had seen him pocket. “That’ll be £5.60.”

He leaned over the counter, but made no effort to pay. “You didn’t tell me that what my mum was saying about you and Eve was true,” he said, in a low voice.

“Why would I? It’s none of your business.”

Suki couldn’t understand where this sudden overfamiliarity had come from. Until the other morning in her kitchen, she and Ravi had barely seen each other since she moved her family to Walford, to be closer to the shop, after Nish’s arrest.

Something in Ravi’s expression changed when she questioned him – it was like a wall went up; his eyes hardened and his jaw set. “Your girlfriend would be in jail if it wasn’t for me. Had to pull her off Ranveer. She was really going for it - saying she was gonna kill him. He wanted to press charges.”

“Oh come off it, Ravi.” Eve was protective, but she wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t violent. Ravi was just working overtime to make her think he’d done her a favour.

“Whatever. Don’t believe me then.” He walked toward the door, then stopped and turned back to her. “Oh, yeah. Nishandeep Uncle said to tell you the divorce is off.”

Ravi was communicating with Nish?

She didn’t remember them being particularly close. Had Nish known Ravi and Ranveer didn’t get along and seized an opportunity?

Had he recruited Ravi to spy on her?

Suki’s blood ran cold at the thought. “Your uncle is not a good man. Trust me.”

“And I should take your word for that should I? You flipped on him in court and got him banged up just so you could take everything from him. Just so you could shack up with a woman.”

“That’s not why.” It had been months since she’d been hyperventilating in a long hallway she couldn’t find her way out of, but just the thought of Nish still having eyes on her, forcing her to stay married to him, made her chest feel fight even now. “Ravi, I did it because I was afraid of him. Because of the way he is - how he gets in your head, makes you feel, makes you need him, makes you doubt everything and everyone else.” Ravi stared at her. She gripped the edge of the counter. “Ravi, he abused me.”

She hadn’t admitted it out loud to anyone, not properly – not even to Eve. It was the weakest part of her, her near two decades of blind stupidity, the only thing more humiliating than her attraction to other women. And yet, on some level, she’d always wanted people to see Nish for what he was. She’d wanted someone - anyone - to recognise the torture she’d endured.

Ravi’s shoulders tensed and he ducked his head. When he looked back up at her, he opened his mouth to speak and then stopped. “Suki – ” he started, trying again.

“‘Ello, ello!” A cheery greeting interrupted. Mitch Baker bounced into the shop doorway in a beanie hat. Ravi pushed past him. “You alright Sukes? That lad wasn’t giving you a hard time was he?”

Later, she’d be mad again that Ravi hadn’t paid, but in that moment, she only wished he hadn’t walked out. What was he going to say? Had she imagined the understanding that passed between them?

“Hm? No, no - it’s fine Mitch.”

“You sure?” He picked up a pint of milk and put it down on the counter, wrestling his bank card out of his worn wallet. “Cause nobody has any business telling you how to live your life. If this lawyer lady makes you happy, that’s all that matters.”

Suki gave Mitch a grateful smile. Before Ravi had given her bigger things to worry about, she was fast losing patience for all the hushed conversations happening in front of her face. She’d cried enough this week about her parents' words and Barminder’s silence. She didn’t take her neighbour’s solidarity for granted.

“Thank you.”

Mitch winked at her as he left. She craned her head to look out the window. She couldn’t see where Ravi had gone, but she couldn’t let it go, either.

She took her phone out of her back pocket.

Chapter 10

Chapter Text

“So wait, hold on, you called the prison?”

Eve knew it had to be good when she called in to say hi to Suki and was immediately whisked across the road for a coffee. It was Saturday morning and Kathy’s was busy, but Suki was seemingly too distracted to care about the occasional look cast their way.

“Yeah. I told them that I’d heard Nish has been getting drugs off one of his visitors.”

Eve considered this. “That could come back on Ravi, you know.”

She couldn’t tell if he was really a bad egg - what with the dealing and his apparent contact with Nish - or if he was just misguided. Her gut told her that he was like a lot of defendants she’d seen, up on drugs charges - a kid who’d fallen through the cracks and had no adult in their lives with enough of a moral compass to help them up.

“Good,” Suki said, bluntly. “If he’s smart, it’ll spook him into staying away from Nish. If he’s stupid, he’ll go down for dealing, eventually, and I won’t have to keep going through my son’s drawers for drugs.”

“And either way, the visits and calls will stop and Nish loses his man on the outside.” Eve was getting used to the chaotic plans Suki came up with when she felt back into a corner. She just hoped she was never on the receiving end of one. “What did his lawyer say?”

“That Ravi wasn’t lying. He’s refusing to sign divorce papers.”

Eve nodded. “Right, well, he can’t hold you hostage. A judge will grant it eventually with or without him.”

“Yeah, but that could take months couldn’t it? Years?” Suki rubbed her forehead. “Everytime I think I’m free of him…”

“Hey,” Eve said, taking her hand across the table. “You are. He can throw whatever tantrum he wants to - you have the kids, the business, the dashingly hot girlfriend.” Suki’s smirk was slight, but it was there. Eve stroked the back of her hand. “You won, Suki.”

“Alright, ladies?” They were interrupted then by Kathy, with their order of two coffees and two pastries. Suki slipped her hand out from under Eve’s, a habit she had yet to break.

“Oh, I’m not judging ya,” Kathy said, giving a little shrug as she passed them their cups and plates. “The luck I have with men, might try it myself.”

Eve couldn’t keep from laughing at that. As Kathy left them to it, Suki gave her a look. In their nightly phone calls, they had taken to ranking the various reactions of her neighbours to the news she was a lesbian. So far, Eve’s favourite was Kim Fox, who’d bought a packet of sponge biscuits from the shop and then hastily clarified they were the only lady fingers she was after.

“Aw come on, that one was funny.”

“Yeah, well, I’m bored of it now.” Suki sulked from behind her coffee. “The Slaters had better have some drunken row in the street tonight to give everyone something else to talk about.”

She was referring to Stacey’s hen party, which was the reason Eve was spending the weekend in Walford. Stacey didn’t want a fuss, but Kat had locked down a group of male strippers and the karaoke machine was being set up in the Vic.

“Watch it, you,” Eve said, tucking into her croissant. “That’s my honorary family you’re talking about. You’re gonna have to get over this grudge you have before Stacey’s wedding.”

“Oh?” Suki blotted at her mouth with her napkin. “Why’s that?”

Eve couldn’t tell if Suki was being coy or oblivious. “Eh, cause you’re my plus one, obvs.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh, aye, might have known you’d play hard to get.”

Suki pulled a face. “Stacey’s not gonna want me there.”

She wasn’t wrong. When Eve had brought it up, Stacey had whacked her arm hard enough to leave a bruise. “I thought it was a fling, Eve! Now you want her in my bloody wedding pictures?!”

“Let me worry about Stacey.” After the amount of alcohol Eve planned on them consuming tonight, Stacey would be easy to wear down. “I’m wearing blue, by the way. We could match. Have I ever told you how stunning you look in blue?”

She wasn’t kidding. Suki’s royal blue jumper was still her favourite. Eve, who had spent years dodging anything deeper than a one-night stand, was familiar enough with her girlfriend’s jumper rotation that she had a favourite. It was almost comical.

“You can charm me into a lot of things. A Slater wedding is not one of them.”

“I love a challenge, me.” Eve‘s smile slipped. “Seriously though. Will you think about it?”

“I’d have to get someone to keep an eye on the shop. And then there’s the kids.” Suki smirked. “Don’t worry. I’ll go to her next one.”

“Oi.” This time, Eve wasn’t messing. There was heat behind her warning. Suki looked a little surprised. “Stop it. Stace is…like a sister to me. I don’t need you two to be best mates, but the jabs need to stop.”

She let Suki huff in silence for a minute or two, and then she changed the subject, got her talking about the business loan she was in the midst of applying for. She wanted to expand, which sounded like a massive undertaking to Eve, but in her matter-of-fact way, Suki made it sound like the natural next step.

“Sorry,” Suki said, a little shy, the way she always did when she caught herself being too animated. It made Eve want to throttle Nish Panesar. “All this must be so boring to you.”

Eve bumped their knees together. “Life with you could never be boring.” She leaned across the table. “It’s actually really hot. My girlfriend the mogul.”

Suki snorted. “Hardly.”

“I’m telling you. I could see you building a - I dunno, an empire.”

“Shut up,” Suki said, but Eve could tell she was flattered. “Anyway. What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Being very very hungover,” Eve admitted. “Why, what did you have planned?”

“Nothing. But my Sunday’s are freed up indefinitely at the moment.” Oh. Right. Suki couldn’t face going back to the gurdwara right now. “So if you manage to drag yourself out of bed before noon, we could have the house to ourselves.”

“See what I mean?” Eve said, grinning. “You’re a mastermind.”

Eve had materialised at the front door within minutes of the children leaving.

“You’re keen,” Suki teased, letting her in. It amused her to think of Eve across the square, peeking out from behind Stacey’s front room curtains, waiting for the coast to be clear.

“That’s me.” Eve acknowledged the hamster cage on the hallway table. “Alright, Kiah? You know, she’s really hanging in there this time. I reckon you’ve broke the curse.”

“Hm. How was last night?”

“It was the most obnoxious display of heterosexuality I’ve ever seen.” Eve ran a hand through her more-tousled-than-usual hair and shrugged. “And y’know, it was a laugh.”

“No female strippers then?” Since she’d heard Kat Slater on the phone arranging the night’s activities, the image of a naked blonde in Eve’s lap had started to form.

Eve laughed and stepped into the space between them. “Would you be jealous if there were?”

“As if.”

She absolutely would be.

“Well, you can rest assured, my honour remains intact.” Eve looked around the hallway. “Suki, we have an empty house. So, are we gonna talk, or…?”

The way Eve was looking at her quickly put out any flicker of insecurity she had, at least for now. Eve wanted her. Eve wanted her so badly that her breathing shallowed when she leaned forward, her eyes on Suki’s lips, her hands hesitating just short of pulling her to her.

Suki moved her head back. Eve followed.

“What, are you gonna make me beg?”

“Yeah,” Suki said, turning towards the stairs with a smile. “Beg.”

She gasped in delight when Eve caught up to her on the landing and wrapped her arms around her waist. In the bedroom, Eve did beg, but she also touched Suki in ways that rendered her speechless, which she seemed to take great pride in. Lately, she had taken to whispering I love you in Suki’s ear right as she was about to come. It was gonna be the death of her.

They lay wrapped up together for a little while, until Eve started to doze off. Usually, Suki quite liked watching her sleep – she looked so peaceful – and she knew Eve had been out late the night before, but she’d had a week from hell and she wanted to be reminded it was worth it.

Eve hardly seemed to mind being woken up with impatient kisses. “You’re a menace,” she mumbled, grinning against Suki’s lips.

“You love it.”

Wide awake now, Eve’s mouth worked greedily at Suki’s neck. “Too right I do.”

After another round of sex – this time, she left Eve speechless – Suki rolled on top of her. “We should make a start on dinner.”

Eve blinked up at her. “What, you want me to stay?”

“I told the kids you might eat with us, but you don’t have to. If you have plans with Stacey or you need to get back – ”

“No, I’d love to,” Eve said, quickly. “I just – I dunno. I didn’t expect it.”

Maybe the shock of her offer accounted for the nerves coming off Eve as they stood together in the kitchen.

“You make the dough,” Suki said, passing her a mixing bowl and the necessary ingredients from the cupboard.

“Eh, are you sure? That feels like a crucial part of the samosas.”

Suki laughed. “It’s mixing flour, oil and water in a bowl, Eve. You can’t mess it up.”

“You underestimate me.”

Eve did seem to be genuinely concerned she would screw up even the few instructions Suki had given her. Suki noticed her glancing over her shoulder, as if waiting for her to approve what she was doing.

“You don’t cook much?”

“Not got much need to.” Eve shrugged as she started kneading the dough. “Working late all the time, living alone… it’s easier to stick something frozen in the oven or order take out.”

There had been plenty of times over the years that Suki had fantasised about a life where she didn’t have a family to worry about. It was nice to think about coming and going as she pleased, never having to explain herself or worry about someone else’s feelings, only having to clean up messes she herself made.

She had never considered how odd it would be to prepare meals for one, to have to adjust the measurements in the book of family recipes that had been passed onto her. Yes, she would save a lot of money, but surely she’d waste so much food without teenage boys around to devour the leftovers? Would she bother to put the radio onto the Punjabi station while she made breakfast, if not for Vinny’s love of music? And cooking dinner together had become the one constant in the ever-shifting relationship she had with her daughter – regardless of whether they’d spent the day arguing about Nish or the eyeshadow no ten-year-old had any business wearing to school, Ash was dutiful about reporting to the kitchen just in time to chop some vegetables and set the table.

“Erica used to bake.”

Suki stopped her mixing of the vegetable filling to look at Eve. “Oh?”

They hadn’t talked about Erica since Suki had picked up her photograph in Eve’s apartment. Knowing how upset it had made Eve then, how she hadn’t been able to comfort her despite wanting to, Suki wasn’t sure it was right to bring it up again.

“Yeah. I helped sometimes. Not enough though – now I wish I’d helped more.” Eve laughed sadly. “When I say I helped, I mean she told me what to do and I did it. You two would have got on.”

Suki wanted to believe that, but she wasn’t so sure. From the first day she met Nish’s family, his sisters had hated her and Stacey was hardly her biggest fan.

“What else did you two do together?”

“Aw, everything. Same clubs at school, same mates. We were gonna go to the same Uni and all. She was gonna do teaching. She was the other half of me.” Eve wrapped the dough in the cling film Suki passed her. “The only time we weren’t together was when it mattered.”

“You mean when she died?”

Eve nodded. “I went home, left her at the party. I wasn’t there when she wandered into the road.”

“You really blame yourself?” Suki put her hand on Eve’s lower back. “What, even after all these years?”

Eve blew out a little huff of fake laughter. “You thought you had baggage, eh?”

“Eve.” She wrapped her arms around Eve’s shoulders and stroked the back of her head. She felt Eve’s head drop to her shoulder. As much as she hated seeing Eve hurt, it felt nice to be the one reassuring her for once.

She waited for Eve to step out of her hold before she asked, “Is that where your anger comes from? Is that why you hit Ranveer?”

“I hit Ranveer because he deserved it,” Eve said, bluntly.

“Ravi said it was more than that.”

“I thought you didn’t trust him as far as you could throw him.”

“I don’t.” Even now she’d had time to think about it, she still couldn’t see Eve being capable of the kind of violence Ravi had alluded to. The woman touched her like she was made out of glass, for God’s sake.

But Eve had mentioned a few times that she was wrong to have left Suki downstairs with Ranveer. It didn’t make sense to her why Eve was so keen to blame herself. She’d barely even met the man; Suki had known him for years and still missed the signs.

Suki squeezed Eve’s arm. “I’m just saying – it would make sense if what happened…brought up those feelings up again. If it made you feel, I don’t know, helpless, like you did with Erica.”

“I don’t want to talk about this.” Eve stepped out of her touch to turn back to the kitchen counter. “What am I doing next? The chutney?”

Suki couldn’t pretend to understand. She felt responsible for Usama’s death, on some level, but she hadn’t known him very well and ultimately, she blamed Nish most of all. It was different for Eve, who had clearly adored Erica and didn’t seem to have anywhere else to put her guilt.

“I’m just saying that I could see how carrying all that around would mess you up.”

“I’m fine, Suki,” Eve said, firm in a way she couldn’t remember being with her before. “Leave it, yeah?”

She hesitated. “OK. But if you’re ever not, will you talk to me? I felt so alone before, and then you walked in front of me that day in the courthouse…”

“- Eh, first of all, you bumped into me. And second – Suki, you have me here preparing dinner for six people. That’s like, the opposite of alone.” Eve still looked much more serious than usual. “Although. What if your kids hate me?”

“What are you on about?” Suki turned the stove back up. “You’ve already met them.”

Eve made a face. “Yeah but not as their mum’s girlfriend.”

They had been largely unfazed when she’d raised it over breakfast. Jags and Ash seemed to genuinely like Eve, for one thing, and Kheerat had backed down from questioning her every decision now they were on good terms again - he was even sly enough to use the opportunity to ask if he could have Mitch’s daughter, Chantelle, over for dinner some night next week. Only Vinny had pouted about it and that was to be expected.

She hadn’t given much thought to how daunting it might be for Eve.

“If it’s too much too soon –”

“- No, course not. I’m just messing.” Eve quickly assumed her usual confidence, but Suki hadn’t missed the moment where it slipped.

She pressed a kiss to Eve’s cheek. “Don’t worry. They’re gonna love you like I do.”

When the samosas were filled and frying, Suki nudged Eve with her hip. “Next week, we should bake something.”

“Like what?”

“I dunno. You pick.” She glanced over at Eve – with her smirking blue eyes and her patience and all the sadder parts of her she could see but hadn’t been able to touch yet. She sighed. “And after dinner, you can help me figure out what I’m supposed to wear to this stupid wedding you’re dragging me to.”

Weren’t relationships supposed to be about compromise? She hadn’t had much of that in her marriage, but with Eve, things were already so different. She was so different - lying less and laughing more and not wanting to disappear all the time.

Best of all, Suki could breathe again.