Unfurl: Chapter 40

Rafe loves me.

It’s staggering to think that the best and worst moments of my life have coincided in a single morning. I know it’s deliberate, that he told me how he felt so I’d be empowered. I’ve taken the gift of his words, and I’ve wrapped his love for me around myself like a Teflon cloak, and I’ve allowed his gift to work the magic for which he intended it.

To swathe me. Protect me.

Embolden me.

To that end, we’ve also called in the cavalry.

Maddy.

No one’s lived the complicated web of my familial relationships like Maddy. No one else has walked by my side, their arm linked with mine, over the eggshells I’ve navigated these past years. She’s the one who understands, viscerally, every nuance of the toxic cocktail of freezing and fawning and resentment and self-recrimination that have churned in my heart for as long as I can remember.

So when my beautiful boyfriend reminds me that Maddy’s off work this week and suggests inviting her over, I jump at the opportunity.

A brief text is all it takes.

She replies right away.

She arrives less than half an hour later, bustling past Rafe and armed with wine and bakery boxes that she promptly deposits on his coffee table. ‘Oh my poor, beautiful girl,’ she coos, throwing herself at me and enveloping me in her fragrant scent. Even on her week off, she’s as glossy and well groomed as I am puffy-eyed and dishevelled.

I still haven’t got around to that bath.

‘Is it too early for wine?’ she asks, releasing me.

‘It’s eleven o’clock,’ I clarify.

She cocks her head. ‘I’m not sure if that’s a yes or a no?’

I laugh in spite of myself. ‘Let’s try to last till after twelve, at least.’

‘Sure.’ She shrugs, collapsing on the sofa and patting the spot I just vacated. ‘Nice pad, Rafe. Now, come and sit down, babes, and tell me everything. You too, Rafe.’

After we’ve meekly complied with her request, Rafe coming to sit on my other side, I fill her in on the bare bones of my catastrophic morning. She’s a good audience, but her aghast reactions do little to quell any fledgling hope I might have had that I was overreacting.

‘Wait—did Ben see your dick?’ she asks Rafe, cutting me off.

‘I grabbed a tea towel as soon as I heard the door go,’ he says, ‘but it was pretty obvious I was totally fucking naked, and when I went to get changed, he got a lovely view of my arse.’

She snorts and clamps a hand over her mouth. ‘Ohmygod. Ohmygod. That is so fucking horrific I don’t think I’ll survive. Fuck. Me.’

‘Helpful, thanks,’ I say drily, patting her knee.

‘Sorry. But that’s literally, like, the worst thing that could possibly have happened to you. Unless he walked in and found you fucking, I suppose. Actually, that’s far worse. Imagine if he’d found Rafe ploughing into you from behind, or—’

‘Seriously,’ Rafe interjects as I bury my face in my hands. The mere thought of that sends shockwaves of horror echoing through me. Okay, maybe I can be thankful for small mercies, after all.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ she says again. She sits still as I tell her the rest of the story, but when it comes to what Daddy said to me, I find I can’t get the words out. I can’t make myself say them. So Rafe takes over and curtly, in a voice vibrating with anger, fills Maddy in on the horrible, devastating indictment that will be forever burnt onto my consciousness. He does it with his hand squeezing mine hard the entire time.

Maddy flinches, her huge eyes filling with tears. She puts one hand to her chest as if her heart is aching and her other to my shoulder. ‘Tell me he didn’t say that. Oh my poor, darling baby girl.’

I close my eyes, exhaustion and nausea hitting me all over again. ‘Then he said I should go to confession.’

Maddy explodes. ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake! Ben, you twisted fucking wanker. I can’t bear it,’ she tells me. ‘I can’t bear that he has the world’s most amazing soul for his daughter and he’s so far up his own ultra-fucking-religious arse that he can’t see it. What is wrong with him?’

My head flops back on the sofa. ‘Ugh, I don’t know. I don’t know if this is an abusive relationship, or if he actually needs intervention—I mean, is this him or is this his religious extremism talking? When he was saying all these things, I was thinking where’s my dad? Where’s the man who adored me when I was a little girl?’

‘That man is still there, but his little girl isn’t playing ball anymore,’ Maddy says. ‘He’s beginning to realise he can’t control you how he wants, and this morning was a rude awakening. I mean, I wouldn’t have wished what’s happening to you on my worst enemy, but honestly, babes, I think this is a good thing for you.’

I turn my head on the sofa so I can stare at her. ‘In what possible universe is it a good thing?’

‘Well,’ she says, ‘for one, it’s forced the issue. Tell me, babes. If you and Rafe were still seeing each other when your folks got home, how long would you have pussyfooted around for? I know you—I know what your dad does to you. He puts the fucking fear of God into you! I’ve seen you lie to his face when he’s asked you if you’ve been to Mass on a Holy Day of Obligation—it’s bullshit.

‘He doesn’t get to tell you what to do. He doesn’t get to make you feel scared of living your own life and feeling like you have to lie to protect him or worse, protect himself. Can you imagine how terrified you would have been of him finding out you were dating Rafe? What would you have done—used the service lift in the mornings so your parents wouldn’t catch you on your walk of shame?’

She raises her eyebrows at me in a challenge. She’s got me, and all three of us know it.

‘I know what you mean,’ I say feebly, ‘but at least I could have eased him in gently. I—’

She holds up a finger and tuts at me. ‘Don’t bullshit me, babes. It would have been hanging over you, and that anxiety of yours would have ratcheted up higher and higher. This has saved you months upon months of agonising and tortured indecision.’

Rafe’s hand releases mine and comes to stroke the back of my neck. ‘I suspect she’s right, sweetheart,’ he says softly.

‘Okay,’ I concede. ‘Fine. But I don’t know what to do. I can’t leave it like this, but the idea of having it out with him in any shape or form makes me feel physically sick. You know I’ve never even raised my voice to my parents, Maddy. It’s always been yes, Daddy and how high, Daddy?’ I shudder out a breath. ‘The idea of having to sit down and confront him is just—I think I’d faint. He’d out-argue me, he’d quote Scripture and the catechism and he’d bulldoze me, and I don’t know if I can do it. Maybe I should just apologise and smooth—’

‘Woah,’ Rafe says at the same time Maddy sticks a hand up to stop me.

‘Stop. Right. There. Rafe, I’ve got this if you don’t mind.’ Her green-grey eyes fix me with a steely gaze, and I know she’s in Stern Maddy mode. She shakes out her shoulders and tosses her glossy hair.

‘I’m happy to announce that, after years and years of me being the hot mess and the delinquent and you being the good, sensible one, I can finally give back. Because, my darling girl, I have years and years and tens of thousands of pounds of therapy to draw on, and all the lessons I’ve learnt boil down to one single word.’

She raises her eyebrows at me expectantly.

I look back blankly.

She sighs. ‘Boundaries, babes.’

‘Oh,’ I say. Boundaries may just be Maddy’s favourite word. She’s always quoting Brene Brown and Oprah and Glennon Doyle at me when she talks about them, but I still can’t say I could define them accurately if you held a gun to my head.

‘Let me be very clear here,’ she says. ‘Boundaries are crucial in all our relationships, but never more so than when dealing with our beloved, fucked up families, and guess where the boundaries are usually shot to hell or non-existent? You’ve got it. Families.

‘You need boundaries with your parents. Should have had them years ago, but it’s never too late. Unfortunately, the later you erect them, the more painful they are to enforce, but the more they will help you heal when you have them up and running. Okay? Now, repeat after me. Boundaries are the line between what is okay and what is not okay.’

‘Boundaries are the line between what’s okay and what’s not okay,’ I repeat.

She beams. ‘Excellent.’

‘She’s good,’ Rafe mumbles in my ear, and I press my lips together to stop myself from smiling.

‘I’m very good,’ Maddy says archly. ‘Now, boundaries are most important when it comes to ensuring that we’re not trying to control other people. In that respect, if your father wants to be a crazy twat with over-zealous religious views, that’s his prerogative. Got it?’

I frown. ‘Got it.’

‘But he seems incapable of establishing healthy boundaries, so this is where you need to do the work yourself. He does not get to use those beliefs to influence or control your beliefs or lifestyle.’ She begins ticking her points off on her fingers. ‘He doesn’t get to demand that you bend over backwards to accommodate him or his beliefs. He doesn’t get to put them on you as if they were hard facts and rules and not subjective or questionable dogma. And he does not get to withhold his love for you because you refuse to conform. Yes?’

I blink. ‘Yeah.’ Wow. This version of Maddy could rule the country if she wanted to. ‘Go on.’

‘Can you see that your dad is incapable of upholding any of these boundaries himself? You need to draw a line in the sand. You need to be brave and tell him this is the only way our relationship can work. You tell him what you will and won’t tolerate—you do not ask him. Basically, babes, he’s a big bully, and no one’s ever stood up to him before, so he’s got no fucking boundaries.

‘He’s got some entitled and misguided-as-fuck belief that you and your mum are extensions of him and that we still exist in this patriarchal fucking society where what he says goes. It does not go. You hear me? It does. Not. Fucking. Go. Someone needs to read him the riot act, and I’m afraid that falls to you, gorgeous, because poor Lauren’s been told what to think for so long she has no fucking clue that she’s got any rights at all.’

She takes a huge breath. ‘I’m nearly done. One more thing. He gets to believe his shit. You get to do your thing. And most importantly, how he reacts to you doing your thing is not on you. You understand me? No matter how hurt or disappointed he is. It’s on him. He’s a big boy. His reactions are not your responsibility, and it’s not your job to pick up the pieces.’