What's a Knife in the Throat Between Friends
by Charlotte Derrick
“Why are you so scared of change?” Georgia tries to catch Joshua’s eye, but he’s more interested in the River Rock bottle clamped between Georgia’s legs. She flicks ash her cigarette into the neck of the bottle and swirls the dying butt around to ensure that it’s snuffed out.
“I like who I am,” Joshua says. He invited her over for a quick shag. Why did she always have to be so difficult? Why did she want to know? He gives her a grin and shrugs. Although he doesn’t believe Georgia would throw a bottle at his head, he can see in her face that she’s considered it more than once.
It’s easy for Georgia. She makes twice as much a month as he does for putting a pen to paper. He writes just as much as her, but people want to be entertained. They want silly little stories that can help them take their minds off the day ahead. They didn’t want to read academic papers about cyclic adsorption separation processes.
He takes his frustration out on Georgia when they have sex. He bites her neck and feels a quiet satisfaction when her skin bruises pink-purple. He’s had enough of her bragging about her online mindfulness classes or the herbal medications she’s been taking for her low moods or her bi-weekly private therapy sessions. Seventy-five pounds per session, she had told him proudly, because she could afford it now.
Georgia sets the bottle down and moves closer to Joshua on the bed, placing a hand on either side of his face, so he has to look at her.
“What if you could be better than you are now?” she asks.
He leans in and kisses Georgia softly on the mouth. A small part of him wants to change, but he’s afraid. What if there’s nothing to change? What if he can’t? People like Joshua for a while. They think he’s funny, charming. And then they scratch the surface. ‘Who are you really?’ He pushes them away before they can find out. He calls himself a narcissist. Georgia says he’s more of a Cluster C personality type. Avoidant, she had told him. He made a mental note to look it up when she was asleep.
“This coming from the girl who can’t even cry in front of people,” Joshua laughs, because if he doesn’t laugh, he knows he’ll be the one to cry. It’s easier for him to hurt Georgia than to be honest with himself.
Georgia shakes her head at him and rolls over, pulling the duvet over her body.
Throughout the night, Joshua tries to inch closer to her. He wants to tell her, ‘I’m sorry, Georgia. I’m sorry I’m like this,’ but he can’t bring himself to do it.
Georgia shifts right to the edge of the bed and lays there, rigid, until the blinds are speckled with early morning light. She leaves without saying a word.
His alarm goes off at 8am. Joshua gets up, gets dressed, and goes to work.
Nothing changes.
Charlotte Derrick is an emerging prose writer and poet from Belfast, Northern Ireland. They were the winner of Spread the Word's Life Writing Prize 2019, and were shortlisted for the V.S Pritchett Short Story Award. Their work has been featured in The Honest Ulsterman, The Open Ear, Beyond Words, The Banyon Review, Flash Fiction Magazine, etc.