Shirley Valentine Goes to Vegas. Michelle Betham

believing in fate all of a sudden? You? Miss cynical?’

      ‘I didn’t say I believed in it. I’m just taking a risk, okay? Isn’t that what you told me I should be doing?’

      ‘I’m absolutely positive I never mentioned running off with a Scottish biker. That wasn’t exactly the kind of risk I meant.’

      ‘I know,’ I sighed, sitting down on the couch, pushing both hands through my hair. ‘I know that isn’t what you meant, but… Something happened here, Finn. Something clicked inside of me. Something I can’t explain.’

      ‘Are you sure you haven’t just been blinded by too much sex? I mean, I know you haven’t had any for Christ knows how long…’

      I threw him a look as he sat down next to me. ‘I don’t know, okay? And you’re right. This is crazy. It’s ridiculous, and unreal, and incredibly selfish of me but…’ I looked down at my clasped hands. ‘Maybe I’m having some kind of middle-age meltdown. But Eddie he’s… he’s just as crazy as I am, Finn. And maybe crazy is just what I need right now.’

      Finn sighed, throwing himself back against the couch cushions. ‘Lana, babe, you know nothing about this guy.’

      ‘And he knows nothing about me. But don’t you think that’s what makes it so much more exciting?’

      He just looked at me, but didn’t offer up any kind of answer.

      ‘I’m almost forty years old, Finn. And I have spent most of my life in a box I thought I was never going to be able to escape from…’

      For the next twenty minutes I found myself pouring my heart out about my marriage break- up. And I had no idea why these floodgates had chosen to open now; why I was suddenly telling Finn all these things I’d kept from him before. I just knew that I needed to get it out. All of it. In order for me to really be able to walk away from the past. Keeping it bottled up inside had only held me back, I knew that now. ‘If there’s something else out there you want, something that might just make you happy; something you know you can have if you just have the balls to go out there and grab it, then… then nobody should feel guilty about doing that. Nobody. And you helped me see that, Finn. You gave me the confidence I needed to go out there and be this person I so badly wanted to be; needed to be. The person I should have become a long time ago.’

      ‘So it’s my fault you’re eloping with Scotty, then?’

      ‘Finn…’

      ‘And what about your apprenticeship at Black Ink?’

      ‘Look, Finn, I’m not saying this is forever, okay? It might not even be something that lasts more than a few weeks but I… It’s something I need to do. And I can’t really explain it, or give you a reason that would make any kind of sense, I just… I need to do this. I kind of want to see where it takes me. And, it’ll give me the time I quite obviously need to get my head around those things I’m still finding hard to let go of. You’ll still train me, won’t you? If I come back home?’

      ‘If?’

      ‘Will you?’ I fixed him with a look and he sighed.

      ‘You know I will.’

      I leant over and kissed his cheek, ruffling his dark hair.

      ‘You’re fucking nuts, do you know that? Certifiably crazy.’

      I stood up and walked over to the full-length mirror by the bed, cocking my head as I stared at my reflection. ‘Yeah. I know I am.’ I swung around, smiling as I looked at him. ‘Like I said, you made me this way, remember?’

      He sighed again as he hauled himself up off the couch. ‘I created a frigging monster, that’s what I did.’ He walked over to me, pulling me into his arms, his expression suddenly turning serious. ‘Don’t do it, Lana. Please. Think about this, okay? Think about what’s happening here. What you’re planning to do, it’s not the most sensible idea you’ve ever had.’

      ‘I’m done with sensible, Finn.’ I snuggled in against him, holding him tight. ‘I’ve been sensible for almost forty years, and I think that’s long enough. Now I want to do crazy and stupid and all those things I never had the chance to do before.’

      ‘But this isn’t just…’ He let go of me, pushing both hands through his hair as he let out another heavy sigh. ‘It doesn’t matter what I say, does it? You’re actually gonna do this.’

      ‘Yeah. I’m gonna do this.’

      ‘Then know that I think it’s a bad idea.’

      ‘I need you to be with me on this one, Finn. Please.’

      He shook his head, and I felt tears start to prick the backs of my eyes. ‘I can’t, Lana. I can’t support you on this because I think you’re making a mistake.’

      ‘Finn, please…’

      ‘Go out with him tonight, and you will be that amazing person I know you are, okay? You do that, you go out there and have some fun, spend the night with him, have as much sex as you want, wear the bastard out for all I care. But in the morning, I want you to tell me you’re coming home with the rest of us.’

      ‘I can’t promise you that.’

      ‘Think about this, Lana, please. What you talked about just now, everything you said about finding something that makes you happy, about starting a new life, you’re doing just fine on that score, kiddo. You really are. You don’t need to stay here to prove anything to yourself…’

      ‘That isn’t why I’m doing it, Finn. I don’t need to prove anything to anyone… Jesus… I just want to… I just want to be with him… There’s something about him that makes me feel – I don’t know. He makes me feel alive. He makes me feel like somebody I never knew I could be. It’s like he’s awakened something inside me that’s been lying there, dormant, for all those years.’

      ‘Just come home, Lana. Come home and let’s get back to normal. Let’s carry on doing what we were doing because we were having a blast, kiddo. I thought you liked our life.’

      ‘I love our life, I really do, I just… I need that space, that time to really push Adam to the back of my mind…’

      ‘I don’t think this is all to do with Adam. Not really.’

      I stared at him, right into his eyes. ‘I’m staying, Finn.’

      He let out another heavy, frustrated sigh. ‘I can’t believe you’re doing this… You know I’m always gonna be there for you, don’t you? Always. And when this crazy, stupid, rash act you’re about to undertake falls down around you – when it all turns to shit and you realise what a huge mistake it really was, I’ll still be there, ready to pick up the pieces. I’ll still be there. But I can’t pretend this is a good idea, Lana. Because I think it’s wrong.’