Men at Work [Quick Read] by Mike Gayle

rid of me.”
    “It wasn’t like that Em, honest. I just wasn’t thinking straight that’s all.”
    “And I’m guessing you blame me for that too!” Emma shook her head. “It’s hard to know which is worse,” she said quietly. “That you went out of your way to get me sacked or the fact that you hated working with me so much that you wanted to get rid of me. That’s right, isn’t it? You would’ve done anything to get rid of me, wouldn’t you?”
    Ian shook his head. “It wasn’t like that, babe. You have to believe me.”
    “Okay then,” said Emma. “Tell me what it was like. Tell me why it was so awful working day in, day out with your girlfriend!”
    “You’re getting it all wrong,” said Ian. “The problem was with me not you.”
    “Are you really trying to palm me off with that rubbish?” snapped Emma. “Do you really think you can get away with using a line like, ‘It’s not you, it’s me?’ Of course it was you, Ian! I’m not the one who’s been a lying, cowardly, sneaky little toad here! I’m not the one who didn’t have the guts to have a simple talk with his girlfriend and I’m certainly not the one who got me sacked!”
    “I know,” said Ian. “I’m sorry, Emma, I’m really sorry.”
    He reached to touch her arm but she pushed him away.
    “Don’t touch me!” she snapped. “Don’t you dare touch me again! You’ve hurt me, Ian. You’ve hurt me so much that I’m not sure things can ever be the same. You were the closest person to me in the world and you let me down, and all for what? So that you can have a laugh with your mates in a stupid job that you care about more than you do me? How can I not be insulted by that? How can I not think that this shows how little you care for me?”
    “Listen, Em,” said Ian, “you’re getting the wrong end of the stick. It was never about making you look stupid. It really was about me and my problems. I should’ve said right from the start that I wasn’t happy about you working at my place but I couldn’t think how to do it without hurting your feelings.”
    “So let me get this straight: you didn’t have the guts to talk to me about working at your place, but you had the guts to sneak onto my computer and send an email that got me sacked in front of the whole office? Have you any idea how shaming that was? How awful it felt thinking that someone in the office hated me so much that they would do that?”
    “It was never meant to go this far,” said Ian.
    “But it did,” said Emma, “and now that it’s all out in the open we’ve both got to learn to live with what happens next.”
    Ian felt himself begin to panic. It was really going to happen, his worst nightmare. Emma was going to dump him. “You’re not saying that you want to split up over this are you? I made a mistake, I admit that, and I promise you that I will make it up to you but please, Em, please don’t split up with me. Not over this. It was stupid, that’s all, just a stupid mistake and I’ll never do anything like it again.”
    “Those are just words,” said Emma rising to her feet. “You might mean them, you might not, and I will never know. But when it comes to love, what really counts is deeds. The things you do and the reasons why you do them. By acting the way that you have you’ve shown me that I don’t matter to you. So maybe it’s my turn to show you just how much you have hurt me. If you have any love for me at all, you will pack a bag and just go, Ian. Go and leave me alone.”
    “Go?” said Ian. “Go where?”
    “To your mum and dad’s . . . to Amar and Rukmani’s . . . you could camp out right in the middle of your beloved office for all I bloody care! All I want is for you to go.”
    “But this is just for now, isn’t it?” said Ian quickly. “Just so that you can sort your head out? You have to promise me you aren’t ending it for good, Em. You have to promise that this isn’t us breaking up forever.”
    Emma