The Liability

"Not my problem." She said dismissively.
Sarah coughed, her champagne had caught in her throat, she could feel it burning the inside of her nose as she grabbed her napkin from the table. "Are you kidding me?" Sarah choked.
"Well that's that then." Helen said and nodded toward Sarah.

Sarah crushed the napkin in her clenched fist as the two women sitting across the table from her avoided her gaze. The older woman was reading her menu with fascination, her green eyes darting up and down barely settling on anything. The younger woman with a blonde bob of haphazard curls staring at the ceiling and counting the light-bulbs dangling from ropes around the restaurant hovering over each booth.

The three women had gathered at the restaurant reluctantly. Helen had ordered a bottle of champagne declaring it a special occasion. It was extremely rare for them to be in the same room but Sarah had insisted on bringing them together much. Helen had determined that it must be a celebration of some sort. Her optimism had been doused upon seeing the barely concealed frustration on Sarah's face and her associate's impudent nonchalance.

Helen didn't know why she was there if it was a matter between the two women. She much preferred to be kept out of any dispute which did not concern her. Sarah had been firm on the matter and ordered a taxi to pick Helen up from her house in the suburbs to ensure she arrived on time.

Helen had been staring in the mirror trying to perfect her makeup but removing her fake eyelashes frantically when she heard the taxi driver lean on the car horn outside. Her children were stampeding up and down the stairs, her husband was yelling ineffectually, the dog was barking and the television was chattering in the background it's volume far too loud. Helen pressed her forehead against her vanity table and lifted her head to observe her top lids gummed together with glue and her eyes down-turned in dismay. She tried to jam an eye-shadow palette which was too large into her sequin covered purse.

The taxi driver had refused to let her turn his interior light on in order to allow her to apply her makeup in the passenger seat. Helen muttered about not giving him a tip under her breath but both of them were aware that Sarah had prepaid for the trip through an app on her phone. Helen didn't understand how it worked and was too embarrassed to ask how technology enabled such a transaction. Couldn't Sarah have picked a more amenable taxi-driver?

"When was the last time we were all just... having a meal together?" Helen asked, attempting to break the angry silence fomenting between her associates. She had bolted into the toilets before taking her seat. The glue was not coming off her eyelashes but it was successfully camouflaged by a layer of black eye-shadow. Neither woman had said anything but Helen was exceedingly self-conscious every time they looked at her.

"Do you hate me?" Sarah asked, "Is that why you are doing this?"
The blonde woman remained silent, her eyes gliding back to the table lazily tilting her head at Sarah. She remained coolly indifferent, forehead smooth, grey eyes rimmed with royal blue eyeliner.
"No one hates anyone." Helen said admonishing Sarah with a frown.
"Look, you just need to get him the fuck off my couch." Sarah said irritably.

Helen had an impulse at that moment to demand to know why she had been summoned. She had been dragged away from an evening with her family. She had shaved her legs and put on an evening dress. Not to mention the ongoing threat that her eyelids could possibly forever remain glued shut. Her first evening free in what felt like months and yet she was here playing referee.

The blonde perm with the penetrating gaze remained silent. She was wearing a silk scarf around her neck and a golden halter neck top. She looked like she had stepped out of a time machine but her nonchalance and intensity made it seem as natural as her skin. Helen noted that her attire always felt like costume as if she were an alien from a world beyond reality who merely wore what she expected humans to dress like from watching old films and reading ancient magazines. She never followed the current trends and seemed to actively avoid dressing in anything modern. Tonight She looked like an extra from an old film who was in the background at a disco. At least she had graduated from dressing like a homeless person.

"She broke the rules Helen." Sarah was exasperated and was looking directly Helen who appeared to be bewildered with red hair and gummy eyelids. If Sarah couldn't rely on Helen for assistance in these circumstances all hope was lost.

"Rules?" Helen asked confused.
"What the fuck?" Sarah cried. "Yes, the rules!"
"What did you do?" Helen asked in a business-like tone turning to the woman sitting next to her. The blonde woman shrugged and turned to look at Sarah who sat opposite them. The young blonde and the older red head pierced Sarah with concerned gazes of different intensities. Helen looked like she was about to cry but her eyes were barely open.

"Look, I'm not dealing with this. This is all so fucked. I'm out." Sarah placed her palms on the table in front of her, "I just wanted you both to know that. I'm out."

The blonde took a sip from her champagne flute. Helen's shoulders sagged and she cast her gaze between the two women glowering at one another across the table. This felt significant. It was the first time Sarah had even expressed that she didn't wish to be a part of their arrangement. Helen was mortified.

"Are you threatening us?" The woman asked.
"No, I'm just done." Sarah said shaking her head. "We're standing over a chasm and it's time to walk away before we all fall in. I'm not falling."
"And if I get rid of him?" She asked, Helen sighed with relief.
"I'm just done." Sarah said and laughed, "God, I'm so out of this."

"We can't just shut this down Sarah." Helen said frantically. She felt like she had been punched in the gut, winded and afraid. The fortifying sips of champagne she had taken weren't enough to steady her, she needed something stronger. Something to settle her stomach which was churning with anxiety, something which would cauterise her insides.

"We managed fine without you." The woman said.
"Yeah sure, I'll just take my contacts and see how long you two last without me." Sarah said, she was grabbing her bag.
"Stop it!" Helen snapped. "Both of you!" Sarah paused before exiting the booth. "I have no fucking clue what is going on but you need to sit the fuck down Sarah. And you-" Helen turned to the woman who was trapped in the booth by Helen's person, "You need to tell me what the fuck is going on."

"He has lost it and you are ignoring him." Sarah said. She had returned to her seat, she had slung her purse onto the seat beside her with a flourish.
Helen had ordered tequila, her triple which hadn't been satisfactory. The knot in her stomach had tightened further as the girls had continued to bicker viciously. Sarah was sipping from a Cosmopolitan and She had a gin martini.

"He'll get over it." She said.
"His uncle died." Sarah responded, a softness had entered her voice.
"I don't need to know this." Helen sighed.
"He'll be fine." She said.
"He knows too much." Sara said her voice hardening.
"Then you deal with him." She said bluntly. Sarah could visualise the gun she had left in her sock drawer. Donovan wouldn't look there she hoped. He had found her stack of hat boxes and proceeded to try them all on and take photos of himself posting them online to his large following. He wouldn't do the same with her stockings. Definitely not.

"Not my job." Sarah said as coolly as she could. The gun was for self-defence.
The blonde perm swung back and forth as she shook her head.
"What? You can't?" Sarah asked. "You've gone soft."

This prompted a frown, Helen sense her tensing next to her, she flagged a waiter to the table.
"Same again but twice for me." Helen advised. "It's tequila." She handed her empty glass to the waiter.
"Vodka." Sarah sputtered. "Vodka and soda, double!"
"Same." She lifted her martini glass and nodded.