It was March 2017 and it seemed to everyone that it was all smooth sailing between Pete and me. Pete was telling people how we’d finally got this whole relationship business sussed. He said to them, ‘We’re getting on really well. It’s taken time, but now we get it. You know what pushes each other’s buttons, and you realise that, and you stop pushing them.’
Well, all I can say is, if I’d been downing my glass of wine, it would have been spat at the screen. In the weeks leading up to that grand speech, Pete and I must have gone through the whole break-up-make-up routine about half a dozen times. It was always the same – some tiny thing causing a massive row, one of us driving off in the car, the other one deleting all our pictures from social media, then someone (okay, that’ll be me) driving round to his house and shouting ‘Let me in!’ like a psycho.
Pete was probably being a bit more accurate when he said, ‘She’s really vocal about how she feels. I ain’t, but I’ve got to let her in more. We’ve got to work on the communication more, because I’m shit at it.’
The truth of the matter was, we weren’t making each other happy, but neither of us was prepared to say it out loud. Simple as that. For our one-year anniversary, we went away to a hotel with the film crew. There were scones, strawberries, champagne on ice – the full romantic works. But I couldn’t sit there and fake my feelings any longer.
When he asked, ‘Who’d have thought we’d make a year?’ even Pete didn’t sound convinced. I tried to tell him how his constant bad mood was affecting me, but he just said it was the same for him. It wasn’t like our other big rows – this chat was actually more sad than angry. I cried, and that’s when he told me, ‘I’d take six bad days for the one day that we are good.’
With his next breath, though, he was moaning, ‘I’ve wasted a year of my fucking life,’ and he stormed off.
We were meant to stay the night, but he left and I had to drive home with one of the producers. As I was packing up, I noticed Pete had left that memory book I gave him, and he’d finished the pages… A few months later, I burned that same book, took a video and sent it to him. Yes, pretty psycho I know.
The thing is, that’s all fine when you’re a teenager and you don’t mind being a bit dramatic – and I should know, Nu Bar anyone? – but nobody should have to go through six shitty days with anybody for one good day, and I think we both realised that. Pete was clearly miserable – I couldn’t make him happy and I couldn’t trust him after everything we’d gone through.
A few days after that, we sat down together in my flat, and I really think he thought we were going to give it another go. Instead, I told him the truth: ‘I wanted it to work. I just can’t deal with it. It’s not fair on you that I can’t forgive you.’
Pete asked, ‘Why can’t you forgive me?’ OMG! I don’t know what it is, but this just used to frustrate me. I must have told him a million times, but now I told him again – it was because he’d never actually explained his bad behaviour to me, so how could I learn to deal with it?
He lost his temper and shouted, ‘Because I can’t explain it! What happened was shit, and I can’t feel guilty about it all the time. I can’t pay for that for the rest of my life.’
It slowly dawned on him that this wasn’t going well. ‘Is that it then? Are we just going to call it a day? Are you still in love with me?’
I took a deep breath. ‘I feel like I love you but I feel different. I feel like you’ve pushed me away.’
That was me saying, but in a pretty wimp way, that I felt like there was no love there – he’d just pushed me too far.
All this shit was going on, but when it came on TV and I watched it back, all I could see was my bloody eyelash stuck to my eyebrow. How embarrassing, ha ha. And people say TOWIE’s fake! That was it – we’d broken up. I was single.
In the days afterwards, there were a few messages back and forth, but as far as I was concerned, we were finally in the past. At this point, I needed a change of scene, so I took up an invitation for a night out at an Essex club.
It was indeed the very same club where I’d gone with The Dip all those years before. God, why out of all places, did I decide to go there? #prat. So much time had passed – I had no idea if he was going to be there, I just knew I’d had enough of sitting in feeling sorry for myself, and it was time to catch up with some old friends and make some new ones. So off I went, hair all blow-dried, wearing a silk mini-dress, and I did have lots of fun. I bumped into The Dip’s mates and we had a right laugh. I was just saying to them, ‘I haven’t been here since you know who,’ when a very familiar face appeared in front of me – Mr Dip himself.
I went to the bar, and there he was. ‘All right, Meg?’ ‘All right.’ I didn’t speak to him properly until the end of the night. We ended up having a chat when the lights had come up, and I started getting a bit emotional. He asked me, ‘Are you back with Pete?’ and I told him we’d broken up. Then it was time for me to go home. I got in a taxi with Amber and just burst into tears. What a state! At this point, Amber looked at me and said, ‘Are you really crying over Pete or The Dip?’ I said, ‘I just don’t know.’
After the weekend, me and Pete spoke a bit – still on bad terms – but then had another huge argument, and we were back on that break again. I thought, ‘Fuck this, I’m going out again,’ so I went to Sheesh in Chigwell. And guess what? There he was – The Dip staring straight at me! Can you believe it? I promise you I hadn’t seen him in two full years, and now here we were, in the same place twice in the same week. That night we sat chatting – we talked all about the past, and eventually I kissed him.
Yep, I know. Quite dramatic. But to be honest, whatever might have been going on in my own head, I really didn’t think I had any explaining to do. Everyone knew I was single once more – God knows, they’d heard enough about the Megan and Pete rollercoaster – but everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, pretty much ran over to Team Pete without even talking to me about it. Inevitably, there were all sorts of rumours going round that I’d cheated on Pete with my ex. I had to use every chance I could get to explain myself, which made for some pretty awkward moments.
‘How I deal with things is I go out and get smashed,’ I said. ‘I went out, my ex was there, we had a few drinks. I’ve done nothing wrong – I’m completely single, I can do what I want. What I don’t want is these rumours being blown out of proportion.’ As if that would happen!
Look, I know this all makes me look like a twat, but I was an emotional wreck, and I think Pete realised that, which was why he decided to get over the whole drama with The Dip. Not saying it was right. Yes, it was too soon. But I just wasn’t in the right frame of mind.
Despite splitting up and having all this mature chat, Pete and I still managed to steal the show with an almighty blow-up halfway through the series – a scene that went viral, became one of TOWIE’s biggest ever fights between any couple, and inspired about a million memes.
We were stood in the street. It all started off quite calmly, with me telling him I was a bit upset about some things the others had been saying, and asking him to stop other people getting involved in all our stuff. Then, I did this big sigh, basically because I was so fucked off with him always playing the good guy – and I said so.
Next thing I knew, he was screaming at me, ‘So you was an angel? I never went near another fucking bird.’ And off he went again about how I’d never forgiven him, how he’d tried everything, and how it could have worked. What planet was he on? It was just bollocks. It was like he’d forgotten how fucking miserable he was the entire time – he was making up this entire story in his head. It made me livid all over again. I screamed at him, ‘It’s a load of shit. I don’t believe it.’ I started walking away and he followed me, but I’d had enough. I told him, ‘You’re fake,’ and that was it. The only thing good about that scene was how amazing my hair looked, LOL.
Somehow, even after that, we managed to calm down and agree not to listen to anyone else weighing in on our relationship. For a while, it seemed as though we might actually be friends.
Don’t hold your breath, guys! By the following month, we were being very friendly to each other. For the series finale, we were all at a pool party for Dan Edgar’s birthday, and Pete and I were flirting across the pool. I know, I know! But somehow, despite all the bollocks we’d put each other through, another romantic reunion was on the cards. In fact nobody knew, but we stayed in the same hotel room that night – just in time for me to head off to Nashville.
This time, we decided to be all grown up, make it official, not put everything on camera, enjoy our time together in the break from filming and give it one last shot. Off I went to America, and things were sweet.