Spending that much time at work would be a red flag for anyone, but where my brother was concerned, it felt less like a flag and more like someone running up to you in the middle of the street, knocking you off your feet and wrapping you up in a red blanket while shouting ‘Something’s going on! Something’s going on!’. I loved Paul, but he hadn’t been faithful to a single woman in his entire life.

  At least, not until he started seeing Emelie.

  When they got together, I promised I would be supportive and when they moved in together, I was so happy for them. Then, on New Year’s Eve, when he drunkenly told me he was thinking about proposing, I even gave him my best friend blessing. But that was months ago and so far, there had been no evidence of a proposal. When I tried to ask him about it, he pretended he didn’t know what I was talking about, dumping me squarely between a rock and a hard place and I didn’t like it one little bit.

  ‘You want to talk about it?’ I asked.

  ‘If there was anything to talk about, I would,’ she replied. ‘Is there anything you want to talk about? Like the fact you’ve barely started planning the most important day of your life and instead you’re handing all the decisions off to Dan’s little sister?’

  ‘No,’ I answered, more snippily than I’d intended. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Anyone would think you don’t even want to get married,’ she said, eyebrows raised as she took a sip.

  ‘I can’t wait to get married,’ I replied. This time I was exactly as snippy as I intended to be. ‘I’m dying to get married. I’d get married tomorrow if I could.’

  ‘Well, that told me,’ Emelie said as she paddled over to the steps, sliding off her inflatable swan with far more elegance than I could hope for. ‘I’m going in. I need to shower before I pass out. Do you need anything?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ A rush of bone-deep tiredness washed over me as I trailed my fingertips in the water and my momentary obnoxious mood passed. ‘I’ll be right behind you.’

  She hung onto the sliding door that led back into the house and smiled, both of us softening at the exact same moment.

  ‘Happy Hen Do, Rachel Summers.’

  I blew her a kiss as she closed the door behind her and stared up at the stars. I’d never seen so many. In London, only the biggest and brightest made their presence known but out here, on my own, I was able to see the bigger picture. Closer and bolder or smaller and far away, they were all beautiful. So many stars had been sprinkled liberally across the Californian sky, and I wished right down to my toes that Dan was here with me to see them.

  ‘Maybe we’ll come back on our honeymoon,’ I sighed as I paddled towards the steps Emelie had used to climb so elegantly off her swan, only to flop face first into the water.

  Our honeymoon. I blew saltwater out of my nose and sighed. Another thing to add to the to-do list. I used to be so good with my lists, writing things down and ticking them off but lately, they felt so overwhelming. No matter how many things I accomplished, five more popped up to take their place. I just couldn’t keep up. Once upon a time I would have been more excited about planning a once-in-a-lifetime romantic holiday than I would have been about going on the bloody thing but now it all felt like such a tremendous degree of effort.

  ‘The only thing on my to-do list right now is go to sleep,’ I told the giant cactus that stood sentry by the back patio doors, arms aloft in a permanent, prickly high five. ‘And I think I can manage that without too much trouble.’

  The cactus didn’t reply but something about the perkiness of its spikes told me it had faith in me.

  My jetlag did not come to play.

  We all woke up at different times the next morning, Matthew surrendered at five a.m. and the smell of freshly ground coffee had me up and out of bed just half an hour later. Maddie was next, dragging herself out onto the patio bleary eyed and yawning an hour later and we were all about ready to turn in for a mid-morning nap when Emelie appeared in a blue and white polka-dot bikini at half past nine.

  ‘I offered you all sleeping tablets,’ she said, stretching high then bending over to limber up before she dived straight into the pool. ‘Come on, get in! It’ll wake you up.’

  ‘She’s probably right,’ I said, staring zombie-like from my sun lounger.

  ‘But it’s so far,’ Maddie reached out an arm, straining towards the pool that was a whole twenty feet away.

  ‘Maybe if we’re very lucky, she’ll drown and that will shut her up,’ Matthew replied, pouring out the last of our third pot of coffee while Emelie powered into her second lap of the pool.

  I lowered my sunglasses so he could see my frown.

  ‘That’s not nice.’

  ‘Wasn’t meant to be.’

  ‘I’m excited for the cooking class today,’ Maddie said quickly. ‘My cooking skills start and end at spaghetti Bolognese and I still wouldn’t serve it to guests.’

  ‘Is Tom a good cook?’ I asked, smiling as she coloured up at the mention of her boyfriend. They hadn’t been together that long, but you didn’t need psychic powers to see that they were meant to be. In all honesty, I’d half-expected them to beat us down the aisle at the rate they were going. Tom was such a smitten kitten and Maddie was still suffering from a severe case of mentionitis, a year after they met.

  ‘Much better than me,’ she nodded. ‘He’s really good at working out recipes, trying different cuisines. He’s the chef, I’m more of a straightforward cook. My specialty is fish fingers and Smash.’

  ‘I’m so hungry I would eat dry Smash right now,’ Matthew groaned. ‘Stephen is a thousand times better in the kitchen than I am as well. You know, these are the things they should put in women’s magazines. Don’t worry about how good a shag he is or how much money he makes, can the fucker cook, does he question how many ASOS packages arrive in your name and how many mini Magnums can he put away in one sitting? These are the real things that keep a relationship going when times get hard.’

  ‘What’s so funny?’ Emelie panted as she came to a stop, treading water in front of us.

  ‘I was just congratulating us all on choosing men who are better cooks than we are,’ Matthew replied. ‘What’s Paul like in the kitchen? I know you said he was better than Rachel but that could just mean he’s capable of opening a tin of beans.’

  Without a word, she disappeared under the water and swam away.

  ‘Have I missed something?’ Maddie asked, looking to me and Matthew for an answer we didn’t have. ‘Have she and your brother had a fight?’

  Pulling up my legs, I wrapped my arms around my thighs and rested my chin on my knees while my friend continued to slice through the water like a hot blade through butter.

  ‘I think so,’ I nodded. ‘I tried to talk to her about it last night, but she shut me down. Obviously, it’s weird because Paul’s my brother, but that’s never stopped her before. I mean, I’ve called him far worse things than she ever has and if she feels awkward at all, it didn’t stop her from sharing that delightful story about the time they tried bondage and he threw his back out while he was handcuffed to the bedframe. I think things might be really bad between them.’

  ‘Thanks for reminding me about the handcuffs, you’ve completely killed my appetite,’ Matthew said. ‘Want me to talk to her? See if I can crack the nut?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I replied. ‘Can you have a civil conversation without sniping her to death?’

  He arched one eyebrow as he sipped his coffee. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Why don’t I start breakfast?’ Maddie heaved her legs over the side of her sun lounger, looking as though she was keen to make herself scarce. ‘Pretty sure I saw all the ingredients for pancakes in the kitchen. Something to put us on until cookery class.’

  ‘You’re an angel,’ Matthew craned his head to grin at her as she let herself inside the house, before turning back to me. ‘She’s an angel. Can we keep her?’

  ‘Yes, but only if you’re going to look after her properly. And that means feeding, cleaning, taking her for walks and not ignoring the friends you already have.’ We both looked across the garden where Emelie was climbing out of the pool and into the hot tub. ‘You two are a nightmare at the minute.’

  ‘She knows I’m only joking,’ he said, absolving himself of any guilt with a shrug. ‘And she’s been so bloody needy lately, what with Paul working all these extra hours and weekends. All the late-night texts, wanting to hang out all the time, it’s too much. Stephen loves her as much as I do but if she had her way, we’d be a throuple by now. Aren’t you sick of it? I can’t see Dan going for a lodger with all the hours he works.’

  My forehead creased with concern. I hadn’t had a barrage of late-night texts or hangout requests. I’d barely heard from Emelie in months.

  ‘She really hasn’t said anything about what’s going on with them?’ I asked, properly worried now.

  Matthew shook his head. ‘Just says he’s busy all the time. He hasn’t said anything to you?’

  I scoffed and reached forward to squeeze my big toes. ‘No, my little brother has not gone out of his way to talk to me about any relationship problems he might be having with my best friend.’

  He inclined his head slightly to acknowledge the situation.

  ‘What do we do if they’re on the outs?’

  ‘You mean, what do we do if my best friend and bridesmaid breaks up with my brother and groomsman, mere weeks before my wedding?’

  We both watched Emelie as dove back into the pool, sailing up and down, her strong arms pulling her through the water, lean legs kicking cleanly behind her.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, sinking back against my sunbed. ‘I really don’t know.’

  ‘Next, you’re going to take your ground pork and place it in your large, blue mixing bowl.’

  Staring at the myriad of confusing ingredients in front of me, I sighed. Several hours and even more pancakes later, I was standing behind a large stainless-steel table in the kitchen of some fancy restaurant, halfway through a ‘round the world’ cooking class with ten other people, none of whom looked as confused as I did, attempting to make xiaolongbao. In a surprising twist, Emelie and Maddie had partnered up and were absolutely killing it. Their food looked edible, they were both smiling and given how many extremely sharp knives were in the vicinity, I couldn’t have been more pleased. Despite his big mouth, my partner, Matthew, was even less use than I was, and I’d already seen him sneaking mouthfuls of cooking wine, which did not bode well for what was to come.

  ‘What’s next?’ he asked, wiping his hands down the front of a stiff blue apron.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I confessed, hurling a handful of chopped spring onions into the pork. ‘But I do know I’m not eating whatever this ends up as. What disease is it you get from undercooked pork?’

  ‘Myxomatosis?’

  ‘That’s rabbits,’ I said, uncorking a bottle and trying not to retch at the unpleasant fishy smell of the liquid inside. ‘You mean trichinosis.’

  ‘No one is getting trichinosis,’ the chef yelled. ‘Before we go on, did everyone sign the waiver at the beginning of class?’

  ‘I thought this was going to be more fun and less absolutely fucking dreadful,’ I whispered, trying not to attract the attention of the not-at-all-friendly maniac in charge. The chef from The Little Mermaid had more charm than this man. So far, he’d shouted at me twice, told Matthew his gnocchi looked like ‘little turds’ and I couldn’t say for sure, but I was pretty certain the second time Maddie excused herself to use the bathroom, she went for a cry.

  ‘So, we’re agreed the class is horrendous and we should leave?’ Matthew picked up a slightly-too-brown-to-pass-as-golden spring roll and bit into it. ‘This is edible.’

  ‘Thank you for the compliment and no we’re not leaving,’ I said, stirring a tablespoon of chopped ginger into the mixing bowl before squinting at the recipe. Did that say a tablespoon or a teaspoon? Oops. Well, who didn’t like ginger? ‘You can have mine. I can’t help thinking they taste a bit like hand sanitizer.’

  ‘That’s probably because I had sanitizer on my hands when we were rolling them,’ he said, happily munching on the second roll. ‘Doesn’t bother me.’

  ‘Do not eat any of the finished items!’ the chef yelled, waving over at our station. ‘We’ll all eat together at the end of the cooking session.’

  ‘When is the end of the cooking session?’ I asked, looking longingly out the window at the blazing sunshine.

  ‘We only have three more hours to turn you into a passable cook,’ he replied, almost mournfully. ‘Next we move on to our goat curry.’

  ‘Or we could sneak out and get a drink,’ Matthew hissed in my ear.

  The idea was not without its merits.

  ‘We can’t just leave,’ I said. ‘What if I go to the loo and call you and pretend to have an emergency?’

  ‘Or, what if we’re actual adults who have paid for the class and if we want to leave, we can?’

  I stared at him, aghast. ‘You mean, just say we’re leaving and leave?’

  ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Like grownups.’

  ‘But that’s so rude.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because the chef will think we’re not having a nice time.’

  Matthew looked over at the chef in his black coat and a little puffed-up hat and shrugged. ‘We’re not.’

  I narrowed my eyes and turned back to my pork, ginger and onion mixture. ‘No, but we don’t want him to know that, do we?’

  ‘Alright, enough is enough.’ Matthew unfastened his apron and pulled it over his head, dumping it in a pile on the table. ‘Sorry, Chef, I just got a phone call from my great aunt to say her guinea pig has gone into hyperglycaemic shock and I have to go to the shop and get it some M&Ms before it dies.’

  Chef said nothing as me, Emelie, Maddie and the rest of the class looked on in shock as he strode out of the kitchen, throwing his arms up into the air as the sunshine blessed his face, like Nicole Kidman getting her divorce papers, only happier.

  ‘I’d better go with him,’ I said, my apron fastening catching in my high ponytail as I fumbled to remove it. ‘Just in case, you know, something happens to the guinea pig, because they’re very close and I know he’d be devastated, and I wouldn’t want him to go through that alone. Thank you so much for the class, it was just brilliant, and we’re gutted to be leaving but yes, just brilliant, totally great. Enjoy the goat.’

  I bowed as I walked, bobbing up and down and pressing my hands together in prayer, offering up what I hoped was a winsome, apologetic and somewhat believable smile before scuttling out the door.

  ‘Ready?’ Matthew asked as I reached for a railing, the dry desert air burning up my lungs.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ I said, refastening my ponytail and counting to ten.

  The door opened again and Emelie and Maddie emerged arm in arm.

  ‘Thank god for you, Matthew, that was godawful,’ Maddie said, pressing a kiss against his cheek. ‘You saved us.’

  ‘If only he wasn’t the one who booked the class in the first place,’ Emelie said with a sly smile. ‘But no need to assign blame. What now?’

  ‘Have you ever been to a tiki bar?’ I asked, eyes fixed on a straw-roofed building across the street.

  ‘Oh, this will be fun,’ she replied, skipping right into the road without waiting for a red light. ‘First round is on Matthew!’

  I glanced over my shoulder through the door into the restaurant kitchen and saw chef sniffing one of our spring rolls while a sweet-looking woman with a springy black ponytail whisked a bowl of something, tears running down her face. Whatever else the tiki bar might be, it would almost certainly be more fun than the cooking class.

  ‘Onward!’ Matthew cried, barrelling over the road after Emelie. ‘Daiquiris on me!’

  ‘Why do I get the feeling this could get messy?’ Maddie asked as we waited for a walk signal before following my friends.

  ‘Because you’re very insightful, intuitive and you’ve spent more than four minutes in their company,’ I replied. ‘Don’t worry, I make sure things stay relatively sensible.’

  ‘Relative to what?’

  I considered my options before I answered. ‘I imagine we’re looking at something between afternoon tea at The Ritz and a full-blown bacchanal?’

  Maddie shrugged and crossed the strap of her handbag over her head. The official move of a woman who means business. ‘Sod it, I’m game.’

  ‘And that’s why I like you,’ I said, giving her arm a squeeze. ‘Come on, let’s get a drink.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Maddie and I walked into the tiki bar one minute after Emelie and Matthew and we were already too late. Four tequila shots lined the bar while the bartender whizzed up a delicious but deathly concoction in a blender, a huge smile on his handsome face.

  ‘You’ve got to do a shot on your hen do,’ Emelie ordered. ‘That should be on the list.’

  ‘She’s not wrong, it’s the law,’ Matthew confirmed, handing me an overly full glass and a wedge of lime. ‘Get it down you.’

  ‘The first one is always the worst,’ Maddie added, accepting her own shot and steeling herself as though she was about to go to war. Which, knowing my friends, she was, only the enemy was her liver and there would be no waving of a white flag.

  ‘One shot and one shot only,’ I warned, carefully clinking my glass against the others before tipping the contents down my throat before I could taste it. I bit down on the lime, embraced the tequila shivers and stuck out my tongue. ‘Please tell me the next round will actually taste good?’

  ‘So good we have to limit you to two each,’ the bartender confirmed. ‘Have you ever had a Zombie before?’

  ‘Only if you count my ex.’

  ‘Which one?’ Matthew asked as Emelie snorted tequila back through her nose.

  ‘Fair point,’ I said, picking up the tropical-looking cocktail with both hands. I took a small taste and rejoiced. It was delicious, like sunshine in a glass. ‘It’s just like juice!’ I told the bartender. ‘I could drink ten of these.’

 

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