Chapter 39
Morning sunlight knifes through the windows, piercing the retina of the one eye I have open.
Lying on my front, I attempt to peel my face off the pillow, managing to lift it an inch before it drops down again, a dead weight.
I’m sure hangovers never used to be this bad.
Admittedly, it is at least twenty-five years since I’ve had a night like that.
But I’m sure I didn’t feel like this then, with a foreboding sense of doom pushing in at the back of my head.
I groggily roll onto my back and register that Nora is still asleep.
She’s wearing her eye mask and has also stuffed in some earplugs, which presumably means I have been snoring.
Or grinding my teeth. Or both – because I left my mouth guard out and my jaw now aches like I’ve been punched in the face.
I need to empty my bladder but am in denial, only willing to lie here in the illogical hope that the urge will pass.
I’m hit by an explicit flashback from last night and heat spreads through me like lava.
I am momentarily powerless to do anything but succumb to the bliss of it and then .
. . something else entirely. That specific type of low-level panic that immediately precedes something bigger, like a rumble of thunder at the start of a storm.
I shake my head and reach for my phone. There are no new messages from Frankie, who clearly had an early night at their nice hotel.
It comes to something when my daughter is the most sensible one in the family . . .
‘This was me this time last year, when I was a slave to alcohol, sometimes drinking three or four glasses of wine
A WEEK.’
I attempt a quick calculation of how much I downed in one night alone with a renewed sense of self-loathing. ‘Here I am now . . . sober, sexy, sensational!’ She spins around and grins at the camera, filtered and ring-lit to the nines, arms open like she’s performing 42nd Street on Broadway.
I swipe her away intolerantly as the urge to urinate becomes too much to bear.
I put down the phone and climb out of bed.
Every joint in my body creaks. A little hammer taps away at my temples.
I pad to the bathroom and after using the toilet I look in the mirror. It’s every bit as bad as I’d feared.
I made a pitiful attempt to remove my mascara the night before, but clumps still cling to the corners of my eyes.
There is a grey tinge to my complexion. My hair is matted from hairspray and smells of chlorine.
I brush my teeth for what feels like forever but my mouth still feels furry afterwards.
When I emerge into the room, Nora is up and chatting to the others on the balcony, their voices drifting through the apartment.
I consider getting straight in the shower but am in dire need of hydration, so head to the kitchen just as Rose arrives to fill up the kettle.
‘How’s the head?’ she asks.
‘Not great. Yours?’
‘Awful. My eyes were so puffy first thing I couldn’t get the Face ID to work on my phone. We’re not alone though. Look at the state of everyone.’
I look out through the patio doors to the other women. It’s like a scene from the fall of Rome. I join them for a little while, deconstructing events of the previous evening, before Nora goes first in the shower and I decide to pack while I wait my turn.
I arrive in the bedroom to find a text on my phone. When I open it and see it’s from Sam, my gut lurches, a feeling like when you’ve missed your step. I sit on the bed and open it up.
‘Last night was lovely. You are lovely. Thought you ought to know. xxx’
I inhale deeply as my fingers hover over the screen, considering my response as my head pounds.
I feel awash with cortisol as I begin to type, then realise I don’t know what to say.
I scrub out my first attempt and I’m about to try for a second time, when I am jolted by my phone alarm, which I’d set to make sure I had plenty of time to pack before our flight home.
It’s Radio 2, my usual wake-up call. Only the music playing makes my blood turn to liquid nitrogen. ‘God Only Knows’ by the Beach Boys.
The first dance song at my wedding.
My throat clenches as I’m hit by a series of flashbacks. Of Ed’s hand in mine, as he led me onto the dance floor. Of the blur of disco lights as they lit up his face. Of a few gentle sways, before a tiny Frankie rushed on to join us.
Regret arrives like a sandstorm; I am assaulted by my emotions from every direction.
I feel awash with guilt and shame and, above all, a deep, penetrating sense of betrayal.
The door to the bathroom opens. I look up to see Nora in her dressing gown.
She gasps and moves towards me, concern etched on her face.
‘What’s the matter? Jules . . . what’s going on?’
She rushes to the bed to sit next to me as I put down the phone and wipe my cheeks decisively, one after the other. My palm sticks to them, already raw.
‘Is this about you and Sam?’ she asks, softly. I look up sharply. ‘I realised I’d left my handbag at the bar so came back to look for it,’ she explains. ‘I saw you on the dance floor together.’
‘Oh. I see.’ I sniff.
She puts her arm around my shoulder. ‘You’ve done nothing wrong. Nothing whatsoever.’
The words make my brow crumple, but I nod unconvincingly.
‘Sam is the first person I’ve kissed since Ed. I mean, really kissed. And I know that technically this is absolutely allowed – and should be actively encouraged as far as everyone else is concerned. But I can’t help this. I feel very . . . weird.’
The fact that it was more than a kiss by the time we got out of that pool is something I can’t bring myself to confess.
‘And the thing is, I don’t even know how it happened.
Two days ago, we talked about being friends.
I liked that idea. I could cope with that.
But last night, it was like something overtook me. ’
‘Gin?’ she suggests, trying to coax a smile out of me.
‘That certainly didn’t help.’
But I can’t blame the booze. That wasn’t it at all. In contrast to how I feel this morning – appalled with myself – last night, I was all in. Raring to go.
‘Listen to me,’ she says gently. ‘It’s bound to be strange the first time you develop feelings for someone.’
‘They’re not feelings,’ I correct her quickly. ‘Not really. Sam was my teenage crush, that’s all. Someone I was besotted with years ago, before I understood what love really meant. The kind Ed and I had.’
She nods, patiently. ‘Still. Sam’s lovely, Jules.’
‘Oh, he is,’ I agree. ‘He’s a nice guy. But I feel much more comfortable thinking of him as a friend these days.’
‘Except you’re attracted to him.’
‘Yes,’ I say quietly, hardly in a position to deny it.
‘So how about friends with benefits?’ she shrugs with a little smile.
The idea makes me wince and I’m not entirely sure why.
Do I find the concept a bit sleazy? Surely I’m not that uptight?
I suppose that kind of emotional detachment has never been my modus operandi before.
But, now I think about it, maybe that could work with Sam.
Maybe that’s how I reconcile fancying him so much with all the turmoil in my head about Ed.
‘I’m never going to be in love with him. I do know that for certain,’ I tell her, determined to make that clear.
She nods. ‘I know. It’s obvious that’s not on the cards for you. You don’t need to spell it out. But you want my view?’ she continues.
‘Please.’
‘You’re overthinking all this. It’s understandable why you would. But Jules, just don’t. It’s pointless. If I were you, I’d accept that there are far worse things in life than being kissed by a handsome man.’
I realise I’m biting the side of my mouth. ‘He is a very good kisser,’ I mutter eventually.
‘Well then. They don’t come along every day. It’s normal that you’d want to take things slow.’
‘But even that implies that we’re taking things somewhere,’ I protest. ‘To an end destination. Which is not what I want at all. That was the problem with Gavin and . . . oh God, I really need to do something about Gavin.’
My head spins just at the thought of him. Wimbledon tickets or not, I have to tell him it’s over the moment I get home. Which I’m dreading so much that it raises a question: why am I seriously contemplating stepping into such dangerous territory with Sam when all of this is such a minefield?
Admittedly, being around Gavin is nothing like being with Sam.
The most I feel around him is affection.
But around Sam? I am on fire. The whole thing is so intensely physical; it’s like every nerve ending in my body has suddenly sparkled into life.
So maybe the answer is easy: I just need to think of Sam in purely physical terms and keep emotion out of it, for my own sanity’s sake.
‘Jules, take my advice, please,’ Nora says eventually. ‘You are way too focused on where this is going. I know it’s hard but try not to worry about the future. And if it makes you feel better, have a chat with Sam, tell him you feel a bit conflicted. I think he’d probably understand.’