17. Seventeen

We sashay — there’s no other word for it — out of the hotel one hour and three outfit changes (for Chloe) later. I’m wearing a little red dress Chloe insisted I borrow from her apparently bottomless suitcase, and she’s even done my makeup for me, somehow managing to cover up my freckles, and produce cheekbones I didn’t know I had, so that, by the time she’s done, I look like a completely different person.

“It’s about time you had a bit of a makeover,” she said, looking at me critically before we leave. “You’ve been stuck in a rut, Summer. It’s time for a change.”

That’s at least one thing we can agree on, so, even though the silky little dress is much shorter than I’m used to, and I’m wearing so much makeup I’m worried my face might melt in the heat, I pull my shoulders back and remind myself that this is what I wanted: to shake things up, and become the person I always wanted to be.

I wanted to change my life, didn’t I?

Well, here I am, doing exactly that.

Before we left, I told Chloe I had to go back to my room to pick up some euros, and went to knock on Alex’s door instead, so I could apologize for what happened at the pool earlier. But there was no answer. Either he wasn’t in, or he just didn’t want to talk to me, so in the end I just left a bag of salted peanuts from the mini bar outside his door as a peace offering, then came down to join Chloe.

And now here we are; off to find Jamie, just like we’re teenagers again.

What could possibly go wrong?

As if in answer to my unspoken question, as we reach the bottom of the steps leading from the hotel to the street, Gerald comes shuffling around the corner, carrying a HiperDino carrier bag stuffed with bags of Lays crisps.

“‘Ello there, Summer,” he says, beaming. “Well, aren’t you looking nice? Off somewhere special, are we?”

“Who’s your friend, Summer?” asks Chloe, smirking in amusement as she takes in Gerald’s socks-and-sandals look. “And here was I thinking that Alex the Hottie was the one for you?”

“Oh, no,” says Gerald, looking pleased to be able to contribute to the conversation. “It’s not Alexander she’s after. It’s young Jamie, innit? That’s the man for Summer. Isn’t that right, love?”

Chloe’s eyebrows almost disappear into her hairline.

“Is that right?” she says coolly. “Well, fancy that.”

“Gerald’s just joking,” I say quickly, giving Gerald a meaningful look, which goes completely over his head. “What are you like, Gerald? Such a joker! I didn’t say that at all.”

I laugh, sounding slightly hysterical even to myself.

“Yes, you did,” says Gerald, looking confused. “You said so at the airport. ‘I’m off to find my true love,’ you said. Then you started going on about this Jamie bloke. Or was it Tim something? Rita’ll know.”

He looks around, as if Rita might be about to appear at any second to back him up. Luckily for me, she doesn’t. Much less luckily, though, Chloe’s there instead; and now she steps forward and links arms with Gerald, smiling at him sweetly.

“Why don’t you come for a drink with us,” she says, speaking the way you might speak to a very small child — or a pet. “And you can tell me all about it?”

“I don’t think Gerald wants to come out with us,” I say shrilly. “Do you, Gerald? Isn’t it almost time for dinner? You better hurry or Rita’ll have all the cocktails again!”

“Oh, there’s plenty of time for that,” replies Gerald, looking at Chloe like she’s an angel sent from heaven. “I’d be more than happy to accompany you two ladies for refreshments. I don’t expect I’m allowed to say ‘ladies’ now, though, am I? It’s offensive, innit?”

“Not at all,” says Chloe reassuringly. “Off we go. Come on, Summer.”

She raises her arm to hail an approaching taxi, and by the time it deposits us outside The Rowdy Squirrel, Chloe’s been fully brought up to date on the reasons for my being here in Tenerife, Fairy Godmother and all.

Thanks, Gerald.

“I have to say, Summer,” she hisses, as we wait for Gerald to clamber out of the passenger seat, “This is really out of character for you. I mean, a Fairy Godmother? Seriously?”

“She was more of a Wise Old Crone,” I begin, but that doesn’t make it sound any better, and she isn’t listening, anyway.

“And Jamie?” she goes on, her eyes flashing dangerously as she scans the tables in front of the bar. “You literally just told me you were over him. Literally. And now you’re telling me you’ve flown all the way out here to confess your undying love to him?”

“I didn’t say that! That was Gerald. Who’s clearly been drinking or something, because he’s talking complete nonsense.”

“Oh, don’t give me that. He sounded perfectly sober to me. It’s you I’m worried about, if everything your mate Gerry’s just told me is true.”

Her brow creases with worry; which just shows seriously she’s taking this, because Chloe never usually allows her face to move at all. She says it gives you wrinkles.

“Look, Summer,” she says, reaching out a hand to stop me in my tracks as we walk towards the bar. “I don’t think this is a good idea. You and Jamie, I mean. Not after what happened at—”

“The prom, I know,” I reply, shaking off her hand. “But, like I said, Chloe, that was years ago. It’s in the past. I’m a different person now.”

Well, I’m trying to be, anyway. If she would just give me a chance.

“If you’d let me finish,” says Chloe, irritably, “I was about to say that I don’t think it’s a good idea, but I can tell your mind’s made up, so okay: I’ll help you.”

She says it as if I’ve somehow managed to talk her into something against her will.

I’m confused.

“You’ll help me?”

“Yes.” She gives a martyr-like sigh. “I’ll help you win Jamie over. It’s the least I can do.”

“Er, it’s really not,” I assure her. “Seriously, I’m fine. I don’t need any help.”

“But of course you do,” says Chloe firmly. “You couldn’t even decide what to wear without me, Summer, so, honestly, it’s a good job I’m here. I’ll be taking over as ‘Fairy Godmother’ now, don’t you worry. We’ll soon sort you out.”

“Wh… what? No!”

The last thing I need right out — or ever, really — is yet another self-proclaimed ‘Fairy Godmother’ trying to stick her nose into my business; especially one like Chloe. But it’s too late.

Chloe flips her hair over her shoulder and turns back towards the door, letting out a shriek of excitement when she spots a familiar figure standing inside the doorway, holding a bunch of cocktail menus.

“Jamie! Surprise!”

Chloe goes bounding towards him, but stops short of throwing her arms around him, like she usually does when she meets someone she even vaguely knows.

“Chloe!” Jamie manages, looking horrified. “And Summer, again! Wow. But I thought you were here with friends, Summer? Different ones, I mean?”

He looks at me accusingly.

“I was,” I tell him brightly. “But Chloe flew over to surprise me. Isn’t that great?”

“Amazing.”

He smiles in a way that makes the phrase ‘putting a brave face on it’ pop into my mind.

“This place is fantastic,” Chloe’s saying, looking around the bar, which is much larger than it looks from the outside, and packed with customers. “Did you choose all this stuff yourself?”

She nods at the walls of the place, which are decorated with various pieces of music memorabilia: there’s a bright red Fender guitar hanging above the bar, framed vinyl above each table, and a bit of a “Hard Rock on a budget” vibe that has Jamie’s name written all over it — figuratively speaking.

“Most of it,” he says, grinning with pride as he looks around him. “You should’ve seen the place to start with; it was a right dive. Like an old man’s pub back home.”

Gerald suddenly appears at my shoulder, as if summoned by the words “old man’s pub”.

“Is this young Jamie, then?” he says delightedly. “Well, I’ve heard a lot about you. It’s like meetin’ a celebrity.”

“Is it?”

Jamie shakes the hand Gerald offers him, looking nonplussed.

“This is Gerald,” Chloe tells him, helpfully stepping in before he can bring up the diaries. “Summer’s friend.”

“Summer’s—? Right. I didn’t realize the friends you were with were…”

He trails off before he can ask me what I’m doing hanging out with pensioners, but I don’t miss the smirk of amusement he exchanges with Chloe, and even though I didn’t particularly want Gerald here either, I find myself feeling offended on his behalf.

So what if Gerald’s a bit… older? He’s still a person.

“Right, then, are we getting drinks or not?” says Chloe. “Can you join us, Jamie, or do you have to work? Wait, what am I saying? You’re the boss! Of course you can!”

Jamie shifts from one foot to the other uncomfortably.

“Look,” he says, glancing over at the bar again, “Why don’t we go somewhere else? There’s a new place just opened not far from here; we could go and check it out?”

“But we wanted to see this place,” says Chloe, who’s obviously angling for some free drinks. “Your place.”

“And you’ve seen it,” replies Jamie lightly. “But come on, Chloe, take pity on a guy, would you? I’ve been here all day! The last thing I want is to spend the evening at work.”

“I suppose so,” she says, seeing the steady stream of free cocktails she’s been imagining slip away from her. “I guess we could always come here another time.”

“Sure you can. Look, I have a few things I need to wrap up here before we go. Why don’t you two … er, three… go on ahead, and I’ll catch up with you. The place I’m thinking of isn’t far.”

He gives us the name and some directions, and we head off, me mulling silently over the fact that nobody bothered to ask me what I wanted to do. It was almost as if I wasn’t even there. I wrack my brain, trying to remember if I said anything at all, other than my brief explanation of how Chloe had turned up to surprise me earlier.

Nope. I don’t think I did. I was the invisible woman. I might as well have been… well, Gerald, really, for all the attention anyone paid to me.

Not that Gerald himself seems to have noticed, mind you. He follows Chloe and I quite happily from the Squirrel to the place Jamie told us about — a lively beach bar with all-white decor and thumping music that you have to shout over if you want to have a conversation — still carrying his carrier bag filled with Spanish snacks.

“I can’t believe we’re out clubbing with a pensioner,” Chloe yells at me as we find ourselves a table in the corner which has one long, curved bench seat for us to share. “What a laugh, eh?”

I smile weakly, hoping the music is too loud for Gerald to have heard her. And also too loud for anyone to hear him, for that matter, because when Jamie finally turns up, three-quarters of an hour later, blaming “staff problems” for his lateness, it occurs to me that I’m once again at risk of exposure as the absolute lunatic who flew all the way here just to see him.

Jamie slides into the circular booth beside us, and Chloe, Gerald, and I all shuffle along to make way for him, me finding myself sandwiched between Gerald and Chloe, while Jamie’s at the end, sitting far closer to my best friend than is strictly necessary.

“Let’s all swap seats!” says Chloe brightly, seeing me looking in their direction. There’s absolutely no reason we should do this obviously, but Chloe’s obviously taking her role as ‘wing woman’ seriously, and she makes us all stand up and shuffle around as if we’re playing musical chairs, until she’s on one side of me, with Jamie on the other.

Jamie and I smile at each other like two people on a blind date neither of us wanted to come on. If I’d thought yesterday’s meeting was awkward, though, it’s absolutely nothing to tonight’s. Jamie seems anxious and on edge, constantly checking his watch, as if there’s somewhere he needs to be. Chloe is practically leaning on my shoulder, blatantly listening in to every word I say. Gerald is… here.

We are not having fun. It’s as obvious as the tan lines on my feet from my sunbathing session earlier, and yet no one’s willing to actually admit it, so we order a round of drinks, then another, and we sit there sipping them way too fast, while occasionally shouting, “What was that?” at each other over the thumping music, which is much too loud to allow for a normal conversation.

There’s no opportunity to talk to Jamie about The Kiss, and whether it meant anything to him. There’s plenty of opportunity for me to sit and think about that diary entry I read last night, and how it’s been fifteen years since I wrote it — fifteen years — and I still feel the same. I still feel like I’m stuck on the wrong channel. Especially at times like this, when I’m sitting in a noisy bar, surrounded by people, but still feeling like I’m outside looking in.

More alcohol probably isn’t the answer to this predicament, all things considered, but we order some more anyway, then Jamie gets us all some burgers and fries when we realize we haven’t eaten yet. At some point, Gerald decides he’s had enough and goes off to find a taxi, then Chloe takes herself off to the bathroom in what I’m 80% certain is just a ruse to leave me and Jamie alone together.

And now we are.

“Jamie,” I say suddenly, the alcohol making me brave — or maybe just stupid. “Do you ever feel like… well, like you have this other version of yourself inside your head? One that only you can see?”

Jamie looks worried.

“You mean like voices in your head?” he asks uneasily.

“No. Not voices. It’s more like… like, you know when you see a photo of yourself, and it doesn’t really look like you? Or not like your reflection in the mirror, anyway? And then you’re left wondering which one is the real you? Is it the photo you or the mirror you? Which is the one everyone else sees? Do you know what I mean?”

“Ummm. Are you sure you’re okay, Summer? Do you want me to get you some water?”

Jamie’s smile is kind, but his eyes are confused, and I feel my shoulder sag with disappointment. “It’s fine,” I tell him. “Never mind.”

I take another sip of my cocktail instead, and we sit there in silence until Chloe reappears.

“Right,” she says, taking charge as usual. “Where to next, then?”

“I don’t think we should go anywhere next,” I reply, trying to stifle a yawn. “I’m knackered, Chloe. Let’s just go back to the hotel.”

“Would you listen to Cinderella over there?” she says, nudging Jamie. “Remember how we always called her that because no matter where we went, Summer always wanted to go home at midnight?”

Jamie just looks at her blankly. He doesn’t know what she’s talking about because we never actually went out to bars together; not just because we were too young, but because we didn’t have that kind of friendship. We never progressed beyond walking home from school together from time to time, and having conversations that seemed deeply profound at the time, but which I now realize I don’t remember a single word of.

Chloe pouts. I can tell she wants our shared history to have been more than this. But it wasn’t. I can see that now. I don’t know why I couldn’t before. I’d always thought of Jamie and me as these star-crossed lovers; cruelly kept apart by forces beyond our control. But maybe I was wrong. Maybe we were just a bunch of mates hanging out.

I chew nervously on my bottom lip as I mull this over.

“Look, guys, I really should be going, too,” Jamie says, looking at his watch again. “I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

“Oh, come on,” says Chloe, looking like she’s about to stamp her foot in a temper. “Why are you two being so boring? We’re on holiday! Surely we can stay out later than twelve o’clock without worrying that we’re going to turn into pumpkins?”

“You two are on holiday,” Jamie reminds her gently. “I’ve got to work tomorrow.”

“You can stay up late just this once, surely?” says Chloe, who isn’t giving up without a fight. “Especially after Summer came all this way just to see you?”

She slaps her hand over her mouth in horror. It feels like the kind of moment that should be followed by a dramatic “DUH-DUM!” swell of music; or maybe just a sad trombone.

“She… she what?”

Jamie blinks in confusion, then his face takes on an odd, closed expression that makes something inside me shrivel up and die.

Yes, a sad trombone would definitely be appropriate around about now. “Chloe’s just winding you up,” I say firmly, feeling almost as if the words are coming from someone other than me. “Come on, Chloe, best get you back to the hotel; you’ve obviously had way too much to drink.”

Jamie nods as Chloe follows me meekly to the taxi rank that’s just along the street, apparently lost for words for once in her life.

“Sorry,” she mouths at me as we get into the cab, which is — mercifully — waiting for us. “It just slipped out.”

Jamie leans through the open window of the car to say goodbye. He’s smiling as if he’s already forgotten the bombshell Chloe casually dropped on him back there outside the club, but he doesn’t quite meet my eyes when I say goodnight, and I lean back in my seat as he and Chloe exchange numbers, wishing I was anywhere but here.

“Well, that was fun,” she says as the cab pulls away. “Wasn’t that fun?”

I don’t even bother to answer her.