Chapter Thirty-Nine

I manage to get a walk-in appointment at the hairdresser’s mid-afternoon so I can look my best for my date with Paul tonight. On a whim, I decide to get the pink tips put back in, and while my hair is still too short to gather up in a messy bun, I feel more like me when I leave the hairdresser’s. I may have tweaked my job but I’ve realised I want Paul to see the real me tonight. I’m not sophisticated and probably never will be, but so what? I can’t pretend to be someone else forever, so Paul is going to have to accept the rough-around-the-edges Cleo.

I celebrate my new mindset with coffee and cake, sitting in the window of the coffee shop so I can watch the families and couples on the promenade. High season is in full swing, so the beach will be packed every weekend for the next few months, bleeding into weekdays once the school summer holidays start. But I won’t be in the thick of it this year, frantically serving customers in the chippy all day until it feels like I could collapse, exhausted but happy. The thought makes me sad, but I can’t dwell on the past. I have a bright future ahead of me with Paul, so I have to focus on that.

I think about popping in on Gran after my afternoon treat, but I’m afraid of bumping into James and having to face up to those weird feelings from last night, so I head straight to the flat and have a long soak in the bath instead. Russell has cleared the shelf in the living room of his CDs and I miss the soundtrack of the flat, so I set up a Seventies playlist on Spotify. I have to lean out of the bath and skip one of the songs when I hear the intro to ‘Get It On’, because it conjures a snapshot of last night, of James with his head thrown back, fist held up in the air, the atmosphere electric and my stomach wonderfully squirmy. I think of Paul instead, squeezing my eyes shut and relishing the images of him from his Instagram. I play out the memory of that last night we had together: getting drunk in the Red Lion, spilling out on to the beach, Paul walking me home. His fingers playing with my hair. ‘Your dreads are so cool. They make you one of a kind. Unique.’ The kiss. Tonight is going to be amazing. It’ll be like the past seven years haven’t happened, as though we’ve slipped from that doorstep kiss to this moment, where everything can play out as it should have back then.

I haul myself out of the bath once the water starts to turn cold. I have loads to do before our date tonight, including painting my nails, updating my bullet journal and other things that will keep me busy. Too busy to think about James.

I paint my nails a rainbow of colours, as a nod to the rainbow dreadlocks. I’ve bought a new teal wrap dress for the occasion, which is cute and comfortable and swishes delightfully as I twirl around the bedroom until I feel dizzy. I was going to wear the shoes I’ve been wearing for my interviews (and that I can now walk in without stumbling) but I select my new pair of white high-top Converse instead, in a bid to further present the real me. The real me doesn’t wear heels, even tiny, barely there ones, and while she may not have a boast-worthy career yet, she’s working on it and she’s beginning to see that her life is pretty fabulous.

With a bit of mascara, eyeliner and a nude lip gloss, plus my little fish necklace, I’m ready. Taking a couple of deep breaths, I lock up the flat and head for the pub to restart the life I put on hold almost a decade ago.

The Red Lion is busy, but it isn’t heaving, and I feel a bit exposed as I step inside, my eyes darting first around the bar and then the seating areas in search of Paul.

‘Cleo? Oh my God, it is you.’

A pair of arms are thrown around me before I’ve had the chance to identify their owner, but I pat her lightly on the back while trying to figure out who it can be.

‘You haven’t changed a bit.’ I’m released from the hug and held at arm’s length. ‘Well, apart from the dreads. And the nose ring. Didn’t you used to have an eyebrow piercing as well? Or am I thinking of Shelby? Never mind. We’re outside in the beer garden. I only popped in for a top-up.’ She holds up a couple of empty glasses and gives them a wobble. ‘What are you having?’

She heads for the bar, and I follow, my mouth opening and closing as I try to figure out what to say. Her hair is slightly longer than the pixie cut from Instagram, with a more shaggy look, but it’s definitely her. The question is, what is she doing back in Clifton-on-Sea?

‘It’s so good to see everyone again after so long, isn’t it?’ She’s on her tiptoes as she tries to catch the attention of the bar staff, still as short as she was when she used to follow us around town. ‘Courtney’s already here with her husband. Have you met Neil? I don’t think you came to the wedding, did you? It was lovely. Intimate but so much fun. Shelby’s brought her whole little family – hubby and baby. He’s so adorable – the baby, not the hubby.’ She giggles, covering her mouth with her hand. ‘Spencer’s here. No wife. Says it’s the first night off from the missus he’s had in ages. Typical Spence, right? Peter can’t make it, unfortunately. He sends his apologies but his wife is due in, like, three days and he doesn’t want to travel too far, just in case. They’re down in Buckinghamshire now. Gorgeous house. Five bedrooms with a self-contained granny flat. We were there for Nancy’s baby shower a few weeks ago. I had serious house envy!’

Courtney, Shelby and Spencer are here? Even Demi, forever our little shadow.

‘Shall I just get a bottle? Shelby isn’t drinking, and Spencer, Liv and Paul are on pints, but it makes sense to get a bottle, doesn’t it? Now you’re here.’

‘I guess.’ I attempt to lift my lips upwards into a smile, but I’m so confused. What are they doing here, today of all days?

With the bottle of wine and a fresh set of glasses, we step out into the beer garden at the back of the pub, into the glare of the spring sunshine. And there they are, the faces I recognise from the past. Courtney hasn’t changed much, apart from having much shorter hair that really suits her, and while Shelby’s a bit rounder in the face and a bit puffy under the eyes (which probably has much more to do with the baby nestled in the sling attached to her front than the passing of time) she still looks like the school friend I remember. Spencer is much bulkier than he was at eighteen, with biceps the size of barrels and a neck that seems to have disappeared. His grip is alarmingly tight as we hug, and I feel a bit bruised as I sit down at the table. Opposite, Paul raises his pint in greeting, much less enthusiastic at my arrival than Spencer was. His other arm is slung around the back of the chair next to him where a small blonde woman sits. I recognise her from his Instagram posts. Olivia. The gym buddy. Except I don’t think she is simply a gym buddy. I think I’ve been a bit foolish over these past few weeks, seeing things I wanted to see and ignoring the things I didn’t.

This isn’t a date.

This is a reunion of old school friends.

‘Sienna’s on her way!’ Demi holds her phone up, where a text message has just come through. ‘She’s just got off the train so should be here in a few minutes.’

I’ve been feeling rather unsettled since I arrived and discovered that Paul hadn’t been planning a date for two all this time but a group meetup, but I feel my spirits rise at the news of Sienna’s imminent arrival. I haven’t seen her since we hugged goodbye at the airport after Grandad’s stroke. She’d offered to come back with me, but I declined; Sienna had grasped the whole travelling-the-world thing much more readily than I had, and she was loving the adventure. I couldn’t drag her away, even if it was a wrench to leave her.

‘She’s come over from New Zealand?’ A balloon of affection for my old BFF inflates in my chest, but one odd look from Demi puts a pin to it.

‘Er, no. Scotland. She hasn’t lived in New Zealand for two years.’ She snorts in a didn’t-you-know kind of way, which I didn’t. ‘She’s in Edinburgh. Not that far from me.’

‘How did she end up there?’ The balloon has well and truly deflated now. Sienna has been back in the UK for a couple of years and she didn’t even bother to get back in contact? I wouldn’t have been hard to track down, being in the exact same place I’ve always been.

‘It’s where Cam’s from?’ Demi frowns at me, and I’m hit full-force by how little I know about Sienna’s life after I’d got on that plane back home. Because I’d always assumed Cam was from New Zealand; it’s where they lived, where they married, where they had babies. ‘They moved back when Cam’s mum was diagnosed. We only met up by chance – I was working on a refit of a shop next door to their local pub.’ She grabs the bottle of wine from the table – the second since I arrived – and tops up the three glasses. ‘Oh, I brought photos!’ After shaking the last drops out of the bottle, she reaches into her handbag and pulls out a wallet of photos, taking them out and spreading them across the table. ‘Look, here’s Spencer and Courtney when they were Spentney. All loved up. How cute! Sorry, Neil. Gah, look at my hair in this one. I look like Morticia Addams.’

I grab one of the photos that was taken on the beach, with the Ferris wheel visible on the pier in the distance. It’s a group shot, with Paul rubbing Spencer’s hair with his knuckles on the left and Peter and Courtney laughing their heads off at something on the right. I’m standing in the middle with Sienna, my arm slung around her shoulders and my eyes squeezed shut as I kiss her on the cheek while she’s sticking her tongue out at the camera and crossing her eyes.

‘Look what a weedy tosser Paul was.’ Spencer holds up one of the photos of Paul, who’s posing on the steps leading down to the beach in a pair of paisley shorts. I look at the photo, waiting for the butterflies to take flight in my tummy, but I can’t get excited about the seventeen-year-old boy in the photo. I look across at Paul, who’s giggling at another photo with Olivia, but I still feel nothing. Which is bizarre. I prepare myself for the punch in the gut as he nudges her playfully before leaning in to kiss her, but I don’t feel much at all. Certainly no sting of jealousy.

‘ I was a weedy tosser? Look at the state of you.’ Paul frisbees a photo towards Spencer, who roars with laughter when he spots his younger self splashing in the sea in his boxer shorts with Sienna and Shelby. It was taken that last night, before we all went our separate ways, the image grainy in the fading light of that summer night. It had felt so magical at the time, as though we were all on the cusp of amazing lives, but the camera hadn’t managed to capture the enchantment the same way my memories have.

‘Things were different back then, weren’t they?’ Shelby rocks the baby in the sling as she reaches for another photo, smiling wistfully at it. ‘We were young and free. We could do anything. Be anything. Not like now. I’m dreading going back to the office once my maternity leave’s finished. I mean, look at her.’ Shelby holds up a photo of her younger self puckering up besides the Captain John statue outside the arcade. ‘She’d be heartbroken if she knew she’d have to sit in an office all day, staring at a screen while hoping Bad Breath Brenda doesn’t pop over for a chat.’

‘Don’t tell her about the commute.’ Courtney rolls her eyes. ‘An hour each way – on a good day. Soul-destroying.’

‘At least you don’t have to deal with yummy mummies and TikTok posers all day.’

I frown across at Paul. ‘I thought you loved your job.’

He shrugs and reaches for his pint. ‘I do, mostly, but no job is perfect, is it?’

Working at The Fish & Chip Shop Around The Corner felt pretty perfect. Even sweeping up missile chips thrown by teenage boys doesn’t seem so bad when compared to wasting two hours plus of your life every day simply getting to work and back home again. The crush of the bus ride to my interview at Brightman Rose pops into my head, the panic of being late washing over me all over again followed by the revulsion of discovering I was tethered to the seat by someone else’s chewing gum.

Oh, dear lord. What have I done?

‘Did you become a journalist like you always wanted to be?’

I frown at Paul again, confused for a moment because I told him I had the day we bumped into each other outside my parents’ house. But he can’t remember, because it was three months ago and he hasn’t carefully dissected every single exchange we’ve had since that day. Because he isn’t interested in me like that. I doubt he even remembers that kiss on my doorstep, and there’s no way he’s obsessed over it all these years. I don’t cause butterflies to take flight in his tummy whenever he thinks of me.

But then there are no butterflies fluttering around my tummy now either. The spell, it seems, has finally been broken.

‘I’m starting a new job on Monday, actually.’ I try to muster a smidgen of enthusiasm, but there is none forthcoming. I’ll be joining Courtney on the commute and staring at a computer screen all day like Shelby, hoping Bad Breath Brenda doesn’t descend.

‘Congratulations!’ Demi raises her glass, clinking it against mine when I half-heartedly follow suit. ‘What will you be doing?’

I don’t get the chance to answer because Sienna arrives, causing Demi to jump out of her seat with a squeal. Shelby’s baby howls at being woken, while Demi bounces across the courtyard and flings her arms around Sienna.

Sienna’s changed dramatically over the past few years. The waist-length brown hair has been chopped into an asymmetrical, pillar-box-red bob, and the jeans and T-shirts have made way for black tapered trousers, a leather jacket and a skull-printed scarf. I don’t think I would have recognised her if I’d passed her in the street. The only sign of the old Sienna is the rose tattoo on her middle finger that we had done before we set off for our adventure around the world.

‘Hey, guys.’ Sienna drags her small suitcase over to the table, stopping to coo at the baby, who’s still disgruntled but in a less fierce way. Her eyebrows shoot up when she spots me and she rushes over, flinging her arms around me in a forceful but brief hug. ‘Cleo! It’s been so long! You haven’t changed a bit.’ She drops into the empty seat between Spencer and Courtney’s husband and pounces on the photos, pulling a face as she holds up a photo of her, Paul and me. Paul’s in the middle, his arms slung around our shoulders as we all grin at the camera while squinting against the sun. ‘Ugh. Look at the state of us. Proper minging.’ She drops the photo and picks up another. ‘Eww, I still have my braces in this one.’ She runs her tongue over her teeth as she tosses the photo back down onto the pile on the table. ‘I need a drink after seeing those.’

‘I’ll go.’ Demi jumps out of her seat again. ‘What are you having? The usual?’

Sienna’s ‘usual’ drink when we were teenagers was a lurid alcopop (any would do) but I doubt that’s her beverage of choice these days. Whatever it is, Demi seems to know and she heads back into the pub without needing any more clarity.

‘Hey, Liv. All ready for your holiday?’ Sienna’s flicking through a handful of photos she’s gathered from the table, but she looks across at Paul’s girlfriend.

‘Yep. Can’t wait.’ Olivia smiles, the action brightening up her whole face and making her look even prettier.

‘You staying at Debbie and Marco’s place again?’

I have no idea who Debbie or Marco are, but it sparks a conversation between Sienna, Paul and Olivia that I tune out of. While I have a shared history with Paul and Sienna, it’s clear they have a shared present. They’ve all kept in contact over the years – attending weddings and birthday parties and baby showers – while I dropped off the radar until a chance encounter in the street outside my parents’ house. The rose tattoos on our middle fingers were supposed to symbolise our BFF status, but Sienna and I are no longer even Fs, forever or otherwise.

‘Oh, God. Do you remember when we got these?’ I hadn’t realised I’d been rubbing my rose tattoo, but Sienna leans across the table, slapping her hand down next to mine. ‘I remember Paul trying to chat me up the day we got them. Told me how cute it was. How unique I was with my little rose tattoo, until I told him it wasn’t unique at all, that you had the exact same one. That was the whole point .’ She leans back in her seat and shoots Paul a disparaging look. ‘He was always trying to get in my pants back then.’

Courtney snorts. ‘Mine too. Even when I was with Spencer.’

‘You what?’ Spencer’s jaw drops in outrage, but he laughs and shakes his head. ‘You little shit. I had no idea.’

Neither did I.

I’d thought I was unique, with my rainbow dreads. But it turns out I was just the last in line when it came to snogging his female friends. I’ve clung on to the idea of being a star-crossed lover all these years, pining for The One Who Got Away, but it’s all been a delusion in my own head. I mean nothing to Paul – to Franko – and I never have.

‘You never told us about your new job, Cleo.’ Demi’s returned with a shot glass of amber liquid, which she hands to Sienna before sitting down.

I open my mouth to tell her that I’m about to become a junior credit controller, but I don’t want to do that, because I don’t want it to be true.

‘I used to work in the chippy. You remember the one on Winden Street?’ I scrape back my chair as I stand up. ‘And hopefully I can still work there.’ My fingers find the fish charm around my neck. ‘Sorry, I have to go. It was great seeing you all again. It really was.’

Because now I can let go of the past and live the life I want to. I just hope it isn’t too late.