‘Wow.’ Lily turned her head to each side. She’d liked her hair the way it was but, given the situation, this was good. She had layers and bounce and Aaliyah had done something which meant that she only had a wispy fringe and the rest of it was part of the layers. It genuinely looked nice. Great, even. ‘You’re very clever.’
‘I am, actually, as it turns out.’
They both laughed and then Aaliyah said, ‘So, I’ve been thinking, about all of us. I can see that parenting three kids and not sleeping and juggling that with work has turned me into a bit of a witch and I can’t do anything about that and right now I don’t want to because I’moverbeing polite for the sake of it and I’m tired and basically everyone who annoys me can piss off.’ Lily nodded. Fair enough. And, also, now didn’t feel like the time to contradict Aaliyah.
‘Tess’s lovely normally butoh my Godshe’s annoying me this week,’ Aaliyah continued, banging the back of Lily’s hairbrush on the bed for emphasis. ‘Meg’s lovely but getting a little bit too desperate to settle down. And you’re just lovely. Like, always lovely. Always there for everyone else. I mean, just now. Your hair lookedterrible. You’re beautiful but even you couldn’t carry that off brilliantly. And Tess was being ridiculously self-centred. And you didn’t lose it with her.’
‘To be fair to Tess,’ said Lily, delighted that Aaliyah agreed about her bad haircut and Tess but really not wanting to say so, ‘I of all people do know that photos are incredibly important to people, and wedding photos and new baby ones are basically the most important of all.’ It was a couple of years now since Lily had started her business helping other people to curate (or just cull, basically) their photos. It had been surprisingly successful – even more people than she’d expected felt overwhelmed by how many photos they had and wanted to get the numbers down to a manageable level so that they could easily look at them and enjoy them but couldn’t bring themselves to delete a single one of their children playing in the garden or their holiday to Ibiza or their fortieth birthday party. So now she was only working three days a week in her job as a midwife and concentrating the rest of the time on the business.
‘Photosareimportant,’ Aaliyah said, ‘but she was still being ridiculously self-centred, becausehair’simportant too. And you just smiled and carried on.’
‘Yeah.’ That was true. That was what Lily did.
‘I know you don’t like going into details when you’re upset about anything.’
‘Mmm.’ Lily did not want to have this conversation.
‘Basically, I just wanted to say that you never really told us exactly what happened with Matt beyond that you were really upset and could we all please get very drunk with you, and I know it was a really long time ago but I’ve always worried that you didn’t completely get over him. I mean, you haven’t really had a serious relationship since then. I don’t think you’ve been out with anyone for more than about three months since him. I hope that isn’t because you’re in some awful still-hung-up-on-Matt place a lot of years down the line. How many years is it now?’
‘Eight,’ said Lily, ‘but, no, honestly, I’m not, I’m fine.’
‘You knew immediately how long ago it was though.’
‘I’m anal like that.’ She wasn’t. But she still knew they’d gone out for one year, two months, three weeks and one day.
‘Hmm. Well, just to say I hope you’re okay. And you know if you ever want to talk we’re all here. Well, Meg and I are. I think Tess will be in a month or two once she’s over her wedding.’
‘Thank you for caring.’ Lily wasn’t about to discuss her feelings, or any weaknesses, in any greater depth. Even with her best friends, it still often felt like it would flip her straight back into how she’d been as a child – always the ill one, always the one who needed everyone else’s support – and she just couldn’t go there. She’d binned that person when she’d left school and gone to uni, and she wasn’t revisiting her. That person had had a really bad time at school, always the odd one out, often not able to take part in things, never invited to parties. Adult Lily, who rarely admitted to much beyond superficial problems, like a bad haircut or an annoying neighbour, was a much happier, way more popular person.
She’d told Aaliyah, Tess and Meg about all of that, during a nightmare time at uni when she’d had an asthma attack during her exams, and they’d been amazing, and they were gorgeously willing to support her however much she did or didn’t want to share with them. It felt like they were the only people in the world who got that about her. ‘I do really appreciate it. Thank you. Especially for letting menottalk when I just can’t. Obviously in an ideal world, Matt wouldn’t be here, but he is, and, honestly, it’s fine.’ Oh God.Oh God. What if he had a new partner and she was coming out for the wedding and Lily had to see him with her? Why hadn’t that occurred to her before? No. Stop thinking about it. ‘And thank you so much for being an amazing hair stylist. New career for you if you ever get fed up with your job.’
‘Come here.’ Aaliyah leaned forward and hugged her. ‘I’m so sorry that you have to see Matt and I totally get that you don’t want to talk about it. Let’s go and find Meg. And we should probably look for bloody Tess too.’
They found Tess on a lounger next to the hotel pool, inching round to exactly follow the direction of the sun while slathering on more Factor 50. She’d been telling them all week that she needed to look sun-kissed on top of her fake tan but clearly in no way burnt. There’d been ructions at one point the afternoon they arrived when she’d fallen asleep in the sun and woken up to discover a branch was casting a line of shade across the middle of her back and arms.
‘Oh, wow, you look amazing,’ Tess said. ‘My wedding photos are saved.’
‘And?’ said Aaliyah, like Tess was a naughty toddler who needed to be taught some manners.
‘And thank you so much, Aaliyah, for saving Lily’s hair and I’m so pleased for you, Lily, that your hair looks so gorgeous now, and I never doubted that it would all be fine,’ said Tess. ‘And I’m getting married on Friday and I’mso relievedthat you’re going to look gorgeous in myvery importantphotos.’
‘Come on,’ said Lily, before Aaliyah couldyellat Tess. ‘Let’s go and look for Meg.’
‘There they are,’ said Aaliyah about fifteen minutes later.
‘Wasn’t that quite quick for golf?’ said Lily, watching Matt and the others in the distance strolling and chatting.
‘Maybe they only did nine holes.’ Tess grabbed Aaliyah’s large straw hat and stuck it on her own head. ‘I need to hide my hair in case Tom looks in our direction. Does he look sunburnt to you?’
Lily squinted at them all. Tom looked fine. Matt looked gorgeous. She could see his hair ruffling in the slight breeze. And now he was laughing at something someone had said, and gesticulating. Tess had asked something about Tom. ‘I don’t think so,’ she said.
‘You have such serious Tom-radar,’ Aaliyah said. ‘I can’t believe you saw them from here. Meg, who we came to find, is right there about twenty feet away, with Pythagoras. Aww. Look at them. They’re like something out of an ad for a tropical beach holiday. Or maybe for washing powder. Or a dating app.’ She was right. They were both dressed in flowing white things – Meg a dress and Pythagoras a linen shirt – and were wandering barefoot along the beach, the water lapping at their ankles, holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes.
‘You’re right, I do,’ Tess said. ‘It’s like I can always sense where he is. And that’s just one of the reasons I’m marrying him.’
Right now it felt like Lily could always sense where Matt was, and she certainlywasn’tmarrying him.
‘Hey.’ Meg was standing in front of them, still holding Pythagoras’s hand, beaming at them. ‘Lily, your hair looks out of this world. Did you do this, Aaliyah?’
