1
GEORGIE
Georgie James leaned back in her chair and beamed at her three best friends. She bloody loved them. And she loved this pub, with its low beams, squishy leather sofas and roaring log fire, not to mention a roomful of regulars, most of whom she’d known her whole life. You didn’t get this in a city wine bar. Doing New Year’s Eve together again at the Duck and Grapes wasamazing.
She reached out to place her glass on the table in front of her, whoops, missed first time, no, got it on now, oops, no, nearly spilled it, no it was definitely safely on now, she was a glass-placinggenius, and then angled herself back in towards the others.
‘You’re the best best friends ever,’ she told them. ‘Thank you for being here.’
‘No, thankyoufor organising us.’ Beth was shaking her head, her blonde curls bobbing manically around her head.
‘It wasn’t me.’ Georgie leaned in even further and beckoned, so that the others drew closer. ‘Obviously it was inspired by Poppy being back from Australia. But also it was my hair.’
‘Your hair?’ asked Beth, frowning.
‘Yes.’ Georgie nodded. ‘Specifically, a grey hair. It made me feel nostalgic for our youth, so I thought we should do New Year again. I found one the day before my birthday right on the top of my head. Then I looked carefully and there were loads. Dozens. And obviously I was already feeling old, because thirty-four’s only a year away from thirty-five, next stop forty.’
‘Then fifty.’ Poppy’s face drooped.
‘That’s right.’ Ankita did a comedy eye roll. ‘It’s only sixteen years from thirty-four to fifty, and then only twenty years until we’re seventy, so we’re totally knocking on the door of old age.Not.’ She put her arm round Poppy and hugged her. ‘Honestly, Pops, you’re letting the drink get to you.’ She pointed at Georgie. ‘And you, Georgie. We arenotold. Forty’s the new thirty and we are nowhere near forty. So we’re actually extremely young. We do not need to be melodramatic about our age.’
Georgie shook her head. ‘Easy for you to say. There’s no way a grey hair woulddareto show its face on your head.’ They all knew that Ankita’s beautiful, glossy, sleek,perfect, mahogany bobbed hair was tended to fortnightly – at a minimum – by a famous Central London hairdresser at about three hundred quid a throw (Ankita had a very hotshot City job that she said she hated but did have the advantage of paying her an absolute fortune).
‘Now that—’ Ankita waved her glass at them, slopping Prosecco over the rim ‘—is where you’re wrong. I’ve been having my hair dyed since we were twenty-nine.’
Beth’s jaw literally dropped. ‘Nooooo. But you said that you’d never doneanythingto your hair. Remember, when we went to the spa?’
‘That was a white lie. There were all those WAGs listening,’ said Ankita.
‘Oh.But I thought we didn’t lie to each other.’ Beth looked like a bewildered eight-year-old.
‘Apparently, almost no adult is capable of holding a ten-minute conversation without lying.’ Raf, the bartender-for-the-night, was manoeuvring past them holding three packets of smoky bacon and anchovy popcorn and balancing a tray with two pints and a glass of red on the fingers of his other hand. Georgie was impressed; he’d told them earlier he’d never worked in a pub before.
‘That can’t be true.’ Beth’s wide-eyed bewildered look had morphed into wide-eyed horror.
‘She’s right, it can’t be,’ Ankita agreed. ‘I mean, I lie, but that’s my job for you. Beth probably never does. And Georgie neither, except about chocolate consumption. Same for Poppy. So there you go: it’s nonsense.’
‘It’s definitely true.’ Raf was on his way back past. He stopped in front of them and opened one of the bags he was carrying. ‘Think about it. Think about the last ten minutes.’ He held the bag out. ‘Popcorn?’
‘It depends what you mean by lying,’ Georgie mused out loud, thinking of how much possible-lying-by-omission she’d been doing over the past ten days. ‘Because there are different kinds of lies, aren’t there? Like sometimes people’s lives can turn into one big, constant lie.’
Everyone’s eyes swivelled to her.
Fuck. Why had she said that? Had she lost her mind?
‘What do you mean?’ Beth cocked her head to one side, her hair only narrowly missing the inside of Poppy’s glass as she reached for some popcorn.
Georgie took a massive slurp of Prosecco while her mind flipped around desperately, searching for a straw to grasp. ‘Well, like people who always tell white lies. People who automatically compliment everyone they see. Like when someone’s wearing a top that really doesn’t suit them and you tell them it lookslovely.’ She smiled, pleased with herself. That was anicerecovery.
‘Do you meanmytop?’ Poppy pulled it down at the hem. ‘I knew I shouldn’t have worn it. I’m so fat now. The baby weight’s never going to go. I should have bought something new in a huge size.’
‘No,’ said Georgie, appalled. ‘Really, no. You look lovely. Beautiful. Stunning. The shape’s great for you. And the colour really suits you. Genuinely. Not a white lie. The total truth.’
Being honest, the top would have looked better if it hadn’t had baby food on the left shoulder, but nowaywas Georgie going to mention that right now and oh, there she went again, lying by omission. That was a tiny lie, though.
‘It really does look good on you, Poppy.’ Beth nodded furiously, and Ankita chimed in with an, ‘It really does, Pops. Honestly. You look blooming.’
‘I shouldn’t be blooming.’ Poppy’s face was drooping again. ‘Daniel’s seven months old. Pregnant people should be blooming. Women who gave birth seven months ago should be back to normal.’
