‘Are we?’ I’d never met anyone that confident and didn’t know how to react. She was scary… but also quite exciting.
‘Might as well start as we mean to go on,’ Clare continued. ‘Grab your purse, wipe that snot off your face, and let’s go. First beer’s on you and you’d better not tell me you don’t drink pints. Or even worse, that you don’t drink at all. Because if that’s the case, we’re not going to be friends.’
‘I drink, but…’ I tailed off. I didn’t dare confess I’d never had a pint in my life. University was going to be full of learning experiences and perhaps drinking pints was one I should embrace.
Six hours and way too many pints of Irish ale later – another new learning experience – Clare and I started a lifelong friendship. I also started a horrendous hangover.
I’d automatically assumed that my two best friends would bond immediately. Elise visited me at university the following term and I couldn’t wait to introduce them. The first hour in the pub seemed to go well but I returned from the ladies to find them in a heated debate about the value of marriage. It had been handbags at dawn ever since.
‘Ready,’ Clare said, pulling me back to the present. ‘You can start passing stuff down.’
I handed down boxes and crates from the deep top shelves.
‘What’s in all of these?’
I shrugged. ‘Haven’t a clue. Mum and Dad brought them down last year. They got sick of nagging Ben and me to clear out our old bedrooms so they could re-decorate so they did it for us.’
Clare looked at the pile she’d just created. ‘It’s all your childhood crap then? Are we going to find naked Barbie dolls with shaved heads and dodgy old school photos?’
‘Possibly. A lot of it can probably be ditched.’
Clare knelt on the floor and started rummaging through a crate. ‘This one’s boring,’ she said a few minutes later.
‘What’s in it?’ I looked up from the box of old board games I’d found.
‘Mainly old schoolbooks. I want an interesting box.’
‘I’m not sure any of them will be interesting. Why don’t you try that cardboard one?’
Clare crawled over to the box, ripped off the parcel tape and started rummaging. ‘Ooh, what’s this?’
I looked up as she pulled out a rolled-up piece of pale pink paper with a dark pink satin ribbon tied round it, like a scroll.
Oh no. She’s found my?—
‘“Life Plan of Sarah Louise Peterson, age almost fourteen,”’ she read as she unfurled it. ‘You have got to be jesting.’
I put my hands over my eyes and felt my cheeks burn my palms. Trust me to direct Clare to the most embarrassing box in the world ever. She wanted interesting? She’d just found it.
Life Plan of Sarah Louise Peterson, age almost 14
Age 20–21: Meet gorgeous, kind, generous, funny, rich boyfriend with dark hair and blue eyes
Age 22: Get engaged (Update Age 22: Big fat fail. Single now. Try 26???)
Proposal: On a red dragon boat on the boating lake in Hearnshaw Park. (Update Age 22: proposal abroad – Venice? Rome?)
Ring: Gold with sapphires and diamonds (Update Age 22: platinum with solitaire diamond)
Age 24: Get married in pretty church. Reception in Sherrington Hall
Dress: Big white dress with puffy sleeves and long train. Wear tiara and veil. Hair piled in curls on top of head. Princess for the day! (Update Age 22: ivory dress with short train, no puffy sleeves and perhaps not so BIG! Yes to sparkly tiara. Still want to be a princess!)
Bridesmaids: Lots of bridesmaids wearing peach frilly dresseswith big sleeves (Update Age 22: Eek! Just Elise and Clare. NOT peach! Definitely no frills or big sleeves)
Age 26: First child – boy
Age 28: Twins – one of each
