Page 57 of To All the Men I’ve Killed Before

I do want to bond with her though.

So I pretend that I actually do like surprises. Love them. Nothing better, to me, than being dragged somewhere and you have absolutely no idea what or where it is.

That’s why I’m here now, on the rooftop of some hyper-trendy wellness centre, trying to hold a plank.

And I say ‘trying’ because I am struggling.

My head is swimming and my abs are screaming at me like they’re auditioning for Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Once again, I’m confused as to how I’m so unfit. I suppose I’ve let thing slip a little this year. I had a personal trainer four times a week in London so I suppose it’s not that crazy that I can now barely hold a plank without feeling bone-aching fatigue.

I don’t want to look at all the lithe young things who are doubtless planking without breaking even a bead of sweat but I can’t help myself. They all look like they eat kale for every meal.

The instructor is called Sage – because of course she is – and has been throwing side-eyes at me that land like knives.

‘Just flow with your breath,’ she says, placing a hand on my back that threatens to destabilise me completely.

My breath is currently not flowing.

In fact it’s doing the exact opposite and coming out in short, staccato bursts.

I’d tell her exactly what she can do with her namaste if I could speak.

I catch Antoinette’s eye and she looks like she’s trying not to laugh.

‘And now, glide into downward dog,’ Sage says, and I contort rather than glide, my arms and legs shaking. ‘Trust your inner strength.’

My inner strength is still in bed at the villa.

I sneak another glance at my sister, who is in a perfectly inverted V and barely breaking a sweat.

For the tiniest flicker of a moment, I despise her.

It feels like months before Sage guides us into corpse pose and I am free to lie on the ground and pant.

But at least I can see the sun rising over the LA skyline, turning everything in its path into the most delicious shades of apricot.

‘That was awesome,’ Antoinette says when Sage finally releases us from her rooftop jail. She is glowing. Literally glowing. I feel like a recently released prisoner of war.

‘I think I may have died,’ I say. ‘It’s possible you’re speaking to my ghost.’

Antoinette laughs. ‘You need to exercise more,’ she says. ‘Don’t women your age start getting like osteoporosis or something?’

I glare at her. ‘I’m not menopausal, Antoinette. I’m just a bit out of shape. That’s all.’

‘Sure, sis,’ she says.

‘I’m only thirty, for God’s sake!’

‘You’re from last century,’ she says.

‘I’m going to join a gym,’ I say.

She snorts. ‘You need a repair café.’

I scowl all the way home.

Antoinette doesn’t stop mocking me until she disappears into the shower. ‘Maybe we should have found a place with one of those alarms,’ she says as a parting shot. ‘Just in case you have a fall when I’m out.’

I throw a cushion at her, having to disguise the wince as the movement sends a shooting pain through my protesting muscles.