Page 28 of Who’s That Girl?

Vanessa rolls her eyes. ‘Are you serious?’

‘It’s my first free night,’ I say defensively.

‘What about your birthday?’ She gasps.

Suddenly I remember. ‘God, I’d totally forgotten about that,’ I confess.

‘Well, it’s this Friday,’ reminds Vanessa, shaking her head. ‘Don’t tell me you were planning to work?’

‘No, of course not!’ I try to look affronted, but it’s a bit hard, considering I spent my last birthday at a conference in Milton Keynes. ‘I haven’t planned anything.’

‘Honestly, Charlotte!’ she exclaims. ‘What happened to the girl who used to love to party?’

I feel a stab of nostalgia, but I quickly dismiss it. ‘She grew up,’ I reply touchily.

‘Well, the four of us will go out for dinner, then,’ she announces, ignoring me. ‘You and Miles, and Julian and me. I’ll get a babysitter. We can go to that gastropub you were telling me about.’ Smiling triumphantly, she gives me a hug. ‘Sorted.’

‘You make me laugh.’ I grin, hugging her back. In the whole time I’ve known her, I don’t think Vanessa has ever taken no for an answer.

‘You make me laugh,’ she retorts, as if I’ve just insulted her. ‘I haven’t laughed that hard in ages. I nearly peed myself!’

I wave goodbye and go to cross the street to walk back to the high street, where my car’s still parked.

‘Oh, and that’s another thing I wish I’d known when I was twenty-one—’ she calls after me, standing on her front steps.

‘What?’ I ask, turning round.

She grins ruefully. ‘Start doing your pelvic-floor exercises now!’

Chapter Nine

Squeeze and hold. Squeeze and—

Damn, they’re really quite tricky, aren’t they?

Forty-five minutes later, after popping back to the office to pick up some files, I’m sitting in traffic on the way home, busily practising my pelvic-floor exercises. To tell the truth, I’ve never done them before. Of course I’ve heard of them, but sort of vaguely. I always assumed they were something you didn’t have to worry about until you were of the age when you start shopping for reading glasses. In fact, I’m not even sure how to do one.

Holding my squeeze, I shift into first gear as the line of cars in front of me starts moving again. The traffic is still bad because of the diversion. It’s going to be like this until next week, I muse, glancing at the large yellow signs. It’s going to take ages to get home. Still, it means I’ve got plenty of time to do my Kegels. In fact, I’ve done a hundred already, I think proudly.

Though I can’t really tell if I’m getting the right muscles. To be honest, I feel as if I’m just clenching my buttocks. I fidget in my seat as I approach the lights. OK, let’s try again. This time I’ll count to five. Concentrating hard, I try to focus in on those bits and squeeze hard.

One, two, three, four—

I’m interrupted by the shrill burble of my phone. I slip on my earpiece and answer.

‘Hello, poppet,’ says a voice with an unmistakable burr. It’s my dad.

‘Oh … um hi,’ I gasp, feeling a flash of embarrassment at being caught doing pelvic-floor exercises by my father. Which is ridiculous. I mean, it’s not as if he just caught me having sex.

OK, scrub that image. That does not make me feel any better.

‘I’m just ringing to say thanks for the lovely flowers. They came yesterday afternoon.’

‘Oh, good.’ I smile.

‘But you shouldn’t have gone to any trouble.’

‘Don’t be silly, it wasn’t any trouble,’ I reply. And it’s true, it wasn’t. I just called up and gave them my credit-card details, I reflect, feeling a twinge of guilt as I think of all the time Dad’s spent on me over the years. ‘I’m just glad you liked them.’