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Carly

“Two hundred and twelve,” Beth announced, raising her glass of Prosecco to the studio. “Two hundred and twelve new members since the relaunch. That’s not a typo. I checked it three times, and then I made Dean check it, and he only got it wrong once.”

A cheer went up. Somebody at the back whistled. Dean, who had been on his best behaviour since the open day and was now wearing a light-up reindeer jumper with real commitment, took a small bow.

Beth had strung fairy lights along the mirrors, propped a balding artificial tree by the stereo, and laid on a buffet across two trestle tables: sausage rolls, crisps in mixing bowls, a cheeseboard the instructors had already ravaged, and a tray of mince pies nobody had touched because a member had made them and nobody trusted her pastry. Somebody had put Wham! on for the third time. Instructors, front-desk staff, their partners, a few regulars from the relaunch and half the Blues, because Jenna had heard there was a buffet: thirty-odd people were crammed in among the step boxes and Swiss balls.

Two hundred and twelve. The roof fixed. The corridor painted. Forty thousand video views, which Beth still called frankly suspicious.

Everything Carly had been grinding towards since September, all in one room, wearing paper hats.

“And none of it,” Beth went on, “would have happened without our fearless leader, who has worked harder than anyone in this building and smiled less than anyone in this building. To Carly.”

“To Carly!”

Carly lifted her glass and smiled, because that was what the room needed. It was a good smile, honed on visiting brass in the army. It worked on everyone except people who knew her.

Beth, who knew her, gave her a long look over the top of her Prosecco and said nothing.

Carly’s phone buzzed in her back pocket. She knew who it was before she looked.

Removal van booked for Saturday 9am. I’ve packed his clothes. He asked if you’re coming. Are you?

A second message arrived before she’d put the phone away.

Sorry. That was blunt. He’d like you there. So would I.

Samantha never apologised. Samantha never said so would I.

She put the phone back in her pocket without replying and took a mouthful of wine she didn’t want.

In the end, Samantha had told him. The morning after Carly had stood on the porch and walked away, Samantha had driven over and said all of it: the conservatory, the house, the Sunday roast. She hadn’t asked Carly to come. She’d just texted afterwards. Done. He knows. No accusation.

Now he was asking for her, and she didn’t know what to say.

Her eyes went, as they had all night, to the buffet table.

Lauren was there.

She’d come straight from a client, branded polo under a cardigan, and had stayed at the far end of the room ever since. Topping up glasses. Finding the bottle opener. Talking a new instructor down from a panic about the January timetable. Laughing, head thrown back, at something the barista from the park said.

She hadn’t come anywhere near Carly. Not once in an hour and a half.

Not properly in over a week, either, unless you counted the Berkeley updates: one text a day, polite and thorough, and never anything that needed a reply.

Right now, she was standing with Jenna and Abi by the sausage rolls, and Jenna was bouncing on the balls of her feet.

“Two rooms!” Jenna was saying, loud enough to carry. “Off the high street! Lauren, that’s massive!”

“It’s not signed yet.” Lauren was smiling, but she kept glancing down at her drink. “He only asked me a couple of weeks ago. I’ve got to go and look at it properly in January. And do the numbers again. And probably panic for a bit.”

“You’ve done the numbers?”

“I’ve done the numbers.”

“Lauren.” Jenna grabbed her by both shoulders and shook her gently. “You absolute legend. A clinic. Your own actual clinic.”