The older woman winked and flashed a smile that could only be categorised as pure cheek, then wandered off.
Sienna shoved the brochure in her pocket and wandered aimlessly, the strap of her carry-on cutting into her shoulder because she’d chosen not to check baggage and had therefore crammed as much as she could into her bashed up old duffel. As she walked past the sign, Aiden popped up, and in a weird trick of the angle or light, it was like their eyes actually met.
Despite all her anger with him, all her frustration, a shiver ran the length of her spine and she admitted – only for a second and only to herself – that she could never really hate him. No matter what he’d done, no matter how much his desertion had hurt, she’d loved him so much, and with such purity, that it could never really turn to hate. Anger yes, hate no.
‘Bastard,’ she muttered under her breath as she passed the screen, doing her best not to look at any other signs in the airport – which was about as easy as not getting frostbite in Antarctica. Her mood was going from bad to worse when she turned a corner somewhat against her will, having been caught in the tide of one large, travelling family who were moving… somewhere? Sienna walked along with them, listening to their conversations in a different language – Italian – until a glow of pink almost blinded her and she stopped walking altogether.
Just Desserts,the sign screamed, echoing the writing on the flyer.
Sure enough, the place was full, packed to the brim with people needing sugar, alcohol and a seat, in no particular order. Except… just as she was preparing to keep walking, a table cleared. Hallelujah! Angels at work, surely. She ducked out of the Italian family, head down, beetling towards the table as though her whole life depended on claiming that space and making it hers…
But three other women had the same desperately determined expression on their faces and they’d all arrived at the table at basically the same time.
Sienna wanted to scream.
She wanted to cry.
A huge photo of Aiden eating a strawberry sundae was hanging behind the counter, and in the bottom corner, his signature had been scrawled. Evenhere? Seriously? She glared at the picture then looked back at the women. She didn’t want a fight.
She just wanted a seat.
‘Fuckity-fuck!’ a British woman snapped, and Sienna 100 per cent echoed her thoughts. Fuckity-fuck indeed.
Each of the women held a flyer in their hands just like she did. Sienna was about to leave hers on the table with a statement about her luck pretty much being the worst in the world when one of the women, all short and confident, with fascinating, curly red hair, shrugged one shoulder. ‘If none of you are with anyone else, we could share?’
Share? Of course they could share! Why hadn’t Sienna thought of that? Because she’d had the day from hell, on top of the year from hell, and lurching from one disappointment to the other had become standard. Somewhere along the way, she’d given up on even looking for an easy solution.
She sighed her relief and smiled a little tightly, scraping back her chair, and removing her deadweight of a bag with relief, placing it carefully at her feet.
Bella introduced herself first – American like Sienna, except she sounded posh and looked fancy; sleek and untouchable. Sienna instantly felt like a hick despite having worn her favourite outfit for what was meant to have been the most important meeting of her life.
Astrid sat opposite – a brunette with supermodel looks and an easy smile. The kind of smile that spoke of always having got your way, always being charmed just for being charming. Sienna ignored the uncharitable thought. Some people got it easy in life, others didn’t. That was just the way it was.
Paige was the British redhead, with freckles that danced over her nose and a face that was hyperanimated and expressive, so it seemed to move to illustrate whatever she was thinking and feeling. She’d be a terrible poker player but an excellent friend.
It was Paige who suggested the first bottle of prosecco and Sienna was all too willing to go along with that. She had some sleeping tablets stashed in her purse for the flight, but a couple of glasses of bubbles would go a long way to taking the edge off her altitude anxiety. It might even give her temporary Aiden-blindness.
‘Four glasses,’ Bella told the waitress. ‘And some water for the table, please.’ Yep, definitely fancy. Back where Sienna came from, drinking water with your booze was kind of frowned upon.
Except, it turned out, Bella wasn’t fancy. She was lovely. A peach. So too were Astrid and Paige. Even though Sienna had made it an artform to keep people at a very firm distance, something about their open natures, the anonymity offered by an airport restaurant and snow-delayed schedule, not to mention a couple of bottles of prosecco, made the time fly. Two hours went in the blink of an eye and she’d only stared daggers at Aiden’s strawberry sundae photo a handful of times. Huh. That was progress.
She listened as Paige talked about her VA business, impressed by her obvious myriad skills, then moved onto talking about the wedding she’d been at. ‘Pavlova dress. Drunken best man’s speech. Smooshing cake into each other’s faces. A handsy Uncle Chip.’ Sienna stifled a giggle at the imagery, but beside her, Bella was in a totally different mood.
‘I’d rather not talk about weddings.’ Her voice was tenser than a tightrope. Concerned, Sienna glanced across at her.
‘Not a fan?’ Paige asked what they were obviously all thinking.
‘Absolutely not.’ Bella shuddered delicately.
‘Don’t believe in love?’ Paige was persistent and Sienna loved that.
‘I did. And then six months ago I stood up in front of 400 guests to let them know that my groom wasn’t coming.’
Sienna’s jaw dropped.
‘Holy mother of… you were jilted?’
‘Yup. By text. The morning of.’
