‘—doesn’t mean he’s right for you.’ Ged raises an eyebrow. ‘I still don’t trust him. I mean, what is he doing, following you around the globe?’
‘We don’t know that for certain,’ I say weakly.
Ged throws his arms up. ‘Seriously? There’s no other explanation, Connie, love. No matter how much you want to pretend otherwise.’
He’s right. The potential of Luke being on this flight has me, Ged, Liam and all the Dollz on high alert. Big Sue tried to do a sweep of the plane but was ordered back from first class by the cabin crew because we are about to take off, and they need everyone buckled into their seats. The Dollz are sitting in the rows behind us. Cherry is slumped down in her seat with her eyes closed. She still has make-up smeared down her face and a false eyelash hanging off. It has been a harrowing last few hours for her. She has still not told her husband with the receding hairline that she may be with child. She is giving off serious unexploded-device vibes. Next to her is Liberty.
‘And still, none of you have the decency to consider Luke may be afterme,’ I can hear her saying. ‘I’m the hottest one out of the lot of you, and yet,oh no,someone that posh couldn’t possibly be after someone like her.’
‘Get over yourself, pet. Of course someone like him would be interested in you. You’re friggin’ gorgeous, and you know it. He obviously has a weird thing for classical singers. That’s all.’ Big Sue, as usual, has worked her magic. Liberty seems temporarily pleased with this explanation.
‘It would really help matters if you explained exactly what happened last night when the both of you sang together at Voices, Connie. How did you end up kissing? What did he say after? What didyousay?’ asks Big Mand from the seat behind me. She rolls her eyes as she twists around. ‘And if you two could keep your tongues to yourselves for two twatting minutes, I’d be able to hear myself twatting think! It’s like sitting next to a herd of cattle slurping at a water trough.’
‘Excuse us for being in love!’ yells Tash, lifting her lips briefly from Sister Kevin’s. She is on a mission to secure him as her baby-daddy-to-be. The cabin crew have asked her twice already to get off his lap, do up her seat belt and keep her hands to herself. ‘Ignore her, Kev, she’s just jealous.’
I hear someone tut loudly. I’m not going to turn around as it may encourage the spat. I only have the duration of this flight to get everyone back on good speaking terms.
My mind flies to last night. Luke definitely kissed me. Not the other way round. Enough people filmed it for the evidence to be crystal clear. Luke did all the leaning. All one inch of it. But if I’m brutally honest, the footage looks very dubious. Especially once uploaded to the World Wide Web. Put that together with the damning tabloid attention we received during our Royal Northern Sinfonia tour, on account of a royal cousin wanting to marry Luke, and the odds are beginning to stack up against me. Matteo would have every reason to be furious.
‘What did Luke say?’ Big Mand repeats.
She’s like a dog with a bone.
‘He said that he thinks he’s in love with me. That he’s never felt this way before, and that he would never forgive himself if he didn’t at least try to win me over because all’s fair in love and war.’
I can hear some murmuring before Big Mand says, ‘Oh, that’s quite sweet actually.’
Then Big Sue says in a slightly choked voice, ‘I guess if you feel strongly enough about a person, then you would fight for them. If it’s a love worth fighting for.’
There’s an almighty silence as we all wonder whether she’s talking about her and Big Mand, or simply reciting Cheryl Tweedy-Cole-Fernandez-Versini-almost-Payne-then-exhaustingly-all-the-way-back-to-Tweedy again.
‘Yes. Yes, you would fight for them,’ Ged agrees, loudly enough for the Dollz to hear over the roar of the engines. The aircraft has started to move. ‘Love conquers all. It’s about openness, accepting each other for who they really are, but above all, it’s about forgiveness.’
This too is followed by a lengthy silence as we appreciate Ged is really talking about the awkward situation (the accidental ‘outing’ that no one has dared yet mention) in the case of him and Liam versus the unconfirmed lesbians. Big Mand and Big Sue, who for whatever reasons want to stay firmly in the closet, did not appreciate Ged and Liam posting a photo of the four of them with the caption ‘Just had the best double date ever’.
‘Well, for what it’s worth,’ Tash bellows, ‘I think love is blind.’
We all take a beat. This overused cliché makes no sense, not in any of the previously mentioned subtexts, unless she means Sister Kevin is blind to her obvious insanity.
A lovely lady from the airline sashays over to ask us all politely to shut up during the safety announcement, adding that we’re all wrong. ‘Love is about respect. Respect for the cabin crew and the pilot. And respect for what to do in the event of an emergency, such as a loss in cabin pressure, or our refusal to serve you free drinks later on if you don’t pipe down and listen.’
Well, that’s love sorted. At least we have safely veered off the topic of me and my unrequited love triangle. While the cabin crew do their demonstration, I look down at my ill-fitting Barbie costume. We were in such a rush that we didn’t have time to change. I suggest we all swap clothes.
‘I’ll go in the toilet with Kev,’ Tash hisses through the seats, even though they have no need to swap clothes with each other. ‘It’s one of his BIG birthday surprises.’ She pauses to allow us to let our imaginations run wild as to what they could possibly get up to in such a confined space.
‘Christ alive. I’m not going in after you two then!’ shouts Liberty too loudly.
‘I thought you were already giving him a surprise for his BIG birthday,’ Big Sue says in a less-than-impressed tone. ‘Remember?’
Tash glares frostily at her.
‘BIG birthday?’ Sister Kevin says, smiling as he leans forward to look along the row. ‘Who has a BIG birthday coming up?’
This causes a lot of eye contact. Sister Kevin’s BIG birthday has been a constant bone of contention over the past few days. Now it seems it may not be as BIG as we hoped.
‘Be quiet or you’ll wake Cherry. She’s like a ticking time bomb, that one,’ Tash says, skilfully changing the topic.
As if evoking some macabre joint memory, I see panic flush their faces. Cherry and pregnancy do not get on well. For Cherry, motherhood is just one long struggle for meaning. Tash has successfully dodged the Sister Kevin BIG birthday bullet for now. I’m just thankful that when I turn back around in my seat, Ged and Liam have their headphones on and are watching the third series ofBridgerton. We are all avid fans of the show.
