“I’m a cat!” she declares, purring noisily and going to lick my hand again. I hastily draw it back under the covers and she meows, climbing up onto the bed with me. I groan, my mouth dry following a little too much Tanqueray.
“Come here, pussycat,” I say, pulling her under the covers with me. “It’s still nighttime.”
She snuggles into me and we both relax, letting out matching sighs as she wriggles into a comfy position.
“Are you sad, Auntie Emmy?” she asks, voice sleepy.
“A little, my love.”
“I was sad at school yesterday. Toby called my school bag stupid and said dolls were for babies.”
I nod, smoothing her hair back from her face.
“Toby sounds like a douchebag,” I reply. She smothers a shocked little giggle, whispering the word ‘douchebag’ back to herself.
“Penelope always makes me feel better. You can take her for the day if you want to?” She offers me her ragged dolly, which has a suspiciously soggy foot.
“Thanks Bells. But Daddy’s got both you and the boys solo today. He might need Penelope’s magic more than I do.”
She giggles and then settles, falling swiftly back into sleep. I’ve always envied the way kids can go from wide awake to fast asleep in the blink of an eye. I tuck her in close to me and close my eyes, willing myself to join her in dreamland.
Four hours later, Chloe and I are stretched out on sun loungers at Nirvana Spa. It’s one of my absolute favourite spots because they let you stay literally all day, they do a mean pizza, and theyhave a thing called celestial floatation where you get to float in silence in Dead Sea water. It’s bliss.
We’re sipping orange juice in our robes, Kindles laid out on the table next to us. Now that my slight hangover has abated, I feel relaxed for the first time since my birthday party. I take a deep breath, filling my lungs, then slowly let it go. Chloe glances over at me and smiles.
“So, Em. What’s your next move?” She angles the straw into her mouth and gives me a pointed look.
“My next move?” I parrot back, raising a brow.
“Well, there’s a lot of boring logistics to work through – where you’re going to live, how you will split things, who gets custody of which friends, etc.” She waves a dismissive hand through the air. “But what’s next in the story of Emmeline Warner?”
I laugh. Chloe’s got a spark of mischief in her eyes and I can’t wait to see where this is going.
“Seems to me,” she continues, “that you’re single for the first time since you were 18. You’ve slept with precisely one person, yes?”
“Yes…” I reply, eyes narrowing.
“Well then, I see nothing but opportunities in your future, my friend.” She waggles her eyebrows at me and I snort.
“You do make a fair point, my dear,” I muse back.
Colin and I had been like rabbits in the early days but we’d never done much colouring outside the lines. Our sex life had been enthusiastic but unimaginative. And in the past five years or so, it had dwindled from missionary once a month to a quarterly drunken fumble. I can’t honestly remember the last time he made me come. I close my eyes as another flash of pain spears through me, the image of him and Stacey reappearing, uninvited, in my brain.
“Well, I know it’s only been a week but they do say that to get over someone, you need to get under someone else. The world’s your oyster now. I vote you make the most of this. What is it you said to Nick? A new chapter? This could be that. A new chapter in a sexy little thriller called ‘Emmy finally gets to have an orgasm’.”
“Hey!” I elbow her. “I have plenty of orgasms!”
“Yes, but we both know the Womanizer can’t make you scream more than a man sucking hard on your clit with two fingers curled inside you,” she says, completely matter-of-factly with a sideways grin. She’s speaking quietly but we still get two shocked glances from the elderly ladies three sun loungers over. I smother my giggles into my OJ.
“Fair,” I concede. “Maybe I should start a bucket list of all the sexy things I’ve never been able to try?”
“A fuckit list!” shrieks Chloe, definitely not quietly, as several more ladies turn to us and glare. One of them actually huffs.
“Shhh!” I stage-whisper, trying to contain my laughter. “Sure, ok, a fuckit list.”
“What would be on it?” she leans in, conspiratorially. “There’s got to be a few things you’vecome across—” she pauses and winks dramatically, and I explode into giggles again “—in your romance novels that you’ve wanted to try?”
I love it when I get to see this side of her again. She spends so much time in mum-mode that I rarely get to see my bestie when she’s being filthy and fun.
