11
Tilly lugs her large yellow suitcase through the revolving doors at Heathrow Terminal 4, her eyes searching the crowds for her sister. Queues snake back and forth, the sound of hundreds of conversations and the trundle of baggage trolleys making Tilly’s head spin. But then she hears a familiar voice calling her name and Harper is running towards her, harem trousers billowing and strappy sandals slapping against the ground despite the grey clouds outside. She is wearing a loose shirt, a pair of sunglasses pushed up on her head, and has a neck pillow and eye mask strapped to her backpack. She beams at Tilly, pulling her into a hug.
‘Nice hat,’ she says, tugging the brim of Tilly’s sun hat.
‘It wouldn’t fit in my bag.’
‘It might not fit on the plane. Or on Bali, come to think of it. You do know it’s only a small island?’
‘Yeah, sorry you’re actually taking a different flight,’ Tilly teases. ‘I’ve chartered my own plane to accommodate me and my hat.’
‘Nooo. At least tell me you upgraded me to first class.’
Tilly adjusts the hat slightly on her head and in a more serious voice adds, ‘Joe liked this hat.’
At the feel of his name in her mouth her stomach tightens. Is she really about to do this? Is she really going to go on their honeymoon without him? If Harper notices the shift in Tilly’s mood she doesn’t mention it. Instead she wraps an arm around her shoulders and squeezes her.
‘We’ll drop our suitcases and then go get a cocktail. Let’s start this trip the way we mean to go on.’
As they sip cosmopolitans in the airport bar, Tilly quickly checks her email while Harper scrolls through photos of the resort on their Instagram page.
‘Ooh, look, they do yoga lessons on the beach!’ she says, showing Tilly a photo of yoga mats stretched out on white sand beneath a peach sunrise, and toned-looking people contorting their bodies into intimidatingly adventurous shapes.
‘That might be more your thing than mine. You know how bad my flexibility is.’
‘Don’t be so boring, youhaveto do yoga in Bali. And maybe you’d get more flexible if you … Oh, I don’t know … did some yoga?’
As Harper continues to scroll through the feed of images Tilly spots a new email thread in her inbox.
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]; [email protected]
Subject: An idea
What do you think about trying to write the memoir in rhyme? Internet poets aresoohot on socials right now.
*
From: [email protected]
Subject: Hell no
Poets might be hot
But your idea is, frankly, NOT
Plus there’s not a word out there
That rhymes with Esmerelda
R xx
Tilly chokes on her cosmopolitan.
‘Are you OK?’ says Harper as Tilly wipes her mouth with a paper napkin.
