I hurry forward. “I’m here! I made it. Barely.”
“Way to make a dramatic entrance.” Huan heaves in a breath. “We thought you were stranded back there.”
“Didn’t you get my texts?” Sage asks.
I scoot into my seat and I pull out my phone. Sure enough, Sage has texted me six times since I left the London Eye, even going so far as to look up alternate train tickets for me. My heart fills with love at the sight.
“I’m so sorry. There wasn’t service on the Tube and then I was running and I didn’t—”
“Christ, Ellie,” Dev interrupts. He stands in the aisle, looming over me.
I clench in preparation for whatever judgmental comment he has. Instead, he sags into the seat across from me and pushes the palms of his hands into his forehead.
“We thought something happened. You weren’t responding and we didn’t know where you were...”
“Oh.” I bow my head. “I didn’t think about it like that. Will and I got caught up and I was rushing to get here in time. I didn’t mean to make you worry.”
“What were you and Will caught up doing?” Huan asks with an eyebrow waggle. He’s clearly already over my late arrival. “Making out at some fancy club?”
“The London Eye.” I can’t keep the joy from my words.
“You got to go?” Sage says. “And I was sure we’d see more today than you would. How long was the wait?”
“He got us timed tickets.”
Huan nods appreciatively. “He’s smooth, I’ll give him that. But you still missed an awesome day.”
Sage yawns. “I’m going to be so tired tomorrow. And we’ve got that anatomy test to study for. We should have taken the earlier train.”
“Anyway, did you get our pictures?” Huan asks.
I laugh and scroll through more photos. I guess they spent the evening walking through a market.
“Covent Garden,” Dev says before I can ask. “Really cool. They had great street performers.”
“I can tell.” I pull up a picture of him with his arm slung around the shoulder of a man covered in gold paint.
He lifts his arm like he wants me to smell his armpit. His shirt is smeared with gold. “Totally worth it.”
“Don’t wash that!” I laugh. “That’s the best souvenir I’ve seen yet.”
“Speaking of souvenirs...” Huan reaches into a bag and pulls out a tiny stuffed toy. “Something for you since you missed out.”
It’s a tiny white unicorn with a rainbow mane.
I squish it to me. “Oh, I love it! You bought this for me?”
“We all pitched in.”
“No,” Dev says. “He’s being modest. You’re sitting next to our very own street performer.”
I spin to face Huan. “What? Did you—”
“Oh, he beatboxed. He had a crowd around him too.”
“It wasn’t a crowd,” Huan argues. “It was maybe a few people at the most.”
“A half dozen,” Sage murmurs with her eyes closed.
