‘Well done.’ He raises his coffee cup.
‘What, you knew?’
‘I’ve known almost since day one. Birdie Daniels, her reputation preceded her. She just asked me not to tell.’
‘That’s not fair!’ I thunder, but his grin breaks me as it always has, as I’m sure it always will.
The American just reaches for my hands that are secured on her shoulders. She squeezes them affectionately.
After the brunch, the guests start to scatter back up to their rooms to gather their possessions and pack away another weekend of their lives. Florian yawns next to me.
‘Didn’t get much sleep last night?’ Crispy asks, eyebrows rocketing up into his diminishing hairline, his lips screwed up into a knowing little smirk.
‘Something like that.’ Florian doesn’t avoid the eye contact. Instead, his own little smirk lets everyone still lingering know that he is incredibly proud of that fact. It makes my insides glow. ‘I’m going to go for a swim.’ He pecks me on the cheek before practically gliding from the patio.
Soon it is just The American and me, our comfortable little twosome that I had grown rather fond of.
She lays her hand out on the table, reaching for mine. They find each other, tie themselves in a little knot.
‘Well done, old girl,’ she says, a sincerity so unusual for her that it triggers some bizarre emotional response that I have to fight to steer under control.
‘Thank you.’
‘Thankyou. I’m not sure I’ve had as much fun as I’ve had with you for a very long time.’
‘The feeling’s mutual.’
‘I have a feeling I might be being replaced.’ She winks, gesturing to the figure walking towards the pool.
I can’t help but grin. ‘You could never be replaced. I feel like I’m going to be running to you with my problems for as long as you’ll listen.’
‘Do you promise?’
‘I promise. Like my first problem is that a good friend of mine bought me a plane ticket that I very much don’t want to use. Do you think she’ll hate me if I waste her money?’
‘And your meeting?’
‘Well, turns out Florian was actually quite a fan of the last chapter. He thinks the project might have some legs.’
‘Does he now?’
‘So, I’ve cancelled the meeting, told Sam that she’ll have the final chapters by the end of the week and I’m going to call Mum in a bit and tell her everything.’
‘That’s the best news I’ve heard all year.’
‘And the plane ticket?’ I nudge.
‘Well, Ava, I think you may find that if you turned up at the airport with that ticket in the first place you may have realised that it wasn’t exactly entirely legitimate.’
Chapter 37
Two years later
The bookshop is busy.Too busy to comfortably host the crowd that have turned up. I made the rookie error of inviting everyone, thinking that if just a quarter actually did turn up then I might be able to make it look less sad. I hadn’t anticipated that almost every guest would attend, from the publishing team to my old English teacher, everyone is here smiling expectantly at me, waiting for an audience as if I’m somebody more than I am. And they’re all chatting, laughing, holding copies ofthebook. My book. The book that is, as Sam so lovingly put it, ‘finally fucking done.’
I’d grown used to its heavy presence in my life, how long it had taken to edit the bloody thing, how every time I sent it off to Sam, it felt like there were more question marks and suggestions than before. But it had been this constant anchor, something that kept me occupied and busy when a French winter had threatened to engulf me, and Florian had been off travelling to various exhibitions and meetings. Seeing it in other people’s hands had been both everything I wanted it to be and also something I was struggling to come to terms with. I couldn’t protect it, couldn’t control how people would receive it. I had done my best to guide the narrative, to portray myself as best as I could, but ultimately there will be people who won’t like it, they wouldn’t like me by proxy and therefore I find myself outside of my own book launch, on a cold dark London street with a cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other.
I am expected to do a reading, to sit at a table and sign copies, to slap on a face that says, ‘I am confident that this book will do well,’ when in reality, I am petrified. It is the last thing that Ettie and I will ever do together, a product of our relationship, the only dependant we can ever produce, and it’s only now when I look through the windows at the people who have turned up to toast and listen and celebrate that I realise what it is, what it truly means.
