LITMIR.BIZ

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      Good news.

      ‘And we’re hosting an influencer event for them in Hawaii.’

      Bully-for-the-influencers news.

      ‘And I have to go because Erin is house-hunting in the UK and my account director just quit to go and run a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania with her girlfriend.’

      Oh god. I-know-exactly-where-this-is-going news.

      I pulled my cocktail closer and sucked on the paper straw.

      ‘What can I do? The last few years have been tough on people,’ she replied with a shrug before pulling her phone out of her bag. ‘Whatever, that’s not the point. The original plan was, we were gonna take a bunch of YouTubers from around the world to Hawaii to promote it, but it turns out maybe one of them tweeted something about Nazis and maybe another one of them fat-shamed some chick from America’s Got Talent and, the short version of my very long story is, the brand disinvited all the Americans and I have one week to find five people to take on an all-inclusive trip and I know I’ve barely had time to hang out lately but I’m going to make it up to you right now because you’re totally coming with me on this trip.’

      I continued to suck on my paper straw until my drink ran dry.

      ‘May I refresh that for you?’ the waitress asked, appearing out of thin air.

      ‘Yes, you may,’ I replied as she scooped up my glass and rested it on a small wooden tray. ‘Jenny?’

      She shook her head as she scrolled through her impossibly full inbox.

      ‘Do you want something else?’ I asked.

      ‘Just a seltzer,’ she replied with a sweet smile. ‘I have a shit ton of admin to do when I get home.’

      Even though I’d said I didn’t want to be out late, it still stung to know I wasn’t her only plan for the evening. While the chances of rolling out of our favourite karaoke bar at three a.m. were slim to none, it would have been nice to think it was still on the table.

      ‘Come on, Angie.’ As soon as the waitress was gone, Jenny hurled herself across the table, stretching out her arms until her phone almost touched my face. ‘Look at this, tell me it’s not heaven. Come through. Come through for your old pal, Jen.’

      ‘Jenny, you’re insane,’ I said, slapping her phone away but not before I caught a glimpse of the photo she was trying to show me. Blue skies, white sand and a turquoise ocean that looked a million miles away from the East River. ‘I can’t just up and disappear to Hawaii. I have a baby and a job and, on top of that, Louisa is coming to stay next weekend.’

      ‘That’s perfect!’ she said, snapping her fingers. ‘Louisa can come too. Now we only need to find three other people. Anyone else unproblematic you can think of?’

      ‘We’re not coming,’ I reiterated. ‘What about Sadie? Précis would love that.’

      ‘I said unproblematic,’ Jenny replied, shaking her head. ‘I had dinner with her last week and she was super excited because someone on Twitter said she was peak white feminism and she retweeted it thinking it was a good thing.’

      ‘OK, so not Sadie,’ I agreed. ‘What about Eva from Evalution? She was at Spencer but she’s gone back to doing YouTube full time. I’m almost certain she’s entirely unproblematic. I can ask her if you’d like?’

      ‘That would be amazing,’ Jenny cheered, flicking through more photos. Oh, it did look pretty. ‘So that’s you, Louisa, Eva and we still have two open seats.’

      ‘Four open seats,’ I said. ‘I’m not coming. And I haven’t even asked Eva yet.’

      ‘Angie, baby,’ Jenny slunk out of her seat and crept around the table, crouching down by my side. ‘Just think about it. You, me, cocktails even more delicious than this one. Sun, sea, sand and a ton of free makeup.’

      Hmm. I did enjoy free makeup.

      ‘And it would be so great for your new website. I could set you up with an interview with the amazing woman who founded the brand, you could write travel pieces about Hawaii and we’ll have make-up artists and a photographer there the whole time, taking millions of photos of you looking super awesome.’

      I also enjoyed looking super awesome.

      ‘Can’t you imagine it?’ she sighed, stretching her arm skyward to paint an imaginary picture. ‘You, me and Louisa, sat on the deck of your private villa, sun slipping over the horizon with nothing but the warm, blue waters of the Pacific Ocean for as far as the eye can see. And then, at the end of the day, you hop in your personal hot tub and go to bed.’

      I held a hand against my chest, my breath caught in my throat.

      ‘Uninterrupted sleep,’ Jenny whispered seductively. ‘For five whole nights.’

      The foul temptress.

      ‘Jen, honestly, I can’t,’ I said, shaking myself to shatter her spell. ‘If someone had told me having a baby would mean turning down a free trip to Hawaii, I’d have considered getting a dog instead, but she’s ten months old now, it’s a bit too late for me to do anything about it.’

      ‘Bring her.’

      I arched an eyebrow. ‘Really?’

      ‘No, not really,’ she sighed. ‘We’re not insured for babies and I really don’t know how I was planning to get out of that one if you’d said yes.’

      I closed my eyes and chased any thoughts of white sandy beaches, cocktails served in coconuts and big, empty king-size beds out of my mind.

      Jenny flopped down into the grass and sighed. ‘I know it isn’t as easy as it was before but come on, Angie. You could at least ask Alex. You could at least find out if you could take the time off of work. We used to have so much fun and now I never even see you.’

      There it was. Used to. We used to have fun. And I’d looked up what normcore meant: it was just a sneaky hipster word for boring. Was that me from now on? A Used To Be person?

      ‘I know this is a lot to ask but it would mean so much to me, for work and as a friend.’ Jenny pushed herself up onto her knees, hands clasped together in front of her chest, her gorgeous silk scarf-print dress spread out around her like a sexy Gucci picnic blanket. ‘Please, Angie, won’t you just think about it?’

      ‘Jenny,’ I whispered.

      ‘Yes?’ she replied.

      ‘You’re awfully close to the edge of the water.’

      ‘Oh shit!’

      Jenny looked over her shoulder, losing her balance as she twisted. All at once, I grabbed for her hand as she grabbed the fishing pole stuck in the grass at the side of my seat, only for the line to suddenly come to life and pull her flat down on her face. Jenny had a bite. She landed flat on her stomach, her face inches away from the water as I launched myself out of my chair, rugby-tackling her around the waist and anchoring my friend to dry land.

      ‘Let go of the fishing rod!’ I yelled as whatever was on the other end of the fishing line splashed furiously in the water.

      ‘Don’t let go of me!’ Jenny screamed, thrashing around as though she was about to dredge up Moby-Dick. ‘It’s pulling me into the river!’

      ‘It’s not Jaws,’ I shouted back, hoping that was true. I was scared, excited and still very hungry but even I didn’t think I could eat an entire shark. ‘Let go!’

      ‘Here’s your drin— oh, crap!’

      But Jenny did not let go. And the waitress, delivering my fresh cocktail, did not see us sprawled out on the riverbank. I glanced upwards just in time to see the look of shock on her face as she tripped over Jenny’s wildly kicking legs. She was not dressed for speedy reactions, her reflexes severely

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