Page 32 of All Our Missing Pieces

‘I love your top,’ Emily said, spreading our blanket out on the grass.

I put down the bag containing cans of lager and a pack of ice, which we’d picked up from the corner shop, and joined her, peeling off the T-shirt I had on over my bikini top and throwing it over for her to see.

It was the first time I’d properly caught up with Emily in a few weeks, and I’d missed her company, but at the same time being with her felt strange – almost as if the house on Damask Square was a different world, a kind of dreamland from which I emerged every morning for work and then returned to at night. It was a world where normal things like picnics in the park with friends somehow didn’t happen.

‘I picked it up in a second-hand shop,’ I told her. ‘Orla showed me how to cut off the sleeves and hem the edges, but I haven’t got round to that yet.’

‘Nice.’ She opened two cans of beer and handed one to me, tearing open a packet of crisps. ‘It suits you. This Orla’s turning you into quite the fashion designer.’

‘I don’t know about that. But she found me a dress that I wore on my first date with Luke, and I⁠—’

‘Yes, come on,’ Emily urged. ‘Less of the Vogue, more of the Just Seventeen. How’s it going with Luke?’

I turned over, propping myself up on my elbows, sipping Stella and feeling the sun on my back. It was a gorgeous summer Saturday, I was hanging out with my best friend and I felt perfectly happy.

‘He’s amazing,’ I said. ‘I mean, it’s early days. We’ve only been… you know…’

‘Shagging each other into early graves?’

I laughed. ‘Yeah, that. Sleeping together for a couple of weeks and not every night, because it would be weird to almost move in together when we’re already living in the same house. Kind of disrespectful to Orla, although she said she doesn’t mind.’

‘Not a lot she could do about it if she did, is there?’

‘Well, no. But – you know. Even though I really like him – like, really, really like him – I feel like it’s better if we still have some space. Did I tell you he’s an artist? Or he wants to be. All the handyman stuff is just to make money while he builds a portfolio. He showed me some of his work and it’s amazing.’

‘Smitten.’ Emily smiled. ‘I knew it when you couldn’t come to the Black Eyed Peas gig with me because you were “busy”.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t want to let you down and it wasn’t because of Luke. Just, I had an early meeting at work the next day and⁠—’

‘I’m only kidding. As it happens, you not wanting the spare ticket meant I could ask Josh from the office. I just gave you first dibs because you’re my mate.’

‘Josh from the office? Tell me more.’

She shook her head. ‘Long-standing crush. But he was awful that night. He got absolutely shitfaced and tried to snog me on the Tube home then vomited on the platform when we got off. So I’m officially cured.’

I made sympathetic noises and opened two more cans of beer and a tube of Pringles.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Better I find out now that he’s a sleaze than six months down the line, right? But Luke – do you reckon it’s serious? Or going to be serious?’

I turned over again, stretching my pale legs out to the sun.

‘Depends what you mean by serious.’

‘Taking him home for Christmas level serious?’

‘Jesus, no. I’ve never taken anyone back to my parents’ place, not even you.’

‘Oh.’ Emily’s face fell. ‘I’m sorry. I forgot.’

‘Doesn’t matter. I try and forget too, only it doesn’t always work.’

‘So…’ she said, clearly trying to change the subject, ‘what about the other girl? Bernice?’

‘Beatrice.’ I flattened my empty beer can and twisted it from side to side. ‘She’s an odd one.’

‘Odd how?’

‘She’s all proper on the surface. Like she just stepped out of Heathers. But she’s a loose cannon.’