Ever since listening to Kimi’s voice note this morning, the idea of tonight has weighed on me heavily. Not because I didn’t want to see my darling friends, but because being an adult is more exhausting than I would like. Between the messy morning and the draining commute, and the general fatigue that comes from sending and receiving emails, the last thing I wanted to do was slap on a smile and play happy for my friend’s near-impossible milestone. However, after seeing Aiden again, the idea of wine in my loungewear with my best friends has never sounded sweeter. Even if it is with the corner shop’s cheapest red wine.
‘You all right, Mads?’ Raina asks as she hands me a glass.
I swear, I could sigh from a million miles away and Raina would be able to hear it. She is the only person in this world that I will allow to unironically call themselves an empath. It was clear even in the formation of our friendship when she took pity on me in sixth form and beckoned me into their fold. With ten years and six degrees behind us, you wouldn’t even guess that I was a later addition to their close-knit group of three.
‘Yeah, sorry. Work is kicking my butt right now.’ I snuggle further into the sofa.
‘So your appraisal didn’t go well?’ Raina asks.
‘It didn’t go at all, actually. Got rescheduled. Again.’
I do my best to wave the topic away, but it’s not enough. She moves to sit opposite me and stares me dead in the eyes, face scrunched with determination.
‘I know your Pippa face, Mads. This isn’t your Pippa face.’
Kimi and Devi stop their squabble to join her pursuit, each one hanging on the promise of my forced brain dump.
‘It’s honestly nothing.’
Because it has to be nothing. It has to disappear, in the same way that I hoped and prayed thathewould disappear from mylife before. I can’t go back to who I am when he is around. Not now. Not again.
‘We don’t have to talk about it, we can just drink,’ Devi says.
Kimi shakes her head. ‘Nope. We are talking about it. It’s something to you, Mads.’
And they’re right. As much as I would like to move on unaffected, I cannot ignore the gnawing pain in my gut. Today dragged up raw emotions I didn’t believe I was still capable of feeling.
‘Aiden Edwards showed up at my work today,’ I say into the rim of my wine glass.
I might as well have dropped a physical bomb with the way the room shakes with the sheer force of their collective gasp at my news. Kimi clutches her chest, Raina’s mouth drops open and Devi’s eyes widen, as they all stare with tender concern.
‘He was in your actual place of work?’ Kimi asks.
‘In the flesh.’
Devi stands up. ‘I’ll open the second bottle.’
‘And I can Deliveroo a third if needed– I know a place.’ Raina reaches for her phone. ‘Is he working on one of the events?’
I huff. ‘Worse. He is Evie Eesuola’s talent manager.’
Talent manager to an icon at my age, while I’m stuck booking Pippa’s bikini waxes and chasing her expense receipts. My stomach fills with a thick, sticky jealousy.
‘TheEvie Eesuola? How the hell did Aiden Edwards score that?’ Devi pours out a fresh glass.
‘Knowing him, it probably just fell into his lap.’ I sigh.
‘What did you do? What did he say? Please tell me you spilled coffee on him or something?’ Kimi downs her glass and joins Devi’s second pour.
‘Unfortunately not. I chose to be an adult about it and asked him how he’d been,’ I reply bitterly.
‘Very mature,’ Raina says.
‘Did he match that energy?’ Kimi asks, eyebrow raised.
Of course, he didn’t. But Kimi knows that. They all already know that.
‘Everyone was confused, so Evie asked if we knew each other.’ I sigh again, feeling the anxiety and frustration build in me. ‘He responded, in front of my entire team, and my bosses, by saying, “I think she was maybe in my class for something at school.”’
