took a surprisingly short time for me to catch Amy up on my first-ever documented case of spontaneity and/or a psychotic episode. Understandably she didn’t say very much while I was talking, but when she did, it was with great reverence.
‘This,’ Amy exhaled loudly, ‘is amazing.’
Not what I was expecting her to say.
‘You don’t think I’ve gone mad?’ I bit my thumbnail gently and made my way towards the sea. It was cool and delicious against my hot sweaty feet.
‘Oh, I absolutely think you’ve gone mad,’ Amy confirmed quickly. ‘But it’s about time you went mad. This is brilliant.’
‘I’m standing on a beach in my pants pretending to be someone I’m not because I lost my job and, apparently, my mind, and that’s a good thing?’
‘Yes!’ she gushed. ‘Like I said, it’s brilliant. Can you see a hula girl? Are there coconuts everywhere? Is there an erupting volcano?’
As stupid as I knew all that sounded, Amy still appeared to know an awful lot more about my destination than I did.
‘Coconuts maybe. There are a lot of palm trees,’ I confirmed, looking past my immediate surroundings for the first time. Oh, what a shock – everywhere was painfully beautiful. ‘Zero hula girls, but there’s a great big fucking mountain behind me. I don’t know if it’s a volcano or not. I hope not because if it is and it erupts, I’m definitely going to die.’
‘Where are you exactly? I want to Google it,’ she said, still sounding far more excited than I did. It was oddly reassuring, like maybe I wasn’t completely insane after all. ‘You really have gone completely insane,’ she added. So much for the feeling of reassurance.
I held my hand over my eyes to get a better look at a small black rock that popped up out of the ocean like a sombrero and vaguely wondered whether or not I could swim it. I couldn’t.
‘Is it bad that I don’t actually know?’ I said, closing my eyes. I needed a break from all the ridiculous natural beauty that was burning my retinas because – oh, bugger me – as soon as I opened them, there was some more. Every time I turned around, I got another eyeful of gorgeousness. Hawaii did not have a bad angle. Hawaii was the Ryan Gosling of destinations. ‘I flew into Honolulu, and we didn’t drive that far. Somewhere near there, I suppose?’
‘Find out – I want to know everything. Text me every second. Or email me. Or Facebook me. Or all of those things. In fact, get on Twitter. TWEET.’
‘I thought I might have a shower before I work out what the actual fuck I’m doing first,’ I said, squinting at the sunshine. ‘I’m knackered and I smell. Oh!’
As I turned back to the cottage, a sweaty shirtless man appeared from nowhere and almost knocked me to the ground.
‘I don’t know about knackered, but you could smell sweeter,’ he grunted, half out of breath. He grabbed my shoulders and stood me up straight. ‘Nice knickers.’
Without another word, the topless man spun me round so that I was facing the ocean again and sprinted off.
‘What was that? Was that a man?’ Amy screeched down the phone. ‘You’re on a freebie trip to Hawaii, sticking it to Vanessa, and there are men there? I’m getting on the next plane.’
‘Unlike me, you’ve got work,’ I reminded her as I watched the man’s back, and backside, run away from me. My forearm shone with a slight sheen of his sweat, left behind after our brief collision. Gross. ‘Actually, I’ve got to work too. For a job I don’t know how to do. I should go.’
‘Extreme Makeover: Life Edition,’ she sighed. ‘But, um, actually … about the me having a job thing. I might have got fired again. So I could totally come.’
‘Oh, Aims,’ I said with as as much sympathy as I could muster for her third job of the year. ‘One quarter life crisis at a time?’
‘Whatever. I hated that job anyway.’ She gave me a verbal shrug down the phone, her voice painfully carefree. ‘By the time you get back, I’ll be all sensible and employed again. Or I’ll have fucked off to Cuba masquerading as a spy.’
‘And I’ll probably be in handcuffs,’ I muttered. The man had completely vanished from sight. ‘Are you all right? Do you need anything?’
‘A drink and a ticket to Hawaii?’ she asked hopefully.
‘I was thinking help with your rent?’ I felt horrible for being so far away. Amy needed me. ‘You’re sure you’re OK?’
‘I’m sure I am,’ Amy shushed me and clapped down the line. ‘You’re doing your bit right now. Go and roll around in the waves for me. I’ll talk to you later on.’
‘You bloody well will,’ I agreed. ‘Daily sanity checks needed. For both of us.’
Hanging up, I looked out at the stupidly beautiful ocean one more time.
‘Oh, just shut up, Hawaii,’ I muttered at no one in particular.
Maybe hourly sanity checks.
Back inside the cottage, I plugged in my phone with the lead I had bought at the airport and placed it carefully on the bedside table, the same spot where it lived at home. It felt good to do something normal. Looking around the bedroom, I shook my head and felt my heavy curls flap around the back of my head in a limp ponytail. If this was the guest cottage, I was almost too scared to see the main house. It was all so perfect. I’d been impressed by the living room and kitchen – they were so shiny and neat – but they weren’t even the half of it. A small hallway led through to an open, airy bedroom filled by a huge bed made up with the softest white linens I’d ever had the privilege of rubbing my face against and giggling into. Off to one side was a small, dark-wood dressing table, a matching desk with accompanying squishy white leather office chair, a huge MacBook Pro and a very swanky-looking printer. Oh yeah, I was here to work. On the other side of the bed was a wall of fitted wardrobes, all white wood, no sticky fingerprints or evidence of a late-night Dairy Milk binge to be seen. Resting on a white floating shelf was a bright pink ukulele. I fought every urge in my body to pick it up and start playing it badly. That time would come.
Peering out of the bedroom window, I saw a narrow path that wound its way through the gardens and up to a huge, tented terrace and the back of the main house. Aka Bertie Bennett’s palace. The only people who could legit live in a house like that were Bond villains, the final six in America’s Next Top Model or P. Diddy. If I got up there for dinner and Beyoncé was a house guest, I was going to lose my shit.
After tearing myself away from the view, I tore myself away from the rest of my clothes and locked my skanky self in the bathroom. Thanks to Boots at Heathrow I had some bare essentials in my suitcase, but there was no need to bust out the miniature Pantene. Mr Bennett had supplied everything a lady could ever need – Molton Brown toiletries, Diptyque candles and even a proper girl’s razor, not the individually wrapped things you get in hotels that slice your legs to ribbons. A proper lady’s razor. He had to be gay.
After the world’s longest and most delicious shower, I settled down in the leather chair with my laptop on my knee. Having been trapped on a Wi-Fi-less plane for the best part of twenty-four hours, I hadn’t been able to do nearly as much research into Mr Bennett as I’d have liked. I’d bought every fashion magazine and photography journal on the stands at the airport, read every single one cover to cover, and by now I knew that my battered H&M denim jacket should be a luxe leather bomber, my loose linen trousers should be cropped cotton, and everything else I owned should be neon. Most of the items I’d plundered from Vanessa’s wardrobe were as far away from my conservative clothing collection as I could stomach, not that there weren’t an awful lot of monochrome options, but I’d been brave and pilfered all of one bright yellow dress as well. Glancing over at the case full of stripey T-shirts and skinny jeans, I sighed loudly. I’d been pitching for a continental chic sort of look, left-bank sophistication and all that jazz.