and she tried to convince this group of surfers she was eighteen so they’d buy her a round of drinks at the beach bar? Miss Rivers went ape shit when she found out!’
Elle screwed her eyes shut and giggled. ‘Oh God yeah! She tried to have a go at surfing too and ended up falling flat on her face. That didn’t stop her though; she gave it another try and almost ended up being taken out by that huge wave. Remember that bloke with the curly blonde hair had to dive in and get her? She pretended to be unconscious so he’d give her mouth to mouth.’
‘I remember all the boys liked her,’ I said with a sad smile. ‘And you, come to that! I was always the shy one who never got a look in for my two gorgeous best mates.’
‘You had your fair share if I remember, Miss Harper! Once you accepted that it was possible for a bloke to like you.’
Now that the floodgates had opened, loads of happy memories of Vicky came racing to the surface. It made me feel better to remember her as my fun-loving, carefree best friend who’d relished anything life had thrown at her.
‘She was always doing daft things,’ I said. ‘She was the wild child out of the three of us. One of a kind, our Vicky. Always coming up with some hare-brained scheme and trying to get us to go along with it… I miss her, you know. Every day, I think about her and wonder if she’s happy or not.’
The air between us turned distinctly sombre and I felt like an idiot for ruining our trip down Memory Lane.
‘Me too,’ Elle admitted with a little sigh. ‘That night still preys on my mind sometimes too. If we could’ve stopped her –’
I put my hands on top of hers. ‘It was my fault OK, not yours. You’ve got nothing to blame yourself for. It’s me who should feel guilty and I do. Every single day for the past eight years, I’ve beaten myself up about it. I should never have even brought the vodka that night and I should’ve tried harder to stop her. I-I should’ve got help, but I didn’t honestly think any harm was going to come to Vicky. That was all on me. You did nothing wrong.’
She looked up at me with sad eyes. ‘If I could go back and undo it all, I would. That night should never have happened. And I-I didn’t mean to go weird on you afterwards, you know. It was just such a horrible situation that I shut myself off from everyone. Didn’t know how to deal with it, really.’
I shook my head and smiled, squeezing her hands. It killed me to think Elle had been carrying around so much guilt for so many years, but I also felt a tiny bit relieved to know I hadn’t been alone. There had been someone else in the world who’d felt as awful as I had about what had happened to Vicky.
‘That doesn’t matter now. At the time, I thought you hated me for what I’d done, but you’re right. It was a bloody weird time and neither of us knew how to cope. But we’re back now and we’ve got a second chance at being friends. What do you say?’
Elle’s face lit up with a smile. ‘You’re on, Harper!’
Later that night, I found myself firmly ensconced in The Purple Partridge. Elle had been true to her word and dragged us down there, promising to buy shots and sing on karaoke. George had been all for it, of course.
‘Make it Sex on Fire and you’ve got a deal!’ he’d said with a cheeky wink in her direction.
So there we were, nursing our drinks and waiting for the karaoke to start. Judging by the garish yellow poster we’d seen on the way in, the ‘extravaganza’ would kick off at seven. Elle was busy filling us in on her travels round the world, most recently Australia and New Zealand. George was looking at her like she was reciting the winning lottery numbers.
‘Bondi Beach was amazing, obviously,’ she said, signalling the start of another anecdote. ‘The surfer guys there were out of this world Luce; they were like those hunks on the Australian soaps we used to watch! Look at this.’
She broke conversation to show me an aquamarine bracelet on her tanned wrist. ‘You like it? I made it myself! I’m thinking of starting my own jewellery business in the future. After Bondi, there was the Great Barrier Reef, where I went scuba diving. One day, I was learning to surf from this gorgeous American called Brett and the next, I was snorkelling and seeing all these incredible fish and marine life. Honestly Luce, you should go the first chance you get. I’ve been travelling for pretty much the past eight years; my gap year kind of turned into a gap life. It’s been amazing, but it’s nice to be back in good old Luna Bay too. Though I must admit, it’s strange going from an apartment in Melbourne with views across the entire city to my old bedroom at my mum’s house. I still have posters of Peter Andre on the wall!’
I laughed as more memories began to resurface. Our earlier chat had reminded me of all the good times Elle and I had shared with Vicky. It made a change from the horrid ones that usually filled my head.
‘Remember the three of us singing along to Mysterious Girl and planning our weddings to him? Those were the days.’
Elle paused and I noticed the bright smile on her face shrink almost imperceptibly ‘Seems like a lifetime ago doesn’t it?’ A brief pause, then she shook her head and dazzled us with another of her brilliant smiles. ‘Anyway, enough about the past; what about you? Tell me everything about your kick-ass career and the trail of broken hearts you’ve left all over London. We didn’t get to that earlier, so you’d better have some news for me, Harper!’
‘Well it’s not been quite like that…’ I trailed off for a second. ‘Guy-wise, there’s been no one really special for ages. I’ve had a few short-term things, but they haven’t worked out. I guess I’m just not very good at letting people in. Always assume they’re going to leave at some point! As for my career… The less said about that the better at the moment. Anyway, tell us more about your travels.’
I wanted to switch the focus away from me and shine the spotlight back on Elle. She belonged there, I didn’t.
‘More drinks anyone? We can do more travel stories in a sec!’
Elle got up and practically sprinted over to the bar, her long legs taking huge strides across the worn, tatty carpet. Once she was firmly out of earshot, George leaned in to me.
‘OK, so she’s absolutely amazing. What do I have to do to get her to go out with me? Like seriously, I’d crawl through pig shit for a date with her.’
‘Oh charming!’ I said with a grin. I hit him playfully on the shoulder and he ruffled my hair, something he knew I hated. ‘She always liked bad boys when we were at school, but I don’t know about now. Haven’t seen her in so long, she’s changed loads since then.’
As Elle waited at the bar, she turned round and grinned at me. There was something different about the way she looked at me. The sparkling confidence she had shown all evening had disappeared and I saw a woman who still carried a lot of guilt. Her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes and in a blink of an eye it was gone. Except, it was too late and I had seen it. My oldest friend in the world was still bearing the scars of the past and it was up to me to change that.
Although the pub was pretty quiet, a large queue had formed thanks to a barrel needing to be changed. I went to join Elle, leaving George to choose a karaoke song for us – he’d also made me promise to talk him up to Elle. He’d probably pick some obscure song by a band we’d never heard
