Page 13 of Endgame

Yup and I think our Lara might have a crush. This is going to be hard to watch.

…and challenging to keep our lips sealed! ??

I chuckle as I finish it with a stressed-looking emoji. As always, Caleb has managed to pull me in. The ‘our’ Lara did it. She belongs to both of us. I really want to share what happenedwith Maximilian with Caleb, but I know nothing good will come of it.

I know! How is your gigi?

Just getting into arrivals so I haven’t seen her yet. She’ll be great though.

Ok. Have fun. I’ll leave you to it.

I instinctively type ‘I love you’ and catch myself before I send it. I delete it quickly. I do love him still, but it would be unfair to send mixed signals.

When Dominic asked if I could join him to help get through his parents’ anniversary, I was ecstatic to discover that it almost coincided with my gigi’s flight to the UK for Zachary’s wedding. Getting precious alone time with her before the wedding was a gift.

When I see my gigi’s silver hair neatly parted into the two French braids she always wears, my feelings can only be described as joy. Her tiny frame is comically dwarfed by the huge suited gentleman she is standing beside and laughing with – she always makes new friends wherever she goes. I smile to myself as I notice that she is wearing the Converse I sent her for Christmas with high-waisted jeans, a billowy blouse and a sun hat. I quickly deduce that she was in her garden before she came to the airport.

‘Gigi!’ I smile. Her love hits me before she even looks at me.

‘Ariella!’ she calls fondly. I am now much taller than my gigi, but when she wraps her arms round me I feel like a child again. Her warmth envelops me with such an intense shroud that I feel like I could burst into a thousand tiny lights.

My gigi was my very first best friend. For as long as I can remember,weshared just as many hours with me on her lap as we traded secrets andgotup to mischief. I especially loved that she was usually the instigator of enacting vengeful acts against Mommy. She actively encouraged me to keep a list of Mommy’s transgressions and, as soon as she arrived for a visit, I would hand my list over. She’d inspect it carefully, always adding a couple of her own grievances, before we’d spend the whole of her visit hiding one thing or another that belonged to Mommy. It used to drive her crazy. My gigi especially got a kick out of when we were enlisted to help find the missing item we’d hidden. Even at this age, with our thirst for vengeance gone, she is still the only person that I feel that I can trust unreservedly with the contents of my mind.

After our embrace she holds me at arm’s length to appraise me, stopping at my head. I know what she is going to say before she says it.

‘What have you been doing to your hair? A bird is going to make its home there soon if I don’t sort that out! Come on!’

We walk hand in hand out of the airport and make our way into the car park. I spot Grandpa Spence’s Shelby Cobra. It’s going to be a frightening ride back to hers. Grandpa Spence loved cars and treated his Shelby Cobra like a particularly delicate child. After he died, my gigi treated it with a level of disrespect that would make my grandfather consider haunting her. If he isn’t already. Mommy and Daddy insisted on buying my gigi a more practical car a few years ago to keep her from casually cruising around New Orleans in a car worth so much, but she won’t be told.

‘Gigi, why aren’t you in your new car?’ I ask, worried.

‘Your grandpa Spence kept this tin can in the garage and only used it for special occasions. Look where that got him. I’m going to enjoy it,’ she says with a laugh, taking a sharp corner. I knowexactly where Mommy gets everything from. Her. My gigi has a heavy foot that she happily uses to speed out of the airport, and we make it to her Garden District home in no time.

‘Meet me in the conservatory, let’s sort out whatever is happening on your head.’

I know the routine, so I drop my bags, and grab a towel and an old T-shirt from the drying cupboard. Then I make my way to the large glass conservatory that overlooks the huge, colourful garden. My gigi is already sitting in her chair, with towels draped everywhere. She has an array of combs and hair products sharing a coffee table with a jug of ice-cold lemonade and glasses. A comfortable cushion waits for my bum in the space between her feet on the floor and I happily find my way over to sit on it. She carefully and lovingly unfurls my hair and starts to section it.

‘Your hair is really dry, Ariella,’ she admonishes softly as she tenderly applies her home-made treatment to a section she has isolated and starts working it through. The familiar smell of the coconut from the treatment fills my memory with warm highlights of all the times we have sat like this, laughing and chatting. I look across to an empty leather recliner and Grandpa Spence’s absence hits me hard. I want him back in his chair, reading bits of the newspaper out to us while my gigi and I debate, gossip and agree over its contents. I try to wipe a tear as subtly as I can.

‘I miss him too, sweetheart,’ she whispers into my ear. ‘So, what are you trying to find on the other side of the world that can’t be found at home?’ She finishes masking and combing the first section of my hair, puts it in a loose twist and lays it over my shoulder carefully before she starts to work on the next.

‘I don’t know, Gigi. I think I am trying to find out if I can stand alone.’

‘Well, I’m glad you got away from that Jasper boy.’

‘Gigi!’ I laugh. ‘I thought you liked Jasper.’

‘I seem to remember telling you to dump him.’

‘Yes, at Grandpa Spence’s funeral. I just thought you were being emotional and slightly racist.’

‘I wasn’t being racist!’

‘You said I should dump that white boy,’ I remind her.

‘Was I wrong? I’ll admit he was a good boy, I just didn’t like the way you followed him around. It held you back. You are meant to destroy barriers and conquer new worlds.’

‘I’m not doing either of those at the moment, Gigi. I’m actually struggling a little in Singapore.’

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