Page 24 of The Way We Fell

“Come on, Lil Lady,” I say. “Let’s go find Mama and Daddy.”

I take her small hand in mine and we swing arms with our joined hands. She laughs in that unashamed, exuberant way only a three-year-old can as we stroll through the marketplace aisles, looking for Amie and Cam.

I spot Cam turned away from me, partially shielding Amie from my view. He steps aside just in time for me to see Amie in her element. She stoops slightly, taking an elderly lady’s hands in hers and when I strain my ears, I can hear her chatting away in fast, fluent Spanish with a pretty smile lighting her face. When she steps away from the lady, she’s holding a small paper bag and a few steps further from the stall, she stops and digs her hand in, then holds something out to her boyfriend. She lifts her curls off her shoulders and I realise it’s a necklace. Cam fastens it around her throat and kisses the spot where the clasp sits, and my heart clenches uncomfortably.

They’re so in love. Amie looks up at him with an expression like that heart-eyed emoji, a wide smile and so much love clear as day on her face. He leans down to kiss her lips and I look away. It feels intrusive to watch this moment, even though they’re in a bustling, public marketplace. I shake off my misery and trot towards them with Maisy’s hand in mine.

“Look Maisy, we found them!”

Amie crouches with her arms spread wide and as I release Maisy’s hand, the little girl runs into them with an excited squeal. Amie sweeps her into the air, planting big kisses all over her face.

That’s what I want, I think morosely. I want a love like Amie and Cam’s. I want the white dress, the house, the babies, the happily ever after. Maybe even a puppy. I’m not getting any younger, and seeing my best friend accidentally falling into the life I want for myself has me irrationally and embarrassingly jealous. I feel sick to my stomach for being so green with envy. And I hate it. I’m happy for Amie. I really am. But I want what she has. I want it so desperately, it hurts.

With one eye on his girls, Cam steps to me and slings an arm across my shoulders. I wrap an arm around his waist in return and lean my head into him. He smells like cedar, warm and comforting, but there are no butterflies in my belly. Not like the woodsy cypress of Jay’s cologne.

“You’ll find it, Katy-cat,” he whispers, as though he heard my thoughts.

I squeeze his waist.

“You’re a good man, Cam,” I tell him, my eyes on Amie and Maisy. “Thank you for making them so happy.”

“I always will,” he whispers, his eyes locked on them, too.

The following morning, I rap my knuckles against the adjoining hotel room door. Cam pulls it open with a grin, Maisy clinging to his leg and cackling loudly.

“Aunty K!” She launches herself from Cam’s leg to mine, shrieking my name. “It Mama’s birthday!”

“It is?” I feign surprise. “I guess we’d better go and give her birthday kisses!”

Maisy rushes across the room, leaping onto the bed where Amie is busy replying to a text. If I know her at all, it’ll be the texts that have blown up my phone in the last couple of seconds—birthday texts from Ruth and Paloma. I pull out my phone to do the same before sitting down beside Amie and pulling her into a sideways hug.

ROO

Happy birthday A!

Lolo

happy birthday bestie love u forever xoxoxo

ROO

@Katy don’t forget to pull her pigtails 32 times

Amie

she will NOT be pulling my hair

Katy

she most definitely will be pulling hair

love you boo xo

After I convince Amie to let me braid her hair—and I send Ruth and Paloma a video of me pulling her pigtails just once, to prove it happened—we head to the pool. It’s gloriously sunny, and warmer than I expected for a February morning.

Cam and Maisy are in the water, roaring like dinosaurs and splashing each other. The air is filled with laughter. Amie and I lie side by side on towel-wrapped sun loungers, a small table between us holding a yellow birthday cupcake and a pair of bright cocktails topped with umbrellas. Amie lifts her glass to her mouth and takes a long drink.

“This is how I ended up pregnant,” she says wryly, holding out the glass in a toast, before drinking more.

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