I Heart Hawaii

I resisted the urge to point out how few of those tasks were ever actually completed.

‘But now it’s bigger-picture stuff. I don’t have so many things to do but the things I do have are intense. Sometimes it’s exhausting, all this power.’

She closed her eyes and smiled like a shark, only Cici Spencer was a thousand times more dangerous than any Great White.

‘I’m sure you went through this when you were younger. I mean, people don’t talk to you like you’re dumb now, do they? It’s terrible that we should have to wait until we’re in our forties to be taken seriously, totally sexist.’

‘Cici,’ I said, clearing my old crone throat before I spoke. ‘I’m not in my forties. You’re three months older than me.’

‘Oh, Angela.’ The look on her face was one of pure horror. She waved a hand in front of her own visage to make sure I knew just what had offended her so greatly. ‘What happened?’

For just a moment, I allowed myself to revel in the memory of that one time I’d punched her at a Christmas party. It wasn’t an act I was proud of but it was something that gave me great comfort in trying times. Like this.

‘Remind me to get you a certificate for Botox for your next birthday,’ she said, still utterly aghast.

‘So, work on Recherché is going well,’ I said, attempting to redirect the conversation before I lamped her. I looked young for my age, everybody said so. Not that it mattered but still. ‘We should be ready to go live in a week or so.’

‘Awesome, sounds great, can’t wait to see it.’ She held up her hand to quiet me as she stared directly at my face. ‘Are you sure you’re only thirty-five?’

‘I’ll be back downstairs if you need me,’ I said, standing up to leave. ‘I’ll try not to bother you in the meantime.’

Because really, if you’d already punched someone once before, did it really count if you punched them again?

CHAPTER FOUR (#u1dc0430f-c533-566f-a4fa-9d38516ec8b5)

‘I thought you’d stood me up,’ I said, manhandling Jenny in a massive hug after she’d run down the street, fifteen minutes late for our dinner reservation. ‘Again.’

‘That was one time,’ she told me, shame-faced and shiny-eyed. ‘I’m a busy gal. How is my favourite baby?’

‘Ask me when my scalp stops throbbing,’ I replied as I pressed my fingers into my temple. Alice was going through a grabbing phase and I did not care for it one bit. ‘Alex says you can’t see the bald patch but I don’t trust him.’

Jenny peered into my hair, giving it a thorough check. When you couldn’t trust your husband not to lie, only a best friend’s opinion would do.

‘You’re good. It’s red, though. She’s getting strong.’ She linked her arm through mine and started leading me down an exceptionally murdery alleyway. I hadn’t seen Jenny in forever but that didn’t mean I wanted to be led to my untimely death just to get in some non-baby friend time.

The sun was setting and we were deep in the middle of an industrial area I had never been to before and, god willing, would never visit again. According to Google Maps, the address Jenny had given me didn’t exist and so I’d already let myself into a lumber store, a ceramics studio and something they’d told me was doggy daycare – but, since I hadn’t seen a single dog or dog-related item, I was fairly certain had been a meth lab. Alex would be so annoyed if I got killed the week the nanny was off.

‘Where are we?’ I asked as Jenny rapped three times on a bright red door.

She turned back to look at me over her shoulder, with a half-smile on her face and dark brown eyes full of mischief. ‘Are you ready for an adventure?’

‘I’m ready for my dinner,’ I replied, pressing a hand against my empty belly. ‘Seriously, I’m starving. You promised me a feed, Lopez.’

‘I promised you an experience,’ she replied. The red door opened and a tall, very serious-looking Asian man appeared. He was wearing an exquisitely cut black suit, black shirt and black tie and I suddenly wasn’t sure my absolutely adorable blue Faithfull shirtdress and shiny white Converse were going to pass the dress code.

‘Welcome to Fukku Rain to Shinka¯,’ he said, looking us both up and down and frowning at my choice of shoe. I was correct. ‘You have a reservation?’

‘Lopez, for two,’ Jenny said. ‘Riverside.’

‘Riverside?’ I whispered as the man nodded once and held open the door. ‘Is that some sort of password?’

‘Not quite,’ she whispered back. ‘Relax, this is going to be a night you will never forget.’

I immediately tensed up from head to toe. When Jenny promised an unforgettable evening, someone either usually ended up at karaoke until three a.m., face first in the bottom of the Bellagio fountains, or moving to Los Angeles. And given that the last thing I’d done before leaving the house was apply calendula cream to my cracked boobs while Alex quietly sulked about me going out, none of those options seemed particularly favourable.

‘Not to be a Debbie Downer but I can’t be out super late,’ I said. Managing expectations was key with Jenny. ‘Alex is exhausted from being at home with Alice all week.’

‘Angie, it’s Wednesday,’ she whispered as we followed the host through a heavy black velvet curtain and into a tunnel so dark I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. ‘And Monday was a holiday so you weren’t even at work.’

‘Well, he’s tired and I don’t want to take the piss,’ I said, stumbling over something unseen. ‘Are you sure about this?’

‘Positive,’ her voice confirmed somewhere in the darkness ahead of me. ‘You’re gonna flip.’

‘Only if I don’t fall first,’ I corrected. ‘I’ve got a bag full of Ikea tealights at home, I’d have brought some if I’d have known.’

‘We have arrived.’

The darkness was split by a sliver of something like daylight as the host pulled back another black curtain at the end of the tunnel.

‘Please, choose your vessel.’

I blinked as my eyes adjusted to the light and then again to make sure I wasn’t seeing things. As far as I could tell, we’d only walked a few feet but somehow we had been transported to another world. I took a step forward onto a rickety wooden dock that jutted out over an actual river. Flowing water ran all the way around the room, surrounding a miniature island that was covered with full-size cherry trees, and dotted between the trees were a number of tiny tables, glowing with the light of a dozen candles. So, they didn’t need my Ikea tealights after all.

‘Well?’ Jenny said, nudging me towards three little wooden rowing boats tied up to what looked like an ancient dock in front of us. ‘Choose your freaking vessel.’

‘We have to row to dinner?’ I asked, as a tiny bird flew past my head. They had birds? Inside? Inside birds on purpose did not seem like the kind of thing that would get you a good grade from the New York department of health and safety. ‘Jenny, is this the actual Gowanus Canal? Because you know that water has gonorrhoea, right? I mean, they tested it and everything—’

‘Roberto will row the boat,’ the host explained with a small bow, gesturing towards what was quite clearly a male model, wearing nothing but a pair of gold swimming trunks. Either someone’s encyclopaedia had its pages stuck together or they’d been doing far too much coke when they came up with the idea of this place.

‘We’ll take this one.’ Jenny pushed me down the dock and hopped into the boat, spreading her gorgeous scarf-print dress around her on her seat. ‘Angie, can you take a picture?’

She leaned forward to hand me her phone before positioning herself in the boat, lifting her chin and reclining seductively.

‘I’m real sorry but we don’t allow photos inside the forest,’ Roberto explained in a thick Texan drawl. Holding my breath, I waited for Jenny to scratch his eyes out but, instead, she simply sat up straight and nodded, her face a study in seriousness.

‘Of course,’ she said, snatching back her phone and shoving it deep into her quilted Gucci camera bag. ‘Totally get it.’

What was going on? Jenny was OK with being told she couldn’t take photos? Everyone had officially gone insane. I looked down at the water and saw something dart underneath the boat.

‘I’m sorry I don’t want to panic anybody but I think I just saw something in the water.’ Most likely gonorrhoea, I thought to myself. ‘It looked like a fish?’

‘Most surely was, Ma’am,’ Roberto replied as he nonchalantly adjusted his package. ‘How else are you gonna fish for your supper?’

‘Jenny.’

‘Angie?’

My heels were already starting to hurt, my stomach was howling with hunger and I was almost certain one of the tiny birds had already shat in my hair.