Scott raises his eyebrows. “I was under the impression that incident was never to be mentioned.”

“True. It’s just I keep being reminded of it because of your smell.”

Scott snorts into his beer. “Sorry?”

“Please don’t take this badly, but I’ve never met a person – especially a male – who smelt so strongly of lavender in my life.”

Scott erupts with laughter. I try to look cool, calm and collected, but seriously, he needs to stop. Half the room is bound to be staring at us right now – not that I dare look.

Once Scott is breathing normally again, he speaks.

“My sister knows I’m struggling to sleep at the moment and she’s been getting into essential oils lately. She made me a special dropper bottle of her ‘sleep potion’, as she called it, which contains lavender along with some other oils I can’t remember the name of.”

“That was thoughtful of her,” I say.

Whenever anyone talks about a sibling doing something nice, it comes as a shock.

Scott grimaces. “Only the damn bottle leaked in my bag just before I boarded the plane. I tried to clean it up, but… well… as you’ve borne witness, it’s a hard smell to remove.”

I’m enjoying having a normal conversation. I haven’t felt this relaxed with a guy in a long time.

“Mystery solved,” I say.

Scott glances behind me and I know from his frozen expression of confusion and pain he must have spotted his ex-wife.

“Should we go and find our table?” I ask.

He blinks and musters a weak smile. “Let’s go,” he says, slipping an arm through mine.

We wander over to the seating plan displayed on a stand and find our names. I’ve been a last-minute addition, judging by the hand-written “Trish” as opposed to everyone else with their name neatly printed in an old-fashioned font.

“At least I made it on there,” I say, pointing.

Then Scott takes my hand and leads me towards table 11.

9

We’re the first guests to take our seats at our designated table and I’m relieved to see it’s not quite the loser’s table – that’s obviously table 12, where a motley bunch sit in wide-eyed, uncomfortable silence. No doubt they’ll be the loudest, most boisterous table here once they’ve had a few drinks.

“It’s all very grand, isn’t it?” I say, hoping to continue our easy conversation.

“And regimented. All the guests are probably worried they’ll get told off by the bride if they do anything untoward.”

I think of my father’s rigid, unbending rules and permanently stern expression. The way I’d quickly check the house was tidy and my outfit respectable every time I heard him put his keys in the front door. Stop, don’t think about him. I refocus on our conversation.

“I take it you’re not so keen on her.”