‘Azi and Rania’s place… Nostromo…?’ Jemima spluttered.

‘That’s the one! You know it?’

‘Not really,’ Jemima lied.

Know it? Not only was it minutes from her flat but she’d written two and a half of her three books there. Why had she never spotted him?

‘Err how did you get into occupational therapy?’ she quizzed.

As she once again shepherded the conversation, Jemima noticed his warm smile wane and in its place something deeper appear – was it pain, regret? She couldn’t tell but clearly, this wasn’t just a job to him. Chance picked at his flask, for a moment taken by his thoughts.

‘My brother lost his leg in Afghanistan. I felt helpless, like I wanted to do something but I didn’t know what so I trained as an OT. And I wanted to support people in the same boat as Pete so I started my charity, Man Up. We give OT to wounded vets. See,’ Chance pulled his faded T-shirt tight showing her the Man Up logo.

Jemima nodded earnestly but inside she was squirming. She’d been so mean when his only crime was to sit next to a snide, seat-hogging misery-guts. She took a hit of tequila and handed the flask back, ‘So what took you to Mexico apart from the search for really good tequila?’

Chance laughed, his infectious smile, returned. ‘Only the best wedding ever.’

Jemima listened as Chance described Pete’s journey to recovery, how it had begun in their parent’s home in Adelaide and continued with a trip to Los Cabos where he’d fallen in love. Chance explained how at first he’d been worried when his brother had left but the minute he’d seen Pete and Lula together, he’d known they were destined for each other. Jemima smiled though something was bothering her. Yes, it was a gorgeous story but it was also oddly familiar.

‘Sometimes you can just feel it, when two people fit. Don’t you think?’ said Chance, handing the flask over.

As their fingers brushed against each other Jemima felt her breath falter. She looked up at Chance, noticing for the first time that his eyes were different colours, one green and the other hazel or was it brown…?

‘I do,’ she said.

‘Huh?’ said Chance.

‘What?’

‘You said, you do.’

‘Do I? I mean, did I?’ said Jemima, ruffled.

Her eyes darted around the cabin, ‘Did they turn the air conditioning off? It feels like the air is… can you feel that?’

‘Feel what…?’ asked Chance.

‘Like, hot. Feels like a heat. A hot heat,’ Jemima gabbled, looking behind her to see if the bathroom was empty.

You’re not going anywhere, the red occupied light glowered back.

‘So you were saying, Peter got married?’ she stuttered trying to look at him without looking at his eyes which were… hypnotic – purely in a freak-of-nature kind of way.

He did. ‘I love a good wedding, but this one… Blubbed like a little girl,’ said Chance.

‘Or boy,’ Jemima said.

She groaned at herself. Halfway through a story about Chance’s disabled brother’s life-affirming wedding was probably not the time to thrust her equality politics on him.