The truth was, I’d been in love with Sean since the end of our first year at Bristol. I had admired him from afar while he went out with a string of girls who were prettier, cleverer, and more confident than me. I’d been in love with him for the one month, three weeks and four days he was with Jennifer. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it just did. And slowly, Sean had become aware of my feelings. When he split up with Jennifer he told her he was freaking out about revision and worried about getting kicked out of uni, and he wanted a break to focus on his exams. It was at least partly true, but there was more to it than that. Much more.

There was me.

He broke up with her because of me, because of what had been growing between us.

Me, comforting a heartbroken Jennifer who couldn’t understand why her first serious boyfriend had ended their relationship. Who had convinced herself that she was too straight, too highly strung, too high maintenance for him. Me offering sympathy and wine and a shoulder to cry on, and all the while fighting the guilt that I was the cause of her misery.

Had I really been a good friend to Jennifer, back then? A true friend? I suppose I knew the answer to that.

‘Yup.’ I smiled. ‘That was the night me and Sean finally got together.’

‘You know what?’ Izzy said. ‘We should do a selfie, just like this picture.’

‘So we can see how haggard and crap we look now compared to then?’ Rowan said.

‘Shush, Rowan, you look absolutely lovely. Stand up now, everyone.’ Izzy took her phone out and began marshalling us into position, in the same order that we stood in the old photograph: Rowan on the left, then Jennifer, then Izzy and me on the end. We stood like that, backs to the low wall at the edge of the patio, arms around each other’s waists, smiling for the camera just like we’d done 19 years ago.

‘Say cheese!’ Izzy said, holding her arm out to get us all in the shot.

The camera clicked once, twice, and she held the phone’s screen out to us so we could all see.

‘Perfect.’

I looked at the picture. The four of us, just like always. A beautiful meal on a fine warm evening, the lights of the valley below twinkling in the darkness. A wonderful time with my dearest friends, people I had known more than half my life. People close enough to be almost family.

It should have been perfect, but one of them had turned it into a lie.

And maybe that was no more than I deserved.

Chapter 23

23

Sean