“I’ve got a headache,” Hayley announced for the tenth time today. It was only 9 a.m. on this glorious Monday morning.

“Aspirin?” I suggested.

“Tried it.”

She was hung-over, as was Susie. They’d been out on the sauce last night and part of the morning too. I hadn’t slept well either, seeing as they’d woken me with a rendition of “Show Me the Way to Amarillo” as they walked up the driveway in the early hours. Neither would win a recording contract.

“I need a fried breakfast,” Hayley said. “That always helps.”

Susie dropped her broom with a groan. “It’s worth a shot. I’ll start cooking while you wash the buckets. We can catch up with work after we’ve eaten. You coming, Ash?”

“I don’t fancy fried stuff, but I wouldn’t say no to a couple of boiled eggs.” 

I’d been trying to eat healthily since I started my exercise routine, and I was less sluggish now I’d cut out the donuts and cream buns. Oh, and I could do my jeans up again—always a bonus. I’d just taken a sip of my coffee when Hayley’s fork clattered onto her half-eaten plate of fried eggs, bread, tomatoes, hash browns, and sausages.

“We can’t eat all this!”

“Why not?” Susie asked, her mouth full.

“It’s the Hunt Ball this Saturday. I was four pounds lighter when I bought my dress. What if it doesn’t fit?”

Susie paused, fork in mid-air. “Oh, dammit! You’re right. How did we not think of this sooner?”

Alcohol, that was how.

She shoved her plate away. “I bet mine won’t fit either. I’ll have to buy a new one. Does yours have any stretch in it?”

“No,” Hayley wailed. “It’s made of silk. I got it at TK Maxx, and I’ll never find another one as nice, not for that price. As of now, I’m officially on a diet.”

Susie carried her plate to the bin and scraped the remains of her breakfast into it. “I’ll do salad for dinner.”

“Salad? I’ll starve.” Hayley picked up her fork again. “I’ll start my diet at lunch.”

“You both look fine as you are,” I told them. “Neither of you needs to diet.”

Although the salad wasn’t a bad idea. I should be eating more of that.

“You haven’t seen the dress yet—it shows everything. Are you coming to the ball?” Hayley asked.

“I didn’t even know there was a ball. So, no.”

“You should go,” Susie said. “I can get you a ticket. Mother’s on the organising committee.”

“I’m not sure it’s my type of thing.”

In fact, I was more than sure it wasn’t my type of thing. Based on the only Hunt Ball I’d attended before, I was well aware they were a euphemism for swimming in alcohol.

“You’ll love it!” Hayley said. “Everyone from around here goes. It’s the biggest event in the village. You never know, you might even meet a nice fella. You know what they say about getting back on the horse and all that.”

“She’s right,” Susie said. “You need to find a man who’ll ruin your lipstick this time and not your mascara.”

“I’m not looking to meet anybody at the moment.”

Or maybe ever. Inside, I was still raw, like someone had taken a cheese grater to my soul. My husband was the only man I wanted, and nobody else would ever measure up to his standards. Nobody. So why did a picture of Luke pop into my head right then?

“You’re coming,” Susie informed me. “I’ll get you a ticket and lend you a dress. I’ve got hundreds. Something will fit.”

Hayley’s head bobbed in agreement. “She’s not kidding about the dresses. Her closet’s bigger than the lounge in the cottage. I just wish we were the same size.”

While Hayley was a career groom who’d been at the stables since she left school two years ago, Susie had a different motive for working there. She’d completed two years of a three-year maths degree, she told me over a glass of wine one evening, before concluding that she hated the subject.

“I walked out right before the exams. I’d have failed them anyway, but Daddy was furious. He said if I didn’t go back to uni or get a job, he’d cut off my allowance.”

So, Susie had applied for the first job she happened to see, the position of groom advertised on a card in the window of the post office. Her father wasn’t happy about her career choice, but she’d done what he said, so he had no choice but to keep forking over the cash. That allowed her to satisfy her designer shoe habit and drive a BMW. And it also meant I knew Hayley was telling the truth about her outfits.

But I still didn’t want to go to the ball.

“Someone should stay here and do the late check on the horses.”

“George’ll do it,” Hayley said. “He doesn’t mind occasionally. Please say you’ll come?”

Shit. The problem with having no social life was that I didn’t have any excuses either.

“Fine.” Perhaps I could fake an illness? “Okay, I’ll come.”

If I did end up going, at least it would get me out of the trailer for an evening, away from the microwave and, more importantly, away from my thoughts. Who knows? It might be interesting to meet more folks from around here. People-watching was always entertaining, especially when everyone else was drunk.

***

A week of rain was made more miserable by Hayley’s mood, and that mood was caused by a fad diet she’d found in a magazine. Eating only chicken, raw broccoli, carrots, and watermelon would be enough to dull anyone’s sparkle, as Bradley would say. Hayley swore she’d lost weight, but the only difference I could see was in her level of grumpiness.

On Friday, Susie invited me to her family home, or rather, their mansion to try on dresses. Hayley came too, smiling for the first time that week despite the bag of carrot sticks she’d brought for company.

“Isn’t this amazing?” she breathed when Susie flung open the door to her walk-in closet.

I stifled a groan. The rows of dresses might have been a socialite’s dream, but I hated trying on clothes. Bradley had been buying mine for so many years he knew instinctively what fitted me, so usually I avoided the horrors of the fitting room.

“How about this?” Susie asked, holding up something pink and frothy. “Or the red one?”

I tried not to grimace as Susie handed me a rainbow of outfits and sent me into the bathroom to change. We might have been the same size, but all that colour and her flouncy style wasn’t me at all. I was wondering how to tell her this when Hayley handed me something black and slippery, perfectly matched to my soul.

Please, let this one fit.

The slinky halterneck had a thigh-high split, and I definitely wouldn’t be wearing a bra with it. Or knickers either, since it came dangerously low over my arse.

“That’s the one,” Hayley shrieked as I emerged into the bedroom.

“Are you sure?” Susie asked. “It’s a designer sample my cousin gave me, but I’ve never been keen on it.”

“Definitely.”

“Yeah, I like it,” I said. It was the lesser of the evils lurking on the rails.

Hayley clapped her hands. “Yay! Now you’ve found a dress, we can relax in the Jacuzzi.”

Hurrah. I’d never been a fan of sitting around until I went wrinkly.

“Or there’s a pool if you prefer, Ash?” Susie said.

A pool wouldn’t be so bad. When I first moved to the States, my husband and a merry band of former special forces trainers had taught me to swim like a fish. Being in the water was as natural to me as walking now, and I missed it.

“Can I borrow a swimsuit?”

She tossed me a bikini. “Here you go.”

While I swam lengths of the pool, the other two shared a bottle of champagne in the spa. So much for their diet. By the time we left, I was exhausted and they were pickled.

***

On Saturday morning, I went for a run while Susie did the horses. We’d swapped so I’d be doing her Sunday shift instead, working on the assumption that she and Hayley would be unconscious after the ball while I planned to stay sober. I made use of the woods, using tree branches to do pull-ups and logs to do tricep dips, and got back in time for a shower before we left for Susie’s at three.

I didn’t see how we could possibly need four hours to get ready, but when we got there, all became clear. Susie’s mother took the Hunt Ball very seriously. The beautician, make-up artist, and hairdresser waiting for us when we arrived demonstrated that fact.

Normally, I couldn’t be bothered with all that shit. People poking and prodding made me shudder. Bradley used to pull stunts like this with annoying regularity, but after he got sick of me turning up late and sending the assorted style gurus home, we’d compromised. If it was an important function, he did my hair and make-up, I had a manicure and pedicure once a fortnight so my nails stayed presentable, and some bitch waxed my legs every month when I was home.

I only let him bring in the big guns for special occasions, like meeting the president or another important dignitary. Even for the president, I couldn’t always be bothered to dress up. He’d seen me in sweats in the gym; his view of me wasn’t going to change if I was wearing eyeliner.

Today, as a sadist plucked my eyebrows, I realised how much I missed Bradley. He might drive me nuts, but at least he didn’t try to insist I had a spray tan.

“You could do with some colour,” Susie’s mother said.

Sure, I’d faded a bit, but Hayley had just been dyed a frightening shade of orange and there was no way I wanted to look like that.

How were the rest of my friends getting on back home? Bradley wasn’t the only one I missed. I’d been watching the news for any signs of trouble, but everything seemed quiet in our little corner of Virginia. The most notable item this week had been a shoot-out and a car chase through Richmond, but that was drugs related. Oh, they didn’t say that, but I knew. I’d recognised “Suspect A” as he legged it from the police helicopter. What a drama. Last time I’d gone after the little shit, I’d shot him with one of those tranquilliser guns they use at the zoo, but the cops had all these pesky rules and it didn’t look good if they broke them on live TV.

No, Virginia was calm. It was just my mind that was in turmoil. Part of me longed to return home, but I knew from the way my chest tightened every time I thought of getting on a plane that I wasn’t ready.