Free Here Come the Boys by Milly Johnson Page B

Ange. It’s beautiful. Romantic.’
    Angie sniffed. She wasn’t to know that every time Selina had been there, she had ended up walking around it alone.

DAY SIX

Chapter 13
    The plane zoomed smoothly upwards into a beautiful clear dark sky. The sun was peeping over the lip of the horizon and was preparing to blast Croatia with some serious rays. Selina found she didn’t need to grip onto Angie’s arm this time. She felt delighted to have rediscovered her flying mojo. Again they slept for most of the journey. Angie dreamed of having an ice-cold shower and using up a whole bottle of zingy lemon shower gel. She would have killed to be able to wash her lank, sun-wilted hair.
    They landed at Dubrovnik just after eight a.m. There was an interminable time before the bus journey to Korčula and it was super-hot when they left the airport building.
    ‘I would love a shower,’ said Selina, raking her hair back from her face.
    Angie gave her armpit a surreptitious sniff. The antiperspirant was working but it smelled awful. It was supposed to represent the scent of spring flowers, if the picture on the canister was anything to go by. It should have had an illustration of a tom cat spraying.
    They hopped in a taxi to the city. The driver was young and drop-dead gorgeous. He drove with one hand dangling out of the window holding a cigarette.
    Angie could not have imagined that Dubrovnik could be so beautiful. The city was surrounded by walls and there were hundreds of tiny back streets leading off the main central thoroughfare. The buildings were sandy-coloured with orange roofs and it all had a very ancient feel to it. The shops were pulling up their shutters to start trading. Selina opened up her mouth to speak but Angie butted in.
    ‘Please do not ask me if I want to go for a coffee.’
    Selina closed her mouth again.
    They wandered along the streets but within a short time they were forced to take refuge in a café from the heat. It was getting very busy too. Five cruise-ships-worth of visitors had been tipped into the city, or so someone on the next table was reporting to his companion. Soon the centre of Dubrovnik was full of fast-talking Italians, photo-snapping Japanese and ice-cream-eating Americans.
    Selina started to salivate as a young child passed her with a three-scoop cornet. She picked up the menu on the table. ‘I’m going to have an ice cream for breakfast,’ she declared. ‘Want one?’
    Angie looked at her as if she was mad. ‘Don’t be daft.’
    Selina called over the waitress. ‘Could I have a banana, toffee and chocolate sundae, please.’
    ‘Make that two,’ added Angie.
    ‘What happened to “don’t be daft”?’ said Selina, leaning back in her chair.
    ‘I’m only having it to pass the time,’ she replied. ‘I have never been so fed up, sticky, sweaty and smelly in my life. Some holiday this is turning out to be.’
    ‘Well, we only have another four and a half hours to fill,’ replied Selina, looking at her watch. ‘Or eight coffees.’
    ‘Kill me now,’ said Angie burying her face in her hands.
    ‘Tomorrow all this will be a bad dream and we will be back on the ship.’
    ‘We have this bloke on our dinner table in the evening,’ said Angie. ‘He brings down sheets of jokes to tell us. He’s the most boring person on the planet but I’m even looking forward to seeing him again, that’s how bad things are.’
    ‘We’re on a table for two,’ said Selina. ‘Just Zander and I staring into each other’s eyes over our haddock en papillote.’
    Angie picked up a tone in her voice that shouldn’t have been there. A cold brittle one.
    ‘He must be missing you,’ she said.
    ‘Madly,’ replied Selina. ‘But it won’t be long now until I see him on the shore of Korčula holding out his arms for me to run into.’
    ‘Quite.’ Angie tried to picture what Zander would look like now. A slight peppering of grey at his temples, a few George Clooney-type craggy lines around his eyes.