Free The Longest Holiday by Paige Toon Page A

did,’ I add.
    ‘Aw,’ she says fondly, thinking of Carl, before asking Marty, ‘Did you really not shag Tom?’
    ‘Nope,’ Marty replies casually and I can’t help liking her more for her response. Marty has never slept around. Neither have I. It’s one thing we absolutely have in common.
    ‘How many men have you slept with?’ I ask Bridget curiously, unable to stop myself.
    ‘Oh, blimey, I don’t know,’ she replies.
    ‘You don’t know?’ My voice sounds a little squeaky.
    ‘She’s lost count,’ Marty says wryly.
    Bridget kicks Marty’s foot good-naturedly. ‘I haven’t lost count. I just haven’t counted.’ She glances at me. ‘I don’t know, twenty? Twenty-five? What about you?’ she asks before I can react.
    ‘Three,’ I reply.
    ‘Three?’ She giggles. ‘You definitely need to shag Leo, then.’
    ‘Stop it!’ I slap her thigh.
    ‘So who were the three?’ she asks.
    ‘Will, Guy and Matthew,’ Marty butts in on my behalf.
    ‘Who’s Guy?’ Bridget asks. She knows about Will and Matthew.
    I sigh. Guy was a mistake. My one mistake. The only reason I know I may be able to find it in my heart to forgive Matthew. Because I’ve cheated, too. Not on him. On Will. My first love.
    I confess this to Bridget.
    ‘Really?’ she asks. I know she wouldn’t have pegged me to be the cheating type. ‘But you didn’t split up over it?’ She shakes her head, almost confirming what she already thinks she knows: that we were still together when Will died.
    Only she’s wrong, of course.
    ‘No. No, this happened years before the accident,’ I tell her. ‘Guy was someone I worked with. I let my crush get out of control, and Will was away racing a lot at the time.’
    ‘Jeez, you’ve had a shitty time with men,’ she blurts out.
    ‘Oh, stop it.’ I wave her away. I’m no angel; I’ve just divulged that.
    ‘Seriously,’ she says, and I hear the anguish in her voice. ‘How the hell did you get over his death?’
    Marty stays silent, her expression serious as she watches our exchange.
    ‘Matthew,’ I reply, my own throat closing up with that one word.
    My first boyfriend, Will, was my childhood sweetheart. I was literally the girl next door. We were neighbours in a tiny village in Cambridgeshire and I still remember how his grandfather used to take him go-karting every weekend as a boy. Years later he secured a drive in a Formula One car. But while it was impossible not to be proud of him for his incredible achievements, I could never be happy. The racing scared the hell out of me, and in the end, my fears were justified. I loved him to death. I still loved him when he died, when he was killed in a car racing accident. But he no longer loved me. At least, not like he used to. He called it off with me weeks before the race, told me it was over. It was no great surprise – we had been growing apart for some time. I suspect he was interested in someone else. I’d seen the way he’d looked at this girl who worked for the racing team. Of course I’ll never know for sure. And I don’t want to know. The thought of one man being unfaithful to me is quite enough, thank you.
    In a way, the hardest thing following his death was the fact that no one knew we had split up. We hadn’t made that fact public. To my everlasting shame, I had asked Will to keep up appearances until after the race. I worked for a charity at the time, and we’d organised a ball to take place at the British Grand Prix, Will’s last ever race. His presence there was paramount to the charity’s success, so he did that one last thing for me. And then he died.
    I still remember the press plastering images of us together all over the tabloids, how dishonourable I’d felt not telling them the truth as they went on about our love, the fact that we had grown up together and were destined to marry.
    We weren’t going to get married. It was over. We’d split up. But oh, how they went on. I didn’t think they’d ever let it