Sometimes Words Cuddle

and another chapter for another week

Dear friends,

Did you know that...
🌹❤️☀️🌊🏖️🤩


Sometimes words cuddle,
obsessed with each other,
calling for more and more
cuddly words,
running away towards seas and sunsets,
filling pages and pages
until they turn into a

Happily Ever After.




Chapter 9: JUST LIKE A MOVIE - currently serialised on The Empress 



We leave Emilio sitting in the car, mucho amused, teasing me about cheating on him with Gary Barlow. This is even more embarrassing than the time when, way back in 9th grade, during a school dance, Celeste informed Wayne Marconi, the most popular boy in our class, that I had named my rabbit after him. I refused to speak to Celeste for an entire week and spent the rest of the term shuffling around incognito, my head buried deep inside my polo neck.
Now Celeste has done it to me again. Only this time, it’s worse. This might someday come out in Emilio’s autobiography. In fact, if Laura hadn’t decided to stock up on wine in Mario’s Deli on her way up to her house in San Matteo, I don’t think Celeste would have made it alive beyond the wine section. I wanted to pound her in the tomato zone and only refrained because Mario himself was replenishing the neighbouring fridges with a selection of sausages and bacon, freshly flown in for those ultrasensitive tourists unable to deal with indigenous food.
Celeste is still giggling when I catch sight of Laura, the embodiment of understated chic in an Agnès B white T-shirt and black linen palazzo pants. As always, she is manicured, pedicured, subtly made-up, her hair swinging down her back like a Kérastase advert. She winks at me and mouths ‘Sshhh!’ while placing her tiny hands across Celeste’s eyes, then says – in her sexy French accent – “Guess who?”
“Laura! I thought you were arriving much later this evening!” Celeste whirls around, holding Laura at arms’ length for a second before embracing her. “You look great. Wow. So elegant!”
“A little boring maybe, compared to you, my love, but you know me. I cannot do colour. And, Gemma, ma belle, how are you? So nice to see you!” 
“Well, if you really want to know, I was just about to murder Celeste, but there are too many people around.”
“Oh mon Dieu! Quelle horreur! What has happened? Why you want to murder the lovely Celeste?” Laura is a flurry of feminine, fluttery gestures. I’m a jittery, fuming, nervous wreck.
“Celeste has… humiliated me. She’s ruined my reputation. I’m just… a joke!” I’ve now fully embraced my inner drama-queen. I wish Emilio would drive off, find some fellow celebrities to play with and leave us here to eat Mario out of his entire stock of sausages. I don’t want to see him ever again.
“Oh, come on Gemma, take a joke. Emilio loved it. Wouldn’t you be flattered if someone slept in a Gemma Talbot T-shirt night after night?”
“Depends who’s sleeping in it! Celeste, that was so embarrassing. How could you do this to me? I mean, first the little nudges in the car, ‘Oh, Emilio, you’re too caliente for this island, women just can’t keep their hands off you, can they GEMMA, nudge-nudge, hint-hint.’ What must he be thinking?”
Celeste rolls her eyes. “Oh, stop! It’s no big deal, and besides, he likes you! All right, all right, I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I promise.”
“Well, it’s too late now, anyway. He’s probably imagining all kinds of things. And the Take That Fan Club stuff? How mean was that?”
“Why was it mean? It’s true! It’s cute! It’s funny! It’s… well, it’s you! Anyway, why do you care so much about what he’s thinking? What’s the big deal?”
“It’s a big deal to me, Celeste. It just is.”
This is horrible. Celeste and I never argue. Ever. Even when she squealed about the rabbit, I was mad as hell, but eventually I let it slide. Besides, a fox ate my rabbit, and Wayne Marconi was expelled for distributing marijuana leaves in biology class for photosynthesis experiments.
Laura looks lost. “Who took something from a fan club? Who is Emilio?”
“You tell her,” I snap, proceeding to bully the trolley around the little shop. I pick up random components of the food chain, concentrating fiercely on those with a sugar content of 99.9%. Then, concerned by potential dental expenses, I put them all back and return, poker-faced, to where my friends are waiting.
Laura puts her arms around me. I burst into tears. Close bodily contact in emotional moments is seldom a good idea with me. To make things worse, Emilio chooses this very moment to come and see what’s taking us so long.
“Aïe, que passa aqui? Why are you crying Gemma?”
Aagghh. Why indeed?
Because I’m a confused, pathetic woman who in the past twenty-four hours has developed an insane crush on a twenty-something-year-old popstar with swivel hips. But hell if I’m going to admit it! I’d rather go back to Richard, Dow Jones, the Meanie from Munich, and let the gulls shit on me. What am I doing here anyway? I should be in my penthouse with blow-dried hair and impeccable makeup, wearing Max Mara, organising charity luncheons with Marie-Chantal and Anne-Sophie. Better yet, I should have passed ‘go’, collected two hundred to the power of one helluvalot, and cleaned Richard out. I should be having my nails painted, not thinking about painting chandeliers.
Celeste comes to my rescue. “Gemma just got a phone call from Richard. It upset her. Men! The root of so many of our problems. We’ve got MENstruation, MENopause, MENtal…”
Emilio doesn’t get it. I can’t help laughing. I love Celeste.
She continues. “Emilio, this is Laura. Laura, Emilio. Laura has kindly offered to drive us home, so you’re free to go. We’ll call you later, or you call us. If you like. Maybe we can meet you and Kirsten somewhere tonight? What do you think?”
Emilio looks at me. “Sure you’ll be okay? If there is anything I can do for you, just let me know.” He seems genuinely concerned, his eyes are all Cocker Spanielish and I want to throw myself into his arms and have a good old sob.
Laura still doesn’t know who he is; I guess capsule wardrobe people don’t watch MTV. However, she seems suitably impressed and is looking at him with composed appreciation, as though he’d look nice against her new curtains.
“Enchantée,” she beams, shaking his hand. “Yes, I can take my lovely friends home. I hope to see you again, Monsieur Emilio.”
“Okay,” he says, “I will leave you. I’ll call you later, Gemma.”
“Sure,” I say, trying not to read too much into it.
“I look forward to hearing more about the Take That fan club.”
Oh God.
“Hasta pronto.”
	He leans over and kisses me softly on the cheek. I catch my breath. He smells so utterly divine, a heady mixture of sun and sea and cinnamon. Then he kisses Celeste while I watch closely to see whether her kiss is less intense than mine was. It’s hard to say. Basically, it’s just your average, generic peck on the cheek. I think mine might have been slightly better. Emilio puts on his sunglasses, slaps his baseball cap on his head, gives us one last wave and is gone.



More soon!

With love and gratitude,

Francesca xx

Ibiza, a couple of years ago