The Single Girl's To-Do List by Kelk Lindsey Page B

must be something faintly criminal that I can get away with. If it’s on the list, I’m going to do it. And since you’re responsible for most of these, you’re going to help me.’
    ‘Rachel, I have to tell you something.’ Emelie leaned forward and took my hand in hers. ‘I have never in my entire life been so incredibly proud to know you.’
    Matthew held his head in his hands. ‘As much as I of course second Ms Stevens’ support, are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, it’s not like I don’t know how hard break-ups can be, but throwing yourself into something dramatic might be a bit much.’
    ‘I think I need to throw myself into something a bit dramatic,’ I replied. ‘I haven’t thrown myself into anything even slightly dramatic in a very long time.’
    ‘As long as you don’t take such a drastic approach to breaking the law.’ He didn’t look convinced. ‘I don’t want to see the two of you on the news after a failed bank heist.’
    ‘We could totally pull off a bank heist,’ Em pouted.
    I switched from chair to sofa and wrapped my arms around my best friends. ‘Which is why I need your help with this,’ I explained. ‘I want to do this. You’re both right, I’ve never been single, I don’t know how to be single. I don’t want to walk into my dad’s wedding looking like some feeble tramp who spent a fortnight listening to Power Ballads ’89 and watching Bridget Jones’s Diary over and over, crying “that will never happen for me” and eating ice cream until I lapse into a diabetic coma.’
    ‘That would be quite dramatic given that you’re not even diabetic,’ Matthew replied. ‘You could just not go to your dad’s wedding. It’s not like there won’t be another one.’
    ‘It’s just too tragic that it’s his fourth and I’m not even engaged.’ I ran my fingers through my short, wet hair. ‘I’m twenty-eight. Everyone’s going to ask if I turned up alone. And you know my brother is going to appear with some random slag he’s picked up the night before and everyone’s going to think it’s charming.’
    ‘Um,’ Em coughed awkwardly. ‘About your brother.’
    ‘Not now, Stevens,’ Matthew gave me a sturdy side hug. ‘Right. In that case, we’ve got a lot of work to do, haven’t we?’
    ‘We really have.’ I heaved myself off the sofa, catching sight of my hair in the mirror. ‘We really, really have.’
     
     
    One of the benefits of being a make-up artist was a wealth of helpful connections in the beauty world, connections I’d never really taken advantage of before. But with just a few texts, I’d called in enough favours to get an appointment at a great salon with a great stylist inside the hour. Given that Matthew had less than no interest in hair, make-up, clothes or anything else that happened on or to girls, he’d been left in charge of clearing Simon’s influence out of the flat: getting the locks changed, clearing out his stuff and preparing for redecoration. I was on a mission. By the end of the day, I wanted to feel like a new woman. If he didn’t want me in his life, I didn’t want him in mine. There was some debate over whether or not changing the locks was overkill, but the idea of Simon just being able to let himself in whenever he wanted actually made me feel sick to my stomach.
    Which was more or less the reaction Tina Morgan, hair stylist to the stars (if you counted the cast of Hollyoaks as stars) had to my hair.
    ‘Fuckin’ hell, Summers,’ she barked with cigarette-scented laughter as I dropped down in the styling chair. ‘Who did this?’
    ‘I did,’ I replied, trying not to regret my decision. I’d known Tina since college and she was amazing with hair. Her make-up work erred more towards drunk Pussycat Doll, but when it came to hair? First class.
    ‘Right, you never did do well in the hair modules, did you?’ She pulled the strands through her fingers, measuring out the lengths. ‘I’ve been dying to get my hands on