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Astrid Sinclair merrily hummed along to Dean Martin’s ‘Let it Snow’ as she sauntered through O’Hare airport… Okay, so sauntered didn’t quite capture the shoulder-barging, bag-negotiating affair that was truly going on.

The place was rammed. Stuffed with grumpy passengers thanks to the DELAYED status littering the screens overhead. Caused by the – yes, you guessed it – snow.

So much snow, good old Dean would be proud.

And so was Astrid. Because it meant she wasn’t going anywhere just yet. And every minute spent on US soil was another minute out of the UK where her mother, her mother’s fresh squeeze, and an endless sea of questions about her daughter’s ‘ latest failed relationship ’ awaited.

And that was a topic-cum-man Astrid never wanted to explore again.

Especially when it was that time of the month, her PMDD – Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder for those in want of a mouthful – choosing to visit right along with Santa.

So yup, she was more than happy to enjoy the sprinkling of Christmas this side of the Atlantic for as long as humanly possible.

‘Do you have to?’

‘Excuse me?’

Some guy was giving her the evils. The woman next to him wasn’t looking too chipper either. Though they did have two toddlers in tow and a screaming bairn strapped to said woman’s bosom. Astrid winced. Rather you than me.

‘The whole humming thing?’ the guy said. ‘It’s a bit much…’

She backed away, zipping her lips with her fingers and tossing an imaginary key over her shoulder as she went.

He probably thought she was bonkers, but she wasn’t about to join in the frenzy.

If her journalistic idol Gay Talese could make Frank Sinatra with a cold work for his creative juices, she could make a snow-crazed airport do the same for her.

All she needed was a teeny tiny space to squeeze her butt and her laptop into and the words would flow.

But finding such a teeny tiny space in one of the country’s busiest airports amidst the city’s worst snowstorm in decades was proving to be as rare as unicorn poop – the stuff of pink magic.

‘Miss?’

A woman burst through the heaving bodies, a bona fide puff of said pink .

Pink hair, pink lippy, pink clothes – pink!

Blinded, Astrid leapt back, taking out a crisp-looking guy in a suit who soon perked up when she gave him the dazzles – a smile she had perfected thanks to a lifetime of clutzy mishaps.

She waved him away as Ms Pink closed in once more…

‘We have 10 per cent off at Just Desserts!’

She thrust out a fuchsia pink flyer in an equally pink talon-tipped hand.

‘What’s that?’

‘A dessert bar just around the corner.’ The woman smiled, her sparkling warmth as welcome as the DELAYED stamp on Astrid’s flight. ‘We do cocktails too!’

‘Now you’re talking…’

Astrid snapped up the flyer and scanned its contents, her eyes bugging out at the array of cocktail-themed cakes and cake-themed cocktails – yum!

‘Doubt I’ll get a seat though; every man and his wife must’ve set up camp in there.’

‘You could be lucky,’ the woman said with a wink, her bright pink hair too unicorn to ignore, and Astrid laughed.

‘I’ll check it out. Thank you.’

Ms Pink wasn’t wrong. Round the corner, standing loud and pinky-proud in the middle of two thoroughfares, was Just Desserts. Not only that, but smack bang in the centre was her bright and shiny luck – a table, freshly cleaned and gleaming.

Gotcha!

Weaving like a bat-out-of-hell carry-on case losing its wheels, Astrid made a run for it.

And all was going swimmingly until a waitress appeared in her path with what looked like a tray of chemistry experiments topped with candyfloss.

Holy shiiiiitttttttt. Like a movie in slow-mo, Astrid took a giant leap for mankind – aka her beloved aviator jacket – and flew straight into the back of the chair she’d been aiming for. Crotch first!

‘Fuckity-fuck!’ she swore at the ground, face screwed up, eyes squeezed shut. When she eased them open it was to find three pairs of hands gripping the other chairs, the same pink leaflet scrunched in each.

She swiped her riotous mane out of her eyes and glanced around at her would-be table competition.

A sophisticated blonde with grey eyes as sharp as her clothes.

Another blonde, blue-eyed, softer in every way.

And an edgy-looking redhead, hazel eyes as electric as her hair.

They all wanted this table. And bad.

‘If none of you are with anyone else,’ the redhead said, ‘we could share?’

Astrid was about to say, ‘Thank fuck for that,’ but she’d dropped the F-bomb twice already and she wasn’t Hugh Grant enough to say it a third. Not among strangers at any rate.

Especially those close to her own twenty-six years and unlikely to understand the whole Four Weddings and a Funeral addiction.

Her mother had started it, nurtured it over a gazillion rewatches, and now she couldn’t shake it.

Much like the PMDD, though the FWAAF hand-me-down brought giggles not gloom.

‘I’m game.’ Astrid threw down her bag and case. Coats were surrendered. Introductions were made.

The sophisticated blonde, Bella, was a posh New Yorker, a socialite through and through. Astrid’s gran, the Lady Ashford, would totally dig her.

The doe-eyed blonde, Sienna, was from small-town Massachusetts.

And Paige, the redhead, was a fellow Brit.

‘What can I getcha?’

Astrid glanced up at the waitress who’d appeared as if on cue and gazed longingly at the brightly lit bar with all the alcoholic beverages and all the sugary carbs… It was ten in the morning, but this was an airport. Normal rules didn’t apply, right?

‘Would you think me a terrible lush if I got a glass of prosecco?’ Paige asked.

Astrid grinned. The redhead was her kind of woman.

‘Oh God no.’ Sienna heaved a sigh of relief. ‘I hate flying and waiting around in airports even more. Let’s get a bottle. I’ll help you.’

Turned out the soft blonde was Astrid’s kind of woman too.

‘I’ll have a glass,’ Bella chimed in.

Make that both blondes.

Astrid glanced at the wall of clocks mounted above the bar, each displaying times from different capital cities around the world. ‘It’s five o’clock in Berlin.’ She grinned at the waitress. ‘Make it four.’

Because Astrid was settling in for the ride… work could wait a while.

* * *

Two bottles and two hours later…

Yup, that’s right, two on both counts!

Funny how bubbles and bavardage could easily make one forget they were supposed to be doing a spot of typey-typey on the tappy-tappy thing still stowed away between one’s feet.

But Astrid was too busy scrolling through Paige’s business account on Insta, her friend’s Virtual Assistant biz was crazy impressive. And entirely Paige’s own doing too. ‘I can’t believe you have your own VA business. That’s awesome.’

Her new bestie shrugged like it was nothing. ‘Thanks.’

‘So you don’t have an office or anything?’

‘Nope.’ Red tendrils bounced, tickling at Astrid’s nose they were sat that close together. ‘I actually house sit for people so I move around a lot and the nature of my business means I can work from wherever I am. Have laptop, will travel.’

Astrid got that. She was a bit of a nomad herself, her work as a freelance journalist taking her all over the world in pursuit of her next big scoop.

‘Is it why you’re in the US? Work?’

‘No. I was at a wedding in Chicago.’

‘Oh, how lovely,’ Sienna crooned. ‘How was it?’

‘You know. Pavlova dress. Drunken best man’s speech. Smooshing cake into each other’s faces. A handsy Uncle Chip.’

Ugh! Astrid swapped her phone for her drink – there’d been one too many step dads like Uncle Chip back in the day.

‘I’d rather not talk about weddings,’ Bella blurted.

‘Not a fan?’ Paige asked.

‘Absolutely not.’

‘Don’t believe in love?’

‘I did. And then six months ago I stood up in front of 400 guests to let them know that my groom wasn’t coming.’

‘Holy mother of…’ Astrid spluttered over her drink, free hand launching out to grab Bella’s forearm. ‘You were jilted?’

‘Yup. By text. The morning of…’

‘By text ? What kind of scumbag does that?’

‘Who is he?’ Sweet Sienna spat fire. ‘Tell me! I’ll bring you his head.’

Everyone laughed but beneath the joviality the sense of injustice burned deep… or was that just indigestion from the fizz and the sugar and the oh-so pretty candyfloss? Eek!

‘He’s not a bad person really, he just did a bad thing…’

And then Bella launched into a series of excuses while Astrid ground her teeth, because she’d heard it all before with Mum and her exes. They’d always had a reason to be a shit. Worse, they’d always managed to turn each one on Mum. Forever her fault, not theirs.

‘Doesn’t excuse him leaving you standing at the altar,’ Sienna said.

‘Via text ,’ Astrid stressed as her mind turned to her own ‘failed relationship’ and how that had been very much not her fault. But her guilt was real. And she shuddered with reignited horror as the six-month-old memory clawed its way to the surface.

‘Well!’ she announced, recognising the kindred spirits around her and the safe space they had created. She could share her sordid little secret. Better still, her ex could get a verbal pasting by these ladies and make her feel a smidge vindicated. ‘You can string mine up!’

‘Were you jilted as well?’ Sienna’s big blue eyes rounded on her.

‘No.’ She took a courage-boosting gulp of fizz, then said, ‘Unbeknownst to me, he’d already trotted up that aisle and merrily said “I do” to someone else.’

Bella – gorgeous, sophisticated, elegant, Bella – eyed her closely and Astrid withstood her scrutiny because it wasn’t judgement she saw, but sympathy. ‘So, he turned you into the other woman?’

‘Too right he did.’ Astrid’s shoulders sagged, knowing that Bella got it, sensing they all got it. ‘Made me feel like a piece of shit.’

Sienna shook her head, her honeyed locks doing a little dance of their own. ‘Are you freaking kidding me? He was already married?’