‘Was the research intense?’

Alexa hesitated, she planned to tell them the truth but when should that start, from a time of her choosing or right now?

‘The research wasn’t too tough.  I had a lot of free time.’  It was a half truth at least.

‘Where did you stay?’

‘Uh well at Helena’s place, she has this massive beach front mansion, it’s awesome.’

‘Awesome? You’ve been Americanised already.  I’m surprised she let you all stay there.  Any hot surfers?’

‘Not that I noticed,’ said Alexa honestly.

They exchanged gossip about the other students on the trip and Alexa caught up with news from back home for a further hour before Alexa yawned and hugged Rachel saying she was going to bed.

‘Alexa, before you go, about the night you left.  I said some things I didn’t mean.  I think it was PMT or something.  I’m really glad you had a great trip.  I’ve really missed you y’know that?’

‘Me too,’ said Alexa.

‘Good because there’s something else.  I broke up with Mark.’

‘Oh my god! Are you okay?’ said Alexa, shocked by that sudden development.

‘Yes, actually it was me who broke it off.  I sort of realised I missed you more in two weeks than I do him when I only get to see him once a month.  I don’t think I ever really wanted to move to London to be with him after graduation.  I want to stay here and rent an apartment with you.  What do you think?’

Alexa couldn’t believe what she was hearing.  Before Helena this would’ve been the best news in the world for her.  She’d known she would miss Rachel like crazy when she moved to work in London.  They’d always talked about how cool it would be to rent one of the new build luxury apartments with views of the city skyline that they could just about afford with their combined prospective salaries.  And now Rachel was even saying she had partly broken up with Mark because she would miss her too much?  This whole thing was too much.

‘I think I can’t even register all of this right now,’ said Alexa.  ‘I just got off an eleven hour flight.’

‘Alright,’ Rachel accepted.  ‘But this is going to be so great, I know it Alexa.’