Nine Muses, Nine Bruises

The Return of Hazel and Alison

The door bell rings. We all scream and run down the hall. 'They're here, they're here!' Diana screams. 'They're baaaack!' I holler. 'Hazel and Aliii!' Sky shouts. As I turn the handle I am greeted by the smiling faces of my old friends Hazel and Alison.

They used to live with all of us but both had to move away for work. They've promised to visit at least twice a year but this is the first time they've been back since they left.

We all sit down at the table and chat, laughing and crying while Hazel tells us about her job and boyfriend in Singapore, and Alison describes her amazing house in The Netherlands.

'This calls for food' I grin. 'Everything calls for food with you, Lola' Elise rolls her eyes playfully. 'Well this calls for EXTRA food!' Sky laughs. Diana and I both say 'We'll do it!' at the same time. Everyone stops and looks at us. 'Are you sure that's a good idea?' Aisling asks, smiling. The last time we cooked we spent about three hours making one cake, which had the completely wrong quantities of ingredients, burnt and caved in. It didn't taste nice but we've got it all on video. 'Yeah, maybe Grace should do it,' Rebekah suggests, 'She did do Home Ec'. 'Okay fine' we sigh. Everyone laughs.

We spend the night looking at old photos from school and telling embarrassing stories from our teenage years.

'I remember getting ready for the social,' Hazel says. 'Oh God, we had no idea how to do our makeup!' Alison giggles. 'I still have pictures and videos from that' I grin.

'Speaking of videos,' Rebekah cuts in 'do you remember our dance to a Uptown Funk?' She, Diana and I exchange a look and break in to song 'I'm too hot - hot damn' before we start rolling around laughing.

Sky cringes and says 'May I remind you that you, Elise and I used the space outside our Irish classroom as a selfie booth?'. The three of us crack up.

Grace says 'Pretty much every moment of music class is an embarrassing memory'. Alison nods in agreement.

Aisling says 'Remember when we got in a huge fight over literally nothing, Hazel?'. 'Oh yeah' Hazel replies, 'I got so angry with you and Diana'.

'One word.' I start, 'fangirling'. 'Guilty.' Elise, Grace, Diana, Aisling, Rebekah and pretty much everyone else say together. We all laugh. I love my friends.