Soundtrack stories - Fast Love

October 1996, Gran Canaria.

There are many reasons for me to remember 1996; not many of them are good. It was the year my dad died, a year after my marriage had ended. I was at University as a mature student, halfway through training to be a primary school teacher,and slowly realising that my childish aspirations were indeed just that. Most of me spent most of that year questioning the actions and decisions that preceded and accompanied it. Most of me spent most of that year not knowing that there'd be a week in October, which would begin to change everything.

One of the outcomes of marrying too young, and then making being married all that matters, is that you miss a lot of other things; I had a whole long list of them. When I met Fran in an English class halfway through our first term at university, when we both pulled a grimacing face at something particularly pointless offered up by one of our fellow students, I realised I'd stumbled across the biggest missing-out of all. 

It seems crazy now, to think that I'd so willingly dropped all my school friends, that I'd given up on going anywhere with anyone who wasn't family, that I'd so easily become a caricature of who I'd thought I should be; but that's what I'd done. And then suddenly, there was Fran. Intelligent, funny, cynical, beautiful, with her dark Italian eyes that always had a glint of wry amusement and a hint of something more. Francesca Ferrari, my new best friend.

I don't know now which of us suggested the holiday - neither of us had any money and it was just another one of those things I should really have known better than to do. But when you've taken so much time and trouble to mess up almost everything, the idea of running away is very beguiling, so we looked on the Teletext listings anyway. And as we scrolled through screen after screen of bargain-priced offers for a week in the sun, the idea took hold. I'd never been on a holiday with a girl friend before, and we didn't even know each other very well, but a quick phone call to a bored-sounding holiday operator, a reckless charge to my credit card, and without even knowing where we'd be staying, we were booked for a week in the Canary Islands.

There are so many things I could write about that week. I could try to describe the way we spent day after day, lying by the pool, talking almost non-stop, the words and the laughter tripping over themselves to be heard. I could conjure up the people we met; the funny Essex boys who tried so hard to impress, the two quiet Austrians who we'd come to know much better.

But this is a soundtrack story, so let me take you instead to a dark nightclub, hidden underground beneath the gaudy shopping centres of Playa del Ingles. The music is loud, its beat echoing around the huge room, pulsating through the dancing crowd. Leaning against the bar at one side, are two dark-haired women. You can tell by their sun-tanned faces and relaxed smiles that they're having a great holiday. They've been dancing for hours, and now they're sipping on vodka and lemon, watching the others, chatting away, though it's too loud to hear. When the music stops they'll pause and listen for what comes next, hoping it will be the song they've danced to all week. And when it is, they'll both leave their drinks and stand up, a quick glance from one to the other, a wide, shared smile, as they make their way through the crowd to the very middle of the dance floor.

George Michael will start to sing "Looking for some education, made my way into the night" 

They will dance. 

And nothing else matters.

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This week, it will be exactly fifteen years since that trip to Gran Canaria. My life has changed so much since then, that I'd barely recognise the woman I once was. Throughout that time, Francesca Ferrari has been my friend and for every one of those years, Fast Love has been the soundtrack to the continuing wonder of her friendship.