by C. L. Taylor
‘Hey,’ Jack says as I stand up, still gripping the arms of my metal chair and carrying it behind me like a turtle shell as I walk to the edge of the pool. ‘What the hell happened to your hands? Jesus, they look really—’
‘Hi.’ As I draw closer Josh releases his grip on Honor’s face and rests his hand on the tiles. He feigns nonchalance, all cocky and chilled. ‘Look at me just chilling by the pool late at night’ – but he’s moved his wandering hand back to Honor’s arm and he’s pinning her to his side.
‘Where are you going with that chair?’ he asks. ‘Going to take it for a swim?’
Behind me his brother laughs.
‘No.’ I smile down at him. ‘I thought I’d join you. Apparently you don’t have a problem with personal space.’
He looks up at me in confusion but, before he can reply, I lower the chair so one of the metal legs is directly above his hand, then I sit down. His shout fills the air – a howl of surprise morphing into a scream of pain. He pushes Honor away from him and grabs at the chair leg but it doesn’t move an inch. I’m too heavy for him to shift. He looks up at me and I feel a stab of satisfaction at seeing Honor’s fear in his eyes. Nothing happens for what feels like for ever, then I hear Jack’s chair scraping on the tiles and his roar of anger. A split second later I’m shoved so hard in the back that I tip forwards. There’s no time to react. All I can do is hold my breath as I fall out of the chair and the lights of the pool rush to meet me. The last thing I hear before my ears fill with water is a single word.
It sounds a lot like ‘psycho’.
Chapter 2
DANNY
Day one on the island
Danny Armstrong isn’t sure what to make of Jessie Harper. There’s a part of him that’s grateful that she stopped that little creep Josh from manhandling Honor the night before, but there’s another, bigger, part that feels awkward about spending a week alone on an island with her. The first few days of the NCT holidays are always a bit weird; these guys might be his oldest friends but, apart from Honor who lives a short train-ride away, the others are all spread around the country. They don’t get to see each other much between holidays, and everyone’s always a bit wary and awkward initially. But then the banter starts up and the group relaxes. It’s like they haven’t spent a day apart.
Only Jessie hasn’t loosened up yet. She’s so tense, so tightly coiled that it makes Danny nervous. That thing with the chair leg last night? There’s no way she would have done something like that before. It’s like there’s an emotional bomb ticking away in her chest – at any moment she might go off – and that scares him. Scares the others too from the way they all seem to be tiptoeing around her, none of them daring to mention why her hands and arms are all scarred up. OK, so he won’t be alone on the island with Jessie, strictly speaking. Honor, Meg, Milo and Jeffers will be there too, along with Anuman, their Thai survival guide who’s currently sitting at the far end of the small motorized boat, guiding it through the crystal-clear water. But they’re a hell of a long way from the mainland already. They’ve been on the boat for over an hour.
Danny tightens his grip on Honor’s shoulder, pulling her into his body, and kisses her on the top of her head. Jessie, sitting nearest Anuman with Jeffers beside her, is staring out to sea, her long brown hair streaming behind her. Danny didn’t expect her to show up for the trip. She wasn’t waiting in the lobby of the hotel with the others when he traipsed down the stairs with his backpack at 6 a.m. She was too embarrassed, he assumed, about what had happened the night before. Or maybe her parents had been told about what she’d done and had banned her from the trip.
When it all kicked off the night before, he was at the bar with Milo – eating peanuts and talking crap. There was an anguished shout from the pool then Honor screamed his name. He knocked over his drink in his haste to get back to her and his blood ran cold as he rounded the palm trees and spotted her hugging her knees to her chest by the side of the pool. There were two lads crouched together a couple of feet away – one of them screaming and nursing his hand to his chest – and Jessie, sopping wet and fully clothed, climbing the ladder at the far end of the pool. She didn’t seem to be the slightest bit bothered by the commotion behind her. Instead she nonchalantly headed for the entrance to the hotel. As Danny gathered Honor in his arms one of the lads pointed over at Jessie and shouted something about payback, while the other lad, the smaller one, groaned about needing a doctor. As they headed off towards reception Danny asked Honor over and over again what the matter was. She was crying so much she couldn’t speak, and it wasn’t until he got her back into her apartment, after her mum had wrapped her in a blanket and given her a long hard hug, that she finally opened up. Danny was off like a shot then, speeding back down the stairs to reception, but it was deserted. The lads, whoever they were, were long gone.
Now, he stifles a yawn. He barely slept last night he was so angry. How dare that arsehole put his hands all over his girlfriend? He’ll kill him if he ever sees him again.
A sudden squeal from Meg wipes the thought from his mind.
‘Oh my God! Is that a squid?’ She points over the side of the boat. ‘It’s enormous.’
‘Don’t touch it!’ Milo shouts as Meg puts a hand in the water. ‘It’s a jellyfish. Remember when Tom stood on one on the beach in Cornwall and his foot swelled up so much he had to go to hospital?’
At the mention of Tom’s name Danny inhales sharply and a strange expectant silence fills the boat. Everyone stares at Jessie, waiting for a reaction. She doesn’t say a word. Instead she continues to gaze out to sea, a muscle pulsing in her cheek, as though she’s repeatedly clenching and unclenching her jaw. The tension is more than Danny can bear and he searches his brain for something, anything, he can say to lighten the mood but the best he can manage is:
‘Aren’t you hot wearing all that, Jeffers?’
Unlike the others, dressed in vests or T-shirts or light summery clothes, Jeffers looks kitted out to go to war in the desert in his black sunglasses, hat, sandy-coloured long trousers, bulky waistcoat and boots and a huge great rucksack propped up beside him.
He shakes his head. ‘Not at all. Everything I’m wearing is either lightweight or breathable, or it wicks the sweat away.’
Danny shakes his head. How can one of his friends be seventeen years old and sound like a fifty-year-old man? Jefferson wasn’t always so weird – tactless and insensitive definitely – but not weird. He was perfectly normal until two summers ago when he turned up to their holiday in Norfolk wittering away about a new group of friends he’d met on the internet who’d opened his eyes to how screwed-up we’d be in the event of natural disasters, petrol shortages, war or acts of terrorism and how important it is to prepare for such an event. Danny mostly uses the internet to access PornHub, not that he’d ever admit that with Honor in the same room.
‘We are here!’ Anuman announces as the boat creaks and putts as it slows down and Danny looks around in surprise. They’re in the shallows and stretched before him is a long, white beach framed with palm trees; beyond them, dense jungle and huge, jagged cliffs. They’ve arrived on the only privately owned island off the coast of Thailand – Ko Kār p̄hcỵ phạy. His breath catches in his throat as he spots a couple of macaque monkeys jumping and playing at the edge of the forest. It’s like they’ve just arrived in paradise.
‘The island of adventure,’ Anuman had told them as he’d shepherded them out of the hotel when Jessie finally rocked up, hiding her face behind sunglasses and an oversized hat. ‘Not many people get to go, and not alone. You very lucky.’
Lucky, Danny thinks cynically as Anuman jumps out of the boat and into the sparkling, clear sea – or stinking rich. Thailand is by far and away the most exotic – and expensive – holiday they’ve had as a group since Milo and Meg’s parents first mooted the idea that they should have an antenatal group getaway when they were all little more than a year old. They spent a week in a shared house on the Cornish coast. He�
�s not entirely sure what Jefferson’s dad does for a living but it’s something to do with banking and investments. Enough, anyway, that he’s rented Ko Kār p̄hcỵ phạy, and a survival expert, for a week to celebrate Jefferson’s seventeenth birthday. When Danny’s dad heard where they’d be holidaying this year he went pale. Unlike some of the other parents, his dad isn’t loaded. He’s a freelance sound engineer and work is sporadic – a three-month tour here and there and then nothing for months on end. Danny hates the way his dad is always so stressed about money, and when the Thailand trip was mentioned he told him that he wasn’t fussed about going. But then Honor voice-messaged him, squeaky with excitement, and his stomach twisted into a tight knot. He hadn’t been apart from her for more than a week since they got together on the day of his fifteenth birthday and he couldn’t bear the thought of being without her for a whole fortnight. He’d help pay for the holiday, he told his dad; get a job washing pots in a local restaurant after school, or working in a café at the weekend. He didn’t have to do any of those things in the end; his dad was offered a gig and couldn’t make the holiday and Honor’s mum, Thea, stepped in to say she was happy for Danny to share their apartment. He’d be on the sofa, of course, but the offer was a godsend. It meant they only had to stump up enough money for one return flight.
Danny’s grip on Honor’s shoulder tightens as the boat rocks and Jeffers leaps into the water, holding his rucksack above his head.
Meg stands up next, clutching her belongings to her chest, and nervously stares down into the sea.
‘Hold your backpack up in the air as you jump!’ Jeffers shouts. ‘You don’t want to get your stuff wet.’
‘Duh,’ Danny says. He looks at Honor, expecting to see her smile, but there’s the weirdest look on her face – it’s like she’s gone completely blank behind the eyes.
‘Hey.’ He nudges her. ‘You OK? I thought you were looking forward to this.’
She shoots him a smile but it looks fake. ‘Yeah, I am.’
‘You thinking about what happened last night?’ he asks. It’s his fault that lad hit on her. He never should have left her alone in the pool, but nothing’s going to happen to her on the island. He’ll make sure of that.
Before Honor can answer, Meg jumps into the sea with a gasp and a splash, swiftly followed by Milo, who turns and offers a helping hand to Jessie. She shakes her head and, instead, hands him her bag then clambers over the side of the boat.
‘Oi, Jeffers,’ Danny shouts, waving at the diminutive figure trying, and failing, to relieve Anuman of the rope that’s attached to the front of the boat. ‘How about you help the girls with their bags instead of playing the big man. I think you’ve got your priorities a bit screwed up there, mate.’
He snaps back round as Honor mutters something and wriggles out of his grasp.
‘What was that?’
She looks at him defiantly. ‘Just leave him alone.’
Danny raises his eyebrows. He can never be sure when Honor’s genuinely annoyed with him or when she’s messing around. She’s good at switching her emotions on and off, it’s what makes her such a good actress. He went to see her in her school play in Brighton and couldn’t believe how easily she was able to transform herself into someone else. She wants to go to uni to study drama after school but she’s worried she’s not good enough. Danny’s pretty sure she is.
‘I’m not kidding, Danny,’ Honor says. ‘You really need to—’
The rest of her sentence is lost to the breeze as she launches herself over the side of the boat leaving her bag, and Danny, behind.
Chapter 3
JESSIE
I have never been anywhere more beautiful in my life. When the boat pulled up at the island I felt like I’d arrived in another world. The beach was a white sheet, pulled tight between two towering limestone hills cloaked in greenery. As I walked up the powdery sand towards the forest, the gentle lapping of the waves faded away and the air filled with the buzz of cicadas, the chirp of birds and the low whoop of monkeys. Paradise. The only thing spoiling it was us. Ever since we got off the boat Jefferson’s been buzzing around Anuman like a fly, commenting on what he’s doing and offering ‘helpful’ suggestions. He’s doing it now, while Anuman shows us which trees we need to chop down to make a shelter.
‘We need to avoid this, don’t we?’ Jeffers says, resting one hand on a tree trunk whilst awkwardly flicking through the pages of his book with the other. ‘Mai nhang. Termites love it, don’t they, Anuman?’
‘Yes, yes.’ Our guide nods politely and gestures for us to follow him further into the jungle. He told us in the boat that he’s sixty-one years old and, whilst his face is as lined as a walnut, he’s so strong and sprightly he could pass for a man twenty years younger.
Honor, walking to one side of me, has her eyes fixed on the ground as she takes tentative step after tentative step.
‘Spiders,’ she says, catching me looking. ‘Tarantulas, black widows, giant orbs and huntsmen.’ She chants the list as though casting a spell to keep them away.
I haven’t got a problem with spiders but even I shiver. I’m pretty sure there are snakes in Thailand too, and God knows what else. All I spotted back at the hotel was a couple of shy geckos and some brightly coloured birds, but we’re a long way from that clean, sanitized world now.
‘Don’t worry,’ Jefferson calls back. ‘The spiders here can’t kill you but bites might hurt and could become infected if they aren’t kept clean.’
‘Thanks,’ Honor mutters under her breath. ‘Really helpful.’
Danny, following behind us with Meg and Milo, gives a strange, forced laugh. I’m not sure what’s going on with him and Honor today but there’s a weird vibe between them. They’re not as touchy feely as they normally are, and when Honor jumped out of the boat before Danny, he looked really annoyed. I’m guessing it’s got something to do with what happened last night. Not that anyone has mentioned it to me, although Danny did mutter an awkward, ‘Thanks for looking after her,’ as we left the hotel this morning and piled into the taxi.
‘Dalbergia cochinchinensis,’ Jeffers says so loudly he makes me jump. He’s pointing at a weedy-looking tree with a thin trunk. ‘Thai rosewood. We can’t chop that down: it’s protected.’
‘Yes, yes.’ If Anuman is annoyed he doesn’t let on. ‘This,’ he says, resting his palm on a tree with a trunk the size of my thigh. ‘We chop this.’
‘That’s a—’ Jeffers begins then cries out in pain as Meg squeezes between me and Honor and cuffs the top of his head.
‘Seriously, Jeffers? Are you going to be like this all week?’
‘Like what?’ He stares at her in astonishment.
‘A know-it-all. Can’t you just let Anuman do his job? He is the expert.’
‘Yes but…’ As Jefferson hangs his head and stares at his feet I feel a pang of pity, then immediately feel annoyed with myself. When I woke up this morning I felt numb, like nothing could touch me, but when I confessed to Mum that I was having second thoughts about the trip she brought out the emotional big guns.
‘Tom would have loved an opportunity like this,’ she said as she perched on the edge of my bed. ‘You can’t not go, Jessica.’
Tom. T–o–m. Those three letters are my kryptonite.
‘Mum, don’t.’
‘Go on, Jessica. Do it for Tom. Go for him.’
As if I don’t feel guilty enough! I wanted to scream.
‘Jessie?’ A swift, sharp nudge in my bicep snaps me back into myself and the sweltering heat beneath the canopy of leaves. ‘Are you OK?’
Milo looks down at me, his dark brows knotted together. ‘You just made a weird noise.’
The others are all staring at me too. Oh God. What did I just do?
I clear my throat. ‘I’m fine… just um…’
I’m saved by the sound of a machete thwacking against wood. Anuman has started chopping down one of the trees. Within seconds it crashes to the ground and he hands the machete t
o Jeffers. He couldn’t look more pleased if he’d just been gifted a lifetime subscription to Preppers’ Monthly. An hour later, dripping with sweat and huffing and puffing, we drag the felled trees through the jungle and back towards the beach.
‘Here we set up camp,’ Anuman says, pointing to a small clearing among the trees. ‘There is a waterfall nearby for fresh water and we are near food source.’ He points upwards. There are coconuts high in the tree above us, and another tree with ripe coral-coloured mangos weighing down the branches, as well as a plant heavy with green bananas.
‘It’s amazing,’ Honor breathes and I can’t help but agree. Now, standing in the jungle, listening to the sweet songs of the birds and the frantic whooping of the monkeys, I can’t believe I ever considered not coming. It’s breathtaking.
‘Mind you don’t eat those,’ Jeffers says, pointing at a tree near the beach. It looks like it’s growing yellow apples with little green poops hanging out of their bottoms. ‘Cashews,’ he says, clocking the blank looks on our faces. ‘If they’re not ripe they’re poisonous.’
‘Yes.’ Anuman nods knowingly. ‘I tell you all what to eat later. First, we build shelter, then fire.’
For the first hour or so we work enthusiastically, laughing and chatting as we split the trees with axes, hammer them into the ground and then fashion a roof made out of banana leaves, but when Anuman tells us that this is our sleeping shelter and we have to make another one to store and prepare food, the excuses come thick and fast: Honor’s got a splinter, Danny feels like he’s got sunstroke and Meg’s hurt her back. I watch, enviously, as they trail down to the sea, strip off their clothes and dive into the icy blue, clear water.
‘It’s all right,’ Milo says, shooting me a look. ‘If you want a swim go and have one. Jeffers and I can cope. Can’t we, Jeffers?’