The Island

by C. L. Taylor

  ‘Sssh… sssh… sssh…’ He sways me from side to side, his cheek against the top of my head, his voice a whisper that mingles with the soft lapping of the sea.

  ‘It’s OK,’ I hear him say as Jeffers calls out to ask if I’m all right. ‘She’ll be OK.’

  Will I? I want to believe him but I can’t.

  We work side by side, making a new roof for the shelter: a tired, companionable silence sealing us off from the rest of the world. Milo glances at me as he weaves banana leaves together. How are you? he asks wordlessly. I nod in reply and shoot him a small smile. My brain feels thick and woolly, my eyes swollen like two split boiled eggs and emotionally I’m spent. Making a roof for the shelter is about all I can deal with right now. It’s like basket weaving, desert island style. Meg and Jefferson are a good hundred metres or so away, fishing on the rocks, and there’s no sign of Danny or Honor.

  ‘Milo,’ I say. ‘There’s something I haven’t told you.’

  He takes a leaf from the pile then cries out in pain as it cuts him, and he sucks his finger. ‘Sorry. What was that?’

  ‘Earlier, when I woke up from my nightmare, Danny did something really weird.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ He looks at me in surprise.

  ‘He was slapping the bottom of my blanket with a flip-flop, then he rolled me around in the sand, screaming that I was on fire.’

  ‘Holy crap! Are you OK? You’re not—’

  ‘Burnt? No. No more than I was already. There was something else. He said he knew I’d lied about my phobia, then he grabbed Jefferson’s rucksack and ran off into the jungle.’

  ‘So he just left you there? On the beach? After he saw you catch fire?’

  ‘That’s just it. I’m fine.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ He runs his hand down the length of my shin, his touch featherlight. He does the same on my other leg then changes position to look at the soles of my feet. ‘Does your skin feel OK? It’s not tender or anything?’

  ‘No. It’s fine. No fresh burns.’

  ‘No pain when you woke up?’

  I shake my head. ‘No, nothing.’

  ‘So maybe it was just the blanket that was on fire?’

  ‘I guess so. I… I didn’t really look at it.’

  He bites down on his thumbnail and stares out to sea. ‘You know this means everyone’s phobia has come true apart from Danny and Meg’s?’ He pauses then looks back at me. ‘She freaks out at the sight of blood but I can’t remember what he’s afraid of.’

  I frown, trying to remember. ‘Something about a bucket.’

  ‘Claustrophobia! He’s scared of enclosed spaces… Oh God.’

  ‘What?’ I ask.

  ‘Jack and Josh had already left when your blanket went up in flames.’ He grimaces. ‘So whoever’s behind all this is still on the island.’

  I rest my head in my hands and exhale noisily. I thought we could relax now, sit it out until our parents rescue us. ‘You think we’re still in danger?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He looks over towards the rocks where Meg is sitting cross-legged with a homemade fishing pole in her hands and Jeffers crouched beside her. ‘You don’t think someone we know could be behind it?’

  ‘You think Danny set me on fire! Milo, there’s no way. Absolutely no way. He was terrified.’

  ‘So that just leaves my sister.’

  ‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘No way. Besides, she wasn’t even on the new beach. She was over here with you guys.’

  An expression I can’t read crosses his face. ‘No she wasn’t.’

  I look at him in alarm. ‘Where was she?’

  ‘In the jungle. She said she needed a wee. She said she’d meet us here.’

  ‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘No way. Meg’s been a bit off with me this holiday but she’s not a psychopath. She wouldn’t deliberately set light to me.’

  ‘You’re right.’ He rubs his hands over his face and groans. ‘Of course you are. I can’t believe I’d even say that. Seriously, this place is getting to me. Big style.’

  ‘Well, whoever’s behind it knows what we’re really scared of.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Well, I lied, didn’t I?’ I say. ‘Like Danny said. That first night when I said my fear was vomiting. Whoever did this knows I’m terrified of fire, not sick. And… oh my God…’ I touch a hand to my lips as a memory comes flooding back. ‘I know why Danny ran off. He didn’t say “you lied about your phobia”. He said “you lied about your phobia too”.’

  ‘So he’s not really claustrophobic?’

  ‘No, but I don’t know what he’s really—’ I break off as the bushes rustle behind us and Danny emerges from the jungle. He looks a state – absolutely dripping with sweat, his dirty hair slicked back and his T-shirt and shorts clinging to his body.

  ‘You guys all right?’ He shuffles towards us with Jefferson’s rucksack in one hand. He drops it onto the sand. Before I can ask him about his phobia he says, ‘Where’s Honor?’

  I twist round, searching the beach, the sea and the edge of the forest for a small blonde figure. I can’t remember the last time I saw her. All my attention was on Milo as I dragged myself out of the sea.

  ‘She’s collecting empty bottles…’ Milo turns to point towards the remains of the shelter. There’s no one there. ‘Oh. She must have gone off to the waterfall.’

  ‘When?’ Danny asks.

  Milo shrugs. ‘I’m… not sure. I didn’t actually see her leave.’

  ‘Jessie?’ Danny asks.

  ‘I haven’t seen her. Not since I swam over from the new beach.’

  ‘And when was that?’

  ‘I’m not… I can’t be sure.’

  ‘Think! How long?’

  ‘I don’t know… an hour… maybe two?’

  All the colour seems to drain from Danny’s face. ‘For God’s sake! Honor’s been gone for up to two hours and none of you thought to look for her?’ He glares down at me. ‘And you call her your friend? If anything’s happened to her, I’ll never forgive you.’

  ‘Danny, wait!’ I shout as he turns and sprints back into the jungle. ‘I’m sure she’s fine. She’ll just be—’

  Milo ducks down to grab a bottle of water. ‘He’s right,’ he says. ‘She’s been gone too long. We need to look for her. Now.’

  We head for the waterfall, running at first, then walking as the undergrowth grows thicker and our throats dry from repeatedly shouting Honor’s name. Danny leads the way, followed by me, then Milo.

  ‘Where did you go?’ I ask as he holds a vine up for me to duck under. ‘When you took Jefferson’s rucksack.’

  He waits for Milo to pass under the vine too then swipes a hand over his forehead, slicking away the sweat that covers his brow.

  ‘I wanted to see what he had in there,’ he says as he falls in step with me.

  ‘And?’

  ‘Food, mostly dried and canned meat. A first-aid kit. Some other prepper bits and bobs. But mostly food. No wonder he was happy setting up camp on his own.’

  My stomach rumbles at the thought of meat and I’m tempted to ask Danny if he’s got any of Jefferson’s food that he could share with me. Instead I say, ‘Do you still think Jeffers is the one behind the phobias coming true?’

  Danny gives me a sideways glance. ‘Not unless he deliberately threw himself off the cliff.’

  ‘He didn’t. I was there.’

  ‘Did you see who was in the bushes?’

  ‘No. I—’

  ‘Could you see all the others?’

  ‘Well, no, not really. It was dark and we were all curled up around a pile of rucksacks. I couldn’t see anyone until Jeffers started stumbling through the clearing.’

  ‘So it could have been Meg, in the bushes?’

  ‘What could have been Meg?’ Milo says from behind us.

  Danny turns sharply. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘He knows,’ I say. ‘About the snake. I told him.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Milo raises his eyeb
rows. ‘Cheers for that, mate.’

  Danny looks affronted. ‘For what? Keeping quiet so you wouldn’t freak out?’

  ‘You could have told me. I’m not eleven anymore.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. But you wouldn’t have been able to sleep, would you? Knowing there were bloody great cobras slithering all over the place. You wouldn’t have come into the jungle to get water or look for food.’

  ‘I’m here now, aren’t I?’

  ‘Guys.’ I touch their arms. ‘Can we not do this now? Please? We’re supposed to be looking for Honor.’

  The expression in Danny’s eyes switches from pissed off to concerned in a heartbeat and he nods sharply. ‘You’re right. We can talk about this later.’

  ‘And he thinks Jeffers is a control freak,’ Milo mutters under his breath as Danny breaks into a slow jog.

  ‘Don’t,’ I say. ‘The last thing we need is more arguments—’

  ‘Wait!’ Milo grabs my arm as I move to follow Danny. ‘What’s that?’

  He points at a shrub, further down the route, just to our left. At first all I can see are flat, shiny leaves, but then I spot it, a flash of pink among the green. I crouch down and pull it out. It’s a flip-flop – pink with white polka dots and a sparkly, silver toe strap.

  Milo reaches to touch it. ‘Is that—’

  ‘Honor’s. Yeah. She’s been wearing them all holiday.’ I look at him. ‘She never takes them off.’

  As Milo searches the undergrowth for Honor’s other flip-flop I shout for Danny, screaming his name. He comes running, fear etched into every line of his face.

  ‘That’s Honor’s,’ he says, immediately spotting the flip-flop in my hands. He spins on the spot, staring wildly around the jungle as though he’s expecting his girlfriend to walk out from the trees at any second. ‘Where did you find it?’

  We show him the spot and, like Milo, he crouches down and rummages among the scrub. He searches the next bush and the next one, muttering under his breath. When he stands up again his whole body is beaded with sweat.

  ‘Have they gone?’ he asks, looking from me to Milo. ‘The brothers? Have they definitely gone?’

  Milo and I share a panicked look. Danny’s thinking what we’re thinking, that Honor wouldn’t just lose a shoe and carry on without it. I have a flashback to Josh and Jack shunting me through the jungle and my blood runs cold.

  ‘Yes,’ Milo says. ‘They’ve definitely gone. We told you, remember. You were sitting by the fire when we came back from our swim.’

  ‘You’re sure? You’re positive there’s no way they’re still on the island?’

  ‘We swam all the way round,’ I say. ‘There was no sign of them, or their boat.’

  Danny stares at me. His pupils are huge, blocking out the pale blue of his irises, making his eyes look black. He looks horrified, transfixed, as though he’s watching the end of the world play out in front of him. The expression on his face makes all of the hairs on my arms go up.

  ‘What?’ I ask. ‘Danny, what is it? Why are you looking at me like that?’

  He shakes his head mutely.

  ‘Dan?’ I can hear the panic in Milo’s voice but I can’t tear my eyes away from Danny.

  ‘Danny!’ A cold chill passed through me as though someone just walked on my grave. ‘Danny, talk to us! Do you know what’s happened to Honor?’

  He shakes his head mutely and a single tear weaves its way through the dirt and grime on his cheek. An image flashes up in my mind of Honor lying dead in the jungle, her blonde hair splayed out, blood clouding her eyes and dribbling from her mouth.

  ‘TELL US!’ I scream as I grab him by the shoulders and shake him. ‘TELL US WHAT’S GOING ON!’

  Danny doesn’t shrug my hands from his shoulders. He doesn’t move. He doesn’t blink. But he does say something. He stares straight at me and says: ‘I found a message in the sand. It said, One of you will die.’

  I pick at the fish in the metal tray. I’m starving, but there’s a knot of worry in my stomach that’s stopping me from eating. We searched for Honor. We headed to the waterfall first, but she wasn’t there. Nor was she up in the clearing. Unsure where to go next, we ploughed back into the jungle and started walking in a straight line, or as straight a line as we could. We shouted Honor’s name until our throats were raw and dehydration began to set in, Milo’s water bottle long since drained. As the sun began to set we had no choice but to head back to camp. Danny cried the whole way and I held Milo’s hand, squeezing it whenever a wave of panic surged through me. Was Honor dead? Was that why we couldn’t find her?

  One of you will die, the message said. Just thinking about it made me want to burst into tears.

  ‘We can’t just pile into the jungle in the dark,’ Jefferson says now, putting down his tin and standing up. He’s remarkably energetic considering he and Milo just lugged all our rucksacks back to camp from the new beach. ‘People will get lost or hurt. We need a cohesive plan.’

  Danny, standing by the fire with a flaming torch in his hand, shakes his head. ‘Sod a plan. I’m going back in. I’ll search all night if I have to.’

  I get to my feet. ‘I’m coming too. We should go in pairs, that way no one else gets lost.’

  Meg raises an arched eyebrow. ‘There’s five of us.’

  ‘So a three and a two then. Does it matter?’

  ‘That depends if you get to go with Milo or not.’

  I shoot her a look. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Meg—’ There’s a warning tone to Milo’s voice.

  ‘What?’ She looks from him to Jefferson. ‘If we’re going to look for Honor we need to do it properly, not wander around holding hands and mewing at each other.’

  I laugh. ‘Seriously?’

  Milo rolls his eyes. ‘We didn’t swim round the island with our eyes closed, you know.’

  ‘Are you sure? It took you long enough.’

  I stare Meg out, irritation burning in my chest. She’s not the only one who’s worried about Honor, but she’s taking it out on the wrong people.

  ‘What do you think we were doing?’

  ‘You tell me,’ she narrows her eyes. ‘Maybe you were too distracted to look for Jack and Josh.’

  ‘Or maybe you don’t think I’m good enough for your brother,’ I snap. ‘Is that it? Is that why you’re doing this? How about you just come out and say it to my face instead of trolling me behind my back, telling everyone who’ll listen that he’s still in love with his ex. I know for a fact that you deliberately told Danny so he’d warn me off.’

  ‘Whoa, whoa!’ Danny holds his hands up, palms out. ‘Don’t bring me into this.’

  ‘You’re not special, Dan,’ I say. ‘She told Jefferson the same thing too.’

  ‘Actually,’ Jeffers says, ‘Meg told me that Milo was a complete arsehole to Bella and he’d cheated on her multiple times. That’s the reason I tried to warn you off him, Jessie.’

  Milo stares at his sister in disbelief. ‘You told him I was a cheat? Seriously? That’s absolute crap and you know it. I’ve never cheated on anyone in my life. Why would you say something like that?’

  ‘Because you’re an arsehole!’ She glares at him but her eyes are shining with tears. ‘You’re completely self-obsessed. And it pisses me off to see girls throwing themselves at you.’

  ‘Hang on,’ I say. ‘I haven’t thrown myself at—’

  ‘I didn’t say you did, Jessie. And this isn’t about you. It’s not even about Milo. Not completely. It’s about me.’

  ‘Huh?’ Jefferson says.

  ‘We were friends.’ Her voice cracks. ‘Us six. Right from the beginning. I loved our holidays. I looked forward to them because you guys treated me differently than people at school. You looked at me differently. You liked me for a start—’

  ‘Is this about the bullying at school?’ Milo interrupts.

  I look at him in surprise. Neither he, nor Meg, has ever mentioned her being bullied before.

  �
�That’s part of the problem, Milo, yes.’ She swipes at her eyes with the back of her hands. I can’t tell if she’s crying because she’s angry or because she’s upset. ‘That and the fact you always talk over me instead of letting me speak.’

  ‘OK, OK.’ He holds out his hands in surrender. ‘I won’t say a word.’

  ‘I liked how I was with you guys.’ She looks from me to Jeffers to Danny. ‘I felt like part of something, like… I dunno, like… you were my tribe. I felt safe with you. I felt good about myself. And then…’ She pushes her dark hair away from her face and stares into the fire. ‘And then you all started coupling up and everything changed.’

  Jeffers clears his throat.

  ‘Well, clearly you didn’t, Jeffers, and that’s why I threw myself at you. Remember, that summer when were all fourteen? Everyone was flirting – Honor and Danny, Milo and Jess… and we were left on our own…’

  He shakes his head, warning her not to go there. He knows what she’s about to say, we all do, and he doesn’t want her to embarrass herself.

  ‘And I tried it on with you.’ Meg closes her eyes at the memory. ‘And you turned your cheek when I tried to kiss you.’

  ‘Meg…’ he says softly.

  ‘No, it’s fine. Honestly. It’s fine. I kind of guessed you were gay. I mean, not that I would expect you to fancy me if you were straight but, for me, it was just… I felt humiliated. Not by the rejection. Because I’d thrown myself at you. But I was so bloody lonely…’

  ‘Oh, Meg,’ I say. ‘I didn’t know.’

  ‘Don’t.’ She swipes at her eyes again. Her voice has softened and she looks like she’s struggling to hold it together. ‘Please don’t feel sorry for me or I’ll… Anyway, yeah, I was being bullied at school. Milo knew but I swore him to secrecy because I didn’t want you guys to look at me differently like… like I was some kind of victim.’

  I make a noise in protest at the same time Danny says, ‘We wouldn’t have done that.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you? Are you sure?’ Meg says. And she’s right. We would have treated her differently if she’d turned up one summer and told us about the bullying. We’d have seen a different side to her, a more vulnerable Meg. We’d have overcompensated to make her feel better.