by Various
‘Please tell me the rest of the story, Jake,’ she smiled coyly.
‘The rest of the true story, mind,’ Jake said pointedly. ‘Okay, so where was I? The first day. Right, so it was a June Saturday, all the Londoners were down for the weekend and they see these four lads, with their colourful board shorts on small fibreglass boards. Next thing, they’re swooping thirty metres along on unbroken waves which none of the Brits had ever been able to do with their massive wooden boards. Within a couple of hours they had crowds gathered on the cliffs, all watching in awe.’
‘Amazing,’ Gemma whispered, imagining that scene in 1962.
‘That night, they went to the bottle shop and bought a keg and went to the butcher and bought sausages. They collected driftwood, lit a fire on Newquay beach, and it was the first ever beach barbeque in Europe.’
‘What?’ Gemma’s eyes widened. ‘Surely not!’
‘Yep!’ Jake replied proudly. ‘But there’s more. A St Ives cabinet-maker had been up at Newquay, visiting friends, and was part of the crowd watching that Saturday. He went back home that week, locked himself up in his shed and made a ten-foot fibreglass board, just like the Aussies’ Malibu ones. He sold it the day after, so he made another and another, and pretty soon he gave up the cabinet-making and opened the very first specialist surf shop in all of Europe. Still exists today, still does a roaring trade. That man’s my godfather, Adrian.’
‘Oh seriously, stop now!’ Gemma said between giggles. This cannot be true!
‘Not a word of a lie,’ he replied earnestly.
She shook her head in amazement.
‘So there you have it, Gemma. Purely because of my dad and his mates coming out here — surfing, fibreglass boards, board shorts, specialist surf shops, beach barbeques and kegs on the beach were all introduced to Europe. The whole surf culture of Cornwall down to four larrikins from Bondi.’
‘And now Cornwall’s world-famous for its surf culture,’ Gemma said in awe.
Jake clicked his tongue and winked, ‘Sure is! Half a million surfers a year now. It’s made Cornwall rich. When my dad first got here, they had eleven surf beaches for the four them. Now you risk yourself getting sliced by someone else’s fin it’s so crowded out there.’
‘That’s what Mrs Harris said, too,’ Gemma joined in. ‘She said she hates how busy Trevone is nowadays, but since I’ve been here it’s been virtually empty.’
Jake nodded. ‘We moved to Trevone because it’s the quietest surf beach. But just you wait another few hours and see. Come Friday afternoons, the city dwellers make their exodus and by Saturday mornings it’s crawling with weekenders, on the sand and in the water.’
‘I don’t think I’d like that,’ Gemma said looking out to the sea, empty save for the two surfing boys.
‘Me neither, I avoid the beach like the plague on weekends. It’s tough in summer holidays, though: it’s packed all day, every day, and none of the buggers know how to be safe. I’m in and out of the surf like a yo-yo.’
‘I still can’t believe it was your dad that brought surfing—’ Gemma stopped abruptly as Jake suddenly sprang onto his feet, and a second later was jumping off the rock, throwing his T-shirt off and running at full speed into the surf.
Gemma’s throat constricted when she saw where he was heading. Over to the right of the bay, about fifty metres out, near the rocks that jutted out adjacent to the sandbar, one of the boys was struggling to swim against a rip. The waves were coming in thick and fast, one after the other, and they were at least three metres high. The other boy couldn’t be seen. Gemma screamed when a few seconds later the second boy disappeared under a wave and didn’t re-emerge. It felt as if Jake was swimming in slow motion towards them.
Gemma slid out of her skirt and ran straight out into the sea. The ice water hit her like a truck. She gasped and pushed against it, running deeper and deeper until she was chest-deep in, and then she dived forwards and swam towards the rip. She was a strong swimmer but she hadn’t swum laps for years, and with the force of the waves against her she found herself getting fatigued and breathless very quickly.
The waves were getting bigger as she got deeper, and she was exhausted diving under them all. Just keep swimming, keep swimming. Gemma felt her legs cramping up from the cold. The next two waves were so close together that she barely had time to breathe in before diving under again, and she swallowed a big mouthful of salty water that froze her chest and made her gag.
Gemma flipped herself onto her back for a brief second to get some air back into her lungs before being smashed by another wave. She inhaled another lungful of water and felt herself losing the battle to stay afloat. Opening her mouth to breathe, more water rushed in. Don’t drown, Gemma, don’t drown. She willed herself to rise back up to the surface and she managed to push herself out of the wall of black water surrounding her.
Gulping in big breaths of air, she prepared to duck before the next wave hit, then she saw that the waves were smaller here and she could float over them instead. She half-spat, half-vomited out the water she’d swallowed, ignoring her screaming muscles and throbbing chest. Now she was only a few metres away from Jake, who was dragging one of the boys out of the rip. There was no sign of the second boy.
One of the surfboards bobbed on the waves near Gemma and she lunged for it, grabbing on with relief and letting it do the floating for her.
‘Here,’ Jake panted as they reached each other, and he draped the boy who was choking and spluttering face-down on the board. ‘Hang on,’ he yelled at the boy, who obeyed and weakly grabbed the side of the board. ‘Go, go! Get out of here!’ Jake shouted at Gemma before he dived back under the water, towards the rip.
Gemma copied what she’d seen Jake do the day before by propping herself at the back of the board and paddling towards shore. It was almost impossible, the weight of the boy making it incredibly heavy, and when she made it past the sandbar the waves came back stronger. Gemma didn’t let herself stop paddling, though, despite the intense pain in her arms and legs and her breathlessness. When the boy vomited over the edge of the board and tightened his grip, Gemma knew he’d be okay. She paddled harder and faster and made it to the flat water where it was shallow enough to stand in. The boy slid off the board and took a few wobbly steps in the water before finding his feet.
‘You alright?’ Gemma panted.
‘Thanks,’ the boy said, tearing up.
They both turned around to see Jake on the second board, with the other boy lying across it, not far behind them. Gemma could see that the boy was moving and she choked back her tears.
‘Max! Max!’ the boy next to Gemma cried out, and Max turned his head to look at his friend.
It was then that Gemma noticed she was shaking madly. She looked down and saw that her body was blue and that the boy’s lips were blue, too.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ she said through chattering teeth, and dragged the board onto the sand. Gemma jogged up to her towel and wrapped it around the boy who was shaking violently now. She hugged him hard in an attempt to warm him up and he cried with force on her shoulder.
‘Hey, it’s okay now,’ Gemma soothed, struggling to hold in her own tears. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Tim,’ he sobbed.
‘It’s your lucky day, Tim,’ she whispered.
They watched Jake paddle in and then lift Max off the board into his arms. He carried the boy into shore while Gemma gritted her teeth and raced back out into the shallow water to rescue the second board, pulling it in with the leg rope. She was too exhausted to carry it.
Tim gave Max Gemma’s towel and both boys sat on the sand shivering while Jake ran up towards the surf shop at the top of the hill. He returned moments later with a large beach towel hanging from his shoulders and carrying a few more, and he was followed by a man talking on a mobile phone.
When he reached the boys, Jake handed them towels, and the tall muscular man, who was past middle age but still had a surfie bleached blond-look a
bout him, gave the boys some water to drink.
Jake held a large fluffy towel out for Gemma to step into. She sighed with relief as it took away the wind chill when he wrapped it around her. Jake held her tight and she relaxed her body into his. He rubbed his hands quickly up and down her spine and it warmed her magically. She looked up into his eyes and the connection between them in that moment took her breath away.
‘You were amazing,’ Jake murmured. ‘So, so brave. I would never have been able to save them both without you.’
‘So were you.’ Gemma smiled and the whole world disappeared for a second.
‘So, hospital?’ the other man called out over Jake’s shoulder, and Jake let go of Gemma and turned around to face him.
‘Yep, Dad. I’ll take them to the hospital. You’ve called their parents now, yeah?’ Jake said, and then he looked down at the boys huddled together on the wet sand. ‘You two are in deep shit,’ he said solemnly.
The boys looked down at their feet and nodded mutely.
Jake picked up Gemma’s crumpled skirt and passed it to her with a smile, then watched her shyly wriggle into it. She hadn’t even realised that she’d been standing there with her white lacy knickers on show.
‘That’s sad. Bye-bye, knickers,’ Jake said in a low voice only she could hear, and his sexy smile made her tingle all over.
Once they had dropped Max and Tim at the hospital emergency department for a check-over, and were back in Jake’s 1980s duck-egg blue kombi van, he turned to face her. ‘Big afternoon, yeah?’ he grinned.
She nodded, smiling.
‘I was really enjoying our chat before we were rudely interrupted,’ he said, looking out the windscreen at the hospital car park and tapping his fingers on the thin black steering wheel.
‘Me, too,’ Gemma answered. ‘I loved hearing your stories.’
‘They weren’t my stories, you haven’t heard my story yet,’ Jake smiled.
‘Well, I’d love to hear your story,’ she replied, getting that breathless feeling again as their eyes locked.
‘And I really want to hear yours,’ Jake said seriously. ‘How about I take you home, you have a shower, get warm, put on some dry clothes and I come pick you up again in a couple of hours? My house is on the other side of the bay, we could walk there and I’ve got leftover lasagne in the fridge. You could stay for dinner — if you’d like to, that is.’
‘I can’t think of anything I’d like more,’ Gemma answered truthfully.
***
‘You been swimming?’ Mrs Harris said in a surprised tone when she opened the door to Gemma.
‘Not by choice,’ Gemma answered wryly, and told Mrs Harris about her misadventures at the bay.
‘My, my, what a brave young girl you are,’ Mrs Harris said warmly when Gemma had finished telling the story.
They were sitting in the cosy front room, Gemma’s favourite room in the house. And as she sat on a soft oversized recliner, with a warm fleece blanket over her legs and a steaming cup of tea in her hands, Gemma felt completely comforted. Where was Mrs Harris during my divorce? Gemma pined. Oh, to have had this kind of caring treatment when Ross was playing hardball with lawyers and sending her menacing emails!
‘Mrs Harris, Jake said his dad told him you were a real catch around these parts back in the day!’ Gemma exclaimed.
‘And? What’s that got to do with the price of fish in China?’ Mrs Harris replied casually, but a pink colour creeped into her cheeks. She patted her white bun and fixed her apron. ‘Jake opened his big old mouth, did he?’
‘He did! He told me lots of stories, and he’s telling me more stories tonight — he’s invited me over for dinner.’
Mrs Harris put her floral-patterned tea cup down on its saucer and stared at Gemma open-mouthed. ‘Jake Dee asked you to dinner?’ She shook her head slowly. ‘That boy hasn’t socialised with a woman in almost two years. Goodness, it’s all any of us can do to get him to even say hello to a woman since Sophie died, but then you swan in and all of a sudden he’s regaling you with old stories and inviting you to tea! You must have cast a spell over him!’
Gemma felt herself redden. ‘Well, don’t get too excited. We only just met. I don’t have plans to get into anything with anyone just yet.’
Mrs Harris took a loud sip of tea and peered at Gemma over the cup. ‘A man like Jake can do strange things to a woman’s plans.’
Gemma laughed. ‘Mrs Harris, we’ve known each other five minutes and you’ve practically got us married off!’
Mrs Harris stood up and wiped her hands on her apron. ‘I’d best get back into the kitchen and take the tea cake out of the tin.’
Gemma smiled at her fondly. ‘I’ll miss you this evening, Mrs Harris. I know it’s only been a few days, but I love having dinner with you every night and watching the telly after. It’s been so lovely staying here with you, thank you.’
Mrs Harris stroked Gemma’s hair. ‘And you’ve been a delight to have young lady. You’re welcome here as long as you like. In fact, I’d be as happy as a pig in mud if you moved in for good, even with that cat you keep telling me about.’
Gemma frowned. ‘But don’t you have other guests booked in after me?’
Mrs Harris shook her head. ‘When you emailed me with your reason for taking a holiday, I had a feeling you’d need somewhere to stay for longer than just a few weeks. I only advertise when the loneliness becomes too much for me, so after you booked I withdrew the ad. The room is yours for as long as you’d like it, and I tell you something,’ she said with a twinkle in her eye, ‘I’ll be very surprised if after an evening with Jake, you still want to go back to Australia at all.’
‘Mrs Harris, you are just lovely.’ Gemma stood up and kissed her soft cheek. ‘Thank you. But you are also too funny. Can’t I have dinner with a man without leaving my homeland forever?’
‘Maybe, maybe not. We’ll see,’ Mrs Harris said smugly.
As Mrs Harris turned to walk out, Gemma called after her: ‘Mrs Harris, was Sophie Jake’s wife?’
Mrs Harris turned and nodded sadly.
‘What happened to her?’
Mrs Harris gulped. ‘She passed away.’ She paused and exhaled loudly. ‘In a car accident. She was pregnant with their son. Jake’s never been the same since.’ She looked at Gemma and smiled. ‘I think the Lord meant for you to find your no-good husband in bed with that fellow, my dear. The Lord works in mysterious ways.’
For the second time in a few hours, Gemma felt her eyes welling up.
Her thoughts tripped over each other as she washed the salt water and sand out of her hair in the steaming hot shower. What a tragic waste Sophie’s death was, and how devastating for Jake and Lani. She wondered how old Lani was when she lost her mother. Gemma didn’t see her parents that often since she had moved away from Sydney two years ago and followed Ross to Brisbane for his work as a scenic flight pilot. But she still couldn’t imagine life without her wonderful parents in it, and this darling child had already lost her mum. And oh, Jake. Any wonder he didn’t want to date, the poor man was heartbroken and raising a daughter on his own.
But he had asked her out. So he was obviously ready to start dating and, to hell with it, so was she! Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined that within days of arriving at her dream place, she would find such a dream man. Perhaps this would be a one-night thing with Jake and he would realise he actually wasn’t ready to date, or perhaps she wouldn’t be as interested in him after spending an evening together (which she doubted very, very much), but she was excited at the possibility that lay ahead. It felt as if her life was just beginning again. She had nearly drowned, and now she had a second chance at living.
Gemma took her time moisturising her legs, thinking about her options seriously for the first time since the divorce. What was waiting for her back in Brisbane? Michelangelo. But he could be brought here. Or he could stay with Jasmin and her family who adored him. And apart from Michelangelo, there was really nothin
g else. Brisbane was Ross. Brisbane was pain. She’d left her job at the high school at the end of last year and had been doing relief teaching since then, so she had no work commitments. She could easily apply for a visa to extend her stay and look for work here. She didn’t even have to teach, she could work in a pub for all she cared. And she had enough money from the sale of the house that she didn’t even need to work for a year at least if she so desired. Why rush home when life was full of exciting possibilities right here?
This is my time to live as I please, to do as I want. If I want a fresh start, it’s now or never.
Gemma slipped on a pair of tiny red knickers and matching bra, and then she wriggled into slim-fitting jeans and a low-cut black lace shirt that her bra peek-a-booed through. She sprayed a couple of squirts of Chanel and held her hair up in a messy bun, leaving some curls loose on the sides that fell past her shoulders. It took a good further twenty-minutes to layer on makeup to give a ‘no makeup on’ natural glow, carefully applying bronzer to her cheek bones and eyelids, and lining her hazel eyes with a soft brown pencil. There, all done and ready for her first ‘first date’ in years.
Her phone buzzed, and when she saw that the message was from Ross she hit delete without reading it. She then went into her contact list and blocked him from texting, calling or emailing her again. The terrifying experience in the ocean and then hearing about Sophie’s death had drummed home the point that life was short, and Gemma made a solemn vow to herself that she would no longer let Ross affect her. The divorce was done with, and all property was settled, so she had absolutely no obligation to him whatsoever. Knowing that she never had to hear from or speak to Ross ever again lifted a great weight off her heart, causing her to feel lighter than she had in months or even years.
With her phone in her hand, she realised she’d forgotten to reply to Jasmin’s email. And now she could hear Jake’s voice chatting away with Mrs Harris. She typed out a quick text.
Hiya Jaz! Guess what? I met a lifesaver. He’s hot! Like really hot! Bondi Vet hot! Not Ross scrawny! Not gay! And he’s asked me out tonight. Wish me luck. Kiss Michelangelo for me, he’s yours for a bit longer — think I’ll extend my stay here. Oh and I blocked Ross from ever contacting me again! Love you, call you tomorrow x