SUN KISSED

by Jenny McLachlan

  ‘This is my friend from home,’ I say, ‘Pearl, and –’

  ‘Are you Peeta?’ Pearl interrupts.

  ‘That’s right.’ As she talks, Peeta taps at some sort of monitor strapped to her arm. ‘I just did my fastest kilometre!’

  ‘Feeling tired?’ says Pearl.

  ‘A little. I have just run 10k.’

  ‘Losers quit when they’re tired.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know about that,’ Peeta says with a laugh, ‘because I never quit. Listen.’ Her face softens. ‘Are you guys sure you should enter Tuff Troll? It’s a difficult race.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ says Pearl, laughing. ‘Unlike you and Kat, I’m not that bothered about it. I haven’t even brought my trainers.’

  Peeta smiles and raises one eyebrow. ‘Challenges are for winners. Excuses are for losers. I’m doing another lap.’ Then she brushes past us and carries on running along the path.

  We watch her go. ‘So are we entering Tuff Troll?’ I ask.

  Pearl looks at me through narrowed eyes. ‘Looks like I’m going to have to. There’s only one problem.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I wasn’t joking about the trainers. I haven’t got any running stuff either. Hang on.’ She looks down the track. ‘Got to have the last word.’ But Peeta’s nowhere to be seen. ‘That,’ she says, punching another tree, ‘is so annoying.’

  *

  Frida drops a plastic bag on the kitchen table. ‘Help yourself,’ she says to Pearl. ‘I always bring my yoga gear, but I hardly ever use it. I’m sure it will be fine for running.’ Pearl peers into the bag. Between her thumb and finger, she pulls out a pair of lime green harem pants. Daisies are embroidered round the hem. This is followed by an orange top covered in tassels. Pearl holds it at arm’s length like it’s contaminated.

  ‘Tie-dye,’ Pearl says. ‘Did you do that yourself?’ Frida smiles. ‘You’re very creative, aren’t you? I liked the picture you drew of me. We just saw it at the shop.’

  ‘And I like your lungs, sweetheart,’ Frida says, giving Pearl a quick hug.

  Pearl sighs deeply and steps away from her. ‘Alright. I’ll wear it.’ She snatches up the clothes and climbs up to the attic to get changed.

  Frida winks at me and tucks her towel under her arm. ‘Enjoy your run!’

  We sit on the veranda and soon Nanna turns up at the cabin with a pair of Sören’s old trainers. Pearl has rolled up the sleeves of the top so the tassels are hidden and is wearing the trousers low on her hips. Her hair is tied in a big knotty bunch high on her head.

  ‘Wow,’ says Nanna when she sees her. ‘Now you look like a pirate from a children’s book!’

  Pearl scowls and pulls on the trainers. ‘These stink,’ she mutters.

  Nanna shrugs. ‘That’s because they belong to Sören.’

  We head into the woods. ‘Are we going to Fun Run?’ asks Nanna, bouncing ahead of us up the path.

  ‘What’s that?’ Pearl’s hands dangle by her sides and she’s barely lifting her feet off the ground. As we jog along the path, I explain the basic idea of Fun Run, with Nanna enthusiastically demonstrating each move.

  ‘Don’t forget the Freak Out,’ she says, starting to scream and run like she’s being chased by zombies.

  ‘OK,’ Pearl says, pausing to cough violently. ‘Just so you both know, I am never doing that. Everyone stop!’ she shouts. ‘Tired.’ We walk for a few minutes until Pearl decides she’s ready to run again. ‘We do need something to make this better though,’ says Pearl. ‘Why do people do this? It’s like torture. I think I might puke …’ We all stop. ‘Nope. False alarm.’

  ‘It gets better,’ I say. ‘I like it now.’

  ‘Well, you’re weird. What we need is music.’

  ‘Yes!’ says Nanna. ‘Like we’re running to a disco.’

  ‘Can’t do it,’ I say. ‘My iPod battery ran out last week and I can’t charge it.’

  ‘Why not?’ asks Nanna.

  I laugh. ‘Because there’s no electricity.’

  ‘We’ve got electricity at our cabin.’ She says this like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

  ‘What?’ I stop running. ‘Are you telling me that, all this time, you’ve had electricity?’

  She nods. ‘All the youth hostel cabins have electricity. They run off the same generator.’

  ‘You never said.’

  She shrugs and carries on running. ‘You never asked.’

  ‘I can have straight hair again,’ I say, jogging after her, ‘and take selfies … and play Toast Time!’

  ‘More importantly,’ says Pearl. ‘We can have music. This afternoon I’m making us an awesome music mix for tomorrow’s run. I’m going to give you two a Fun Run you’ll never forget.’ This idea obviously fills Pearl with energy. She whoops and picks up speed, which is lucky as we are just passing Otto’s hut and he’s on the prowl. Nanna grins and runs after Pearl.

  ‘Don’t clench those fists,’ Otto shouts. ‘Loosen those fingers!’

  ‘What? Like this?’ Pearl asks, and she sticks one finger up at him.

  ‘Rude English girl!’ he shouts and he starts to run after us. This makes Pearl and Nanna scream and run faster.

  ‘Help!’ shouts Pearl as we pass a couple of tourists. ‘That old man is chasing us!’

  ‘Fool!’ he yells. I turn round. Otto has given up the chase and is staring at Pearl, arms folded. I’m about to say sorry – apologising for Pearl is something I’m good at – then I realise he’s smiling.

  ‘Lazy English idiot!’ he shouts.

  ‘Old Swedish perv!’ she shouts, throwing her head back and laughing. Then she dashes off so fast I can barely keep up with her.

  SIXTEEN

  Otto must have forgiven Pearl because the following morning he turns up at our cabin with two printed training schedules. A printer! Suddenly, I’m seeing evidence of electricity everywhere.

  ‘This is what you’re going to do,’ he says, handing me an A4 sheet. ‘When you complete an activity, I tick it off.’ He jabs at the little boxes running down the side of the sheet. ‘Where’s Pearl?’

  ‘Down there,’ I say, ‘on the jetty.’ She’s been sitting there for the past two hours, in her bikini and pirate shirt, working on our running playlist. Spread around her are our three iPods and her laptop. Yesterday we had a big charging session over at Nanna’s.

  Otto goes over to her. ‘Here we are, young lady.’ He holds out her schedule.

  Pearl pulls out one earphone, takes the sheet and drops it on the planks next to her. ‘You shouldn’t have bothered,’ she says.

  ‘Oh yes I should.’ He stands over her, hands on his hips. ‘I organise Tuff Troll and I’m responsible for all the competitors. You have got under two weeks to get fit. If I don’t see you running round this island, swimming or kayaking every single day, you’re not competing, and neither is your friend.’

  ‘Alright, calm down,’ she says, smiling under her long hair.

  ‘After each session, you see me, and this afternoon, you are going out on one of my kayaks.’ He stomps back to his moped and starts it up. ‘Kayak hire is one hundred kronor an hour,’ he shouts over the engine. Then he disappears in a burst of smoke.

  The moment he’s gone, Pearl picks up the sheet. ‘Says here we should be running.’

  ‘Two laps of the island.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well, what?’

  ‘Get your trainers on.’ says Pearl. ‘Time for a Fun Run!’

  We meet Nanna outside the shop. She’s just jogged a lap of the island and she’s happy to do another one. I think she’d do anything Pearl suggested.

  ‘Find the Fun Run playlist and put your earphones in,’ says Pearl. We do as we’re told, Nanna grinning with excitement. ‘It’s important that our music is synchronised or this won’t work.’

  ‘What won’t work?’ I ask. Pearl’s air of mystery is starting to get annoying.

  ‘You’ll see. You just need to copy me.’ She widens
her eyes. She is so enjoying this. ‘OK, press play on the count of three.’ Obediently, Nanna’s finger hovers over ‘play’. ‘One … two … THREE!’

  We all press play and thudding hip-hop blasts into my ears. ‘Keep it loud, but not so loud you can’t hear me!’ Pearl shouts. ‘Enjoyin’ the tunes?’ Nanna nods eagerly. ‘Ready to run?’

  ‘Yes!’ shouts Nanna.

  ‘Ready for some FUN?’

  ‘Yes!’ Nanna’s jumping up and down.

  ‘Yes,’ I say with a sigh, but neither of them hear me.

  ‘Then let’s do this!’ Pearl takes the lead, running into the woods, one arm raised high, pumping in time to the music. Nanna follows her, her arm waving madly above her head and I jog after them. No way am I doing any air-punching. We’ve only been going for a minute or so when Pearl stops, spins round and starts to do a simple hip-hop move. ‘Shoulder punch!’ she shouts. ‘C’mon, Kat, move those shoulders.’

  ‘Really?’ I say. I glance around to see if anyone is watching.

  ‘Look at Nanna. She’s got style! She’s got the moves!’ Nanna is shoulder punching like mental, her hair whirling round her face. It looks like I’m in one of those situations where you just have to join in. I start a half-hearted shoulder punch and Pearl nods her approval. ‘C’mon, girls. Let’s Fun Run!’ And she’s off.

  Pearl’s planned the whole route and every few minutes, she makes us stop and do another move. She’s like a cross between a DJ and a dance instructor, and so enthusiastic I find it impossible not to start enjoying myself. We Harlem shake at the campsite (embarrassing), slide glide at the dock (painful) and twerk by the swings (inappropriate).

  At one point we laugh so hard that Nanna has to sit on the floor so she doesn’t wet herself. ‘Come on,’ says Pearl. ‘Only one track left and I’ve saved the best till last.’

  As we run into the mötesplats, I see Peeta coming out of the youth hostel. Leo isn’t with her and I haven’t seen him since he trod on my cinnamon bun.

  ‘Copy me,’ Pearl says, just as ‘Super Trouper’ starts to play. She drops to the ground. I think I know what’s coming next, the most embarrassing dance move ever invented: the worm. Pearl starts to pop her body so she’s wriggling forward in the dusty grass.

  ‘Yeah!’ says Nanna, throwing herself down next to Pearl and writhing around.

  ‘Nice swag, Nan,’ Pearl calls out. ‘Kat. Get down here and crank your ass.’ Out of the corner of my eye, I see Peeta gasp and put her hand up to her mouth, and that’s when I get down and start to do the worm, enthusiastically, with passion and absolutely no swag. ‘Go, Kat!’ says Pearl. ‘Move it, baby! Yeah! Just like a wiggly worm!’ Pearl makes us worm to the entire song and by the end we’ve wriggled halfway across the mötesplats.

  Pearl rolls on her back and shrieks with laughter. I pull out my earphones and lie next to her, every muscle in my body aching. I don’t care what Peeta thinks because I’ve just been doing the worm with my friends and I feel so happy. Nanna sits up, dry grass stuck to her hair. ‘Can we do it again?’ she asks.

  ‘No,’ says Pearl, jumping to her feet. Out of her back pocket she pulls our training schedules. ‘C’mon, Kat. We’ve got to see Otto.’

  The three of us wander through the woods to Otto’s cabin. ‘Oi!’ shouts Pearl. He’s pulling kayaks out of a rack. ‘We did it. Bet you thought we wouldn’t.’

  ‘Well done,’ he says. He disappears into his hut. ‘I saw you adding some core-strengthening exercises of your own invention. Good idea.’ Pearl rests against a tree. Otto comes out holding a sheet of stickers. ‘Which one would you like?’ he asks, holding out the sheet.

  For a moment, she just stares at the stickers. ‘That one,’ she says eventually. ‘The purple sparkly one.’

  Otto peels it off and sticks it over the first box. ‘Good work, Pearl,’ he says.

  ‘Whatever.’ She turns and walks away.

  Otto comes over to me. ‘Green, please,’ I say.

  ‘There we are.’ He passes me my training schedule. ‘By the way,’ he says. ‘You’ve got an unfinished job.’ He nods in the direction of his hut. The roof is still covered in poo. ‘Leo has taken off for a while, doing another job for me, so if you ever find yourself at a loose end …’ I look at him suspiciously, but he just shrugs and turns away.

  ‘How come I don’t get stickers?’ asks Nanna.

  Otto takes the biggest sticker – a round yellow cheese doing a thumbs-up sign – and sticks it on her forehead. ‘Now you’ve got a sticker.’

  SEVENTEEN

  In theory, we follow Otto’s schedule every day and we always have at least one Fun Run with Nanna. The quality of our training depends on Pearl’s mood and how much she’s craving a cigarette. Our training is often interrupted by sunbathing and eating ice creams, but I don’t think Otto knows this and soon we’ve got a lot of stickers. Sometimes, I abandon Pearl and run off on my own. I love how invincible I feel – now I never get stitches or feel sick. I wonder if Stråla wasn’t an island, just how far I could go. I’m starting to think it would be a very long way.

  Because we’ve been living in our running clothes, getting ready for the disco on Friday is fun. I sit on the bed and talk to Pearl while she does her make-up and gets dressed. In complete defiance to the heatwave, she puts on black lurex leggings and a black top with a pair of red eyes glaring out from the front. Her hair is wilder than ever because she’s decided not to bother washing it. She likes the way the sea makes it look ‘freaky’.

  ‘Do you know,’ says Pearl as we walk into the cafe, ‘you got ready in under ten minutes. That must be a record for you. You usually take ten minutes just applying lipstick.’

  I shrug. ‘I guess I’ve got out of the habit.’ I look down at what I’m wearing: a white dress that looks so awesome against my tan that I don’t care how resplendent it is. ‘Do I look alright?’

  ‘You look OK. Anyway, what’s the point in dressing up? There are no fit boys here.’ Pearl looks around the cafe while I rummage in my bag for my purse. ‘Hang on,’ she says. ‘Who’s that?’

  I look up. Pearl is gazing at the stage where Otto’s disco is set up. Standing behind the decks is Leo. He’s wearing a washed-out shirt with rolled-up sleeves, and his arms are golden from the sun. His hair is falling across his face. ‘That,’ I say, ‘is Leo.’

  ‘That’s Leo? Huh.’ She stares at him. ‘I thought you said he was nothing special.’

  ‘It’s not just about looks –’

  ‘His looks are sexy.’

  ‘Stop looking, Pearl!’ I try to pull her toward the cafe, but she refuses to move. In a way I can understand. All I want to do is stare at Leo. Together we watch as Peeta goes up to him and slips her arm round his waist. ‘Let’s get a drink,’ I say.

  ‘Why would he go out with her?’ says Pearl.

  ‘They’re perfect for each other,’ I say. ‘C’mon, time for a Friday night fruit juice!’

  ‘We’ll see,’ says Pearl, eyeing a half-empty beer bottle.

  We find Nanna at our rock and, after a few minutes, Leo and Peeta come over and join us. It had to happen eventually. To begin with, it’s massively awkward – Leo and I both spend a lot of time staring at the rock, or the sea, or anywhere but at each other, but soon Peeta and Nanna start talking about Tuff Troll, discussing the exciting news that Otto’s actually got a prize for this year, an ‘I Stråla’ hoodie.

  Pearl is suspiciously quiet, following the conversation closely, but not joining in. Her eyes flick from person to person. Suddenly, she says, ‘Hey, Leo.’ He looks up. ‘We’ve not properly met. I’m Pearl, Kat’s friend.’

  ‘Hello,’ he says, frowning.

  ‘She’s told me all about you,’ she says, smiling sweetly. She looks terrifying.

  ‘She told me about you too,’ he says. I did. In the few days we spent together, I told Leo everything about my life.

  ‘Did she say that we’re best mates? And that I always look out for my mates?’ The smile has gone no
w and everyone is silent. I see Peeta move her fingers so they’re resting against Leo’s hand. I know exactly why she’s done this.

  Leo pulls away his hand and sits up. He looks Pearl in the eye. ‘I think Kat can look after herself.’

  ‘Yes, I can,’ I say quickly. Pearl scowls at me, pulls out a packet of Lakrisal and throws two of the sweets in her mouth. A few days after Pearl was forced to stop smoking, she developed a new habit of eating Lakrisal – small salty liquorice lozenges – and now she averages three packets a day. ‘So, what have you two been up to?’ I ask with a smile. If I can get over Leo, then so can Pearl.

  ‘Enjoying the island together,’ says Peeta. I try to keep my smile fixed in place.

  ‘And I’ve been doing a job for Otto,’ says Leo. ‘He arranges camping trips to different islands and I was checking the tents are OK. When I was out there, I went free diving.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Pearl asks, her voice almost back to normal.

  ‘You dive down into the sea using a snorkel and flippers, no oxygen tank.’

  ‘It’s pointless,’ says Peeta. ‘There’s nothing to see around here.’

  ‘I saw lots of things,’ says Leo. ‘Prawns and chequered snails, and perch and pike. It feels like another world. The colours are so vivid, even the seaweed looks beautiful.’ As Leo talks he smiles, losing his frown. And even though I’m definitely over him, I realise I’m smiling too as he describes his dive. ‘This perch had orange fins and was big. It swam right up to me and stuck its nose in my face … I actually felt it!’ He laughs then trails off, aware that he’s been talking perch for some time.

  ‘They can grow up to a metre long,’ says Pearl, ripping open a fresh packet of Lakrisal. ‘They get big round here because of the herring.’

  Suddenly, Peeta says, ‘Do you like aquatic biology, Pearl?’ It could be an innocent question, but not the way she says it. Clearly she’s had enough of Leo and Pearl’s cosy chat.

  ‘What? Fish? Yeah. I love them. More than I like most people.’ For a moment, they stare at each other. Then Pearl looks past her to the sea and her eyes go wide. ‘Do you get whales round here?’ she says, excited. ‘I would love to see a whale.’ For a moment, all her hardness slips away, and I see the girl I first met at nursery school. The girl who once cried when she found a squashed woodlouse in her plimsoll.