The Sea Sisters

by Clarke, Lucy

  ‘Oh. Do I?’ she said with a smile.

  He stared at her, open mouthed. ‘You hustled me?’

  She slid the large pile of money across the table and into her wallet. ‘Yes, I believe I did.’

  He laughed, a loud, throaty sound that pleased her. ‘Where the hell did you learn to play poker like that?’

  ‘On my travels.’

  ‘I can’t believe it. You’ve been letting me win for –’ he glanced at his watch – ‘an hour and a half, and then you pull out the big guns in the final play. Katie Greene, you’ve changed.’

  She smiled.

  ‘Now I’ve only got four nights to reclaim my dignity.’

  She wished he wouldn’t remind her of how little time he had left. She gathered up their cards.

  ‘I suppose the loser should get the next round.’ He gestured to her empty glass. ‘Vodka orange?’

  ‘Please.’

  She watched his easy strides, his shorts hanging low over his hips like a schoolboy’s. The other guests wore shirts and light trousers, but she liked his casualness; anything else on Finn would be wrong. He said something to the barman, who laughed and clapped a hand on Finn’s shoulder. She remembered how he used to arrive at the house she shared in London with Jess and two other girls and, before he’d even got as far as her room, she’d hear her housemates laughing at some quip he’d made. His ability to make people laugh, to make her laugh, was one of many things she’d loved about him.

  When he returned with their drinks, he set them down and said, ‘Right. I’ve been very courteous and avoided bringing this up since visiting Richard Hastings, but that was a week ago now. So, I’d really like to know: when are you planning on going to the Umanuk cliffs?’

  She took a long swig of her drink. ‘Soon.’

  ‘Not good enough. I’m looking for a date. A time. A mode of transport.’

  ‘I’m not ready. Honestly. I can’t go there yet.’

  ‘It’s a huge thing,’ he said more gently, ‘I realize that. But you need to do this, Katie.’

  She placed her drink down and pressed her lips together. They felt cool from the ice. ‘Once I go there, this whole thing … following Mia’s journal … it ends. I always imagined I’d go to the cliff with answers. But I don’t have any.’

  ‘Maybe there will never be answers.’

  ‘There have to be. Because what am I supposed to do afterwards? Just fly home? Get on with my life?’

  ‘Does that scare you?’

  The couple at the next table stood and carried their drinks through to the restaurant to be seated for dinner. ‘There’s nothing in London for me any more. No family. No fiancé. No job.’

  ‘It’s going to be hard but you will manage. You’re strong, Katie. Resilient. You’ve got your friends. You’ve got me.’

  Was he setting himself apart from the category of a friend? She glanced at his face but his expression seemed impassive, difficult to read.

  ‘Why don’t we go back together?’ he said. ‘If you’re not ready for London, you can crash at Mum and Dad’s for a while. Teach me your poker moves.’

  She smiled.

  ‘You’ve got to go back at some point. I’d rather it were with me.’

  ‘What will you do when you’re home?’ she said, shifting the focus. ‘Are you staying in Cornwall?’

  ‘Depends on work – whether I get back into radio.’

  ‘Will the station take you back?’

  ‘I doubt it. They weren’t hugely impressed when I quit.’

  ‘You worked so hard to get that job. I thought you loved it there?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘Why did you leave?’

  He lifted his shoulders. ‘I was never able to say no to her.’

  The thought of what happened between Finn and Mia reared up in her mind. It was one of the few things they’d not talked about and it hung between them now. She fixed her gaze on him. ‘Were you in love with Mia?’

  He drew in a breath. ‘Yes.’

  She felt the stab in her gut, a sharp pain that spread outwards and made her want to hug her arms to her middle. Instead, she picked up her drink to give her hands something to do. ‘Since when?’

  Finn scratched a knuckle back and forth beneath his chin. ‘When we were 16 we were at a gig and she kissed me. Just a peck on the lips, that was all. She didn’t mean anything by it. But for me it was the first time I’d thought of her as more than a friend.’

  Her eyes widened. ‘All this time you’ve…’

  ‘No. No, I don’t think so. It’s hard to untangle because Mia always meant so much to me.’

  ‘But when you travelled together…’

  ‘I realized that I was in love with her.’

  Her throat felt tight. She took another drink and finished it. ‘It must have been hard seeing her with Noah.’

  ‘It was hell.’

  ‘What was he like?’

  ‘He was an incredible surfer. Completely focused on it. I think Mia was drawn to that intensity in him.’

  Katie nodded.

  ‘But he was also distant, a bit of a loner, really. He hung back from the crowd. He always struck me as troubled. I’m not claiming that’s an objective opinion. It’s just mine.’

  ‘Mia wrote the same thing. She said there was a sadness about him that reminded her of herself.’

  Finn swallowed. ‘You know, if I’d thought he’d loved her, then maybe my opinion of him would have been different.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It would’ve been easier to let her go.’

  They were both silent for a time.

  Finn shifted and when she looked up, she saw his foot was jigging nervously. ‘I’ve got questions, Katie. About her journal … About some other things Mia may have written.’

  Of course he would have, she realized. ‘Ask me whatever you need.’

  ‘Did Mia write anything,’ he began, his gaze slipping to the floor, ‘about why she slept with me?’

  She thought back to the entry, the description of the stars dripping from the sky and the rum warm in Mia’s throat. ‘She wanted to feel what you did.’

  ‘Only she didn’t.’

  ‘You’d always been her best friend. She wrote that it was too big a jump for her to think of you as anything else.’

  ‘She regretted it?’

  ‘She regretted how it changed things.’

  ‘Sorry, I know it must be odd talking about this. After us.’

  She looked at him closely. ‘When we were together, were you … in love with her?’

  He took a deep breath. ‘I found it hard that Mia and I weren’t speaking. Really hard. But when I was with you, I was never wishing I was with Mia.’

  It was a relief, at least, to hear that. ‘I’m sorry for how things ended between us,’ she said suddenly.

  ‘It’s in the past.’

  No, it’s not. It’s here in the present, she thought. ‘Do you remember what I said to you at the end? We went to that bar in Clapham.’

  ‘Course. You told me it had been fun, but you didn’t see a future.’

  Her heart began to drum. ‘That wasn’t the truth.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I was worried about Mia. It was tearing her apart that we were—’

  ‘Miss Katie!’ Ketut was rushing towards their table. ‘I have a message for you!’

  She blinked. ‘A message?’

  ‘Yes, a fax. It is here for you.’ He passed her a white sheet of paper.

  She angled it towards the light and read:

  Katie,

  Following your visit, I was pleased to make some inquiries regarding your stolen backpack. It seems that you are in luck: yesterday the police arrested part of the Malaysian gang we spoke of. I am told your backpack has been recovered, although I’m not sure if anything of value remains.

  I do not claim any part in having the backpack returned to you. The police were scheduled to do so later in the week; my inquiry sim
ply prompted a marginally swifter delivery. I do hope its return gives you a little pleasure; no doubt you deserve it.

  Yours,

  Richard Hastings

  She looked up at Ketut.

  He beamed. ‘Your backpack has been taken to your room.’

  *

  She ran from the bar, her sandals clacking against the tiled floor. Ducking past a family dressed for dinner, she raced along the wide corridor towards her room, Finn behind her. She slipped the key in the lock and burst in.

  Propped against the foot of her bed was Mia’s backpack. It looked more worn than she’d remembered. There was a rip along the front pocket and a dark stain spread from the bottom upwards, as if it’d been sitting in oil. She crossed the room and lifted it onto the bed, not wanting to think about why it felt lighter. She groped with the buckle and drawstring and then dug her hand into the belly of the bag.

  Please, she said to herself, please be in here. She began yanking items free – clothes, shoes and toiletries were bundled up together and she tossed them onto the bed. A shampoo bottle had leaked over her belongings, turning her fingers damp and sticky. She pulled out item after item: a green dress, a paperback, a pair of earphones, a torch. Then her hand met with the bottom of the bag. There was nothing more in it.

  ‘No!’ She flipped it upside down and shook fiercely. ‘Come on!’

  She shoved the bag aside and pawed through the belongings littering the bed: flip-flops, a hairbrush, a cardigan, suncream, a pair of shorts. She must have missed it. She turned everything over, shaking out clothing, tossing aside shoes. She sieved through the pile again, twice. ‘It’s not here! Her journal’s not here!’

  She turned and saw Finn crouched beside the backpack. He was running his hands along it and then he unzipped a side pocket, which she must have missed in her hurry. She saw a flash of sea-blue as he pulled out the journal, a magician performing his best trick.

  ‘Thank God!’ she cried. She took it, her fingers moving over the cover. The spine was worn and cracked and the fabric seemed thinner. She flicked her thumb through the pages: it was all there!

  ‘Finn—’ she said, spinning round.

  She froze.

  His expression was serious and in his hands he held a dress. It was the colour of wet grass and belonged to Mia, one of the few items of her clothing that Katie had kept in the backpack. She watched as he fingered the light cotton straps that would once have rested on Mia’s shoulders. She wondered what memory it stirred to make his eyes close for a moment. He lifted the dress, as if trying to find weight or substance in the empty material, and then he drew it to his face and breathed in the smell of her sister.

  Even though you’re gone, it will always be you and Finn, won’t it?

  Finn opened his eyes and his gaze met Katie’s. Neither of them spoke. It felt as if Mia’s presence suddenly loomed so large that the air in the room constricted with it. They both held part of her in their hands.

  Suddenly Finn loosened the dress from his grip and cleared his throat. ‘You’ve got the journal back.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You must be desperate to read it,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘I’ll give you some space.’

  She nodded. Even before the door closed behind him, she was pulling herself onto the bed, drawing the journal into her lap and opening the intimate cream pages.

  24

  MIA

  Bali, March

  Mia reached the cliff top and planted her hands on her hips while she caught her breath. Sweat beaded between her breasts and at the waist of her shorts and she was grateful for the breeze funnelling up from the sea.

  Noah was sitting in the shade cast by a granite boulder, his knees drawn towards his chest. She knew he’d be here. The lonely ocean view drew him daily to the cliff’s crown to watch the waves peeling below. He did not turn at the sound of her footsteps, nor as she lowered herself beside him, pressing her back against the cool boulder.

  From a canvas shoulder bag she took out a bottle of water and a sandwich. ‘Thought you might be hungry.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, taking them. His eyes briefly met hers and she saw the hollow rings beneath them. Week-old stubble grazed his jaw and the cut on his forehead had healed over with a brown scab.

  After his surfing accident three weeks ago, Noah had driven himself to hospital, leaving a ragged bloodstain on the driver’s seat. The doctor, who wouldn’t examine him until he’d returned with proof that he could pay the final bill, told Noah he had an acute tear to the rotator cuff muscles in his shoulder and a 3-inch laceration on his upper back that would need stitches.

  ‘I waited for you back at the hostel. How did the check-up go?’

  His gaze was on the sea where lines of swell, smooth and glassy, rippled beneath its surface.

  ‘The cut on my back’s infected.’

  Yesterday she’d seen the wound as she’d helped him change the dressing. The jagged mouth of it was raw and pink, but in the centre she’d noticed a paler tinge to the flesh and had worried then about infection. ‘Have they given you antibiotics?’

  He nodded. ‘Anyway, they reckon the muscle damage will keep me off the water for at least three months. Maybe six.’

  ‘It’ll be sooner,’ she promised, placing her hand over his and squeezing it.

  The morning following Noah’s accident, she’d found him at Nyang beach, using his good arm to launch sticks into the rolling surf.

  ‘I need to know,’ Mia had said, coming to stand at his side, ‘why you put yourself in such danger?’ All night she’d replayed the image of him staggering from the surf. ‘You could have been killed.’

  Noah had stared at her, the flatness of his expression unreadable. ‘I know I could have.’

  Since then he’d taken to spending most days alone on the cliff top, watching the peeling waves and listening to the far-off hoots and cries of the surfers who rode them. In the evenings he’d come to her room and he’d make love to her with a desperate urgency. Afterwards they’d lie together beneath the whirling fan, before Noah returned to his room to sleep alone.

  ‘I was thinking,’ she began, forcing her voice to sound bright, ‘that we could do something different tomorrow. You said Ubud is beautiful. I’d love to visit the temples and water gardens. We could spend a few days up there – stay in one of the lodges where it’s cooler.’ She imagined a small place set in the foothills, embraced by brilliant tropical plants that perfumed the air. Away from the dusty heat of town she’d draw Noah out of himself. They’d take early-morning walks through dewy grass, spend the afternoons in bed making love, and talk late into the night.

  ‘I’m thinking of leaving Bali.’

  ‘What?’ She felt a pressure expanding in her chest. ‘Why?’

  ‘I came here for the surf.’

  ‘I came here for you.’ The words were out before she could stop them. She thought for a moment of Finn and all she’d sacrificed. The image of him was like a fist squeezing tight around her heart. ‘What about us?’

  Noah withdrew his hand from beneath hers and she felt the gesture was something larger than that. ‘I don’t know,’ he said eventually. ‘I’m sorry. I just don’t know.’

  Her happiness had become measured with a ruler notched by her interactions with Noah. She’d read books in which characters described themselves as being ‘imprisoned’ by love, and had dismissed the term as melodramatic. But now she could think of no better way to describe what it was she felt: she was trapped by the intensity of her feelings for Noah.

  ‘I love you.’ The words slipped out unbidden and immediately her cheeks flamed. She looked at her hands, shaken by the enormity of what she had declared. It was the first time she’d said those words to a man.

  Silence swelled around them. She waited, willing him to speak.

  When he said nothing, she felt her eyes pricking with tears. She glanced up, setting her gaze on two gulls wheeling on the air currents, the undersides of their wings sharp
white.

  Mia stood and began moving towards the cliff edge, breaking away from his silence. The breeze was stiff against her cheeks and she squinted into the sun as she tracked the gulls. They glided down the cliff face, dipping low to the sea where waves hummed and rolled. She envied their freedom: she wanted to dive from the cliff, fly through the air and drift above the ocean.

  She stepped forward, placing her toes right at the edge. It was a 400-foot drop onto angular slabs of rock, which waited like tombstones. The breeze wound around her fingers and she began to lift her arms like wings, the cool air stroking her skin, soothing her. The lure of the ocean, liquid and glinting, beckoned her and a dizzy rush filled her head.

  Suddenly Noah was beside her, grabbing her arm and yanking her away from the edge. ‘What the fuck were you doing?’

  ‘I … I was just …’ she stammered, shocked by herself.

  ‘You were right out on the edge!’

  ‘I wanted to feel the breeze.’

  He released his grip and his fingers left a red imprint around her wrist. ‘Jesus, Mia, I thought you were…’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Tears stung the back of her throat and she couldn’t meet his eye.

  ‘Hey,’ he said more softly now. ‘It’s okay. I overreacted.’

  She felt his hand on her lower back and stepped towards him. He folded her into his arms and she pressed her cheek to his chest. She wrapped her arms tightly around him, her hands clutching his cotton T-shirt.

  As she listened to the fierce drumming of his heart, she realized that they were no longer hugging: she was holding on.

  *

  Mia drifted along the corridor towards her room, her mind heavy. Noah had offered no time frame of when he would leave, or explanation as to what would happen between them, but deep within her she already knew: it was ending.

  She unlocked the door and stepped into the stagnant heat. She’d forgotten to leave the window ajar so the sun had been blazing in, cooking the dust motes that hung in the air.

  ‘How’s it goin’?’

  She turned in the doorway to find Jez approaching. ‘Fine,’ she replied, ducking inside, desperate to be alone. All she wanted was to stretch out on her bed, close her eyes and sleep.

  His trainers squeaked across the lino floor as he followed her in. She hadn’t seen him in almost two weeks and knew he was here to collect the money she still owed. Yesterday she’d visited the bank and had been surprised to learn that her overdraft was already at its threshold. She knew things would be tight after splurging on the flight to Bali, but had been blithely unaware how desperate her finances were. When she and Finn had drawn up a budget for the trip, they’d built in three months working in New Zealand; now that that was out of the equation, she had no idea how she’d survive.