Now Is Our Time

by Jo Kessel

  Claire kissed her goodnight and headed back downstairs. She found Jonah on the patio, lazing in the hammock in his swimming shorts, nursing a glass of white wine. On the round mosaic table an open bottle sat in a cooler next to a spare glass. Claire glanced at her watch and did the arithmetic. It was now 6 pm local time, which made it 2 am in Britain. She was tired and yet the sun still hadn’t fallen below the level of the trees shading the terrace. The thick vegetation surrounding them made it impossible to see the Pacific but they could hear it. Claire closed her eyes, listening to waves crashing against the shore.

  “I’m tired,” she yawned, making a beeline for the wine and pouring herself a glass. She was only wearing a bikini and yet the heat of the day was wrapping around her like a healing balm.

  “It’s my favourite Sauvignon Blanc from a local winery called Hawk Watch,” Jonah told her. “And you know why I picked this one?”

  “Why?” asked Claire, taking a generous mouthful and letting the flavours settle on her palate. It was sensational. Cool and dry.

  “What can you taste?”

  “It’s a fruit, but I can’t work out which one.”

  “Remember, it was picked with you in mind,” teased Jonah.

  “Tell me, what is it?”

  “How can you of all people not know?” Jonah laughed.

  “Is it a berry?”

  “Yes, but which one?”

  Strawberry, blueberry, loganberry, blackberry, none of them felt right.

  “I’m too tired to guess,” Claire gave up, “just tell me.”

  “Ok,” Jonah conceded, holding out his spare hand as an invitation for Claire to join him in the hammock. “It’s gooseberry.”

  He was messing with her.

  “Very funny,” said Claire.

  Jonah took Claire’s glass from her and leaned carefully out of the hammock to lay both of their wines on the ground. He then sat up, wrapped his long arms around Claire’s back and yanked her playfully on top of him. She squealed as the hammock tipped precariously, but after they’d wriggled back into its centre, it settled and stilled.

  “I’ve got the best cure ever for jet lag,” he said, easing her into a comfortable position as they gently swayed.

  “What’s that then?” she murmured, her smile hitting his lips as he pulled her close. He tasted deliciously of wine. And yes, a hint of gooseberry. His skin felt so good against hers under the warmth of the sun. He slipped his hands underneath her black bikini bottoms. She wriggled nervously.

  “I’ve got to put on some more clothes,” insisted Claire, “or the neighbours will see.”

  “Pretty English lady,” Jonah inched the bikini bottoms lower, “nobody can see here, I promise you, and even if they could, the jet lag cure I’ve got in mind means that whatever, these are going to have to come off.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Claire lay in bed, her limbs paralysed. It was as if she’d been drugged. She was awake, yet she was not awake. She was aware, yet she was not aware. In a fug of semi-consciousness she heard voices. Was she dreaming? At first she heard a woman’s voice. Perhaps it was the caretaker’s wife, Maria, checking in. She strained her ears. No, the voice was too young. Was it Jonah’s ex-wife? She willed her body to wake up. She didn’t want to be seen but, perhaps if she could manage to roll out of bed, she might be able to hide behind the wall at the top of the stairs and spy. But try as she might to force her legs to swing over the mattress and take her body with them, she couldn’t. She drifted back off into blissful slumber. Minutes, hours, who knew how much longer later she heard children’s voices, girls’ voices accompanied by lots of laughter and running. Jonah calmly called “Careful, your feet are wet from the swimming pool, don’t slip.” Miriam, one of the girls must be Miriam? Claire had to wake up and check she was ok, but still she couldn’t move and drifted back off. Minutes, hours, who knew how much longer later, those voices became louder, chasing up and down the stairs. Martha, one of the girls must be Martha, had a sweet accent. “I’ve got a twister in my room,” she called. Claire had to wake up. She had to meet Martha. Jonah had told her that Martha was being delivered this morning. How rude that she hadn’t been there to meet her, but still she couldn’t move and drifted back into a dream about cars and parking tickets and supersonic vehicles that didn’t make any sense whatsoever.

  “Claire,” someone shook her shoulder.

  This time it was a man’s voice.

  “Claire, you’ve got to wake up, I’ve brought you some coffee.”

  She didn’t want to wake up, she wanted to snooze and return to the supersonic vehicle dream where she’d now patented the car and was about to make a fortune for having been the first person clever enough to design it. She heard the sound of a cup land on a table next to her and then felt a hand on each of her shoulders. They tugged at her and pulled her to sitting. She reluctantly opened an eye, then immediately closed it. The room was too bright. She slumped, wanting to lower herself into the refuge of the bed once again and to shroud herself back into darkness.

  “No you don’t,” said Jonah, pulling her back to sitting. “If you don’t get up now, you’ll be stuffed later. Trust me.”

  Now she was awake. She yawned and ran her forearm over her eyes.

  “What time is it?” she croaked.

  “It’s ten o’clock and you’ve been asleep for thirteen hours.”

  Thirteen hours? Wow, Claire was normally lucky to get seven hours. She looked at the mug of coffee by her bedside. She usually started the day with tea.

  “You need the extra caffeine to wake you,” Jonah read her mind. “Drink it because we’ve got plans for the day already.”

  “Plans, what plans?”

  She’d envisaged a nice, chill day by the pool, perhaps followed by a beach walk.

  “It’s the perfect cure for jet lag,” smirked Jonah.

  No, he couldn’t mean that again?

  “Honey, I haven’t even woken up properly yet,” she protested, remembering last night’s hammock shenanigans. She had a seemingly insatiable appetite for Jonah, but really, now, again?

  “No,” he laughed, “I don’t mean sex. We’ve got something completely different planned. The girls chose it. Blame them, not me.”

  -----------------

  The girls! She had to check on the girls and meet Martha. Claire quickly finished her coffee and popped in the shower. The water spray revived her, which is what she needed because now, as the moment approached, she found herself nervous. Jonah had seemed so cool when he’d met Miriam so why did she feel like such a bundle of nerves? It mattered that this went well, it mattered that Martha liked her.

  Once dry, she put on a pair of green denim shorts and a grey ribbed vest top and searched in her only half-unpacked suitcase for the main present they’d bought for Martha. It wasn’t there. She flung all her remaining clothes onto the beige carpet in a fluster. She couldn’t have forgotten it. Or could she? She’d been juggling so many balls that perhaps it was inevitable that something would slip through the net. Oh well, at least she knew that the other smaller present hadn’t been forgotten. Claire had rescued that one from the suitcase as soon as they’d arrived, before it had had a chance to melt into oblivion. Miriam had been so disappointed when she’d tried one of the Hershey bars that she’d insisted on bringing Martha some ‘proper’ chocolate. So they’d bought her a massive bar of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk, which was now in the fridge. She could hear the girls playing in one of the upstairs rooms. Her heart thumped a little faster than normal as she followed the noise.

  “Oh,” she said, smiling when she found them. They were playing in Martha’s room, huddled around a plastic box whose many compartments, to the untrained eye, looked as if they contained a multicoloured array of elastic bands. “That’s where Martha’s present is. I was worried I’d forgotten it.”

  Martha did a half-spin on her bottom, finishing facing Claire. She was even prettier in the flesh than she’d been in the photo. Her hair wa
s almost phosphorescent in its whiteness and her eyes were spookily similar to Jonah’s, perhaps even a deeper shade of grey. Despite her fair colouring, she too had deeply bronzed skin.

  “I came to take it out of your bag,” explained Miriam, “because I wanted to give it to Martha.”

  “Great idea,” said Claire.

  Martha’s gaze was boring a hole in her head.

  “Hey, Martha,” said Claire, approaching and squatting to join the girls. “It’s so nice to finally meet you and sorry I was such a sleepyhead this morning. Miriam chose this present. I hope you don’t have it already.”

  “No Ma’am,” said Martha

  “No,” laughed Claire, mortified. Now she knew how her mother felt. “Please call me Claire.”

  The gift was called Rainbow Loom and was the latest craze in bracelet-making. There were a thousand and more ways that these rubber bands could be fashioned into different weaves. Martha held up her wrist for inspection.

  “Miriam made me this one,” she said.

  It was blue, black and green.

  “And Martha made me this one,” Miriam showed off her new pink and purple bracelet. Yep, the girls had already sussed out each other’s tastes.

  “Thank you Ma’am, I mean Claire,” Martha giggled. “I love the Rainbow Looms.”

  “It’s my pleasure.”

  “And now that you’re up,” Martha scrambled to her feet wearing the same impish grin as her father, “we’re going out. Miriam thinks you’re going to love what we’ve got planned.”

  -----------

  It was a good thing that Claire had been busy in the run-up to San Diego because that had given her less time to fret. She was a worrier, perhaps not one of her better traits, and it had become worse since having a child. Series of ‘what ifs’ would rattle round her brain before there was even a sniff of a concern. If she’d had a proper chance to worry about this particular trip, it would have mostly pivoted around Martha. What if Martha doesn’t like me? What if Martha doesn’t like Miriam? What if Martha resents her father for introducing this new family into their lives? What if she resented the lot of them for invading what was hers and her father’s space and time. If Claire had been in Martha’s shoes, she wasn’t certain how happy she’d have been about it.

  Jonah, by contrast, took life in his stride. He worked on a philosophy that things only became a problem if you made them into one. And so far he was right. It was early days yet, admittedly, but far from appearing annoyed that her home and father had been usurped by foreigners with funny accents, Martha seemed delighted to have a ready-made play mate. It was indeed fortuitous that she and Miriam were so similar in age.

  Martha also thought Claire’s reaction to where they’d come was very amusing. They all did. It was hard for Claire to pale, given the shade of her skin, but somehow she’d managed. She was running around flapping her arms nervously, as if being chased by an imaginary swarm of bees. It was lucky that Claire hadn’t had a chance to fret in advance, because not only would she have worried, she would have told them there was no way she was coming here to do this. When they’d driven through the entrance of the San Diego Zoo Safari Park, she was excited. She’d heard about this place. It was a massive reserve where wild animals roam free over vast expanses as they would in their native habitats of Africa and Asia. There were white rhinos, buffalo, gazelles, lions and elephants and a smorgasbord of different safaris on offer. Sadly, the ‘safari’ the rest of the posse had in mind was far from conventional. Their idea of a great way to take in the wildlife was by observing it not only from a height, but at a speed. The park had a zip-line and Jonah kept referring to the four-hundred-feet long aerial flight as ‘the perfect jet lag cure’.

  There were signs everywhere posting contra-indications. “Do not do if you’ve got a bad back”. “Do not do if you’ve got heart problems”. “Do not do if you’re under 130cm”. “Do not do if you weigh less than 75 pounds”. “Do not do if you’re under 10 years old”.

  “Jonah,” she whispered. “They’re under age.”

  “Come on babe,” he whispered back, “they’re so excited. No-one will know. They’re both tall enough and weigh enough.”

  She knew he was right and she also knew she couldn’t disappoint the girls who had started jokingly referring to her as a ‘pussy’.

  “All right, girls,” Claire jogged on the spot, trying to gee herself up. “I’ll do it.”

  They were given helmets and a safety briefing, before being let loose on what was referred to as a ‘fledgling’ training zip-line. Children under sixteen had to fly with an adult, and the fact that she wouldn’t be doing it alone felt vaguely comforting. Claire wanted Jonah and Martha to go first, but the staff had different ideas, trussing her and Miriam into harnesses, clipping them onto a line, and with a “three, two, one” pushing them from the take-off platform. The fledgling line was actually quite enjoyable. It was fairly low to the ground and the speed was gentle as they flew between fragrant, shaded forest. If the line broke and they fell, there’d be the odd graze or cut, but nothing too serious. Why had she made such a fuss? Hell, this was fun.

  They were then loaded them into a truck and were driven across the dusty savannah towards the real part of the course. In the distance she spotted a steel platform which resembled some weirdly shaped electricity pylon. It wasn’t until they got out the vehicle and walked across a bouncing metal bridge that she fully appreciated that it was from the top of this towering pylon, one hundred and thirty feet high, that she would have to take a leap of faith. Perhaps even Miriam might want to back out. “Wow, that looks awesome,” squealed Martha, watching as someone in the distance flew along the zip. “I’m so excited,” Miriam jumped up and down.

  Nope, clearly Miriam was unaffected.

  “I need a Diazepam,” Claire pulled a weak smile, vowing she would never mock her mother again for being scared of flying.

  There was an eerie quiet in the atmosphere, as if this really was far, far away from civilisation. She felt Jonah’s hand like a caress on her back.

  “You ok babe?”

  “If I die,” she smiled weakly, “remember I love you.”

  “You’re not going to die,” he comforted her.

  They could all do it together, apparently, on two parallel zips. And so they formed two lines, Jonah and Martha next to Claire and Miriam, all being clipped and trussed and choreographed for simultaneous take-off, like some crazy, blended Brady Bunch family. “Three, two, one……………….

  -------------------------

  “Three cheers for Claire being brave,” said Jonah, as they drove out of the Safari Park.

  “That was soooo much fun,” said Miriam, “thank you for doing it Mummy.”

  “Hooray for Claire,” giggled Martha.

  Claire wondered what Martha really thought of her. She was being ever so polite when her own mother couldn’t possibly be quite such a wimp.

  “I love this photo,” chirped Miriam.

  “Me too,” echoed Martha.

  The girls had both loved the photo so much that Jonah had bought two copies of it so they could have one each. An aerial camera must have captured the moment at some particular scary point during the flight, perhaps when Claire’s stomach had started to lurch from the G-force. The picture said it all. Three passengers were beaming from ear to ear, eyes alive with excitement. The pussy member of the party had her eyes and lips firmly sealed.

  “My dad plays tennis,” Martha informed them, “and when he serves, the ball goes 130 mph which is way faster then we went on the zip-line.”

  “My mum plays tennis too,” said Miriam.

  “I do not play tennis,” said Claire.

  “Yes, you do,” Miriam boasted. “You got to the final last summer.”

  Claire laughed. Miriam was referring to her small local club, which could hardly be compared to Wimbledon. She’d always enjoyed playing tennis and whilst she might not have watched the game for the last thirteen years,
she never stopped hitting balls.

  “Yes, but only recreationally. Jonah did it competitively,” Claire explained. “It’s not the same.”

  “I want to see your Mom play tennis,” said Martha.

  “And I want to see your Dad play tennis,” said Miriam.

  Wasn’t a zip-line enough for them?

  “No. You guys have just done what you wanted to do and now I get to plan the rest of the day.”