by Tayte, Megan
‘Doesn’t it?’ said Luke. ‘I’m not saying it’s right, going about killing people. But if those people really do deserve it…’
‘If,’ said Jude. ‘If, Luke. And who is Gabriel or Sienna or Daniel or any Cerulean – any person on this planet – to pass judgement and decide who deserves to live and who deserves to die?’
We all thought about that.
‘It’s a matter of interpretation,’ said Luke. ‘Of what’s right and what’s wrong. Clearly, Gabriel thinks he’s right to use his power to the utmost.’
‘But he’s not right to go against the instinct!’ Jude slammed his mug down on the table. ‘Don’t you see, we know when to stop healing. We know who to help and who to leave. We know not to resurrect. We know not to kill. It’s fundamental knowledge – to ignore that is to go against everything that makes us human!’
‘But you’re not human,’ Luke pointed out. ‘Not just human.’
I thought Jude would go for him, he was so angry. I looked at Luke and saw he was flushed too, but calmer.
‘Luke,’ I said, ‘I don’t understand. You agree with Gabe?’
It seemed to go against every reaction he’d had so far to the Cerulean world.
‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s not as black and white as that. All I’m saying is, what he described – saving people – that’s the archetypal hero, isn’t it? You protect the innocent, whatever the cost. And if he’s telling the truth then he saved your mother, Scarlett. He saved her! God knows if I’d had the power to save my mother or my father or Cara the night of the accident, I’d have done it. In a heartbeat. And, like Gabriel said, without a shred of remorse.’
Jude looked horrified. I could imagine what he was thinking about: the car accident, the choice he’d made that night not to save Luke’s parents, the guilt he’d carried for that ever since. He slumped into his armchair.
‘Cerulea… Kikorangi… we were always taught the Fallen were depraved, evil.’
I said nothing. Neither did Luke.
Jude’s inner conflict was patent, and painful to see. I wondered whether, when the dust settled, this would change anything for him and Sienna. I’d seen the look in her eyes in the little glances she cast his way. He wasn’t the only one who still cared.
‘I have to go,’ said Jude suddenly. He stood and hovered awkwardly – had we been alone, he’d have hugged me goodbye, but with Luke beside me, he held back.
‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘Go. We’ll call if we need you.’
And with a nod, Jude left us.
‘Urgh,’ said Luke. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this blinking in and out business. It’s kind of creepy.’
‘It is,’ I agreed. ‘Especially today on the beach. People watching, unseen. People appearing out of nowhere. It’s thrown me. Even here, where I should feel safe…’
I looked around the living room, at all the remnants of my grandparents’ life together. This place had always been my haven. But today, it felt different. Today, it felt full of shadows.
Luke put his hands on my shoulders and turned me to him. ‘Come away with me,’ he said urgently. ‘Please, Scarlett. Just for a little while. Let’s go where no one can find you. Take some time. Get some perspective.’
I sighed. ‘It’s a nice idea. But the cafe...’
‘The staff I hired are doing great, and Si and Cara can cover.’
‘You’ve only just opened and you keep skipping out on the job!’
‘Owner’s prerogative. Besides, you come first.’
‘I don’t know, Luke. I mean, what about needing to be away from people?’
‘Since last night you’ve only been with one human – me – for what, an hour or so? So you could manage a night away. Just one. Or maybe longer if we can think of someplace remote enough and big enough for you to get some space to yourself.’
A break from all that being me, being Cerulean, meant. Time away with Luke. Free.
Leaning over, I planted a smacker on his lips. ‘I know just the place,’ I told him. ‘Wait here while I call my mum.’
36: THE GOLD OF THE AZURE
Come 5 p.m., Luke and I were in the garden of an English cottage.
Come 5.01 p.m., we were on the terrace of a Spanish villa.
‘Woah!’ Luke staggered backwards and fell onto a sun-lounger. Then froze, staring across the infinity pool at the panoramic view: a city of colourful rooftops and iconic spires and, beyond, the dazzling Mediterranean.
I knelt beside him. ‘Are you okay? Travelling can be pretty disorientating.’
His glassy eyes shifted to look at me. ‘Scarlett.’ He lifted a shaky finger and pointed it. ‘What. Is. That.’
‘Barcelona.’
‘Not Barcelona, Cornwall.’
‘Nope. Barcelona, Catalonia.’
‘As in Catalonia, Spain?’
‘Yep.’
‘Scarlett… you… I… when you said you’d surprise me, I thought Newquay. Or St Ives.’ He looked again at the view. ‘Spain?’ he said wondrously.
Poor Luke; he looked fit to pass out. I wanted to be sympathetic, but we were here, in Barcelona, my favourite city in the world, and it was all I could do not to throw my arms wide and cheer.
Now, I was glad that before leaving the island the night before I’d made Jude teach me the knack to Travelling in company (really easy when you knew how; it was a matter of careful visualisation of both parties).
And I was glad that when I’d spoken to Mum and explained that Luke and I were, randomly, in Barcelona and needed a place to stay, she’d happily called her old friend Jesús and lined up the villa we’d stayed in when we came here, Hugo and Mum and Sienna and me.
And I was really glad that tonight could be nothing more than me and Luke alone in a luxury hillside villa with private gardens and a view to stir the soul.
‘I don’t even have my passport,’ said Luke.
I laughed at that, and then he started laughing, and he stood up and grabbed me and kissed me until my knees were molten.
Then he broke away. ‘We’re alone?’ he said.
‘All alone.’
‘All night?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘In Spain!’
I grinned. ‘You like?’
‘I love.’
‘So – what shall we do first?’
‘This,’ he said.
And he slid an arm under my knees and swept me up and kissed me tenderly on the lips...
... and threw me into the pool before cannonballing in beside me.
*
I woke the next morning feeling good. I’d slept alone, at the other end of the huge villa to Luke, so I was high on energy. And monumentally excited: a whole day in Barcelona with Luke!
I found him sitting on the terrace, lazing on a sun-lounger and drinking in the view. When I kissed him, he tasted sweet.
‘Peaches,’ he said, pointing to a bowl of sliced fruit on the table. ‘Just peachy peaches.’
‘Where did you get them?’ I said, perching beside him. ‘I thought there was no food.’
He pointed down the hill a little way to a grove of trees.
‘You foraged for our breakfast?’
‘Move over, Bear Grylls,’ he said and I laughed. He handed me the bowl. ‘Try some.’
I did.
‘Oh!’
‘Best you’ve ever tasted, right? Everything’s better here.’ He lay back, hands behind his head, and gazed seaward. ‘Look at that blue,’ he said. ‘The sea’s never that blue in Devon. It makes me want to surf. In Spain!’
‘Then we’ll surf,’ I said. ‘We’ll go down there, today, to the beach, and afterwards we’ll be tourists in the city.’
‘But all the people... you shouldn’t...’
I shoved a peach slice in his mouth to silence him.
‘There’s no shouldn’t. There’s just me and you and this place.’
He frowned.
I sighed.
‘Trust me, will you?
I can manage a few hours at least in the hustle and bustle. Please, Luke. I just want one day being a regular couple. One day we can always remember.’
He stared at me soberly. Then, abruptly, he said ‘Right’ and launched himself up, leaving me wobbling precariously on the edge of the sun-lounger, and strode off down the hillside.
Not quite the reaction I’d been hoping for.
As I watched, confused, he drew something out of his back pocket and hunched down under a tree and fiddled for a while. Then he grew still, and I heard...
Music. A banjo lick. A familiar intro.
And my boyfriend turned around, with a peach-on-a-stick mic, and began lip-synching to the song blasting from his mobile phone: American Authors’, ‘Best Day of My Life’.
He ‘sang’ with complete abandon. He jiggled about jerkily to the beat. He looked ridiculous – he looked happy – he looked adorkable.
I ran down the hill. He grabbed me. Threw me up in the air. Spun me around and around and around. Kissed my neck. Kissed my lips. He tasted like peaches. Best I’ve ever tasted.
*
Once it sank in for Luke – who’d never travelled – that he could explore a thriving, quirky, historic city (‘in Spain, Scarlett, in Spain!’), he ditched the idea of surfing, insisting he wanted new experiences.
We started at the Sagrada Familia, the enormous, one-of-a-kind church dreamt up by architect Gaudi in the nineteenth century. Luke was so blown away by the design that I made our next stop Gaudi’s Casa Batlló, part building, part modernist artwork – ‘wacky,’ Luke decided, ‘like something out of Grannie’s films.’
We moved on to the sprawling Catalonia Square, the heart of the city, and watched a flamboyant flamenco performance while eating hot, sweet churros from a street vendor, before cutting through to the labyrinthine streets of the Gothic Quarter. There we had coffee in an arty pavement cafe, and then did a quick tour of the archaeological remains of the Roman city of Barcino.
As the Spanish began closing up for siesta, we strolled down Las Ramblas, the long, tree-lined street leading to the port, watching the locals, skirting around the gaggles of tourists, pausing here and there to take in the scents of a flower stall and look at a pavement mosaic and spook a man dressed as a statue into twitching.
Finally, we reached the waterfront. Luke suggested an open-top bus tour, but I had another idea.
‘Are you feeling brave today?’ I asked him.
‘Definitely,’ he said. ‘It feels like the kind of day we could do anything.’
I grinned. ‘Then follow me.’
*
An hour later and a good deal shakier, Luke and I stood on the hill named Montjuïc, staring at the cable car that had brought us up here, which was now making its steep descent.
‘I can’t believe we did that,’ I said.
‘Me either. I’ve no idea why we just did that, Ms Vertigo!’
He looked at me quizzically and I smiled. ‘Last time I came here, with Hugo and Mum and Sienna, they made me go on the cable car and I had a total breakdown. I wanted to see whether I could do it now.’
‘And you could.’
‘And I could. Though my legs are still shaking.’
‘Well, my stomach’s still cartwheeling, so you’re not alone. People are not made for dangling off cables at height.’
‘We’ll get the bus down,’ I promised.
‘Hallelujah.’
Neither of us asked where that bus would take us. We both knew we couldn’t stay here much longer. I was tiring now. I could feel the heaviness in my limbs. But I wouldn’t admit to it – not yet. Just a little longer here, the two of us. Just a little longer making this the best of days.
‘So other than a cable car station, what’s up here?’ asked Luke as we began walking away.
‘A cemetery.’
He gave a mock shudder.
‘Botanical gardens.’
He wrinkled his nose.
‘The National Art Museum of Catalonia.’
He tried to look interested.
‘And a modern art museum: the Miró Foundation.’
‘Miró. Do I know that name?’
‘You should. You see it in your kitchen at home every day.’
His eyes lit up. ‘The print on the wall?’
‘Yep. It’s called “The Gold of the Azure”.’
‘My mum loved that artwork, you know.’
‘I know. Which is why I thought you’d like to see the original.’
‘We can see it here?’ Heedless of all the tourists milling about, he grabbed me and kissed me. ‘Scarlett Blake,’ he said, ‘you are my gold in the azure.’
I smiled up at him. ‘What does that mean?’
‘No idea,’ he said. ‘But I like the sound of it.’
I laughed and he kissed me again, and then tugged my hand urgently. ‘Let’s go – before we run out of time in Spain... we’re in Spain!’
37: PROBABLY NOTHING
I’d thought, perhaps, a modern art museum wasn’t the most appealing of destinations for a twenty-year-old guy on a date. But then, I wasn’t exactly a hardcore modern art museum visitor myself. It was this museum I loved, had loved since my mum first brought me here when I was a kid. And it soon became apparent that this place gave Luke ‘the feels’ too.
He ground to a halt on the path leading to the Foundation to take it in: the unique architecture, angular, bizarre and blazing white.
‘My parents would have loved this,’ he said.
Then, inside, as we roamed from room to room, he was full of awe, for the experimentations of new, upcoming artists but most of all, like me, for the works of Miró himself. I’d always felt that standing before one of his paintings or sculptures was like seeing through the eyes of a child again – with abandon and happiness and passion.
We stopped before ‘The Gold of the Azure’.
‘I’ve always seen two eyes, a big blue nose and a smiley mouth when I look at this,’ said Luke. ‘But Mum always swore it was about cosmology.’
‘My mum, when we came, said it was about the male and the female.’
‘Maybe it can be all things at once.’
‘Maybe that’s the point.’
We stood quietly for a while, absorbing the painting. It was the first time we’d been still and quiet all day – we’d been relentless in our quest to see everything in the city. Now all there was to see was oil paint on canvas, and that should have been calming. And yet, as I looked at Miró’s work, I struggled to relax and be in the moment. I felt unsettled, pulled in another direction.
It was the lines, I realised, and the shapes they formed. They reminded me of paintings back home – in the cottage, at Hollythwaite, even that sketch on the napkin that my mother had kept for all these years.
Why had she kept it? Why wasn’t Gabe firmly in her past? Why was her room blue now? Why were those pictures on her wall? Why had she locked them away before – what was she afraid of? Did she love him still? Would it never be over for her?
And him, Gabe. His reaction to the napkin, his words on the beach. He thought of her too. He cared for her. What was it he’d said? He’d respected my mother’s wishes and kept his distance. Until now.
‘Is something wrong?’ said Luke, squeezing my hand.
‘Yes,’ I replied without thinking.
‘What is it?’ he said urgently. ‘Do you need to go – is it…?’
I shook my head. Tried to smile. ‘Let’s get a drink,’ I said.
In the restaurant, we sat at a table in the corner. I toyed with the teapot and thought of my mum, who loved teapots. When we’d been to the Tate Modern in London she’d bought me a ridiculously expensive one by a famous artist.
‘Scarlett,’ said Luke, ‘you need to tell me what’s up.’
‘Nothing,’ I said automatically.
‘Something,’ he said.
‘No, nothing – it’s probably nothing.’
‘If it’s bothering you then it’s someth
ing, but you don’t want to tell me about it because we’re here and it’s great and you don’t want the day to end.’
Reluctantly, I nodded.
He rapped a teaspoon lightly on my knuckles. ‘It has to end sometime, Scarlett. You know that. Don’t end it by closing down on me.’
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘You’re right. It’s just... I’m thinking about my mum. With everything Gabe told me, the logical next step for me is to talk to her, ask her for her side of the story. But I can’t do that without opening a massive can of worms. My tongue’s tied. And Gabe knows that.’
‘So...?’
‘So what if I could talk to her? What if that was possible? Gabe said he’d respected my mother’s wishes and kept his distance from us all until now. He’s crossed the line with Sienna. He’s crossed the line with me...’
Luke was frowning. ‘You think he intends to walk back into your mum’s life next? Why? I mean, I didn’t get that impression yesterday.’
‘Like I said, it’s probably nothing. I don’t even know why the idea came into my head. It was this, I guess,’ I said, holding up a napkin. ‘His reaction to Mum keeping the one he’d scribbled on. He obviously thinks it’s meaningful.’
‘Well, I suppose it is, if she’s framed it and put it on the wall.’
‘But whatever Mum might feel – however much she may think about the past – for her it’s just that: past. Gone. For him, though... “We can only go forwards. With hope.” That’s what he said. What exactly is he hoping for? Me in his life? Her? Luke, he can’t go near her. He can’t! She’s doing so well – she’s made a life for herself. To see him again would rip her apart. He’d break her all over again!’
Luke hushed me, and I realised belatedly that people were gawping at the ranting girl in the corner.
Turning my back on them, I finished quietly: ‘I don’t want him near her. I don’t want him involved in her life. He’d ruin everything.’
‘Funny,’ said Luke. ‘That’s pretty much exactly what Sienna said to Gabe before she left the beach.’
We stared at each other.
‘It’s probably nothing, though,’ I said. ‘There was no suggestion that Gabe wanted to see my mother. None at all. And even if he did want to, he’d tell me first – surely. This is just silly paranoia.’