One Day in December

by Josie Silver

  Koh Lipe isn’t a place for people with big plans. The entire point of the island is to chill out. He laughs as he walks away to speak to new customers who’ve just ambled up from the beach.

  “No plans on a beautiful day like this?”

  I turn toward the distinctly English voice and a guy drops down at the little table on the other side of me. He catches Nakul’s eye and raises his hand in greeting, his smile easy and relaxed as he stretches his long legs out in front of him on the sand. The Thai sun has baked my own skin honey gold, but this guy has been more serious altogether on the sun-worshipping stakes. He’s chestnut brown, his almost blue-black hair flopping in his dark, amused eyes.

  I smile and shrug a little. “Nothing beyond floating in the sea and reading my book.”

  “A fine plan,” he says. “What are you reading? Please don’t say The Beach.”

  “It’s a good book,” I joke. Not that it isn’t, but no self-respecting traveler can admit to such an obvious choice. “The Great Gatsby, actually.” I don’t elaborate and tell him that my reading matter is completely dictated by the small stack of books someone left behind in my shack. Much better that he thinks me educated enough to carry F. Scott Fitzgerald around the world in my backpack.

  “Shack find?”

  I roll my eyes and laugh. “Busted.”

  “You could have lied and I’d have believed you.”

  “I find that lies encumber me.”

  He stares at me, as well he might. I sound as if The Great Gatsby has gone straight to my head.

  “I’m Oscar,” he says, stretching his hand out formally across the space between our tables. “And my plan for the day is to spend it with you.”

  * * *

  “You look like a starfish.”

  Oscar prods me idly with the oar of the kayak, and I let him spin me slowly on my back with my eyes half closed against the glare of the sunlight. Brilliant blue above me and below me, bath-water warm over my blissed-out skin when he ladles seawater over my belly with the paddle of the oar.

  “I feel like a starfish.”

  True to his word, Oscar has spent his day with me. I wouldn’t usually warm to someone who sounded so horribly self-assured, but something in me is determined to do the opposite of what I’d normally do. He’s been in Thailand for a couple of months longer than I have, choosing to stay on in Koh Lipe for a while after his traveling companions returned home to the UK. It explains his native tan, at least.

  “Have you ever eaten one? They sell them on sticks like lollipops on Walking Street.”

  I open my eyes, appalled, and find him laughing.

  “Very funny.”

  He’s lounging in the boat, his chin resting on his forearm as he looks over the side at me, his fingertips trailing in the sea. I flick a little seawater at him, speckling a shimmer of droplets over the bridge of his straight nose. I’ll admit it. He’s bloody good-looking in a classic, chip-off-the-old-Greek-god kind of way. He has the confident aura of wealth about him, louche and debonair. I know, I know. Who uses words like that anymore? Me, apparently, after a day spent drinking local beer and reading The Great Gatsby in a hammock. There’s something about living in a different place that allows you to be whoever you want to be.

  “Can I take you to dinner tonight?”

  I lay my head back in the water and close my eyes again, floating. “As long as it isn’t starfish.”

  “I think I can promise that much.”

  I roll onto my front and swim the few strokes to the kayak, curling my wet fingertips over the edge. His face is inches from mine.

  “Let’s not make each other promises,” I say.

  He gives me the same perplexed stare he did when we met at the beach cafe this morning, then leans in and brushes his warm, sea-salt lips over mine. “I like you, Starfish. You’re interesting.”

  OCTOBER 13

  Laurie

  Oscar Ogilvy-Black. It’s quite a mouthful. I don’t think he and I would have crossed each other’s paths in the normal course of things back in London, but here in Thailand the dating rulebook has been ripped up. He tells me he’s a banker but not a wanker, and I confide my hope of gaining my first foothold in the world of magazine journalism one day soon. I have to admit that I judged him when we first met. But underneath the undeniable poshness, he’s funny and self-deprecating, and when he looks at me there’s a kindness in his eyes that warms me.

  “You’re not going to be one of those awful gossip column queens, are you?”

  I gasp, mock offended, and then sigh, a little giddy because his fingers lace with mine as we walk along the cool sand after dinner. “Do I look like I care about worst- and best-dressed celebs?”

  He takes in my denim cut-offs and black vest, then the lemon toggles of my bikini top visible around my neck.

  “Umm…maybe not,” he laughs.

  “Cheeky, you’re hardly suited and booted.” I raise an eyebrow as he looks comedically down at his ripped shorts and flip-flops.

  Laughing, we reach my shack, and I kick my shoes off on the deck. “Beer?”

  He nods, leaving his shoes outside beside mine before he flops down on my huge beanbag, his hands folded behind his head.

  “Make yourself at home,” I say, and I drop beside him with the cold beers.

  “Are you sure about that?” he asks, rolling onto his side, propped on one elbow to look at me.

  “Why? What would you do if you were at home?”

  He reaches down and drags his T-shirt over his head, leaving him in just his shorts. The moonlight shades his skin coconut-shell brown. “I’d get more comfortable.”

  I pause for a beat, considering just laughing at him—I mean, what a line—but then I follow suit and pull my vest off. Why not? Oscar is everything that my life is not: lighthearted; uncomplicated.

  “Me too.”

  He holds out his arm for me to settle in beside him, and when I do his body is warm and vital. I am as free as one of the small, blush-pink birds that wheel through the sky above my shack at dawn.

  Through the window I can see the black spindle outlines of the long-tail boats anchored just off the shore in readiness for the morning, and the pitch-dark sky overhead studded with a myriad of diamond stars.

  “I can’t remember the last time I felt this peaceful.”

  Oscar takes a long drink, then puts his beer bottle down on the floor before he replies.

  “I think I might be insulted. I was hoping you were outrageously turned on.”

  I laugh softly into his chest and prop myself up to look at him. “I think I could be.”

  One arm still bent behind his head, he slides his free hand around the back of my neck and tugs slowly on the string ties of my bikini top. It falls when he lets go, and he doesn’t take his eyes from mine as he reaches lower between my shoulder blades to finish the job.

  “Now I’m outrageously turned on,” he says, tracing one fingertip from the dip between my collarbones to the button on my shorts. He swallows hard as he looks at my bared breasts. A breeze catches the wind chime hanging from the corner of my shack, a soft glitter of bells as he shifts slightly, pressing me back into the beanbag as he draws my nipple inside the heat of his mouth. Jesus. Aching, spiraling lust unfurls octopus-like inside my body, its tentacles licking fast along my limbs, heavy in my abdomen, fast in my chest as I push my hands into the thickness of his hair and hold him to me. I never thought I could feel like this for someone other than Jack, but something about being here with Oscar has freed me.

  He reaches for the button of my shorts, lifting his head to look at me before he goes any further. I’m relieved he’s that kind of man; even though his breathing is shallow and his eyes are begging me not to stop him, I know that he would, and that’s enough.

&nb
sp; “Do you have a condom?” I whisper as I stroke his hair, praying he says yes.

  He moves over me, his chest on mine, and his kiss is so unhurried and exquisite that I wrap my arms around his shoulders and hold him to me.

  “I think so,” he breathes, then laughs shakily. “I just hope it’s in date.” He reaches into his back pocket, kissing me some more. Laying his wallet on the floor beside the beanbag, he flicks it open and pulls out a silver foil packet, checking it before he presses it into my palm for safekeeping.

  He sits up, and this time he doesn’t pause over the business of unbuttoning my shorts. His fingers are sure and steady, working them down my hips until I have only my small, yellow bikini bottoms left.

  He spreads my thighs and kneels between them, then splays my arms wide and pins me lightly in place. “Do you know what you are?”

  I stare up at him, unsure what he’s going to say.

  “A fucking sexy starfish.”

  I close my eyes and laugh, and then I gasp, because he’s lowered his face between my legs and I can feel the heat of his mouth moving over the silky material of my bikini.

  There isn’t one atom of me that wants him to stop as he discards what’s left of his clothes. For a second we hold a silent conversation with just our eyes. I tell him that I know he’s running away from the responsibility and stress of the city life awaiting him back in London, and he tells me he can paper over the cracks in my heart and make me better again. We make each other promises even though we pledged that we wouldn’t, and then he settles over me and I forget about everything but now.

  * * *

  Later, I wake and find him sitting on the steps of my shack watching the beginnings of another pink and purple dawn.

  I sit beside him, an elephant-patterned throw pulled around my shoulders, and he looks at me sideways.

  “Marry me, Starfish.”

  I laugh softly and get up to make coffee.

  NOVEMBER 29

  Laurie

  I’d planned to go home a few weeks ago, yet here I am still in Thailand, still with Oscar.

  Oscar, Oscar, Oscar. Who knew? I think we’re both living in denial, completely unprepared and unwilling to return to the world we belong to. But who’s to say that you have to belong to somewhere forever, anyway? Why do I have to belong to England, when everything there is gray and confusing and difficult? Were it not for the people I love, and my promise to Sarah, I’d stay here on this beach and have a dozen little babies, though not with a Thai monk. Back in England, Mum reports, the rain has settled in for the long haul, like an unwelcome relative at Christmas, but here when the rain comes it’s fast and furious and then gone in a blink, shoved aside by the sun. I don’t think I’ve ever been colder than the day Jack kissed me on a London backstreet nearly twelve months ago, and I don’t think I’ve ever been warmer than I am here on Koh Lipe with Oscar. My blood is warm, my bones are warm, and my skin is warm.

  Sometimes, when we’re lying on our backs on a beach or reading in a hammock or falling asleep in bed, I lie and listen to the gentle rush of the sea meeting the shore and I imagine we’re castaways, washed up on a desert island, left to spend the rest of our days eating fish we’ve caught and having sweat-filmed sex. Every now and then we’d hear the rumble of a plane’s engine in the cornflower sky above, and we’d hide in the shelter of the treeline rather than write SOS in the sand.

  DECEMBER 12

  G’day from the bottom of the world, lovebirds!

  Hope you’re not freezing your tits off too much up there, ha ha!

  Australia is heaven on a stick. Jack has gone completely native, I’m going to buy him a hat with corks on and call him Crocodile Dundee. He even went and checked out a radio station in Melbourne; seriously, if they offered him a job I don’t think he’d ever come home again. Except, ha, get this! He’s MORTALLY TERRIFIED of snakes. I didn’t know until there was a tiny one on our balcony last week and he practically screamed the place down. I had to coax him down off a chair with a brandy. It’s a good job he’s got me to protect him.

  Oscar! Take care of my girl, can’t wait to meet you!

  Laurie, let’s all get together as soon as we can, dying to see you.

  Lots of love and kisses, Sarah xx

  PS Jack says to say hi! : )

  2012

  NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS

  1) By hook or by crook, I’m moving back to London this year to start my fantasy job in publishing.

  I’ve let my ambitions simmer on the back burner for too long now because of Thailand and Oscar, and most of all because I wanted to spend some proper time at home and be around for Mum and Dad. There are lots of reasons and explanations, all excuses; what I’ve really been doing is avoiding Jack.

  I’ve decided I’m not going to do that any longer. I miss Sarah so much, and I miss the buzz and crackle of London life too. I’m going to hand in my notice at the hotel I’ve been temping at lately; my CV so far is all hospitality-based, stop-gap jobs and temporary positions to keep money in my pocket while I wait for the rest of my life to kick in. Well, I’m done waiting. I’m going to pull on my boots and kick life’s butt, instead.

  2) And then there’s Oscar. Oscar Ogilvy-Black, the man who found me on a beach in Thailand and jokingly asked me to marry him at sunrise the next morning. He’s asked me to marry him dozens of times since, mostly after sex or when we’ve had a few drinks—it’s become our standing joke. At least I think it’s a joke.

  I don’t actually know what my New Year’s Resolution is about Oscar. Just to try and keep hold of him, I think, and keep hold of the feelings I have for him now that we’re going back to reality.

  3) Oh, and I’ve decided I’m ready to give false eyelashes another go. Because gluing your eyes shut once in a lifetime isn’t enough for a woman like me.

  JANUARY 3

  Laurie

  “I’m so nervous,” I mutter, straightening the collar of my woolen winter coat as we walk hand in hand along the pavement. I’m wearing a brooch. Who does that? Nobody sane under thirty. I’m just desperate to make a good impression. “Is this too much?” I touch the little jeweled daisy and look up at Oscar, who just laughs.

  “You’re being ridiculous. It’s my mother, Laurie, not the queen.”

  I can’t help it. Everything seemed far simpler in Thailand; we got to know each other while stripped back to whatever basics we could fit in a backpack. Here among the trappings of our usual lives, our differences seem more stark. I’m back to being socially awkward, doubly so today, and Oscar is far more man-about-town than I imagined.

  “Here we are,” he says, leading me toward a patent-black front door in an elegant sweep of townhouses. “Stop fidgeting, you look fine.”

  I swallow hard as we wait for the door to be answered, hoping that Oscar’s mother likes the bunch of winter white roses I bought on the way over. God, what if she’s allergic? No, Oscar would have said. I tap my foot, nervy, and then the door opens at last.

  “Oscar, darling.”

  Lucille Ogilvy-Black may not be actual royalty, but there is a definite regal air to her straight back and white, perfectly blow-dried hair. She’s dressed all in black, a sharp contrast to the lustrous circlet of pearls around her neck.

  “Mum, this is Laurel,” he says as he steps out of her hug, his hand on the small of my back to encourage me forward. Afterward, I realize that I should have read more into the fact that he called me Laurel rather than Laurie.

  I put my best foot forward and smile, and she accepts the flowers with a gracious incline of her head. She doesn’t look at all like Oscar, and she certainly exudes none of his natural warmth. I follow them into the immaculate hallway, awkward as we hang our coats. I compliment Lucille on her beautiful home, and then start to worry because that’s my small talk quota used up.


  She serves us tea in her formal sitting room, and I can’t help but feel as if I’m being interviewed for a job I don’t stand a chance of getting; as if I’m the Saturday girl going for a managerial role.

  “What does your father do, Laurel?”

  “He retired recently,” I say, not wishing to go into his health woes. “He owned a cleaning company; my brother, Daryl, runs it now.” I can’t be sure, but I think Lucille just flinched. “Mum works there too, she keeps the books.”

  The expression on Oscar’s mother’s face is crystal clear; she thinks we’re a bunch of Brummie cleaners. I reach for my pendant, following the outline of the purple stone with my fingertip for reassurance. My mum and dad started their company more than twenty-five years ago and employ more than fifty people now, but I don’t feel like justifying my family. The more Lucille Ogilvy-Black looks down her nose at me, the less inclined I become to impress her.

  She excuses herself from the room momentarily; I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s gone to hide the good silver in case I slip it in my handbag. The lid of the grand piano in the bay window is covered with photographs, and I can’t help but notice (probably because it’s been pulled to the front) the large photograph of Oscar and a blond; they’re dressed in ski gear, suntanned and laughing into the camera. I see it for what it is: a gauntlet being silently thrown down by Oscar’s mother.

  We talked about his family when we were in Thailand, one of our many late-night shack conversations. As a consequence, I probably know a lot more than Lucille would like to think I do.

  I know Oscar’s father was a bounder; work-shy and handy with his fists toward his wealthy wife every now and then behind closed doors. My heart broke a little when Oscar told me how much he’s tried to protect his mum and how close they’ve been in the years since his parents separated; he was around a lot more than his older brother and as a result he and his mum are incredibly tight-knit. I was, and am, impressed with him for being his mother’s rock, and I naively expected her to be warm and, well, motherly. I thought she’d be glad to see Oscar with someone who makes him happy, but if anything she seems hostile to my intrusion. Perhaps she’ll warm to me.