‘Where’ve you been?’ Pete asked as I arrived next to him at the bar a few hours later, hot and a bit sweaty from all the dancing with all the friendly people.
I stretched onto my tippy toes and kissed his cheek. ‘Dancing.’
‘Well, do you want to know where I’ve been?’
‘Where?’ I said, slipping my phone out of my bag and checking for emails and texts from Dad. Nothing.
‘Talking to an American actor from Priya’s show about himself.’ He took an icy-cold beer from a lady behind the bar with a twinkly ‘thank you’ and turned back to me. ‘For an hour.’
I slid my phone back in my bag and gave Pete a sympathetic look while asking the bar-lady for a rosé with extra ice cubes.
‘I pretty much know his jock strap size, the glucose levels of his last blood test and the thread count of the sheets at his mother’s house, and I one hundred per cent guarantee he won’t even remember my name.’
‘Aw, poor baby,’ I said, curling an arm round his waist and giving him a squeeze. ‘How do you always manage to find the one twat at an event that is almost ninety-nine per cent twat-free?’
‘It’s a gift,’ Pete said, mock grimly.
I laughed then stopped as ‘You’re the One That I Want’ from the Grease soundtrack came on. ‘Oooh, let’s go dance!’
Pete’s eyes widened in horror. He used to be way more fun, but as he’s gotten older he’s become more serious. Like now that he is thirty it isn’t cool to replicate Sandy and Danny’s synchronised 1970s strutting. Which was exactly what Priya and Laurel were doing, and I wanted in!
‘Right,’ I said as I took my giant glass of rosé from the lovely wine-supplying lady with a big thank you. ‘You’re coming with me and we will find you a non-twat to talk to, OK?’
With our drinks condensating (it’s a new word) I led Pete into the crowd of non-dancers, got him talking to some friendly folk then kissed his cheek and raced back to the dance floor to join the John Travolta pelvic pumping that had now morphed into everyone dancing like backpack kid.
As the sun dipped, I left the dance floor (a grassy patch marked out with pink and silver bunting) to call the RSPCA bar and ask to speak to Frankie. I was having so much fun with Priya and Laurel and all their friends, but the nag of my father’s whereabouts and why-abouts was at the back of my mind, pulling me back from complete abandon.
‘The Baroness, Jimmy speaking.’
‘Oh hi,’ I said. ‘You again.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘It’s me. The girl from last night.’
Uncomfortable stammers came down the phone line.
‘Not that kind of girl!’ I laughed. ‘It’s Jess. I came in with my boyfriend and was asking about an exhibition?’
Jimmy laughed. ‘Oh yeah! So what’s up?’
‘I was wondering if I could speak to that guy Frankie you were talking about.’
‘Well firstly, Frankie is a girl. And secondly, we’re not open yet so she’s not here.’
I looked at the time on my phone. It was only 5.23 p.m. but felt much later. I guess that’s what afternoon drinking did to your perception of time.
‘Are you ever open?’
‘Yes. At eight p.m.’
‘That’s late for a restaurant.’
‘We’re more of a nightclub-type restaurant.’
‘Right.’
‘Why don’t you pop by later and you can talk to Frankie and I’ll make you guys that margarita?’
‘I can’t, I’m at a wedding.’
‘Then why are you calling here?! Go back and have more free champagne and dance to the Bruno Mars medley that’s bound to come on at some point.’
After I’d worked up a South African sweat leaping about to said Bruno Mars medley, Pete called me over, his cheeks flushed with alcohol and excitement.
‘Jess! Come meet Goat!’
I wobbled towards a man who had the physical stature of a London bus on its end. He was literally rectangle-shaped and, from the looks of his strained dress shirt, all muscle. His meaty hand made the beer bottle he was holding seem like a prop for a Ken doll.
‘Hi, I’m Jess.’
‘Goat,’ he said, shaking my extended hand. ‘How’re you liking South Africa so far?’
‘It’s hot,’ I said, and although it wasn’t funny Goat laughed, loud and chesty.
‘Goat says he can take us up Table Mountain tomorrow,’ Pete said, a hopeful look on his face.
Goat had a proud one. I’d realised that mentioning Table Mountain to a Capetonian made them flush with pride. It was like you’d paid a compliment to their favourite child.
‘Is Goat your real name?’ I asked, avoiding any climbing commitment just yet. I was planning on having a hangover tomorrow. And wanted to eat that hangover away at a steam-punk café I’d seen on Instagram.
‘No, it’s Adrian.’ Goat adjusted his considerable weight from one wide spread foot to the other. ‘But only my mum calls me that. I’ve been Goat since I started climbing as a boy.’
Another tanned man in a button-down peach shirt and giant aviators arrived beside Goat. ‘Goat is called Goat because he can climb anything,’ the new man said.
‘Then wouldn’t you be better being called Monkey?’ I giggled. ‘Aren’t they better climbers?’
‘Goats climb mountains,’ Pete said, worried I was going to embarrass him in front of these ever so manly men. He lowered his voice. ‘Mountain Goat?’
‘I reckon a monkey could climb a mountain better that a goat, they’re more limber.’ I mimed a monkey mountain-climbing, stumbled, then under Pete’s alarmed gaze, stopped and took a swig of my warm wine.
‘He’s a beast! ’ the new man said. ‘He looks as unlikely as a goat does at being able to climb mountains. But despite their “un-limberness”,’ the new man winked at me, ‘goats are very good climbers. Like my bru here.’ He clapped a hand on Goat’s meaty shoulder.
‘All right,’ Goat blushed under his surfer’s/climber’s/general-outdoorsy tan.
The two mates began talking about a seven-day hike they had coming up. They were sleeping under the stars and aiming to get to an especially high, especially dangerous peak and it was evidently ‘brutal’. Pete’s excitement ignited at the words ‘high’, ‘dangerous’ and ‘brutal’. Mine powered down. I made polite excuses and wandered off to cuddle Priya and request the ‘Mahna-Mahna’ song from The Muppets that Priya, Laurel and I had a whole routine to.
*
‘Goat is picking us up at five a.m.,’ Pete said, as we climbed into the back of Trust’s van at the end of an extremely fun, love-filled wedding.
I wondered when Trust ever had time off. He seemed to be in the van day and night, at our beck and call and it was not something I was a) used to or b) comfortable with.
I checked the time on my phone. 11.29 p.m. ‘Babe, I’d rather climb it when I’ve had a proper sleep. And haven’t been drinking. And when I’ve done some kind of training. I can barely walk up the apartment steps!’
‘But Goat only has tomorrow morning free.’
‘Why do we have to go with Goat?’
‘He knows the way.’
‘So do I,’ I said, trying to defeat a hiccup. ‘Up.’ I pealed in to giggles, which made Trust chuckle twelve octaves lower. ‘And we have the post-wedding BBQ at Priya’s.’
I opened Alice and began to eat some liberated wedding food.
Pete frowned. ‘There’s plenty of time.’
‘I was talking to a girl at the wedding who said her parents had this snake called a Cape Cobra in their garden,’ I said, my mouth full of grapes. ‘And then another girl said one came into their kitchen. And another said they see them all the time on their lawn.’
Pete gave a weary shake of his head.
‘It’s true! They all have snake stories! And do you know where all these people live?’
Pete shrugged.
‘Around Table Mountain. And do you know what they call that snake?’
> Pete, again, shook his head.
‘The two-step snake. As in, it bites you and two steps later you die. And I bet it’s a lot more than two steps from the middle of that mountain to a syringe full of anti-venom.’
‘You’re probably right,’ Pete said with a small smile.
‘And this other girl’s dog, a Cape Cobra bit it and it died. Immediately. And it was a Rottweiler. One of those big ones that look like Mike Tyson in a flea collar.
‘They disappear when they hear humans,’ Pete said, and admirably he was maintaining his patience. ‘Just stamp as you walk.’
‘So not only do you want me to climb that massive mountain, but you’d like me to do it stamping like a North Korean soldier?’
‘It takes Goat and his mates fifty minutes to climb. So we’ll probably do it in an hour and a quarter.’
‘You want me to stamp upwards for an hour and a quarter?’ I hiccuped and dropped grapes all over the floor of the van.
Pete looked at the state of me. ‘Maybe an hour and a half.’
As I bent to pick up the grapes I was suddenly struck by a brilliant idea. ‘I’ve been suddenly struck by a brilliant idea,’ I said, righting myself. ‘Why don’t you go without me?’
Pete opened his mouth to protest and I held up a palm, perhaps a little too close to his nose but my depth of field was shaky.
‘Just listen. You go without me this time, and for the rest of the holiday I’ll practise stamping up the apartment steps and just before we leave we can climb it together.’
Pete could see the merit of my proposal. Especially since it had been delivered interspersed with hiccups. Trust dropped us off and we security-swiped ourselves into the foyer at the bottom of our apartment block. Pete pressed the lift button.
‘Uh-ah,’ I said, shaking my index finger. ‘Up.’ I pointed at the stairs. ‘Training starts now.’
Pete laughed. ‘Really? Now?’
‘Come on.’ I stamped my first step. ‘All hail Kim Jong Ju-Ju!’ I said, doing an attempt at a North Korean salute, which looked more like the beginning to Madonna’s ‘Vogue’ dance. ‘What is his name anyway . . .?’
It took us at least twenty-five minutes to drunkenly climb all six flights of stairs. During which I sang the bits I knew to Yazz’s ‘The Only Way is Up’, Wham’s ‘Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go’ (and had a brief moment of sadness about George), ‘Moving on Up’ by M People, ‘Get Up, Stand Up’ by Bob Marley, ‘Start Me Up’ by the Stones, ‘Straight Up’ by Paula Abdul, ‘Uptown Girl’ by Billy Joel and ‘Up Where We Belong’ by some old people. By the time we got inside we were breathless with giggles and stamping and had upset two sets of neighbours. We fell into bed, shagged once and fell asleep.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I was partially aware of Pete leaving at 5 a.m. but didn’t wake properly until the much more respectable holiday time of 10 a.m. I padded across the cream tiled floor to the living room to check my phone. I had a couple of emails from Mum and Dad’s friends RSVPing to the party, one from the caterers asking to quadruple-check the food list (it contained three distinctly different, uncomplementary menus: Mum’s grain/sugar/dairy and fun-free items that the rest of us had mostly given up eating, Dad’s traditional ‘meat ’n’ veg’ fare and Hunter and Katie’s kid-friendly treats) and no emails from Dad. I had a text from Pete saying instead of the fifty-minute walk they were going to do a three-hour one, leaving the fifty-minute one (that I was intending to do in a leisurely two hours in a snake-proof, air-conditioned suit the internet was yet to provide me with) as a new experience for both of us. He said he’d meet me at Priya and Laurel’s BBQ. I smiled and flicked on the kettle.
With a hot coffee in a patterned mug, I slid open the doors to the balcony and got comfy on a lounger in the morning sun. I dialled Annabelle while soaking in the sights and sounds of the busy harbour. Annabelle answered and we exchanged updates on the party. We locked down the menu, agreeing to disagree that Brussels sprouts were a good choice (old people farting en masse? I wouldn’t be staying long) and then I asked if she’d heard from Dad. She hadn’t.
‘If you’re so worried about it why don’t you call his office?’ Annabelle said.
‘Nah.’
It was a pointless exercise I’d tried many times before. The secretaries at Dad’s London office had to remain discreet about their high-profile clients, so only ever took a message and said they’d have him call us.
‘Who’s that man I can hear?’ I said, not wanting to get off the phone just yet. I was feeling a bit homesick for my usual routine of being there over the weekend, having Katie cuddles and cleaning whatever Hunter had got stuck to the walls/floor/ceiling/cat.
‘Marcus.’
‘What’s he doing there again?’ I said, checking the time in England. It would be 9.30 a.m. Annabelle usually only did her accounting work in the afternoons or evenings when Mum or I were around to help with Katie. Although with us both away perhaps her schedule was totally different.
‘I’m helping him with his new business.’
I began to worry. What if Marcus’s new business took all of Annabelle’s attention and Katie started having breathing problems and nobody noticed because they were nose-deep in Marcus’s books and had found his 100-flavour popcorn café was spending too much on organic vanilla dust? I forced myself to exhale. That would never happen. Annabelle was a sharp-eyed mama bear and nothing would ever, ever make her compromise her precious children. But oh my gosh! What if he intended to be the next to nail and bail? To fornicate and evacuate? To bump hips and jump ship? To hit it and quit it?
‘What are Marcus’s intentions?’ I said stiffly.
‘Oh, well, he thinks he should be renovating one of his sites but with the current business loan rates so low and his equity levels, I’m suggesting he diversify—’
‘No,’ I said, thinking Annabelle sounded extremely money-knowledgeable, and also, renovating? What happened to the popcorn café? ‘His intentions with you?’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Does he have romantic intentions? Or sexy-time ones?’
‘You’re on speakerphone.’
I cringed. Then coughed my dignity back in check. ‘Hello Marcus,’ I said formally.
‘Hi,’ a soft Welsh voice replied.
‘How . . . how are you?’ I attempted. ‘Business going . . . is it going? Annabelle, can you take me off speakerphone please?’
‘Oh sure,’ she said, then came back on the line a bit louder than before. ‘There you go.’
‘You should tell people when they’re on speakerphone so they don’t make an arse of themselves. Do you know this Marcus very well? He might be a psycho or a pervert or a money launderer or—’
‘I can still hear her,’ Marcus said in his soft voice.
‘He can still hear you,’ Annabelle repeated matter-of-factly. ‘I think I’ve got the volume quite loud.’
‘Annabelle!’
‘Marcus is a property developer. He buys big old houses and renovates them to become private childcare centres. He’s not a psycho, or a pervert, or a money launderer. From what I can see from his books so far, anyway,’ she chuckled and I heard Marcus laugh softly in the background.
The thing about Annabelle, which is something she doesn’t seem to be aware of, is that she is beautiful. With her olive skin (something we both got from Dad), cupid’s bow lips, rich chestnut hair and huge brown eyes ringed in lashes so thick and long I used to call her Camelbelle, she looks elegant and vulnerable. Like a French Bambi. With wrist tattoos and a small scar from a septic home eyebrow piercing. And despite her chaotic youth, she moved about her adult life with a measured peace. She doesn’t expend any unnecessary energy. Perhaps she’d used it all up sneaking out of her teen bedroom, lugging backpacks full of Carling across south London and scaling nightclub walls. And, most worryingly, Annabelle is not wary of men. She’s wary of who she becomes around men, and even though there is no scientific evidence, she still harbours a
fear that her wayward years have karmatically caused Katie’s Down’s Syndrome and Hunter’s ‘hyperactivity’ (the family ADHD). She is pragmatic and says there is no point blaming men as a whole, which is refreshing and enlightened and all that, but it means she doesn’t have her shit detectors on. I felt she needed reminding of the dangers of the unknown (penis).
‘Advancing males need to be heavily vetted, not heavily petted.’ I repeated the helpful motto I’d come up with after Daniel had poked and revoked.
‘Marcus is not an advancing male. He’s a client,’ Annabelle said airily.
‘AS LONG AS HE KNOWS THAT,’ I said so Marcus could hear.
There were some muffled noises like Annabelle was covering the mouthpiece and making unknown gestures.
‘I do,’ was Marcus’s distant, somewhat uncomfortable, reply.
An hour later I threw my beach bag in the back seat and clambered next to Trust in the front of his van.
‘This OK?’ I said at his shocked look.
‘Yes, Sisi!’ He broke into a brilliant white grin and drove towards the security gates.
‘When do you get a day off?’ I asked, competing with Trust’s music.
‘Oh,’ he shifted in his seat and turned the radio down. ‘Maybe one day if you don’t need me I get a day off. But Miss Priya, she says to look after you, so that’s what I do.’
‘Do you like your job?’
‘Yes. Very much. I like to drive.’ He shot me a sideways amused look.
‘Are you married?’
‘No,’ he said and his voice was warm and chocolatey. ‘Not married yet.’
‘Oh,’ I replied. ‘Girlfriend then?’
Trust gave a slow chuckle. ‘You ask many questions.’
‘Yeah, I know. I can’t help myself.’ I said. ‘So . . . do you have a girlfriend?’
‘Yes.’ He smiled. ‘She’s pregnant. And I have a daughter. Two years old.’
Trust and I chatted all the way to Priya’s and I was stunned to find out he lived in a small township. Like the ones Pete and I had seen sprawled out on either side of the motorway. I was embarrassed to find myself inspecting his clothing. His striped polo shirt was box fresh and I wondered how they did their laundry in those tin houses. Trust was surprised that Pete and I had been together so long and had no children. He was twenty-two but he didn’t know how old his girlfriend was because she was an orphan. They guessed she was between twenty and twenty-five.
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