by Fiona Harper
‘I didn’t know you were coming on this,’ she said, clutching her bag on her lap.
‘Neither did I until ten minutes ago,’ he said, and pushed his sunglasses on top of his head. ‘But I saw the flyer and I thought, why not?’ His smile faded a little. ‘Do you mind? I promise I am not following you.’
Juliet laughed. More from the idea of a man like him following her around than anything else. Even Greg hadn’t done that in the early days. ‘No, I don’t mind. It will be nice to have someone I know to talk to.’ Most of the rest of the passengers were couples or families; she’d been getting ready to feel like the proverbial gooseberry again.
‘Bene,’ he said, then clapped his hands and stood up. ‘What are we doing sitting back here? Come. It is better up the front end of the boat.’ And he took her hand and led her up past the cockpit to the area between the twin hulls in front of the mast, and sat down on the fibreglass deck, his legs resting on the string net that made up the front portion of the bow.
They got underway almost immediately, and once the sails were up—although Juliet guessed it wasn’t that windy, because the engine was still on—they spent the next hour sailing down the island’s west coast. The breeze was delicious. She rested back on her hands, tipped her head back to the sun and closed her eyes. Heaven.
Marco didn’t stay with her the whole time, but she didn’t mind that—she had no claim on him. He’d get curious and look over the side of the boat, or go and ask one of the crew what a town on the shore was called, or strike up conversation with one of the other groups of tourists. He was like Gemma, she realised, in that he found it easy to talk to anyone about anything, even if he only had the flimsiest grip on the subject matter. People felt comfortable around him. Before they were halfway to their first destination, he’d charmed all the women and was buddies with the men.
Juliet just sat on deck, content to be half aware of his comings and goings. He always came back to her and shared a story, either from someone he’d just talked to or from sailing escapades on Lake Garda, where it seemed almost every child learned to sail as soon as they could toddle.
When they’d been sailing for about an hour, he held out his hand for hers and tugged her to standing. ‘Come, Juliet. You cannot see this for the first time sitting down.’
Juliet had been staring out to sea, wondering if she could catch a glimpse of Martinique off to the north, and when she turned she gasped out loud. They’d come far enough down the coast now to have a spectacular view of the Pitons, the twin volcanic mountains that St Lucia was famous for, rising like sharp points from the sea. She’d had a fuzzy view of them from the aeroplane, but from this angle, with all of the haze of the day swept away by the fresh salty air, they were stunning.
She stayed at the bow, drinking it all in, as the catamaran rounded the headland into a wide bay. The old capital of Soufriere lay scattered before them across low-lying hills, with the mountains as a dramatic backdrop.
The passengers loaded into a convoy of minibuses and headed up into the rainforest for a gondola ride through the trees. The little craft were hardly more than metal frames with wooden seats and a wooden floor, and they glided silently through the trees on a thick metal cable held aloft by sturdy pylons. She wasn’t a huge fan of heights, but she was okay if she had something solid to hold onto and the bars of the gondola were thick and well-welded, and she found she didn’t mind the experience at all.
They were sitting at the back of the group of eight. There was Marco and Juliet, a young couple who looked like they might be on their honeymoon, two girls in their twenties and a father and a daughter. One guide, Davidson, whom Juliet had been chatting to, sat at the back of the gondola and the other was right at the front, pointing out the different trees and plants and giving a running commentary.
It was cooler here up in the mountains and so peaceful, even though the air was filled with the songs of unseen birds and the calls of insects and tree frogs. When they finished their slow ascent and crested the top of the ridge she held her breath. The gondola stayed there for a moment, swinging gently, so people could take photos.
The whole north-west end of St Lucia was spread out before them. Rolling hills packed with tropical plants, one after the other, until she could see a smudge of yellow through the haze near the coast and then the bright, deep blue of the sea beyond. She was almost sad when the craft began moving again, meaning they were near their halfway point and it would be time to get off and do a short trek before getting back into the gondola and making the return journey back to the base.
But when they disembarked, instead of the few moments to enjoy the cool mountain air and the sounds of the forest, they were all herded into a group and their guides started looking them up and down. Then they produced tackle and harnesses from a small hut on the flat concrete expanse that marked the gondola station. Someone shoved a helmet into Juliet’s hands. She turned to Marco, puzzled, but he just shrugged.
Davidson was busy helping the young girl into a harness. Juliet tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Excuse me?’
He finished what he was doing and turned round, completely unruffled. ‘Yep?’
Juliet thrust the collection of tackle she had in her hands at him. ‘What’s all this for? The gondola trip back can’t be any more dangerous than the trip up, can it?’
‘It isn’t,’ Davidson replied, smiling, and Juliet began to relax a little. ‘This is for the zip lining.’
Juliet almost dropped her tackle. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Zip-line-ing,’ Davidson said slowly, as if she didn’t understand English.
Juliet’s jaw moved up and down a few times before any words spilled out. ‘But I’m not booked for zip lining. I’m booked for the gondola ride and that’s it. The lady at the hotel said so.’
Davidson just shrugged. ‘Looks like you’re booked up for zip lining now.’
Juliet tried to press the tangle of straps and clips into his hands. ‘No, really. I’ll just go back down on one of the other ones.’
Davidson laughed gently. ‘We were in the last one.’ He nodded to where the gondola had come to rest only minutes before. The stand was empty.
‘When’s...when’s...?’ Her voice was all scratchy and high. She tried again. ‘When’s it coming back?’
The guide sighed and looked at her sympathetically. ‘It’s not. There’s only one way down this mountain now.’
Her stomach rolled and she clutched the harness to her midriff. She glanced nervously at the rest of the group who were already halfway into their gear.
‘It’s perfectly safe,’ Davidson assured her.
Juliet nodded blankly, but all she could think about was the waiver she’d signed before getting in the gondola, the one that said she understood that if death or injury were to occur she accepted responsibility for her actions. She’d thought at the time it was a little OTT for what was basically a mini version of a cable car, but everyone knew what health and safety regulations could be like...
She swallowed. ‘There’s really no other way?’
Davidson’s mouth pulled down at the corners and he shook his head. ‘Sorry, but we’re going to do a short training run before we start the main thing. You’ll see. It’ll be cool.’
The next few minutes were a haze as Davidson strapped her into her harness. It was made of two pieces—one that went over her shoulders and a bit that wrapped round her bottom and thighs—and they were held together with a couple of massive clips. When she tried to walk, she looked like a cowboy, but she didn’t care. She was strapped up tight, held together, and somehow that made her feel slightly less afraid.
And then her hard hat was on and she was walking to the platform that led to a low, short wire over a shallow incline. Juliet concentrated hard on everything Davidson had to say, but she felt as if her memory was a great dark sponge, soaking e
verything up and refusing to let anything out again.
Marco was in his element, volunteering to go first and whooping as he sped down the line. Juliet couldn’t even watch. He waved and grinned at her when he got to the other platform, but she kept shaking her head every time the line was free again, until it was just her and the girl left.
She gathered she must be American, because her father, who had been one of the first to go, was now yelling things like ‘You can do it, honey!’ and ‘Just suck it up!’ from the other platform. But it was obvious the girl was frozen with terror. Much like her, really. However, Juliet forgot that for a moment. She wanted to zip down that line and go and make that oaf suck it up. Didn’t he realise how scared the poor kid was?
She put on her best brave face—just as well she was an expert at it—and turned to the girl. ‘Listen,’ she said, ‘I’ll admit that I’m just as scared as you are about doing this, and I’m older, heavier and creakier, but I reckon if I can do it you can too.’
The girl’s eyes just widened and she gripped the rail tighter.
‘I’m Juliet. What’s your name?’
‘Amy,’ the girl said shakily.
‘Well, Amy, I have a daughter a bit older than you, and she did something like this a couple of years ago. She told me she was terrified at first, but really loved it after the first line, and it’s all very safe. Look at how many clips and safety wires there are!’
‘Too right!’ Davidson said from beside them.
A brainwave hit Juliet. ‘Listen, why don’t I go first—and if I don’t scream, you’ll know it’s not so bad, and that you’ll be fine too. Okay?’
After a moment’s hesitation, Amy nodded, and Juliet’s stomach dived. Look what she’d just talked herself into!
As Davidson led her forward and clipped her onto the double wires, adding in a safety line for good measure, she fought the urge to whimper. Oh, God, please don’t let me end up as a tangle of flesh and bones halfway down a mountain somewhere. Her kids needed her. This couldn’t be it. She visualised them all, lounging round at home, fighting over the last of the candy canes on the Christmas tree and her heart rate calmed a little. But her knees wobbled as she stood on the edge of the platform and her jaw muscle went into spasm.
Davidson, who’d been nothing but a typical laid-back St Lucian up until then, looked her straight in the eye and spoke firmly to her. ‘You’re going, Juliet.’
It wasn’t a question.
She tried to dig the toes of her trainers into the rough wood of the platform, but he gave her a gentle shove, and suddenly the only thing that was stopping her plummeting twenty feet into a lush carpet of greenery was a couple of thin wires and some fabric straps. She clamped down on her jaw, glad she couldn’t even find the breath to scream as she hurtled down the wire, the words death or injury rushing through her brain.
* * *
VIOLET WAS OUT AT her party, dropped off safely with her mobile phone in her handbag and a lift home arranged with one of the other girls’ mums, and Polly and the boys were in bed. All Gemma had to do now was wait, and she filled the time by finishing off wrapping some of the small bits for the kids’ stockings. The only problem was that Juliet had run out of sticky tape.
She rummaged through the kitchen drawers, and when she came up empty she resorted to raiding the kids’ craft box. No tape. But she did find a Pritt Stick, and went to work welding the presents closed with it as best she could.
When that was done, and stockings filled and ready, she retreated to the living room with a glass of wine, turned off all the lights bar the ones from the Christmas tree and switched on just in time to catch The Holiday on the TV, and while Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz swapped lives and fell in love, Gemma leafed through Juliet’s Christmas notebook.
She sighed, picked up a pen and added a light row of ticks next to Josh’s thick black ones. It felt odd writing in Juliet’s book, as if she was trespassing somehow. After she’d done that, she flicked through a couple of pages, and then a couple more. It was slightly addictive. Maybe because, between the lines, squashed in with the calendar items in a packed schedule, underneath the tick boxes and threaded the whole way through, was a fascinating insight into her sister.
Boy, did Juliet know how to pay attention to details. She noted down tiny little things other people probably wouldn’t bother with, like adjustments in cooking times to make a dish perfect, or her guests’ culinary preferences so she was sure not to serve them up something they didn’t like. But there were other things too, more worrying things, like pages of designs for table settings, some scribbled out crossly, and each drawing was just a tiny tweak different from the last. And the fact that every minute of every day was tightly scheduled with no time for fun or relaxing or anything nice.
And Juliet did this year after year, if the row of neat notebooks on the bookshelf in the study were to be believed. The more Gemma dug into the notebook, the more one word rang round her head. Why? She just didn’t understand what drove her sister, in this, and in life in general, but this time of year seemed to be the focal point of all her energy, the time when all her sister’s little neuroses reached fever pitch.
Gemma remembered Christmas at home when she was a child as being wonderful—happy and relaxed. Juliet had recreated many of their mother’s recipes and traditions, so why didn’t her version of Christmas feel the same? Why was there a faint air of panic drifting up from the pages of this book, instead of warmth and comfort and love? It just didn’t make sense.
She closed the book and stared straight ahead, forgetting all about the film playing on the TV.
Juliet didn’t just want Christmas to be perfect; she needed it to be perfect.
The only problem was that Gemma had no idea why.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘SEE? THAT WAS NOT so bad,’ Marco said, his arm coming around her shoulder.
Juliet shrugged it off and spun around to face him. ‘Are you freaking kidding me? It was the worst ten seconds of my life!’
She hadn’t even opened her eyes. The sense of hurtling through the air, twisting slightly in her harness, hearing the ground rush somewhere beneath her feet... And people did this for fun? Her legs were shaking so badly she could hardly climb down the steps from the platform to the forest floor. ‘How many more lines did they say there were?’ she asked Marco weakly.
He heaved out a sigh. ‘Sixteen.’
Sixteen. The number echoed through her head as they made the short trek through the rain forest on a well-trodden route to the platform for the first proper zip line. Juliet couldn’t help but notice that the ground dipped away more steeply here. Somewhere in front of them she could hear the screams of another party as they navigated the course, mingling with the calls of the birds and insects.
Juliet and Marco were the last to go. The other six in their party had followed the first guide across the short wire. Not many had whooped as Davidson had, concentrating instead on using a gloved hand to slow their progress on the approach to the next station. Marco offered to go last so Juliet wouldn’t have to be the only one left with the other guide, but she clutched onto the rails at the back of the treetop platform and shook her head.
‘I can’t do it,’ she said through clenched teeth.
Marco laid a hand on her arm. ‘You can. You’ve seen all the others do it and not one of them was hurt.’
There was that. Even Amy had done it, holding tightly onto her harness, but with a tentative smile on her face. But somehow it didn’t calm the rolling feeling in Juliet’s stomach.
‘What is it that you fear?’ Marco asked, smiling softly at her.
She squeezed her eyes shut. She’d always hated the feeling of being totally at the mercy of something beyond her control, even if it was the usually helpful force of gravity. ‘It’s the thought of stepping off the edge into no
thing and, that once I’ve started there’s no going back, nothing I can do to stop it.’ She gripped the rail even harder.
Marco gently peeled her fingers from the wood and walked to the front edge of the platform, stopping a shoe length before the edge, then he leaned in and whispered in her ear. ‘You don’t have to do anything, Juliet. You just have to let go.’
As his words snaked their way into her brain she went very still.
Let go.
That was what she needed to do, wasn’t it? Of the idea of her old life—because it wasn’t coming back. Of hurts so old she hardly remembered the wounding, even though the scars pulled every day. Most of all, she wanted to let go of the person she’d become, the woman that was so neurotic, her kids begged her to run away for Christmas. She didn’t like that woman at all.
But she didn’t know how. She’d already banged her head against those emotional walls and come away with nothing more than a headache.
She looked across at the next platform. It was maybe a hundred feet away and fifty feet up the tree. She might not know how to do those things, but she knew how to do this, had already done it once, although she hadn’t exactly ‘let go’ that time. Every muscle in her body had been clenched.
Slowly, she shuffled right to the edge of the platform, careful not to look down. On the other platform, Davidson grinned and waved, beckoning her forward. Juliet wasn’t ready to let go of the railing either side of the gap she now stood in, but she smiled weakly back, even though at that distance he would hardly be able to see it.
Don’t do...
She drew in a shaky breath, sat back in the harness the way Davidson had shown her, feeling the weight of her body pressed against the straps circling her thighs and bottom.
She couldn’t do this bit by bit, she realised. Letting go was a black or white situation. All or nothing. Either she was full of tension, stopping her forward momentum, or she was giving in to it.
It seemed that she hung there for an age, suspended between fear and courage. In her head she kept telling herself she just had to lift her foot, remove that last piece of resistance, but somehow the message never travelled down her leg.